The radio voice didn't waver. It simply stated a fact. Around Vyrheim, military units continued the evacuation to the secure zones planned for years for this type of scenario. Convoys advanced under escort, sirens wailed intermittently, but it was no longer the chaos of the first assault. It was worse. It was the moment everyone understood that the last official barrier had fallen.
On the outskirts, the enemy army was methodically tightening its encirclement. Heavy armored vehicles formed a pressure arc. A and A+ ranks organized themselves in successive waves intended to absorb the remaining districts. Intercepted transmissions confirmed the intention: complete occupation, neutralization of energy centers, elimination of local resistance. Taren's death was not an end in itself. It was the signal to advance.
In the city center, the damage from the initial assault rendered every structure unstable. A cracked building threatened to collapse onto a street already littered with debris. Beneath a sloping slab, the old construction worker, the woman, and the child they had helped a few days earlier were struggling to breathe. Sigi watched the scene without a word. Ivar stood a few meters away, his gaze fixed westward where the enemy line was advancing.
There was no debate, no hesitation.
They adjusted their masks.
The Ghosts appeared.
Ivar left the center with a sharp, sharp impulse. The air exploded behind him, compressed beyond its stability threshold. At Mach 5, each impact with the ground generated a radial shockwave that swept away dust, rubble, and soldiers. The first A+ lines were thrown back before they could even identify the source of the disturbance. He wasn't trying to demonstrate theatrical power. He was applying a simple logic: eliminate any offensive capability.
Heavy armored vehicles suffered instantaneous deformation as the dynamic pressure generated by his trajectories pierced their hulls. Turrets were torn off, tracks pulverized. Ivar constantly changed his angle of attack to prevent any coordination. At that speed, his body became a kinetic mass capable of piercing a reinforced vehicle without slowing down. The impacts left only mangled wrecks.
The support units attempted a countermeasure. Too late. He had already breached their supply lines, destroyed their communication systems, and reduced their reserves to incandescent fragments. He left no room for an orderly retreat. Every regrouping was shattered before it could achieve tactical cohesion. In less than four minutes, the western flank ceased to exist as an organized force.
At the same time, Sigi remained motionless in the heart of the city.
His open hands seemed almost calm.
Within a radius of one hundred square kilometers, matter vibrated under an invisible stress. He wasn't simply moving masses. He was influencing internal structures, molecular alignment, the microscopic tensions accumulated in cracked concrete and alloys under pressure.
The building, poised to collapse, stabilized its center of gravity. The rubble above the old man rose smoothly, then settled some distance away. The woman and child were freed without the slab fracturing further.
Then his attention shifted to the enemy units penetrating the city perimeter.
The weapons ceased to function when their internal mechanisms lost their structural cohesion. The metals cracked from within.
Overloaded energy systems imploded under localized compression. The soldiers advanced nonetheless, attempting to compensate for the loss of equipment.
Sigi tightened the field.
The pressure surged abruptly within precisely defined volumes. Human bodies, subjected to stress exceeding their tolerance threshold, gave way. No spectacular explosion, no blazing wave. A clean, irreversible compression. Biological structures were crushed to the breaking point. No survivors remained in the impact zone. The air units engaged in support lost their atomic cohesion when the forces binding their components were disrupted. Drones crumbled to metallic dust before reaching the central headquarters.
Sigi could have disassembled matter at a fundamental level, fractured the ground for kilometers, razed the enemy infrastructure in a single stroke. He didn't. The official S-rank was their public ceiling. Nothing beyond what an expert observer might attribute to recognized maximum power. But even a limited S-rank was still overwhelming. A single one was equivalent to hundreds of A+ ranks. The army that thought it could take advantage of Taren's fall realized too late that it had entered territory defended by a force of a different order.
In less than ten minutes, the threat was eliminated.
Not repelled. Not dispersed.
Eliminated.
The Ghosts vanished as suddenly as they had appeared, without a statement or any usable signature. Vyrheim's forces were left only to secure a field of ruins where the enemy no longer posed any risk.
Reconstruction began the very next day.
Not in an hour. Not by some miracle.
Sigi and Ivar resumed their public roles as powerful but ordinary superhumans. They carried loads, adjusted beams, and cleared streets with their bare hands. Ivar categorically refused to use telekinesis in public. He lifted the concrete blocks with the visible effort of a credible high-ranking officer, accepting simulated fatigue as a strategic necessity.
Lucy arrived with Raven after learning of Taren's death and the extent of the damage. She asked no unnecessary questions. She focused on the house plans, reassessing the foundations and the interior layout. Raven coordinated the volunteers with methodical efficiency. Sigi and Ivar's parents came to lend a hand. Their mother, an S-rank healer, treated the most serious injuries in a temporary structure, expanding her scope of practice without ever drawing attention to her true level. Their father remained discreet, intervening only when structural safety demanded it, his strength wielded like a precise tool. The days passed to the rhythm of poured concrete and erected structures. Discussions centered on angles, load-bearing capacities, and curing times. Nothing extraordinary on the surface. No one suspected that the two young men covered in dust were the same masked figures who had annihilated an army. Only those already familiar with their abilities could make the connection. For the others, the Ghosts remained a distinct, almost mythical entity.
Gradually, a rumor began to circulate. One name was whispered: Yggdrasil. The organization never intervened without reason. If the Ghosts were linked to it, directly or indirectly, then the elimination of the enemy army might have been just one move in a larger strategy. No evidence confirmed this hypothesis. But the lack of information fueled more tension than any revelation.
Sigi and Lucy's house gradually took shape. Reinforced foundations, stronger materials, an optimized structure without any visible extravagance. Several weeks were needed to achieve a stable and credible result. Nothing to suggest an instant reconstruction.
When the last section of the roof was secured, Sigi remained silent for a moment, gazing at the completed facade. Lucy stood beside him, assessing the work done with a more serene expression than when they first arrived.
Ivar finally broke the silence. He announced that he had found an apartment two streets away. Close enough to allow for swift intervention if necessary. Far enough away to maintain a logical independence. It was neither an escape nor a retreat. It was an adjustment.
The decision was accepted without debate.
In the distance, Yggdrasil's massive tendrils still dominated the horizon, motionless and impenetrable. Vyrheim breathed again, but the balance had shifted. An army had been wiped out in minutes after Taren's death. Two masked entities now existed in the collective shadow.
And above it all, Yggdrasil watched.