Roric staggered back a single step.
Blood flowed from the cut on above his right eye and fell in dark droplets across the vault floor.
He did not wipe it away.
He did not lower his axe.
Around him, the remaining Dishonored tightened their circle.
Their robes were torn.
Their bodies wounded.
But they were not weakening.
They were strengthening.
The black veins beneath their skin had grown thicker, branching like ink spilled through parchment. Each pulse of their hearts sent a faint shimmer beneath the surface, as though something inside them was learning the rhythm of their flesh.
Roric adjusted his stance.
His shoulder burned where a blade had bitten earlier. His ribs ached. His breath came heavier now.
Still, he stood.
Torvin stepped forward, weapons low, eyes sharp.
"It's pointless," he said flatly. "You caught us lacking. You killed several of my men. Fine. But you're fighting a losing battle."
Roric spat blood onto the stone between them.
"Losing," he said calmly, "is nothing compared to losing a loved one."
His grip tightened around the haft of his axe.
"I won't allow you to take my daughter."
A flicker of confusion crossed Torvin's face.
He tilted his head.
"What daughter?"
Roric's eyes darkened.
"Don't play dumb you bastard, I know why you're here!"
His voice rose, not frantic — but edged with something colder.
"You murdered my wife years ago. Now you come crawling back for my child."
Torvin's expression did not change. Infact, his confusion increased.
"Why would we come all this way, do all this just for some lttle girle? We have no interest in your daughter."
The words struck oddly.
Too direct.
Too clean.
For a fraction of a second, Roric hesitated.
Were they lying to fracture his guard?
Or—
He knew how the Dishonored operated. They were a foreign task force made of the scum of Nordhelm. A blade used discreetly the nobility who preferred not to stain their own hands or destry thier public reputation. Missions were given. Targets assigned. Quietly erased.
It was not impossible that their whole purpose for infiltrating Aerthos and coming to Blackhaven had nothing to do with him or Jamie.
'Still...'
He did not lower his weapon.
"If not her," he said evenly, "then what?"
Torvin's jaw tightened.
"That," he replied, "is none of your business."
Silence lingered between them.
Torvin's voice sharpened.
"This ends now. You let us walk, we finish what we came for then we leave. No more blood has to be spilled."
Roric paused he noticed the black veins on this one were receding then increasing as if he was facing an internal struggle.
Even though he didn't know what it meant he laughed. A short, humorless sound that echoed against broken stone.
"Do you take me for a fool?"
He stepped forward.
"Even if what you're saying were true — why would I let you go? A foreign militant unit operating discreetly in my city is a breach of the international peace treaty. You've bought yourselves time with this stunt. And that time has run out"
His eyes hardened.
"So, whats going to happen is you surrender, and I turn you over to the Inquisition."
He lifted his axe.
"Or you resist."
A faint smile touched his lips.
"And personally… I hope you resist."
Torvin's composure cracked, the black veins increasing.
"Bastard— I'm trying to do you a favour here."
"Think about the plank in your own eye before the speck of dust in anothers."
Torvin was about to retort but stopped.
All of them did.
A wave swept through the air.
Cold.
Heavy.
Oppressive.
Anti-Flow washed across the city like a silent tide.
Roric felt it immediately.
His head snapped toward the direction of the manor.
"Elara," he breathed, "She's entered labour."
The surge had her signature woven into it — raw, unrefined, instinctive.
His mind calculated instantly.
Alaric would definately know that his wife was entering delivery.
As a Saint, it would take him, lets say, two hours on foot if he ran there.
One hour if he halved the distance with his Trait 'Wheel Of Fortune'.
Roric's jaw tightened. As Saints they were faster than the blink of an eye.
'But thats not enough.'
He had to hold them here.
Just a little longer.
He charged.
Steel met steel in a shower of sparks. The Dishonored moved in unison — faster now.
Stronger.
Even weakened by the Nulbrand collar, something beneath their skin fed them.
The black veins pulsed brighter.
Behind them, partially obscured by debris, Lyle stood clutching a small crystal vial.
Inside it, black ooze churned.
It moved as though alive.
As though eager.
Lyle's eyes were focused — calculating — faintly unfocused in that peculiar way that suggested he was not entirely present.
From behind the scenes, he nudged.
Subtle.
A shift in timing.
A blade arriving half a second earlier.
A stone fragment rolling beneath Roric's heel.
Cause and effect tilted ever so slightly.
Torvin saw the opening.
He invoked his trait, 'The Chariot'.
His first resonant sharpened his perception, thought accelerating, the world stretching thin as his reactions multiplied.
His second resonant engaged.
He lunged.
There was no inertia.
No buildup.
One moment he stood five paces away.
The next he was upon Roric, blade descending.
Roric barely intercepted the strike.
