Boundless Evolution: The Summoning Beast
Chapter 74: Cult Leader Defeated

Chapter 74: Cult Leader Defeated

Across the field, standing with the scorched remains of her fallen cultists surrounding her, the cult leader did not move.

Her eyes swept to the wall that now had a hole from the two cultists that had just been blown into oblivion. Smoke still curled from the earth like ghostly fingers reaching for salvation. The aether residue in the air pulsed and hissed.

She stared at the spot for several long moments, and then-

She laughed.

Not loudly. Not in triumph. But bitterly, as if mocking the very ones who had sacrificed themselves.

"Fools," she hissed, voice cracked and venom-laced, "They were so desperate to be vessels to attack Eldoria due to what your kingdom did to them... and yet... they became nothing more than kindling."

But there was something behind her voice-something not quite as steady. A faint tremble, a sliver of realisation as if she now knew that this was going to be her last fight.

She looked up.

And for the first time, the weight of her position struck her.

Ash had walked near Bennet as the last echoes of the explosion faded, the dust swirling around him like the breath of a dying storm. His paws hit the broken ground hard, claws digging in, shoulders tense and heaving. And to Bennet’s other side, the serpent appeared.

Three stood against her now. Bennet, ash-coated but glowing with unwavering power. Ash, crouched and coiled like a predator, his eyes gleaming with sharp intent. The serpent, unblinking, radiant, ready. All of them fatigued but still brimming with battle intent.

She was alone.

And she knew it.

Yet her smile remained, stretched too wide—too forced. Her fingers curled tighter around her weapon.

"Outnumbered, is it?" she murmured, mostly to herself. There was a twitch at the corner of her mouth that betrayed the crack forming in her composure. "So this is how fate twists the blade for me once again... stacking the deck when it knows the end is near."

Something in her eyes flickered.

Ash’s instinct flared as he could almost immediately feel it. The Aether surged around her, but this time it wasn’t just magic—it was life force. She was burning through it, willingly, feeding it into the core of her being. Her veins lit up with a dull crimson glow, each beat of her heart siphoning time from her body and turning it into power.

She threw her head back and screamed—not in pain, but in furious defiance.

"IS THIS WHAT YOU WANTED, WORLD?!" she howled. "To watch me fall—again and again—no matter how hard I clawed, how much I bled?!"

Her body convulsed, glowing cracks spider-webbing down her arms as if her soul itself was fracturing. "You let them rise. You let them thrive. And me? You left me to drown in the blood of everyone I failed to save!"

Her voice tore through the sky, jagged and raw. "Fine! If I was never meant to win, then let me become the ruin you fear!"

"You took everything from me and still demand more! THEN TAKE IT! TAKE ALL OF ME!"

The air warped around her, drawn into the growing maelstrom of her collapsing form, as she fed everything she had left into the storm.

Fueled by fury, madness, and sacrifice, she launched herself at Bennet with a scream that scraped the sky.

Bennet surged forward to meet her. "Let’s see if your rage can match my resolve," he said coldly. Their blades collided with the sound of thunder cracking through glass.

For a moment, neither yielded. Sparks screamed as steel ground against steel, the very air shaking with the strain of their clash.

The aura of Sovereign Resonance glowed along Bennet’s form, but her strikes came erratic, unpredictable—raw power coursing through her muscles as if her body were unraveling with each movement.

Her first blow sent tremors through the earth. The second carved a line of molten stone in its wake.

He parried, rolled, countered with strikes that shimmered with harmony. But she didn’t stop. Every motion she made promised destruction.

Ash darted to flank her, claws bared, but the cult leader twisted at the last moment and slashed sideways, her blade barely missing his throat.

The serpent struck next—launching from the side, radiant and coiling through the air—but the cult leader spun, driving her blade into the ground and releasing a shockwave that sent the summon tumbling backward.

Her laugh returned—frantic, shivering.

"Do you think I will die quietly!?" she roared, "I will take you all down with me!

"I’m afraid we’ll still be standing when your ashes fall," Bennet growled—and struck again.

Ash darted to the left, eyes locked on the cult leader’s exposed side. He moved fast, shadow clinging to his form, ready to strike from the blind spot her frenzy left open.

Though her motions were wild, more instinct than intention—each swing of her blade an act of pure emotion rather than strategy, she wasn’t blind.

