Extraordinary Pedigree.

Chapter 1028 72-Hour Cleanup Operation IV: Flame Judgment!

The flames fell.

The entire market seemed to be being scorched and stripped of a layer of sky. High above the clouds, a streak of blazing white light, like a falling meteor, pierced through the sky above the city.

That was the signal of the first wave of Balrogs descending.

Then, the flames surged into the birdcage. The flames were no longer flames, but a force with a will, clinging to the bird's lines like a living thing, devouring, twisting, and eroding them inch by inch.

The Emperor was slightly taken aback.

The next second, flames descended from the sky like a tide, and burning figures fell vertically into the market area, burning, multiplying, and burning again.

They are the Flame Demons.

Initially, there were only a few small flames, but after landing, they expanded like wildfires taking in oxygen, instantly growing into a humanoid flame more than two meters tall. Its body was burning with an inextinguishable flame, and deep within its core, one could vaguely see a pulsating fire core—as if it were some kind of source of wisdom.

They have no eyes, but they seem to be able to see every inch of a living body. The burning desire drives their limbs to rush, tear, and burn at high speed.

A building exploded inside a birdcage.

Reinforced concrete is like paper in their flames, instantly heated to a reddish-brown color and then melted.

The wires in the birdcage kept breaking, charring, and melting.

"This...this is impossible..." The Emperor's voice trembled; for the first time, he had lost control.

"My domain...my rules...why—"

The Thread Emperor roared madly, waving his hands in an attempt to reunite the threads, but every thread he touched was burned and destroyed. The flames seemed to bite at the source of his power, dragging him down from the pinnacle of rules.

He was facing an ever-burning fire, no ordinary flame. Even the buildings that had once been covered and assimilated by the sea of ​​lines were now burning.

No, it is burning forever.

No matter how humid the air, how thick the flame-retardant coating, or even how extraordinary the control and ability to block it, nothing can stop the spread of the flames.

That was the blazing flame of an inextinguishable candle; once lit, it could never be extinguished.

At this point, there was more than one Flame Demon.

Each time a fire demon reaches its maximum burning point, it splits into new individual fire demons, much like cell division. The new fire demons inherit a portion of the original's fire intelligence, grow rapidly, and replicate themselves again.

The Burning Legion is expanding exponentially within the market.

The Line Emperor stared wide-eyed at the burning monsters that were killing each other yet continuing to reproduce.

"What...what kind of monsters are these?"

The birdcage completely collapsed.

The sky was a blood-red hue, and ashes fell like snow.

The Line Emperor stood in the center of the birdcage's remains, the white silk threads he had once used as symbols of divinity now burning away inch by inch like terminally ill organs. His body twisted and convulsed, stripped of his status as the ruler of rules by some deeper force.

His gaze began to wander, and the ocean beneath his feet no longer churned, but instead turned black and cracked.

The fire is spreading.

A figure slowly emerged from the flames.

Those were high-ranking Balrogs from the Burning Legion.

Unlike the previous violent and chaotic low-level flames, its flames were a ghostly red, with patterns flowing like molten gold on its surface. Behind it burned a flaming spine like wings, and when it stepped down, the ground collapsed into a carbonized pit.

The Thread Emperor suddenly waved his hand, attempting to twist the threads on the ground into spikes, and thrust them at it from all directions.

It's useless!!!

The white line trembled violently, turned black, and broke when it came within five meters of it.

The inextinguishable candle's characteristic—a perpetually burning flame—is impervious to any attempts to cut, freeze, or suppress it; as long as the fuel remains, it cannot be extinguished.

The Thread King hurriedly switched techniques, trying to control the thread blades with high-frequency vibrations to cut through the air and create slashes, but found that the air itself was scorching and expanding, and the threads could only twist and curl up in the high temperature, disintegrating inch by inch.

This is restraint in adhering to the rules.

White lines require precise control, a complete form, and rely on tactile connection.

Flame, on the other hand, is a destructive force that completely disregards rules.

It cannot be entangled, nor is it afraid of breaking, nor does it depend on any form; rather, it is a pure instinct that devours everything.

