The demon and Cahir were fighting in the lowest floors. The breaking of walls and prisons, the sheer kinetic force of their collision, was creating a symphony of destruction.
Cahir, the Titan, used every ounce of his strength to counter the Astarey. For the Wanderers, killing monsters was a specialty, a holy duty. And this was not Cahir's first time fighting an Astarey. But it was always difficult. These demons were among the strongest, a force of nature that refused to be meddled with. Even the combined might of the human kingdoms struggled to contain them.
Cahir grunted as he blocked a massive claw strike, his iron skin sparking. 'Damn it. This is why I hate demons. Just a huge mass of killing intent and strength for no reason. Just filth on the earth.'
"The world is better off without you!" Cahir roared, swinging a makeshift iron club.
The demon didn't care about philosophy. It punched Cahir.
It was a blow so hard that Cahir flew backward, smashing into the outer wall with enough force to crack the foundation. If the wall had broken completely, the entire ground floor might have collapsed.
But the demon didn't follow up. It didn't care about the Titan. Its instinct—or perhaps the lingering commands in its fractured mind—drove it upward.
It broke through the ceiling. It jumped, its leg strength propelling it through the masonry like a missile. Its torso was durable enough to smash through any barrier humans had constructed. It ascended, leaving Cahir in the dust.
Norvin was hiding in an empty prison cell on the third floor, dragging the Red Ghost into the corner. He was gasping for air, trying to calm his racing heart.
The Red Ghost sat slumped against the wall, her eyes closed. She was pulling ambient Awen from the surroundings, desperately trying to refill her vessel. She needed strength. She was accumulating it drop by drop.
Just as Norvin's breathing slowed, he felt it.
Tremors.
The ground shook violently. Then, with a deafening crash, the floor in the corridor outside exploded upward.
The Astarey had arrived.
Thankfully, they were hiding in a cell outside the demon's line of sight. Norvin pressed his hand over his mouth, watching through the bars as the massive, green-furred nightmare climbed past them, ignoring the empty cells, driven by the chaos above. It continued going up, toward the floor where the fighting was thickest.
The demon reached the main hall, the epicenter of the battle.
It saw hundreds of men—Serpents, Bronze Falchion, and Wanderers—killing each other. To the demon, this was fuel for the fire.
Most of these men had never seen a demon before. Seeing an Astarey—a legend of horror—broke their minds. It was a creature that hated the weak and obeyed only the strong. And right now, it had decided to kill everyone.
The Wanderers, recovering from their shock, charged forward. They were trained to kill monsters. They maintained distance, using hit-and-run tactics, but the demon was too fast, too strong. It beat anyone who attacked it into a bloody pulp.
Seeing this, Dion, who was fighting near the entrance, shouted orders. "Bronze Knights! Fall back! Let the beast work!"
The Serpents joined the fray. They couldn't let a demon roam free. But the demon started killing them too. The Bronze Falchion knights, seeing an opportunity, joined in, helping the demon by picking off the distracted Serpents.
It was a gruesome sight.
The demon's mind was fragmented. It saw a hundred men, but its memories superimposed another hundred men from its past—the retrieval unit that had captured it in the Land of the Foul Souls. It saw Riven. It saw Dion. It remembered the pain.
It let out a huge roar and continued killing. None of their attacks stopped it. It killed one man by crushing his skull, then moved to the next, ripping him apart in a way more harrowing than the last. It beat a man until his corpse was unrecognizable meat paste.
Then, Cahir joined the chaos again.
He burst from the stairwell, shaking off the dust. "KILL THE DEMON!" he shouted.
The Wanderers' morale soared. Currently, Cahir was the strongest human in the hall. He attacked the demon with a giant sword formed from scrap metal, protecting his men while the demon slaughtered any Serpent or Wanderer foolish enough to get close.
In the shadows near the stairs, Norvin emerged, carrying the Red Ghost on his back. He saw the massacre.
'This is the perfect chance', Norvin thought. 'I can run while they are distracted.'
He moved toward the exit, sticking to the shadows.
"Where are you going, rat?"
A voice stopped him cold.
Dion stepped out from behind a pillar, his rapier drawn.
Norvin dodged instinctively as Dion lunged. He placed the Red Ghost gently in a corner, safe from the immediate fighting. He pulled out his two axes.
Norvin looked at Dion. He remembered the forest. He remembered the old man, Remus, turning to ice to save him. He remembered how this man, this smiling viper, had hunted them.
Rage flooded Norvin's veins.
"You will die today!" Norvin shouted, his voice cracking with fury. "Remus will get his revenge!"
Dion laughed, a cruel, high-pitched sound. "I don't care about revenge, boy. I only care about killing you."
Norvin launched himself forward. He fought like a madman, swinging his axes with reckless hate. But Dion was experienced. He was a noble, a trained killer.
