The air in Nyxholm always carried the scent of road dust, exotic spices from passing caravans, and a hint of magical ozone. This crossroads city never slept; it merely blinked between business transactions. Yet, on a quieter street corner, in front of a shop named "The Golden Hook & Legendary Bait," a highly unnatural scene was unfolding.
Archduke Morvax, the Archduke of Industry, one of the most feared entities in the entire Gloomfen Sovereignty, was confused.
His body, nearly three meters tall, clad in jet-black armor with dimly glowing cyan accents, towered inside the cramped shop. His head—a plain white faceless skull surrounded by a spiked collar—dipped slightly, staring at the two fishing rods he held in his spiked iron gauntlets.
Perched atop his gruesome skull was a beige canvas fishing hat patterned with cute little fish. The hat looked incredibly small, incredibly silly, and somehow, completely fitting for the absurdity of the moment.
"Hmm..." Morvax's voice echoed, heavy and vibrating like grinding tombstones, yet the tone was filled with genuine hesitation. "A difficult choice. The left one is made of wind-magic-reinforced carbon fiber, light as a feather. But the right one... made from the bone of a juvenile Leviathan, flexible yet sturdy."
He turned to the side, where his loyal servant, Liora Vesper, stood with perfect posture. Liora wore her tight black butler suit, hugging her curves elegantly yet modestly. Her sharp eyes, one black and one amber-red, stared at the fishing rods as if they were enemies of the state.
"What do you think, Liora?" asked Morvax. "I want to catch Ghost Koi in Mirror Lake. They are sensitive fish."
Liora stepped forward, her white gloves touching the Leviathan bone rod. Her face remained ice-cold, an unshakable expression of "Cool Beauty," but inside her heart, a storm of emotions was raging.
'Lord Morvax... wearing a fish hat...' Liora's inner voice screamed, her cheeks tinting with a blush so faint it was barely visible. 'So cute! This combination of majestic death aura and a relaxed middle-aged man's hobby... what incredible gap moe!'
Externally, however, she cleared her throat softly. "Ahem. Allow me to check the specifications, Master."
Liora took the rod, her eyes narrowing sharply at the metal joints and the reel seat. She turned toward the shopkeeper, an old goblin with thick glasses who was trembling violently behind the counter.
"Hey, Shopkeeper," Liora's voice was sharp and cold. "You said this was top quality? I see a micro-scratch on the third guide ring from the top. And..." She flicked the string. Ting. "...the line tension is uneven. If Lord Morvax pulls anything heavier than five kilograms, this will snap. Are you trying to sabotage my Master's vacation?"
The goblin squeaked, his green face turning pale. "N-no, Miss! I swear on my grandmother's teeth! That... that is the best rod for the lake! Unless... well, unless you plan on fishing for Sky Whales or Krakens!"
Morvax tilted his head, his fishing hat tilting with it. "Whales? Hmm... as far as I know, there are no whales in Mirror Lake. Just fish, giant turtles, and perhaps a few corpses dumped by the mafia. So this is safe?"
"S-safe! Very safe, Your Excellency Archduke!"
"Very well," Morvax decided, his tone cheerful again. "I'll take this one. And a jar of magic worms. Strawberry flavored; I hear the fish there like sweets."
Liora sighed in internal relief. Finally, they could go to the lake. Just the two of them. By the quiet water. Far from piles of documents and palace politics. Maybe she could help bait the hook... or simply stare at her master's broad back while he fished. It was a dream date—she meant, an ideal escort mission.
However, fate in Nocturnus never allowed peace to last long.
Nyxholm Railway Station - Signal & Telecommunications Room
The atmosphere in the station control tower shifted from boring routine to total panic in seconds.
Indicator lights on the magitech control panel flashed furiously red, accompanied by warning sirens that wailed like dying banshees. Needles on the steam pressure and speed gauges on the main console spun wildly into the danger zone.
"What is that?! What is that?!" yelled the Station Master, an old Orc with one broken tusk, jumping from his chair.
The signal operator, a young Imp wearing a crystal headset, went pale. His hands trembled over the control levers.
"Emergency signal from the East Main Line, Sir! There's a train... a ghost train!"
"A ghost train? You mean the Spiritus Aeternum?"
"No, Sir! It's physical! A Heavy-Class Magitech Cargo Train! Hull number 774!" The operator swallowed hard, his eyes wide as he stared at the magic monitor screen displaying a red dot moving at insane speed. "Braking systems are offline. The train crew is not responding. The speed... good God... the speed is over 250 kilometers per hour!"
The Station Master froze. The blood drained from his rough green face.
"250...? That's suicide speed for a cargo train!"
He turned to look out the tower window, staring down at the station platform below. There, on Track 1—the very track the death train was heading for—a regular passenger train bound for Vesperia was stopped.
The platform was packed. Mothers carrying shopping baskets, vampire businessmen checking pocket watches, demon children running around chasing balloons. Hundreds of lives.
