# CHAPTER 164— DOMAIN
The silence that followed did not feel natural.
It spread too quickly.
One moment the chamber still carried the lingering destruction of Frigga's battle, the next even the heatstorms above had gone still, as though the realm itself understood that a line had just been crossed.
Erasmus seemed not to notice. Or perhaps he simply did not care.
Frigga remained over his shoulder while he stood at the center of the ruined battlefield, his gaze resting casually on the black cloth tied around her eyes.
"You hid it well," he said quietly. "I almost didn't recognize it at first."
Frigga clicked her tongue.
"I wasn't trying to show anyone."
"That's the problem."
His answer came instantly.The smile on the Marquis' face faded slightly.
The woman beside her finally spoke.
"Erasmus."
Her voice was smooth and measured, yet something beneath it felt sharp enough to cut skin.
"You've just returned from the border. Perhaps you should rest before discussing matters that do not concern you."
Erasmus slowly turned toward her.
For the first time since arriving, the warmth in his expression disappeared.
"And perhaps," he replied calmly, "you should remember who you're speaking to."
The chamber trembled. The pressure this time did not erupt outward wildly like before. It descended.Controlled. Heavy.
The mountains surrounding them groaned as invisible force pressed against the realm itself. Cracks spread through the sky above while the rivers below sank several meters into the earth.
The woman's smile stiffened slightly. Then Heat flooded the chamber.
Not from Erasmus. From the Marquis.
"You're overstepping."
Her voice cut through the pressure instantly. The world changed.
The burning mountains vanished.The shattered battlefield disappeared.Even the sky itself folded away like torn paper.
Frigga's pupils contracted beneath the blindfold.
The hidden elders observing the chamber recoiled violently as isolation spread outward across the battlefield.
A Domain.
The space around the Marquis transformed into an endless world of crimson fire.
There was no earth beneath them anymore
No sky.No stars.
Only an infinite expanse of burning red stretching endlessly in every direction as flames flowed across reality itself like an ocean.
The heat inside this place could not be measured normally.
It did not burn skin first.It pressed against identity.
Even Frigga felt her signature recoil instinctively.
Yet Erasmus simply stood there.
Still carrying her over his shoulder.
His gaze moved across the Domain slowly before settling back on the Marquis.
Then he smiled faintly.
"I see," he said.
"So you finally succeeded."
The Marquis said nothing.
But the pressure inside the Domain deepened.
Frigga immediately felt it.
Outside the Domain, the Marquis was terrifying.
Inside it..She became absolute.
Every strand of fire surrounding them answered to her existence. The heat itself moved with intent, shifting subtly around Erasmus like predators testing unfamiliar prey.
The woman beside the Marquis relaxed slightly after entering the Domain, the earlier tension leaving her expression entirely.
Here, she felt safe.
Protected.
Erasmus noticed.
That amused him.
"You rely on her too much," he said while glancing briefly toward the woman.
The smile on her face twitched faintly.
"And you rely too little on anyone."
Erasmus chuckled softly.
"Fair."
The Marquis finally stepped forward.
Each movement caused the Domain itself to pulse.
"You didn't come back just to see Frigga."
It wasn't a question.
Erasmus nodded once.
"The border is becoming unstable."
The atmosphere shifted immediately.
Even Frigga straightened slightly.
"The other Marquis houses?" the woman asked.
"No."
Erasmus' eyes narrowed slightly.
"Something worse."
Silence settled again.
"The dead realms are reacting."
This time... Even the Marquis' expression changed.
Only slightly.
But Frigga noticed.
"The failures?" she asked quietly.
Erasmus nodded.
"At first we thought it was isolated corruption." His gaze lowered briefly. "Now entire chambers are changing."
The Domain around them flickered once.
A small movement.
Yet it revealed enough.
The Marquis was disturbed.
"The Southern Vale reported three collapses last month," Erasmus continued. "House Serad lost an elder after his chamber consumed itself during refinement."
"That's impossible," the woman said immediately.
"No," Erasmus replied calmly. "What's impossible is what happened afterward."
His gaze shifted toward Frigga.
"The chamber kept evolving."
The silence that followed felt colder than the fire surrounding them.
Frigga slowly frowned beneath her blindfold.
Dead realms were not alive.
They were remains.
Fragments left behind by failed cultivators whose worlds collapsed during advancement.
They were tools.
Training grounds.
Nothing more.
Yet Erasmus' expression held none of his earlier humor now.
"The surviving witnesses said the chamber resisted dismantlement," he continued. "It reacted to external pressure like a living organism."
The Marquis' eyes narrowed.
"Growth?"
Erasmus nodded slowly.
"And adaptation."
The flames within the Domain surged briefly before calming again.
For the first time since arriving, Frigga felt genuine tension from the Marquis.
Then Erasmus said the one thing that changed everything.
"We think one of the dead realms inherited its owner's will."
The Domain shook.
Violently.
Far beyond the isolated space, hidden elders throughout the chamber stiffened in horror as waves of unstable heat leaked briefly into the surrounding realm.
The Marquis stared directly at Erasmus now.
"That should be impossible."
"I know.
And yet?
Erasmus looked toward the endless sea of crimson flames surrounding them.
"Something inside the dead realms is waking up."
The words settled heavily between them.
Frigga slowly looked downward.
Dead realms inheriting will.
The idea sounded absurd.
And yet, for the first time in years, she remembered the old stories
whispered deep within the Phoenix House.
Stories about failed Domains that refused to collapse.
Stories about cultivators whose identities became so strong that even death could not erase them completely.
At the time, she thought they were myths.
Now..she wasn't so certain anymore.