The five assassins of the Black Crescent stood in the burning street, demon corpses piled around them like ash-covered ruins. The air reeked of sulfur and blood. Fires raged through buildings, smoke coiling upward like fingers grasping for heaven. Screams still echoed, but now they were distant, muffled by the stunned silence of momentary victory.
But they all felt it.
A new pressure.
Something darker was coming.
The ground trembled.
And then—a massive fissure split open in the center of the main square, sending cracks racing outward like lightning. Buildings tilted. The flames dimmed slightly, as if cowed by the energy that burst forth.
Out of the chasm rose a figure—a demon unlike the rest.
It was massive, over thirty feet tall, with wings made of chained shadows. Its body pulsed with dark energy, and around its neck hung a collar made of demon bone. Its face was an ever-shifting swirl of mouths and eyes, never resting, never blinking.
The demons that had survived knelt.
The assassins didn't.
Sei Lui narrowed her eyes. "Arch-tier."
Krein cracked his knuckles. "This is going to hurt."
The shadow demon raised its hand and screamed. The sound was like a thousand dying voices, and the air around it twisted.
Then it attacked.
The ground burst open beneath the assassins. Sei Lui leaped first, spinning into a deadly arc, her twin daggers glowing blue. She dashed forward in a blur, aiming for the demon's eyes.
Before she could strike, a shadow limb smacked her midair. She spun like a bullet through the air, crashing into a crumbled tower.
"Sei!" Copper shouted, blinking into smoke. He reappeared at the base of the demon's spine, twin blades whirling. He stabbed upward—
—but his swords passed through nothing.
The demon flickered.
An illusion?
No—
It was shifting realities.
Krein roared, launching himself through the confusion. His fists glowed silver as he struck one of the demon's shadow limbs. The contact exploded, shockwaves radiating outward. He grabbed the limb with both hands and tore it free.
The demon shrieked and retaliated, slamming its wing against Krein and sending him crashing through four stone walls.
Poison Arrow knelt on a rooftop, calm.
"Target mass: unstable." He dipped three arrows in glowing black vials. "Air-based toxins ineffective. Core disruption required."
He fired.
Three arrows, precise and humming with lethal energy, struck into the demon's chest.
A heartbeat.
Nothing.
Then a roar. The demon staggered, ichor spraying from its torso like molten tar.
It turned—eyes narrowing.
It knew who had hurt it.
Poison Arrow leapt from the roof just in time as a giant hand crushed the building behind him.
Then came the fifth assassin.
Still unnamed.
He appeared in midair, cloaked in both dark and light. His twin swords hummed—one crackling with divine energy, the other absorbing light itself.
He didn't land. He moved—like a shadow being dragged by the wind.
The demon swung.
The assassin wasn't there.
Instead, he reappeared above its shoulder and slashed downward with both blades.
Black ichor burst.
The demon screamed, wings writhing.
Sei Lui rejoined the battle, her body glowing faintly with runes. Her speed doubled. She moved like wind incarnate, carving runes into the demon's legs.
"Trap it!" she shouted.
Krein was already on it. He grabbed the runes Sei carved and held the demon's leg down.
"NOW!"
Copper blinked behind the demon, stabbing into the back of its neck repeatedly. Poison Arrow fired a spread of holy bolts, each one laced with ethereal poison.
The fifth assassin blurred again, slashing across the demon's midsection.
It howled.
Then—the demon changed. Its body exploded in size, becoming a cloud of screaming faces and jagged claws.
Sei shouted, "Pull back!"
But Krein stayed.
He punched the cloud. His hands lit up in a dome of kinetic light.
BOOM.
The shockwave disintegrated the nearest faces. Poison Arrow covered Krein with suppressive fire, targeting weak points that opened mid-shift.
Copper blinked into the cloud, pulling Sei out just before it closed in on her.
Then—
The ghost assassin.
He moved straight into the heart of the demon.
His swords burned brighter than ever—light and dark converging.
He slashed once.
Twice.
Thrice.
A pause.
The demon froze.
And then it shattered, its pieces raining like ash over the square.
Silence.
The city held its breath.
And then, slowly… the assassins stood.
The five shadows of Castle Loon.
The Black Crescent.
They looked to the rising sun.
Their work wasn't done. More demons lurked beyond the horizon.
But for tonight, Lareth City would live.