The long-separated companions had countless words they longed to share, aching to sit down and speak their hearts. Yet the time for such reunion was not now.
Surrounded by Godrick's soldiers, Lucian stepped to the forefront, placing himself before the frightened Tarnished.
"Stay close. Do not scatter."
The young Tarnished nodded furiously, huddling behind him like chicks behind a hen. Though they did not understand why a Banished Knight had chosen to aid them, they saw he knew Hakkan. And if their elder brother Hakkan trusted him, then surely this knight was no enemy.
Relief washed over their pale faces. Salvation had come.
Lucian's blades sang, storm-winds bursting forth as storm blades that shredded the Godrick soldiers with ease.
"Hakkan," he called amidst the carnage, "how did you come to be here?"
Hakkan, still reeling at the sheer force of Lucian's strikes, shook his head. "Ah, that… too much has happened. Another time, perhaps. But you… you've become frighteningly strong."
Lucian laughed heartily, joy breaking through the tension. "Of course! I am, after all, the man who will become Elden Lord!"
Yet the press of enemies was relentless. Soldier after soldier surged from every corridor, filling the halls with the clash of steel. They had not come for Roderika's band of Tarnished. They came because Hakkan, in his desperate flight, had stumbled upon the most perilous path — straight toward Godrick's throne.
This was the heart of Stormveil, its defenses the thickest in the entire keep. Lucian almost pitied Hakkan's misfortune… though perhaps it was fortune in disguise. Anywhere else, these young Tarnished would surely have been overwhelmed, with no one to save them.
Best not to dwell on it.
For Lucian, this throng of soldiers posed no true threat. Numbers alone could not wear him down, not while his flasks remained and the Wind Spirit Moon Shadow at his side never faltered.
As Lucian cut through the mob, Elyssa and Nepheli finally caught up, with two more Tarnished lagging behind, barely ten meters away.
Then the air shifted.
A vast shadow fell upon the stragglers.
The Tarnished who had fought with them against the Omen reacted first, seizing his companion and diving aside. A monstrous shape slammed down where they had stood, two ritual swords piercing deep into the stone.
Its twisted, spiderlike frame quivered as it rose. A Grafted Scion.
The pair scarcely had time to breathe in relief before a massive cleaver swung from a side passage, splitting the leading Tarnished in two. From the doorway squeezed an obscene bulk of flesh, its body mottled with crimson, ring-shaped wounds poorly bound in rags.
A Child of the Omen.
Together, the two abominations closed the path behind them, sealing Lucian's band within a tightening noose of steel. Soldiers surged at the front while monsters lurked at their back.
The soldiers parted, creating a path of dread.
Then it came: a voice like rot and rusted iron, heavy with decay.
"A lowly Tarnished, playing as a lord… you dare bring disorder to my castle?"
"And it was you, was it not, who boasted to take my head?"
"To think you would come here… truly, your audacity knows no end."
The words were accompanied by a cacophony of clattering metal. Then the figure emerged in full.
Godrick the Grafted.
His body was grotesquely immense, far beyond what the Lands Between had ever whispered. Every limb was doubled, stolen troll's arms twined together and sprouting like branches, each clothed in mismatched armor. From these limbs spread countless lesser hands, each clutching weapons: swords, hammers, lances, bows, even knives that seemed laughable in those infant palms.
Upon his vast chest hung a custom-forged cuirass, and over his shoulders trailed a peacock-patterned mantle of dark green. At his side, the famed golden greataxe scraped against the ground.
In his other hand, a rope dragged behind him. Its end bore a grisly cargo.
Tarnished. Dozens of them.
Their limbs were gone, taken for his craft. Yet no blood flowed; their wounds were smooth, raw, obscene. Nooses at their throats dragged their limp bodies across the floor, faces darkened from strangulation.
Godrick hurled them at Lucian's feet.
"This shall be your fate," he roared. "Sacrifices for my graft!"
Nepheli's fists clenched tight. Among the faces of the mutilated, she recognized some of her adoptive father's warriors.
Rage boiled within her. Grafting… this sin, this desecration. Even the wind itself felt fouled by his crime.
Yet she restrained herself. This was Lucian's battlefield to command, and she knew well — disobedience could doom them all.
Lucian smirked coldly. "Is this all you are, Godrick the 'Grafted'?"
At his words, Godrick's veins bulged. He slammed his greataxe down, pulping the maimed Tarnished into unrecognizable gore.
"Silence! I am no mere graft! I am Godrick the Golden — true heir to the throne!"
"Seize the Tarnished!"
At his cry, the soldiers surged forward, driven into a frenzy.
But faster than any of them came the Grafted Scion and the Omen, their charge heedless of the soldiers beneath their feet. Men were crushed outright, their comrades scattering aside to trail behind the monstrous vanguard.
"Elyssa!" Lucian barked. "Take those two!"
Without hesitation, Elyssa darted to meet the abominations, blades drawn.
"Nepheli, Hakkan — protect the Tarnished! Keep them alive."
Nepheli answered with steel resolve. Hakkan, though his expression hardened with worry, gave a firm nod.
And Lucian himself advanced. Step by step, his storm-wreathed swords rose, his gaze fixed upon the towering tyrant.
"Godrick," he declared, his voice cutting through the din, "I come as promised — to take your head."
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[T/N: 2 of 2 Bonus/Extra Chapters for your powerstones. Thank You!]