Aric’s heart hammered in his chest as he watched the demons prepare for battle. He knew that Brenville’s survival depended on the warning he’d sent. The prisoners he’d freed carried the town’s only hope.

The first rays of dawn broke over the horizon, painting the sky in shades of rose and gold. And then the demon army was on the move, a roiling tide of shadows and steel surging towards the human town in the valley below.

Vizra rode at the head of the vanguard, her obsidian armor a dark slash against the morning light. Her eyes blazed with a feral light as she urged her war steed onward, the anticipation of battle making her almost glow. Aric watched her with a sinking feeling in his stomach, knowing that she was a skilled and ruthless commander, despite her recent missteps. She would not make the same mistake twice.

The demons on the front lines howled their battle cries and charged headlong towards the town, their blood up and their confidence high. They had come so far; victory was almost within their grasp. The humans, for all their vaunted defenses, were no match for the might of the demon army.

Or so they thought.

A rumbling filled the air, a low, ominous sound that sent a shiver down Aric’s spine. He scanned the valley below, trying to make sense of what he was seeing. The demons were almost to the town now, their vanguard engaged with the human defenders.

And then the ground beneath them gave way.

Hidden pits opened up, filled with sharpened stakes that skewered the unfortunate demons who stumbled into them. A network of trenches and barricades appeared as if by magic, channeling the demon forces and cutting them off from each other. The human defenders, it seemed, had not been idle in the days since the demons arrived at their doorstep.

The panicked braying of war steeds, the howls of wounded demons, and the clash of steel filled the air as the battlefield devolved into chaos. The demons, overconfident and expecting an easy victory, were thrown into disarray by the sudden shift in the human tactics.

“Mages, to the front!” Vizra’s voice cut through the mayhem, and a line of demon sorcerers surged forward, unleashing torrents of dark magic in a desperate bid to turn the tide. Malekith’s soldiers moved to flank the demons, but the humans were ready for them, meeting their advance with a wall of fire and steel.

Vizra’s forces fought with savage determination, their battle cries echoing across the blood-soaked field. The cacophony of clashing steel, snarling demons, and screaming humans created a hellish symphony that assaulted Aric’s ears. He watched in horror as Karthax, his massive form a blur of rippling muscles and gleaming armor, led his elite team in a relentless charge towards the town’s wards.

“Push forward!” Karthax’s booming voice carried over the din of battle. “The wards are weakening! Victory is at hand!”

Aric’s heart raced, a frantic drumbeat in his chest. He found himself torn between conflicting emotions: a desperate hope for his people’s survival warring with a gnawing fear for the lives being lost on both sides. The weight of his divided loyalties threatened to crush him.

Suddenly, the air itself seemed to scream. A sound like reality tearing apart sliced through the battlefield, drowning out even the loudest battle cries. Aric’s eyes widened in shock and recognition.

“No,” he whispered, his voice barely audible. “They couldn’t have . . .”

But they had. A blinding rift of unstable magic erupted across the battlefield, its edges crackling with raw, uncontrolled power. The prototype weapon, the one Aric had hoped would never see the light of day, had been unleashed in all its terrible glory.

Time seemed to slow as the rift expanded. Aric watched in horrified fascination as it sliced through the demonic forces like a scythe through wheat. Stone walls crumbled, steel armor warped and melted, and flesh . . . flesh twisted in ways that defied comprehension.

“Fall back!” Vizra’s panicked cry cut through the chaos. “Retreat! We can’t⁠—”

Her words were cut short as the rift engulfed her position. Aric caught a glimpse of her honey-colored skin contorting, her golden eyes wide with terror, before she vanished into nothingness.

Demons screamed, their bodies contorting with gruesome abruptness. Limbs elongated impossibly, faces melted like wax, and some simply ceased to exist, leaving behind nothing but echoing howls of agony.

The air grew thick with the stench of ozone and corrupted magic. Aric choked with every breath, his eyes watering as he witnessed the carnage unfolding before him. For the first time since his capture, he felt a perverse gratitude for the bonds that cut him off from his magic. The thought of what such unstable energy might do to his own powers sent a chill down his spine.

As he watched the destruction unfold, a sickening realization dawned on him. The Silver Order, his own people, must have been truly desperate to deploy the weapon in such an unfinished state. Its wild, unpredictable nature posed nearly as great a threat to the human forces as it did to the demons.

