The cold light of the underground corridors vibrated as if always on the verge of failing.
Éreon walked in silence, steps far too light for someone carrying that much weight on his shoulders.
The air down there smelled of old iron, burnt oil… and of a past buried by force.
The human military base — built during the first desperate attempts to kill gods — felt like a tomb someone insisted on keeping alive.
And it was there that he saw her.
A Crimson Lady Armor.
Raised on its metal stand, tall, elegant, and threatening, it seemed to pulse to its own rhythm — like ancient crystallized blood still stubborn enough not to die.
The cold light trembled at the edges, as if afraid to reveal too much.
Ekaterina stood still before it.
Firm shoulders.
Hard gaze.
She wasn't admiring the metal… but measuring it, like someone facing a memory they never asked to carry.
Éreon's shadow stretched across the room before his voice ever did.
"Curious…" he said, slow steps, contained echo. "You insist you don't care for human relics, and yet every time I come here, I find you in front of this one. That feels more… intimate than a habit."
Ekaterina didn't turn her face.
Didn't offer a smile, nor a deflection.
She just breathed — deep, controlled, military.
"I don't like it." Her voice was firm, without hesitation. "But this armor… this one almost killed a god without ever having been fully activated."
Éreon tilted his head, not in surprise, but in recognition.
That look of his… heavy, inevitable.
As if everything he touched was an omen.
She finally turned to face him, posture straight, constant evaluation — as if she were measuring a potential enemy, even if that wasn't exactly what he was.
"So you're done up there," she said. "And you're calm. Too calm for someone who sent his own brother into the lion's den."
Éreon released a soft sigh, but it seemed to distort the air.
"My brother grew up. And I'm not his leash. If he chose to face monsters… then he must learn to distinguish the ones who walk under the light from the ones who hide beneath the tongues of men."
He spoke without hurry.
Without justification.
Like someone describing a natural law — inevitable, eternal.
Ekaterina crossed her arms — a gesture of discipline, not confrontation.
"Then listen carefully, prince," she said, each word like a war report. "The monsters this time have a name. The Abyssal Creed has moved. And when they move, someone bleeds. Those fanatics don't fight for territory. Don't fight for glory. They fight for the End. If your brother truly intends to advance through the East… he will run straight into Them. And they do not stop. They do not retreat. They do not rest until they tear their enemies apart."
She lifted her chin, sharp as a blade.
"And your brother… is a perfect feast for them."
Silence fell.
Heavy.
Cold.
Like stone sinking into deep waters.
Éreon took a single step.
One.
And the room seemed to shrink.
"I appreciate your clarity, Ekaterina." His voice was low but firm, dark and far too calm.
"The Creed… their rituals, their prayers, their blind devotion to the Void — none of it surprises me. But what you've brought me will be… useful. When I meet them."
"And as for the Democrats… both those who paint themselves in Purity and those who preach Liberty… they're just two sides of the same broken faith. Change the symbol, change the color — the stench is the same."
Éreon's gaze met hers.
It didn't challenge.
It didn't ask.
It commanded.
The air froze.
"In the end…" he said, almost in a whisper that seemed to scrape the soul, "the one who will come out winning is me. I don't enter disputes to lose, Ekaterina. I never have. And so I expect you not to forget our agreement."
A smile appeared.
Slow.
Dangerous.
Lethal.
The kind of smile that makes instinct want to step back even if the body doesn't.
He stepped closer; his shadow merged with hers.
"If you betray me… you will pay the price. And no—" he tilted his head, voice even colder "—don't fear the wrath of the Democrats."
Another beat of silence.
"Fear mine."
And for a moment, just one, the light wanted to die.
His shadow still hovered over her when Ekaterina drew a breath — not in fear, but in calculation.
She inclined her head slightly, like someone accepting a challenge… but not giving an inch.
"Don't worry, prince." Her voice was firm, almost calm. "If that ever happens, I'll make sure I'm prepared. But do not make the mistake of thinking I'm someone easy."
She raised her hand and pointed to the Crimson Armor.
"The gods who thought that… ended up like this."
The silence between them gained a different texture.
Not hostility.
Not submission.
Something rarer — mutual recognition of danger.
Then Ekaterina stepped aside, posture straight, gaze steady, and walked toward the door without looking back.
Éreon watched.
And for the first time that night, allowed a smile to form — slow, dark, satisfied.
He stared at the armor like one looks at a promise… or a warning.
Then he turned, still smiling, and left the room.
The metal door closed behind him with a slow, heavy snap — as if the base itself had held its breath.
And as Éreon set his plans in motion…
…on the other side of the Empire, the army marched under the moonlight.
Not in victory.
In survival.
A march that carried the weight of those who had seen too much… and breathed only because stopping meant dying.
The soldiers moved in mechanical steps, as if each were carrying an invisible corpse on their shoulders.
The night seemed to absorb their breath, as if wanting to swallow them down to the sound of fear itself.
No one spoke.
No one dared break the weight of what had just happened.
The world ahead was nothing but a gray wall, and the world behind… was something none of them wanted to look at.
And the post-trauma march walked with them — without hurry.
Without mercy.
The march carried on a few more meters — heavy, uneven — until a different sound broke the stupor.
Footsteps.
Dragged.
Faulty.
Too irregular to belong to someone whole.
