Yig, Mona, and the hunters lined the hills at the front of town, looking down as they stood ready—some with shaking legs, others grinding th

  Yig, Mona, and the hunters lined the hills at the front of town, looking down as they stood ready—some with shaking legs, others grinding their teeth in anticipation. A garrison of maybe forty or fifty marched toward Chestnut Town, ever closer, snarling with yellow teeth. Some faces were fury and beast-like, others human yet deranged, with eyes that bled purple and skin that split around their features. Towering above the troops were two oversized wolves, foam sizzling from their mouths, eyes bloodshot and watery, pupils tinged with purple.

  Many, like Jordan, had retrieved their professional weapons—large, jagged molds of metal stained from use.

  “We should run! Meet them before they reach the town!” Jordan decided.

  Yig nodded and ran ahead of the count.

  Everyone paused, stunned by the recklessness, only breaking from their disbelief when Mona decided to follow.

  “Right then,” Jordan bellowed to his men, “are we going to leave it all to them?”

  The hunters roared, raising their hands in a battle cry as they rushed into the field—a cascade of muscle and adrenaline.

  The grass Yig ran across had always filled him with joy and freedom, but in that moment, it felt oppressive. His eyes locked with the foes below, their bloodlust evident. He clenched the hilt of his weapon, preparing for the first swing. Then, from above Yig’s head, Jordan jumped, using the high ground to strengthen his heavy downward strike, knocking back a beast in a flurry of blood. The violent hunter kept bashing, slowly cutting them down with his battle axe like one would a tree stump.

  Yig came from behind, cutting through a waist and then a neck in two strikes, killing his target instantly. For a moment, he felt a weight tug at his heart—the weight of a soul just extinguished. But when he looked to his comrades, he pushed the hesitation down. Mona followed, leaping from foe to foe as she skipped off enemy shoulders, swinging her two swords with scary precision, striking at the heads below her.

  Blood of an unnatural color spread thickly onto the grass. But these beasts showed no care or worry, fueled by wrath and nothing else—so bloodthirsty they tore their own flesh apart to kill. The only reason the fighters of Chestnut survived was their wits. Each was locked in concentration as adrenaline surged; one misplaced step, one wrong lunge, and their life was as good as gone.

  Holding his battle axe vertically, Jordan blocked half a dozen strikes. The enemies kept beating him down, an unnatural fury burning in their eyes. He held firm as his allies covered his back but could do nothing when one wolf rammed its face through friend and foe alike, forcing down both Jordan and the men struggling with him. Its jaw loomed over him, breath rancid, paw pressing on the pile of bodies beneath.

  Mona and Yig hopped up behind him, attention locked on the wolf. Remembering the many texts on swordplay he’d read over the years, Yig looked deep within himself for that familiar feeling—the spirit that commanded his weapon whenever he trained, a force that enhanced the power of his technique.

  Their minds remarkably in sync, Mona and Yig slashed with their weapons—the strikes from their three blades slicing through the beast’s body. Mona gouged from below, Yig slashed from above, and by the time they passed their target, it fell from the strain of its wounds, blood pooling over the men around it.

  Shack swung two daggers, slicing enemy necks, yet hesitated as he quick-stepped past many attacks, beads of sweat dotting his brow. Fynn showed far less fear, slashing his rapier with elegance, targeting enemy hands in an effort to disarm.

  The remaining wolf rampaged across the field, picking men up with its jaws and ripping them apart as it waved its head. Yig’s heart sank, the spectacle catching him off guard. He readied to fight it off but heard a cry before he could. The men farther back were struggling, overwhelmed by the sheer carelessness of the enemy’s assault. Their relentlessness slowly pushed Chestnut’s forces back up the hill. Some of the beasts were missing limbs, and many of the men had blades protruding from their backs—none of them cared. The kill was all that mattered.

