Raizen didn't speak for a long time after the masked figure vanished. The space around him began to stabilize again, the rift sealing as if nothing had happened.
But he could still feel it.
That pressure hadn't truly gone.
Something was still watching.
He lowered his hand. "Kael."
The First General stepped forward silently. "We were detected."
"I know. And the one that came… wasn't the last."
Kael didn't question. "Should I deploy scouts?"
"No," Raizen said. "If we search for them, they'll take that as an invitation."
He looked up into the endless void. His tone dropped lower.
"They're not like the sects. They don't want war. They want erasure. Quiet, clean, unnoticed."
The other generals gathered without being called.
Raizen glanced at Nyra. "Is our realm stable?"
"Mentally and structurally," she replied. "But I sense cracks forming in the dimensional shell. Something is probing for entry."
"Strengthen it. Reweave the layers. Add your illusions to every border. Let them see a dead world if they look."
"As you will," she said, fading into mist.
He turned to Varn. "I want six shadows released. No more than one per region. Watch only. No engagement."
Varn bowed once and disappeared.
And finally, he turned to Draxis.
"Start spreading false trails," Raizen ordered. "Send echoes of our energy toward abandoned ruins, broken tombs, fake inheritance sites. Let them chase ghosts while we move."
The brute nodded, dragging his massive hammer through a rift.
Raizen exhaled quietly.
This was what it meant to build something the world wasn't ready for.
No announcements.
No banners.
Only whispers… and then destruction.
He stood alone again, the black mist of the void swirling gently around his feet. The silence wasn't empty. It was heavy—alive with tension. And within it, Raizen began to think.
"This world will never accept me. Not as I am."
But that didn't bother him.
Acceptance was never part of the goal.
He sat down and crossed his legs, forming a cultivation seal with one hand. The space around him twisted, pulling in chaotic energy, spiritual residue, even forgotten emotions left behind by the dead.
He let it all pour into his core.
But even as the energy flowed, his mind wandered—not just to his power or the enemies ahead, but to the concept itself.
Void.
Not emptiness.
But absence with potential.
The absence of restriction.
The absence of law.
The absence of limits.
He opened his eyes slowly, and the black glow behind them
was sharper, heavier, deeper than before.
"Let them come," he whispered again.