In seconds, Norvin was covered in blood and wounds. Dion's rapier was too fast.
Norvin knew he was outmatched. That was why he had made the request to Thane. But he couldn't get back to Thane. He had to fight.
'I will at least hurt him', Norvin thought desperately.
He lunged again.
In the background, the demon continued its rampage. Cahir was barely holding it back. The Wanderers were being pushed into corners.
And then, the demon went mad.
It stopped distinguishing between friend and foe. It killed a Wanderer. Then it turned and punched a Bronze Falchion knight so hard the man flew across the room, his bones shattering upon impact.
"Damn it! It attacked us too!" a Bronze knight screamed. "Why?!"
In the higher floors of the Obsidian Tower, three Ciphers stood around a glowing relic—the Heart.
"We are losing control!" one shouted, sweat pouring down his face.
"The demon is trying to take over!" the second cried.
"Focus! Damn it, it killed one of our own men!" the third yelled.
"He is going frenzy!"
"Strengthen the spell! Use more Awen!"
All three were pouring their entire Awen reserves into the relic, trying to leash the beast below.
Suddenly, the wall exploded.
Chief Varic burst in, holding his warhammer. He had been hunting the secret weapon, and he had found it.
Behind the three Ciphers stood Chief Riven.
Varic assessed the situation instantly. Riven was a Vortex Nexus. The three Ciphers were dangerously drained, but one was a Whisper Cipher and two were Fragment Ciphers.
'I can't handle all four of them', Varic thought, gripping his hammer.
"You are dead now, Varic!" Riven shouted.
But Varic knew the truth. The Ciphers couldn't leave their post. They were the only thing stopping the demon from completely wiping out the Bronze Falchion forces downstairs.
Varic had to fight four enemies. Would he back out?
Of course not.
He attacked the Ciphers, ignoring Riven.
Riven intercepted him. The Ciphers used one hand to cast defensive spells while keeping the other on the relic, but their hold on the demon slipped further.
Varic swung his hammer, fighting for his life.
CRASH.
The ceiling above them shattered.
A man descended from the dust. Sir Corell.
"What huge bad luck," Varic muttered. He was against four, and now a Prime had joined the fray.
"Why are you here?" Riven shouted at Corell.
"Look up," Corell said simply.
A wind spear shattered the floor where Corell had been standing.
Aegis Kazar descended.
The Wind-walker saw the scene instantly: Corell, Varic, Riven, the three Ciphers, and the relic controlling the demon.
"The relic is controlling the demon!" Varic shouted to Aegis seeing his chance of success.
Aegis didn't hesitate. He didn't care about Varic. He cared about destroying the Bronze Falchion.
He began to chant.
"Goath... Omni-Slash."
Everywhere in the room—a full 360 degrees—thousands of small, highly compressed wind blades manifested. They hummed with lethal energy.
Aegis was pouring all his remaining Awen essence into the spell. The strength of a Phantom was not to be challenged.
The Ciphers screamed, building defensive barriers. Riven hid behind them. Corell raised his Yellowstone sword.
But Varic? He had no cover.
"Bye bye," Aegis whispered.
He released the spell.
The room became a blender.
The thousands of wind blades shredded everything. Corell's sword chipped. His armor cracked.
The Ciphers' barriers shattered. Their bodies were punctured a hundred times. They fell, dead before they hit the ground. Riven, cowering behind them, survived only because their bodies acted as meat shields.
The room was destroyed.
But Varic?
He jumped. He threw himself out of the tower, falling from the 7th floor.
His hammer was gone. His armor was gone. He was covered in wounds, bleeding from a dozen cuts. He had no energy left to protect his vital points with Numen.
'I guess this is it, huh.', Varic thought, closing his eyes as the wind whistled past his ears. 'Hard concrete comes next.'
He braced for the impact.
Instead, he felt two familiar, strong arms catch him in mid-air.
He opened his eyes.
It was Mat.
Mat had caught him, landing heavily on a lower balcony.
"Got you," Mat grunted.
Back in the control room, Corell was heavily damaged, bleeding profusely, but alive. Riven was alive, shaking in the corner.
Aegis didn't care about them. He looked at the relic. The Ciphers were dead. The spell was broken.
"The beast is free," Aegis muttered.
He jumped down through the hole, descending toward the main hall to kill the demon once and for all.
But the relic remained. Unguarded. And the connection was severed. The demon downstairs was no longer a puppet. It was a calamity unleashed.
The Bronze Falchion knights, who had been feeding commands into the beast's fractured mind, were no longer protected. The connection was severed. The Astarey saw them not as masters, but as meat.
It killed a Bronze knight with a single, crushing blow to the chest, caving in the breastplate like tin foil.
"Fall back!" Dion screamed, his voice cracking. "Retreat!"
