The vibration came again.
This time stronger.
Tankards toppled. A chair scraped across the tavern floor on its own.
Someone laughed nervously. "Earthquake?"
Stonehaven didn't get earthquakes.
Owen didn't speak. He was already moving.
He stepped outside.
The night air felt… wrong.
Too heavy.
Like the whole town was covered in mana.
Across town, Lucius exited the cathedral at a brisk pace, eyes sharp. He pressed two fingers to the ground.
Mana.
Wild.
Unnatural.
Distorted.
Zach landed beside him from a rooftop like he'd been waiting for something to punch.
"You feel it too, yeah?"
Lucius didn't answer but his expression was clear he was pissed.
Under the city, something was circulating.
Not flowing.
Circulating.
Like a heart.
Back at the tavern, the tremor turned violent.
A crack split across the main street.
People screamed.
Cobblestone shattered upward as something enormous pushed from below.
Owen didn't hesitate.
He ran toward it.
The ground exploded.
A pillar of blackened flesh and bone burst through the street like a grotesque flower blooming wrong.
It wasn't a normal mana beast.
It didn't even look stable.
Its body was stitched with veins of glowing crimson. Metal fragments jutted from its spine. Its limbs were uneven, like something had been forced to grow too fast.
And its eyes,
they were layered.
Multiple irises stacked over each other.
Stonehaven turned from warm laughter to screams instantly.
Lucius arrived first.
He drew his blade in one smooth motion.
"Light Art: Sanctum Divide."
A pillar of pure light carved downward, slicing off one of the creature's protruding limbs.
The limb didn't fall.
It regrew.
Faster.
Zach whistled low. "Yeah. That's illegal."
The creature roared.
Not animal.
Not human.
Something in between.
Owen stepped forward.
Glauderia appeared behind him like she had always been there.
"Don't rush."
Owen didn't turn.
"I'm sorry."
She offered no reply. Instead, she simply studied him.
His mana wasn't flaring wildly.
It was compressed.
Cold.
Controlled.
"It's okay," she murmured as she walked by him coat and hair fluttering in the wind.
Owen's breath hitched.
The world around him blurred until only Glauderia remained, and in that singular, heart-stopping moment, it was not the commander he saw, but the haunting image of Lysa.
The creature swung.
A building collapsed instantly.
Zach flickered, lightning streaking black across his movements. He carved across its torso in a zigzag pattern, laughing almost wildly.
"Hey ugly! Over here!"
The beast's chest split open.
Not bleeding but,
Opening.
Inside it was a pulsing core surrounded by layered runic rings.
Lucius saw it instantly.
"…It's artificial."
Glauderia's eyes sharpened.
"Most likely a prototype."
The ground trembled again.
Two more ruptures split open down the street.
Smaller versions clawed their way out.
Stonehaven had just become a battlefield.
Owen moved.
Flickering through the chaos but not attacking yet.
Just observing.
The veins along the creature's body pulsed in rhythm.
Left shoulder. Right rib. Lower spine.
Three stabilization points.
He reappeared mid-air and drove Seishi down into the first.
The blade hummed violently.
The vein ruptured.
The creature shrieked.
Zach whooped. "That's what I'm talking about!"
Lucius didn't smile.
"This isn't random."
Glauderia nodded once.
"We move."
She turned her gaze toward the guild district.
"The source is close."
Owen froze for half a heartbeat.
Guild.
Rovan.
Suddenly another beast burst from the cathedral square.
Lucius moved to intercept.
Zach followed without hesitation.
Glauderia stepped forward but then she stopped.
Her eyes narrowed toward the guild hall.
Someone was watching.
From a rooftop.
Cloaked.
Still.
The figure turned and disappeared.
Glauderia's lips curved slightly.
"There."
She didn't chase.
Instead She looked at Owen who also saw what she saw.
"Go."
Owen's head snapped toward her.
"If you stay here, they'll get away."
Her voice was calm. Certain.
"Find him and kill him."
The beast roared behind them.
The city burned.
Owen hesitated for a second.
Then he vanished.
Flickering images tearing through rooftops.
Toward the guild.
-
Inside the guild hall, It was empty.
Too empty.
No bodies.
No Rovan.
Just acircle carved into the wooden floor.
Glowing.
Owen stepped inside.
The air twisted.
A slow clap echoed from the upper balcony.
"Well done," a voice said lazily.
The figure stepped into view.
It was guildmaster Cyrus with a terrifyingly broad grin on the face.
"You survived the first one."
Owen's eyes darkened.
"…You."
The Guildmaster adjusted his gloves.
"Did you really have to come back?"
Owen didn't respond.
The man sighed.
"We were hoping you'd die quietly. Saves clean up work."
Owen stepped forward.
Mana pressing outward.
Dense.
Crushing.
The Guildmaster didn't flinch.
"Well I guess I can start the cleanup work."
The circle beneath Owen ignited.
The floor shattered downward.
And Owen dropped.
Into darkness.
-
The street had become a graveyard of shattered stone and burning timber.
The prototype towered above the square, veins pulsing violently, its stitched limbs expanding and splitting like it was still evolving mid-combat. Every movement warped the air. Every step cracked the earth.
Civilians were still screaming.
Glauderia didn't raise her voice.
"Zachary."
Her tone alone cut through the chaos.
Zach landed beside her, black lightning dancing across his shoulders. His grin was gone now. Focused. Sharp.
"Yeah."
"Evacuate anyone still breathing."
He glanced at the creature tearing apart the cathedral's outer wall and sighed.