At this moment, dozens of Balrogs from the Burning Legion approached from all sides, each one like a horde of fire beasts, writhing, roaring, burning, and scorching.

A fire demon burst forth from the building, leaping towards the Thread Emperor; he used the remaining threads to control dozens of fused wire shields to envelop himself, attempting to withstand the impact—

boom! !

The flames instantly ignited the silk shield. Instead of being blocked, the flames spread along the silk threads to his arm, causing nerve burns.

He screamed and hurriedly severed his arm to escape, but the burning arm continued to writhe and burn on the ground before crumbling into ashes.

The Emperor staggered backward, and for the first time, despair appeared in his eyes.

"Monster, monster... These things belong to Abraham..."

His feet trod on the remnants of the ocean of lines, but the once bright white surface of the lines had turned into charred asphalt, like a melted carpet.

The surrounding fire demons did not stop.

They multiplied, some began to split apart, and others drew strange spiral marks on the ground with flames, as if constructing some deeper realm of fire.

The heat on the Earth's surface is exceeding the limits that the Earth can withstand.

He tried to reawaken the power of the birdcage, summoning a vast rain of threads to envelop the battlefield, but no matter how many threads he released, they were either scorched or directly severed by the flames at their source before they could be formed.

"You monsters, don't come any closer!!!"

The Emperor roared hysterically.

However, his response was the slow approach of the high-level fire demon, which used its flames to burn lines of text:

"This is purification."

"The filth of rules must be burned away."

"You have been rejected."

The next moment, five Flame Demons broke through the building and, together with the main high-level individual, pounced on the Line Emperor.

He raised his hand, trying to recall the last of his silken weapons.

But he discovered that the whip he had woven himself had also been burned through by the flames.

He held it in his empty hand, the burning ash scattering like feathers. He finally realized just how terrifying the Lord of the Horizon was.

"...No...this shouldn't be the case..."

The Emperor stood frozen in place, muttering to himself.

He couldn't believe it.

This was a situation he had never envisioned.

He is the "Thread Emperor," the arbiter of the Far East City's underground, an awakened Devil Fruit user, who controls countless threads and can even cover the entire city!

But now, his thread has been lit.

His birdcage was burned to a crisp; his body was crumbling; his rules were utterly ineffective!
"I absolutely will not die here!!!"

He finally screamed, filled with uncontrollable fear and anger, and turned to run away.

He was surrounded by a sea of ​​fire, and the heat waves felt like blades lashing his body.

He strained to keep going, dragging his remaining body across the scorched earth. Using his abilities, he spat out white threads, which pulled him onto a building that hadn't yet collapsed, only to find that the walls were also on fire, the steel bars were deformed, and the foundation was cracked.

boom!
A ball of fire demon suddenly pounced from the flank, crashing into him with a wave of scorching flames. He swung his wielding wielding thread to sever it—but the next second, three more figures burst out of the fire, leaving trails of burning flames as they rushed toward him!

The Thread Emperor raised his hand and roared, conjuring thousands of threads that formed a white wall as a barrier.

Flames surged up, instantly burning through the white wall.

But the flames licked at his escape route like living things; with every step, tongues of fire danced wildly; with every leap, he jumped from one level of purgatory into another.

His lips began to crack, his eyes were scorched red by the heat, and his linear body began to spontaneously combust. He could not feel his fingers or his legs.

He went from being a ruler to a fleeing prisoner to be burned at the stake.

"Get away!! Get away from me, ahh ...

He went completely mad, swinging his arms to unleash the final barrage of thread guns, piercing rain of silk, and strangling wreaths!

Hundreds and thousands of sharp lines instantly formed a chaotic rain of light, pouring wildly in all directions.

But the fire demon, charging like a mountain, fearlessly faced the flames and threads head-on.

Flames devoured the lines, like raging waves swallowing a boat.

There was even a Fiery Demon whose size swelled to four meters, opening its fiery maw and swallowing his bundle of threads whole. — The world of the Thread King had become a world of fire.

Burning, exploding, roaring, suffocating heat... all intertwined to create a funeral-like symphony.