  He stepped forward, putting himself between the beasts and the hunters. They had fallen to the ground, overwhelmed by the sheer brutality of the attack. With immense focus, he parried blow after blow in rapid succession, holding the enemy at bay as his allies scrambled to their feet. But despite his unwavering defense, the hunters were still forced to retreat up the hill, leaving the bodies of their friends to be trampled by foes with fiendish faces. They were losing ground.

  As the battle raged on, the defenders of Chestnut found themselves pushed to the hilltop. At its peak stood a wooden barricade, hastily erected while the hunters engaged the enemy. Now, pinned before the town’s buildings and structures, their numbers began to fall even further. No one was prepared for what they saw. Though they remained steady in the heat of battle, hearts were breaking. The body of Henry—who had run with them, laughed with them, grown alongside them—lay in the dirt of the town road, slowly crushed under the marching feet of the enemy. The grief was the same for Worin... and for Girrl.

  Yig kept swinging, again and again, until his strikes deteriorated into meaningless chops. The beasts knocked him back, sending both him and his sword to the ground. He held his breath, unable to process his mistake—until axes swung toward him, stopped at the last second by Mona’s twin blades.

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  “Snap out of it!” she shouted between slashes. “We need you up and fighting!”

  Behind them, pieces of the barricade were pulled apart by townspeople, clearing space for some men to fall back. On the other side, rows of villagers—farmers, carpenters, bakers—braced behind wooden planks, pressing them together like shields to form the bulky fence that held the enemy at bay.

  Yig grasped his weapon and stood, just as the civilians charged in, weapons drawn. But their arrival didn’t bring relief. Instead, his throat tightened, his stomach churned, and his heart froze. A creeping aura overtook him—like cold hands wrapping around his chest. His mind reeled, adjusting his vision just in time to lock eyes with a deeply unsettling figure. The man walked toward him slowly, almost mockingly, dragging the tip of his sword through the grass. As he stepped into the dim evening light, his form became clearer. His clothes were as tattered as his face: a single blue robe hung from his shoulders to his knees, stitched with mismatched thread. His gaunt face resembled a skull, its hollows eerily pronounced. Around his neck, a long, bloodstained bandage clung tightly. He smiled, untouched by the chaos around him. Yig could only stand frozen.

  Fynn pulled out his daggers, seemingly fearless in the face of the strange figure, and leapt in to help. But to Yig, time slowed, holding him motionless as he watched Fynn’s head slip from his shoulders and roll across the rubble-strewn road—its expression still frozen in shock. It took only a second for the skull-faced man to draw his blade through flesh, yet Yig saw every gruesome detail as if time had stretched, forcing him to absorb it all.

  Tears welled in his eyes as he gripped his hilt, charging recklessly at the figure. He never saw the sword move. He only realized they had clashed when he was flung backward, soaring over the crowd and crashing through a barricade, then farther still, until he struck a house window, shattering the glass and slamming onto the wooden floor inside.

  Outside, beasts and men climbed the barricade, hurling themselves at the townspeople. Weapons clanged and blood streaked the cobbled road.

  Yig pulled himself up, brushing off glass and splinters. He looked around, unfamiliar with the house he’d landed in. Gripping tables and shelves for support, he limped toward the back door, not daring to look back toward the source of that oppressive aura. As he walked, he glanced at his sword—now snapped down to a mere inch of steel. His face twisted in shock. A salty tear slid past a cut on his lip as he shoved open the door and stumbled outside. Each step was agony, the ground more uneven than he remembered. His knee buckled, sending him to a crouch.

  The clean sound of slicing metal and groaning wood rang behind him as the building split cleanly in two, falling into neat halves. From the rubble emerged the swordsman—calm, smiling, and walking straight toward him.

  It’s hopeless. Nothing I could’ve read would help me now.

