The climb had been grueling—each meter a test of resolve. Their limbs ached from the strain, shoulders tight with exertion, fingers raw where stone had scraped through gloves. But as they crested the final lip of the plateau and hauled themselves onto solid ground, both Oligar and Haaskin paused, hoping for respite.
What met their eyes instead was a scene carved from dread. Where are the familiar outlines of Trader's Union motorcraft should have stood—sleek, functional, almost comforting in their civilian neutrality—there now loomed a formation of alien machinery. Angular. Unfeeling. dark as obsidian and twice as sharp in silhouette, casting an oppressive gloom across the high plain.
A low hum vibrated through the earth beneath their boots.
The vehicles were not of commerce, but conquest. Broad transports with hulls thick as fortress walls, studded with modular weapon turrets that slowly rotated, scanning. Near them stood mechanical soldiers—humanoid, but unmistakably inhuman, Robots.
The man at their center wore armor of matte steel and dark carbon weave, every motion a study in ruthless efficiency. He issued orders in clipped, exact gestures, his presence a stark contrast to the machines—yet no less mechanical in its authority.
Oligar tensed.
This wasn't a checkpoint. It wasn't a search party or a sentry unit. This was a deployment force—coordinated, ready, and purposeful. And its presence here, at the far edge of the plateau, could only mean one thing: The Authority wasn't waiting for the fight to come to them. They were moving. Advancing.
But toward what? He needed answers.
Oligar's hand rose slowly, all the while maintaining balance and concentrated his focus towards weaving invisible air threads with his mana near his right ear. With a breath drawn deep into his core, he began to pull the air inward—not chaotically, but in precise spirals—compressing and aligning it into a thread of focused sound.
The whisper-filament technique. An ancient spycraft, honed across a dozen borders and in the shadowed corners of a dozen wars. Air pressure shifted around his ear as he extended the conduit, invisible to the eye but hypersensitive to vibration. Eighty meters away, the commander barked another set of orders.
Just as the conduit neared the Authority commander, a massive robot strode past. The sudden displacement of air disrupted the delicate stream with a sharp hiss that whistled in Oligar's ear.
The connection fractured.
But the technique, refined over decades of clandestine observation, was resilient. The compressed air, formless and obedient, rapidly reshaped itself. Within seconds, the line reformed, tenuous yet functional.
And this time, Oligar heard them—each word a knell, carried on a ribbon of wind.
To a novice, it would have been unintelligible noise.
To Oligar, it was a code. A language of war, spoken through action and intonation.
"Master," Haaskin whispered beside him, breath tight with unease. "What are they doing?"
Oligar didn't answer at once. His gaze remained locked on the unfolding scene, his brow creased in concentration as he parsed the broken stream of words and accompanying movements. Then, grimly, he spoke.
"They're not here for us directly… not yet. But we're not the only ones considering a route through the Whisperwood. The Authority is moving to secure it—likely to cut off any Democracy reinforcements approaching from the western ridgelines."
He gestured subtly with his chin as the commander raised an arm and pointed toward a squad of humanoid automatons. Without hesitation, the machines turned and marched toward a massive tracked vehicle—its scale dwarfing all others. A mechanical behemoth. At its front was an enormous plow, serrated and reinforced, clearly built to rip through dense foliage. It was not a transport—it was a spear.
The weaponry mounted on its flanks wasn't intended to breach bunkers or fight tanks.
It was meant to suppress people.
His eyes grew large, filled with an emerging sense of dread.
"They are going to clear the forest," he murmured, his voice trembling. he whispered, his voice cracking. "They're going to erase the tribe. Just to make way. Those engines—are they electric? Are they avoiding demana pockets?"
Oligar's nod was slow, heavy with understanding. "Precisely. Their machines won't trigger wild demana reactions… and they won't need to send living troops. It's a cold strategy. Efficient. And monstrous."
He looked toward the young man at his side, his voice low and hard. "To the Authority, people who don't submit are not enemies—they are inconveniences. The tribe is simply in the way."
Haaskin stood frozen, staring as the machines began boarding the war plow in precise formation. The jungle beyond the ridge—home to those who had never known allegiance to the Authority—would soon be ashes beneath metal treads.
A spark ignited in his chest.
He had heard the stories. The hushed warnings. But now the stories had faces—machines with dead eyes, a commander with clean hands, a forest soon to be trampled. It was no longer myth. It was happening.
