The swamp flats stank of rot and desperation.

  Captain Nathander led what was left of the caravan—sixty mercenaries, battered and bloodied, and perhaps fifty merchants who had managed to flee the burning camp. They pushed through fetid waters and hanging moss, firelight lost behind them, dawn still leagues away.

  The mud sucked at their boots. The wind cut like knives. The rain hadn’t stopped in days.

  And behind them…

  The drums had begun to beat.

  “They’re close,” Sergeant Yunna said, her armor spattered with gore, her voice hoarse from screaming orders.

  “I know,” Nathander replied. His sword was still slick with blood, and he hadn’t slept in two days. “They’re toying with us. Driving us forward into the open. I wish you had made it further." Yunna smiled, her eyes were tired and her breath haggard. "They do not move as fast as they should captain."

  Nathander looked around, he could see the fear upon the merchant's faces, and from his soldiers for that matter. "It seems we have taken up our last campaign Yunna."

  "Did Velk and Dregor die well?" she asked.

  "They did," Nathander replied soberly.

  "That's all any of us could ask for in the end."

  They emerged onto a flat stretch of flooded grassland, twisted willows swaying like hanged men. And then they heard the horns.

  Low. Guttural. Triumphant.

  The horde had arrived.

  Shadows emerged from the mist—green-skinned warriors, armored in bone and iron, weapons raised, their eyes gleaming with hunger.

  Nathander turned to Yunna, his jaw clenched.

  “Take ten riders. Stay with the merchants. Guide them through the flats. If they make the hills, they might survive.”

  “And you?” she asked, already knowing.

  “I’ll hold them here. Buy you what time I can.”

  “Sir, no—”

  “That’s an order, Sergeant.”

  She met his eyes—storm and fire—and nodded.

  “You’ll be remembered.”

  “Only if you survive.”

  He turned, spurred his mount, and drew his sword.

  “Blood Riders— with me!”

  All Fifty soldiers answered the call.

  And from the mist, Warmonger stepped forward.

  It was the first time he had set foot on the battlefield.

  He walked like a god of war, great axe slung over one shoulder, blood-red armor glowing faintly with runes. His eye—bright and cruel—fixed on Nathander like a predator studying prey.

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  Nathander did not hesitate.

  He spurred his warhorse forward, blade high.

  “For the Empire!” he screamed.

  Warmonger raised one fist.

  And punched the warhorse in the face.

  Bone cracked. The beast’s skull shattered, and Nathander was thrown from the saddle like a broken doll, crashing hard into the muck.

  The horde roared.

  Nathander rose, staggering, spitting blood. He gripped his sword with both hands and faced the towering orc.

  Warmonger stalked forward.

  “You fight well… for a man,” he growled, voice like stone grinding on bone.

  “You talk too much,” Nathander hissed—and lunged.

  Steel flashed. The blade scraped off Warmonger’s pauldron. A heavy backfist sent Nathander tumbling again.

  He rolled to his feet and slashed upward, missing the war king’s throat by inches.

  Warmonger laughed.

  “You’re fast,” he said. “But I am the end of empires.”

  They clashed again—blade against brute strength.

  Nathander ducked a swing that would’ve torn him in half. He stabbed low, grazing Warmonger’s side. The orc grunted, stepped back—and slammed his knee into Nathander’s chest, sending him skidding across the mud.

  “Still breathing?” Warmonger asked, amused.

  Around the two combatants, the sound of battle rang out, thick with the screams of the dying. The Blood Riders would not go silently into the night.

  Nathander pushed himself up, ribs cracked, blood in his mouth.

  “I’ll die on my feet.”

  “Good,” the war king said. “That’s where hearts are easiest to reach.”

  He surged forward.

  They fought—savagely, desperately. Nathander’s blade found Warmonger’s thigh. Warmonger’s axe split the air, just missing his neck. The mercenary captain leapt, drove his sword toward Warmonger’s eye—

  —but the orc caught him by the throat mid-air.

  With one motion, he lifted Nathander off the ground.

  “Enough,” Warmonger growled.

  And then, before Nathander could strike again—

  He ripped the man’s heart from his chest.

  Nathander gasped, spasmed… and was still.

  Warmonger held the heart aloft.

  Then bit into it.

  ?

  Elsewhere on the flats, Oogold’s riders had found the fleeing merchants.

  They came like wolves—black-armored orcs on howling beasts, cutting down everything in their path.

  Naub turned to flee, pushing others aside. A spear pierced his chest.

  He fell to his knees, gasping.

  Another rider passed by and, without slowing, ripped his head clean off.

  Yunna was knocked from her horse, her sword rising before her body did. Orcs closed in around her like sharks in bloodied water.

  “Come then!” she roared, eyes wild. “I’ll take ten of you with me!”

  And she did.

  She cut and carved, kicked and slashed, until several orcs lay dead at her feet.

  But Oogold came from behind.

  His massive blade punched through her back, through her breastplate, and out her chest—lifting her from the earth.

  She didn’t scream.

  She glared.

  And then she died.

  ?

  Further back, Gundred and Riggio stood back to back, surrounded.

  Riggio fought like a cornered animal.

  Until a spear punched through his throat.

  He fell gurgling, eyes wide.

  “NO!” Gundred screamed, swinging wildly, hacking an orc’s leg off.

  He fought like a man possessed. But there were too many. They swarmed him. Blades found his belly. His back. His neck.

  He collapsed beside his nephew.

  Dead.

  ?

  One orc, curious, picked up the long, oil-wrapped bundle from Gundred’s body. He unwrapped it slowly, revealing an obsidian sword etched in ancient sigils.

  It hummed.

  Oogold appeared, shoved the orc aside, and ripped the sword from his hands.

  “You know the rules,” he growled. “Treasure belongs to Warmonger.”

  ?

  Later, as the battlefield cooled and dawn finally broke, Warmonger stood alone among corpses.

  Oogold approached and handed him the blade.

  Ar’Sul.

  Shermongrin’s eyes narrowed. He could feel the power radiating from it.

  Warmonger tore the obsidian blade from its scabbard.

  And fell to one knee.

  Inside his head—a voice.

  A scream.

  A flood of images—cities burning, gods dying, towers crumbling to dust.

  Ar’Sul spoke.

  “You will not control me, demon!” Warmonger growled aloud. “I command. I do not serve!”

  “Then destroy me,” the voice replied. Deep. Cold. Endless. “But if you want power… if you want dominion… you must feed me.”

  “What price?”

  “Souls.”

  Warmonger rose slowly, pain twisting in his skull.

  “I accept. But cross me, and I’ll throw you into the sea’s blackest trench.”

  Ar’Sul laughed—a sound like thunder inside the war king’s skull.

  “No need for threats, mighty one. I will make you unstoppable.”

  And then it went silent.

  But its presence lingered.

  Warmonger opened his eyes.

  And his horde gasped.

  All around him, warriors dropped to their knees.

  Even Oogold bowed.

  Shermongrin approached, trembling.

  “My war king,” he whispered. “Your eye…”

  “What about it?”

  “Not the red one. The other one.”

  Warmonger lifted a gauntlet to his face—and felt it.

  His empty socket… was no longer empty.

  Where there had once been a hollow void, a new eye now glowed.

  Bright green. Piercing. Alive.

  “Together,” Ar’Sul whispered from the depths of his mind,

  “we will conquer all.”