The agitated roar of the Rogthars tore through the heavy air of the Rail Hall, echoing off the walls.
'W-What the hell are Rogthars doing here?!'
The question exploded in Mirac's mind before he could even form any other thought.
And he wasn't the only one. From Carmen's wide, fixed eyes staring at the advancing red figures, it was clear that the same question was racing through her mind as well.
The rest of the team remained silent. They were all stunned.
"W-What the hell are those things…?" Darick asked, voicing the question that buzzed in everyone else's head.
"IT DOESN'T MATTER RIGHT NOW!" Alvern shouted. "EVERYONE, FORM UP!"
The team leader's voice cracked like a whip, instantly easing the tension weighing on the group.
In no time at all, they shook off the initial shock—as expected from people with real experience in the field—and each of them moved. Some with more energy, others with legs still unsteady, some gripping their weapon hilts so tightly it looked like they were clinging to the edge of a cliff.
The ground was uneven, the tracks snaked under their feet like steel traps, overturned wagons lay scattered like obstacles, and as if that weren't enough, the flickering torchlight made every shadow unstable, every silhouette ambiguous, and every movement hard to read.
Nevertheless, the team managed to orient themselves and take up the positions they had agreed on during the briefing on the way there. All the fighters—Alvern, Felisia, Roric, Seren, Darick, Morwen, Joren, Carmen, and Mirac—formed a wide arc on the front line, ready to face the enemies head-on.
Before taking her position, Carmen quickly slipped the backpack off her shoulders and dropped it to the ground, not far from Zoltan's body. She rolled her wrists to loosen the built-up tension, then gripped her daggers once more.
Meanwhile, the others moved away from what would become the epicenter of the clash, heading toward the far end of the hall, opposite the archway from which the Rogthars continued to pour out.
Dorran was the first to bolt for safety. His massive frame instinctively lowered as he ran—an effort that was anything but silent, with that enormous backpack rattling and creaking at every hurried step.
In a hurry, he found cover behind an overturned cart and crouched against it, pulling himself out of the line of fire. He was well aware of what a spear thrown by those monstrous creatures could do.
Lirael followed right behind him, but she didn't stop next to him.
Instead, she looked for an elevated spot in the hall where she could position herself and provide covering fire for her companions.
After a quick glance, she chose the flat surface of the overturned cart—the same one Dorran had crouched behind—and leaped onto it in one fluid motion, her knees bending slightly on landing.
She extinguished her torch with a sharp motion, slipped it into the ring on her belt, and assumed her stance with her bow already in hand and an arrow nocked.
Her breathing settled on its own. Her posture found its balance without her having to search for it—the result of years of practice ingrained in her body long before her mind.
She scanned the front line ahead, trying to make out the shapes of the Rogthars in the unstable torchlight. The monsters at the head of the horde were just visible enough to aim at, but those farther back, still wrapped in the darkness of the tunnel they were emerging from, were little more than dark moving shadows—difficult to isolate, difficult to track.
For now, Lirael could do nothing but wait, keeping the bowstring taut.
Beside her, Aisha took position, gripping her gnarled staff firmly.
Even for the young healer, the tension was sky-high, but she wasn't afraid.
Her steady, focused gaze betrayed her readiness: she would intervene without hesitation to heal any of her companions who got injured in the fight.
Brann, on the other hand, positioned himself a few steps ahead of the other three, acting as the last bulwark between the rear guard and the chaos about to erupt.
He planted his feet between two parallel tracks, legs spread wide, body low and stable.
His spiked mace was already wrapped in Mana, pulsing along his arms, ready to be unleashed.
And just like that, in no time, everyone had reached their positions in the rear.
Everyone, except one…
"Blake, what are you doing?!"
Brann's voice reached the front line like a sharp bark, harsh and urgent.
While he, Dorran, Lirael, and Aisha had taken their positions in the back, Blake hadn't moved an inch.
He remained exactly where he was, in the same position as a few seconds earlier, as if time had frozen around him.
His eyes were wide with horror, arms hanging limply at his sides, the map still clutched in his hands in a gesture frozen halfway.
