Rian followed the General and the gathering of officers out of the keep. They moved briskly through the corridors, arm reverberating off the stone walls.

  By the time they reached the external ramparts, the wind had picked up, carrying the scent of corruption through the barrier. Hundreds of soldiers were already lining the battlements. Archers tugged at bowstrings, mages traced the first lines of spells. But no one was giving orders. Everyone waited.

  Rian stepped up to the edge, fnked by Scarlette.

  “Probably just a migration,” Scarlette murmured, wrapping herself with her fur-lined cloak. “A few hundred beasts moving to a new feeding ground. We’ll vaporize them and be back inside for tea in ten min—” Her words caught in her throat.

  Rian’s breath followed. The wastends of Seraphia were moving.

  A sea of corrupted, half-dead monsters and unnatural pureborn mimics, all marching in the tens of thousands. Bodies packed so tightly together that the ashen ground beneath them bnked out completely. Drained flesh. Warped silhouettes. Bck veins threading through the mass in jagged bck lines. Shoulder to shoulder, emerging from the crumbling forest and stretching across the horizon.

  “That’s... way too many.” A voice near the wall whispered.

  “Goddess Seraphina protect us,” another said in a broken voice.

  “Eight miles! Closing fast!” Rian called out, using [Panorama] to gauge the distance.

  Scarlette’s porcein face had lost all its color. “How did they get this close? What were the patrols doing?”

  “They were waiting,” Rian realized aloud.

  The general turned and raised an armored hand. “Infantry captains,” he ordered, voice carrying. “Standard formation. Outside the walls. Now.”

  Soldiers surged from the base of the battlements. Thousands of men rushed to gather weapons and gear. Horns sounded within the fortress as officers broke away, barking orders. The gate began to grind open below as the fortress prepared to send men instead of shelter them.

  “Archers!” Rian bellowed, turning on his heel. “Range markers at two thousand! Do not loose until they cross it. Don’t waste a single arrow!”

  Nearby soldiers responded instantly, fear morphing into discipline. Bowstrings were checked again. Quivers adjusted. Rian pointed down the line as his Aspect fed him angles and spacing. Then he grabbed the rgest bow he could find and rushed to the top of the closest watchtower.

  He wasn’t a marksman of any sort, but knowing how to handle a bow came with the scouting job. He pulled at the string a few times to get a feel for it. Much lighter than he would normally use, but most of the men up there were only in the Nebu stage at best, meaning powerful bows were scarce.

  “Left fnk, you’re drifting. Close ranks. You—aim lower, you’ll overshoot otherwise,” He ordered from his vantage point.

  Scarlette had already disappeared from his sight, but her voice still echoed off the walls. “Mana discipline! No free casting. Barrier support teams rotate in pairs. If you burn out early, you’re useless when it matters!”

  Magic circles formed in the air as mages took positions. Below them, the first infantry columns marched out through the gates in tight ranks with shields locked. Frontline units—heavy armor, powerful aura, meant to break momentum and die buying time.

  Rian wiped cold sweat with his palms. He’d led men into worse terrain. But he’d never even heard or seen a horde of such scale, let alone fought against one.

  The light around him dimmed. A vast shadow passed overhead and slid across the ramparts. Rian looked up just in time to see it circling.

  The creature cut through the clouds in a wide arc, its passage leaving streamers of bckened vapor in its wake. Wisps of corrupted energy bled from its frame. Bck fire crawled along the length of its wings with every beat, igniting in sudden bursts that hurled the dragon forward in powerful lurches.

  “Dragon!” a young soldier screamed, stumbling back and dropping his bow. “It’s a Dragon!”

  The formation sagged as men staggered back. Spells sparked and fizzled as fear tore through the battlements.

  “Hold!” Hadrun’s voice boomed, amplified with his Aura to roll over the entire fortress. He turned away and sprinted, not looking back as he headed toward the stairs.

  Rian followed the General’s gaze and understood the hesitation.

  The dragon’s wings were easily two hundred feet across, scarred and stitched together with thick seams of bckened flesh. Jagged horn stubs jutted from its skull, one snapped clean near the base, the other split and crudely regrown. Ptes of its hide were chipped, fractured, or missing entirely, repced by corrupted matter that pulsed faintly with each breath. What color remained looked leeched, once-rich scales reduced to washed grays and dull blues. Every wound marking it looked ancient.

  Rian’s instincts screamed as he tracked it through [Panorama], watching it circle the fortress.

  “Shit. That’s a fucking Elder Dragon!” Scarlette cried out.

  The dragon slowed. Spreading its wings wide to halt its momentum. It let out a piercing roar that left Rian’s ears ringing. Corrupted energy condensed around its chest, coalescing inward in spiraling currents. The glow inside its body shone through the cracks in its armor.

  Scarlette’s voice was shrill. “Barrier teams—reinforce now!” She was too te.

