The Moonflayed King's flesh rippled beneath Ludwig's boots as he sprinted up the length of its massive arm, each step pounding against bone and sinew that strained to crush him. The giant shuddered, a guttural roar rising from its hollow throat, wings stretching wide in defiance. Those wings, though ragged and stripped of many feathers, still carried enough death to blot out the sky. With a convulsive jerk, it unleashed a storm, feathers loosed like barbed javelins, their edges keen enough to carve through stone.
Ludwig saw the storm descend. Without Oathcarver in his hand, parrying was suicide. Instead he reached to his left arm's bracelet, summoning his Soul Shackles, and then pouring loads of souls into them for what is next to come. With a snap of his arm, the links coiled around him, whirling into a circular bulwark that spun faster and faster, clashing against themselves until the sound became a constant metallic shriek.