His gaze was fixed on Zoltan...
On the blood that continued to slowly spread...
On the spear lodged in his skull with a precision that was anything but accidental...
Faced with that scene, the tall, slender boy's legs had begun to tremble, and soon the shaking spread through his entire body—torso, arms, all the way to his jaw, which quivered and prevented him from saying what he wanted to say.
"Blake, don't just stand there! Move and get with the others!" someone shouted.
But Blake didn't answer...
He didn't blink. He didn't turn his head. He didn't react to the calls.
"BLAKE, CAN YOU HEAR US? YOU'RE NOT SAFE HERE!"
One after another, the team members tried to snap him out of it, but nothing worked...
It was like shouting at a wall.
"Blake, can you hear me?!" It was Mirac's turn, and even his own voice sounded distant and muffled to him, as if he were speaking underwater.
But the tall, slender boy still didn't respond.
It was as if his mind had completely shut down. Or rather: it had stopped somewhere else, fixed on an image he couldn't stop staring at…
To a memory he couldn't pull free from his head...
Meanwhile, the Rogthars kept advancing.
Their heavy footsteps made the floor vibrate with a slow, almost deliberate rhythm—the pace of those who are in no hurry, because they already know how it will end...
'Shit! Has he frozen from shock?!' Mirac wondered.
There was no time to wait for him to recover on his own...
The masked boy sheathed his sword with a sharp motion. With only one arm, he couldn't afford the luxury of holding two things at once, and while everyone else had hurried to light their torches, he had chosen to keep his weapon in hand.
But right now, he needed his free hand for something else: to drag Blake away!
Without wasting any more time, the masked boy dashed toward his friend, reached him, and grabbed him firmly by the shoulders.
No one stopped him.
Alvern saw him move and followed him with his gaze for a moment, but he didn't say a word. It wasn't the time for reprimands, and deep down, there was no need. After all, Mirac was doing the right thing.
The rest of the team felt the same way.
Some of them gave a slight nod without taking their eyes off the advancing horde. Others didn't react at all, too focused on what was about to come to to afford even a second of distraction.
It was Joren, of course, who broke that silence thick with unspoken understanding—he was always ready to voice his opinion on everything.
His voice came out sharp, almost annoyed, without him even bothering to turn around:
"Get that dead weight out of here! If he stays, he'll only get in the way…"
There was no kindness in his words.
No solidarity.
Only the cold, ruthless pragmatism of someone who evaluates the pieces on the board and discards the useless ones.
And yet, in the chaos of that moment, he had said exactly what needed to be said.
"B-But…" Mirac hesitated, his voice uncertain.
Carmen intervened before the protest could even take shape.
She turned slightly toward him, her gaze steady but unhurried, as if this had always been the decision from the start:
"Don't worry about us…" she said in a calm, measured tone. "Go!"
Mirac remained still for another second, his expression conflicted.
But in the end, he clenched his teeth and nodded, turning toward Blake:
"Come on, let's go! This way…" he told him, his urgency sounding dangerously close to a plea.
Then he practically lifted him off the ground, turned him around, and began dragging him away—far from the entrance, the front line, the red figures drawing closer.
Blake offered no resistance, nor did he cooperate. He simply let himself be dragged along like someone who had stopped deciding where to go.
Meanwhile, one of the Rogthars—taller and bulkier than the others, with two black horns sprouting from its head—broke away from the horde, stepped forward ahead of its kin, and let out a guttural roar. It pointed its weapon toward the team with a sharp, unmistakable gesture.
There was no need to understand their language to realize that it was their leader, and that it had just given the order to charge!
Without hesitation, the horde surged forward in unison, their heavy footsteps shaking the floor beneath the team's feet.
'Shit!' Alvern cursed inwardly as he saw the monsters running toward them.
"They're coming!" he shouted, his voice rising above the thunder of the advancing steps.
