The general's shadow fell across the field like an eclipse. Men fell beneath the sweep of his blade like cut wheat. The formation trembled holes yawned.
Damian stepped forward. He felt the crushing power in his chest raw, hot, insistent. He'd trained for worse. He'd tasted life and death in the jungle. But this was a different kind of pressure; it was the kind that demands surrender from a world.
The general swung. Damian blocked with his spear, the impact sending a jolt up his arms and through his ribs. He tasted iron and thunder.
[AI]: Impact force registered. Structural integrity of lance: 72%. User vitals spiking.]
The general roared, closing the distance. Now it was hand-to-hand; the battlefield shrank to two men and the space between life and nothing. Soldiers around them screamed and fought, but the center was where all eyes fixed.
Damian dropped the spear. He had to move fast reach and outmaneuver. He drew his dual blades; they flashed in the sun, a pair of cold promises.
"You want to test me?" Damian said, voice low. He advanced.
The general laughed. "I will make you wish you'd stayed where you were."
They clashed. The general was a mountain of muscle and magic; his fists could flatten shields and his claws shredded armor like paper. Yet Damian danced sidesteps, feints, footwork honed by countless scraps. Each cut he made cost him; each block bled him. He wasn't invincible.
A sharp strike from the general opened a wound along Damian's side. He hissed, but pressed on. The general's strength was monstrous, but there was slowness in it a heavy pride that could be baited.
[AI]: Warning user close to stamina threshold. Recommend tactical adaptation: switch to faster assaults to exhaust enemy.
Damian ignored the advisory for a breath and charged, slamming a palm to the general's face and driving one blade into joint and jaw. The creature staggered, enraged.
Heaving breaths, the field seemed to hold its breath, watching the human who refused to fold.
The general struck again a brutal overhead that cracked the earth. Damian ducked and rolled, flipping, catching the general off-balance. He found purchase, he found a gap. He leapt and sunk his sword deep into the general's shoulder. The monster bellowed, a sound that shook the bones in men's chests.
But the general did not fall. Instead he grinned blood and shadow seeping from the wound and hissed something in a language like breaking stone.
"You fight well, human," he spat. "But I am not alone."
Damian's chest tightened. The battlefield blurred for a heartbeat. The general's aura rippled and a dozen demon forms surged not to ally, but to curtain them buying time for their commander.
[AI]: Hostile reinforcements detecting. Probability of being outnumbered in immediate sector: 81%. Energy reserves low (user).]
Damian fought on through the swarm, every muscle burning. The soldiers rallied, inspired by his tenacity; they punched holes, they bled. At the center, Damian and the general traded blow for blow, each strike a conversation in steel and pain.
At one point, the general pushed Damian back so hard that his chest slammed into a broken standard. cold stone rising at his command, of the faces of those who trusted him.
"Not now." He breathed and then he pushed back harder than he knew he could.
The old warmth, the Spark—the Maker's flame—stoked. It flared into a white-hot pressure under his skin. The air above him shimmered. Damian felt something snap inside the lattice of his power.
The AI's voice did not sound like machine now; it was clinical and, briefly, something like awe.
[AI]: Threshold breach detected. Evolution node approaching. Energy flux unstable.
[AI voice softer]:
You can push further careful.
Damian planted his feet. He focused.
For a split second the world narrowed to the single idea of formation: compress, bind, release.
He felt the leveling happen like a door thrown open. Power flowed through him, not borrowed but earned—the next step of his path. He did not think of consequences. He thought only of the living and the dead on this field.
[AI]: Level Up — Level 5 achieved. Town-scale magic protocols unlocked. Spatial resonance upward. Probability of success in singularity deployment: 63%. User vitals critical threshold crossing imminent.]
A hush fell as the Damian telling everyone to go away and maintain a safe distance from the battlefield and as he was telling everyone to go he felt the rush of mana and knowledge flooding his mind and body, then slowly he starts to fly above in the sky and after reaching reaching a safe distance Damian made a condensed orb of mana into a tiny marble of storm—no bigger than a fist, dense as heartstone, humming with the promise of ending. He rose, breath ragged; the general's red eyes widened as if to find new fear.
Damian whispered, quiet as a vow: "Genesis Nova Burst."
He let the orb fall.
It hit the ground and what happened was just terrifying the space itself shuddered. The orb unfurled into a black-and-silver bloom, an expanding wave that devoured the whole army of demons . The shock pushed men to their knees. The general screamed as the blast carved him like a canyon.
When the light receded, silence hammered the air. Smoke curled. The general lay crumpled, great blade broken, blood and shadow leaking. Around him, the living tide staggered and splintered—without their commander, cohesion shredded.
Damian hung from the effort, knees buckling. The AI's warning hammered in his head:
[AI]: Post-activation feedback—user vitals critical. Stamina -82%. Cellular strain detected. Recommend emergency extraction and medical attention.]
The general, bleeding and broken, coughed. He managed a rasping laugh that tasted of ruin. "Impressive… human. You broke your limits, and you will be remembered." He coughed black blood. His eyes flashed with a dark amusement. "But you do realize… I am no master. There is one who waits… who knows your name." He spat a single word of recognition—like an old echo. "He knows… Damian Arkwright."
Damian's head swam. The general's lips peeled back in a grin, then the life left him like ash on the wind.