She turned mid-parry and thrust her free hand toward him. Raw aether burst outward in a jagged wave, slamming into Ash like a wall. He grunted, flipping back through the air, landing in a low crouch, smoke trailing from his shoulders.

"Too quick..." he muttered, shaking the sting from his limbs. But this was what he wanted.

He didn’t need words and in that instant, Ash sent a pulse of intent. The serpent, coiled nearby, turned its head and met his eyes. Pack Instinct flared.

The serpent darted forward again, weaving left, then right—feinting a strike. The cult leader reacted to the wrong motion.

That was enough.

The serpent lashed out, its body whipping around her leg and locking tight, just for a moment.

In that breath of stillness, Bennet surged forward. His blade screamed through the air and sliced across her shoulder, searing golden light into torn flesh.

The cult leader screamed—not in pain, but in shock—as golden-white light erupted from her chest where Bennet’s blade had struck. Her body arched backward, caught in the swirl of collapsing magic. A vortex of black and gold aether howled outward from her form, tendrils of unstable power lashing the air like serpents.

Her eyes shimmered with chaotic energy, but there was no focus, no discipline—only wrath.

Bennet was thrown back, the force of the detonation hurling him through the smoke. But the Sovereign Resonance cloaking his form held—cracks forming in its shell as he tumbled, protected, yet barely.

Ash saw it coming.

He spun, throwing his body between the vortex and the serpent. Aether surged through him, coating his form in shadow as he wrapped himself around the summon. The backlash struck, tearing the earth apart where they’d stood moments before.

The cult leader’s figure disintegrated at the heart of the storm, swallowed by her own defiance.

And as the light faded, silence returned—grave and resounding.

But there was no time left for her to recover.

Ash’s eyes gleamed. He sent one final pulse of intent through the bond.

The serpent didn’t hesitate. With a hiss of wind and energy, it launched itself forward, body twisting through the air like a ribbon caught in a storm.

Ash moved at the same moment.

He raced low along the broken ground, shadow trailing behind him. With a surge of dark energy, he slammed his paw into the cracked earth.

"Umbral Bind."

Black tendrils erupted in a circular burst beneath the cult leader, latching onto her legs with ruthless speed. She shrieked, trying to break free, but her footing was locked, her motion stalled.

The serpent struck a heartbeat later, its weight slamming into her upper body with the force of a gale. The impact drove the breath from her lungs and shattered her focus.

And Bennet was already there.

In that instant—his entire body became a conduit of resonance and vengeance. The glow of Sovereign Resonance wasn’t just power—it was legacy, fury, and an oath rekindled. His stance was unwavering, his breath controlled, and his eyes burned with everything he had lost—and everything he was now about to claim.

Time collapsed into a single heartbeat.

He could see his father’s broken body, sprawled beneath banners of flame. The silence that followed—the weight of a goodbye that had never been said.

This wasn’t justice.

This was vengeance.

"This is for Daryl Valen," he growled, stepping forward as light surged from his blade.

"You won’t even leave a name behind."

The cult leader looked up, wild-eyed, and in her gaze was not fear—but the tragic clarity of someone who knew the end had arrived.

Bennet’s blade pierced her core.

A flash of white-gold light erupted from the point of impact. Her body seized, trembling violently as the unstable aether within her combusted inward.

For a heartbeat, silence.

Then the explosion.

A deafening roar thundered through the field, swallowing the world in light, dust, and flame.

The cult leader’s scream was lost in the cataclysm.

And when it cleared, she was gone.

Silence.

Not the kind that follows victory, but the kind that weighs heavily, pressing into the bones of the survivors.

Smoke drifted across the battlefield, rising from shattered stone and charred sigils.

The once-vibrant ground had become a graveyard of magic and rage.

Ash stood slowly, wincing as the heat from the air singed his fur.

He looked to the side, where the serpent uncoiled from a crouched position, its breathing shallow but steady.

’Is it over...?’ Ash thought to himself.

Then Bennet stirred.

He pushed himself up to one knee, blood trickling down his cheek, Sovereign Resonance flickering dimly across his armor.

"Dad, my vengeance has started," Bennet mumbled out, as his face rose towards the sky. Slowly, he then turned towards Seraphina and Lucas, "Please watch over us..."

And without another word, Bennet collapsed.