The shadows of ghosts stood with their bows arched, fingers white-knuckled against the strings, lining both sides of the riverbanks like shadow centaurs poised to release their arrows.
Across the banks, the tall grass swayed with the night breeze, a soft, dry hush-hush sound that seemed to mock the frozen soldiers on the water. Jietang and his men watched as the enemies began to multiply, more and more shadows emerging from the reeds like spirits conjured from the mountain soil.
The air on the raft grew thick—not with the steam of the sewer, but with the cold, metallic taste of fear that coated the back of their throats. It was the kind of fear that made the heart stutter, a realization that they were no longer the hunters, but the prey caught in a narrow, liquid cage.
Then, just like the fireflies that had signaled their arrival, torches began to ignite. One by one, orange flames blossomed in the dark, stretching along the riverbanks in a long, flickering line. The light revealed the truth: hundreds of Magoli soldiers stood waiting, their faces hardened by the march. Jietang had tried to hide in the veins of the earth, but he had only succeeded in circling himself within his own motherland by Hmagol soldiers.
The "People's Princess" hadn't just arrived at the gates—she had already claimed the river.
The weight of their heavy armor felt like leaden coffins as the Paayasian soldiers stared into the dark water. They knew the truth: if they were to fall into this river, the weight of their iron would pull them straight to the silt, leaving them to drown before they could even draw a blade. But on the ground, they still had the strength of their training. On solid earth, they still had a chance of surviving.
Jietang watched the Magoli lines. He saw the hesitation in their arched bows—a stillness born of the fear that a stray arrow might find the heart of their captured Captain.
Using the orange glow of the Magoli's own torches to light his path, Jietang made his move. He raised a hand in a sharp, silent signal to his captains. They leaned into their poles, steering the bamboo rafts with desperate strength, pushing the vessels away from the center of the current and toward the tall, swaying grass of the left riverbank.
The rafts groaned and creaked, the wood bobbing under the weight of the armored men as they drifted closer and closer to the shadows where the Magoli waited. Jietang gripped his hilt, his eyes locked on the shoreline. He was trading the safety of the current for the brutality of the blade.
Siqi watched from the shadows of the overhanging branches as the bamboo rafts scraped against the muddy bank. The Paayasian soldiers began jumping off, their heavy boots thudding onto solid ground with a newfound confidence. They moved with the brazen speed of men who knew they held a winning hand. They knew the Magoli discipline; they knew that without a direct order from Chinua, no arrow would fly while Drystan was in the line of fire.
Then, Siqi saw him.
Drystan stumbled off the raft, his movements sluggish and pained. His leg dragged through the dirt, and even from a distance, Siqi could see the exhaustion weighing down the man who had spent years training him to be a warrior of the peaks. Seeing his mentor—the man who felt like a pillar of the kingdom—in such a broken condition made Siqi's heart ache with a raw, pulsing fury.
"Uncle Drystan!" Siqi's voice erupted, echoing across the narrow water, cracking with the weight of his grief.
The line of Paayasian soldiers stiffened, but Drystan simply turned his head. He looked across the small river, his gaze locking onto the seventeen-year-old standing among the ghosts in the trees. There was no fear in Drystan's eyes—only a cold, demanding clarity.
"Shoot me!" Drystan's voice rang out, startlingly loud in the quiet of the Ghost Hour. "Shoot me now!"
The Magoli archers hesitated, their bowstrings humming with tension. Drystan stared directly at the boy he had helped raise. Shoot me, kid, he thought, his jaw set in a grim line. We talked about this. We prepared for the day the mission mattered more than the man. I am already good as dead. Shoot me... and take them with me.
The silence of the Ghost Hour didn't break with an arrow; it broke with a roar.
Rushing through the disciplined ranks of the Magoli, Jeet moved like a storm. Mingle attempting to haul Daiji off the raft never stood a chance; he was yanked back with such violent force that he collided with his own comrades, stumbling into the mud. Before Daiji could even draw a breath of the night air, Jeet's heavy boot slammed into the burned man's chest. The impact sent Daiji flying backward, his body plunging into the river with a deafening splash that shattered the glassy reflection of the torches.
Jeet didn't stop. He leaped into the shallow, murky water, his hands already gripped tight around his beloved Katar. The sharp daggers caught the orange firelight for a split second before he fell upon the gasping Daiji, stabbing repeatedly with a rhythmic, vengeful fury that turned the water dark.
On the left bank, the world erupted into violence. The Paayasian soldiers, realizing the "human shield" of Drystan was no longer enough to hold back the Magoli's rage, drew their blades. Steel clashed against steel as the two forces collided in the tall, swaying grass.
On the opposite bank, the rest of the Magoli archers stood frozen. Their bows were still arched, their strings taut, but they were paralyzed. The battle was too close, too messy. They watched through the smoke and the flickering light, their fingers trembling on their bowstrings, terrified that if they released their arrows now, they would only find the backs of their own brothers.
