Draped in enchanted armor that breathes shadow, blades of black glass in each hand, sunlight swallowed whole. Hispresence is a smear of calm and power. Not death, but inevitability.
My stomach flips. This is it.
Kragna rises with a roar that shudders stone. Horns rip from his skull, shining gold like early dawn. His fists thicken, limbs barrel into muscle as black as night. He charges like a tornado made manifest.
I raise my rifle, knees snapping back into tension. I’m screaming on the inside but steady outside: auto-rifle butt tight to my shoulder, fingers dancing on the trigger.
Laertiez turns slowly, as if he’s been waiting. His blades spin, blades of night-red glass humming. He doesn’t move fast—but he means every inch of what follows.
I open fire.
Gun snaps echo, bullets flare like starbursts against obsidian armor. Sparks fly. Laertiez roars in shadow and steel. His scimitars catch the light, every strike ripping air, stealing breath.
Kragna slams into him, fist colliding with armor. Bones crack, steel bends, horns glow bright. Laertiez snarls—black smoke dusting between his lips. He drives Kragna back with the cascade of glass.
I keep firing, splintering stone, shredding the rubble underfoot. My blood hums. Smoke chokes me. I reload fast, every shell a promise.
Harriet’s voices rise—each head whispering poison into Laertiez’s flank. Bruce’s roar rumbles ground cracks, shaking dust from towers. Veeto whips around Laertiez’s back, dagger whispers light—but the prince of blood diverts him with a flick.
Kragna regains balance. He leaps forward, roaring fire and bone, swinging horns first. The hairpin crack of horn meets glass. Laertiez stumbles.
I sprint closer, adrenaline scorching veins. I slide behind Kragna, duck sniping to the noble’s flanks, half-bullets slidingthrough gaps. The sound—the raw crack of glass, bone colliding, rifles spitting fire—fuses into a wild orchestral chorus.
He’s cornered now.
But not dead.
Laertiez shields a hand across his face and simply snarls in defiance. His eyes sparkle with rage and unbroken death.
Kragna hits him again, wind ripped from both their lungs. Laertiez slashes back—his twin scimitars grazing bone. Kragna roars, shifting deeper: skin cracks, obsidian plates bloom, talons curve sharper. He pins Laertiez against shattered stone.
I slide in under Kragna’s arm, rifle canted. Crack of glass against steel, sparks that smell like ozone and torn wings. I mark his chest—where darkness glitters under smoke—and fire.
Laertiez screams. Not a death rattle, but a sound that fractures the stench of war. Steel sizzles. He staggers.
Kragna pins him—centaur-sized, breath blowing smoke. My heart pounds so loud I think it might shatter.
“It ends now,” Kragna snarls, voice twisting with something ancient.
Laertiez glares. The battlefield hushes as if even war respects this moment.
But he doesn’t fall.
He just smiles, cruel and broken, and whispers,
“Is it over? Or just beginning?”
The world slides.
Gunfire starts again. Elites in the distance rally. The human flank shifts forward.
I stand, shaking.
Kragna lowers me to my feet—arms still wrapped around Laertiez, horns glowing.
My hands slide to Kragna’s side, blood, dust, sweat, fear.
This isn’t over.