  The dragon opened its jaws and released a concentrated beam of corrupted energy. It struck the dome. Light distorted as the surface bent, straining against the bst. Cracks propagated outward, forming a web of jagged fractures.

  At the base of the barrier, the horde reacted. The front ranks surged forward, pressing into the weakened section as a singur mass.

  “Rotate! Divert mana!” Scarlette shouted. “Keep it stable—don’t let it—”

  The dragon roared and breathed again. Corrupted energy tore through the already fractured point.

  The barrier flickered. Then shattered into motes of mana. The colors of life inside the barrier instantly began to dull. Pnts wilted before Rian’s eyes—and with them, the illusion of safety.

  “Contact at the breach!” Rian howled from the watchtower. “Archers! Hold elevation! Do not fire into our own men!”

  The corrupted poured through the colpsing barrier, heading straight into the waiting infantry. Their shields formed a tight wall. Aura fred along the line as the vanguard pushed power into their footing, digging their boots into the dirt. Ghoulish limbs smmed into metal. Bck ichor sprayed. The front ranks became a wall of commotion as bdes stabbed forward through gaps between shields.

  Rian nocked an arrow, coated it in aura, and drew. “Aim for the center! Loose!” The volley vanished into the horde. Bodies crumbled where they stood.

  Through [Panorama], Rian tracked movement beyond the main csh. “Right side! Flyers approaching! Second rank, track high!” He fired again, then pointed down the line, feeding angles and spacing as fast as his Aspect could give them. Archers adjusted without question.

  Down on the field, General Hadrun stepped forward. “All units!” he said, voice carrying all the way to the walls. “Keep formation! Hold the line!”

  The ground bent under his boots as his Aspect took hold. Rian saw it clearly through his own Aspect. Hadrun lightened. Stepped forward. Then vanished upward, shedding weight in an instant. He ran through open air with Air Step, a technique Rian hadn’t yet mastered.

  The dragon twisted toward him, corrupted fire venting from its wings. Hadrun met it mid-air.

  Aspect amplified mass pummeled the dragon. Its body was smmed downward, ripped from the sky. Both forms crashed through a haze of corrupted vapor toward the csh below.

  The dragon hit the ground and exploded into a puff of earth and ash, covering the entire battlefield in a thick cloud. The impact pounded a crater into the soil, the force traveling across the field in a powerful wave. Corrupted and infantry alike were crushed by its fall.

  But the dragon didn’t lie still, waiting for death.

  It dug its cws in immediately, talons raking through piles of corpses as it dragged itself upright. Its wings smmed down, sending dozens of men flying while corrupted fire bled along their edge and detonated in a violent surge. Bck fmes washed across the ground, igniting the surroundings.

  “Hold steady!” voices screamed from below.

  Scarlette’s orders echoed across the walls. “Third squad. Fifth squad. On my count.”

  Above the field, magic circles formed in a tight vertical array. Lines of light connected them, forming a floating pilr over a rge portion of the advancing horde.

  Rian felt the mana pressure shift all the way from his tower.

  “Hold,” Scarlette commanded. The corrupted surged forward beneath the forming magic, unaware. “Now.”

  The circles colpsed inward. The bst struck down in a wide section of the field. Corrupted bodies folded. Struck by an invisible weight. The impact fttened everything beneath it, leaving behind a shallow crater slick with bck residue.

  “Reset,” Scarlette called. “Wait for my signal.” New magic circles repced the old ones in an instant.

  Rian took a deep breath and raised his bow again, focusing on his task. “Do not chase targets! Anything that reaches the walls dies first! Focus stragglers and flyers. Ignore the dragon. That’s not our problem.”

  General Hadrun reappeared amidst the chaos. “Forward infantry! Transition to encirclement,” he ordered. “Shield cores advance. Elites—bring it down!”

  The line split cleanly. Soldiers peeled away from the wall and drove inward, shields locking into new formations as they moved. The containment around the dragon tightened, hundreds of men funneled it back toward the crater it had made for itself.

  The General stepped into open space and surged upward again.

  The dragon reared, wings half-unfurled. Bck fire burst along their edges and washed outward, forcing the nearest infantry to scatter or burn. Some died screaming, others pushed through.

  “Left side, focus! Don’t stack!” Rian barked. He shot another arrow, hitting a smaller monster in its neck as it cleared the smoke. The body tumbled into the mass below. “High targets only! Anything airborne dies now!”

  Below, the elite forces hit the dragon in a coordinated rush. Aura fred as they struck at joints, wings, the neck, every open spot they could find.

  The dragon answered their attacks with its own violence. Its tail swept through the encirclement, spping bodies away like heavy sacks. Jaws closed around one of the soldiers and shook him, crumpling his armor before he vanished in a shroud of bck fire.

  Hadrun reappeared, plunging down onto its skull with the weight of a boulder.

  The impact drove the dragon’s head into the dirt. The ground caved, cracks raced outward. The beast writhed, roaring as corrupted fme spewed from its mouth and wounds alike, setting the crater alight.