The Bronze Falchion broke formation, fleeing in terror. The Wanderers, experts in monster hunting, were also retreating. Even Cahir, the Titan, was on the back foot.
The demon roared.
Cahir, seeing an opening, swung his massive scrap-metal sword with everything he had.
CRACK.
The blade connected with the demon's head. The force was so immense that one of the mossy antlers snapped clean off, spinning through the air to impale the stone floor.
The demon stumbled. It touched the broken stump of its antler.
Then it moved.
It didn't retaliate with rage; it retaliated with physics-defying speed. It kicked Cahir in the chest.
BOOM.
Cahir was launched like a cannonball. He smashed through the outer wall of the tower, flying into the courtyard, tumbling through the dirt until he hit a ruined fountain.
Now, the demon had no restrictions. No Titan to hold it back. No spells to bind it.
It became a whirlwind of gore.
One man was punched through the heart. Another was torn to shreds by claws. One was bitten in half. Another was ripped apart at the waist. One was squashed under a stomp. Another was smashed into his comrade, both bodies exploding on impact.
"RUN! DEMON!"
"SAVE YOURSELVES!"
"DAMN YOU FALCHION! WHY DID YOU DO THIS?!"
The screams echoed through the hall until, one by one, they were silenced by wet thuds.
Then, a new sound cut through the chaos.
"Goath... BLADE!"
Aegis Kazar descended from the upper floors. He was exhausted, his Awen reserves critically low, but he was screaming with fanatical fury. He threw wind spell after wind spell at the demon, drawing its attention, buying time for the survivors to flee.
In the commotion, a group of Serpent knights spotted Norvin dragging the prisoner toward the exit.
"Norvin! Come on!" a knight shouted. "Let's get out!"
Norvin nodded, hauling the Red Ghost through the rubble.
As they emerged into the cool night air of the courtyard, away from the slaughter, the knights paused to catch their breath.
A female Serpent knight looked at the woman Norvin was carrying. She squinted, wiping soot from her eyes.
"Who is she?" the knight asked.
Norvin didn't answer. He kept walking, his grip tight on the woman's fragile arm.
"Doesn't matter," another knight panted. "Just run. That thing inside... it's killing everyone."
They moved further away. From the corner of their eyes, they could see flashes of green light inside the tower as Aegis fought the demon.
Suddenly, a Serpent veteran stopped. He grabbed Norvin's shoulder.
"Wait."
The veteran looked at the Red Ghost's face, now illuminated by the moonlight. His eyes widened.
"I recognize her," he whispered. "Norvin... drop her."
Norvin stiffened. "No."
"DROP HER!" the veteran shouted, drawing his sword. "She is a dangerous criminal!"
The other Serpents, confused but trusting their veteran, drew their weapons. They surrounded Norvin and the frail woman.
"Leave her," the veteran commanded. "Step away."
Norvin didn't budge. He had guessed who she was. He had discussed this with Thane. He knew the risks.
At that moment, Mat limped into the circle. He was battered, covered in dust, but his authority was intact.
He looked at the woman. His face went pale.
"Put the woman down, Norvin," Mat said, his voice deadly serious. "She is dangerous."
The Red Ghost looked up at Norvin. "Leave me," she whispered. "Save yourself, boy."
"No," Norvin said.
"She is Xylia," Mat announced, the name hanging in the air like a curse. "A Phantom Cipher. The previous Captain of the Hex-Born Crows. And the greatest traitor in the history of the Roric Kingdom."
Norvin's mind went blank.
'Captain. Traitor. Xylia.'
The words hammered into his skull. He knew she was important. He knew she was powerful. But a former Captain? A Phantom? She was a legend, and now she was a broken doll in the dirt.
Xylia looked at Norvin with sad eyes. "Leave me, boy. You can't get out of this. I am a traitor."
"Hand her over," Mat ordered. He signaled a knight. "Take her."
The knight reached out to grab Xylia.
"NO!"
Norvin shoved the knight back hard enough to make the man stumble. He stood in front of Xylia, raising both axes.
The Serpents gasped. A slave raising a weapon against a Knight?
"She is with me!" Norvin shouted. "She is under my protection!"
His heart was hammering against his ribs, but it wasn't fear. It was something else.
For his entire life, Norvin had been the one cowering. He had been the one waiting for a savior, waiting for Remus, waiting for Thane. He had been a leaf in the wind.
But now? Now he stood between the world and this broken woman.
He looked at the knights surrounding him—men who were supposed to be his allies. He realized they didn't care about Xylia. They cared about the bounty. They cared about the glory.
'They are vultures', Norvin thought, the realization burning hot in his chest. 'And I am the only shield she has.'
To protect her... it meant defying the Kingdom. It meant defying Mat. It meant he was no longer a tool following orders. He was a man making a choice.
This feeling... this weight in his hands... it was heavy, but it was right. It was the burden of choice.
