The Scion Order Hold, once humming with steady, purposeful work, erupted into a storm. Runners sprinted through the stone corridors, arms full of missives glowing faintly with binding seals.
Crystals in the message halls pulsed in quick succession, their light flaring brighter with each incoming signal.
Arasha intercepted the first bundle, eyes scanning the jagged handwriting. "North border of Telum—two rifts. Citadel nearly breached." Another slip. "Ishart coast. Three rifts, one naval port under siege." A third. "Southern plains—five rifts, scattered villages cut off."
Kane's jaw tightened as he seized another stack from a panting courier. "Too many at once. This isn't a coincidence—it's coordination."
The air itself seemed heavier as the truth sank in. The rifts weren't merely flaring—they were pouring open, in every nation allied under their fragile net.
Arasha wasted no breath. "We move. Garran, rally strike squads. Rewald, prepare the teleportation gates—we'll bleed ourselves dry before we let this network collapse."
The Hold's halls surged into action. Mages scrambled to align teleportation runes, their voices chanting in unison.
Warriors strapped armor over half-eaten breakfasts. The scent of ink, metal, and alchemy gave way to the iron tang of imminent battle.
Kane stood at the central array, his hands weaving quick, efficient gestures. Portals rippled into being across the chamber, each glowing with the hue of its destination. "We'll cycle squads—short bursts through, hit the monsters, stabilize, then rotate back before the corruption drains us dry."
"Just like we planned," Arasha answered, striding to his side. Her comm-link flared, Linalee's clear voice crackling through.
"Scion Hold, this is Capital Command. Reports are streaming in from all allied fronts. Are you in position?"
Arasha replied without hesitation, her tone steelbound. "Already moving. First strike force en route to Telum. Relay this: reinforcements will rotate through every major breach. The net holds."
"Understood," Linalee's voice answered, now echoing as her aides carried the report through channels to allied rulers, generals, and field commanders across the alliance.
The first squads surged through the gates, weapons gleaming, eyes sharp with both fear and resolve. Their roars echoed as they vanished into light.
Moments later, the first reports came back—victories snatched from chaos, villages shielded, enemy lines disrupted.
Yet the flow did not stop. With every stabilized rift, another message crashed down: new breaches, new cries for help.
The network trembled under the weight of so many demands, the very crystals of the communication hubs whining with strain.
"Hold it together," Kane muttered, pouring his mana into a stabilizing rune before it fractured. Sweat beaded his brow, but he didn't falter. "We built this net. Now, we have to believe in it."
Arasha stood at the head of the command chamber, her voice carrying across the hall to every soul within earshot.
"Listen well! The rifts want us scattered, broken, afraid. But look around you—the union holds, because of each of you. Fight, not as one nation, but as one world. Every child's laughter, every elder's breath depends on us standing together. We don't give ground. Not today!"
A roar of affirmation answered her, shaking the rafters. The Scion Hold was alive with fire.
Through the day and into the night, the fight stretched on—squads teleporting in and out, victories and losses relayed in real time to the capital, then dispersed to the farthest allied fronts.
It was chaos, brutal and unrelenting—but the alliance, the nations, the people were still holding on.
The overwhelming surge had been beyond their anticipation, a storm meant to crack them apart. Yet the net they had spun—fragile and patched—held.
And in its holding, the union proved itself stronger than fear, stronger than the rifts themselves.
****
The first teleportation shimmer spat Kane, Arasha, and their strike force into the choking smoke of Telum's northern fort.
The ground shook under the pounding of colossal limbs—rift-born beasts towering three times the height of men, their jagged forms slick with corruption.
The walls were already half-shattered, but the soldiers of Telum clung to the breach. Shields locked, pikes braced, they stood against the impossible tide.
Every step backward cost blood. Every scream torn from the line was matched by a roar of defiance.
Behind them, villagers poured through the narrow gates, children carried in trembling arms, and elders supported by neighbors.
The evacuation was chaotic, but still it moved. Soldiers died not for glory but for those stumbling feet behind them.
"Fall back! Make room for the strike force!" a commander bellowed, his voice raw. His armor was split, his face bloodied, yet he still swung his blade to keep his men in line.
Arasha charged without hesitation, her glaive cleaving into a monster's corrupted tendon, sending it toppling into the mud. "Get them clear!" she roared, already turning to intercept the next.
Kane stood with both hands raised, runes spiraling outward. A barricade of radiant force surged into existence, pressing the rift spawn back and giving the defenders a breath's worth of safety.
The relief on their faces was fleeting but real, as if they'd been given air after drowning.
"Medics, now!" Kane barked.
Healers darted forward, robes stained and hands shaking, dragging the most wounded from the front lines. Their chants wavered with exhaustion, but light still bloomed from their palms.
One young healer collapsed to her knees after stabilizing a soldier's bleeding gut, whispering through trembling lips: "Please, just hold on."
For every man they saved, another fell. Still, they did not falter.
The Telum commander staggered to Kane's side. "You buy us moments we didn't have. Go—go where you're needed next. We'll hold."
Kane looked at him, saw the exhaustion, the certainty in his eyes. He gave a short nod. "Use this chance to turn things around, stay strong."
Then Arasha's hand fell heavy on his shoulder, already urging him back toward the portal rune their squad was priming.
She had blood spattered across her cheek, her eyes burning—not with despair, but with fire that refused to die.
The portal flared again, and in a blink they were gone.
They landed next in the southern plains. The air here reeked of scorched flesh, the rift tearing open like a wound across the horizon.
Beasts with maws wide enough to swallow carts lumbered forward, while smaller spawn swarmed like a black tide around their feet.
Here, cavalry units darted in and out, buying time with daring charges. Commanders shouted hoarse orders, their voices nearly drowned by the clash of steel and the monsters' guttural screeches.
Arasha led her squad in like a hammer, cutting through the swarm to give the horsemen space to wheel around.
Kane unleashed a cascade of binding chains etched from pure mana, shackling one of the larger beasts to the earth as arrows and spears rained upon it.
"Forward, together!" a southern captain cried, rallying what was left of her troops. She raised her banner with a broken arm, her shield strapped to it so her men could see.
And though half her soldiers limped and bled, they lifted their blades higher, pushing step by step into the tide.
The battle stretched until breath burned, until sweat and blood mingled. Then—once the frontline steadied—Arasha and Kane were already gone again, their squad vanishing in a ripple of light.
They repeated this again and again.
In the Ishart coast, they arrived just in time to stop a leviathan-spawn from tearing through the last barricade shielding hundreds of cowering civilians.
In the mountain passes of Solum, they drove back swarms climbing over the cliffs, giving archers precious moments to rain death from above.
In the plains of Fretelia, they fought alongside soldiers too young to even bear full armor, steadying their line long enough for reinforcements to arrive.
Everywhere they appeared, they gave breathing room, a heartbeat of hope. And every time they left, they carried the weight of those they couldn't save.
But the network held. The alliance did not break.
And though the rifts poured endless monsters, the united will of many nations pressed back—not fast, not clean, but together.