Nidhogg panted heavily, took a sip from his Flask of Crimson & Cerulean Tears, then surged forward. Before the knights outside the house could react, his Lordsworn's Greatsword swept through the air!
THWACK!
Through the thick smoke, Nidhogg severed Boscogn's cleaved head from his neck and held it in his hand. At the same time, he whistled.
White light coalesced again. Torrent the spirit steed materialized.
Nidhogg swiftly mounted, secured Boscogn's head by tying it to Torrent's horn.
Torrent shook his head unhappily, disliking the tumor-like head dangling from his horn.
Nidhogg fed him a fruit. That was enough to compromise.
"General—!"
The knights outside were horrified as they realized their general had been decapitated—and the enemy was making off with his head.
A loyal knight, enraged and desperate, charged into the flames to retrieve Boscogn's head. He was instantly engulfed.
His armor offered no protection from the fire. Instead, it trapped the heat, searing his flesh within. In moments, he became a blazing human torch, writhing in agony before collapsing and lying still.
The other knights recoiled in terror at the gruesome sight.
CRASH!
While the knights were stunned, Nidhogg spurred Torrent through the wall of flames, bursting from the blazing sea. They leaped over the shocked men before them and landed in the corridor outside the study.
Nidhogg stroked Torrent's smooth mane and surveyed the corridor.
Throughout Doldrey, the night was lit by countless torches. The stars themselves seemed beautiful, but the sound of horns and bells warned every defender.
Doldrey was in uproar.
The knights behind him, their fear barely concealed, raised longswords, halberds, spears, and crossbows, aiming at Nidhogg and Torrent. They surrounded him, shouting hoarsely.
"You can't escape! You killed General Boscogn—you'll never get out of Doldrey!"
Nidhogg hadn't planned to acknowledge them. But hearing this, he turned his head and fixed the speaker with a cold stare.
The knight flinched under that icy gaze. The man before him had killed General Boscogn. His pupils dilated. He took a step back, breathing heavily.
"You're wrong." Nidhogg corrected him. "Killing your General Boscogn is exactly what will allow me to escape Doldrey safely. Thirty thousand defenders? That's a headache. But thirty thousand panicked pigs running in circles? Not so much."
The knight instinctively wanted to retort, but his lips moved soundlessly. Finally, he choked out a single word: "You..."
"Let's go." Nidhogg waved at the knights, then squeezed his legs. Torrent leaped into the air, cleared the railing of the walkway, and plunged downward!
The knights gasped.
They had jumped from the third floor of the main citadel!
They rushed to the railing and looked down.
They expected to see a shattered mess of man and horse. Instead, they were shocked to see Nidhogg riding that strange horse, somehow hovering in midair on all four hooves—then leaping again!
Man and horse arced gracefully through the air and landed lightly on a second-story walkway!
Then they did it again, flickering and twisting through the air with impossible agility, finally touching down in the first-floor courtyard.
How is this possible? Everyone was baffled, their sense of scale shattered.
Nidhogg scanned his surroundings. Towering walls and battlements hemmed him in. Before him stood the gate leading to the inner city.
He hadn't only been tracking Persian's location that day. He had also studied the structure of the main citadel, mapping his escape route for this very moment.
A man and a horse falling from the sky quickly drew the attention of nearby knights. And with horns and bells blaring across Doldrey, warning that an assassin had breached the main citadel, the alarm was already raised.
The intruder—the villain—was right before them. Knights converged from all sides.
Nidhogg wasn't nervous. He leaned close to Torrent's ear. "Charge! Ride out of Doldrey in one go. Wherever I point, run!"
The horse whinnied!
Torrent exploded into a gallop, a thunderbolt tearing through the courtyard. A rain of arrows fell behind his hooves. Not one struck true.
Soldiers blocked the gate, but they froze when they saw the severed head dangling from Torrent's horn.
They barely recognized the face, split in two.
That... that's General Boscogn... How...
In that moment of panic, Torrent was already upon them. Nidhogg had sheathed his greatsword and switched to the lance he had taken from the Black Boar commander.
Skill: Charge!
FWOOSH!
The lance impaled the first soldier, but it didn't stop. With tremendous speed and overwhelming force, it punched through him and into the soldier behind, skewering them both!
The two soldiers screamed in agony, writhing as they tried to save themselves.
Nidhogg shook them off. They hit the ground with twin thuds.
Torrent stamped a hoof on one soldier's head, crushing it like a gourd.
Nidhogg looked around again.
Every soldier who met his gaze instinctively flinched. No one dared step forward to stop him.
He squeezed his legs, and he and Torrent burst through the main citadel gate into the inner city.
Soon, they were surrounded by a large group of patrolling Purple Rhino Knights.
These knights didn't know what had happened in the main citadel. They only knew that the alarm had sounded, and the figure before them was likely the cause.
They charged at Nidhogg. He met them without mercy, lance flashing.
In an instant, over a dozen knights crashed from their saddles, their bodies pierced by horrific, irreparable wounds.
These knights were Doldrey's elite, yet even they sensed the danger. This man was beyond them. They couldn't surround him.
They hesitated, hoping Lord Boscogn would appear soon and direct their actions.
Nidhogg realized that in the night, despite the torches and candles, they might not see what was tied to Torrent's horn. An idea formed.
He produced Pippin's miner's lamp, clipped it to his belt, and lit it. Then he untied the head from Torrent's horn, wrapped it several times with rope, and bundled it into a crude net.
More and more Purple Rhino Knights arrived.
They surrounded Nidhogg again, watching him do something strange. They frowned and murmured uneasily.
But what troubled them more was: where was General Boscogn? Why hadn't he appeared to take command? Was he wounded? Or...
The next moment, their worst fear was confirmed.
Nidhogg swung the simple net like a flail or a meteor hammer. Inside, they could dimly recognize the shape of a cleaved human head. Some knights' eyes went wide.
"This is your General Boscogn's head."
Nidhogg was blunt. He held up the head so the miner's lamp illuminated its pale, rotting, grotesque face.
"If you want it—come and get it! First come, first served!"