The night did not fall.
It collapsed like the swing of an axe.
The carriage jolted along the forest road, protesting with every pothole, when the first scream split the air in two.
What followed was pure chaos in fast motion: wood splintering like glass, bloodcurdling screams, and a violent spray of blood across the canvas.
Then a brutal impact sent the vehicle flying through the air.
She was thrown clear, tumbling until she landed soaked in mud. When she lifted her head, her vision blurred, panic freezing every thought in her mind.
Monsters.
But not ordinary forest beasts.
They looked like hypertrophied hyenas, twisted by some kind of warped magic. Their elongated bodies were covered in bony spines that ran along their backs like saw blades, while veins of elemental light pulsed beneath their withered skin.
And they attacked as a pack.
Lightning cracked against the trees. Earth spikes tore through the wood. Pressurized streams of water sliced through flesh.
Those abominations had turned an ordinary country road into an elemental slaughterhouse.
She watched one passenger disappear beneath a mass of snapping, hungry jaws.
She saw a mother shield her child with her own body, waiting for an ending that seemed inevitable.
Until the sky spat out a shadow.
A spear of pure darkness descended like a meteor and pierced the skull of the creature about to devour her.
The impact was so clean that the monster was pinned to the ground, kicking for a second before going still.
She looked up, trembling.
Lusian was walking slowly through the carnage.
Dainslein gleamed in his right hand with a faint, hungry radiance.
He did not say a single word.
He did not deliver some grand speech.
One simple stroke through the air.
The black flash tore through the forest.
One beast fell.
Then another.
Then five more.
When the echoes finally faded, not a single one remained standing.
She stood frozen, barely capable of processing the miracle she had just witnessed.
—The... Devil... —she whispered, her voice shattered by terror.
Lusian did not even bother looking at her.
He walked past as though she were a ghost.
—Emily.
A dark-haired woman emerged from the forest undergrowth and ran toward the few survivors still standing.
—I'll take care of this —she announced.
Lusian quickened his pace without stopping.
—Make it quick.
Emily dropped to her knees beside the mother who was still trembling in the mud, protecting her child.
—Easy —she said gently—. It's over.
The woman, her eyes wide with shock, looked over Emily's shoulder toward the solitary figure disappearing into the darkness.
—He... he saved us?
Emily turned her head slightly to look at Lusian's back and let out a weary smile.
—Yes.
The survivor frowned, trapped in an impossible contradiction.
—But... he's the Devil.
—That's what they say —Emily murmured before beginning to tend to her wounds.
Farther ahead, Lusian came to an abrupt stop.
Several figures emerged from the darkness of the forest.
Pristine white robes.
Golden embroidery.
Sacred insignias gleaming across their chests.
They wielded weapons imbued with divine mana.
Their faces reflected no caution.
Only the almost arrogant certainty that blind faith alone could inspire.
—Lusian Douglas! —proclaimed the apparent leader, raising a sword wrapped in flashes of pure light—. By the will of the goddess, today we shall put an end to your existence!
Kara narrowed her eyes.
—They're not ordinary soldiers.
She pointed toward their weapons one by one.
—Look at their mana cores. They've been blessed.
Adela swallowed.
—Heroes?
—No —Kara replied—. But they're close to what one can do.
The statement made Emily fall silent.
Lusian observed them in icy silence, completely unmoved.
—Does the blessing make you feel invincible? —he asked flatly.
The man gave a smug smile.
—It has made us the chosen.
Lusian released a heavy sigh, thick with exhaustion and boredom.
—Then you still understand nothing.
The attack erupted all at once.
Scorching fire, cutting gusts of wind, spears of earth, and volleys of sacred light converged upon him in a spectacular display.
Lusian simply walked straight into the elemental storm.
Dainslein traced a single curve through the air.
The enemy formation shattered like a broken mirror.
A second movement.
A blessed sword went flying, spinning through the air before embedding itself several meters away.
A third attacker tried to hurriedly form a spell, but Lusian struck him across the chest with the back of his sword hand, sending him violently crashing into a tree trunk.
The impact knocked him unconscious instantly.
Lusian raised his sword to finish the fallen man.
A firm hand closed around his forearm.
Emily.
—Enough —she murmured.
Lusian glanced sideways at her, his eyes still burning.
—They tried to kill us.
—And they can't anymore.
—They can come back.
—Then we'll stop them again —she replied with unwavering calm.
Silence stretched between them for several agonizing seconds.
Finally, Lusian relaxed his shoulders and sheathed his sword.
Emily smiled softly.
—Thank you.
—Don't thank me —he replied, turning around and continuing onward without looking back.
Behind them, the fanatics lay scattered across the mud, bruised, disarmed, and barely capable of forming words.
Kara and Adela watched the scene in complete silence from the rear.
—Was that all? —Kara asked, bewildered by how brief the encounter had been.
Emily shook her head, keeping her eyes fixed on Lusian's back.
—No.
—They thought they were strong —Kara muttered, frowning—. Aren't they?
Emily took several seconds to answer.
Her eyes drifted toward the corpses of the elemental hyenas Lusian had slaughtered minutes earlier without so much as breaking stride.
—They are —Emily admitted quietly—. They simply have no concept of the monumental distance separating them from him.
Nearby, Thunder whinnied, a spark of electricity racing from the tip of his mane to the end of his tail.
Elizabeth walked several paces behind them, keeping her own shadowy aura under absolute, painstaking control.
Those paladins had received genuine blessings.
They had survived massacres that would have wiped out any ordinary mortal, and because of that, they believed themselves touched by divinity.
But none of them could comprehend the true scale of the power they had just challenged.
Lusian continued walking in silence, his pace steady but heavy, like that of a man carrying an invisible burden.
Emily watched him from the corner of her eye for several meters, gauging the tension gathering in his shoulders before finally breaking the silence.
—Are you all right?
It took him a moment to answer, as though he had to drag his mind back from somewhere far away.
—Yes.
He raised his hand and stared at his palm.
He could still feel the darkness pulsing and winding just beneath his skin, a cold, alien current threatening to break free.
—I think so —he murmured.
But before Emily could notice anything else, he clenched his fist tightly, hiding the tremor that betrayed the horror he felt toward his own strength.
And the most terrifying part was that Lusian did not fully understand it either.