Prominent Leg watched with an amused expression, a small grin still playing at the corners of his lips as his eyes locked onto Ultron's frame.
The massive soldier was a far cry from how he'd looked when the battle began. His body was carved with countless wounds, blood streaming down his face and torso in winding rivers. Bruises bloomed across his skin like ink stains, dark and spreading.
Yet his eyes hadn't dulled. If anything… they burned even fiercer now, colder and more dangerous than before.
That quiet intensity made the Duke begin to grow uneasy—his confidence faltering.
But Prominent Leg kept grinning, undeterred.
"You're strong. Makes one wonder… where in the world has the government been hiding people like you?"
He said, voice laced with irony.
"Were they breeding war machines in the shadows, and now—what? They finally feel ready to bare their fangs through some lousy young Paragon? After everything the Alliance of Nations has done for the prosperity of that government, this is how they repay us?"
Ultron remained silent. Indifferent. He stood like a monolith—unshaken, unbending—his very presence casting a weight across the battlefield that was hard to ignore.
Around them, chaos still raged. The clash of steel, the shrieks of monsters, and the thunder of collapsing buildings echoed through the war-torn city. Fighters scrambled to defend the walls from being overrun.
And yet, amidst the carnage, a few soldiers—some even civilians—had paused just long enough to witness the standoff. Their eyes flicked between the two figures locked in silent tension.
Then Ultron moved.
Just slightly—his gaze narrowing, his focus tightening on the man before him like a blade being drawn from its sheath.
"It's useless."
His voice was low but heavy enough to pierce the din.
"The question you ask is useless. I hate the government as much as I hate the Alliance of Nations."
Prominent Leg's expression darkened. His grin vanished. Fingers curled into fists.
"And yet you fight for them."
Ultron remained silent for a few moments. His eyes seemed distant, unfocused—like he was peering through time rather than the man before him. Yet even in stillness, with his strong, angular features cast in cold light, he looked anything but vulnerable. There was a threat in the quiet. A tension.
Then, he exhaled—subtle, almost soundless.
"I see… you still don't understand."
Prominent Leg's eyes narrowed slightly.
"Understand what?"
"That the entire continent is under siege. The government, the nations… everything will collapse."
Silence hung for a beat.
Then Prominent Leg erupted into laughter. Wild, unrestrained. He threw his head back as the sound tore from his throat, almost defiant in its madness.
The fit of laughter only lasted a few seconds before he staggered, grimacing and clutching at his ribs—his injuries biting back with sharp pain. He inhaled raggedly, forcing himself upright once more.
A crooked grin curved across his face as he fixed his gaze on Ultron.
"Funny. Very funny. The continent is under seige, you say? That's the best joke I've heard in years. You're going to bring down twenty-five nations? Including an empire that holds forty percent of the continent's population? The first nation to ever rise in the Central Plains?"
Ultron didn't flinch. His expression was stone—void of mockery, of warmth, of doubt.
"All will fall, starting with Verulania."
Prominent Leg's grin faltered, warping into something darker. His eyes sharpened.
"Why Verulania?"
Ultron looked around the battlefield with a distant, hollow stare—as if searching for something he couldn't quite see.
"Because that's the only way the Academy can be destroyed."
Prominent Leg's expression soured. His mouth thinned, eyes tightening with a dangerous grimace.
"What?"
In that moment, pieces began to shift—sliding into place inside his mind with a weight that made his stomach turn.
One of the first signs of this conflict had been the airships. All stolen. Every last one, hijacked before the airport was obliterated. It hadn't seemed part of a greater strategy—just a troubling wave of thefts that had grown bolder over the past few months. Airports attacked. Supply lines sabotaged.
The Alliance had dismissed them as isolated incidents. Minor insurgencies. Not worth prioritizing.
But now…
Now it reeked of orchestration.
His gaze sharpened to a blade's edge.
"Don't tell me… You people collaborated with terrorists. You stole the airships to trap the students—so they couldn't return to the Academy?"
Ultron offered a faint smile—barely more than a shift in his lips.
"The Prophet is a very shrewd man. I don't know where he found those cultist freaks… but they've been quite useful to our cause."