Then, with the quick thinking his role demanded, he issued new orders—rapid and sharp:
"We can't fight properly with torches in our hands, and in this darkness our defeat is guaranteed! We need a better field of vision!" he yelled, his eyes already scanning the walls of the hall, spotting the iron brackets holding unlit torches. "Joren! Do you think you can light the wall torches with your Syntony with Fire?"
Joren didn't answer right away.
For a fraction of a second, his eyes slid over the advancing horde. Something cold and unexpected crawled down his spine.
Years of training at Sivanyr, the prestigious Swordsmen's Academy of the Kingdom of Ardorya, had forged him in ways few could boast: thousands of hours spent perfecting every slash, every parry, every step.
First against wooden dummies, then against increasingly skilled training partners, and finally against beasts hunted in the forests on the kingdom's borders—creatures that knew no mercy and allowed no mistakes.
He had learned to read an opponent before they even moved, to find openings in chaos, to turn fear into something more useful.
And yet, now, facing that endless horde writhing in the darkness like a sea of fangs and claws, he felt small.
Afraid.
The same kind of stupid, paralyzing fear he had sworn he would never feel again after that day…
'Tsk! I can't afford to make the same mistake twice!'
Joren took a deep breath, letting the cold air fill his lungs.
He exhaled slowly, pushing the knot in his stomach away along with the memory. His shoulders relaxed, his jaw clenched with determination.
The fire he carried within him—the same fire that Sivanyr had forged and refined until it turned him into a living blade—began to crackle again, hotter and fiercer than before.
Then he let out a short, almost scornful chuckle. A flash of wild excitement crossed his eyes, and his answer came with all the confidence of someone who had never doubted himself:
"Leave it to me!"
His sword was already in his grip—a weapon that seemed made to be admired as much as used. The blade was long and slender, forged from dark gray steel, etched with runic inscriptions that ran along its length like veins of cooled lava.
The hilt was wrapped in dark red leather and ended in a spherical pommel bearing the seal of the "Dragon's Jaws" workshop—the same place where Mirac had bought his new sword the day before.
In the blink of an eye, he channeled Mana along the blade with the instinctive ease of someone who had performed that gesture countless times. The runic inscriptions ignited instantly, glowing with a warm, pulsing light that snaked across the entire surface like embers beneath ash.
The weapon began to vibrate, and a living, pulsing, impatient spark ignited at its tip.
At that point, Joren sprang into action.
He started with the nearest torches, those still faintly visible in the flickering light of his companions' torches, making them barely visible in the darkness.
His first movement was a wide arc traced through the air, sweeping the blade from left to right in a fluid, controlled motion. A flame detached from the tip like a living spark and flew straight toward the nearest torch, igniting it with a sharp crackle.
The second was even more precise: a quick thrust upward, his wrist twisting at the last instant to correct the trajectory. The flame cut diagonally through the air and struck the next bracket with the same unerring certainty as a well-shot arrow.
Joren's movements were fast—extremely fast—but never lacked precision.
As the nearby torches lit up, their glow spread toward the back of the hall, gradually illuminating even the farther brackets—those that, just a moment earlier, had been swallowed by darkness.
Joren used them as new reference points, calibrating every gesture according to the distance and angle of the next target.
A diagonal slash for the one high on the right. A short, sharp flick of the wrist for another. A wide semicircle to cover two torches on the opposite side in a single motion, the flames splitting midway as if they already knew where to go.
One by one, the points of light came back to life along the walls, all the way to the far end of the hall where the rear guard had taken position.
The shadows shortened abruptly, and the darkness that had reigned supreme until that moment retreated into the deepest corners.
In the end, in less than seven seconds, the Rail Hall was completely filled with light, restoring depth to the grotesque chamber—tearing that space back from the darkness the Rogthars had used as their ally.
Only then did the team realize the true scale of the danger: dozens upon dozens of those demonic creatures charging ferociously, without slowing down.
A horde far larger than the darkness had initially suggested.
"Don't panic!" Alvern shouted.
Now that the light had returned to their side, he and the rest of the team extinguished their own torches and slipped them back into the rings on their belts, freeing their hands for what was about to come.
"Be ready!" the team leader shouted, gripping his double-bitted axe with both hands, braced for the clash. "We can do this!"
