Three solar cycles had elapsed.
Since that harrowing nocturnal incursion—where Ragguard was subverted by venom and the Crawler horde laid siege to its vital heart—three further nights had withered into the past. This marked the sixth dawn since the tenth airship's arrival at the fortress, signalling the grim midpoint of the second Bloody Hunting tenure.
In the wake of that slaughter, the fortress had begun a clinical census of its devastation. The ledger of the dead was far more substantial than their darkest prognostications had allowed.
The Ragguard garrison, once boasting a complement of one hundred thousand men, had seen over half its number extinguished in a single night of treachery and poison. At present, the north-western frontier force had been bled white, reduced to a mere forty thousand souls—a figure that included non-combatant support units.
Such a tally revealed a fortress in terminal crisis, its capacity to repel the Demon Legion fractured beyond any semblance of stability.
The demon hunters of the Bloody Hunting mandate fared little better. Following the conclusion of the Ruffbloom mission—their initial baptism of fire—their ranks had numbered nine hundred and fourteen. Now, they stood at a depleted six hundred and sixty-four. Those hunters who had attempted a premature withdrawal fared even worse, with over half their number claimed by the abyss.
These were harrowing metrics of attrition. While a casual observer might perceive the loss of a few hundred warriors as a minor statistical shift, the reality was far more profound; every hunter who had survived to this second tenure possessed a martial threshold approximately a hundred-fold that of a standard sentry. A single man like Robin possessed the capacity to dismantle several companies of Ragguard regulars with clinical ease.
To lose even one warrior of such calibre was a strategic catastrophe; to witness their systematic erasure by the hundreds was an agony that defied description. Both the demon hunters and the Ragguard regulars represented the primary martial spine of the Arkflame realm.
The reason for such catastrophic attrition lay in the opening movements of the siege; as the venom took hold, the demonic horde initiated a relentless slaughter before the defenders could even uncork their antidote potions. In those frantic moments, they possessed no martial faculty to repel either the Devilbats or the Crawlers, falling in numbers that mirrored the steady descent of autumn leaves.
Even after the majority had ingested the counter-agent, the theatre of war did not shift as favourably as they had prayed. Their combat efficacy remained fractured, far from its absolute zenith.
As they struggled to endure the lingering toxicity while desperately holding the ramparts against the undead tide from beyond, the toll upon both the Ragguard regulars and the demon hunters continued to mount with grim regularity.
Had Seraph not been present within Ragguard that night, the north-western frontier might well have been extinguished. Even had the crown eventually reclaimed the stones of the city, they could never have reclaimed the thousands of lives sacrificed to the abyss.
Though every Hunting Season historically exacts a heavy price from the Bloody Hunting mandate and the frontier garrisons, this cycle has proven to be the most ruinous in the annals of the Arkflame realm.
Across the breadth of Laurasia, other border forts remain under heavy bombardment; the Hunting Season has yet to reach its conclusion. This serves as a stark reminder that their terminal crisis has not yet dissipated into the ether.
Fortunately, in the wake of the absolute power unleashed by Seraph, the Demon Legion has maintained a respectful distance. Since the retreat of the north-western host back into the demonic territories, no fresh vanguard has been dispatched to test the resolve of Ragguard.
This stagnation has allowed the garrison a momentary reprieve—a brief interval to breathe and tend to their wounded. This hiatus represents their longest sustained period of recuperation since the siege began.
Furthermore, a coalition of relief forces from the neighbouring provinces is now within a half-day's transit of the gates. With the arrival of these reinforcements, the stability of Ragguard is expected to rise once more.
After Norak's subversion through venom and the subsequent nocturnal descent of the Crawler horde, a singular resolve took hold of Seraph.
He harboured a visceral desire to breach the Ancient Battlefield and the demonic territories alone, intent on scouring the remnants of the legion—those tens of thousands who had slipped through the gap of his solar liturgies.
However, his peers stood in absolute opposition, with General Leonis voicing the most stubborn and inflexible dissent.
The passage into the Ancient Battlefield, which served as a grim buffer zone, necessitated confronting the Toxic Trench—a vast, serpentine expanse of pestilence that girded the demonic frontier like a natural moat. This poisonous barrier possessed the breadth of a titanic serpent, functioning as a primary defence for the abyss.
Beyond the trench loomed the Great Thornwall, a giant palisade of briars whose height rivalled the ramparts of Ragguard itself. While it was acknowledged that Seraph might possess the mageia to cross such a threshold, the remaining demon hunters and sentry forces would be robbed of any opportunity to follow or extract him should he encounter a terminal crisis.
Indeed, the scouting echelons and sentries of Ragguard had never once breached the Toxic Trench or the Ancient Battlefield to set foot within the demonic realm. Every scrap of intelligence they possessed was gleaned by hunters who surreptitiously despatched enchanted corvids or winged sky-beasts to overfly the territory—entities specifically bred to endure the atmospheric blight and demonic miasma.
Furthermore, in the aftermath of the wings of flame engagement, Robin and the survivors had yet to achieve a full restoration of their faculties.
The venom brewed by Norak was of a particularly malevolent vintage; even now, the Necromancer remained obstinately mute, refusing to divulge the toxin's name or the specific alchemical counter-agent.
Consequently, the process of purging the residual decay from their systems proceeded with agonizing slowness.
Since the conclusion of the Ruffbloom and Crawler tenures, reports regarding the young magis Seraph have been relayed to Sanctus and the Arkflame Court without cessation. The visceral imagery of the conflict, captured by Observation Crystals, has been broadcast across the realm, allowing the populace to bear witness to the desperate struggle upon the frontiers.
The mageia skills manifested by the young man have defied all orthodox prognostications, necessitating a repeated re-evaluation of his tier throughout the Bloody Hunting chain-mission.
Owing to his exponential evolution, Eldra has formally submitted his candidacy to the Sanctus Council and the royal administration. The petition seeks to grant him an immediate ascension to the rank of Warlock, bypassing the traditional Magister examinations entirely.
Upon the conclusion of the Hunting Season and his return to the capital, should he navigate the final trials of the High Council, he will be invested with the mantle of Warlock in a ceremony of unprecedented magnitude.
This escalating strategic importance has rendered it impossible for Leonis and the Arkflame high command to sanction a solo incursion into the demonic territories without a dedicated support echelon.
The current theatre of war stands in stark contrast to the Ruffbloom assignment; during that tenure, the ten Arkdreadnoughts maintained a constant vigil over the Darkwood, capable of executing extraction protocols that preserved the lives of numerous demon hunters.