The moment the pulse hit the battlefield, Shun felt it.
A sharp, invisible ripple of pressure sliced through the ether like a predator cutting through murky water. Without hesitation, he slammed his hand into the ground, summoning a glowing dome of translucent energy around the frontline. The barrier shimmered like fractured glass, pulsing against the unseen force.
The monster was testing them again.
A mind attack.
"It's intelligent," Shun muttered under his breath. "Too intelligent."
The pressure eased for a moment, allowing him to see it more clearly.
It stood still, yet its presence pressed in like a storm. The creature did not blink. It did not breathe. Its form was vaguely humanoid, but ever-shifting, with too many joints and too many eyes, some closing, others opening, all staring in different directions. A mass of tendrils lashed around it, thin and soaked in black ichor, as if the air itself refused to touch its skin.
Even with Shun's ether-enhanced vision, it was difficult to look at directly.
"Focus," he whispered.
The battlefield boiled in chaos. Excluding himself, thirty one fighters remained: seventeen vanguards, nine duelists, and four strategists. Shun's role was not to command. That was left to the generals. But he knew how to fight, how to read the flow of combat.
And this was going to be brutal.
The vanguards surged forward with a roar, clad in metal and powered armor, their weapons flashing with ether circuits. Duelists danced around them, quicker, more agile, slicing with precision and rhythm. The strategists stayed back, lining up near the rocky edge of the battlefield, their bows charged with ether and experimental explosives slung at their hips.
Xin's work.
Shun's jaw tightened.
He remembered when Xin had taught them, only a week ago. Late-night sessions. Rushed simulations. Quiet jokes between blasts and failed mixtures.
Now, they had to rely on that training, because Xin had gone ahead to stay above ground, protecting the rest of the populi.
Shun looked up again.
The monster had not moved.
But its head tilted slightly. Watching.
Judging.
Then it started walking. Slow, deliberate steps.
It moved like it had all the time in the world.
Shun's chest tightened. He was not sure why, until he realized it was walking away from the bulk of the battle. Toward the edge.
Toward the strategists.
"Wait," Shun breathed. "It's..."
Too late.
It vanished.
No sound. No flash. It was gone.
Ether screamed behind him.
"Strategists, move!" Shun shouted, spinning around.
Mira, the first strategist, was yanked into the air, her scream choked off by a sudden crush of invisible force. Her limbs twitched, convulsing violently, before her body exploded into a mist of red and blue. Blood sprayed across the rocks, and her bow clattered to the ground, its ether charge flickering out like a dying star.
No warning.
No fight.
Olan, the second strategist, tried to pull his bow. His arms twisted unnaturally behind his back, as though a giant hand had gripped him like a doll. A snap echoed, sharp and sickening, like a bone breaking in Shun's own spine. Then a tear followed, skin peeling, muscle unraveling. Olan's body split into two uneven halves, collapsing with wet thuds, his blood pooling in the dirt.
"No!" Shun shouted, leaping forward, ether crackling around his fists. But Del, the third strategist, was already gone, ripped underground by a long tendril that erupted from beneath. It dragged him into the earth with a desperate, muffled scream, the ground swallowing him whole, leaving only a smear of crimson in its wake.
Only one remained.
Tariq.
He fumbled with one of Xin's ether-laced bombs, his hands trembling as he tried to activate it. The charge fizzled, sparking uselessly. The monster appeared behind him, standing in the space he had occupied moments before. Its form was shifting, taller, sharper, its mouth, if it could be called that, wide and grinning like a rift in reality. Its eyes glowed like stars behind thick fog, pulsing with malevolent intent.
It did not kill Tariq quickly.
Shun was still running, ether surging through his veins, when the horror unfolded. Tariq's head twitched, then his arms, then his legs. His body floated, bending backward as if the laws of physics had abandoned him. His eyes widened, bloodshot, as his mouth opened in a silent scream.
Then he began laughing.
It was not his voice.
It was the monster's.
The laughter pierced Shun's ears, low, guttural, echoing inside his skull. Tariq's body burst into flames, not fire, but light, too white, too bright. His flesh twisted inside out, collapsing into a pile of steaming, blinking eyeballs that sizzled into smoke, leaving behind a stench of burnt bone and ether.
