The world blurred into white and shadow as they plummeted. Elin barely had time to brace before she slammed into snow hard enough to drive the breath from her lungs. The impact sent her tumbling down a slope, ice shards slicing against her coat. Brynhild crashed beside her like a falling boulder, the ground groaning beneath her weight before she rolled and skidded to a stop.
For a moment, there was only the ringing silence of survival. Elin blinked against the moonlight glaring off jagged cliffs and glaciers above them, her chest searing with every breath. She pressed her hand to her side — ribs aflame, likely cracked. Beside her, Brynhild pushed up on one knee, cursing under her breath as she tested her leg. Her knee buckled once, forcing her to slam her gauntlet into the ground for balance.
"Alive," Brynhild rasped, spitting blood into the snow. "Mostly."
Elin lay back for half a second, the cold seeping through her clothes, before forcing herself upright. We lived. The thought hit her like a desperate prayer. But the relief lasted only a heartbeat before the truth bled through her chest in a bitter whisper: But for how long?
Above, the Citadel loomed — a black crown of alloy and stone, glowing faintly red against the night sky. It was still watching them. Still hunting them.
The answer came quickly.
A sharp whine split the night, followed by the crunch of metal on stone. Elin's eyes shot upward. Crimson eyes dotted the cliff edges, rows of Draugr drones scanning the ravine below. Their searchlights cut jagged beams through the darkness, crawling over the walls like hunting knives.
"Down!" Elin hissed, dragging herself behind an ice outcrop. Brynhild limped after her, gritting her teeth.
The searchlights passed once, twice. Then the Draugr leapt.
Metal bodies crashed into the snow around them, sending up powdery bursts. The ground shuddered under their weight. The first drone rose from its crouch with unnatural speed, blade-arms gleaming under the moonlight. Its crimson optics locked onto them.
Brynhild swung her gauntlet in a wide arc, the impact detonating with a crunch of alloy and ice. The drone split in two, scattering limbs across the ravine floor. Another lunged at her from the side; she pivoted, shoulder-checking it hard enough to splinter its torso.
"More coming!" Elin shouted, backing up, rifle snapping to her shoulder. A quick shot cracked a drone's optics, sending it jerking blind into the snow. She fired again, blowing out a leg joint, buying seconds. But seconds weren't enough. Above, more Draugr were pouring over the cliff's lip, raining into the ravine like predators descending on prey.
Brynhild crushed another drone "We can't kill them all." she said.
"I know," Elin snapped, already digging into her belt. She pulled out a compass, its needle trembling against the magnetic chaos of Draugr energy. She paired it with her battered scanner, flickering with ghostly outlines of the terrain ahead. "The old maps showed caves in this ravine. If we find them, we might—"
"Might what? Crawl away like rats?" Brynhild barked, smashing a Draugr head into the ice.
"Survive," Elin hissed, ducking as a searchlight swept across their position. "It's this or nothing."
Brynhild gave her a fierce grin, gauntlet dripping sparks. "Fine. Lead the way, and I'll clear it."
The ravine stretched out like a frozen artery, narrow paths twisting between jagged ice spires. Moonlight and searchlights mingled on the slick surfaces, casting fractured shadows. Elin moved fast, compass trembling in her gloved hand, her eyes flicking between the scanner's weak readings and the terrain.
Brynhild thundered after her, smashing through drones that caught up, her gauntlet striking like a forge hammer. Each hit cracked the air with shockwaves, sending pieces of metal spiraling into the snow. But the Draugr kept coming, endless, their movements eerily synchronized, as though driven by one mind.
"They're herding us!" Elin shouted over the clang of metal and roar of impacts.
"Good," Brynhild growled, shoving an ice pillar loose. It toppled into the path behind them, crushing a squad of drones. "Let's see how the herd likes a stampede."
As they raced, Brynhild lashed out at the environment itself — punching into brittle cliff faces, shoving boulders of ice loose to tumble down and block paths. Each crash bought them moments, just enough space to keep running. Elin ducked flying shards, her lungs burning with the cold, ribs stabbing with every step.
Her scanner blipped faintly — a hollow under the ice, a pocket of darkness ahead. A cave.
"There!" Elin pointed, pushing harder despite her body's protests. "Cave system, two hundred meters!"
Brynhild barreled through the next wave of drones, leaving their sparking wreckage strewn across the snow. Her grin was feral. "Then run, little sniper! Run faster before our welcoming party grows!"
The ravine howled with the sound of pursuit: the metallic shrieks of Draugr, the hiss of servos, the thrum of searchlights burning over the ice. The hunters were closing.
