The night did not bring darkness. It brought a bloody, pulsating twilight.
To the east, the sky was stained a violent crimson, illuminated by the continuous discharge of the Crimson Lotus Sect's blood-fire arts. To the north, flashes of jade-green lightning tore through the clouds as the Empire's reinforcements clashed with the enraged sect.
Rylan stood on the palisade walk, the wind whipping his hair. The air smelled of ozone and burning pine.
"They are tearing each other apart," Lyra said, standing beside him. She held a spyglass, her knuckles white. "The Crimson Lotus moves like a swarm. The Jade lines are breaking."
"Good," Rylan said. His shoulder ached, a constant reminder of his own fragility. "Let them bleed."
"Master!" Elara's voice crackled over the Sound-Capture receiver on Rylan's belt. Her voice was tinny, distorted by the primitive speaker. "Movement in Sector Four. Fast. Heading straight for the main gate."
"Identify," Rylan ordered.
"It's... a mix," Elara reported, her voice trembling. "Jade Empire soldiers. But they are running. They have dropped their banners. And... there are civilians with them. Merchants, maybe? They are terrified."
Rylan leaned over the parapet.
Out of the tree line, a chaotic group burst into the clearing. There were about twenty soldiers wearing the tattered armor of the Jade Empire—likely the remnants of a patrol caught in the initial Crimson Lotus assault. With them were a dozen civilians, pulling carts and carrying children.
They were running for their lives.
Behind them, the forest shadows lengthened and twisted. A low, wet growling sound echoed from the trees.
"Open the gate!" one of the Jade soldiers screamed, waving his sword at the walls of Oakhaven. "In the name of the Emperor, let us in! The Blood-Beasts are coming!"
The villagers manning the walls looked at Rylan. They saw women and children down there. Instinctively, two men moved toward the gate mechanism.
"Halt!" Rylan's voice was like a thunderclap. He activated his Imperial Aura, freezing the villagers in place.
"Master?" one of the guards stammered. "But... there are children."
"If you open that gate," Rylan said, his eyes fixed on the tree line, "you break the seal of the Bramble Array. It takes ten minutes to re-pressurize. In those ten minutes, whatever is hunting them will be inside."
"We can't just leave them!" the guard cried.
"Watch," Rylan said coldly.
The Jade soldiers reached the gate. They started pounding on the wood. "Open up! They are right behind us! You damn peasants, open the gate!"
Then, the trees exploded.
Three figures leaped from the darkness. They were human-shaped, but they moved on all fours. They were Crimson Lotus disciples who had engaged in the Blood-Beast Transformation—a forbidden art that sacrificed sanity for raw, feral power. Their skin was flayed red, their teeth filed to points.
They didn't roar. They shrieked.
The slaughter was instantaneous.
The first Beast pounced on a Jade soldier before he could level his sword. The civilians recoiled behind the men at the gate. The civilians screamed, scattering in panic.
"Help us!" a woman shouted, holding up her child toward the walls. "Please!"
The villagers on the wall looked at Rylan, pleading silent questions. Do something. Save them.
Rylan waited, trying to judge whether a shot would draw the beasts onto the wall. The hesitation lasted only a few breaths. It was enough for the first creature to reach the civilians.
"Cover them!" he shouted. Lyra was already turning toward the nearest launcher. Its winding gear caught halfway back; the second crew fired into the trees as the refugees scattered below.
A bolt struck the beast nearest the gate and tore a strip from its shoulder. It did not fall. Rylan saw a woman lift a child toward the wall, saw the distance neither could cross, and reached for an attack that could not cover it. By the time the second launcher was wound, the bodies had stopped moving.
It was brutal. It was inhuman.
"Why did you wait?" Lyra asked. "The first shot should have been ready when they reached the clearing."
"I waited," Rylan said. He wanted to explain why, but Lyra was staring at the launcher, where the crew were still pulling at the jammed gear. He could find no explanation that changed the bodies below.
"Next time," Lyra said, "we decide the rescue signal before someone is at the gate." He nodded. She did not look relieved.
Below, the screams died out. The three Blood-Beasts stood amidst the carnage, panting. They were covered in gore.
One of them sniffed the air. It turned its eyeless, scarred face toward the wall. It could smell the prey inside.
It leaped.
With unnatural strength, the creature cleared twenty feet in a single bound, slamming directly into Mei's invisible barrier.
ZZZZAAP!
The Iron-Wood Bramble Array triggered. The Spirit Ore foundations flared. Arcs of green lightning, reinforced by the Earth-Kin's Qi, exploded outward from the point of impact.
The Beast didn't just get shocked; it was vaporized. The lightning tore its unstable biology apart, reducing it to a cloud of red mist.
The other two Beasts recoiled, hissing. They circled the barrier, testing it, scratching at the air, but the fear of the lightning held them back. After a moment, they grabbed the corpses of the Jade soldiers and dragged them back into the forest.
Silence returned to the clearing. Only the bodies of the civilians remained, untouched by the beasts but broken by the violence.
Rylan turned away from the wall.
Every villager was staring at him. There was no adoration in their eyes tonight. There was fear. Naked, primal fear. They realized, perhaps for the first time, that their "Savior" was not a hero. He was a warlord.
"Mei," Rylan called out calmly.
Mei stepped out of the shadows of the watchtower. She was pale, clutching her blueprints.
"The array held," Rylan noted. "Efficiency?"
"It... it consumed 5% of the charged array reservoir in that one strike," Mei stammered. "If a full army hits us..."
"Then we find more fuel," Rylan said.
He walked past the stunned guards. He stopped in front of the man who had tried to open the gate.
The man was shaking. "You... you let them die."
"I ordered you to keep the seal," Rylan said. "I should have ordered the cover sooner."
He leaned in close, his voice a low growl.
"We need a signal the crews can act on without waiting for me. Opening the main gate would have broken the seal. That still doesn't excuse waiting on the shots. Do you understand?"
The man swallowed hard, tears streaming down his face. "Yes, Master."
Rylan walked toward his command room. He felt the weight of their gazes on his back. He felt Lyra's judgment. He felt the System silent in his mind.
[Local morale assessment: fear and distrust.]
Rylan closed the pane. It offered no distinction between fear of the beasts and fear of him. Tonight both had reasons.
Rylan entered his room and closed the door. His legs gave out, and he slumped against the wood.
He looked at his hands. They weren't bloody this time. But they felt filthy.
He found the rescue plan on the map and marked the gate signal in ink. A correction on paper was easy. Tomorrow he would have to ask men who had watched him hesitate to trust it.