The upheaval within the orcish realm sent shockwaves through the continent. Vast quantities of intelligence poured into the networks of every kingdom and organization.

The strangeness of the event quickly drew the gaze of several great powers. After all, both the dwarven and elven nations were facing similar waves of rebellion and unrest.

And as one of the fastest-growing organizations on the continent, the Church of Nightfall was privy to such information as well. Aided by the absurd efficiency of the Prayer Network, news traveled through its ranks almost instantaneously, known to all the moment a single member learned of it. And such information was naturally disseminated in Aleisterre, a place of unique significance to the Church of Nightfall.

Yet Aleisterre had little energy to spare for the orcish crisis. It was already entangled in a far more pressing situation: a creeping invasion from neighboring human realms. Almost imperceptibly, armies from all four directions had gathered along its borders, encircling the kingdom in a silent noose.

It was an unprecedented crisis. These silent aggressors were not backward nations like Selwyn, that bitter land of ice and hardship struggling to stay afloat. They were peers, fully developed kingdoms with the strength and means to wage a proper war.

Aleisterre had already suffered heavily in the conflict with Selwyn. With yet unhealed wounds, for it to face four nations at once was nothing short of a death sentence. There seemed to be only two outcomes: surrender and subjugation... or a desperate last stand, leading inevitably to annihilation.

But Charles refused both.

"Mm. The four Grand Dukes will head west," he said, voice calm but cold. "As for the other fronts, leave those to me and a few... friends. Four legendary warriors and their armies will be deterrence enough for the west."

After confirming his plans with the dukes, Charles leaned back and exhaled a long, weary breath. Strategy and formations had long lost meaning in a situation this lopsided. When the balance of power was so utterly skewed, only a strike from outside the board—one that broke the game itself—could offer any hope.

He collapsed into his office chair, rubbing at his temples with both hands.

"Damn it, that's the best I can come up with. You bastards, let's see how far your blind patriotism really goes. Are you so brainwashed you'll drag your kingdoms into ruin just to keep this madness going?"

He laughed under his breath, half in bitterness, half in despair.

Meanwhile, on Aleisterre's eastern frontier, the invasion had already begun. The armies of the Losman Kingdom stretched endlessly across the plains, their banners shrouded in killing intent as they stared down the small, lonely garrison standing watch. 𝑓𝘳𝑒𝑒𝓌𝘦𝘣𝘯ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝑚

The difference in numbers alone was a form of psychological warfare. Their overwhelming presence pressed on the defenders' minds, waiting for them to surrender before the first arrow flew. But if that didn't happen, the cavalry would charge, and the border would be crushed beneath their hooves.

Then, as tension peaked, space itself rippled. A lone figure appeared before the gathered hosts. His sudden presence drew every eye. He raised his voice, calm and clear.

"If possible, I'd rather not fight you. Could I trouble you to turn back? As far as I know, Aleisterre and the Losman Kingdom have no quarrel. Neither side has anything to gain from this war. Don't you agree?"

Even before an army, Wang Yu stood with casual ease, as though the sea of armored men were no more than an audience. His tone held no tension, no bravado, just simple truth. Yet one could not help but wonder if he really meant it. If pressed, would he truly fight an entire kingdom's army alone?

"..."

The Losman commander frowned. After a brief exchange of signals through his officers, confirming that no record of such a man existed, he made his decision. "Advance."

"Alright then," Wang Yu sighed. "Have it your way."

He hadn't expected diplomacy to work. If they wanted war, so be it. It always came to this in the end.

The earth thundered. A deafening crack tore through the plains as void energy surged, wrenching open a vast rift in space. Through sheer force of will—and the power of the Chariot—Wang Yu pried apart the barrier between worlds.

From that wound in reality, darkness spilled forth. The midday sun vanished. Light itself was devoured. Within seconds, the entire plain was drowned in night so deep the soldiers couldn't see what lay right before them.

From where Wang Yu stood, a colossal black tree erupted from the ground. Its vast canopy blotted out the sky; its roots reached into the unseen depths. The very concept of light was banished from the land beneath its shadow.

"Magicians! Wizards! Cast your spells, now!"

The Losman commander barked the order through his communication crystal. Wang Yu's appearance out of nowhere had been too sudden. He didn't know what was going on.

But it was impractical to have knights resolve a situation like that. He could only order the army's magicians and wizards to use their experience to figure out what was happening.

Belatedly, he realized that he couldn't make any sound at all. His throat moved, but his ears heard nothing. Panic flickered in his eyes. Was he the one who'd gone silent, or was it the world?

The darkness deepened. He could no longer see his men. No footfalls, no clatter of armor—only a faint, droning static that soon faded as well.

Then his last remaining sense, touch, slipped away. He reached out for the shoulder of a nearby soldier, but grasped nothing save emptiness.

Silence devoured all. And in that formless void, even his sense of self began to unravel. His consciousness grew turbid, dissolute...

From afar, Wang Yu watched as the Tree of the Night Sky spread its power across half the plain, swallowing the entire Losman army within a black domain.

