The shattered moonlight bled across the battlefield, turning the mist into a silver ocean. Altharion stood at its center, his obsidian armor drinking in the light while his silver hair streamed behind him like a banner of defiance. His sword, Nightrend, pulsed in rhythm with his heartbeat, each thrum echoing with the power of the ancients.
The enemy came in waves—ghastly wraith-knights with spectral halberds, their armor fractured between realms. Their leader, a hulking revenant with a crown of thorns made from shadowsteel, roared and charged.
Altharion's eyes burned with twin lights—one the deep red of blood magic, the other the cold blue of moon qi. He stepped forward, and the ground beneath him crystallized into black glass. With a single slash, Nightrend erupted in a crescent arc of shadowfire, cleaving three wraiths in half.
The revenant swung its halberd, and reality screamed. The weapon tore through the air, trailing shards of broken space. Altharion twisted, letting the attack miss by a breath, then plunged Nightrend into the revenant's chest. The blade drank deeply, pulling not just essence, but memories—its victories, its rage, its very name.
A shockwave burst outward. More wraith-knights fell back, shrieking as their forms unraveled.
But Altharion didn't stop. He closed his eyes and reached inward. The qi within him swirled into a dual storm—shadow qi from the Veil and blood magic from the pact he had sworn in the war's earliest days. The fusion ignited inside him, forming a halo of shifting colors—red at the edges, violet at the core.
"Duskfall Technique… Third Seal," he whispered.
In an instant, the battlefield bent to his will. The mist condensed into spears of frozen shadow, each one aimed with deadly precision. They rained down, impaling the remaining wraith-knights, pinning them to the earth like insects in a collector's case. The revenant roared again, tearing itself free of the impalement, but Altharion was already in front of it.
The duel that followed was a blur of speed and sorcery. Each strike from Altharion's blade birthed a shockwave, while each parry from the revenant warped the space around them. Sparks, both physical and magical, filled the air.
Finally, Altharion feinted left, drawing the revenant's guard, and unleashed his right hand—gloved in the crimson light of his blood magic. He drove it into the revenant's helm, shattering it. The creature froze, its body dissolving into black dust as Altharion ripped its soul free and bound it within Nightrend.
The moment the last enemy fell, silence claimed the field. Only the sound of Altharion's steady breathing remained.
But peace was short-lived. From the distance, a tear in the sky began to widen—a rift of pure void, swirling with chaotic power. Through it, something massive stirred, its silhouette jagged and wrong. Altharion tightened his grip on his sword.
Behind him, his allies approached—Kael with his arcane staff, Lira with her bow of moonlight, and the former Veilbearer, cloaked once again in shifting shadows.
"You've been busy," Kael muttered, glancing at the corpses.
"Too busy," Lira added, notching an arrow. "That thing isn't here by accident."
Altharion didn't answer. His gaze was locked on the rift, where a single, colossal eye had opened, staring directly at him. The air thickened, pressing down on them like the weight of an ocean.
"The war isn't over," he finally said, his voice like steel drawn from ice. "It's only waking up."
And as the rift screamed open, the battlefield erupted into chaos once more.