The rift pulsed and writhed, a hungry, ravenous beast that seemed to devour everything in its path. Aric’s gaze darted frantically between the fleeing demons and the terrified human soldiers, knowing that at any moment, the weapon’s fury could turn on its creators.

He held his breath, his entire body tense as a bowstring. This, he realized, could be the moment when both sides finally understood the true cost of their war. The air crackled with potential energy, both magical and emotional, as demons and humans alike stared into the face of annihilation.

The rift pulsed again, growing ever larger, and Aric braced himself for what might come next.

Then the battle descended even further into utter mayhem.

Hidden human forces emerged from concealed positions, raining arrows and spells upon the disorganized demons. Vizra’s forces, at the forefront of the assault, bore the brunt of the ambush. She fought furiously, her honey-skinned form a blur as her daggers flashed in the morning light, but her troops were falling rapidly around her.

Malekith watched from a distance, his face an impassive mask. Aric hoped it hid his inner satisfaction at seeing his rival’s forces decimated.

“Fall back!” Vizra’s cry echoed across the battlefield as she cut down a human paladin with a vicious backhand. “We’re overrun!”

The human town’s defenders regrouped, the survivors of the initial demon assault falling back to their barricades and trenches. The demons hesitated, uncertain, their overconfidence shattered by the sudden reversal of fortunes. And yet even as the rifts devoured clusters of demonic soldiers, Aric could only watch in mute horror as a human guardsman, too, was rent apart by the lingering magical detritus.

“Lord Malekith!” Vizra’s voice was a raw, animalistic snarl as she fought her way towards him, her war steed carving a bloody path through the demon ranks. “Order the retreat! We are lost here!”

Malekith’s gaze locked with Aric’s, a silent command passing between them, before he turned his attention back to Vizra. His posture was straight, his movements unhurried as he dismounted and approached her. “Fall back. All forces, retreat.”

His voice, though raised only enough to carry, seemed to echo across the battlefield. The demons hesitated, looking to their commanders for guidance, and then the first ranks began to turn and flee.

“Withdraw! Fall back to Drindal, now!”

Vizra’s face was a mask of fury as she met Malekith’s gaze, a look that promised retribution, and then she was turning, her steed leaping over the churned-up earth as she fled towards the foothills.

The demons, shattered and bloodied, streamed past Aric, their wounded cries filling the air. Malekith’s soldiers, for their part, moved with grim efficiency, falling back in tight formations, protecting their flanks and covering the retreat of the rest of the army. The human defenders, wisely, did not pursue. They had inflicted heavy casualties on the demon forces, but they were in no shape to give chase.

Not as the magical mayhem they’d wrought on the battlefield threatened them just as savagely.

As the last of the demon army regrouped at their camp halfway between Drindal and Brenville, Malekith stalked towards Vizra, his face an unreadable mask. “A word. Now.”

She dismounted, her movements jerky with rage, and bowed stiffly, her eyes never leaving the ground.

Malekith’s voice, though pitched for Vizra’s ears only, carried across the camp in the sudden silence that fell over the demon soldiers. “You were so certain of the humans’ weakness, of your own strength. And yet, you led the vanguard straight into a trap of your own making. The very thing you accused me of plotting.”

Vizra’s lip curled back, her fangs bared, but she said nothing.

“The humans were ready for us, yes. But your overconfidence, your bloodlust, blinded you to the warning signs that were there to see. You gave them the opening they needed to turn the tide against us. Fortunately, I was able to salvage the situation, but the cost of your folly is steep.”

“I . . . I am sorry, my lord,” Vizra said, her voice a strangled whisper.

“Sorry will not be enough to appease the Sovereign,” Malekith said. “You have failed him, and he will not look kindly upon that failure.”

Vizra’s eyes widened in horror, the full weight of her mistake crashing down on her. “My lord, please⁠—”

“The fate of your household now rests in the hands of the Sovereign. I can only hope he will show you more mercy than the humans showed us or themselves.”

He released her then, and she crumpled to the ground, her shoulders shaking with silent sobs as he retreated to his private tent.

And there, he allowed a small smile to play across his lips, and Aric found himself smiling in kind.