The battlefield reeked of smoke, blood, and mud, a haze of heat and iron hanging thick over the ramparts. For days the tide had battered the walls, wave after wave of claw and fang, but now the air carried a silence that pressed heavier than any roar. The silence of beasts drawing breath for one final strike. The silence before the true storm.
Men gripped their spears tighter. Shields rattled. A thousand eyes scanned the treeline, where the forest edge boiled with a darkness alive. The earth trembled under paws too massive for ordinary creatures.
And then they came.
From the veil of trees emerged monsters unlike the countless packs before them. An ursine colossus, its fur black as coal, shoulders crowned with jagged bone spurs, eyes burning red like twin lanterns. Beside it slithered a serpent wider than ten men, its scales oiled with shadow, its forked tongue tasting the air for blood. From above, wings unfurled — a raptor the size of a keep, feathers edged like blades, each beat of its wings scattering debris across the battlements.
The apex beasts.
Soldiers shuddered at the sight. Veterans who had fought for decades swallowed hard, knuckles whitening on hilts. "Heavens…" someone muttered, voice cracking. "How can we fight that?"
But Zed stood still, at the front of the clan's line, his shadow stretched long beneath the firelight. His garments had changed; no longer ceremonial robes, but plain black battle gear, cut close to the body, his boots laced firm, his staff gleaming with subtle runes. Sweat clung to his brow, but his gaze was steady, sharp, unflinching. The weeks of war had tempered him. Every scar earned, every kill etched into his marrow — all of it spoke now in the weight of his stance.
And then the ground behind him shivered.
A shadow peeled free from his body, rising, reforming into a pale, terrible figure. His beast had awakened in full. The Vampire — no longer the crude apprentice that had followed him into the forest, but a true creature of the night. Regal, tall, with skin white as moonlight and eyes burning crimson. A smile curled over its lips, revealing fangs meant for kings. It spread its arms wide, and the shadows bent to it, as though welcoming a sovereign.
Gasps rippled among the men of the Latian clan. Some even stepped back in awe, their fear of the tide momentarily forgotten. "What… what is that?" one whispered.
Zed's answer was silence. Only a faint nod to the beast that had fought and bled with him, bound by more than just contract. The Vampire tilted its head, then dissolved into a swarm of bats, black wings flooding the sky, cloaking the wall in writhing shadow.
The apex beasts bellowed, the sound shaking the heavens. The army roared back, spears clattering against shields.
The clash began.
The bear thundered forward, smashing through abandoned barricades as though they were twigs. Its paw swept across the field, sending soldiers flying like straw dolls. Zed moved, faster than sight. His staff cracked against its claw, runes bursting with light, forcing the beast to stumble a step. The shockwave alone knocked men to their knees.
"Hold the line!" Zed's voice rang clear. "Form ranks — aim for the joints! Shields high!"
The serpent struck, jaws snapping toward the wall. Soldiers braced, but its fangs pierced stone as though it were soft bark. The Vampire reformed mid-air, talons sinking into the serpent's eye, tearing it loose in a spray of black ichor. The serpent shrieked, thrashing, its body crushing whole siege towers as it writhed.
The sky darkened under the raptor's descent. Wind howled as its talons stretched for the battlements. But Zed was there, leaping skyward with impossible speed, his Shadowfoot carrying him into the storm. His staff spun, runes igniting gold, striking the bird's talon with a crack that shattered bone. The raptor screeched, twisting midair as bats swarmed over its wings, forcing it off balance.
Blood rained. Flesh tore. Men shouted, rallied. The clans fought shoulder to shoulder — spears plunging into gaps of armor, arrows whistling into eyes and throats. The healers dragged bodies back as fast as they fell. The air was madness: fire, shadow, iron, screams.
Zed fought at the heart of it all. His staff cleaved skulls, his daggers tore through sinew, his shadow bent with him as though the night itself answered his call. Where he struck, beasts fell. His Vampire carved deeper, faster — teleporting in bursts of red mist, striking from impossible angles, tearing through hides that no blade could pierce.
The men saw. They saw the young master drenched in blood, unafraid, moving like death incarnate, and their despair melted into fury. They roared his name, striking harder, pushing forward. "Latian! Latian! For the clan!"
But the apex beasts did not yield.
The bear, half-blind, charged again, its body aflame with arrows, spears broken in its hide. It swung down toward Zed, the earth cracking under the force. Zed caught the blow on his