Chapter 300: Heaven-Grieving Sword

Yelena’s fingers trembled at her sides.

She heard Mika’s calm, almost too gentle words and for a split second, she felt like crumbling.

Because deep down...she had always known.

She had always known that no matter how strong she became.

No matter how revered she was as the Saintess of a Thousand Swords, the woman who once cleaved through armies and stood tall among the heavens—

—when it came to Mika, she was just as helpless as the rest of them.

Against that boy, logic unraveled.

Power lost meaning.

Her god-slaying blades might as well be butter knives.

The very laws of nature seemed to skip pages around him.

Once, long ago, she used to tease him. Push him. Bully him, even.

She’d been stronger. Older. Wiser. He was nothing but a runt in her eyes, struggling to keep up with her shadow.

And now?

Now she was the one in his shadow, desperately trying to prove herself...and failing.

She wanted to reclaim her pride.

To prove that she wasn’t just his mother and mentor, but a warrior in her own right.

The same Yelena who had once terrified demon lords into submission with just a glare.

But here she stood.

Her pride shattered. Her attacks nullified. Her daughter getting a pedicure mid-apocalypse.

She was about to give up.

About to give it all up and admit defeat.

Until she saw Charlotte staring at her.

Not looking at her with pity.

Not sorrow.

But just...watching.

Waiting.

No hate. No disappointment. No mocking smile.

Just quiet expectation.

Like a child waiting to see if her mom would get back up again.

And that was all it took.

She steadied her breath.

Her golden aura flickered, crackled, then began to glow steadily brighter,.purer.

This wasn’t about Mika.

This was for her daughter.

To show her she could still be strong.

To show her what it looked like when a mother refused to break.

No. She wasn’t going to give up. Not in front of her daughter. Not today.

If this was going to end, then let it be glorious end.

"For you, Charlotte." She whispered, her voice barely audible before closing her eyes.

The winds stilled around her. Her golden aura flickered, like flames being smothered by divine breath, shifting, distorting, pulsing—until it began to tremble violently.

Even Mika glanced up from buffing Charlotte’s nails, raising a brow with mild interest before resuming with a gentle hum.

Then—her eyes snapped open.

They were no longer just green.

They glowed an ethereal, haunting green, like the embers of a dying world. And from her lips, she murmured:

[Heaven-Grieving Sword of the Ninth Firmament]

Suddenly, the world screamed.

The skies roared with a thunderclap that shattered clouds across a hundred miles. The fabric of reality beneath them tore open like parchment soaked in flame.

But this time, it wasn’t a vertical portal.

No—it was horizontal.

Beneath the ocean’s surface, the very seafloor began to warp, twist, and cave in on itself as a massive portal bloomed open like a yawning maw, stretching wider and wider and wider, until it spanned over ten miles in diameter.

From above, it looked like the ocean had given birth to a swirling void—a chasm that reached up toward the heavens like the eye of a god.

And then...

A tip.

A silver tip began to emerge from the portal.

First small. Then thick. Then taller.

It climbed—inch by inch, then meter by meter, then kilometer by kilometer—a towering, shining spike breaking through the ocean’s surface, gleaming under the fading sun like a deity’s divine judgment.

Sailors on ships beneath screamed in terror.

Fishermen fell to their knees in prayer.

From the faraway city of Windor, people pointed toward the horizon, gasping in shock.

"W-What is that?!"

"It’s a mountain!"

"No, it’s a battleship! Look at the metal!"

Then a small boy raised a trembling hand and shouted:

No, it’s...It’s a sword! A sword!!"

And he was right.

What had emerged was not a ship, nor a mountain, but an unimaginably colossal sword, whose hilt was still buried within the other realm—whose blade pierced the skies and cast a shadow so vast, it blotted out three cities at once.

People across the continent began to react:

—

Southern Midas City

News anchors scrambled as sirens blared.

"This just in—a gigantic unknown object is rising from the ocean near the Central Territories. Citizens are advised to evacuate—wait, we have a zoomed-in image—its...it’s..."

"IT’S A FREAKING SWORD!!!"

"A MASSIVE SWORD FROM YHE THE OCEAN IS RISING TO THE HEAVENS!!!!"

—

Central Capital–Market Square

A merchant sipping tea paused and squinted at the horizon.

"...Hey, uh...is that mountain new?"

His apprentice looked up, squinting.

"Mountain? No, that’s...wait...IS THAT A SWORD?!"

CRASH!

The merchant dropped his teacup.

"PACK UP THE STALL. WE’RE MOVING TO ANOTHER PLANE OF EXISTENCE."

—

In the barbarian highlands of Ulfgarde:

A one-eyed warrior looked up, squinted, and grunted.