He saw his lines crumble and collapse.

I saw those fire demons sprouting new life forms in the flames.
He saw the high-ranking Balrog spread its molten gold wings in the air, looking down at him like a judgmental eye...

His last shred of composure was completely swallowed up by the sea of ​​fire.

"No!!!"

On that shattered land—on the scorched earth of the Rift Market,

The ground churned like lava, and the air was distorted into a glass-like shape by the flames. The once high and unruly Line Emperor, the so-called rule entity that controlled the city's veins and laid out the birdcage to imprison the heavens, was now gone.

Finally, at this moment, they were enveloped in the flames of judgment.

That was the Flame Legion from the Lord of the Horizon—His Majesty the Great Hugh Abraham, a spiritual flame that transcended mortal fire.
Those are burners that belong only to divine punishment.

Those things were composed entirely of scorching flames, like a twisted, raging will of fire. Crimson flames constantly flowed, burned, and devoured from their bodies, as if swallowing reality itself. Most terrifyingly, there were far more than one of them.

One, two, ten, dozens...

"You are the truly filthy creatures who should not exist in this world!?" The Line Emperor gritted his teeth and roared, his voice trembling.

No one answered him, only the sound of footsteps—thick, scorching footsteps—coming from all directions.

He wanted to escape.

My first instinct was to run away!
He still has a chance, as long as he escapes from here...

But the next second, a fire demon whose size suddenly increased leaped up, its flames condensing into a fist, and slammed hard into the street directly in front of him!

The high temperature directly melted half of the building, the fire burst out, and even the air collapsed in one corner!
The Thread Emperor was thrown backward by the impact, a dull pain shooting through his chest. He tried to prop himself up, attempting to use the white threads to create a defensive barrier, but…

Failed.

The moment his thread was extended, before it could even take shape, it was instantly vaporized by the scorching flames, like scraps of paper cut by high temperatures, burning up in the air in an instant.

He stared wide-eyed at the white thread in his hand that had turned to ash, unable to comprehend it.

His power of rules... was completely countered.

"I am an Awakened One! I am—the Rule! Body!!"

"I won't die here, I won't die like this..."

He roared and staggered, his hands transforming into thread-like wings as he tried to fly away, but a gigantic fire demon leaped down from the sky and slammed a fiery fist into the ground, causing waves of fire to surge up, white threads to burst, and flesh to tear apart.

The Line Emperor let out a shrill roar, and white lines burst out of his body. He no longer maintained his human form, and his entire being completely transformed into a strange bird form made of white lines, twisting, writhing, and roaring, trying to break out of the flames.

"I will not lose! I am the master of the lines, the awakener of the rules, I am the true king of this city!!"

He roared and lunged at the Flame Demon, the white lines transforming into sharp blades that pierced through it.

Unfortunately, it was all for naught.

"Ahhhhhhhhhhh-!!!"

He screamed and retreated, patting the flames burning on his body, but the flames wouldn't go out no matter how hard he tried to pull, cut, or move the threads.

The Line Emperor fell into the ashes, his mind remaining intact.

At that moment, words of world-destroying incantation echoed from high above. A member of the scribe group who had accompanied the battle slowly opened a document press engraved with lead-printed runes and recited aloud:
"That night, the fire of God descended from the depths of space."

“The wicked lay lines all over the earth, wanting to create a prison for humankind.”

"But God’s anger was like a torch, and He called upon the One who would burn the world to destroy what He had created."

"The sinner (the Line Emperor) fled into the flames, howling like a wild beast."

"Heavenly fire engulfed its shadow, its bones turned to charcoal, and its soul to ash."

“And the sons of the flatlands are all witnesses.”

This text was slowly inscribed into the second section of the Universal Manuscript: The Judgment of Flames.

The instant the document was inscribed, a fire demon burning with golden flames opened its arms and embraced the remains of the Line Emperor into the core of the flames. Then, under the watchful eyes of everyone, it completely incinerated its form.

That was a being that instilled fear in countless people; that was a sinner who attempted to challenge the order of the horizon.

