Back at The Bastion - The Day Before The Inner Gates Fell

Ray stared at his trembling fingers, slowly curling them around the wooden shaft of the shovel. The tip had long turned dull, and before him were twenty freshly dug graves. Each one was six feet deep, all except one. The only one he had yet to finish. He raised the iron shovel and drove it into the mud, lifting the dirt from the grave and throwing it to the side.

Rover dug beside him with each swipe of its paws driven by compassion. Each attempt was done out of care for its contractor, to support him and the heartache that followed. With each day, Ray was fighting back the tears in his eyes. They lost men after every battle. Friendships and bonds that were formed during their days of training—gone just like that.

But he couldn't just leave them there in the cold rain. The least he could do was prepare their graves and give them a proper burial. They didn't deserve to be left out on the streets, rotting like all the other corpses in their ruined city. Their lives meant so much more than just another body. Another number on the list of casualties of this godforsaken war.

Soon, the sound of footsteps sinking deep into the wet ground entered his ears. Ray looked up from the grave and locked eyes with the watchman several feet away from him. To the side was his comrade, a friend who had served as an instructor for the Thirty-First.

"Ray… that's enough," Eric said, scratching the back of his head. His brown hair had long since been covered in dirt and grime, while his hazel eyes were nearly hollow, tired from the long nights of battle. "We can't bury them all."

Ray ignored him, driving his shovel into the soil once more and hurling the mud to the side.

"Could… could you just put that damn shovel down for a moment?" Eric pleaded with Ray, taking several steps forward. "I know what you're feeling, and it's a shame. A damn shame that we lost them, but you can't go on like this—"

"Who… the fuck do you think you are to tell me how to grieve?" Ray didn't look him in the eye. "You—out of everyone else—should understand what I'm feeling."

"I'm saying this because I know what you're going through. It wasn't just you who trained them, but me as well, and I would be lying through my goddamn teeth if I said I wasn't in pain. If my heart weren't in pieces, watching the men I train die like dogs out there." Eric placed his hand over his heart. "But right now, I can't have my second-in-command use what's left of his strength to dig holes."

Ray's hand tightened around the shovel. The fabric of his leather gloves creasing against the iron shovel. His posture was steady, refusing to break from the rain that pattered softly against his armor. He was on the verge of breaking down, on the verge of crying his heart out for those who had given their lives so he could live. Each raindrop streaked down his cheeks in thin lines that could almost be mistaken for tears.

"It's my fault," Ray said with regret. "If only I were stronger, then I could have prevented this. I could have saved them."

"We both know that's not true. It's a miracle we even held on for so long."

"If only a miracle were enough." Ray stuck his shovel into the ground. "If our captain and the others were here. We could've done so much more…"

"I know, but they have their own problems. If it's this bad at the inner gates, I can't even imagine what they're going through right now."

Ray slowly released a trembling breath. "I can't do this. I can't keep fighting. I don't have the strength anymore to keep going."

"You have to."

"Why?" he weakly asked.

"Because it's the only way we'll make it. The only way we'll protect the men following us. And before you say another thing, you need to know that they're relying on us. If you can't do it for yourself, you do it for them."

Ray stood still with his gaze trailing to the sky. The grey clouds over their heads continued to rain upon them and despite how much he wanted to argue. He couldn't. Now wasn't the time, and if he was ever thrown into a situation where his comrades were about to die before his eyes. He vowed he would protect them or die trying.

.

.

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In the Depths of Alexandria

Tucker stared in shock. It was the first time he had seen something like this. The swirling spirit essence around Ray should have collapsed since there weren't any threads to support the technique. Yet it didn't. Instead, the sheer force behind the phenomenon erupted, spreading across the chamber in wide arcs that scorched the floors.

Tucker blocked the wave of heat with his arms, watching as the runes shimmered across the surface of the black iron armor. His gaze drifted to Serevoth, who stood in awe as the seams of their crimson robe danced in the current. It didn't make sense. Why was the demon so insistent on trying to pull out their strength? If it had wanted to kill them, then they would already be dead. But that wasn't the demon's goal.

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It wanted something else.

There had to be a reason it wanted to fight them. A reason it was pushing them to their limits. Tucker just needed to figure out why. The demon said that his kind had grown weaker in less than a century. However, there weren't any records of spirit contractors within the Order ever fighting demons such as Serevoth. Most of the watchmen had died in the previous war against the Empire. The Order had lost its best soldiers, but they couldn't have been the only spirit contractors in the world, even if the timing matched.

But before he could even begin to piece together the information, a thumping sound like a heartbeat tore through the air. With each passing moment, the thumping grew stronger. Tucker stared into the vortex of flames as Ray stood still. It wasn't the watchman's heart that was beating, but what dwelled within.

The influx of spirit essence was enough to drown out the entire chamber, but it was slowly converging towards Ray. Even Alex couldn't fathom what was going on. Spirit essence was something that came from their companions. But that wasn't the case. Each flame brimmed with life, flowing into Ray's blade and body like a constant stream of lava.

Once the flames had fully settled, only a searing heat remained on the black iron armor. A spiral of flames on his blade. Ray locked eyes with Serevoth. The demon's sinister grin stretched from one side to another, sending a surge of fury through his limbs. Rover was gone. Too damaged to manifest again, and whatever essence Ray had left… was all that he had to fight with.

