Veil passed through the battlefield like water. Not a ripple on his surface betrayed the carnage around him—except for the faint distortion in the air, the barely visible waver of his shadow as he flickered between corpses and fla.
The ground was a tapestry of blood and ash, and he moved through it not as a man, but as a current of sothing older and colder. Sared faces stared blankly skyward, half-burnt flags fluttered beside charred bones. The stink of boiled flesh, of scorched mana veins and shattered spirit threads, clung to the wind like rot.
He didn’t pause. He couldn’t.
One shadow to another, connecting with them—dead soldiers, crushed mages, so still breathing but cracked open like overripe fruit. The echoes of their final thoughts pressed against his shadow, whispering things they’d never said aloud. Promises to wives. Half-muttered apologies to brothers. Regrets inked too late.
"I’m gonna have a fucking feast after this," he muttered to no one, laughing under his breath—then shaking his head sharply, his mouth twisting. "No. No, no, no. First save Atlas."
He didn’t know if he truly rembered that as his mission... or if he just couldn’t bear the thought of facing Eli with blood on his hands and Atlas gone from this world. The thought of facing that woman without him beside her—it felt like betrayal. Or perhaps cowardice.
The shadow deepened under his feet. He felt it—Atlas’s shadow—battered, stretched thin, like a barely breathing lung. Then ca another—a shadow he hadn’t touched in years. Familiar in the shape of its heat.
Veil materialized behind a broken wall of collapsed marble and steel. His body reford in a ripple of black light and breathless silence.
"...Eli?" he whispered.
She was kneeling, one hand stained in blood, the other cradling Atlas’s unconscious form like a broken relic. His head rested on her thigh, his body limp, almost lifeless. Her face—Eli’s—was empty and burning at once, like a statue catching fire.
But it was what lay to the side that twisted sothing inside Veil.
Claire. Her back arched as she threw up another defensive scroll. Her assistant—Valora—fumbled for a new incantation, her lips bloodied, her robes torn. Mages surrounded them like wolves circling a wounded deer. Two in particular—Imperial High Mages—moved like dancers of death, unraveling her spells with elegant contempt.
Atlas had warned Veil. Warned him exactly for this.
"If it ever cos down to it," he’d said once, gripping Veil’s shadow, "save the ones I love. Not . I’ll survive. No matter what. Even if the sky falls or the world tears in half... I’ll co back. I always co back."
That voice. That vow. It rang like steel now in Veil’s ear, even as doubt crept in like a crack in the dam.
Could Atlas truly co back... from this?
Claire’s scroll sparked and fizzled, the sigils growing sluggish under her trembling fingers. Her mana was waning—Veil could see it in her skin, pallid with strain. Her nerves were overstretched, flickering, frayed. Her heartbeat was a ticking trono against the battlefield’s chaotic orchestra.
The air burned. Literally burned. The spells hurled at her scread with temperature—threads of blue fire, violet thunder, molten wind. Her comrades, what few remained, stood on the last breath of their magic. The end was coming, and still she didn’t stop. Couldn’t.
Because Atlas was here.
Because she could see him.
Because even now, unconscious, cradled like a dying prince in a battlefield of ruin, he looked like he could rise again. Like a star trying to rember how to burn.
Claire blinked through the sweat in her eyes. The world swam. Pain curled behind her temple. Her teeth clenched.
She would die. Gladly. If it ant touching him one more ti. If it ant hearing his voice say her na again. Just once.
A deep, unnatural crack split the air—the sound of a barrier fracturing.
The three mages with her flinched, the shimr of their joint defense trembling. Claire looked at her assistant.
Valora’s gaze t hers—steady, clear, resolute.
"A sacrifice is needed..." Claire whispered. The words ca from her like glass—sharp-edged and breaking her from within. Not from cruelty. But from sothing worse.
Duty.
Valora nodded with a soft smile. "For you, my lady... anything."
She had been with Claire since they were nobodies—before scrolls, before palaces, before Atlas. She’d washed her blood, stitched her wounds, morized the patterns of Claire’s sleepless pacing. She had once laughed at her for falling in love with the ’mad prince.’
Now she would die for that sa man. For her.
Overhead, the two high mages doubled their assault, lances of searing energy and thunder slicing through the sky. The shield held. But barely. Their protective spell humd with tension, each impact a drumbeat counting down to disaster.
And still, they kept their eyes on Eli.
Eli—The Empress of Fla.
"Your Majesty..." one of the high mages called to her as he cast another blazing curse. "If we win this war—can we finally be entitled the rank of High Mage? Not just in na... truly?"
The other joined him, eyes half-pleading, half-burning. "We want to be acknowledged. Not just compared to Aurora. We want to surpass her."
Eli gave a slight nod, a smile cold as gold. "If you bring Claire’s head... you will not only be entitled, but rewarded. With spell books from the First Vault. Ancient and forgotten. Magic powerful enough to rival even Aurora herself."
Those words lit a wildfire in their gaze. Their spells intensified, a deluge of raw destruction that cracked the sky like a mirror.
The shield cracked again.
"Lady Claire!" one of the mages cried.
Crack.
"Lady Claire!!"
Crack.
Valora gripped the scroll tightly. It pulsed in her hand like a living thing, eating through her mana with a hunger that clawed at her veins.
"I’m ready," she whispered.
She had always been ready.
She glanced at Claire one last ti. Her lady—her friend. The one who’d saved her from a gutter with nothing but fire in her eyes and compassion she never admitted aloud.
"You gave everything," Valora said, her voice trembling only at the edges. "More than I could ever ask for."
Claire’s lips parted. "Valora—"
But Valora was already moving.
She snatched the scroll from Claire’s hand. Claire reached—but too slow. Valora was already channeling, her veins lighting up with magic far beyond her threshold.
Ti stilled.
The barrier shattered.
Claire’s heart stopped.
Valora flew through the collapsing shield—straight toward the two high mages. The scroll flared with white fire, bright as a star imploding.
Claire stumbling forward.
The high mages faltered for a breath. One raised a defense. The other hesitated, eyes narrowing in disbelief.
Too late.
The scroll detonated mid-air—runes unfolding like wings of burning paper. A soundless scream tore across the field as light swallowed all vision.
Veil stepped forward, just enough to shield Claire and the remaining mages in shadow, pushing Valora away.
Then silence. As Veil swallowed the burst, the scroll, the so called high mages in one full sweep.
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