The critical objective was simple: exterminate the swarm by severing its head. They had to kill the Insect King or the Broodmother. Without a hive mind to command them, the insectoid legions were nothing more than mindless vermin.
"Your Highness, do we storm the city?"
Godfrey leaned over the map; his finger tracing the lines of the outer walls. "If we attack, it must be now, while the sun is high. The dark favors the chitinous bastards. We lose our advantage at night."
Godfrey's eagerness was palpable. He had joined the volunteer legion for one reason: glory. The vaults of the Stoneheart Horde were rumored to be overflowing with spoils, and the hierarchy of this new empire was still being written. He wanted a seat at the table.
He was also intensely curious about the giant before him.
Kaelen didn't answer imdiately. He turned his gaze to Thundar, the Battle Elder of the Horde—a creature of imnse status and power.
Thundar rely shook his head. He offered no counsel, no words. This was not his command.
Kaelen returned his eyes to the map, silence stretching out between them.
He had the n. He had the steel. He could crush the swarm through sheer attrition. But this was his debut. The first war waged under his banner as a Prince of the Stoneheart Horde. A ssy victory wouldn't suffice. He needed a masterpiece.
He needed to etch his na into the minds of the tribesn following him.
Kaelen's eyes narrowed. He had a plan.
At dawn the next day, the Second Legion marched on Soaring Bird City.
The vibration of their boots disturbed the hive. Countless multi-legged horrors—centipedes the length of a man's arm—poured from the cracks in the masonry, from beneath the foundation stones, and over the parapets.
The sight was enough to make skin crawl. It was a living carpet of mandibles and hard shells.
Yet, a murmur of confusion rippled through the Legion ranks. The swarm wasn't attacking.
Veteran soldiers gripped their pikes, sweating. Experience dictated that once you breached the three-mile periter of a hive, the swarm would descend like a tidal wave. But this... this was wrong.
The insectoids filling Soaring Bird City did nothing but emit high-pitched stridulations and clack their mandibles. They held the walls, waiting.
11:26
The insectoids filling Soaring Bird City did nothing but emit high-pitched stridulations and clack their mandibles. They held the walls, waiting.
The tension was becoming unbearable when Kaelen's voice, young and brimming with absolute confidence, cut through the air.
"Hold position."
As he spoke, the air around him shimred. Massive, iridescent wings—the wings of a monarch butterfly, but dark as midnight—erupted from his back. He lifted off the ground, hovering above the vanguard.
With every eye fixed upon him, Kaelen flew alone toward the infested city.
What happened next defied belief. As Kaelen's shadow passed over the walls, the insectoids did not strike. They cowered. They pressed their bellies to the stone, trembling violently.
It was as if a god were passing among mortals.
"What in the hells..." Godfrey whispered. "The bugs... they're terrified of the Prince?"
He exchanged a bewildered look with Aldwyn.
"I think I understand what the Prince intends to do," Thundar said, breaking his long silence.
Truthfully, even the Elder hadn't known Kaelen's plan until this mont. But seeing the swarm recoil, the pieces fell into place.
"You wouldn't know," Thundar rumbled, a grin splitting his bearded face. "His Highness's mother was of the Insectoid Race. Before he returned to the Stoneheart Horde, he was raised among them."
"To us, he is a Prince."
"To them... he is an Insect King."
It was true. Kaelen carried the blood of the Dark Butterfly Race. Despite Orion's lineage purifying his chaotic nature, when those wings unfurled, Kaelen was royalty of the hive.
And by the ancient laws of the insectoids, an Insect King could invoke the Rite of Challenge.
When two Kings t, only one could rule. The victor claid the loser's entire colony. The loser claid nothing but death.
"A eting of Kings," Thundar said, his voice thick with pride. "What do you think happens next?"
The giants of the Stoneheart Horde were prodigies, every last one of them. Kaelen was the future, the steel upon which the next age would be forged. Watching the young Prince float toward the enemy, Thundar felt the hardships of their crusade were worth every drop of blood.
"A duel to the death," Godfrey realized, breathing the words.
"To the death!" Aldwyn echoed.
Suddenly, the passivity of the crawlers made sense. They weren't waiting to attack; they were waiting for the outco. They were waiting to see whose bloodline would prevail—who would make them stronger.
"My Lord," Godfrey looked to Thundar nervously. "Should we intervene? It's risky..."
"Save your worry," Thundar scoffed. "The Princes of the Stoneheart Horde are not cowards. They are stronger than you can imagine."
As if to punctuate the Elder's faith, Kaelen's voice bood over Soaring Bird City.
"Show yourself! I sll your stench!"
"I am taking command of this hive!"
Kaelen hovered high above the central plaza, looking down with imperious disdain, searching for the hidden monarch.
"You are a King of the Race... yet you kneel to soft-skins?"
The response ca from deep underground—a voice like grinding stones, muffled and heavy.
"Or are you rely a traitor?"
The earth in the city square buckled. Paving stones exploded outward as a massive shape breached the surface. An insectoid warrior, riding a thirty-yard-long subterranean worm, rose from the depths. He tilted his armored head back, locking eyes with Kaelen.
Two Insect Kings, face to face. The air crackled with hostility.
"Traitor?" Kaelen laughed. It was a cold, mocking sound.
Behind him, the air rippled. A squad of butterfly-assassins detached from the formation and flew to flank their Prince. They hung in the air behind him, a silent, deadly court.
The creature from the depths stared at the butterfly-assassins, falling silent. After a long, tense pause, the insectoid spoke again.
"I am Azhur. King of the Myriapex Race."
It was an introduction, and a death sentence.
"I am Kaelen. King of the Dark Butterfly Race."
Kaelen's introduction was louder.
"I will claim your children. I will lead them to a glory you could never provide."
Azhur said nothing more. He simply raised his heavy trident, signaling the start of the duel.
Kaelen's expression remained calm, though his mind raced. Unlike his brothers Kronos or Pallas, the trident was not his weapon of choice. He was an assassin by nature, a master of the short blade.
But in his current form, the Dark Butterfly Race offered no biological weapons that suited him. He was unard.
However, he was not unprepared.
Orion had taught him a Divine Art—a forbidden technique known as the Rite of Fatebound Offering. It allowed a warrior to sacrifice living souls to forge a weapon perfectly attuned to their spirit.
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