He exhaled softly. "The Lady of the Night's power is truly terrifying..." Among the gods, she was hardly the mightiest. By his reckoning, she was roughly middling in strength, but none could match her freedom to act within the material world. Her dominion was not destruction, yet in her hands even night itself became an annihilating force.

The spell, which Avia had invoked through the Tree of the Night in the void, was known as Exile. It was a divine spell on the same level as the miracle Edward had once invoked from the God of Light, though it lacked the same destructive fury.

That, however, was a flaw Wang Yu could remedy.

"Load explosives. Target acquired. Firing..."

High above the clouds, the orbital fortress Archangel stirred. Its weapons charged as it gathered the energy of the heavens. Ten seconds later, devastation rained down upon the plains—upon the trapped Losman army, stripped of sight, sound, and sensation.

Wang Yu said nothing as the light consumed them. He had given them fair warning. They had chosen not to listen.

Far to the north, upon the snowfields beyond Winterhold, Edward stood still against the cutting wind. Behind him were Uller and a few trusted companions, men who had followed him for years. He was clad now in the Lionheart Warplate, the same armor once worn by his father.

Only the rightful heir to the North was permitted to don that armor. And thus, with Grand Duke Leon's departure for the western front, the rule of Winterhold and the North itself had passed into Edward's hands.

His gaze fixed upon the far horizon, where through the thinning blizzard the enemy host was faintly visible: the Sarybin Empire's legions, lines of ironclad cavalry, magician formations, and squads of wizards.

Everything that Selwyn once possessed, Sarybin possessed as well—its knights, its armies, its spellcraft—and beyond that, powers Selwyn could never have hoped to command.

Now those armies no longer lingered on the border. Without hesitation, they pressed deep into Aleisterre's lands. Magicians cast mass spells that melted the deep snow and drove away the falling flakes, clearing a path for the cavalry's advance. Their formations rolled forward, relentless as a tide.

"The Sarybin Empire's determination to invade Aleisterre is absolute," Uller murmured, his voice taut with strain as he watched the enemy close in.

"What could they possibly want from our kingdom? According to our reports, their expeditionary force is the strongest among the four fronts."

Edward's expression did not waver. Uller, however, could not hide his unease. Even knowing that his commander—his friend, as well as the future Grand Duke of the North—must have prepared something, the sheer imbalance in strength was enough to make any general's heart sink.

Winterhold was, for all intents and purposes, undefended. The Grand Duke of Lionheart had taken the entire northern army to the western border. Only a skeletal garrison remained to maintain order within the city. Even a single knight from Sarybin's host might be enough to slaughter every soul here.

The scale of Sarybin's deployment defied reason. It was hard to imagine what could drive them to wage a war of such magnitude without provocation.

"We're not certain about the cause," Edward said evenly, "but according to Charles's deductions, it's likely the ancient ruins buried beneath the St. Anna snowfields. Sarybin's army may be the strongest of the four, but they will also be the least suited to face what's coming."

There was a faint note of sympathy in his tone. He looked skyward.

Uller followed his gaze instinctively—and his eyes went wide. He had imagined many possibilities, but never this.

Dragons. A flight of dragons.

"Are those... dragons?"

"What?"

"Watch out!"

"Counterattack!"

The Sarybin troops, too, turned their eyes to the heavens. There, the sky had rent open. A vast rift in space unfolded. From it burst a silver dragon, its elegant frame cutting a lethal curve through the air. In its claws it bore a colossal silver greatsword, which came crashing down upon the imperial ranks with unimaginable speed.

They barely had time to react. Against Aurelian's might, human armies were as fragile as paper.

The silver blade swept through their lines. In its wake, bodies fell like wheat. Where the edge of the blade passed, grand knights, grand wizards, and mages all perished alike, erased from existence wholesale.

And that was only the beginning. From the same rift that Aurelian had torn open descended another—Miselyx, the white dragon, last surviving patriarch of the dragonkin.

Feeling the chill of the St. Anna snowfields, he inhaled deeply, satisfied. After all, this kingdom might well become the first new home for dragons upon the continent.

Then the dragon's innate mana circuits flared to life. A white dragon, Miselyx could control ice mana unlike any other being.

The lingering frost essence that had gathered around the ancient ruins,undispersed even after centuries, now converged upon Miselyx. A storm of blizzards and ice spears took form above the plain, a maelstrom of frost that spanned the heavens.

Within that storm, colossal shards of glacial ice coalesced, molded, and then plummeted toward the Sarybin host below like the wrath of winter itself.

"Seems I wasn't wrong after all," Edward said softly. "No creature on the continent would ever wish to stand against the dragons. If they hadn't vanished from this world, no other race would have become its masters."

He spoke with genuine awe. Despite all his preparations, the sight surpassed all imagination.

Under the watchful eyes of Winterhold's people and the other dragons that had crossed through the rift, a mountain-sized glacier descended upon the Saryben army, crushing all beneath its frozen weight.