Spears rose in automatic reflex, but lowered the moment the figure stepped out of the treeline.
Ryden.
He emerged from the trees as if they had spat him out.
Face split open, blood dripping down his arm, breath stuttering.
Even wounded, something about him still drew every gaze.
His light-brown skin was covered in scratches and dried blood.
His short black hair, usually marked by unruly strands like trapped electricity, now hung heavy with sweat and dirt.
But it was the eyes… the electric-yellow eyes that shocked them all.
They still glowed.
He walked with his body tilted, almost collapsing at every step, until he stopped in front of the formation — legs trembling too much to hold him.
Two soldiers rushed to catch him before he fell completely.
Zeph was the first to reach him.
"Ryden…?"
The name came out like a cut-off whisper.
Ryden tried to focus on him — the electric-yellow eyes flickering like a lamp about to die — but consciousness slipped like sand between fingers.
He tried to speak.
Nothing came.
Only a broken sound in his throat.
Karna shattered the silence with a cry that cut the air like a blade:
"HE'S LOST TOO MUCH BLOOD!"
The entire troop tensed.
Brianna arrived before anyone managed to breathe again, sliding between soldiers with almost predatory precision.
Her gaze swept over Ryden — quick, technical, deadly cold.
And then she saw it.
The edges of the wounds.
Darkened.
The edges of the wounds… darkened. As if something had altered the tissue from within.
Her eyes narrowed.
"…This isn't just blood." Her voice came out low, grave, shadowed. "He's been contaminated."
Karna turned toward her, tense, desperate, holding on to control by a thread.
"Is there anything we can do?!"
Brianna didn't hesitate.
"The wounds are mild. The contamination is the problem."
She raised her hands.
The air shifted.
The shadows around seemed to lean toward her.
"Phasmatos…"
Brianna's eyes glowed — that deep, cold glow that didn't ask permission to exist.
Green filaments, alive, pulsing, snaked along her arms like roots from a hungry forest — climbing to her fingers and sinking into Ryden's skin.
He gasped.
A broken, painful breath.
And then, between coughs full of blood, he managed to whisper:
"The wo… wounded… cof… cof…" he gripped Zeph's arm with fragile strength "y-you need to… kill… the wounded…"
The world froze.
Zeph widened his eyes.
"What are you saying, Ryden?"
But Brianna already felt it.
The magic flowing into him… didn't meet only poison.
It met something active.
Something multiplying.
And her expression changed — not to fear.
But to certainty.
Dark.
Cold.
Ritualistic.
She lifted her face slowly, the filaments trembling beneath her skin.
"Zeph…" Brianna said, voice heavy. "He's not delirious."
Then she felt another pulse.
A movement.
There, beneath Ryden's flesh — where nothing should move.
Brianna frowned, tilting her head slightly, like a predator hearing something inside the woods.
The green filament on her arm trembled.
Not from instability.
But from rejection.
Her magic was trying to pull away.
"…This isn't a poison reacting," she murmured, more to herself than to the others. "It's something… trying… to anchor itself."
Zeph swallowed hard.
"Anchor itself? And what… what does that mean?"
She didn't look away from Ryden.
Another spasm.
Small.
Subtle.
As if something inside had pushed the tissue from beneath the skin, trying to find a shape.
Brianna drew her hand back slightly, as if sensing the intention of the thing.
"I don't know what it is," she said, firm, cold. "But it's… growing."
The word dropped heavy.
Like lead.
Like a sentence.
Ryden squeezed Zeph's arm again, weaker now, as if sinking inward.
And at that moment…
From the wounded line…
A scream burst.
Dry.
Irregular.
Broken.
The kind of scream that comes from someone who doesn't recognize their own body.
Brianna turned her head, slowly, with the calm of someone who knew this was inevitable — even without knowing what she was seeing.
Another scream.
Another.
Then the sound.
That dense, wet sound of flesh giving under pressure.
One of the wounded arched his back in an impossible angle.
Another began scratching at his stomach as if trying to rip out whatever was inside.
A third cried and laughed at the same time, as if two conflicting emotions were fighting inside him without permission.
Zeph stepped back, breath quickening.
"What's happening?"
She didn't answer immediately.
The glow in her eyes intensified.
She observed.
Calculated.
Tried to understand the pattern of it.
Then, with the coldness of an executioner announcing the inevitable, she said:
"They're not reacting to their wounds."
The screams grew louder.
One body began trembling violently.
Another smashed his head on the ground, again and again.
Brianna continued, shadowed:
"They're reacting… to what's inside them."
The first soldier turned his face — slowly, as if something were testing the movement.
And his eyes, for a moment too brief for any human to register, seemed to seek the light…
…and reject it.
Something was beginning there.
Something that had no name — not yet — but which she recognized by the oldest instinct:
it was not human.
The air grew heavy.
Éon's shadow moved before anyone else had time to understand what was happening.
It wasn't speed.
It was inevitability.
The metallic sound — soft, precise, absolute — of the katana leaving its sheath spread through the air like a warning that never needed repeating.
He placed himself before the line, between the soldier and the rest of the formation, with the natural ease of someone forever meant to stand there.
Éon's voice came then.
Low.
Controlled.
But charged with so much authority it seemed to shift gravity around him:
"I suggest you keep moving. Before this decides to get up."
Éon kept the katana low, but its mere presence seemed to redraw the air.