From atop the battlements, the king saw it all happening and for the first time since the battle began, shock broke through the iron control he had carried so firmly.

His eyes widened as the field that had just been a symbol of victory twisted into something unnatural before him. The corpses moved again. They rose. The very ground that had been soaked in triumph now writhing like a living nightmare.

Around him, the archers and mages who had remained on the wall also began to murmur in disbelief. Low voices spread quickly, filled with confusion and fear, because none of them had expected the dead to rise again after such a decisive slaughter.

For a moment even he felt it. That sharp, cold realization that what they faced was not something that could be ended by strength alone.

But just as quickly, the king forced that hesitation down. His jaw tightened, his teeth grinding as his gaze hardened once more. Deep inside, a thought pressed forward with bitter clarity.

"Of course... it would not be this easy."

He drew in a steady breath, then raised his voice with renewed authority.

"Archers!" he commanded. "Cover their retreat! Do not let those things reach our men!"

"At once, Your Majesty!"

The answer came without delay. The murmur vanished, replaced by discipline. Bows were lifted and strings pulled taut again. Eyes sharpened as every archer focused on the chaotic field below.

Then the arrows flew again.

This time, they were not released in blind volleys. Each shot was measured, controlled and carefully shot. Arrows arced over retreating knights and mages, threading through narrow openings between moving bodies.

Shafts struck the reanimated beasts as they staggered forward with broken limbs and torn flesh. Some of them were pinned back to the ground while others jerked violently as arrows embedded into already ruined bodies, yet they did not stop.

Below, the retreat had turned into a desperate movement.

Mages stumbled over uneven ground and discarded tools as fear finally broke through their composure. Some of them even nearly fell as they tried to keep pace, their robes catching on jagged bone and torn hide. Their earlier discipline strained under the sight of corpses rising around them.

But the knights did not break.

Under the shouted commands of their captains, they held formation even while moving backward. Shields locked together once more. Lines adjusted with practiced precision. They did not run blindly. They withdrew with control, placing themselves between the mages and the advancing reanimated corpses.

"Hold formation!" one of the captains roared. "Do not scatter!"

A reanimated wolf lunged forward with half its body dragging behind it, only to slam into a raised shield. The knight behind it staggered but did not fall. Another knight stepped in immediately to reinforce the line.

Arrows continued to rain down from above, striking the beasts again and again. Bodies were torn further apart. Limbs snapped. Yet the creatures still moved, driven by something that ignored pain and death alike.

"What do we do?!" one knight shouted, his voice strained as he forced back a thrashing carcass. "They’re already dead so we can’t make them more dead!"

For a split second, uncertainty flickered through the line.

Then one of the captains answered without hesitation.

"Then cut them apart!" he bellowed. "Severe the limbs! Stop them from moving!"

The command spread instantly.

Blades changed direction. Instead of aiming for hearts or skulls they hacked at joints. Swords bit into already broken flesh. Axes came down on legs and necks. Spears pinned bodies in place while others moved in to sever what still allowed movement.

A serpent reared weakly from the ground, only for its head to be split from its body by a coordinated strike. A boar dragged itself forward on shattered limbs before a group of knights surrounded it and carved its legs apart piece by piece until it could no longer move.

The battlefield became even more brutal than before. 𝒻𝑟𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝑛𝘰𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝘤𝘰𝘮

Not a clash of life against life, but a grim dismantling of things that refused to remain dead.

Above, the king watched with narrowed eyes, his expression hardening as he saw the truth of it. This was no longer a battle that could be won by killing alone.

—

Then there were changes in the air. A pressure that did not belong to the battlefield arrived. A presence that pressed against the senses of those attuned to Magic could be felt. The wind itself seemed to change direction for a brief moment, as if something had cut through the world to arrive here.

High above the battlefield, a figure emerged.

Erend descended from the sky.

His body remained in human shape, yet vast Dragon wings spread wide from his back. Each beat of those wings pushing aside the wind as he lowered himself toward the battlefield.

His eyes scanned everything below him in a single sweeping motion, taking in the broken lines of reanimated beasts, the retreating mages, and the knights who struggled to hold the line against something they did not yet understand.

He had felt that the disturbance in the air and the shift in the world itself had grown too strong.

Not just here, but across multiple lands. That was why they had separated.

Eccar had gone to another kingdom where the corruption had begun to spread through the land as well. Aesa had moved toward a distant region where the skies had started to fracture with unstable Magic. Sylven had chosen a location he alone understood.

And Erend had come here.

Because this one had escalated into direct conflict.

He had stepped through a portal deep within the forest only moments ago, emerging into a place already scarred by the aftermath of battle.

From there, he had taken to the sky immediately, drawn by the sound of war and the surge of unnatural energy that pulsed across the plains.

And now he saw it clearly.

Just as he expected.

"This is already worse than I thought..."

His wings beat once more as he angled his descent toward the walls of Leonora. Below him, the knights still held formation with discipline that impressed him, while the mages struggled to retreat under pressure from corpses that refused to stay dead.

They were holding. But they would not be able to hold this forever.

Erend’s eyes narrowed as he focused on the moving corpses, sensing the foreign energy within them. It crawled beneath their flesh.

He lowered his altitude further, the wind rushing past him as the walls of Leonora rose closer.

From below, some soldiers began to notice him and lifted their heads.

—