Atlas Von Roxweld step forward, his golden eyes blazing through the smoke, his black hair fluttering with excess mana. His body was a healing faster, much faster—virus and Yggdrasil locked in their endless war, [Healing Litigated ... process... healing continued... 48%]—but his will was a furnace, burning through the pain.
The ache in his bones calming down, his breath coming smoother, but in his chest, his heart was the sa.
The scrolls were a lie, a bluff to keep Five and Seven’s eyes on him, to stall until the dragons descended? Or was it? He’d played their ga, baited their pride, and now the night was his blade. A blade forged in pain, tempered in exile, and sharpened by betrayal.
The earth shook—a primal growl that split the ground. Imperial soldiers scread as red dragons tore through their ranks, jaws snapping bone like twigs, wings casting shadows that devoured torchlight.
Each breath from the dragons was molten fury, fire that liquefied flesh and turned steel to slag. The sll was unbearable: burning oil, charred bodies, and the sharp, sterile ozone of collapsing magic barriers.
Number Five staggered from the command tent, his slim sword gleaming with runes, his blue eyes wide with sothing new—panic.
"TEN!" he bellowed, his voice a raw wound, cutting through the chaos like a whip.
Ten erged, weak but armored, his face pale, the mory of Atlas’s beating a ghost in his eyes. Every ti he blinked, he saw those golden irises—unblinking, unpitying. "The spell’s coming from sowhere," Five snapped, mana flaring in fractals along his arm. "Find it. Destroy it."
Ten nodded, relief puffing from his chest, hands trembling. He turned and vanished into the smoke, grateful—desperate—not to face that monster again.
Five turned to Seven, her red eyes burning, her armor blackened with soot and streaked with blood. "Your revenge is at hand..." he said, his voice flat, cruel. "Release your limiter."
She didn’t speak. She didn’t need to. Her body convulsed, mana bursting from her in gory tendrils, the ground fracturing beneath her boots. Her molar cracked, blood leaking from her gums as she bit down, triggering the berserker core in her spine. Her humanity dissolved, consud in blue fire. Only the need remained.
Atlas.
"Don’t forget..." Atlas called without turning. His voice was calm, almost amused, yet laced with razorwire tension. "You have orders. From your Empress."
Five cracked his neck with a slow, deliberate pop, the sound echoing like a guillotine reset. His grip on the linear sword at his hip tightened, tal fingers curling around the hilt as blue veins of mana pulsed up his arm.
"Her Majesty said you must be kept alive," Five muttered, voice low and surgical. "Not unhard Not whole."
Atlas smiled, the expression thin and laced with venom. "Confident words," he replied, his head tilting back toward them just enough to show the ghost of a grin. "Are you sure you can make that happen?"
Atlas exhaled, almost relieved.
"I warn you," he said, his voice low, the words crawling from the pit of sothing older, sothing colder. His hands flexed, light dancing faintly over his skin as mana lines began to awaken, glowing like forgotten circuitry. "I’m not the sa man you fought before."
Then he raised his head—and smiled.
"But please, Lord Almighty," he mocked, lifting his hand in mock-prayer. "Please let them try their luck. Maybe, just maybe... they’ll have a chance to defeat ."
His eyes flared.
"Because frankly... I’m in a bad mood."
The last word cut like iron as his mana flared outward, a ripple of violet and gold tearing through the dust and fire. From the corner of his vision, Claire’s faint silhouette trembled in the flas—still coughing, still weak—but watching him, always watching. Her blood on his hands, her pain clinging to his ribs like sha.
"I was feeling off," he muttered, more to himself than to them. "Watching soone I care about... vomit blood."
His gaze turned sharp, vicious.
"So now I’m wide awake."
And with that, the air cracked—Atlas stepped forward, his figure blurring as a pulse of mana exploded beneath his feet. The battlefield shifted. The first move was his. The last... would be theirs to regret.
She charged, her scream unholy, her spear dragging behind her like a harbinger of ruin.
Atlas turned, his Truth Eyes flaring red, catching their desperation, their mana—jagged, unstable, wild. He saw their fractures. Their fear. And it fed him.
Five didn’t answer. He stepped forward, boot slamming into the ashen ground with increasing speed. The earth cracked beneath each footfall as he accelerated—until he was a blur of steel and concentrated murder.
