The battlefield was fire and ruin.
Smoke choked the air where once holy bells rang. Church battlemages were being cut down in tight formation as waves of Midnight Covenant units moved with clockwork precision. No mindless zealots. No reckless charges. Just cold, coordinated slaughter.
From her scrying platform, Bishop Meredy watched in growing horror as another squad was eviscerated. This one by a barrage of cursed knives hurled in perfect arcs, followed by an acid mist that melted armor like wax.
"These aren't cultists," she spat. "They're trained."
Tiran paced like a caged wolf. "This should've been containment. Why are our lines folding?"
"They knew," Archbishop Virell finally admitted, fingers white around her staff. "They knew it was a trap."
Tiran sneered. "Then we burn the trap closed. Permission to enter the field, Archbishop?"
Virell's jaw tightened. "…Granted. You, me, Meredy. Send word to the remaining Bishops: collapse all outer formations and tighten into the spire zone. Keep the Archangels on reserve."
"And the target?" Meredy asked.
Virell's voice lowered. "If the demon shows himself, we hold him. Until then we kill their elites."
Northern Courtyard – Moments Later
The sound of cracked stone echoed as Tiran descended like a comet, crashing through the wall of a burning wing of the temple. A massive flanged mace hummed with divine resonance in his hand. He strode through flames, burning sigils flickering at his heels.
At the far end of the courtyard stood Odin, dusting ash from his glasses, unimpressed.
"So they send a Bishop now?" Odin mused. "That took longer than I expected."
Tiran didn't respond. He simply raised his mace and muttered a prayer.
"Luminous, light of my blood, strike this shadow down."
A sunburst flared to life behind him. Holy projectiles rained down like divine artillery. But they never hit. Dozens of glowing runes lit up midair, intercepting the light with scalpel precision.
"Careful," Odin said as he adjusted the lens of his spectacles. "Light travels fast but thought moves faster."
The battle exploded.
Tiran closed the distance with the force of a meteor, swinging his mace with enough force to shatter marble pillars. Odin ducked beneath it, leaving a shadowy clone of himself behind that absorbed the next strike. As the illusion dispersed, Odin's fingers flashed across his left sleeve activating a runic glyph seared into his arm.
Dozens of tiny blades erupted from the courtyard tiles, each honed by thought and mana.
Tiran grinned as he tore through them.
"A challenge then. Good."
Elsewhere – Southern Basilica Steps
Meredy descended with grace, wielding a twin-helix staff that pulsed with harmonic spells. Her presence alone repelled the minor Covenant fighters holding the sector. But she wasn't alone for long.
A slow clap echoed from above as Phoenix stepped into view, crimson cloak fluttering, her ring glowing with the essence of the dozen lives she had already stolen that day.
"Oh, you're pretty," Phoenix said. "I'll enjoy wearing you."
Meredy's lip curled. "You'll find I don't die easily."
"That's fine." Phoenix smiled wider. "Neither do I."
Their battle ignited in an instant with Phoenix striking with twin swords coated in black flames, Meredy deflecting with rotating glyphs of song-magic that retaliated with sonic bursts. The two danced around each other's attacks. Meredy testing her opponent, looking for subtle signs of a pattern. Until she found the distinct resemblance of what she was looking for.
She lashed out with her attack, aiming where Phoenix was, causing her to jump back. However, Meredy was expecting her to do so. Phoenix steps back onto a glyph Meredy placed just moments prior, igniting the area with an explosion. Meredy scoffs at how easy her opponent fell.
Her smile fades as Phoenix's charred lips peel back to form her usual smile. Her burns fall off her to reveal new, smooth skin as she begins to laugh.
"Wha...?" Meredy asks in confusion.
"I guess now is the time to tell you that I meant what I said. For every life I take, it adds it to my own."
Meredy grimaces in absolute disgust at her words. "Absolute filth. I must do everything within my power to purge you." Her glyphs triple, sending out more sonic blasts than before.
Laughing manically, Phoenix rushed forward, not even bothering to dodge.
One death. Two. Three.
"Just how many lives have you stolen?" Meredy whispered, breath ragged.
Phoenix licked the blood from her lip. "Not enough."
At the Temple's Western Steps
Archbishop Virell herself led a squad of Light Sentinels through the heart of the resistance, only to find it evaporating before her eyes.
Shadow laced the air like ink, dancing on stone, moving unnaturally fast. Then a child's voice whispered, "Boo."
A ten-foot bear dropped from the sky like a reaper, slamming into the squad, scattering them in terror. Every Church soldier who saw it froze.
Fear.
Real, soul-rooted, spell-breaking fear. And with that fear came Lenatti, skipping across bodies, carving through stunned enemies with knives that glowed with a joy no child should feel.
"Spread fear," she giggled, "and he gets to watch."
Realizing what the kid was doing, Virell shouted a warding command, but it was already too late. Her unit had broken formation.
Underground – Inner Temple Vault
In the chaos, Church reinforcements tried to reposition to defend the vault, only for a chorus of screams to rise from the depths. Achlys moved like a shadow of inevitability through the tunnels, her knives silent, her poisons patient. The vault guardians had been neutralized before the alarm finished sounding.
And now…
She reached the mana stone.
She knelt. "So, this was the trap."
She touched the scripture-laced casing and hissed as her fingers burned slightly.
"They laced it for demons…" she murmured. "How thoughtful."
Behind her, Tempo appeared from a ripple in time.
"Church signatures are converging. We've got ten minutes before they collapse on this entire sector."
Achlys stood. "Then we take what we can and leave a message."
Tempo nodded, flipping open his father's pocket watch.
"For him?"
"For all of us."
—
Back at Aurion....
Acolyte analysts screamed as soul signatures exploded across their tracking glyphs.
"Bishop Tiran engaged! Meredy outnumbered! Virell's unit fractured!"
The commanding ArchBishop's eye twitched. "The Midnight Covenant are coordinated. This isn't a raid, it's a military assault."
His subordinate looked up. "Should we deploy the Archangels?"
He paused.
Then: "No. Not yet."
He turned toward the bridge window.
"We still haven't seen the demon."