The fight became rhythm. Knives hissed, mace answered. The assassin's feet barely touched the ground, each dodge boosted by a whisper of wind. Alarik kept pressing, heavy, relentless, forcing him toward the bend in the road.
But the assassin was herding him. Every exchange pulled him farther from the carriage.
Shouts and screams tore through the clash of steel, sharper than the wind between strikes. A guard's voice rose—raw, desperate—then was cut short with a wet, gurgling choke. Hooves hammered the earth in a frantic rhythm until a shrill equine scream split the air; the beast crumpled, arrows buried to the fletching in its neck, hot blood spraying across the churned mud.
Beyond the assassin's shoulder, Alarik saw the battle unravel like a tapestry being ripped apart. The guard captain's face—the same man who had shared bread with him by the fire the night before—twisted in shock as a hooked blade tore him from his horse. The crowd of bandits swallowed him, and a silver slash across his throat sent a spray of blood that steamed in the cold air. His body hit the dirt before his eyes had time to glaze over.
Two soldiers staggered near the carriage, one clutching at an arrow jutting from his side, the other already sagging with a shaft buried deep between his shoulder blades. They went down almost together, their armor clattering against the churned ground.
The royal standard, proud and defiant even in chaos, bobbed once more into view through the smoke—its bearer's face pale, lips drawn in a grimace. His chest was soaked red where a cut had split his mail. He held on, stubborn as a dying flame in the wind.
Then came the axe. It fell with a sickening crunch, cleaving helm and skull. The man toppled, the flagpole slipping from his grasp as though even the banner itself had lost its will to stand. It struck the mud with a dull thud, the fabric folding in on itself before a rider's hooves pounded over it, smearing it into the filth until it was nothing but tattered cloth and trampled dreams.
Alarik's chest burned—not from fatigue, but from the sight. His men were dying, the line crumbling, the symbol of their cause ground beneath a bandit's mount. It was a weight heavier than armor, heavier than stone.
The assassin's voice cut through it all, smooth and taunting.
"Split your guard, and the line breaks."
Alarik's eyes locked on him. In that moment, there was no smoke, no screams—only the man before him, the pivot on which the battle turned. His voice, when it came, was low and edged with the cold certainty of a promise.
"Weight of the Oath."
The ground broke under his boots, as if he instantly started to weigh like a mountain. It was as if the burden of every vow, every fallen comrade, had been made manifest, pressing down on his shoulders until the very earth responded. He stomped forward—shards of stone exploded upward, spiraling around him before crashing down against his armor.
Layer by layer, the rock fused to him, until he stood like a monument to unyielding defiance—a warrior carved from the road itself.
The assassin's smirk thinned into something sharper, colder.
He stepped back, spreading his hands as if parting the air.
"Gale Fang Array."
Wind surged outward in a spiraling burst, tearing dust and leaves from the ground. Ten knives slipped free from the belts across his chest, rising as though tugged by unseen strings. They hung in the air for a heartbeat, then began to orbit him in a flawless ring, their polished edges catching stray shafts of light.
The blades whispered as they spun—not the clean whistle of a thrown knife, but a low, tearing hum, the sound of air being sliced apart. The ring shifted and twisted with the patience of a predator circling prey, never still, never breaking formation.
A flick of his fingers—one knife shot forward, propelled not by muscle but by compressed wind, screaming through the air. Before the echo faded, it curved in a perfect arc, snapping back into its place in the ring. The formation did not falter; the steel tide was endless.
Alarik's eyes narrowed. This wasn't speed. This was mastery—the power to strike from any angle, at any moment, without so much as lifting a hand. Mid-range perfection. Years of blood honed into a single technique.
The assassin's voice cut through the rising wind. "Let's see if the storm can break the mountain."
The forest seemed to hold its breath. Branches whispered overhead.
They moved in the same instant.