"TRACK 1 IS OCCUPIED!" roared the Station Master, grabbing the PA system microphone. "EVACUATE! EVERYONE! GET OFF THE PLATFORM! NOW!"
Platform 1
The deafening sound of sirens tore through the busy afternoon air. The frantic announcement from the Station Master echoed, distorted by panic.
"ATTENTION! RUNAWAY TRAIN APPROACHING! GET OUT OF THE CARRIAGES! GET AWAY FROM THE RAILS! THIS IS NOT A DRILL!"
Panic spread like fire doused in gasoline. The orderly crowd turned into a sea of bodies shoving one another. Screams of terror filled the air. People leaped from train doors, falling into piles on the platform, trampled by those panicking behind them.
However, not everyone could move fast enough.
Inside one of the passenger carriages, an old Elf woman was pinned between seats, her walking stick broken. At another door, a young mother was pushed out by the current of the mob, falling onto the platform while her hand slipped from her son's grip.
"MOM!" screamed the child, a seven-year-old boy with small horns on his forehead. He was still left inside the carriage, trapped behind the glass window, his eyes widening in horror as he watched his mother being dragged away by the river of humans.
"NO! MY SON! MY SON IS STILL INSIDE!" screamed the mother, trying to fight the current, but it was futile.
And then, the sound came.
Not the sound of sirens. Not the sound of screaming. But the sound of approaching death.
A low rumble vibrated through the station's concrete floor. The iron rails began to shake violently, singing a high-pitched note that hurt the ears. A strong wind blew from the station entrance tunnel, carrying the smell of hot metal and burnt oil.
From the darkness of the tunnel at the end of the station, a pair of train headlights emerged like the eyes of an angry monster.
The train arrived.
Massive. Black. A giant iron locomotive five meters tall, weighing thousands of tons, speeding like an unstoppable cannonball. There was no sound of braking. No attempt to slow down. Only pure momentum ready to crush anything in its path. The carriages behind it looked severely damaged, as if they had just been shredded by giant blades, yet they still hurtled forward, following the crazed locomotive.
People on the platform froze, staring at the horror speeding toward them. The little boy inside the stopped carriage closed his eyes, hugging his knees, waiting for the end.
Distance remaining: one hundred meters. Fifty meters.
Doomsday was right before their eyes.
"Golden Hook" Fishing Shop
In the middle of haggling over the price of magic worms, Morvax's head suddenly jerked upright. His fishing hat tilted slightly.
"Master?" Liora, sensitive to even the slightest change in her master, was instantly alert.
"This vibration..." Morvax murmured, his voice losing its relaxed tone, replaced by cold authority. He didn't look toward the station, but he felt it. The vibration in the ground. The mass fear radiating like a heatwave. And the momentum... the massive momentum of steel moving without control.
"Chaos. At the station."
Without another word, Morvax vanished.
He didn't run. He launched.
The shop floor cracked as he propelled himself. The shop door exploded open from the wind pressure generated by his acceleration. Liora, reacting a split second later, saw only a black and cyan blur shooting through the streets of Nyxholm, moving faster than the blink of an eye, leaving a trail of phantom smoke behind him.
"Master!" Liora ran in pursuit, but she knew she couldn't catch up to the Archduke's full speed.
Railway Station
Ten meters.
The death train now filled the entire field of vision. Its black iron snout looked like a maw ready to swallow the stationary passenger train in front of it. The screams of the people reached a crescendo, a choir of despair.
The mother who had lost her child closed her eyes, screaming her son's name for the last time.
And that was when darkness descended.
Not night. But a shadow darker, heavier, and more majestic.
BOOOM!
Something landed right on the tracks, in the narrow gap between the stationary train and the speeding one. The landing was so hard that the concrete beneath the rails shattered into a crater, and dust flew into the air.
A figure loomed there. Tall. Terrifying. Jet-black armor. A white skull. And a small fishing hat still clinging to his head.
Archduke Morvax.
He didn't take a stance. He didn't cast a complex protective spell. He simply stood tall, one hand—his right hand—raised straight forward, palm open facing the snout of the oncoming locomotive.
"STOP."
His voice was not a shout. It was an Absolute Command.
Contact made.
The locomotive, weighing thousands of tons and traveling at 250 km/h, slammed into Morvax's palm.
The laws of physics demanded Morvax be crushed into red pulp. The laws of physics demanded he be thrown.
But Morvax was the law here.
KRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNGGGG!!!
The sound of the impact surpassed anything human ears had ever heard. It was the scream of tortured metal, the sound of steel forced to submit by an immeasurable force.
The locomotive stopped.
Instantly.
The front of the train, its thick iron snout, crumpled inward as if it had hit an invisible mountain wall. Metal buckled, glass shattered, and scalding steam spewed out from bursting pipes.
Morvax's feet sank into the ground up to his knees, splitting the platform concrete and the steel rails beneath, creating a long trench as he was pushed back—one meter, two meters, five meters—before finally, his heels dug in firm and halted everything.
