Rebirth: Necromancer's Ascenscion
Chapter 187: A Mountain That Bleeds

Renner's POV*

The Crucible wasn't just a place where men fought.

It was where they were destroyed or made worthy to live.

Where titles bled from tongues and screams were chewed to nothing by stone. Where masks fell. Where the soul screamed so loudly it burned itself hollow.

And on that day—beneath the black sun banners and the cheers of a thousand fools—Ian walked through the bloodgate with nothing on his face but indifference.

Not rage.

Not pride.

Just… stillness.

I remember the way the sand crunched beneath his boots. I remember the hush that fell—not complete silence, but the sharp holding of breath that passed over the crowd like a fever. They knew.

He was fighting today.

The Demon Blade.

The Whisperer of Death.

The one whose bones had snapped and reset in real time. Who rose from disembowelment. Who carved champions like meat and walked away bloodstained and unbothered.

And across from him—Veyne, the Third Fang of House Vallis.

A monster in his own right. Taller than Ian by half a head. His body wrapped in glimmersteel and bone plates carved from a Hazard-ranked serpent. He bore a hammer bigger than most men and wore pride like a second skin.

He screamed.

Ian didn't.

The fight wasn't fair.

It wasn't even close.

Veyne charged first. A roar that split air, a hammer that cracked the ground. He moved like a titan, all thunder and fire, each blow enough to shatter ribs and rattle the teeth from your jaw.

Ian didn't parry.

He moved.

Not dodging—flowing.

He bent around the hammer like water folding around stone. Slid in, a whisper against metal, and then—strike. A dagger through the ribs. A flick against the thigh. Blood welled. Veyne didn't even realize he was dying.

Not until his knee buckled.

Not until Ian whispered something—I couldn't hear it, but Veyne did—and then drove the second dagger up through his jaw, pinning the scream in his mouth like an insect on a hook.

The body collapsed seconds later.

Ian stepped back.

Breathing steady.

Eyes flat.

Just like that… it was over.

I stood among the masses. Sectioned off with the other up-and-comers, the ones clawing for recognition. None of us cheered. Not like the nobles did. Not like the drunk lords betting coin on blood.

We stared.

And in me—something broke.

Or maybe woke.

I felt it in my throat first. Like bile. But it wasn't sickness. It was... envy.

The kind that festers.

That consumes.

That claws at your spine like you're trapped in a cage staring at the only man who ever escaped.

He was everything I wanted to be.

No—he was the thing I had to kill to become what I wanted to be.

A gate.

A threshold to something higher. Something holier. Or something worthy.

I remember whispering, without even realizing it—

"One day… I'll walk out of that sand with your blood on my hands."

What came after barely mattered.

Another arena match. Another noble house applauding. Another night of drink and pointless praise. But in the back of my skull, Ian's movement repeated like a curse. The way he slipped through the air. The way he didn't react—he simply knew.

He was a beast. A storm with flesh. A myth still walking.

And he didn't even look back.

---

I trained harder after that.

No more sleep.

No more women.

No more fame-chasing or speech-giving.

I bled in the sand until my fists couldn't close. I learned to listen to my bones when they cracked. I hunted men through the city slums just to learn how to read their fear. I fought on broken legs. I starved myself until I could taste blood in my teeth from the hunger.

And still.

Still.

I knew I couldn't reach him.

Not like I was.

Not with what I had.

So, I took what the Demons gave me.

---

The gods' chosen arrived not long after.

It was raining that night, I remember. Not the soft kind. The kind that hit like nails, washing the streets clean like the city itself was trying to shed the blood crusted into its walls.

We didn't know his name then.

Just their presence.

Wings that split the sky.

Light that screamed down from above.

They came to judge.

And when they arrived—Ian met them head on.

The temple district caught fire first.

I remember the glow. A halo above the rooftops, green and white and searing.

People were running toward the light. To watch. To witness.

I did, too.

When I reached the edge of Esgard outer parts, half the ground was already molten.

Three of them stood above it—robed in divine fury, faces hidden behind godly expressions like weeping saints. Each radiated power. Not magic. Not mana. Something older. Heavier. A divine truth made manifest.

They called Ian heretic.

They said the Void walked with him.

Said he'd stolen power meant for the gods.

---

The first clash broke the world.

No, that's not exaggeration.

The cobbles beneath them shattered. The air went dead—so still it hurt to breathe. The god's chosen struck. Spears of sanctified light. Chains of fire. Wards that cracked reality.

Ian didn't block them.

He let them hit.

And when they did—when his coat burst into flame and his bones cracked—you could see the blood igniting.

Red.

Then black.

Then something that shimmered like stars behind your eyelids.

His eyes went empty.

And then he moved.

Faster than I could track. Like he wasn't even bound to a body anymore. Like the space around him was just a suggestion.

They fought until the sky rained blood.

---

Afterward, the silence didn't feel like awe.

It felt like fear.

Like every man and woman watching knew something had been shattered that night—and it wasn't just our ignorance or false understanding of what power truly meant.

I stood there, breathing smoke, surrounded by the wreckage of evil and divinity.

And for the first time in my life, I felt something close to small.

Not weak.

Just… insignificant.

---

Later, I stood in the alley behind the crucible barracks. My fists clenched. My knuckles raw. I couldn't get his eyes out of my mind—gray, dead, and calm. Like nothing could touch him. Like nothing mattered.

I remember gripping the rusted railing and asking myself—

"Is this what I'm chasing?"

"Is this power?"

Could I even reach that?

Would I survive it?

Would anyone?

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