The cold, Inhuman Insight—the perfect, silent, analytical void—shattered like a pane of ice, vanishing as if it had never been. The absolute zero that had momentarily frozen his soul was consumed by a screaming, white-hot inferno. Physical reality came crashing back in a wave of agony. His ribs felt like a cage of shattered, white-hot glass, each frantic breath a fresh, stabbing torment. The 33-year-old mind, his true mind, was fully exposed, and the panic buried deep beneath fourteen years of brutal, relentless training came roaring back with a vengeance.
He was a 14-year-old boy again. A boy who had just seen his friend, his only equal, his rival, his brother, blasted into oblivion. A boy who was hurt, exhausted, and now, finally, truly terrified.
He was alone.
The Bone-Knight, its howling shriek fading to a low, guttural rumble, turned its full attention to him. The Tainted creature was a towering, skeletal mockery of a man, its form both humanoid and horrifyingly alien. Its bones were not white, but a slick, oily black, fused and warped into a semblance of plate armor. A cage of exposed ribs pulsed with a sickly, corrupted light, revealing the faint, screaming visages of the souls it had consumed. Its skull-like face fixed on him, its empty sockets seeming to know. It had identified him as the secondary threat, and now, he was the only one left. It took a heavy, deliberate step, raising the massive sword of jagged, serrated bone that extended, as if it had been grown, from its right forearm. It was savoring this.
Asterion's 33-year-old mind analyzed the situation, and the answer was a cold, brutal, absolute negative.
I cannot win this.
His liquid Faith, which had felt so powerful just moments before, now felt thin and useless, a child's toy. This thing was a mountain of solid, condensed Malice. His "cold" state, his "Inhuman Insight," had been a fluke, a one-time gift from a moment of pure, overwhelming shock. He had no idea how to summon it again. He was back to being a "storm," and a storm cannot break a mountain. To fight this thing now, in this state, was not bravery. It was suicide.
His gaze flickered, his mind racing through impossible options.
To his right, the main Holy Knight line was a distant, embattled wall of golden light, locked in a desperate, grinding battle. He could hear their shouts, the constant, rhythmic clash of steel, and the high-pitched zzzing of the warrior-priests fighting beside them, their spears of light lancing into the horde. They were holding, but they were too far, and their hands were full.
To his left, he saw Kalean. His master was a whirlwind of molten gold, a true Great Knight. He wasn't just "holding on"; he was actively dominating three of the skeletal monsters. His newly-regrown arm, a pale, unarmored blur, worked in perfect, brutal concert with his armored one. His greatsword was a blur, parrying a bone-sword with such force it sent cracks up the Tainted limb, shattering another's guard with his shield, and countering with a Singularity-fueled strike that vaporized a third's shoulder. Kalean was a fortress, dismantling them piece by piece, but it was a battle of attrition. He was winning, but it would take time—time Asterion did not have. He was too far, and his fight was his own.
Behind him, a hundred meters away, was a mound of shattered stone and splintered wood. The grave of a siege tower. The grave of his friend.
There was no choice. It was an instinct, raw and primal.
The Bone-Knight lunged. It didn't just step; it crossed the distance with a terrifying, fluid speed, its bone-sword slashing in a dark, whistling arc that tore the air.
Asterion didn't parry. He didn't dodge. He ran.
He poured every remaining drop of his liquid Faith not into his fist, but into his legs, and bolted in the opposite direction. He scrambled over the blood-soaked mud, his boots sucking at the gore, stumbling over the corpse of a Holy Knight he didn't dare to look at. He ignored the blinding pain in his ribs, ignored the howl of rage and offense from the monster behind him. It was a pure, desperate, and utterly humiliating retreat.
The Bone-Knight roared, a sound of fury, cheated of its kill. It gave chase. Its heavy, thundering steps shook the ground. THUD. THUD. THUD. Each impact was a physical blow, a shockwave that rattled his teeth, a relentless drumbeat of approaching death.
He reached the ruined siege tower, a mound of shattered, rain-slick stone and splintered, blackened wood. "Elian!" he screamed, his voice cracking, tasting blood and dust.
He saw a hand. A single, mailed glove, its metal scarred and dull, sticking out from under a massive, iron-banded oak beam.
"No!"
He threw himself at the rubble, his desperate strength making him reckless. He grabbed the beam, his fingers digging into the rough, splintered wood. His forged body strained, his muscles screaming in protest. "MOVE!" He heaved. The half-ton piece of timber, which would have been impossible for a normal man to move, shifted, scraping across the stone. He heaved again, and it rolled aside with a heavy, wet thud.
Elian was there. He was limp, his body bent at an unnatural angle against the broken stone. His helmet was gone, his pale, sharp-featured face streaked with blood and dust, a mask of stillness that terrified Asterion more than the Bone-Knight. A trickle of dark red leaked from the corner of his mouth. But he was breathing. Shallow, ragged, but breathing.
The THUD. THUD. THUD. was closer. The Bone-Knight was fifty meters away and closing fast, no longer running, but stalking, its pace deliberate. It knew it had him.
"You are not dying here," Asterion growled, the words a raw tear in his throat. He hooked his arms under Elian's shoulders, the metal of the pauldron cold and wet. He braced his legs, his feet slipping in the mud. "Up!"
He tried to lift him, and a fresh wave of agony exploded in his chest. His broken ribs screamed, a white-hot fire that made his vision swim with black spots. Elian's body was limp, a dead weight in heavy plate armor. The sheer awkwardness of the load, combined with his own critical injuries, made the lift a near-impossible task.
"UP!" Asterion roared again, a sound of pure, animalistic defiance. He channeled his rage, his fear, all of it, into a single, desperate surge of strength.