  Once the swordsman reached the boy, he drove a kick down into Yig, forcing him back to the ground. Yig felt the blunt hilt of the man’s sword press into his neck, straining his throat and making it hard to breathe. As the swordsman held it there, a symbol on Yig’s right arm began to glow pale yellow beneath a dangling bandage, almost as if mirroring his pain. The mark was intricate, like something etched into the walls of an ancient temple—shaped like a sword, its tip pointing toward Yig’s hand.

  Yig elbowed the man’s stomach, mustering enough strength to break free from his grip. As fast as he could, Yig swung his broken sword. A single strike was all it took to shatter what little remained of the blade, leaving only the hilt in his hand. But he had no time to dwell on it—the swordsman caught him by the neck. His opponent’s blade shot for Yig’s chest, but a sudden jolt on Yig’s part redirected it to his gut, slicing through the tissue with ease.

  Yig fell, writhing in pain, his desperate flailing just enough to escape the swordsman’s hold. The man kept moving forward, and Yig could only claw at the dirt, crying out in agony. Then, in a miraculous instant, Mona leapt from a rooftop, intercepting the swordsman mid-attack. Sparks burst from their clash, igniting a patch of grass. In a graceful flurry of steel, Mona held the swordsman at bay, giving Yig a moment to clutch his wound. The warmth spread across his palm as blood gushed out, his only instinct to press down harder. Then his eyes were drawn to his right arm—still glowing, the bandage now nearly gone.

  Forget about that… he thought, watching his parent duel the vicious man. I need to help her.

  He picked up the hilt, still holding a jagged shard of metal. As he stood, something popped in his waist. He held his stance for a moment before collapsing back onto the grass, his head hitting the cold dirt.

  Mona continued her duel, batting aside the swordsman’s elegant blows with fierce precision. But he wasn’t just aiming at her blades—something Mona realized too late when he kicked her back toward Yig.

  “Can you walk?” she asked, dazed from the impact of his last move.

  “No,” Yig replied weakly. “Just go find somebody.”

  “You’ll be dead by the time I get back.”

  As the swordsman advanced, his eye glowing a faint, disturbing red haze, Mona lunged at him and the fight resumed. Yig, one hand still pressed to his bleeding side, tried again to rise—but his legs refused to lift him. No matter how hard he fought, his body would not let him escape. Mona was pushing the man back, steel clashing, sparks flying—but Yig knew it wouldn’t matter unless he could get away.

  The swordsman punched Mona mid-swing, halting her attack for a split second. As she recovered, he struck again, this time square in the throat. She raised her blades to block a third blow—but the swordsman, with eerie precision, raised his weapon above his head and brought it down in a fluid yet horrifying arc. She barely had time to react. One blade shattered on impact, the other split in two, its broken tip flying through the air and landing inches from Yig.

  He tried to scream, but only coughed blood. Mona staggered back—but not fast enough. The swordsman thrust his blade straight through her chest, the steel punching out her back.

  Time seemed to pause. Her body hung in the air before she slowly slid off the blade and crumpled to the ground, her eyes finding Yig’s with a silent, heartbreaking confusion. Though neither of them could speak, Yig knew exactly what she wanted to say. And he wasn’t going to let either of them break their promise.

  He crawled forward. The symbol on his arm now lit the area around him, the golden glow reflecting off blades of grass and tree leaves. The light revealed the swordsman in full—scarred, tattered, bruised—each detail illuminated. Caught off guard by the light, the man stood still. Yig seized the moment. He grabbed the broken shard of Mona’s blade and hurled it at him. But it was a feeble throw. The man didn’t even flinch, letting it glance off his ankle. Defeated, Yig collapsed again. All he could do was stare into Mona’s fading eyes as the color drained from them.

  A sting surged up Yig’s arm as the symbol flared even brighter—a warm, embracing glow that unsettled the swordsman. It felt like lightning flowed through his veins, but without pain—more like a guiding presence, motherly and safe. As the swordsman suddenly lunged toward him, the light burst outward, engulfing everything. The figure blurred, distorted, and finally vanished into the glow.