"Hmm. Big stick...No, very big stick."

—

Eastern Desert Monastery

A monk meditating on a spire suddenly opened one eye.

"...I’ve achieved enlightenment."

His junior monk turned pale. "Enlightenment...from fear?!"

The elder nodded gravely. "Yes. I have seen death take sword form."

—

High School Classroom–History Class

A bored student glanced out the window.

"Yo teach...?"

The teacher looked up. "Yes, Jamal?"

"There’s a thing in the sky."

"What kind of thing?"

"A massive mother-flipping sword."

"...I see." He set his chalk down. "Pop quiz cancelled. Everyone write your last wishes."

—

Amusement Park–Ferris Wheel Top

A young couple stared at the skyline.

"Aw, look at that cloud. It’s shaped like a—"

Pause.

"...Honey, that’s a SWORD."

She squinted. "Like, a giant sword?"

"...Like, we’re gonna die kind of sword."

"...Huh. So should we start banging?"

"...Definitely. I don’t want to leave this world a virgin."

—

Bureau of Foreign and Inter-dimensional Affairs—Top Floor

Standing in front of the glass window of her grand office, Nadia, clasped a porcelain cup in her hand as her gaze fell upon the silver monolith in the sky.

Her face didn’t twitch. Her fingers didn’t tremble. Her coffee didn’t even ripple.

She simply sighed and muttered with the same tone one might use when talking about a minor delay in the morning meeting.

"I sincerely hope they end this little fight of theirs quickly. I don’t want mass panic disrupting the bureaucratic rhythm of the week."

Behind her, her young assistant was visibly shaking, clutching a tablet that had frozen mid-refresh due to overwhelming emergency alerts. Her eyes were locked on the blade that reached beyond the clouds.

"L-Lady Nadia." She stammered. "Should—should I initiate the apocalypse protocol?!"

Nadia turned around slowly, eyes calm. She sipped her coffee, then placed the cup neatly on the saucer with a soft clink.

"No. Send a Level 3 Public Notice. Mark it as a ’sky phenomenon due to weapon testing.’ State there’s no need for fear. No evacuations necessary. No doomsday predictions allowed on broadcast."

"Y-Yes ma’am!" The girl nodded rapidly before rushing out of the room.

Outside the glass walls, the city was already buzzing. Airships halted mid-air. People pointed and gasped. And social media feeds were bursting with hashtags like #SkySword and #EndoftheWorld.

And Nadia...returned to her seat, pulled out a dossier, and muttered:

"They better finish up before 12 PM. I have a diplomatic summit and I don’t want to be explaining that this all probably happened because my sister just can’t accept her son is stronger."

—

Elsewhere in the main district of the capital, the scene was...oddly peaceful.

Fauna and Anya sat on the open terrace of their skyscraper, sipping freshly brewed hazelnut coffee.

The view? The sky-splitting god-sword visible right above the mountains.

Anya casually pointed toward it with her spoon, swirling her coffee as she spoke.

"Mom." She said, brows raised. "I think Mika really pissed off Auntie Yelena. I mean...that’s not just a little angry. She’s trying to rip the heavens open."

"I don’t know what he did, but he definitely did something stupid."

She took a sip of her iced latte, as if the impending celestial annihilation was a Tuesday routine.

"Bet he said something smug about his cooking being better or something."

Fauna, however, wasn’t paying attention to the sword.

Her gaze was unfocused, her cheeks faintly pink, fingers twitching around her mug.

Anya blinked at her. "Uh...Mom?"

Fauna whispered, almost to herself.

"Mika...he’s an adult now...A grown man..." She flushed darker, biting her lip.

"Huh? What are you even talking about?"

Fauna buried her face in her hands, groaning.

"I did something unspeakable...unspeakable with Mika."

"Unspeakable? What are you—"

"Hey, where are you going?! Don’t you want to see the show?!"

Anya shouted out to her mother but Fauna had already darted away before throwing herself off the building and flying away, almost as if all the fresh air streaming across her face would solve the inner turmoil she was having.

—

Mika looked up at the massive sword with a blank expression.

Then glanced at Charlotte, who had peeled off her second cucumber slice.

She blinked at the shadow above.

"...Think she’s overcompensating?" Charlotte asked.

Mika nodded. "Yup."

—

But even with all the world reacting—whether with awe, horror, prayers, or breakups—only one person remained truly calm.

Yelena.

Because she wasn’t doing this for the world.

She wasn’t doing it for Mika.

She was doing it for her daughter.

To show her—once and for all—that her mother wasn’t just strong...

She was legendary.

—

Note: Illustrations for the battle are available in the discord...Check them out!