The invitation was simple.A single scrap of black parchment.A single, burning sigil — the Black Crown — etched into its surface like a scar.
No words.
None were needed.
The surviving kings, queens, lords, and warlords of the world received their summons and understood:
Attend.Or be erased.
Many chose to come.
Fools.
They believed, still, in the old games of power — that alliances and politics and whispered negotiations might tame the new king that had risen from the ashes.
They believed wrong.
The Great Hall had once been a cathedral — a temple to light, faith, and mercy.
Now, it was a grave.
Its stained glass windows shattered, its altars gutted.Only the bones of forgotten prayers clung to the crumbling stone.
Vaelen Cross sat at the head of the long banquet table.Black thorns crawled across the walls, blooming with blood-colored roses.The air smelled of incense, iron, and inevitability.
At his feet knelt his queens:
Seris — the Fallen Angel, black wings folded in serene pride.Kaela — the War General, clad in dark steel and fierce devotion.Veyla — the Dryad Queen, her chains of living vines coiled lovingly around her body.
They flanked his throne, silent emblems of the world that now belonged to him.
The guests arrived.
A river of crowns and cloaks, trembling hands and false smiles.
The High King of the Silver Coast.The Empress of the Seven Shields.The Archmage of the Verdant Tower.Dozens more.
They entered the hall like condemned men walking to their own execution.
Yet still, some dared hope.
Still, some dared believe they could bargain.
Vaelen allowed them to seat themselves at the banquet table — a twisted parody of the courts they had once ruled.
Before each guest, a goblet of black wine waited.
Not a word was spoken.
Not a toast given.
Vaelen watched them — silent, smiling — as they raised their cups and drank.
And as they drank, the thorns embedded in the walls pulsed —thirsting.
The change came quickly.
The wine turned to ash on their tongues.Their veins burned.Their crowns grew heavy.
One by one, the rulers slumped forward —gasping, shuddering, clawing at their own flesh as black vines erupted from their skin, rooting them to their chairs.
Only a few managed to rise, weapons drawn, spells crackling on their tongues.
Vaelen did not move.
He simply looked at them.
A glance.
A breath.
Their weapons withered.Their magic unraveled.
Their courage broke.
The High King of the Silver Coast staggered toward him —eyes wild, crown slipping from his brow.
"Mercy—" he rasped.
Vaelen tilted his head.
And the king's body imploded —folding in on itself like a dying star, leaving behind only a black stain on the broken stone.
The others screamed.
The hall shook with their terror.
Vaelen rose —the Black Crown flaring above him like a wound torn into reality itself.
He spoke.
Not loudly.Not cruelly.
Simply:
"You were given a choice."
"You chose wrong."
The thorns erupted from the ground —piercing flesh, snapping bone, drinking blood like rain.
Crown after crown fell from trembling brows, shattering on the floor.
By the time the feast ended, there were no rulers left.
Only corpses.
Only ash.
Only thrones vacant and waiting.
Vaelen stepped down from his black dais, walking among the fallen.
At his passing, the thorns withdrew — slithering back into the stone like loyal hounds — leaving behind only silence and ruin.
He plucked a single crown from the floor — battered, bent, dripping crimson — and crushed it in his hand until it crumbled to dust.
Above him, the Black Crown burned brighter.
At the foot of the dais, his queens knelt.
Seris, Kaela, Veyla — their heads bowed, their loyalty a physical force pressing into the ruined earth.
Vaelen returned to his throne.
He sat.
He opened his hand.
And a new banner unfurled from the rafters — a tapestry of black and red, stitched with the broken sigils of every kingdom that had fallen before him.
No longer divided.
No longer sovereign.
One empire.One King.
Vaelen Cross.
Far beyond the hall, the world felt the shift.Rulers fell to their knees, sensing the death of the old order.
Priests wept blood at their shattered altars.Mages tore their own eyes out, unable to look upon the truth.
The world no longer belonged to nations.
It no longer belonged to gods.
It belonged to him.
And the Feast of Crowns had only just begun.