He held it. With one hand.
However, physics could not be completely ignored. Inertia is a cruel monster.
Although the front locomotive stopped dead, the dozens of carriages behind it did not. They still carried the momentum of thousands of tons moving at full speed. The carriages began to pile up, lifting off the rails, ready to cartwheel and explode, destroying the station and everything in it.
"Hmph," Morvax grunted.
Behind the crushed locomotive, a secondary disaster was unfolding in terrifying slow motion. The second carriage slammed into the first, crushing it like a soda can. The third carriage lifted into the air, jumping the tracks, twisting, and ready to crash down onto the packed platform. The fourth carriage exploded, its fuel payload ignited by the friction.
It was a tidal wave of steel and fire ready to bury the station.
But Morvax wasn't finished.
The eyes in his skull sockets flared with bright cyan fire.
"Be still," he commanded.
From the back of his armor, from the shadows beneath his feet, hundreds of spectral chains in black and blue exploded out. The chains were not physical; they were made of dense supernatural energy, tipped with soul hooks.
CLANK-CLANK-CLANK-WHISH!
The chains shot past the crushed locomotive, piercing through the smoke and fire. They wrapped around the carriage flying through the air, holding it back from falling onto the crowd. They pierced the walls of the piling carriages, stitching the torn steel, containing the explosions from within.
At the same time, cold gray ghost smoke radiated from Morvax's body, enveloping the entire wrecked train. The smoke possessed a strange property—it absorbed kinetic energy and heat. The raging fire was instantly extinguished, choked by the lack of oxygen. Flying metal shards slowed down and fell gently to the ground as if they were underwater.
In seconds, the kinetic chaos froze.
The carriages that had been crashing into each other were now suspended in the air in impossible positions, bound by a web of glowing ghost chains. The locomotive in front of Morvax was totally crumpled, steam hissing weakly around the Archduke's iron fingers still pressed against its snout.
Silence returned to the station. Absolute, shaken silence.
Morvax slowly pulled his hand from the dented metal. He straightened his body, pulling his legs out of the concrete trench he had made. He patted the dust from his armored shoulders, then carefully adjusted his fishing hat, which was slightly askew.
Liora finally arrived at the scene, breathing slightly hard—something very rare for her. She saw the scene: the destroyed yet magically suspended train, the cracked platform, and her master standing untouched in the center of it all.
"Master..." Liora whispered, her eyes radiating unconcealable admiration.
Morvax didn't look at the crowd beginning to cheer or cry in relief. He didn't care for praise. He stared into the crushed driver's cabin. Empty. No driver.
His cyan eyes narrowed dangerously. He sensed residual magic on the train's metal—blood magic, foreign, and traces of violence that had just occurred. This was no accident. This was an aftermath.
Liora approached, smoothing her hair that had been slightly messed up from running. She stood beside her master, ready to leave. In her mind, she was already imagining the next scenario: they would leave this noisy crowd, head to the quiet Mirror Lake, and fish under the twilight glow, just the two of them...
"Master," Liora said softly. "I have the pickup car ready. We can head straight to the lake now before this crowd becomes—"
Morvax raised one hand, stopping Liora's sentence.
He didn't move. His armored feet remained planted on the cracked concrete. He stared at the carcass of the train with an intensity that chilled the surrounding air.
"No, Liora," Morvax's voice echoed low, heavy like a death knell. "We are not going anywhere."
Liora's heart stopped for a moment. "Master?"
Morvax turned slowly, looking at the chaos in the station. The terrified people, the crying child in his mother's arms, and the Orc Station Master running frantically toward them with a pale face.
"Someone dared to send a death train into my city," Morvax said, the fire in his eyes burning brighter. "Someone dared to threaten order in my territory. And someone dared to ruin my vacation schedule."
He crossed his arms over his chest.
"Hmm... very well," he muttered, his voice containing a threat that promised suffering for whoever was responsible. "Who is responsible for this?"
Liora fell silent. She looked at her master's broad, majestic back. She saw that undeniable aura of leadership. It was the side of Archduke Morvax she admired, the side of the ruler protecting his people.
But...
Liora's shoulders slumped slightly, ever so slightly, a micro-movement that occurred only due to profound disappointment.
'Ah...'
Liora's inner voice screamed in silent agony.
'Goodbye, Mirror Lake. Goodbye, romantic picnic for two. Goodbye, the moment of applying sunscreen to Master's skull back...'
Her face remained flat, the expression of a perfect servant, but inside, she was weeping tears of blood.
'Ouch... looks like the vacation has to be postponed. What a shame... even though I prepared Master's favorite cucumber sandwiches and my new swimsuit...'
Externally, however, Liora bowed deeply, hiding the disappointment in her sharp eyes.
"I understand, Master," she said with a cold, professional voice. "I will interrogate the Station Master immediately and trace the origin of this train. Whoever did this... will wish they had died in the crash."
Morvax nodded in satisfaction. "Good. Do it now."