THE DRAGON'S BRIDE.

Chapter 43: THE REGENT'S WRATH

While An-li and Heiying were making progress in their isolated battle, the war in the world below had reached a fever pitch. General Kaelen’s legend of the "Mountain Princess" had proven to be a powerful weapon. The northern provinces were in open, unified rebellion, and several key southern prefectures were beginning to waver, their governors refusing to send troops or taxes to the capital.The Regent, An-li’s brother, was trapped in a gilded cage of his own making. His control over the capital was absolute, but his influence over the rest of the Empire was crumbling. He was a king of a single city. His paranoia grew, and his rule became increasingly brutal. Public executions of suspected traitors became a daily spectacle. He doubled down on his claim that his sister was dead and that Kaelen was a power-hungry madman.To prove his point and crush the rebellion once and for all, he made a fateful decision. He would not just defeat the legend; he would desecrate its source. He announced a grand "Purification Expedition" to Black Tooth Mountain.His stated goal was to cleanse the sacred mountain of the "dark spirits" that had clearly driven General Kaelen insane. He assembled a massive force, including the elite Imperial Guard, powerful cultivator sects loyal to his purse, and—most ominously—a secretive order of curse-breakers and ward-masters known as the Silent Scribes.His true goal was twofold. First, to find his sister’s body, if it existed, and display it publicly to shatter the rebellion’s morale. Second, if he could not find her body, he would perform a grand ritual to "pacify" the mountain, a ritual so magically potent it would scar the landscape and show the world that he, the Regent, held dominion even over the sacred places. He would kill the legend by killing the mountain it was born from.News of the Regent’s expedition sent a shockwave through the warring factions. General Kaelen knew he could not let the Regent reach the mountain. It would be a strategic and symbolic disaster. He marshaled his forces to intercept the Regent’s army, setting the stage for a single, massive, decisive battle at the foot of the mountains.The fate of the Empire was about to be decided in the shadow of the very peak where its true heir was fighting a battle of her own. The echoes of the gathering armies were a thunderous roar in Heiying’s senses, a psychic storm that threatened to overwhelm them just as they were on the verge of victory.