Without a word, without a second of strategy, Haaskin moved.
He leapt from the ledge.
A blur against the sky.
Oligar's hand shot out instinctively—but caught only air.
"Haaskin—!"
Too late.
The apprentice descended like a meteor, eighty meters of freefall converted into deadly momentum. The first mechanical soldier turned its head, sensors flaring red, but the warning came too late. Haaskin crashed into its frame, fists smashing into alloy with the force of a hammerfall. Circuits sparked. Metal screamed.
Panic erupted among the automatons.
As weapons activated, crimson lasers cut through the air in precise, deadly trajectories; however, Haaskin maneuvered with an almost supernatural agility, ducking, twisting, and spinning amidst the barrage. His body moved with instinctive grace, every motion guided by fury. He drove his fist through a robot's core, tearing out its stabilizer. Another fell beneath a crushing elbow, its head crumpling like foil.
From above, Oligar watched in shocked silence, torn between awe and dread.
The boy wasn't holding back.
He was unleashing something.
Something that might not stop.
In a breathtaking display of brute strength, Haaskin seized the robotic driver from the lead war machine, his fingers locking around the alloy plating with terrifying force. The automaton faced difficulties, its servos whirring in objection, yet Haaskin's force remained relentless. With a roar that resonated across the plateau like a battle cry from a long-lost legend, he ripped the driver from its position and launched it into the air. The metallic figure rotated in the sky, momentarily disappearing against the bright sun before plummeting back down among its counterparts with a piercing sound of tearing metal.
The impact sent a ripple through the Authority's formation—confusion, hesitation, a break in their relentless rhythm.
From above, Oligar stood motionless for a fraction of a second, his cloak caught in the updraft like a banner of indecision. Awe and apprehension warred within him. Haaskin's strength was extraordinary—terrifying, even. But this reckless streak, this disregard for restraint, this echo of the violet-eyed enforcer they had barely survived... it was a warning. Power, unchecked, was as dangerous as the Authority's cold precision.
Haaskin turned, chest heaving, eyes ablaze with raw energy. He lifted his hand in invitation—no words, just a gesture that crackled with challenge and urgency. Oligar hesitated.
Then he leapt.
The air tore past him as he descended, landing beside his apprentice. The ground trembled beneath them. The moment of hesitation passed. Now, there was only the mission. The Authority's massive war vehicles had already begun its descent toward the tree line, its plow carving a path through stone and root alike.
They had to stop it.
Below, the machines—once marching with mathematical order—now scrambled to adapt. Their leader lay crumpled, circuits sputtering in the dirt. The loss of command had broken the cohesion. For the first time, the Authority's forces faltered.
"Now!" Oligar snapped, his voice sharp and urgent, as Haaskin powered up the tank-like vehicle he had just claimed. "The mission to bring the king has turned into a rescue mission."
"An A-rank mission turned S-one, just like that," Haaskin muttered in disbelief, remembering events from the afternoon.
Oligar and Haaskin began their descent toward the humanoid weapons arrayed before them.
"We'll need our animals at the palace," Oligar added. "Let me send a signal to Lord Vulturing."
"Finally," Haaskin said with a grin, "it's been ages since I saw Meeky. Best puppy a man could have."
The vehicle jolted suddenly, its balance thrown off as Haaskin's mind wandered mid-drive, lost in his affectionate thoughts.
"Focus," Oligar hissed.
A vanguard of steel and silence, descending in tight columns. They moved with mechanical purpose, each unit synchronised to the next—a merciless procession of death. Their destination was clear: Zedah. The capital. The King's palace. And anything in their way—be it rebel, tribe, or land—would be crushed.
Haaskin's reckless assault, however unwise, had cracked the front. They had seconds—perhaps minutes—before the machines recovered, before the tide reasserted itself. But in that sliver of time, they had a chance.
They sprinted toward the lumbering colossus, its rear hatch still ajar from the chaos. The earth trembled with every turn of its treads. Their breath came fast, their bodies pushed to their limits. This was no longer about survival. It was about interception. Disruption. Sacrifice, if needed.
Their earlier mission—the search for transport—was a fading shadow, irrelevant in the face of what now surged before them. The forest, once a feared barrier to passage, had become the last line of defense.
The battle for the Whisperwood had begun.
And its outcome might decide the fate of the entire kingdom.