"Man, really?"
She didn't even look at him.
"If I have to protect you too, I'll be annoyed."
Zach cursed. "Dammit."
Then he vanished.
Black lightning ripped through the street in jagged streaks as he moved building to building, grabbing civilians, tossing them over shoulders, shattering falling debris mid-air with precise kicks.
The prototype roared and swiped at him.
Too slow.
Zach reappeared on its arm, carving a spiral slash down its limb before leaping away with three civilians under one arm like groceries.
"Ugly and slow," he muttered. "Pick a struggle."
Lucius stood at the center of the square.
Still.
Calm.
The prototype's chest split open again, revealing the rotating core. Runic rings spun faster, gathering unstable mana into a condensed storm.
It fired.
A beam of compressed energy tore across the plaza.
Lucius stepped forward.
"Light Art: Bastion."
A radiant barrier bloomed before him. The beam slammed into it exploding outward in a dome of blinding white and crimson sparks.
The barrier cracked.
Lucius' boots slid backward across scorched stone.
The prototype lunged.
Too fast.
Its mutated claw smashed down.
The ground folded inward.
Lucius vanished from beneath it at the last second, reappearing mid-air. His blade carved a perfect vertical line down the creature's spine.
Light erupted.
The wound closed instantly.
Lucius frowned.
"So it can control how fast it regenerates?"
Glauderia finally moved.
Green lightning streaked across the battlefield.
She didn't run.
She appeared.
One second she stood at the edge of the square.
The next her blade had already cut.
A horizontal arc cleaved through the prototype's midsection. The air split with a thunderclap so violent it shattered every remaining window in a two-block radius.
The creature staggered.
Half its torso slid apart.
And then—
It reattached.
The veins pulsed brighter.
Like it was adapting.
Glauderia clicked her tongue.
"That's irritating."
The prototype's body began mutating again as extra limbs started forming, skeletal protrusions growing outward like armor.
The ground beneath it liquefied from mana overflow.
Zach returned, sliding to a stop.
"Evac's clear in this sector."
He looked up at the monstrosity.
"…that thing is disgusting."
The prototype roared and slammed both arms down.
Shockwaves tore outward.
Zach crossed his blades in an X, black lightning exploding around him as he absorbed the impact.
Lucius skidded back again, boots carving trenches into stone.
Glauderia didn't move.
The shockwave split around her.
Her eyes narrowed.
"Fine."
The air shifted.
The sky darkened slightly—not from clouds.
From pressure.
Green lightning began threading upward from her body, crawling into the heavens like veins reaching for something beyond.
Lucius' eyes widened slightly.
"Marshal."
Her smile was thin.
"I was planning on stretching anyway."
The prototype sensed it.
It charged.
Faster than before.
Glauderia stepped forward.
The world blinked.
She vanished.
A second later the creature's head twisted violently sideways from an impact no one saw.
Thunder detonated across the square.
She reappeared above it, blade drawn back.
"Mana Art: Storm Dominion."
The sky cracked.
Green lightning speared downward in a dozen violent pillars, each strike perfectly synchronized with her blade movements.
Every cut summoned thunder.
Every step fractured the ground.
The prototype screamed as entire sections of its body were vaporized.
Unfortunately they regrew.
Faster.
Denser.
Its core rotated at blinding speed now.
Lucius stepped forward sharply.
"Stop."
She didn't look at him.
"It's adapting to your output. You escalate further, it escalates further."
Another limb lashed toward her.
She caught it mid-swing and ripped it clean off.
"I can end it."
"Yes," Lucius replied calmly. "And you'll drain yourself for whatever will be coming next."
That made her pause.
Just slightly.
The prototype's chest split open wider than before.
The core expanded.
Condensing.
Preparing something catastrophic.
Lucius exhaled.
"…Very well."
He stabbed his blade into the ground.
The light around him shifted.
Gold instead of white.
Dense. Divine.
Wind spiraled upward around his body as radiant mana poured from his back.
And then—
Wings unfolded.
Brilliant gold, layered like forged glass.
A halo manifested above his head, spinning slowly.
The pressure in the square flipped entirely.
Zach blinked.
"…Sovereign State."
Lucius rose into the air.
His eyes glowed like twin suns.
"Divine Manifestation."
The prototype roared and fired its core beam again—
Lucius didn't block.
He lifted one hand.
The beam split around him.
Like light refusing to touch light.
Above the battlefield, mana gathered.
Condensed.
Compressed into form.
A blade.
No—
A sword.
Colossal.
Radiant.
So large its tip pierced the cloud line.
Stonehaven went silent.
Even the prototype stopped for a momment.
Lucius lowered his hand.
"Heavenly Erasure"
The sword fell.
It didn't crash.
It descended.
Calm.
Inevitable.
The moment it touched the prototype, there was no explosion.
Just light.
The creature disappeared.
Not cut.
Not burned.
Deleted.
The ground beneath it carved into a perfect circular crater, with specs of gold light flowing in the air.
Silence consumed the square.
Lucius descended slowly, wings and halo shimmering away.
He landed lightly, brushing dust from his sleeve.
Zach stared at the crater.
"…You couldn't have done that earlier?"
Lucius gave him a sideways glance. "You were enjoying yourself."
Glauderia watched him for a long moment.
Then smirked.
"You've improved."
Lucius inclined his head slightly. "I had to."
The sky began clearing.
The immediate threat Gone.
Suddenly shockwaves erupted from the guild hall's direction.
Zach turned.
"…That wasn't me."
Glauderia's smile vanished.
"…Owen."