They tried to fix the earth.
That was how the morning began.
Not with horns.
Not with charge.
With carpenters.
Timber beams were dragged to the crater's lip before sunrise.
Engineers hammered stakes into fractured soil that no longer held cleanly.
Planks were laid across narrower stress lines like bandages over a wound too deep to stitch.
The crater was no longer round.
It had grown teeth.
Eiden stood in the third rank and watched men argue with physics.
"Reinforce the outer shelf," one engineer muttered. "Spread the load."
Spread the load.
As if weight obeyed orders.
Behind them, the mage division repositioned again—another half-rank back.
Diagonal layering maintained. No full-circle formation.
Wilfred Webstere watched the reinforcement attempt without comment, staff grounded, jaw tight.
High Marshal Garry Hawkinge stood at the ridge crest beneath his banner, conferring with Knight Generals.
His posture was upright. Unyielding.
The ground had shifted yesterday.
So, they adjusted.
Humans always adjusted forward.
Across the field, the demon formation was already awake.
They had shifted left.
Five paces.
Not dramatically.
Just enough to change where pressure would meet instability.
The red-trimmed demon stood nearer the right flank now, no longer at the canter.
His posture was identical to yesterday. Calm. Weight evenly distributed.
He was not studying the crater anymore.
He was studying correction.
"They're mirroring us again," Rynn said quietly.
"No," Eiden replied. "We're mirroring them."
She glanced sideways.
"You're certain?"
"Yes."
The horn sounded advance.
Controlled.
Infantry only.
No artillery. No saturation.
The humans moved down the ridge in measured steps, shields interlocked.
The engagement line had been shifted slightly left—away from the deepest fracture veins.
Safer ground.
On paper.
Steel met steel along the outer edge of the crater's shelf.
The first clash was clean. Rhythmic. Controlled.
The demons did not yield.
They held.
Human captains barked for steady pressure. Not surge. Not yet.
Eiden adjusted his stance as the first compression wave hit.
The ground vibrated faintly.
Not magical.
Weight.
Bodies pressing against bodies.
The second compression wave came slower.
Then the third.
The demon line advanced two paces.
Not a push.
An invitation.
"Drive them!" a human captain shouted.
Momentum built.
The human line leaned forward.
Eiden felt the vibration increase beneath his boots.
A subtle tremor radiated through the shelf's weakened veins.
"They're testing load," he muttered.
"What?" Rynn asked.
"Not our shields. The ground."
The red-trimmed demon stepped forward three paces—not to strike, but to observe alignment.
He raised one hand.
Flat palm.
Downward angle.
The demon right flank advanced in a shallow diagonal.
Sideways compression.
The human line followed instinctively to maintain contact.
Midline drift.
Weight redistributed.
The timber reinforcement beams creaked.
The shelf cracked.
A sharp report split the air—wood snapping under stress.
The ground did not explode.
It sheared.
A ten-pace stretch of outer shelf slumped inward as one.
Three infantries vanished knee-deep into fractured soil.
One lost footing entirely and slid toward the inner depression.
Shields collided. Formation spacing ruptured.
"Back!" Eiden shouted.
Too late for the first three.
Rynn lunged, grabbing a falling soldier by his collar as he slid.
Eiden anchored his weight and pulled from the opposite side.
The man came free, but his shield remained buried.
The demon line did not charge into the collapse.
They stepped back.
Measured.
Letting the instability widen.
The human left flank overcorrected, pulling inward too sharply.
The canter compressed.
A gap opened on the right.
The red-trimmed demon moved.
Not toward Eiden.
Toward the gap.
He bypassed the exposed front-rank soldier and struck the second-rank support instead.
Two precise cuts.
The support dropped.
The seam widened.
Regional Captain Knox Edisone was there.
Polished Armor. Gold-edged crest.
He shouted for reformation late.
He stepped forward to close the seam personally.
The red-trimmed demon met him without flourish.
Three movements.
Feint high.
True cut low.
Reverse pivot.
Edisone fell before completing his order.
No dramatic duel.
No exchange of speeches.
Just structural removal.
The human right buckled inward.
Retreat horn sounded—fast. Too fast.
The demons advanced exactly three paces, forcing the retreat path to narrow before halting at calculated distance.
They disengaged in perfect sequence.
Leaving the shelf cracked wider than before.
Silence returned unevenly.
The crater had grown.
Not dramatically.
But undeniably.
Timber beams hung broken at angles.
Fracture veins speared outward from the shear point.
The human line reformed higher on the ridge.
Breathing heavy.
Alive.
Thinner.
Hawkinge's voice carried sharply from the crest.
"Stabilize the flank! Re-establish interval discipline!"
Wilfred did not respond immediately.
He was watching the fracture seam.
The red-trimmed demon stepped near the collapse edge and looked down briefly—not entering, not inspecting closely.
Confirming.
Then he turned away.
The message was clear.
Weight increases failure.
Rynn stood beside Eiden, dirt streaking her cheek.
"He killed Edisone like he was removing a loose plank," she said.
"Yes."
"That wasn't chance."
"No."
She exhaled slowly.
"They're not trying to break us."
"No."
"Then what?"
"They're measuring what breaks us."
Engineers rushed forward to assess the new shear.
Mages attempted low-intensity stabilization pulses along the outer veins.
The pulses rippled unevenly.
One caster winced as mana feedback stung his fingertips.
Wilfred stepped in sharply.
"Reduce output. You'll widen it."
Marshal Hawkinge descended halfway down the ridge.
"The shelf can be reinforced," he said flatly.
Wilfred looked at him for a long second before replying.
"It can be delayed."
The distinction hung in the air.
Across the field, the demon formation had already shifted half a pace backward, maintaining buffer distance from the expanded collapse.
They were not exploiting.
They were preserving.
Eiden watched the red-trimmed commander speak briefly to a taller, heavier-armoured figure behind the line.
Hierarchy.
Structured.
No visible frustration.
No urgency.
They had applied load.
The shelf had failed.
Data recorded.
Rynn adjusted her grip on her sword.
"We can't fight on that ground much longer."
"No."
"Then we move."
He shook his head.
"They want us to."
She studied him.
"You think they'll keep pushing sideways?"
"Yes."
"And if command doesn't stop compressing?"
He looked at the widened fracture seam cutting across the crater.
"Then the next shear won't be ten paces."
Behind them, officers argued again over maps and distance rods.
"…tighten interval…"
"…shift engagement zone…"
"…increase pulse timing…"
They were correcting tactics.
Not structure.
The sun climbed higher.
Engagement did not resume.
Both sides withdrew to recalibrated lines.
The crater sat between them like a widening mouth.
Eiden remained at the ridge edge long after most soldiers dispersed.
The fracture veins reflected light unevenly, thin as scars.
Incremental collapse.
Not sudden.
Not dramatic.
Load-bearing systems fail slowly.
Until they do not.
Across the field, the red-trimmed demon turned once more before disappearing behind layered ranks.
Not triumphant.
Balanced.
Acknowledging progression.
Eiden exhaled slowly.
They had not broken today.
But they had shifted.
The shelf had given.
The line had bent.
A captain had fallen.
And command still believed reinforcement was solution enough.
He felt the weight settle behind his ribs—not fear.
Calculation.
If compression continued at this rate—
The fracture index would rise beyond tolerance.
And when it did—
It would not shear a flank.
It would take the entire canter with it.
He closed his eyes briefly.
Still clear.
Still anchored.
Still sharp.
For now.
When the collapse came—
It would not feel like surprise.
It would feel like arithmetic.
And arithmetic never lied.