All four strategists were gone.
In under five seconds.
Silence fell across the battlefield.
Even the vanguards had stopped moving, their weapons lowered, their faces pale.
Shun turned slowly.
The monster now stood alone, centered between the frontlines and the corpses.
It wanted them to see.
Its hands rose, and the ground pulsed with etheric veins, glowing sickly green. Symbols of a forgotten language appeared in the sky, floating above its head in a burning halo, each glyph writhing like a living thing.
A ritual.
Shun's eyes widened. "It's preparing something... something bigger."
"Everyone, pull back. Form a defensive line!"
No response.
He tried again.
Nothing.
The barrier of reality was warping, the air growing thick, heavy with the weight of the monster's presence.
This was not only a mind attack.
It was claiming the battlefield.
Shun inched closer, his barrier reforming around him. Sweat dripped down his brow. Every instinct screamed to run, but he had to buy time. The others needed to escape.
"Face me, createn" he said, voice steady.
The monster paused.
Then it turned fully toward him.
Shun raised both hands, gathering ether into a silver Jian of light, its blade brimming with energy. "Come on, then."
The monster responded.
With a whisper.
Not in his ears.
In his mind.
A voice, cold, ancient, not made for human understanding.
{You think you are awake, child of shaper?}
Shun's vision blurred.
}You dream... still.}
Pain lanced through his skull. He staggered back, clutching his head as the world tilted.
And then he saw it.
Not only the monster, but something behind it.
A shadow, vast and formless, loomed over the battlefield, its edges bleeding into the sky. It pulsed with the same sickly green as the etheric veins, and within it, shapes moved, writhing, clawing at the edges of reality. Faces pressed against the void, eyeless, mouthless, their screams silent but deafening in Shun's mind.
He swung his Jian, the blade slicing through the air, sending a wave of ether toward the monster. The creature did not flinch. It raised a hand, and the wave shattered, dissolving into sparks that burned Shun's skin as they fell.
The ground beneath him cracked, and tendrils erupted, wrapping around his legs. They were cold, slick, and impossibly strong, pulling him downward. He slashed at them, his Jian cutting through the ichor-soaked flesh, but more tendrils replaced them, faster, tighter, their tips sharpening into needle-like points that pierced his armor.
Shun roared, channeling ether into his body, his muscles glowing with silver light turning into scales. He tore free, leaping into the air, and brought his Jian down in a blazing arc. The monster sidestepped, its form blurring, and countered with a swipe of its own. A wave of black ichor shot toward him, jagged and alive, tearing through his barrier like paper.
He hit the ground hard, rolling to avoid another strike. The ichor splashed where he had stood, melting the stone into a bubbling, hissing pool. Shun scrambled to his feet, his breath ragged, and summoned another barrier, this one thicker, pulsing with raw ether.
The monster tilted its head again, its eyes narrowing. Then it lunged, faster than before, its tendrils whipping through the air like living blades. Shun ducked, parried, and struck back, his Jian carving a glowing line across the creature's chest. Ichor sprayed, but the wound closed instantly, the monster's flesh knitting together with a sickening squelch.
It laughed again, the sound reverberating in Shun's bones.
He stumbled, his vision swimming. The shadow behind the monster grew larger, its faces pressing closer, their silent screams clawing at his sanity. He swung his Jian wildly, cutting through tendrils, through air, through the very ether itself, but the monster was relentless, its attacks growing faster, sharper, more precise.
A tendril caught his arm, twisting it until the bone cracked. Pain exploded through him, but he gritted his teeth, channeling ether to numb the agony. He broke free, slashing upward, and caught the monster's face, slicing through one of its many eyes. It shrieked, a sound that shattered the air, and the shadow behind it pulsed violently, its faces screaming in unison.
Shun fell to one knee, gasping, his Jian flickering. The monster stepped closer, its grin widening, its remaining eyes glowing brighter. The glyphs above its head spun faster, their light searing into Shun's retinas.
He could feel it now, the ritual nearing completion. The air grew heavier, the ground trembling, the shadow expanding until it blotted out the sky.
Shun raised his Jian, his body trembling with effort.
He had to stop it.
He had to fight.