Soon enough, the outpost, which had seemed a scar from the outside, revealed itself to Liam as a frantic, fractured organism.
In the hours following Koth's grim endorsement, a new, sharp energy pulsed through its veins—the energy of a desperate, focused purpose.
Liam's first stop was the engineers' pit, a chaotic trench filled with the smell of sulfur, scorched metal, and demonic sweat.
Varg was already there, his lean form radiating hostility as he oversaw a team of hulking demons with arms like granite.
"The human's fanciful ideas," Varg snarled to the lead engineer, a grizzled old demon missing one horn. "We are to become ditch-diggers and trap-setters. He wants screams."
The lead engineer, Grish, wiped a greasy claw across his brow, his single tusk lifting in what might have been a smirk.
"Screams, I can do. Simpler than your fancy flanking maneuvers, Lieutenant." He turned his bored, practical gaze to Liam. "The ridge path. You want them to fall?"
"I want them hesitating," Liam corrected, his voice cutting through the clangor. He ignored Varg, focusing entirely on Grish.
The Cognitor fed him data on material strengths and structural stress points.
"The pits are the opening act. The main event is the rockfall. Can you rig the overhang at the crest to drop on a signal?"
Grish squinted, looking from Liam to the distant ridge, his mind visibly working. "Aye. The bedrock's unstable there. A few controlled charges… but the signal? A shouted command won't carry."
"You won't need to shout," Liam said. He focused inward, feeling the embers of Hell's Flame in his core.
He extended a hand, and a single, tiny wisp of black-and-crimson fire, no larger than a sparrow, danced above his palm. It gave off no heat, only a malevolent, silent light.
"This will be your signal. When you see this flame bloom at the crest, you blow the charges."
The engineers stared, their hostility momentarily replaced by a wary fascination.
Varg looked disgusted. "Parlor tricks."
Grish, however, gave a slow, appreciative nod. "A clear signal. I can work with that." He turned and bellowed at his crew, his voice full of newfound vigor. "You heard the… strategist! Get the drill-spikes! We're gardening today, boys! Planting screams!"
As Liam turned to leave, Varg stepped into his path. "You think a few fireworks and falling rocks will win a war?"
"No," Liam said, his gaze cold and level. "I think fear will. And you're in charge of building the fear, Lieutenant. Don't disappoint your Commander."
He moved past the sputtering Varg, leaving him surrounded by demons now eagerly preparing their implements of terror.
---
His next destination was a silent quadrant of the outpost, a place even the ambient noise of the fortress seemed to avoid.
This was the domain of the Shadow Claws.
They were not soldiers.
They were instruments. Five of them, waiting in a shallow, shadow-drenched trench. They wore no heavy armor, only close-fitting, matte-black leathers that drank the light.
Their horns were filed to smooth, non-reflective nubs. They didn't speak. Their eyes, reflecting the dim light like a predator's, tracked Liam's every move as he approached with Zara.
[Shadow Claw Unit - Designation: Reapers]
[Emotional State: Absolute Focus. Suppressed Bloodlust.]
[Belief: 0%]
[Loyalty (to Koth): 98%]
Zara stood beside him, her data-board in hand. "The team. Their objective, as you outlined: infiltration and silent elimination of patrols in Sector Gamma, between the enemy's forward camp and our walls."
Liam looked at them. They were the sharpest scalpel in his plan. They were also the most likely to be sacrificed if it failed.
"The Paladin patrols run on a fixed schedule," Zara continued. "They are overconfident. They believe the darkness is their ally because their sigils glow. A fatal error."
One of the Claws, a female with a scar bisecting her lip, tilted her head. Her voice was a whisper of sand on stone.
"Glowing targets. Easier to find."
A grim chuckle rippled through the others.
Liam stepped forward.
"Your mission isn't to kill. Not primarily." The Claws went still, their predatory focus sharpening on him.
"It's to make them disappear. No bodies. No noise. If you can drag a paladin into the shadows without his partner ten feet away noticing, you win. I want their command to count heads at dawn and come up short. I want them to wonder if the darkness is eating their men."
The lead Claw, the one with the scar, studied him.
The 0% Belief didn't waver, but a spark of professional interest ignited in her eyes. This was a different kind of hunt. More subtle and far more cruel.
"We can do that," she whispered.
"Good." Liam held her gaze. "You move at my signal. The same as the engineers."
He didn't summon a flame for them.
He simply met their feral stares with his own, which held a coldness that rivaled theirs.
He was not their friend or their lord.
Not yet.
He was the architect of a new kind of violence, and they were the instruments. It was a language they understood.
---
As dusk began to bleed into true night, Liam found a quiet vantage point on the inner wall, away from the main sentry posts.
He watched the final preparations unfold like a dark ballet.
He saw Grish and his engineers, tiny figures on the distant ridge, carefully placing their "props."
He saw the Shadow Claws, mere flickers of deeper shadow, melting into the rocks at the outpost's base, becoming one with the coming night.
And he saw the reaction of the ordinary soldiers. The disbelief was still there, a thick fog in the air.
[Collective Belief Average: - 25%]
But it was now laced with something new: a nervous, fearful anticipation. They saw the frantic activity, the grim purpose on the faces of the specialists.
They didn't believe in him, but they could no longer ignore the storm he was brewing. Whispers slithered through the ranks.
"The human is using hellfire as a signal…"
"The Claws are hunting tonight. They say he wants ghosts, not corpses…"
"Grish is building a death-trap on the ridge…"
They were afraid. But for the first time, the fear was not solely of the paladins. It was also of the unknown variable in their midst.
It was of the script he was writing for the coming night.
Liam's hand rested on the cool, non-reflective black metal of Igar's Shard.
The props were in place. The stage was set. The actors knew their parts.
Now, all that was left was for the audience—the Paladin-Commander and his army of light—to take their seats.
The horror story was ready for its premiere.