"Norvin," Mat warned, stepping closer, his hand on his sword hilt. "She is a criminal. There is a death warrant on her head. Do not throw your life away for a traitor."
"Killing her means a huge merit!" one knight shouted, greed entering his eyes.
"The Lord Captain will reward us!" another added, stepping closer.
Little did they know, it was Thane's idea to let her out. They thought they were being loyal, but they were just being greedy.
The circle tightened. Swords were raised. The metallic ring of steel being drawn filled the air.
Norvin looked around. He was surrounded.
He looked down at Xylia. She wasn't a traitor to him. She was the woman who saved him.
'I won't let her die in the mud', Norvin vowed silently. 'I won't let them butcher her for a medal.'
He tightened his grip on his axes.
"Come and get her," Norvin snarled.
But he knew he couldn't win a fight against twenty knights and Lord Mat.
'Run.'
Norvin channeled his Numen. He jumped.
He cleared the heads of the knights, landing on a broken pillar, then springing toward the trees.
"GET HIM!" Mat roared. "He's helping the traitor! Kill them both!"
Norvin ran. But he was tired. He was carrying a dead weight. His lungs burned.
Mat, despite his injuries, was fast. He was a Vortex Nexus. He surged forward, cutting off Norvin's path.
Mat reached out and grabbed Xylia's arm, pulling hard.
Xylia, weak and exhausted, was ripped from Norvin's grasp. She fell to the ground hard, crying out in pain.
"NO!" Norvin screamed, skidding to a halt and turning back.
Mat raised his broadsword. The moonlight glinted off the steel. He wasn't hesitating. He was going to execute her right there.
"Traitor!" Mat yelled, bringing the blade down.
Norvin lunged, but he was too far. He stretched his hand out, a scream dying in his throat. 'I failed. I failed.'
"LEAVE HER."
The voice wasn't loud. It was heavy. It dropped onto the clearing like an anvil, crushing the intent of every man present.
Mat froze mid-swing. The blade hovered inches from Xylia's neck.
Thane Cladaron walked out of the shadows.
He was covered in blood—most of it not his own. He dragged his Redstone Axes behind him, carving deep lines in the dirt.
The Serpents looked at him, confused. Why was he stopping them?
"Captain?" Mat asked, bewildered, lowering his sword but not sheathing it. "She... she is the Traitor Xylia. There is a death warrant... killing her would be a service to the Crown."
"I know who she is," Thane said calmly.
He looked at his men. They were standing around, ogling a prisoner while a demon rampaged inside.
"The Demon, Aegis, and Cahir are inside," Thane said, his voice rising to a shout that shook the leaves on the trees. "The mission isn't completed yet! Why are you wasting time?!"
He pointed at the tower with a blood-soaked axe.
"You ran away from the demon? Cowards! Go back inside! Kill the Bronze Knights! Kill the Wanderers! Kill anything that moves!"
The Serpents hesitated. They were terrified of the demon. They didn't want to go back into that hellhole.
"Captain," Mat stammered. "But... what about the traitor? We should execute her..."
Thane stepped closer to Mat. His eyes were voids.
"We will kill her after the mission," Thane lied smoothly. "For now, let her be with Norvin. He captured her. He keeps her."
Thane leaned in, his voice dropping to a lethal whisper.
"Now... GO. Or die by my hand right here."
The threat was real. The Serpents scrambled. They didn't want to face the demon, but they would rather face a beast than an angry Thane. Even Mat, casting one last suspicious look at Xylia, sheathed his sword and ran back toward the tower.
The clearing emptied.
Thane walked up to Norvin and Xylia.
He looked down at the woman in the dirt.
"You haven't changed," Xylia whispered, looking up at him. "Same old ruthless bastard."
Thane's expression softened. The monster vanished, replaced by something almost... human.
"But you have changed a lot," Thane replied quietly. "A noble like you... covered in dirt."
Xylia giggled. It was a weak, raspy sound. "Oh Thane..."
Thane stared at her face. His shoulders relaxed. For the first time in years, the tension that constantly coiled inside him seemed to unwind. He had done it. She was out.
He smiled. A genuine smile.
"Thank Norvin," Thane said, nodding at the boy.
Xylia looked at Norvin, with a heartfelt smile on her face. "Yes... of course. Norvin, my boy... I owe you a lot."
Norvin didn't reply. He was stunned. He was watching Thane. He had never seen the Captain look like this. No one had never seen him smile without malice.
Norvin realized then that this was not just a mission for Thane. This was personal. This was love, or loyalty, or something deeper than the Kingdom itself.
Thane looked at Norvin.
"You have done your side of the job," Thane said.
He turned toward the tower, where the roars of the demon were getting louder.
"Now stay back," Thane said, lifting his Redstone Axes. "And watch me."