Nightblade (Darkest night)

At the centre of the city, the calamitous battle between the King of Elaris and the leader of the first awakened raged on.

Several of the more prominent structures in the city had already been utterly obliterated in the wake of their ruinous clash.

Even as the two blurred figures raced across the city, Morgan’s mind was already feverishly straining to find a solution to his current predicament.

With the elusive phantom gone, he now had more leeway to activate freely.

What did the awakened want? What was their reason for being here? The cause for all the senseless destruction and death...

"The Vault..."

Even while trading blows with the sovereign of Elaris, the stranger laughed. The sound was dry, echoing over the clashing of steel like dead leaves rustling across stone.

"The prince is quite perceptive," he remarked, parrying a thrust with a casual flick of his wrist.

King Aldren’s expression hardened, his features setting into granite.

"Enough."

For the first time since the slaughter began, power truly erupted from the king.

Golden light burst from his frame, flowing around his broad shoulders like liquid sunlight. It clung to his armor, bathing the now grim plaza in a warm, blinding radiance.

Beneath his boots, the ancient runes carved into the marble flared to life, burning through the layers of dust and dried blood. The glowing ley-lines spread rapidly across the plaza floor, spider-webbing outward toward the edge of the city.

Morgan’s breath caught in his throat.

"How is this possible..."

The entire capital answered its master, stirring to life as a slumbering giant roused from the depths of the deep.

Every towering obelisk lining the perimeter flared with incandescent light.

Every glass lantern along the avenues brightened until the flames within turned pure, searing white. High above the city, the enormous magical lattice—the ancient sky-shield of Elaris—groaned.

The massive construct descended slightly, locking into place and enveloping the capital within an impenetrable, shimmering dome of golden energy.

The stranger’s easy smile slowly faded. The playful light vanished from his eyes, replaced by a cold, calculating stillness.

"So..." he murmured, shifting his stance as the golden glare reflected off his dark armor. "You still possess the King’s Authority."

"Leave," Aldren commanded. His voice was no longer that of a man; it echoed with the resonant, thundering weight of Elaris itself. "This is your final warning."

Silence stretched across the plaza. The wind died down, trapping the smell of ozone and burnt stone in the air.

Then, the stranger let out a quiet sigh.

"I truly wished to avoid this."

He slowly raised one hand, his pale fingers extending toward the darkening sky.

For a long second, nothing happened. The golden dome held firm.

Then...the sky behind him rippled like a disturbed pond.

Morgan’s pupils contracted.

Dozens of figures stepped from space. They did not fall from the clouds, nor did they burst through the golden lattice above. They simply stepped through the air, as though invisible doors had opened across the fabric of the heavens itself.

Each newcomer held a different weapon. Curved scimitars that gleamed with dark poison. Long, slender spears wrapped in crimson cloth. Heavy iron chains that rattled against the wind. Twin daggers dripping with shadow. Colossal great-hammers capable of shattering city gates.

Yet despite their wildly different gear, every single one of them shared the same unnerving composure. Their eyes were silver, devoid of emotion, and their faces carried the chilling stillness of statues.

The First Awakened. More of them.

Morgan gritted his teeth, his eyes narrowing with fury.

There were no battle cries to signal their arrival. No rhythmic pounding of shields, no grand boasts, no roar of bloodlust. There was only an absolute, terrifying certainty of victory.

The stranger lowered his hand, his eyes never leaving King Aldren.

"Open the way."

The silver-eyed warriors descended like falling stars, their bodies breaking into trails of pale light as they dropped toward the plaza. Below, the surviving royal guards roared, surging forward to meet the onslaught.

The silver-eyed warriors swept forward like a tide, drowning the plaza like elusive shadows. They moved with a terrifying, unnatural synergy—not as individual fighters, but as a single, lethal organism executing a long-calculated execution.

Where the royal guards swung with heavy, desperate fury, the invaders glided through the chaos with eerie grace, their pale light trailing behind their weapons like ribbons of frost.

A captain of the guard raised his tower shield, roaring a prayer to the city, but a silver-eyed warrior wielding twin curved daggers didn’t even slow down.

She stepped onto the face of the shield, vaulted smoothly over his head, and drove both blades downward into the soft seam of his neck armor before her boots even touched the cobblestones behind him.

The man collapsed without a sound, his blood spilling onto the cold stone.

Beside them, the air shattered.

A man in dark robes thrust his staff into the earth.

A moment later, his eyes glowed an eerie violet, the nebulous staff he wielded unleashing a blinding arc of jagged purple lightning.

The bolt tore through the vanguard, vaporizing three of the invaders into bursts of pale, glowing ash.

The dark figures around him hesitated for the briefest moment, then promptly resumed their massacre, sowing death and destruction with every movement.

Despite the fleeting moment of respite, the momentum of the destructive tide of silver-eyed shadows never broke.

Two more leaped over the smoking remains of their brethren, a great hammer swinging in a wide, crushing arc that caught the sorcerer full in the chest.

The force sent him skidding fifty yards across the marble, his ribs caving in beneath the impact.

A moment later, the man rose, shrugging off the blow without concern, his violet eyes illuminating the dark grin on his face.

Morgan stared at the man in disbelief even as he darted backward to avoid a blade that harmlessly whizzed by his neck.

Strangely enough, none of the assailants made any real effort to engage him, darting away and entirely dodging his attacks.

"Strange..."

The plaza became an abattoir of magic and steel. Bursts of intrusive shadow erupted from the pavement, wrapping around the ankles of the defenders and dragging them into the widening cracks of the earth.

Waves of kinetic force rattled the surrounding stained-glass towers, sending showers of razor-sharp colored glass raining down on both armies like deadly hail.