Prominent Leg was seething, every muscle in his face tight with fury.
"These are innocent children!" he snapped. "What do you gain from destroying the Academy?"
Ultron gave a slow nod, his expression calm—eerily so. His voice rumbled with thick indifference, heavy and unmoved.
"They are innocent children. That's why we've taken them away from the harm that's coming. Then we'll release the ancient monster sealed beneath their school—let it rage. Milhwa's legacy… we'll reduce all of it to ash."
Prominent Leg's face blanched. For the first time, visible fear crept across his features.
"Why?!" he shouted. "That thing could destroy the entire continent!"
Ultron gave a tired shrug, lips curling into a weary smile.
"Then now you understand how we'll deal with the Empire."
The words sank into Prominent Leg like ice. Slowly, the reality began to settle—the scope of what Ultron had just revealed pressed into his chest like a crushing weight. The grin that once danced on his face was gone, replaced by a grim, hollow frown.
"What you're doing is senseless slaughter," he said quietly, the heat in his voice simmering into something colder, deeper. "All for what? What do you gain from rebelling against the entire continent? From destroying everything?"
Ultron grinned.
"A new age."
He leaned forward slightly, the shift in his body subtle but loaded with intent.
Prominent Leg's voice burst out, sharp as a blade. "This is madness! You think this is a battle you can win?!"
But Ultron remained indifferent, even as a glint of satisfaction danced behind his eyes. His voice came, low and final.
"We must."
Then he vanished.
Not with speed.
Not in a blur.
But with inevitability.
Prominent Leg's eyes widened as Ultron's fist drove into his gut. He folded, air erupting from his lungs in a wet, guttural gasp. Before he could even register the pain an elbow slammed into his spine, sending him crashing face-first into the dirt.
He tried to rise—
But a foot came down on his wrist, causing his bones to splinter beneath the weight.
"GAAAH—!"
Ultron leaned in, his voice a whisper laced with steel.
"This is what happens when you cling to the past."
His other hand gripped Prominent Leg's hair—
He wrenched the old warrior's head up—then smashed it back down into the earth.
Once.
Twice.
Blood sprayed.
Prominent Leg's vision swam, darkness bleeding in at the edges. His body screamed. His mind raged.
But his limbs… refused to move.
Ultron stood upright, gazing down at the shattered legend below.
"You were strong. But strength alone isn't enough."
He raised his foot—
And stomped down on Prominent Leg's ribs.
"Not in this world."
Prominent Leg's body jolted, a strangled cry ripping from his throat.
Ultron lifted his foot again—
"Not in this era."
Another rib cracked—shattered.
Prominent Leg's fingers twitched. His vision blurred. Fading fast.
Ultron raised his foot for the final strike…
But then—
something fell from the sky.
The world trembled as it struck.
It moved too fast—no one caught a clear glimpse before it collided with the ground, shattering the earth in an eruption of force. Shockwaves rippled outward, tearing debris into the air like shrapnel from a bomb.
A dust cloud exploded, swallowing everything in an instant. The battlefield fell into a stunned hush. Even the monsters recoiled—not just from the impact, but from something deeper. Something primordial they could feel.
Inside the thick veil of dust, Ultron frowned.
The indifference was gone. His face tightened with sharp caution—and the unmistakable sting of displeasure.
That final stomp—meant to crush Prominent Leg beneath his heel—had been stopped.
And now… he was staring at the one who'd interrupted.
A foot rested beneath his own, halting his momentum entirely.
But it wasn't just physical strength.
Ultron could feel it—an invisible force, radiating from the boy before him. It pressed down on his body like unseen gravity, locking his limbs in place. He couldn't move. Not an inch.
The boy stood calmly, neck slightly tilted as he gazed up at Ultron.
His white hair swayed gently in the air, untouched by the chaos.
His eyes—blue, tranquil, yet impossibly deep—looked as though they held oceans.
And at the bottom of those oceans… something dangerous stirred.
Ultron slowly withdrew his foot and dropped it.
"Who are you?"
The white-haired boy smiled, his eyes glinting with a dark glee.
"I am a student of the Academy, the one whom you all are gonna destroy."