Sovereign of the Ashes

The forbidden spell that Sein summoned was classified as pyro elemental magic within the magic spectrum.

However, because it incorporated a large amount of lumen and geo elemental magic principles, it could also be considered a mixed-type forbidden spell.

At first glance, it looked like nothing more than a beautiful meteor shower.

When the meteors fell from the sky, piercing through Boubor World’s planar barrier and shrieking as they tore through the air, many of the world’s lesser creatures sensed the scent of death hidden within the dazzling spectacle above.

This was officially the first time Sein had successfully summoned and unleashed an area-of-effect forbidden spell.

In terms of destructive power against a single target, it was definitely not as strong as the Penetrating Eye magic he had released earlier.

But in terms of coverage, it was an entirely different story. The target Sein was aiming at now was the vast plain where millions of allied native forces were gathered.

Countless meteors punched through the planar barrier. Although their size had shrunk considerably from friction and energy erosion, the tremendous kinetic force they carried remained largely intact.

The ear-splitting sound of the meteors breaking through the planar barrier almost sounded like the tortured groan of Boubor World itself.

As a microplane, Boubor World’s planar will was neither strong nor complete, and the sheer impact of the forbidden spell would leave it severely weakened for the foreseeable future.

The faint, powerless murmur of Boubor World’s planar will also reflected the helplessness of the native creatures as they faced the forbidden spell’s overwhelming force.

Boubor World and its sovereign plane, Bouldrak World, were both conservative geo elemental worlds.

Before the half-beastman legions arrived, the native creatures of this world had rarely made any contact with the outside world.

Having never encountered warfare on this scale before, many of Boubor World’s natives were utterly bewildered in the face of the forbidden spell.

The crushing elemental pressure brought by the falling meteors spelled certain death for them.

Facing such a devastating assault—one far beyond what ordinary living beings could resist—most had no choice but to cower and wait for death.

If this had been a stronger medium, large, or even top-tier civilization, the forbidden spell of a Magus World mage, while still devastating, would never have created such an overwhelming and exaggerated level of destruction.

After all, every major civilization had its own hidden trump cards and strengths.

Nowadays, the Gallant Federation had specially designed protection force fields, underground metal tunnels, and various other fortifications to defend against Magus Civilization’s long-range, wide-area magical strikes.

If Sein were facing the Gallant Federation’s millions-strong robotic army, his forbidden spell-level magic would still inflict serious casualties, but it definitely would not have been as devastating as it was against the native creatures of Boubor World.

This was just a microplane, after all.

The air currents from the meteor shower swept across the battlefield, instantly blowing away the peripheral forces of Boubor World’s native alliance.

Even the toughest geo elemental creatures were far too fragile in the face of a forbidden spell—an assault more terrifying than any natural disaster.

According to Sein’s pre-battle assessment of his spell’s destructive power, he estimated that any creature below Rank One caught in the outer edges of the forbidden spell’s impact zone would be completely obliterated.

At the heart of the strike zone, the destructive force was enough to annihilate creatures up to Rank Two.

On any plane, the majority of native forces were made up of creatures below Rank One. After all, beings capable of reaching Rank One or higher were rare.

In interplanar wars, the Magus Civilization’s recruitment standards for native knights and mages required them to be at least Rank One.

Yet even with all the Magus Civilization’s might, every interplanar campaign still needed millions, sometimes tens of millions, of enslaved creatures as cannon fodder.

Naturally, the composition of these cannon fodder armies was dominated by creatures below Rank One.

Although a demigod-level knight was incredibly powerful, there was a limit to how many enemies they could cut down in a single battle.

Even if they completely exhausted their battle qi, it would already be impressive if they managed to slay a few thousand or perhaps tens of thousands.

By contrast, Sein’s forbidden spell could cover and strike down hundreds of thousands in a single move.

This was the fundamental difference between mages and knights.

If a demigod-level mage could cast forbidden spells freely on the battlefield, even the killing speed of a Rank Four knight could not hope to match them.

Of course, once knights reached extremely high levels of power, they too could harness the power of laws and create devastating area-of-effect techniques.

Some knights, through unique methods of energy manipulation, might even reach a level where their battlefield destruction could rival or occasionally surpass that of mages.

But those were rare, exceptional cases.

The moment Sein managed to unleash a forbidden spell on Boubor World’s battlefield, strong figures on the other two battlefronts could not help but turn their attention toward him as well.

The threat posed by a forbidden spell was no less than that of a Rank Four creature.

The appearance of a forbidden spell on Boubor World was like a weathervane, signaling what the next stage of the war in this microplane might look like.

The cost of casting the forbidden spell that Sein had named “Everfire Hellscape” had depleted ninety percent of his mana reserves.

Almost all of his mana had been exhausted in a single shot—this was the price of using a spell of such caliber.

Not only that, the elemental energy stored in his magic rod had been seriously depleted as well. The two divine relics embedded within it had lost about half their power.

It would take several months of recovery for them to fully replenish.

“No wonder there’s a saying that demigod-level mages who frequently use forbidden spells risk damaging their life essence and shortening their lifespan. I can now say with certainty that it’s true,” Sein told Leena.

His face had turned slightly pale, and he had to lean on Yuri for support.

Despite having a physique far stronger than that of an average demigod-level mage, the casting left Sein feeling an unprecedented weakness.

One could easily imagine how ordinary demigod-level mages would fare after casting a forbidden spell.

Sein’s Everfire Hellscape had been far more destructive than a typical forbidden spell at his rank, thanks to the amplification from the two divine relics embedded in his magic rod.

When Sein finished chanting, even though the dense meteor shower overhead was finally dying out, the devastation below showed no signs of lessening.

Red-orange flames of horrifying intensity melted Boubor World’s geo elemental creatures into blackened, shattered chunks of stone.

The terrifying destructive force of the forbidden spell left many half-beastman warriors on the front lines shivering uncontrollably.

”There’s probably still room for improvement in this forbidden spell... If I can evolve this elemental fire into Ashen Flame...” Sein mused to himself, stroking his chin thoughtfully.