The Black Tigers die badly.
That is the first thing I learn.
They do not break. They do not flee. They fight the way they were trained—tight formations, overlapping arcs, disciplined withdrawals. But discipline means nothing when the ground itself no longer favors you, when every step forward feels like moving against a current that knows your name.
The Lord Protector's troops move like they have rehearsed this moment for years.
Because they have.
Steel rings across the courtyard and spills into the lower terraces, boots pounding stone slick with blood. I feel the Presence strain beneath me, restless, distant, its responses dulled and delayed. I reach for it out of instinct—
Nothing.
Not refusal.
Delay.
A Black Tiger captain falls at my feet, throat opened cleanly. He tries to speak. Blood fills his mouth instead. I do not kneel. I do not look away. I step over him and push forward, blade drawn, mind narrowing to angles and distance.
This is what I am still good at.
For a moment, we hold.
My soldiers carve a wedge through the Lord Protector's men, blades moving in brutal harmony. I feel a grim satisfaction as training overrides fear. We are fewer, but sharper. Bodies fall. The courtyard fills with the smell of iron and incense.
Then the counterstroke lands.
They flank us—not from the sides, but from behind. Hidden passages open in the tower's lower walls, disgorging armored troops I did not know existed. Sigils flare beneath their boots, stabilizing the ground, denying me even the illusion of supernatural advantage.
I shout orders.
They are obeyed.
Too late.
The Black Tigers are being dismantled, not crushed—isolated in pairs, separated, cut down efficiently. This is not chaos. This is execution wearing the mask of battle.
I cut down three men myself. A fourth hesitates when he meets my eyes.
I kill him for that.
The Presence stirs weakly, like something sedated but angry.
I feel it then.
Desperation.
Not the clean edge of resolve. Not rage.
The hollow certainty that I am losing.
"An!"
I turn.
Liao Yun is bleeding from the head, dragged backward by two soldiers. He locks eyes with me, understanding passing between us in a heartbeat.
This was always going to end here.
A heavy blow catches me across the ribs. I stagger, breath tearing out of my lungs. Another strike follows—shield edge, precise, trained to disable, not kill.
They want me alive.
That knowledge terrifies me more than death.
I force myself upright and charge—not at the soldiers, but toward the Lord Protector.
He stands above the fray, untouched, watching as if this were an accounting exercise.
I reach him.
For one breath, one moment, steel meets steel. His blade is old, balanced, unhurried. He parries without effort, steps inside my guard, and strikes.
Pain explodes across my shoulder. My arm goes numb.
I fall to one knee.
Around us, the Black Tigers are breaking—not in will, but in number. Their bodies litter the stone, red against gray. My soldiers. My responsibility.
"You see?" the Lord Protector says calmly, stepping back. "This is what happens when you mistake terror for authority."
I try to rise.
A boot presses into my chest and drives me flat.
I cannot breathe.
The Presence hums, distant, unhelpful.
I am alone.
Then the horn sounds.
Not a battle horn.
A palace signal.
The fighting hesitates—not stopping, but listening.
From behind the lines, from the direction of the palace, banners rise.
Not the Lord Protector's.
Not mine.
Wu Jin's.
The Lord Protector stiffens.
I turn my head slowly, blood in my mouth, vision blurring—and see it.
Wu Jin's troops advancing in disciplined ranks, palace guards and city regulars moving with intent. Not rushing. Not panicked.
Prepared.
Between them walks Shen Yue.
She is armored.
Not in battle gear.
In ceremonial black.
The sight of her hits harder than any blow.
She does not look at me.
She raises her hand.
The palace troops stop.
Wu Jin steps forward, visible now to everyone watching—from Zhou's distant lines to the Southern banners rippling beyond the hills.
His voice carries.
"By authority of the throne," he declares, "I order the cessation of unauthorized hostilities."
The Lord Protector turns fully now.
"You planned this," he says, low.
Wu Jin's face is pale but steady. "You forced it."
Shen Yue finally looks at me.
Her eyes do not apologize.
They commit.
She speaks, and the words feel like a knife sliding between my ribs.
"Wu An," she says clearly, so everyone can hear, "you are under arrest for crimes against the city and unlawful exercise of extraordinary power."
The courtyard goes still.
I laugh.
It is broken, hoarse, humiliating.
"So this is it," I rasp. "You finish me yourself."
Her jaw tightens.
"This is how I stop you from destroying everything," she replies.
The soldiers move.
Not the Lord Protector's.
Wu Jin's.
Hands seize my arms. I try to resist, but my body betrays me—blood loss, exhaustion, the Presence's distance turning strength into memory.
I am forced to my knees.
Shen Yue steps closer, her voice dropping so only I can hear.
"Trust me," she whispers.
That is the cruelest thing she could say.
The Lord Protector watches, expression unreadable.
Zhou's lines shift in the distance, already recording, already rewriting the story.
The Southern banners stir.
The Black Tigers lie dead around me.
And I kneel in chains before the woman I love, realizing too late that the most effective betrayal is the one that convinces everyone—including you—that it was necessary.
The Presence hums once beneath the city.
Not for me.
For what comes next.
And I understand, as the world closes in:
I did not lose this battle because I was weak.
I lost it because everyone else finally agreed I had to.