  Rian kept his eyes focused. He tracked movement at the edges, sensing monsters gathering at the foot of the walls. “Angle down! Don’t let them breach the walls!”

  Arrows punched straight down into the mess below.

  The dragon was battered, beaten, and losing strength. Bck blood poured from its shredded wings and shattered armor. But it was still dangerous. Still fighting.

  Minutes dragged with smoke and death. The horde was never-ending. Hadrun was still locked in a battle with the undead Elder Dragon.

  The dragon was barely staying upright. One wing dragged along the dirt, Its scales were mangled and torn away. Its breaths were short, and each exhale spilled bck fmes that forced its enemies to keep moving or burn.

  Rian could see the General’s fatigue too, even from the tower. His Aura was dimming. His impacts still nded, but the follow-through was weak. He was drained, and the dragon was still thrashing.

  Rian knew what an Elder Dragon was supposed to be. They weren’t beasts. They were people. They spoke, reasoned, wielded magic as cleanly as any Sage. Some wore human skin and lived among cities. This one did none of that; it was just the dying vestiges of a once noble being.

  It fought on instinct alone, power without thought, strength without restraint. Enough to level a fortress. Enough to kill a Corona stage warrior off a single mistake.

  The dragon tucked its wings tight and roared. Corrupted fire exploded from its body. Hadrun crossed his arms, shifted his Aura, and took the heat head-on. The fmes washed over him and split, bleeding off as his Aspect anchored him in pce. The ground around his boots fused into dark gss.

  Then [Panorama] noticed it. Something other than the dragon. Movement, lurking in the crowds, cutting through the smoke. It wasn’t the mindless frenzy of a corrupted. A sleek pale shape was slicing through the battlefield, low and fast, weaving through bodies with instinctual grace. It moved like it had a purpose.

  “General!” Rian shouted as he leaned over the battlement. “Your left!” His voice was lost in the noise.

  Two of the men near Hadrun turned at the same moment. They pivoted their shields into pce. One took the impact full on, skidding backward as cws tore through his guard. The second drove his bde into the creature’s fnk.

  Another presence was picked up through [Panorama]. Behind Hadrun.

  “No—!” Rian yelled.

  A second Pureborn came in from the opposite side, slipping through the dragon’s shadow. It focused, ignoring the chaos, ignoring everything except the man at the center of the field.

  Hadrun turned just in time to meet it. He tried to condense what little Aura he had left to block, but the blow tore right through it. Bck cws punched through his side and out the back of his armor. The force lifted him clear off the ground before the creature tore free and bounded away.

  The battlefield stalled.

  Hadrun dropped to a knee. He stayed there. His Aura sputtered out, and the wound wasn’t closing.

  Rian went still and his blood ran cold.

  Hadrun’s unit closed in around him immediately, angling their shields as the dragon thrashed again.

  The second Pureborn had already disappeared but Rian looked for it anyway. No energy trail. Just nothing where something should have been.

  Screams from below begged the general to fall back.

  The dragon lunged, jaws snapping shut where he’d been a moment earlier. Hadrun stepped aside with effort this time, the movement much slower. He threw one fist into the dragon’s snout and drove it into the crater wall.

  The beast wailed. Bck fire burst from its mouth and wounds, washing over the encirclement. Men burned. Others vanished under the weight of bodies as the horde surged again, drawn in by the corrupted energy.

  Hadrun raised one hand. The battlefield obeyed.

  “All units,” he said, voice resounding without amplification now. “Disengage. Fall back north. Full withdrawal. Leave nothing behind.”

  Officers repeated the order instantly. Horns sounded.

  Rian noticed it then—what the general was doing. His Aura condensed inward. “No,” he whispered. “He can’t—”

  “Now!” Hadrun roared. “Move!”

  The vanguard broke formation at once, dragging the wounded with them. Infantry peeled away in disciplined lines, shields locked as they gave ground step by step. Archers and mages covered the retreat, sending arrows and magic at anything that tried to follow.

  Rian followed his orders. “Pull back!” he barked down the wall. “Staggered retreat! Northern gate only!”

  He fired twice more, dropping a flier that crested the rampart, then slung the bow aside and ran.

  Behind him, mana pressure spiked. Hadrun stood alone in the crater, facing down the horde and a dragon.

  Rian was already halfway down the stairs when he felt it. He gave one st gnce between the thousands of soldiers retreating through the open gate.

  Everything colpsed toward a single point. The dragon disappeared first. The surrounding horde followed. Light bent. Sound vanished. Then... nothing.

  Hadrun had overloaded his Corona stage core, turned his Aspect inward, and crushed everything at the center of the field. He sacrificed himself for the retreat.

  Hytul was gone.

  The fortress that had stood for years inside Seraphia’s remains fell behind them, swallowed by corruption. What remained of its garrison fled north through smoke and broken roads, toward the outer fortresses near Aegis.

  Twenty thousand had lived behind those walls.

  Far fewer were running now.