Alaric landed.
The earth shivered beneath him. Lightning coiled along his limbs like living serpents.
The bull-head turned its massive head, and Alaric's spear exploded forward, leaving streaks of electricity.
Alaric's follow-up was a blur of lightning and fists, striking again and again.
Every movement was amplified, turning the battlefield into white-blue chaos.
"Ophelia!" he called, voice almost lost in the thunder. "There's another. Deep in the cave! It had a weakness!"
Her eyes narrowed, teeth gritted. "What weakness?"
Alaric didn't answer. He vaulted over a fallen tree and met the bull-head head-on, thrusting spear after spear. Lightning crackled across the beast's broken horns.
"RAGHHH!!!"
It staggered, bellowing with rage, but its shadowy eyes burned with stubborn life.
The clay golem, reshaping and rolling toward Ophelia, laughed. Its voice was layered, warped, booming.
"LOOK AT YOU! ALL SO SMALL! ALL SO WEAK!"
Ophelia raised her sword. "I'm not small. And I'm not weak."
Her blade swung, and the clay fists flew apart like sand in wind. The golem roared in frustration.
"YOU THINK THAT CAN STOP ME?" it bellowed, but a tremor in its voice betrayed the strain.
"ARRGGGHHHHHH!!!"
Alaric struck the bull-head again and again, spear flashing in white-blue arcs. The monster staggered. Its eyes losing that shadowy glint.
Alaric said, "Core."
The creature's chest burst open in a spray of red ambrosia.
The clay golem twitched. Panic in its malformed features. It tried to flee, a rolling, reshaping mass of mud, stone, and twisted limbs.
"You aren't going to escape."
Ophelia intercepted. Her greatsword became a blur. Ten strikes in a heartbeat. Clay flew, limbs separated, but the golem reformed, mocking her effort. It ran again.
Victor shouted from the back, "It must be able to control the core's position in its body!"
Alaric's brows furrowed. Victor was right. Killing it will be harder than the others.
Alaric and Ophelia ran after the golem. The hunt began.
They circled it, danced around the forest, striking, cutting, shocking. The clay golem screamed and laughed, a horrible, layered noise. Each time it reformed, Alaric and Ophelia were there. Lightning, Prana strikes, repeated slices. Terror became the weapon, each strike driving it back into a trap of its own creation.
Eventually, their endless assault forced it back toward the clearing.
Ophelia launched herself first, greatsword a glowing arc of destruction. Each strike severed clay, twisted it, shredded limbs—but she was hunting not just flesh and mud, but the hidden core.
A crunch. She smiled.
Something deep within gave way. One core fractured. The mass of clay it had anchored went limp, lifeless…almost.
The golem looked angry, and then laughed, cruel and high-pitched. Like a dead man who found his mortality amusing. It looked at Alaric.
"MY MASTER…TOLD ME ABOUT YOU. HE WILL BE PLEASED."
Alaric pressed, "Who made you? The cult?"
"YOU'LL SEE…WHEN IT'S TOO LATE!"it bellowed, voice echoing.
One piece of core rolled free, steaming with melted clay.
Victor's eyes narrowed. He moved faster than thought, and cut it in two. Sparks flew. Red ambrosia hissed and spilled.
The golem shuddered, stilled, then collapsed entirely, clay limbs twitching like spent puppets.
Silence fell.
Then the earth shook. Rocks cracked. Dust fell from the canopy.
Melina stumbled, looking around frantically. "Why is everything collapsing? Why now?"
Alaric's eyes narrowed.
"The monster in the cave… it killed the core of the dungeon. You said that was holding it together, right?"
Branches snapped. Trees tilted. A boulder tumbled, carving a trench through the mud.
"We need to move! Now!" Victoria shouted, gripping her spear.
Adam carried Tani on his shoulder, dodging falling stone. Ophelia slid under a collapsing root and split it mid-motion. Victoria yanked Melina clear as a boulder smashed where she'd stood. Victor stayed beside Alaric, eyes flicking ahead, calculating paths through the chaos.
The dungeon was alive with danger: ceilings cracked, walls shuddered, stone split underfoot. Dust and debris rained from above.
They ran. No one looked back. Each step was a fight against gravity, against chaos, against the dungeon itself.
Melina cried out as a tree fell beside her, almost killing Nita, before she blew it away with a fireball. Victoria shouted instructions at Ophelia's party members, clearing paths. Ophelia smashed obstacles with precise swings. Victor calculated, leapt, and slashed as debris threatened to block their escape.
"Is there even an exit?!" Adam yelled.
"I think so!" Victor shouted back.
"I saw something when we crossed the ravine—"
Alaric cut in, lightning flaring brighter as the tunnel opened ahead. "It's our best bet!"
They plunged into the cave together as the dungeon collapsed behind them.
_______________________________________________
Aurelian, City of Magic –
They say magic either enlightens a person or drives them mad.
Aurelian did both.
The city was a triumph of spellcraft and ambition, raised over nearly a century by the greatest mages alive. Teleportation circles littered the surface. Flying automobiles traced glowing arcs through the sky. Above it all drifted the Magic Towers of Aurelian—seven colossal spires suspended in the air, each ruled by a different magical faction, watching the city below like silent gods.
But brilliance cast long shadows.
Beneath the towers' glow, the black market flourished. Here, magic shed all pretense of virtue. Illegal enchantments, forbidden creatures, and depraved services were traded openly, their prices measured in blood, coin, or worse.
On the rooftop of a tall building buried deep within that district, two figures stood cloaked in darkness, red masks gleaming faintly in the citylight.
One sat cross-legged on the stone, a black magical sphere cradled in his palm. The other stood nearby, posture rigid, hands clasped behind his back, restraint radiating from him like a held breath.
The sphere cracked.
A jagged line split its surface.
"Damn it~!" came a young girl's voice.
"Did the experimental beasts die?" the standing figure asked, his tone refined, carefully controlled.
"Yeah." She rose to her feet, staring down at the fractured sphere. "Sucks, doesn't it?"
A third presence emerged from the shadows, dressed the same. His footsteps were soundless. His voice, when he spoke, was calm. It was like the voice of a singer, like a man who could use his speech alone, to destroy someone. Or make them fall in love.
"Was it him? The Knight in Redgate."
"Probably," the girl said, tilting her masked head toward the ruined sphere.
The older man turned sharply. "What are you doing here? Weren't you supposed to be at the auction?"
The newcomer shrugged. "Got bored. All rich bastards. Nothing interesting." He paused, then added, almost idly, "What was his name again?"
Silence stretched between them.
"Alaric," the older man said at last. "That's what Brutus called him."
"Ah." The man walked toward the edge of the building, citylights reflecting off his mask. "Alaric…"
He reached up and pulled the mask down.
"Hey!" the girl snapped, pointing at him. "He's allowed to do that when we're together! Why can't I?"
"Because we aren't supposed to," the older man said sharply. "Isn't that right, Julius?"
Julius only smiled.
Pale blue eyes caught the light. Hair like silver-gold framed a face sculpted with unsettling perfection—timeless, beautiful. So beautiful it felt wrong to look at him for too long.
He looked out over the glittering city below.
"I wonder what you look like on the inside," he murmured.
"Alaric."