Earth's Greatest Magus

Chapter 2973 Baeldum Battle

Maren City had been built to hold ten million.Now more than thirty million souls sheltered behind its walls — refugees crammed into every street, plaza, and stairwell, driven inward by the collapse of half the continent.

And beyond the eastern ramparts, across the scorched plain where the infected army gathered, the defenders made their stand.

Lieutenant General Anderson stood at the very front of the line. His broad frame radiated restrained killing intent as he surveyed the horizon, scarred arms folded, every motion deliberate. To his right, Ayla sat astride her golden-striped tiger, her silver beasts circling restlessly at its feet. To his left, Formation Master Arctus had already begun activating his banners, hundreds of yellow flags shivering in the wind as glowing runes crept beneath the soil.

At Anderson's shoulder stood the lord of Maren itself — Verrin, a Two Cosmos Grand Magus whose family had governed the city for three generations. He was the weakest of the four at the front, and he knew it, but he had refused every suggestion that he withdraw behind the walls with his people. This was his city. If it fell, he intended to fall with it.

Behind them stretched the defensive line — a desperate alloy of local Baeldum elites and first-response volunteers who had answered the Alliance's emergency call.

By rights, that line should have numbered well over a hundred Grand Magus. It did not. Word of Solrath had spread faster than any order could contain it — the smaller city to the south, overrun and massacred down to the last soul within hours. The horror of it had broken something in the gathered force before the battle even began. A few dozen of them slipped quietly away — a number of the local lords among them, along with several of the first responders. No one openly condemned them for it. They were volunteers, after all, not soldiers sworn to die here — and that so many had *stayed* was its own quiet kind of courage.

By rights, that line should have numbered well over a hundred Grand Magus. It did not. Word of Solrath had spread faster than any order could contain it — the smaller city to the south, overrun and massacred down to the last soul within hours. The horror of it had broken something in the gathered force before the battle even began. A few dozen of them slipped quietly away — a number of the local lords among them, along with several of the first responders. No one openly condemned them for it. They were volunteers, after all, not soldiers sworn to die here — and that so many had *stayed* was its own quiet kind of courage.

What remained were a hundred. A hundred Grand Magus to hold the eastern wall against the horde rising before them.

Among them stood Julian of Nova Roma, flanked by Guskov and Poseidon.

"Are we certain these people can't be saved?" Guskov asked quietly, his gaze fixed on the corrupted mass ahead. Many of those distorted figures still wore the clothes of farmers and merchants.

"That's what the general confirmed," Poseidon answered, his voice steady with grim confidence. "They're already in the late stage. There's nothing human left to pull back out."

Julian exhaled a heavy sigh. "Worse — these ones carry the enhanced strain. If even one breaks the line and reaches the city behind us…" His jaw tightened. "We have to erase every last one of them."

No one disagreed. No one wanted to.

The plain itself seemed to crawl. Nearly a million infected pressed forward in a single heaving tide, climbing over their own dead without slowing. And in the sky above that tide hung something far worse — some eighty infected Grand Magus, their auras twisted but undimmed, hovering like a flock of carrion birds.

It was the sight of those figures, more than any horde, that had hollowed out the courage of the deserters.

Because the defenders recognized them.

Among the corrupted floated faces famous across all of Baeldum — venerable sect elders whose names were spoken with reverence, clan leaders who had ruled their territories for centuries, masters who only weeks ago had stood as the planet's last line of defense. Worse still were the dozen or more whose corruption was still fresh, their uniforms barely soiled: Grand Magus who, mere days ago, had fought shoulder to shoulder with the very people now gathered to kill them. First responders who had answered the same call. Allies who had simply been a little too slow to retreat.

City Lord Verrin's hand tightened around his sword until the knuckles whitened. He noted three of those faces.

Two of them he had hosted at his own table. The first was Elder Ravik of the Crimson Pine Spear Sect — a Three Cosmos master whose seclusion-breakthroughs were legend across the southern continent. The second was Lord Daven of the Azure Banner, a Three Cosmos faction leader whose word had once moved armies. Both men had been pillars of this world. Now their eyes were filmed yellow, and the things that wore their faces drifted among the horde without a flicker of recognition.

Beside him, Anderson's jaw set hard.

He, too, had noted a face he knew — and it struck deeper than the others. A military man in the ruined coat of the Alliance, his rank insignia still half-visible beneath the corruption. Colonel Garran. A Three Cosmos officer, and Supreme Marc's closest aide, the man who had flown out at the Hunter's side when the advance team first descended on this planet.

The enemy was not some faceless swarm.

It was the fallen best of an entire world.

The Alliance still held the greater numbers if its Magus-realm warriors were counted — but Anderson had declared otherwise. None below the Grand Magus realm would set foot on this plain; against the enhanced strain, anything weaker would only become fresh hosts. The Magus would hold the walls and shield the thirty million behind them. The plain belonged to the Grand Magus alone.

A hundred living experts against seventy corrupted ones — and the better part of the million infected beneath them.

The two forces stood facing one another across the endless yellow desert.

Neither side moved.

The battle had yet to begin, as though both armies were waiting for something—or someone.

Then the sky above the parasite horde shifted.

A lone figure rose into the air.

Thousands of infected stood beneath him, yet his presence dwarfed them all. Waves of terrifying power radiated from his body, pressing down upon the battlefield like a physical weight. It was a pressure far beyond that of a Grand Magus.

A Supreme.

Marc.

The Hunter Supreme who had vanished into this nightmare days ago had returned.

Not as a survivor.

Not as a prisoner.

But as the spearhead of the enemy army.

---

The moment Marc's aura unfurled across the battlefield, a second figure silently rose into the sky to meet him.

Supreme Lord Dunadan.

The two powerhouses faced one another high above the desert, neither making the first move. Frost and corruption bled into the air between them, causing the surrounding space to tremble beneath the clash of their domains.

For a long moment, neither spoke.

Dunadan simply stared at the figure across from him.

The Supreme before him had once been a trusted ally. A comrade who had fought beside him through countless campaigns and shared victories stretching back centuries.

Part of him still searched for something.

A trace of recognition.

A spark of humanity.

Any sign that Marc still remained somewhere within that corrupted body.

But there was nothing.

Only an endless hunger burning behind those eyes.

Then Marc opened his mouth.

A deafening roar erupted across the battlefield.

The sound shook the desert, sending shockwaves rolling across the sand while millions of infected answered in unison. Their howls merged into a single monstrous cry that echoed beneath the darkened sky.

The war had begun.

The sound tore across the plain like a physical force, and at his command the eighty infected Grand Magus surged forward as one, the corrupted Supreme driving down at their head.

Dunadan answered with a single sign of his hand.

"FIGHT!!" Anderson bellowed.

The battlefield detonated.