He closed the distance in a heartbeat with Alex rushing in from the flank. Waves of scorching heat radiated off of Ray at an intensity so hot that Tucker couldn't get anywhere close. If he did, he would just get in the way.

Ray gritted his teeth. He wasn't used to fighting with Salamander, and there wasn't any way for them to coordinate their attacks in one fluid motion. Unlike Tucker, he never worked with the veteran. This meant there was only one way left for him to telegraph his intent. One he wasn't sure if Alex would remember.

"Everheart—First Sword Form!" Ray roared, letting the words strike the air before he did.

He lunged forth, driving the blazing blade toward the demon's white palm extending before him. The strike met with an invisible resistance as Serevoth pushed the sword aside, but Ray didn't let the deflection kill his momentum. He shifted his weight, dragging the fiery arc back down in a powerful diagonal cut.

The crackle of energy shook the chamber. Fire and shadow burst outward in violent spirals, with both of them refusing to yield an inch of ground. To Ray, this was more than a battle. It was a trial for him and the others to overcome. A trial between soul and sorcery.

Serevoth gathered the ichor coiling around its body. Under its robe, the demon sent the liquid slithering beneath the tiles. But before the black tide could pierce through the stone, a sizzling sound filled the chamber. Serevoth lowered its gaze, watching as the ichor it had painstakingly cultivated evaporated in the blink of an eye.

A flash of confusion flickered across the demon's face. But before it could even think, Ray shifted his grip and snapped the blade backward in a blazing arc, retracing the path it had gone. Flames etched themselves across Serevoth's crimson robe as the demon jerked away—narrowly preventing itself from being cleaved in two.

Yet it came at a cost; evading one strike exposed it to another. A blade punched clean through its spine, causing the demon's head to twitch to the side. Its single teal eye focused on Alex with a look of agony. A sharp pain filled its body, one it had never felt before.

Slowly, its lips parted. "Halt."

The command crept through the air like a curse. Ray and Alex were both frozen mid-step, their muscles locking in place as if chains had clamped around their limbs. They trembled violently as they fought to move even an inch, with Alex cursing under his breath. The old man met the demon's gaze as it turned its head.

"Thou hast interfered enough—"

But before it could finish its sentence, a sharp whistle cut through the air.

From the corner of its vision, a verdant arrow soared toward the demon, burying itself deep into its left shoulder. Ichor gushed out of the wound as a guttural cry escaped its throat. The smoldering pressure pressing against Ray and Alex vanished.

In an instant, Alex planted his boot against the demon's back and kicked, ripping his blade free as he shoved Serevoth forward while breaking its balance. The pain that coursed through its body left a searing sensation that puzzled the fledgling fiend, leaving it wide open for the roaring sweep of Ray's overhead swing. The watchman pivoted on his feet, bringing his sword full circle towards the demon's neck.

But just as the blade was about to meet its flesh, a violet vapor emitted from its body before rupturing outwards in a powerful wave that blew Alex and Ray back. Both of them landed on their feet, skidding several meters before finally stopping.

Tucker glanced at Ray, who had fallen to his knees, gasping for air. He was coughing up smoke from his lungs, and from that alone, Tucker knew that whatever strength Ray had brought out couldn't be used for long. Even the scorching heat that he had felt before had diminished.

"How long can you keep fighting for?" Tucker asked.

"As long as needed," Ray replied. "But if we're talking about whatever I'm currently using, a few minutes."

Tucker nodded as Alex quickly rejoined the two. His eyes focused on the demon as he spoke in a low voice. "That bastard's one troublesome opponent."

Alex smirked. "I couldn't agree more, but it seems like Ray has done something. Our attacks are effective now."

They watched as Serevoth staggered for half a step. It slowly reached for the arrow embedded in its shoulder with ichor running down in thin rivulets. Its expression, once amused and scholarly, shifted in an instant. The demon's grin faded and narrowed its eyes, not out of rage but out of sheer calculation.

Its assessment was wrong. These weren't ordinary mortals. They were cunning, precise, and above all, adaptive. The old one fought with surgical precision, always driving a wedge into the slightest opening. Then, there was the wind-touched contractor. The one who consistently provided cover and created breathing room for his team.

Serevoth's eyes focused on Ray. The one that had awakened spirit reflux. Such abilities were on a timer. The demon's kind had fought many contractors in the past, documenting each encounter. Yet, this spirit reflux was unlike any he had seen before. It burned their blood in ways that shouldn't be theoretically possible.

The fiend slowly released a wisp of air, letting the ichor retreat from beneath the tile and coil protectively around its body. "So… thou art not subjects," it muttered in a low voice. "Thou art predators."

The tiles around its feet darkened. Its violet aura thickened into a suffocating pressure as the air rumbled around them. Its relaxed stance shifted, acknowledging the skill of the watchmen before it. Serevoth's fingers and joints cracked and reformed, its left arm warped into a long ivory blade, and the skin around its body hardened into a newfound exoskeleton with spikes protruding along its spine.

A hiss of heat steamed off its body as Serevoth rolled its shoulders, lowering its center of gravity. The curious scholar no longer remained, only a being that recognized the genuine threat standing before it.

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