The battlefield held its breath.
Aden stood alone in a circle of corpses, his sword dripping black ichor onto the blood-soaked earth. Around him, the remnants of the Twelfth Pillar formed a loose semicircle—three hundred men where there had once been two thousand. Their armor was cracked, their faces hollow. And their eyes...
Their eyes burned with betrayal.
Sergeant Dain was the first to break ranks. The veteran took three thunderous steps forward, his warhammer clenched in white-knuckled fists.
"Look around you, commander," he spat the title like a curse. His hammer gestured to the scorched earth, the melted corpses. "This wasn't battle. This was butchery."
Aden's grip tightened on his sword. The memory of fire and laughter still coiled in his veins. "I told you—"
"We heard you!" Joric, the youngest knight, shoved forward. Tears cut clean streaks through the grime on his face. "You smiled while cutting down Ser Haldon! I saw you!"
A muscle twitched in Aden's jaw. The accusation hit like a physical blow. He remembered Haldon's face—the shock, the betrayal—before the flames took him.
A murmur ran through the ranks. Swords shifted in scabbards. Hands drifted toward hilts.
Then Captain Rhea stepped between them, her blade still sheathed but her voice sharp as steel.
"Enough." She turned to Aden, her gaze unreadable. "Give us one reason not to carve that demon's eye from your skull."
The air crackled with tension.
For a heartbeat, Aden said nothing. Then—
His sword slammed into the earth, sending cracks spiderwebbing through the ground. When he spoke, his voice was winter itself:
"You forget your oaths."
The words landed like a executioner's axe.
"You live," he continued, stalking forward, "because I allow it. You fight because I command it." His black eye pulsed as he stopped before Rhea. "The Twelfth Pillar exists to serve one man and one man only - ME."
A collective flinch ran through the men.
The words rang across the field, leaving a wake of stunned silence. Even Dain took a half-step back, his hand falling away from his sword.
For a long moment, no one moved.
Then—
Lieutenant Cray, his jaw still swollen from earlier wounds, let out a weary sigh. He sheathed his blade and stepped forward, kneeling in the blood-soaked mud. "We serve at your command, Lord Vasco," he said, his voice rough but steady. "Always."
One by one, the others followed—kneeling, heads bowed. Even Dain, after a heartbeat of hesitation, dropped to one knee, though his eyes still burned with unspoken fury.
Aden stared at them, the weight of his guilt crashing down like a physical blow. The remnants of Wrath's euphoria faded, leaving only the bitter taste of shame.
He swallowed hard, his voice barely above a whisper. "I... apologize." The words felt inadequate, but they were all he had.
The anger drained from him, leaving only ashes.
His knees hit the mud.
"...Forgive me."
The words were raw, torn from somewhere deep. His hands shook against the hilt of his sword.
"From now on, not a single person would fall under my command."
"I Swear to you in my name"
Silence.
Then Rhea's sword slid free. For a heart-stopping moment, Aden thought she would strike—
—until she planted it point-first into the earth and knelt.
One by one, the others followed. Even Dain, though his face remained stormy.
Aden opened his mouth—
The horns sounded.
Deep, bellowing notes that shook the very air. Every head snapped toward the northern ridge where the earth trembled under the weight of marching boots.
The Ash-Sworn had arrived.
Five hundred strong, their obsidian armor gleaming like a wave of liquid night. At their head rode Veyra the Iron, her infamous executioner's axe slung across her back. The mercenaries moved with predatory grace, their formation flawless—a living blade pointed straight at the Twelfth Pillar's heart.
But it was what came behind them that turned Aden's blood to ice.
A massive siege engine, pulled by a dozen armored warhorses. And chained to its frame—
The Rune Stone.
A monolith of black basalt, its surface etched with glowing crimson sigils that pulsed like a heartbeat. The air around it warped, reality itself seeming to fray at its edges.
Veyra raised a fist. The Ash-Sworn halted as one.
Her voice carried across the field like a death knell:
"This ruin belongs to the Iron Contract now. Walk away... or become part of its foundation."