The retreat didn't last.
Ankalyon hesitated for barely a heartbeat.
Then the fog moved.
Shapes poured onto the bridge from both sides, no longer hiding their presence. These weren't champions stepping forward with confidence and titles. These were killers. Veterans. Survivors hardened by a war that rewarded speed and cruelty.
Reserves.
Lyra straightened immediately.
"They're not backing off," she said. "They're committing."
Bran didn't answer.
He stepped forward and drove his shield into the stone.
The bridge groaned.
A visible pressure spread outward from his position, bending the air, forcing the first wave of Ankalyon fighters to slow as if they were charging through deep water.
"They don't pass," he said again.
This time, it wasn't a warning.
It was a promise.
The first enemy hit the barrier.
Then the second.
Then a dozen more.
Blades slammed against Bran's shield, sparks bursting on impact. Spells detonated, fire and force washing over him like waves crashing against a cliff.
Bran didn't move.
Cracks spiderwebbed beneath his boots.
He smiled.
Ishren vanished in a flash of white-blue lightning.
He reappeared in the middle of the enemy formation, electricity screaming from his hands as he discharged a violent arc into the ground. The bridge lit up in branching lines of energy, Ankalyon fighters convulsing as the current ripped through them.
"Too slow!" Ishren laughed, already gone again, reappearing behind another group and tearing through them with a lightning-charged strike.
Maelis raised one hand.
The shadows answered.
Darkness spilled outward, swallowing the center of the bridge in silence. Ankalyon soldiers disappeared into it, their shouts cut off abruptly. Shapes moved inside the black mass. Blades struck. Something screamed.
Then nothing.
The darkness receded.
Bodies fell.
Ken pushed himself upright, muscles screaming in protest.
The vibration inside him was quieter now, but not gone. It pulsed weakly, irritated, like it had been denied a conclusion.
Lyra glanced back at him.
"You standing?"
Ken nodded.
"Barely."
"Good enough."
She moved.
Lyra didn't rush forward. She flowed.
An Ankalyon fighter lunged at her from the side, blade aimed for her neck. Lyra twisted, not faster than the strike, but earlier. The attack passed where her head had been a moment before.
She stepped inside the enemy's reach, redirected the momentum of his own charge, and drove her blade through the opening she'd created.
Another attacker came from above.
Lyra shifted her footing, the force of her movement changing direction mid-step. The attacker overshot, crashing into the stone railing instead.
She didn't slow down.
Ken watched for half a second too long.
Then the bridge screamed again.
A heavy impact shook the structure as Seris of the Deep Rock slammed her fists into the stone, forcing massive slabs upward. The bridge warped, creating jagged barriers and unstable footing.
"Ken!" Lyra shouted. "Left!"
Ken reacted instinctively.
He raised his sword and let the vibration flow again, controlled, precise. He cut through the rising stone, shattering it before it could trap him. The backlash tore through his arms, but he stayed upright.
Two Ankalyon fighters rushed him immediately.
Ken didn't retreat.
He stepped forward.
The blade hummed.
He cut once.
Both fell.
Not cleanly. Not easily.
But they fell.
Ken exhaled sharply, forcing the vibration back inward.
Control.
Not yet.
Above them, Varkhrel roared as he forced his way through Ishren's lightning, flames exploding outward in a violent ring. The heat scorched the bridge, turning stone red-hot.
Maelis moved to intercept.
Shadow met fire.
The impact sent a shockwave across the bridge, throwing fighters from both sides to the ground.
Lyra slid to Ken's side, blade already stained dark.
"You still with us?" she asked.
Ken nodded, jaw clenched.
"Ask me later."
She smiled.
"That's my answer too."
The bridge shook again.
Ankalyon pushed harder.
Garnafall didn't yield.
Steel clashed.
Power screamed.
And above the roar of battle, one thing became clear to everyone still standing.
This bridge was no longer just stone and iron.
It was a line.
And neither side could afford to be the one that broke.
The fog didn't just move this time.
It folded.
The mist on the far side of the bridge collapsed inward, dragged toward a single point like air being sucked into a wound. The river below roared louder, the sound bending unnaturally as pressure built above the ravine.
Lyra felt it first.
"Everyone—" she started.
Too late.
The bridge shook violently as a massive sigil ignited beneath Ankalyon's remaining forces. Crimson lines burned into the stone, spreading fast, pulsing like veins.
A formation.
Not an attack.
A sacrifice.
Bran slammed his shield down harder than before, bracing himself as the air thickened to near immobility.
"They're channeling," he growled. "All of them."
Ken's chest tightened.
The vibration reacted violently.
Not curiosity this time.
Fear.
Ankalyon soldiers stepped willingly into the glowing sigil. One by one. Two by two. Their bodies stiffened as their powers were ripped out of them, torn loose and dragged into the center of the formation.
They screamed.
Then they burned.
A towering shape began to rise above the bridge, formed from compressed fire, stone, and wind twisted together. A colossal humanoid silhouette, barely contained, its surface cracking and reforming constantly.
A war construct.
Ankalyon's last card.
Maelis staggered back as shadows recoiled instinctively.
"That thing isn't alive," she said. "It's worse."
The construct opened what passed for a mouth.
The bridge screamed.
A blast of compressed force slammed forward, ripping chunks of stone from the structure and hurling them like cannon fire. Bran took the hit head-on.
His shield shattered.
Not fully.
But enough.
Bran slid backward for the first time since the battle began, boots carving deep trenches into the bridge as blood ran down his arm.
Ishren swore.
"That's new."
The construct raised one massive arm, gathering wind and fire into a spiraling mass dense enough to distort light.
Lyra turned to Ken instantly.
"Can you cut that?"
Ken stared at it.
The vibration inside him surged wildly, desperate, screaming to be unleashed.
He swallowed.
"Not like last time."
"Then don't," Lyra said. "Do it clean."
The construct fired.
The blast tore across the bridge, obliterating everything in its path. Stone vaporized. The air detonated.
Ken moved.
He stepped into the roar.
The vibration flowed, controlled, razor-thin, wrapping around his blade like a wire pulled taut to its breaking point.
Not Omicron Slash.
Something smaller.
Sharper.
Ken cut once.
The blast split.
Not destroyed.
Diverted.
The force tore past him on both sides, shredding the railing and gouging massive scars into the bridge, but leaving the center intact.
Ken dropped to one knee immediately, blood dripping from his nose.
Lyra was there in an instant, pulling him back.
"Enough," she said sharply. "You'll kill yourself."
The construct advanced.
Each step cracked the bridge further, threatening to collapse the entire span.
Ankalyon didn't care anymore.
If they couldn't have the bridge—
They would destroy it.
Maelis spread her arms wide.
Shadows surged forward, wrapping around the construct's legs, anchoring it in place. The darkness screamed as it burned, but it held.
For now.
Ishren raised both hands, lightning exploding outward in a violent storm that wrapped around the construct's upper body. Electricity crawled across its surface, destabilizing the energy flow.
Bran pushed himself upright, bloodied but grinning.
"One more hit," he said. "That's all I need."
Lyra looked at Ken.
Her expression was hard.
Focused.
"This is it," she said. "If we stop it, the bridge holds. If we don't—"
Ken forced himself back to his feet.
The vibration inside him was screaming now, no longer patient.
He tightened his grip.
"I know."
The construct reared back, gathering everything it had left.
Fire.
Wind.
Stone.
Sacrifice.
Ken closed his eyes.
Listened.
Not to the sound.
Not to the bridge.
To the thin line where everything broke.
He opened his eyes.
"Omicron Slash," he whispered.
And stepped forward.