He hauled Elian bodily from the rubble, his back screaming, and slung him over his shoulder in a fireman's carry. The impact of Elian's armor crashing against his own shattered ribs sent a jolt of white-hot pain through his entire torso. He almost blacked out.
He stumbled, his vision greying at the edges, but he did not fall. He had Elian.
Now, he ran.
He forced his liquid Faith to surge, overriding the screaming protest of his shattered ribs. It was a crude, inefficient burn, a desperate measure, but it flooded his limbs with power. He was a 14-year-old boy, critically injured, carrying another 14-year-old boy in full armor. Every step was a fresh hell, a jolt of pure agony as shattered bone ground together, but he was not slow. He was a pained, determined blur, his body moving with a speed that defied his injuries. He was still a target, but he was a target moving with desperate, Faith-fueled power.
He ran toward the main gate, toward the distant, embattled line of Holy Knights, his mind screaming for Kalean, for anyone.
The Bone-Knight was right behind him, its shadow stretching, a predator toying with its broken prey.
As he ran, he glanced to his right. The eastern flank, which he and Elian were supposed to have anchored, was buckling. Without their focused power to break the Tainted's elite, the Holy Knight line was being pressed back, overwhelmed by sheer, grinding numbers. He heard the clear, desperate shouts of the Legion Captain: "Form on me! Retreat! Retreat to the wall! Priests, cover the rear!" He saw the golden light of the Holy Knights and the bright, flickering white flares of the Priests fighting beside them, a shrinking island of Faith in a sea of black. They weren't being slaughtered—not yet—but they were ceding ground, their disciplined retreat a costly one.
They were retreating because he had failed. Because he was running.
The guilt was a physical weight, heavier than Elian.
'I'm sorry. I'm sorry.' The words were a silent, frantic prayer in his mind. 'I'm sorry, I failed you.' But he did not stop. He could not save them. He could only save him.
"KALEAN!" he finally screamed, his voice a raw, broken plea, knowing his master couldn't hear him, knowing he was about to die.
The shadow of the Bone-Knight fell over him, a cloak of absolute cold. He felt the air displace, the sudden, oppressive silence as the massive, arm-length bone-sword was raised for the final, killing blow. He was too slow. He had failed.
"Child."
The voice was not a roar. It was a single, sharp, ancient word, spoken with absolute, ice-cold authority. It cut through the din of the entire battlefield.
A figure landed between Asterion and the Tainted, not with a crash, but with a precise, silent impact that barely disturbed the mud. It was a woman, but she seemed carved from the same ancient stone as the fortress. Her armor was a simple, unadorned plate of darkened steel, so scarred by a thousand battles it was almost black, yet it hummed with a power that felt as deep and solid as Kalean's. Her helmet was off, revealing a severe face etched with wrinkles, a map of a life that must have spanned centuries. A mane of stark white hair was pulled back in a tight, practical braid.
She was old. And she was terrifying.
The Bone-Knight, in its blind, arrogant rage, didn't hesitate. It shrieked and brought its bone-sword down, a blow meant to shatter any guard and the knight behind it.
The old woman didn't brace. She didn't seem to move.
She simply drew her greatsword. It was an unadorned, practical weapon, but as it cleared its scabbard, it blazed with a white-gold light. It was not the explosive, molten-gold aura of Kalean; it was a stable, solid, pure light, as if a star had been compressed into the steel. It was the Singularity, perfected.
SHIIING—CLANG!
She met the Tainted's blow with an almost casual, one-handed upward parry.
The Bone-Knight's sword shattered. Not broke, but exploded into a thousand dusty, inert fragments.
The monster froze.
Its arm, still raised, vibrated. The howling chorus of souls that animated it went silent. The Tainted, a 15-foot-tall engine of destruction, stared at the old woman, and for the first time, its pure, animalistic malice was eclipsed by something else.
It realized.
It recognized the quality of her Faith. This was not the raw, explosive power of a standard Great Knight like Kalean, who was currently wrestling three of its kin. This was something else. This was power honed by centuries of practice, wielded with an efficiency that was absolute. This was a level of mastery it could not comprehend.
The Bone-Knight did the unthinkable. It recoiled, taking a half-step back. Its Tainted spirit, for all its malice, was not stupid. It gathered its power, not to attack, but to flee.
The old Great Knight stepped forward, planting her foot. "No," she stated, her voice devoid of all emotion.
She didn't give it time to retreat. She didn't use a complex form. She simply swung her greatsword in a single, horizontal arc. It was not a fast swing, but it was absolute. It moved with the unstoppable, crushing weight of a collapsing mountain.
The sword, blazing with its pure, solid Faith, did not just cut the Bone-Knight. It was a perfect, focused, impossibly thin line of condensed power. It was the work of a master who wasted not a single drop of energy.
The blade struck the Tainted's midsection.
There was no explosion. No sound.
The creature simply… collapsed. The swing had been so focused, its Singularity so pure, that it had unmade the creature's core, just as Asterion had done, but with contemptuous ease and perfect control. The top half of the Bone-Knight, its shriek cut short, clattered to the ground, its power utterly and irrevocably annihilated.
The old woman let the greatsword's tip rest in the mud, its light fading to a low hum. She did not even look at the bisected monster. She turned her ancient, piercing gaze on Asterion.
"You have the squire. Get him to the gate," she commanded, her voice like grinding stone. "Now. I am holding this line."
Asterion, his body a map of pain, his mind reeling from the display of absolute, casual domination, didn't need to be told twice. He crawled, grabbing Elian's armor, and dragged him, inch by agonizing inch, behind the terrifying, ancient sanctuary of the woman's back, toward the safety of the fortress.