They tore through the air and shadows... massive forms of wings, claws, and fangs. Yet when they passed the mage, they didn't even slow.
As if he wasn't there.
They were charging straight for Keiser.
His pulse spiked.
He spun and sprinted back toward the gate.
The people who had been pushing against it only moments ago broke away in terror, scattering as the beasts thundered after him. They thought the monsters would plow right through the gate.
Only three remained.
The princess.
Lenko.
Diego.
They refused to move.
Keiser's chest heaved as he closed the last few paces. Just a step left. His palm slammed against his chest, as the mana surging into a sigil. He had seen it... the word inscribed on the parchment pressed to the mage's body.
'Evanescence'
A spell to vanish. To erase scent, presence, mana... everything that made prey visible to the beast.
The mage had hidden himself. And Keiser was the only one left for the monsters to see.
Keiser crouched low, sliding sideways with his back pressed to the ward.
The first beast slammed into the ward at full speed... its massive bulk unable to stop now that the he had been erased. The ward flared like a wall of force, the impact blasting the monster backward in a violent rebound.
Another came. Then another.
Each hulking form thundered toward him, unable to halt their charge. The ward repelled them all in savage bursts, launching them back through the air. One crashed so close it nearly flattened the shock mage who stood frozen, gaping at the scene.
Keiser's breath came in controlled bursts, his body coiled. He sidestepped each one carefully, letting the beasts slam against the barrier and ricochet away, the ground shaking with every impact. Step by step, his careful movements carried him closer... not to the gate... but back toward the mage.
The old man stumbled back, his eyes wide.
"Y-you---!" he stammered, his voice breaking in disbelief. His eyes darted to the beasts still writhing on the ground, then back to Keiser. "How did you---how did you do that?! That was a high-level spell! Nobody taught you magic back in the palace!"
In a heartbeat, his hand shot forward, fisting the front of the mage's robe and yanking him off his feet. The old man sputtered, fingers clawing weakly at Keiser's wrist as the fabric cut into his throat. His sandals scraped uselessly against the dirt, body trembling as Keiser hiked him higher, choking him in plain sight.
"You think too little of me." Keiser's voice was low, dangerous, his teeth bared in a smile that was anything but kind. Keiser thought that there's no way Muzio wouldn't know how. That boy managed to hide in Sheol's Forest of all places---warding every inch with careful sigils.
His grip tightened until the mage's face darkened, veins straining against his temples. "Do you really think I wouldn't learn?"
He leaned in, close enough for the old man to see the mania burning in his eyes.
"I know how to read, old man."
Keiser's other hand pressed flat against the glowing sigil burned into the mage's chest. The runes flared wildly as Keiser's will clashed with them. He twisted the design, disrupting its pattern, forcing the lines to bend, fracture, and unravel.
The old man shrieked.
His scream tore through the air, raw and blood-curdling as the sigil backfired, burning into flesh. Keiser winced... he knew exactly how much it hurt. He could feel the backlash scorching his own hand, biting into his veins. But he didn't let go.
Because the mage was howling like a man being flayed alive. And that was the point.
Keiser knew one thing about himself.
He was no saint. He was a knight forged in war, a blade hammered on blood and fire. He had marched across this rotten kingdom, breaking beasts and men alike beneath his hand. He had dreamed of a crown... not for glory, but to tear out the rot at its roots and burn it clean.
Mercy?
He had none to give. Not for men like this.
This mage... this decrepit relic who wrapped himself in authority like armor... was the kind who preyed on his own people. Helping only those he deemed worthy. Leaving the rest to beg, starve, or die.
Worse still, using them as sacrifices… as bait. As if lives were pawns he could play with, so long as the game ended in his favor.
Keiser's jaw clenched, his fist grinding deeper into the mage's chest sigil as the old man writhed against him. The stench of burning flesh clawed at his nose, but his grip never loosened.
"You know what's right and wrong", he said coldly. "Even when they poison you, teach you to obey, force their doctrine into your bones... your body still feels it. The wrongness. The cruelty. The weight of another's suffering."
This mage had felt it. And ignored it.
That made him worse than a beast.
Keiser's eyes blazed, his voice low and sharp as a blade. "Men like you don't deserve mercy. You knew the pain you caused. And you chose it anyway."
The sigil cracked under his will, light bursting in jagged flares, and the mage screamed again... louder, more desperate. Keiser pushed harder, every ounce of his battle-forged fury driving the runes toward collapse.
He didn't stop. He wouldn't. Not until the old man broke.
But of course, Keiser had to let go.
That feeling... sharp, wrong, too familiar... stabbed through his chest like ice water. A memory of something he had no wish to remember.
His gaze snapped to the ground.
The runes. The 'offering'. Still burning faintly, shimmering with hungry light. He cursed under his breath. He should have broken it the moment he saw it. If left unchecked, it was nothing but a beacon... a lure for things that did not belong.
And he had been too slow.
Keiser's eyes widened as the air thickened, heavy with pressure. Behind the mage... who stood frozen, trembling, refusing even to look back... the world darkened.
It wasn't the starry sky anymore.
It was a mass. A hulking, writhing shadow that blotted out the heavens from where Keiser stood. An endless bulk that shifted and breathed, a presence so massive his instincts screamed to run.
Eyes. Dozens. Hundreds. Layered in the dark, unblinking and wide, pinning him like spears.
And teeth. Rows upon rows of jagged white gleaming from the abyss, wet with hunger.
The mage whimpered, his voice breaking into a pitiful croak. He didn't turn. He wouldn't look.
Keiser did.
He forced himself to stare at the thing blotting out the sky.
Every instinct in him... beast and man alike... tensed, preparing for the inevitable clash.