The streets of Brasswick erupted.
The Phantom's crimson beams pulsed faster, drawing more and more of the city's bones into his living body. Statues lurched into motion, gaslamps cracked and stalked like spindly insects, bridges unhinged themselves to re-form elsewhere.
But the true terror was not steel. It was man.
Citizens who once whispered rebellion now rioted openly—not against the Phantom, but against their neighbors. Some cried that resistance brought only death. Others screamed that surrender was treason. Fists met steel, fire met water, the city drowned in its own contradictions.
Elric and his companions moved through the madness, guiding stragglers to safe paths. Selene cut down automata where shadows let her. Evangeline tried to silence the voices of machines, but they screamed in a chorus too loud to smother.
In the heart of the market square, a priest knelt before a colossal clockwork angel, its wings of brass unfolding in slow majesty.
"Behold!" he cried, his voice shaking with fervor. "The new god rises! Surrender, and you shall be spared!"
The crowd surged toward the angel, some with worship, others with weapons. The automaton crushed them both without pause, its gears turning with holy indifference.
Elric dragged Selene and Evangeline into an alley, his coat soaked with blood not his own. "The city is no longer at war with him," he said grimly. "It is at war with itself."
And above, the crimson sky pulsed like a heartbeat.