As swords swung inches from his face and the air filled with the frantic grit of steel on steel, Drystan felt a sudden, hysterical urge to laugh. It was a cruel joke played by the heavens: he sat in the mud, begging for the release of death, yet both sides treated him like a piece of precious, fragile jade.
Every time a Paayasian blade moved too close, a Magoli shield was there to catch it; every time a Magoli spear lunged, his captors yanked him back into the safety of their formation. He was the most dangerous man on the field because of his life, not his sword—and he hated it. With just one slip, one stray cut, his story would end, and the hesitation holding back Chinua's full might would vanish like smoke. Kark City would fall within the hour.
But heaven has its own way of fooling with the lives of men. Drystan stared death in the eyes, unblinking and ready, and yet death remained a distant stranger. Meanwhile, those who had spent their lives hiding behind the massive, "strong walls" of Kark City—those who dared not look death in the eye—found their very existence hanging by a thread, held in the calloused hands of time.
While Drystan sought the quiet release of death, Jietang and his captains were fighting with the frantic energy of cornered wolves. Jietang kept a death-grip on Drystan, determined to keep his "Jade Captive" alive as his only shield, while his two finest captains—Bliang, Mingle and Nhia—formed a wall of steel around them.
As the blades clashed, the grim reality settled over Jietang. Whether they were on the raft drifting down the current or on solid ground, his small, battered group was no match for the soldiers of Hmagol. The Easterners fought with a terrifying, calculated precision, every strike powered by the hatred running in their blood from the fires of their past.
Jietang looked toward the water, where the splashing and screams of the river fight provided a momentary window of escape. His eyes locked onto a few horses foraging in the tall grass along the bank—mounts that had likely lost their riders in the initial ambush. He reached out, grabbed Drystan's back collar, and hauled the injured man to his feet with a violent jerk.
"Create a path!" Jietang's voice roared, cutting through the din of battle.
Bliang and Mingle didn't hesitate. They swung their heavy spears in a massive, horizontal arc, the iron heads of the weapons tearing through the abdomens of the four Magoli soldiers standing in their way. The sheer force of the synchronized blow cleared a bloody semi-circle in the tall grass. They rushed forward into the gap, their spears a blur of motion as they cut down anyone who tried to close the line.
Seeing the path open toward the horses, a surge of adrenaline flooded their veins. This was no longer a tactical retreat; it was a desperate race between life and death. Behind them, Jietang dragged the stumbling Drystan, pushing through the gore toward the only hope of freedom they had left.
Behind the retreating General, Nhia and a handful of loyalists held the line, anchoring themselves against the rising tide of Magoli steel. They knew their escape was nearly impossible, but they were soldiers of the motherland; they knew that eventually, every man's luck must run dry. Tonight, their primal will to survive was the only thing capable of matching the Magoli's absolute hatred.
Nhia's longsword carved through the air like a farmer clearing his brush, his blade reaping the Magoli soldiers who rushed him. The sound of his steel colliding with the enemy's leather armor mimicked a scythe hitting thick grass—a rhythmic, deadly harvest. Even as the hot blood of his enemies splashed across his face and the metallic tang touched his tongue, he refused to falter. He would not give them the chance to reach his General.
In the chaos, a frightened horse—startled by the breakout of Jietang, Bliang and Mingle—bolted toward him. Nhia seized the reins with a desperate hand and hauled himself into the saddle. He swung his sword in a lethal circle, clearing enough space for the beast to pivot, and kicked hard into the horse's flanks.
The horse galloped away, chasing the dust of the four horses ahead. Nhia took one final look back at his comrades scattering across the riverbanks, his heart aching as he watched them sacrifice their lives to buy him seconds of distance.
Then, the world turned sharp and cold.
A sudden, agonizing pain pierced the center of his chest. Nhia looked down, gasping as he saw two shiny, metallic arrowheads protruding through his armor and skin. Before he could process the wound, a massive, heavy-shafted arrow hissed through the air, burying itself deep into the back left leg of his mount. The horse shrieked, stumbling and collapsing onto its side, sending Nhia tumbling into the dirt with a bone-jarring crash.
The horse, driven by instinct and pain, struggled back to its feet and limped away into the dark, leaving Nhia pinned by his injuries. Laying broken on the earth, as his vision blurred, he locked his gaze onto the pale crescent moon and let out a wet, rattling chuckle. His luck had finally run out.
Slow, rhythmic footsteps crunched through the dry grass. Nhia looked up into the silhouette of a hunter.
"I would rather die... than be taken hostage," Nhia murmured, blood gurgling in the back of his throat.
"Who said I am taking prisoners?"
Chinua's voice was a blade of frost. She notched a final arrow, the wood groaning softly as she drew the string to her ear. The tip of the iron arrowhead remained perfectly still, centered between his eyes.
In the sudden, suffocating silence of the riverbank, the sharp thrum of the released string was louder than any scream that had come before.