With that, everyone braced themselves, breath held—the horde now only a few steps away…
Meanwhile, Mirac hadn't stopped. He continued dragging Blake by the arm, the tall, slender boy's feet scraping limply across the ground.
'Shit!' the masked boy cursed, picking up his pace.
He had to get Blake to safety before the horde overwhelmed the battle line.
As they crossed the Rail Hall, streaks of fire shot overhead, striking the wall-mounted torches. One after another, the flames erupted with a violent crackle, tearing away large swaths of darkness and illuminating the path ahead of them.
Mirac didn't turn to look. He already knew what it was.
'So behind all that cockiness there's something real…' he noted mentally, without dwelling on it any further.
He zigzagged between the rusted tracks, leaped over an overturned wagon, brushed against a corroded wheel that creaked under his fingers, and finally reached the rear guard where Brann and the others were waiting.
With a gentleness the situation barely allowed, Mirac lowered Blake into a seated position behind the overturned wagon, next to Dorran.
Then he knelt in front of him.
"Blake, look at me!" Mirac ordered.
No response. Blake's eyes were fixed on some invisible horizon, lost somewhere far away.
His gaze was empty—not frightened, not desperate, just absent…
Then something changed…
His chest began to rise and fall in quick, shallow bursts, as if he were drowning in the air itself.
"No no no, calm down, Blake! Breathe slowly… gently…" Mirac insisted, demonstrating the rhythm: he drew in a slow breath, held the air in his lungs for a second, then exhaled calmly.
He did it once. Then a second time, and a third…
He hoped Blake would imitate him instinctively, as often happens when someone is in the grip of panic.
But it was all in vain…
The tall, slender boy continued to gasp, his breathing growing shorter and more erratic.
Mirac clenched his jaw. 'Damn it! He's completely gone…'
Meanwhile, behind him, all hell broke loose.
The first clash of blades rang out like thunder—sharp, metallic, so violent it seemed to echo all the way up to the rocky vault above.
It was followed by the roars of the Rogthars—deep, guttural, overlapping in a bestial chorus—interspersed with the sharp cries of his companions, the hiss of swords slicing through the air, and the wet, nauseating sound of blows sinking into flesh.
Mirac gritted his teeth and kept his gaze fixed forward.
He didn't need to turn around to know what was happening: behind him, the battle had just begun!
'Damn it!' thought the masked boy. 'I can't stay here… I have to go back and help the others!'
With that in mind, Mirac stood up abruptly.
"Please, take care of him…" he said, addressing the quartet that made up the rear guard, without looking at anyone in particular.
They all nodded in unison, a silent and solemn gesture.
Aisha, however, approached Blake and placed a hand on his shoulder with the same tender gentleness one uses to caress the sick.
Meanwhile, Mirac slipped the backpack off his shoulders and set it down on the ground beside Blake. Then, in one fluid motion, he drew his sword.
The gray-silver veins of the blade caught the flickering glow of the torches, while the stylized wing-shaped guard cast a thin shadow across the rocky floor.
After that, the masked boy finally turned toward the battle line, urgently scanning the unfolding clash.
Alvern was on the front line, his double-bitted axe spinning in wide, controlled arcs, holding off two Rogthars at once. Beside him, Morwen had just hurled an entire cart into the path of a third monster, blocking its way with a deafening crash of twisted metal.
Another was pushing toward the left flank of the formation, its curved scythe sweeping wide arcs through the air. Roric was already moving to meet it, scimitars ready in hand.
Darick and Joren covered the center, their slashes tracing trails of flame through the air. A little further back, Felisia and Carmen moved like lethal shadows among the red figures, exploiting every tiny opening to drive their daggers in with surgical precision.
From atop the overturned cart, right next to Mirac, Lirael had already found her first target.
After taking aim, the bowstring snapped, and the arrow shot off with a tight, precise trajectory, streaking above the heads of the companions on the front line.
Mirac didn't look back.
He tightened his grip on the hilt and ran back toward his companions…
Toward the heart of the battle!