As the thunder of the mageia finally faded into a smouldering silence, the interlocking domes of the garrison began to break apart. Small gaps appeared as the soldiers tested the air. Finding no more fire and no sign of demon movement, the lockdown was finally lifted.
Tens of thousands of the Ragguard sentries stepped out from their shelters with tentative caution. Many leaned over the battlements, their eyes fixed on the abyss below.
In decades of soldiering, none of them had seen a sea of carrion like this. If they hadn't watched the furnace-field with their own eyes, they'd never have believed the reports: the lands around Ragguard were now a necropolis of over a hundred thousand demon husks, piled like slag from a volcanic eruption. The embers continued to slow-roast the fallen host, a process that would last until the last scrap of fuel was gone.
A few undead minions still writhed in the mud, letting out gurgling roars as the embers consumed what was left of their dried-out frames.
Leonis was among those stuck in a wide-eyed stupor. He approached the magis with hesitant steps, his face a mask of conflict—as if he were afraid that one wrong word might set off the mercurial wielder of such destruction.
In sharp contrast, the girl vaulted to Seraph's side with unburdened speed.
"Master! You were magnificent!" Rosalyn exclaimed, her voice ringing with a brightness that seemed to mock the surrounding slaughterhouse. "You've got to teach me that spell. You simply must!"
She grabbed the hem of his ivory mageia cloak, hopping with infectious excitement, seemingly oblivious to the brush with death they'd all just survived.
"If your men don't get down there fast to secure those carcasses... the heat's going to burn the loot into a pile of useless ash," Seraph remarked, his voice a dry rasp of exhaustion.
"Ahem... and if we do head out onto those smoking fields... I take it you don't plan on dropping another firestorm on our heads?" Leonis asked, his voice cracking with lingering hesitation.
"I hadn't anticipated this composite weave—a craft of my own design—to be quite so volatile," Seraph countered, his face clouding with sombre regret. "I tried to keep the destruction on the battlefield and within the limits of my job. For the fires that broke out inside your walls... you have my sincerest apologies."
"Forget it! You've wiped the horde from our gates with a force that defies reason," Leonis replied, his relief breaking out in a booming, jovial laugh. "It's me who owes you a massive debt. By the Goddess, we're going to mark this night with ale and a hell of a feast in your honour! Ha-ha-ha-ha!"
✧ . ✶ . ❂ . ✶ . ✧
Following the slaughter of the Arrowrain, the lands around Ragguard fell into a tomb-like silence. Inside the fortress, a fragile peace took root; as far as the sentries could see, not a single demon dared to move within the cleared perimeter.
The horde had dissolved into the gloaming like phantoms from a fever dream, leaving behind nothing but the stench of charred meat.
While Seraph felt a predatory urge to press the advantage and hunt the scattered remnants, tactical reality kept him tethered. Beyond the immediate meadows lay the Ancient Battlefields—a scarred expanse that served as the gateway to the desolate, abyssal territories.
Though the Crawler packs had come from those haunted ruins, chasing them in the dead of night was a sucker's bet. These weren't brain-dead undeads; the Crawlers were apex predators whose power hit its peak in the dark.
They were the Legion's premier assassins, and hunting them among the ruins of the old world was an open invitation to a silent, sudden grave.
Urban warfare and the cramped geometry of city alleys weren't the Crawlers' preferred playground. Their physical dominance only hit its peak amidst the thick demonic miasma of the abyss or under the absolute shroud of midnight.
For the armies of man, the pragmatic rule stayed the same: it was always better to keep a sharp vigil behind the stone, waiting for the demonic tide to break against the walls from the Ancient Battlefields—the scarred buffer zone separating the realms of light from the void.
The garrison might take a beating and the city might suffer under the lash of a siege, but forcing a push into abyssal territory was an invitation to total annihilation. This was a wisdom bought with a century of agonizing failure and the bleached bones of countless legions.
With the Crawlers and their kin refusing to show their faces, Seraph kept a tireless watch on the battlements, waiting for the moment the siege might flare back to life. Their disappearance was total; they hadn't left a single track across the smouldering meadows.
Still, this breather served the human cause. It allowed for the repair of the fractured curtain walls and the systematic harvesting of demon carrion from the field. For the Bloody Hunting party, it was a rare break; they'd been denied the sanctuary of sleep since this chain-mandate began.
As for the undead carcasses, they were the bottom of the barrel in the demon market. Most were just human remains, jumped back to life by the blasphemous spells of necromancers and demon cults.
Even though their bodies had been warped by the dark, they still held a haunting trace of their former humanity—unlike the Crawlers, who were pure, predatory biomorphs with no human lineage at all. Because of that, both moral decency and Crown law forbade any deep alchemical harvesting or structural use of their remains.
Nevertheless, the undead weren't completely useless. In fact, despite their pathetic individual worth, these carcasses provided a more vital contribution to the foundations of human society than the exotic parts of higher-tier demons.
The putrid flesh and dried-out hides of the undead were good for nothing but the pyre—mostly to stop them from spreading blighted plagues or lingering hexes. But their skeletons were a different story, hiding a wealth of practical treasure.
Beneath the rot lay sinew, bone, claw, and fang, each possessing a toughness that put the parts of common beasts to shame.
Undead sinew had a tensile strength so incredible it was prized for stringing war-bows and reinforcing leather armour. Their bones, tempered by the unnatural energies of the abyss, were harder than any ivory. They served as the raw material for masterwork blades and heavy-duty farming tools alike. Even the fangs, beyond being used as serrated daggers, could be turned into protective charms—acting as wards against the very curses that birthed them.
Furthermore, any demons carrying toxic stains were systematically bled. Their venoms were distilled into the sera and anti-venoms needed to keep the garrison alive, or woven into the fabric of offensive enchantments.
Yet, the most coveted prize from the undead wasn't in their solid remains, but in the ash left behind after they burned.
The ashen remains of the Legion acted as a catalyst for the earth—a fertilizer packed with minerals and mageia nitrates essential to human survival. This demonic silt had a potency that made even the richest volcanic soil look dead by comparison.