At this moment, it transforms into the flames that burn out the soul, etched into an indelible part of history.

"Heavenly punishment has descended."

The company commander of the terrorist mobile unit murmured, while the other soldiers took off their helmets, knelt on one knee, and bowed their heads in respect to the will of the supreme monarch.

Ashes rose, while the embers of the flames continued to burn quietly.

When the last flame was completely extinguished, the entire Rift Market seemed to have been burned away, even the air itself. The once chaotic and bustling underground stronghold was now nothing but scorched earth and ashes.

Just then, a notification came from the Horizon lineage.

[Horizon Blackwall Protocol Notice!]

Objective: Clearance complete.

Enemy signal sources are permanently silenced.

Rift Market Cleanup Mission:

[Completion Rate]: 93%
[Priority Target]: Already killed
[Cleansing up remaining forces]: In progress (Estimated completion time: 7 hours)

[Anomalies Across the Entire Theater]: Low-level → Medium-level → Stable
……

……

Horizon Governor's Residence.

Operations command center.

Xia Xiu stood before the curved holographic screen, his brows furrowed. His figure merged with the battlefield projected on the screen, and virtual data scrolled continuously before his eyes.

City zoning status, thermal energy distribution of combat units, casualty records of the Terrorist Mobile Company, fission index of the Burning Legion, spirituality index disturbance, rule contamination value...

Every piece of data was changing rapidly. The progress of every battlefront was laid bare under his watchful eye.

Suddenly, a golden light flickered in the upper right corner of the screen, and a humanoid figure composed of virtual data streams slowly emerged.

Demon King Amund looked at the scorched battlefield in the curtain and clicked his tongue in amazement, saying, "The mechanism of your spiritual army is really interesting. This unlucky guy really had the worst luck to run into you."

After a moment of reflection, Amond asked Xia Xiu:

"What are your thoughts on the newly formed wolfpack unit based on this operation?"

Xia Xiu did not answer immediately. He stared at a certain point in the image: it was where the Wolf Pack had finally gathered to resist the shrinking Birdcage; the blazing flames had not yet dissipated, and several soldiers were still maintaining their tactical positions.

After a moment of silence, he spoke:

"The drawbacks are obvious."

"Their Holy Forging Spells are still too incomplete, averaging only five spells. Against a Level 5 Rule Body, they cannot withstand a direct confrontation for more than ten minutes."

"At the tactical level, relying too much on physical strength and the will to charge, and lacking sufficient intelligent coordination, makes it very easy to suffer local annihilation."

Armand did not respond, but simply recorded the events.

Xia Xiu turned around and looked at him, his tone softening slightly:

"...but they did not retreat."

"Not a single person deserted in the face of battle."

"Even with the birdcage pressing down on them and the company collapsing, they kept pushing the line. They knew they couldn't stop the line king, but they still stubbornly pushed forward."

Xia Xiu remained silent for a moment, his eyes fixed on the center of the curtain, where the area swept by the Burning Legion was now charred black, with only the projection of the Sons of the Wolves remaining.

He spoke slowly, his voice low and firm:
"This is the wolf son I've been looking for."

“They are not perfect, even immature—but they have the essence to become a true warband.”

Before the curtain, Armand tilted his head slightly, and a faint, ambiguous smile flickered across his face, which was constructed from data.

That was not a cold calculation, but an affirmation by a rational being of "faith in blood and fire".

"Indeed, they possess the qualities that heaven needs—the courage to wield a sword against the strong."

"What the wolfpack forces need now is... time."

With a flick of his fingertips across the curtain, the scene shifted.

What followed was a second red war zone appearing on the map. The image had not yet fully loaded, but from the blurry view, it was clear that there was smoke and fire everywhere, the city outlines were broken and intertwined, data interference was severe, and some areas could not even be fully reconstructed into 3D models.

From a high altitude, an irregular structure is constantly writhing, like a physical entity, or like some suppressed being struggling and twisting.

"Next is the second battlefield. It seems that the infiltration of the wandering rule entities is more serious than I imagined..." Xia Xiu squinted at the map.