While Jin Ho and Seol Hwa-rin fought their war of consciousness, the physical world around them began to come apart.
Blood Wolf stood at the edge of the crimson-and-ice energy storm that had enveloped the two fusion candidates, his weathered face grim as he watched dimensional tears spreading across the sky like cracks in a broken mirror. Each new fissure released a fresh wave of void creatures, and these were nothing like the scouts they'd faced before.
"Formation Delta-Seven!" he bellowed to the assembled alliance forces. "Priority One: protect the fusion process! Priority Two: civilian evacuation! Priority Three: stay alive!"
The creatures pouring through the largest dimensional tear defied every law of physics Blood Wolf had learned in thirty years of cultivation warfare. Some were geometric impossibilities—spheres that existed inside their own surfaces, creating visual paradoxes that made veteran warriors stumble and retch. Others seemed to be made of living shadow that moved independently of any light source, flowing across the ground like oil given predatory intelligence.
But the worst were the ones that looked almost human.
The Hunger Walkers
They came through the tears in perfect formation, and at first glance, they might have been mistaken for particularly pale cultivators. They had the right number of limbs, the correct proportions, even facial features that weren't quite alien enough to trigger immediate revulsion.
But their eyes... their eyes were holes in reality itself. Not black, not empty—absent. Looking at them was like staring into the concept of void given physical form. And from those impossible eye-sockets came a sound that wasn't quite a scream and wasn't quite a song, but somehow managed to bypass the ears entirely and resonate directly in the bones of everyone who heard it.
"H̴u̶n̸g̷r̸y̵," they whispered in unison, their voices creating harmonics that made reality ripple around them. "S̶o̵ ̸h̶u̴n̷g̴r̵y̸."
Blood Flower, positioned behind the main battle line with his analytical equipment, paled as his instruments registered the energy readings. "Wolf!" he called out urgently. "These creatures aren't just alien—they're actively consuming the dimensional fabric around them! Every step they take is weakening the barriers between realms!"
"How many?" Blood Wolf demanded, even as he drew his twin sabers and began channeling blood qi into their edges.
"Seven hundred confirmed through the main portal," Blood Flower replied, his voice tight with strain. "And the portal is still expanding. At current rate of growth..." He paused, double-checking his calculations. "At current rate, we'll have three thousand creatures within the next ten minutes."
Blood Wolf felt ice form in his stomach. Three thousand void creatures was an army-level threat. Even with the alliance forces and Thunder Palace defenders, they were looking at fifteen-to-one odds against enemies that violated natural law just by existing.
"Time estimate on the fusion completion?" he asked.
Blood Flower glanced at the energy storm surrounding Jin Ho and Hwa-rin, where crimson lightning and ice formations were creating a light show that hurt to look at directly. "Unknown. The energy patterns are unlike anything in our databases. Could be minutes, could be hours."
"We don't have hours," Blood Wolf muttered, then raised his voice to battlefield command volume. "All units, listen up! We're holding this position until the fusion completes, no matter what comes through those tears! Blood Flame Sect—take the left flank! Thunder Palace defenders—right flank! Support units—establish overlapping barrier formations!"
The Dance of Geometries
The first wave of void creatures hit their defensive lines like a tide of living mathematics.
Blood Protector met the leading edge with his signature technique—the Crimson Fortress formation that could turn a single cultivator into an immovable wall of blood qi. His energy flared out in protective patterns that had deflected everything from demon beast claws to siege weapon projectiles.
The geometric void creature simply... walked through it.
Not around it, not over it, not by breaking it. The thing's impossible angles seemed to exist in dimensions that Blood Protector's defensive formation simply couldn't account for. One moment there was a solid wall of blood energy, the next moment the creature was standing behind him with one clawed appendage already reaching for his spine.
Only Blood Guard's shadow-step technique saved his teammate's life. The stealth specialist materialized behind the creature and drove both daggers into what should have been vital points, only to watch his weapons pass through the thing as if it were made of mist.
"Physical attacks don't work!" Blood Guard shouted, shadow-stepping away as the creature spun toward him with fluid grace. "It's not fully materialized in our dimension!"
"Then we make it materialized!" Blood Flower called back, already weaving complex hand seals. "Dimensional Anchor Array—third pattern!"
