Kale stood amidst the cooling glass and scorched earth of the Inferno Hollow... his chest heaving in a rhythmic... pained cadence as the adrenaline of the slaughter began to recede. The silence of the deep trench was oppressive... broken only by the crackling of charred roots and the distant... rhythmic hiss of escaping steam.
He moved through the carnage with surgical efficiency... checking the pulse of each fallen Master rank agent to ensure their deletion from the world was absolute. One final flick of his mana-enhanced dagger ensured that the female Artificer and the noble recruit would never breathe again... removing the final variables of the ambush.
The golden radiance that had previously wreathed the ambushers was fading... leaving behind only the pale... empty shells of zealots who had traded their souls for borrowed divinity. Kale stared at them with cold... analytical eyes... his mind already calculating the next set of variables in this equation of betrayal.
