Chapter 576
By now, Kaelen had secured the necessary approvals from both Vellok and the Emperor. The moment he confirmed the Abyssal armor was ready for mass production, he dispatched Gorok to deliver its building methods to Vellok.
For the first time since the war began, a new energy swept through the entire fortress. Changes materialized with astonishing speed: walls and tents were torn down, and in their place, factories swiftly rose and hummed to life. Each new factory meant that every soldier would soon receive their groundbreaking new armor. Even the ratfolk were included in this drastic plan; for Kaelen, all political considerations had been cast aside. Only survival mattered now.
The transformative power of the new armor was felt almost overnight by the soldiers who received it. For the first time in what felt like an eternity, they were finally able to shut their eyes and experience normal, undisturbed sleep. The corrupted land, which had relentlessly assailed them with psychic torment, seemed to have lost its strange grip on these armored soldiers. It no longer attacked them; instead, an unsettling sense of familiarity, almost a feeling of home, began to bloom between the soldiers and the corrupted lands themselves.
For the mages, the armor functioned more as a focusing lens and a power conduit, rather than just a shield. Instead of merely absorbing the psychic static of the corrupted land, the runes and the Interface Sigil within the mages’ armor would likely filter and refine it. This allows them to draw upon the ambient Abyssal psychic energy as an additional, albeit dangerous, mana source.
The integrated Abyss material acted as a catalyst for their existing spells, amplifying their destructive or protective capabilities. A mage’s firebolt might burn with a sickly green flame, or their shield spells might ripple with dark, corrosive energy.
It took a grueling three weeks for the entire army to regroup, re-equip, and emerge as something new entirely. Kaelen, observing the transformation, immediately ordered a one-week rest, hoping his soldiers could recover and return to their peak. But the rest was brutally short-lived. The current soldiers were no longer as they were before. They were restless like the demons they fought, their newly integrated Abyssal essence stirring within them. They no longer simply accepted orders; they desired battle, craved bloodshed, and were fiercely eager to test the destructive power of their new armor.
The Abyss, for weeks, had known only the slow, psychological grind of attrition. But that fragile peace shattered with the dawn. The Imperial army, no longer content with passive defense, surged forth from the fortress, a dark, churning tide.
The demons on the corrupted lands, accustomed to the scent of fear and the sight of faltering resolve, paused. Their multi-faceted eyes, usually quick to identify prey, now struggled to process the unfolding sight. This wasn’t the same army. The familiar glint of polished Imperial steel was now eclipsed by a dull, obsidian sheen on armor that seemed to writhe with a subtle, internal energy. Where once there was the scent of human and goblin sweat, of fear and desperation, now there was a faint, unsettling aroma – metallic, earthy, and underscored by something subtly akin to their own sulfurous breath, a hint of the Abyss itself.
There wasn’t the expected repulsion. Instead, a low, guttural murmur rippled through the demon ranks, a sound that quickly swelled into a chorus of unholy glee. Their forms, usually contorted in malice, seemed to straighten, their claws flexing in anticipation. Kin! the primal part of their minds shrieked, not in recognition of shared blood, but of shared essence, of a corruption that resonated with their very being. The prey was no longer just prey; it was a challenge, a twisted reflection, a glorious, new kind of battle.
The clash was instantaneous, a cataclysmic collision of two dark forces. The air screamed as the transformed Imperial soldiers met the demon charge. No longer fighting with cautious tactics, the soldiers moved with a feral, unthinking aggression, their movements mirroring the demons’ own chaotic ferocity. An ogre warrior, his Abyssal armor rippling with dark energy, met a hulking brute demon head-on, not with a block, but with a bone-shattering shoulder charge that sent both tumbling into the churned earth. His fists, now edged with jagged, dark protrusions from the armor, hammered down with a strength that cracked the demon’s carapace.