The impact jarred his wounded shoulder.
Pain flared white.
Torvin twisted, decelerating his own retreat instantly, reversing momentum without the lag of physics. He thew the disc blades which curved and ricocheted to hit at difficult angles.
Roric adjusted. Though he managed to defelect them he was too slow.
A spear from another man struck his thigh.
He grunted.
Another's blade cut across his ribs.
The black veins along the attackers' arms pulsed thicker.
Their breathing grew ragged.
Anger sharpened.
Hatred intensified.
The ooze inside them responded to emotion.
Amplified it.
Fed on it.
Torvin exercised his third resonant which expanded a localized field. Here, he could freely dictate the speed of the objects and or people within.
Space itself thickened around Roric.
Movement dragged.
Every swing felt heavier.
Every step delayed.
Roric roared and forced through it, brute strength cracking the decelerated field in a burst of resistance.
He scanned.
Assessed.
And saw him.
Lyle.
Not fighting.
Observing.
'So thats the leader, the snakes head...'
Cut the snake's head off and the body dies.
Roric pivoted violently, driving forward through two knights. His axe carved a brutal arc, splitting one from collarbone to hip.
He broke through.
Torvin reacted instantly.
Acceleration.
He intercepted.
Twin disk blades met axe mid-swing, sparks exploding.
"You're not reaching him!" Torvin snapped. If Lyle died, the rands on their bodies would kill them as well.
Roric did not answer.
He simply pushed.
The other knights converged.
Steel clashed in chaotic rhythm.
Torvin's third resonant flared again.
A pocket of accelerated space formed around Roric's feet, threatening to send him stumbling forward uncontrollably.
Roric dug his heel into the stone, shattering it and resisted.
Behind them, Lyle's grip tightened around the vial.
The ooze writhed more violently now.
The veins across the knights' bodies thickened further, spreading across their necks and faces.
Their emotions spiraled.
Frustration.
Rage.
Desperation.
The corruption amplified it all.
One knight began laughing hysterically mid-swing.
Another snarled, teeth grinding.
Roric broke through again and hurled his axe.
It spun end over end toward Lyle.
Torvin accelerated.
Too late.
Lyle jerked back—
The vial slipped.
It struck the stone, shattering.
For a heartbeat, nothing happened.
Then—
The ooze expanded.
It did not spill.
It surged.
Black tendrils shot outward like spears, impaling shelves, pillars, walls, the knights.
The jewelry shop above exploded in a thunderous blast as spikes of corruption tore through floorboards and storefront glass.
Stone fractured.
Wood disintegrated.
A pillars of black mass erupted upward, shredding the roof apart.
Roric grabbed a falling beam and launched himself through collapsing debris. He landed hard, rolling across cobblestone as the entire shop imploded behind him.
Many sleeping civilians were alarmed by the sudden destruction and came out of their houses to see what was going on. A sizable crowd was already gathering , baffled by the sight.
From within the wreckage, shadows writhed.
Torvin burst free moments later, dragging Lyle by the collar. Two surviving knights followed.
The rest—
They did not emerge.
They rose, broke free of the rubble and moved foward slowly.
The ooze had engulfed them entirely.
Their forms twisted into something inhuman as they approached.
Bones cracked.
Spines elongated.
Arms split at the elbow and reformed into serrated appendages.
Black spikes burst from their backs.
One knight's jaw unhinged impossibly wide, splitting down to the sternum as rows of needle-like teeth grew inward.
Another's legs fused into a multi-jointed mass, forcing it to roll backward into a spider-like stance.
Their robes dissolved.
Skin blackened and peeled away, revealing slick, glistening musculature beneath and yellowed bone. Their bodies expanded till they were the of whole houses.
Their eyes turned empty devoid of any humanity.
All that remained was black.
The corruption had reached its final stage.
They had become monsters.
They moved without coordination now.
Without discipline, just pure instinct.
One leapt onto a nearby building, crushingits roof beneath its weight the inhabitants barely had time to escape, though the last person to leave, an old woman the house was caught and torn apart right infront of everyone.
Another tore through a brick façade with its elongated limbs, dragging civilians screaming into darkness. The screams ended abruptly and blood flowed from that alley.
A third convulsed before splitting into two smaller, shrieking forms that scuttled across walls.
They roared and fire spread.
Buildings cracked and the street became chaos.
Roric stood, blood soaked his side.
His shoulder hung stiff.
But his eyes were clear.
Another monstrous shriek split the air as a monster tore through a balcony, sending stone crashing down onto fleeing citizens.
Roric had two paths.
Chase the escapees.
Or contain the disaster unfolding before him.
A monstrous shape lunged toward a group of civilians.
Roric exhaled once, having made his choice.
The night unfolded, a night filled with fire and ruin.