And Elin knew, with a sinking pit in her chest, that something worse was coming. Something heavier. The ground trembled faintly beneath their boots — as though the ravine itself was preparing to birth a new monster.
Then, with a sound like the sky tearing apart, something vast dropped from above.
The impact shook Elin to her bones. Ice cracked, snow cascaded, the earth itself seemed to recoil. When the dust cleared, the thing stood revealed in the pale moonlight — a Draugr Titan.
It was a nightmare made of steel. A quadrupedal construct, spider-like but heavier, its plated body bristling with cannons and jointed with jagged scythe-limbs. Crimson cores pulsed across its frame like diseased hearts. Its optics flared wide, burning down on them, and then it roared — a sound of metallic thunder that rattled stone from the cliffs.
Brynhild spat blood and snarled, planting her boots.
Before Elin could protest, she charged.
The Titan's front limb scythed down, the blade larger than Brynhild herself. She rolled beneath it, her gauntlet igniting with unstable energy, and smashed into its knee joint. The impact cracked the alloy but only staggered the monster. It shrieked in a chorus of grinding gears and reared, cannons swiveling to lock onto her.
"Brynhild!" Elin shouted, rifle snapping up, but her bullets sparked uselessly against its armor.
Brynhild didn't care. She slammed another punch into its foreleg, dodged left as a plasma cannon belched a beam that scorched the ice black. She was drawing its fire, but it was killing her to do it.
Elin's chest heaved, her ribs screaming. Brute force won't do it… it's too big. Too armored. Her eyes flicked up, desperately scanning the cliffs — and there she saw it: a jagged overhang of an ice shelf, fractured and barely clinging to the wall. A fragile ceiling waiting to collapse.
Her mind sharpened. That's it. That's the kill.
Elin sprinted across the ravine floor, half-limping, dodging shards of ice and ricocheting plasma. She ripped her demolition charge from her belt, thumbed the primer, and pressed it against the trembling cliff face.
The Titan roared and fired. Brynhild barely dodged the blast, her gauntlet glowing red as it absorbed strain. Sparks showered around her, and still she laughed like a madwoman.
"Is that all you've got, tin-spider?!" she bellowed, leaping to smash another strike against its limb. The blow left her gauntlet sparking dangerously.
Elin's hands shook as she set the detonator. She glanced up, breath steaming, muttering under her breath: "Come on… just a little closer…"
The Titan advanced, each step a quake, its massive shadow crawling up the cliff face. Brynhild staggered under another near-miss, falling to one knee.
The Titan reared back, limbs rising, cannons charging to full glow. It was about to crush her.
Elin slammed the trigger.
The world exploded.
The ice shelf above groaned, split, and then collapsed in a tidal wave of white. An avalanche roared down like the wrath of the gods, burying the Titan in a storm of crushing weight. Its shriek was drowned by the thunder of collapsing cliffs, its cannons firing wildly before vanishing under the deluge.
Snow and ice blasted outward, the shockwave slamming Elin against the wall. Brynhild was hurled onto her side, half-buried, coughing blood and snow. The avalanche poured on and on, filling the ravine, until the Titan was gone — buried under tons of frozen death, its red eyes winking out one by one.
"Elin—!" Brynhild rasped, dragging herself upright through the storm.
"I'm here!" Elin gasped, grabbing her hand.
The cave mouth was seconds away from being sealed by the cascading snow. Together they stumbled, half-blind, half-falling, diving into the narrow opening as the avalanche thundered past, walling off the ravine behind them.
Darkness swallowed them. Silence, at last.
Inside the cave, the world shrank to ragged breathing and dripping ice.
Elin slumped against the frozen wall, every muscle screaming. Her ribs felt like shattered glass, her hands shook uncontrollably, and her lungs burned from cold and exhaustion. But she was alive. Somehow.
Brynhild stumbled beside her, blood trickling down her split lip, her face smeared with ash and snow. She collapsed onto the ice with a grunt, then leaned back and laughed. A raw, hoarse sound that echoed off the cave walls.
"That…" She coughed hard, spitting red into the snow. "…was one hell of a brawl."
Elin let her head fall back, her breath fogging in the cold. Her voice came out dark and tired: "We came for answers… and we barely escaped alive."
Brynhild chuckled again, eyes half-lidded but still burning bright with that feral fire. "But we broke their cage." She gestured vaguely toward the sealed avalanche behind them. "That's a win in my book."
Elin managed the faintest smile, though her chest still ached. She looked deeper into the cave's black maw. It stretched on into unknown darkness, away from the Citadel, away from Tyrakos's reach.
They were alive. Bloodied, exhausted, shaken to the core — but alive.
And for tonight, that was enough.