Beside him, Seven’s pupils vanished into an electric blue haze. Her lips curled back in a grin that belonged to nothing human. A faint growl built in her throat as her muscles convulsed, pulsing under skin veined with berserker fla. Her greatspear hit the ground once, sparking against blackened stone.
She was no longer in control.
There was no reason left in her body, no rcy. Only target. Only kill.
His death.
Clang!!!!
Number Seven landed first—armor blackened from blood and soot, her spear dragging a trench in the earth. Her eyes glowed wild, feral—nothing human left in them. She snarled and charged.
A blur of silver and red followed.
Number Five descended like a blade himself, long coat flaring behind him, a linear sword in one hand and glyphs of glowing magic coiling up the other. His aura shimred—flawless synchronization between steel and spell.
But Atlas didn’t flinch.
He stood atop a shattered rock mound, cloak torn, golden eyes glowing through the smoke. Not a man. A force. And as the two Pris lunged, the world slowed.
Atlas moved.
Seven’s spear cracked through the air, a sonic boom behind its thrust—but he ducked under it, sliding between her legs in a single smooth motion. He grabbed her ankle mid-dash—twisted—and snapped.
Seven scread, her berserk mana flaring wildly as she crashed to the ground, kicking up rock and fla.
Before Five could reach him, Atlas was already on the offensive. He stepped inside the sword’s arc—too close, too fast—his palm colliding with Five’s chest in a thunderous blast of redirected mana.
Five skidded back, boots carving trenches. His lips bled. He smiled.
"Interesting."
Five raised his blade, magic forming around him in geotric patterns—*Haste, Aero Shield, Chain Burn*. The sword blurred, dancing like wind.
Atlas narrowed his eyes. "Predictable."
Then he vanished.
—Boom—
He appeared behind Five with a rift-step, elbow crashing into his spine, folding the man like paper. Then a heel to the shoulder. Then a burst of explosive mana straight into his ribs.
Five’s body bounced, blood trailing in arcs, spells flickering unfinished around him.
But Seven was up again.
She ca roaring, her broken ankle already regenerating, her arms glowing with berserker runes. She slamd the ground, causing a shockwave. Atlas stood in the middle of the quake—unmoving. Unimpressed.
Seven lunged.
He caught her spear. With one hand.
Her eyes widened. "You—!"
"I’ve already read your rhythm," Atlas said coldly.
With a twist, he yanked the spear out of her grasp and slamd it through her own shoulder, pinning her to the ground. Her scream was cut off by his fist crashing into her jaw—once, twice—until the ground cratered beneath her.
Then fire swallowed them all.
A red dragon swept low, incinerating soldiers by the hundreds. Five flickered into view behind the chaos, blade glowing with black fire, aid for Atlas’s spine.
Atlas turned—barehanded—and caught the blade mid-strike.
"No." His voice was the sound of steel snapping.
Five’s eyes went wide.
Then Atlas gripped the blade *and* Five’s arm—and shattered both. A burst of mana exploded from Atlas’s core, golden lines etching down his arms like molten veins. He roared—not in pain, but in *release*.
From behind him, Seven staggered up, face bloodied, spear broken.
"I’ll rip your damn heart out!"
She charged.
Atlas lifted Five’s limp body and threw him—directly into her.
The two collided mid-air like rag dolls, collapsing into a heap of blood and broken armor.
Atlas walked forward slowly, dust and fla parting around him. His cloak trailed in the inferno, golden eyes reflecting the screaming world.
"You were supposed to be elites," he said, voice bored now, disgusted. "Two of the Seventeen Pris. This is the best your Empress sent?"
He raised a hand.
From his belt, a black spell scroll uncoiled—a forbidden type, crackling with ancient runes.
"I could end you with a whisper," Atlas said, letting the scroll burn away. "But you’re not worth my breath."
Seven tried to rise, coughing blood. Five was unconscious. Neither could move.
"Tell your Empress," Atlas said, "next ti... she cos herself."
He tossed the scroll up.
"Oh, yeah," he said, smile cruel. "I lied. ....Again."
Their eyes widened. A final, fatal second.
"Explosion," he whispered.
The scroll ignited.
Five’s voice croaked, half-alive: "Mother... fucker..."
BOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMM!
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