Streams of silver energy shot out from his position, creating a web of force that settled over the geometric creature like a net. Where the energy touched, the thing's impossible angles suddenly snapped into normal three-dimensional space, its form becoming solid and vulnerable.
Blood Protector didn't waste the opportunity. His crimson fortress formation reformed, but this time instead of a defensive wall, it became a crushing sphere that contracted around the anchored creature. The thing let out a sound like reality tearing, then imploded into a point of darkness that quickly faded.
"That's one," Blood Wolf said grimly, watching three more geometric horrors advance on their position. "Only six hundred and ninety-nine to go."
The Hunger Song
But it was the Hunger Walkers that proved to be the real threat.
Where the geometric creatures were alien and difficult to fight, the human-shaped void entities were something far worse—they were infectious. Every alliance cultivator who looked directly into their impossible eyes felt something fundamental change inside their own consciousness.
Junior disciples began stumbling, their cultivation techniques suddenly failing as they forgot how to manipulate qi properly. Senior operatives found their memories becoming fuzzy, important tactical knowledge simply evaporating like morning mist. Even veteran masters like the Thunder Palace elders discovered that looking at the Hunger Walkers too long left them feeling... empty. As if essential parts of their souls had been quietly consumed while they weren't paying attention.
"Don't look at their faces!" Blood Wolf commanded, but it was too late for some. Three Thunder Palace disciples had already fallen to their knees, their eyes reflecting the same terrible void as the creatures they'd stared at too long.
"H̸u̶n̷g̵r̴y̶," the transformed disciples whispered in perfect unison with the void creatures. "S̷o̸ ̵v̶e̵r̸y̴ ̶h̷u̵n̴g̶r̵y̸."
Elder Noe Cheong-woon, the interim leader of Thunder Palace, felt his heart break as he watched his own students turn against their fellow defenders. But there was no time for grief. With movements too fast for normal eyes to follow, he struck precise pressure points on each infected disciple, rendering them unconscious before they could spread whatever corruption had taken them.
"Isolation barriers around the infected!" he commanded. "No one approaches them until we understand what we're dealing with!"
The Fusion Storm Intensifies
Through all the chaos of dimensional warfare, the energy storm surrounding Jin Ho and Seol Hwa-rin continued to grow more intense. What had started as a localized disturbance was now affecting the entire battlefield, with tendrils of crimson lightning and ice formations extending outward to interact with the void creatures in unexpected ways.
When Blood Wolf's saber strikes hit one of the Hunger Walkers, instead of his usual blood qi techniques, crimson electricity suddenly danced along his blade—power that wasn't his own, but somehow perfectly synchronized with his fighting style. The void creature recoiled from the fusion-enhanced attack, its empty eye-sockets actually showing something like fear for the first time.
Similar effects were occurring throughout the alliance forces. Ice formations sprouted from the ground to block void creature attacks, while lightning bolts struck from clear sky to support hard-pressed defenders. It was as if the fusion process was somehow extending Jin Ho and Hwa-rin's protection to cover their allies.
But Blood Flower's instruments registered something else—something that made his blood run cold.
"Wolf," he called out urgently. "The dimensional tears are responding to the fusion energy. They're not just growing anymore—they're evolving."
Blood Wolf followed his gaze upward and saw what he meant. The random cracks in the sky were beginning to connect with each other, forming patterns that looked disturbingly like ritual circles. And at the center of the largest formation, something vast and terrible was beginning to take shape.
"How long until that thing finishes manifesting?" Blood Wolf asked.
Blood Flower's calculations ran for several seconds before he replied, his voice barely audible over the sounds of battle.
"Eight minutes. Maybe less."
Blood Wolf looked around at their hard-pressed forces, then at the energy storm where their only hope for survival was fighting a battle no one else could help with.
Eight minutes to hold the line. Eight minutes to protect a fusion process they didn't understand. Eight minutes to prevent whatever nightmare was forming in the sky from fully entering their reality.
"All units," he called out, pouring every ounce of authority he possessed into his voice. "Hold the line. No matter what comes through those tears, no matter how impossible it seems—we hold the line."
Around him, alliance fighters gripped their weapons tighter and prepared to face horrors beyond imagination.
Because the alternative was the end of everything.