Lancelot rose.
His knees left the ground slowly, painfully, as if the act of standing required more strength than he had left. But he rose. His heart pounded in his chest a drumbeat, a war cry, a countdown.
Thump-thump. Thump-thump. Thump-thump.
Every sound on the battlefield sharpened. The clash of steel. The screams of dying men. The whisper of wind over blood-soaked sand. He heard everything, as if each sound was the only sound, as if the universe had narrowed to this single moment.
He walked toward Sir Gawain.
The great knight's corpse still stood frozen in death, held upright by the great sword planted in the ground. His smile remained, peaceful and eternal. Arrows covered his body like a grotesque decoration, each one a testament to his final stand.
Lancelot stopped before him.
He reached out a hand trembling, hesitant, broken and touched Gawain's face. The skin was cold. Already cold. Already gone.
"If this was a dream," Lancelot whispered, his voice cracking, "I would want to wake up."
His fingers traced the smile on Gawain's lips.
"But it's not."
Tears fell hot against the cold of Gawain's skin.
"You died because..." Lancelot's breath hitched. "Because I'm weak."
His hand clenched on Gawain's armor.
"I killed you."
The words hung in the air like poison.
"I'm the one who killed you. Your death it's my fault. My fault. "
His forehead pressed against Gawain's chest. Against the arrows. Against the stillness.
"I need power." The words were muffled, desperate. "I want to be powerful. What can I do for power? What can I give?"
For a single heartbeat, a vision flashed through his mind.
Excalibur.
The holy sword. The blade of kings. The weapon that could change things. If he had it if he had that power maybe Gawain would still be standing. Maybe Beloberis would still be alive. Maybe
He pulled back, looking at Gawain's smiling face.
"But you're dead now."
A laugh escaped him wet, broken, insane.
"You're dead, and I'm still here, and I'm weak, and I killed you, and"
He smiled.
Tears rolled down his cheeks, but his lips curved upward in something that was not joy. Not happiness. Something else.
The complex emotions that filled Lancelot's heart began to move.
Pain circled Sadness. Hate circled Grief. Happiness circled Anger. They circled each other like wolves, snapping and snarling, fighting for dominance. But none of them won. None of them could. Because they weren't meant to win.
They were meant to combine.
And from their union, something new was born.
Something that had always existed, in every human heart, waiting for the right moment to emerge.
Malice.
It started small a seed in the center of his chest, cold and dark and hungry. Then it grew. Spreading through his veins, his muscles, his bones. It filled the empty spaces where grief had been, where hope had been, where humanity had been.
It did not stay inside him.
The malice pulsed outward a wave of cold, choking intent that spread across the battlefield like ripples in a pond. It touched Sir Tristan first.
The hunter stumbled. His spear wavered mid-thrust. His eyes went wide as the feeling hit him a pressure, a presence, something vast and dark and hungry watching from the shadows. His opponents saw their chance and pressed forward, nearly overwhelming him.
It touched Sir Percival next.
He was mid-dance with the winged messenger, their blades a blur of motion. But when the malice hit, his rhythm broke. His footwork faltered. His spear came up a heartbeat too slow. The messenger's blade cut across his arm, drawing blood.
Both knights gasped for breath not from exertion, but from the weight of what they felt. It was like a great demon had awakened. Like something ancient and terrible had opened its eyes and was looking at them.
They couldn't understand it. Couldn't fight it. Could only feel it.
Lancelot's heart beat faster.
Thump-thump-thump-thump-thump.
The malice grew with each beat. With each emotion that fed it. With each tear that fell from his eyes.
Behind him, invisible, Darlington felt it too.
And Darlington was afraid.
His body his invisible, formless, godly body went cold. He couldn't move. Couldn't speak. Couldn't think. The malice wrapped around him like chains, like hands, like judgment.
How
His mind raced, stumbling over itself.
Yes. This is it.
A smile cracked his frozen face.
This is what it's supposed to be like.
He looked at Lancelot at the knight drowning in his own darkness and something twisted in his chest.
Let it devour you, he thought, and the thought was a prayer. Let it consume you completely. So that I can save you. So that I can truly become your god. Your savior. So that you will be welcomed in my arms.
His smile widened.
It was not a kind smile.
It was the smile of a devil.
This false god has lost himself, some small, sane part of his mind whispered. But the whisper was drowned by the hunger the need for Lancelot to fall, to break, to need him.
Darlington's own heart what passed for a heart in this form filled with malice. And with something else. Something worse.
False ego. Built upon his malice. Built upon his desperation.
He smiled down at Lancelot like a predator watching its prey stumble into a trap.
Lancelot bit down on his lip.
Hard.
Blood dripped down his chin hot, copper, real.
His eyes burned. Not with fire with something deeper. Something that turned the white of his eyes red.
The malice continued to grow. To swell. To fill every corner of his being until there was nothing left but malice.
And then
He opened his mouth.
Tears still poured down his face. His voice still cracked with grief. But the sound that emerged was not a sob. Not a scream. Not a cry for help.
It was a howl.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
The sound tore from his throat like something alive, something hungry. It echoed across the battlefield, bouncing off rocks and ruins, reaching every ear, every soul, every heart.
It was not a scream of pain.
It was not a cry of despair.
It was a prayer. The last prayer of a man who had nothing left to give. Who had lost everything. Who had become nothing.
And it was heard.
Across the desert, in his own section of the battlefield, Arthur cut down a Roman giant.
The creature fell with a crash that shook the ground, its blood pooling around Arthur's feet. Around him, twenty knights of the Round Table fought on, their blades flashing in the grey light. They were winning. Slowly, painfully, but winning.
Then the howl reached them.
Arthur froze.
His blade—Excalibur, the holy sword, the weapon of kings trembled in his grip. The light within it flickered, wavered, dimmed.
Arthur's face went pale.
"Lancelot," he whispered.
He felt it. The pain. The rage. The malice. It washed over him like a wave, cold and dark and endless. And beneath it all, he felt something else.
The voice of his oldest friend. Crying out in the darkness.
"What has happened to you?" Arthur breathed, his eyes searching the distant battlefield. "Lancelot... what has happened?"
Excalibur shook again. Even the holy sword even Excalibur felt the malice emanating from the greatest knight of Camelot.
Arthur gripped the hilt tighter, forcing the blade to still.
"Hold on," he murmured, though he knew Lancelot couldn't hear him. "Hold on, my friend. I'm coming."
He turned to his knights.
"Push forward!" he shouted. "Now! We end this, now!"
They obeyed, throwing themselves at the remaining Romans with renewed fury. But in Arthur's heart, a cold dread had taken root.
Something was wrong.
Something was very wrong.
Lancelot's mind was going blank.
The thoughts that had tortured him the memories, the grief, the guilt all of them began to fade. Not disappear, but recede, like waves pulling back from the shore. They were still there, somewhere, but they no longer mattered.
There was only the malice.
Only the darkness.
Only the hunger.
He stood before Gawain's corpse, tears still falling, but his eyes were empty now. Red. Gone.
No more memories.
No more thinking.
No more Lancelot.
Just a void. A plain black darkness where a man used to be.
And then
Aronde began to shake.
The blade, still gripped loosely in Lancelot's hand, vibrated. At first gently, then harder, faster, more desperately. It was as if the sword wanted to be free. As if it had been waiting for this moment.
It began to glow.
Not the silver light of its normal form. Not the red pulse of its curse. Something else. Something new.
Burning red. Deep, violent, angry red.
And from the blade, black steam began to rise.
It poured from the steel like smoke from a fire, thick and dark and alive. It coiled around Lancelot's hand, his wrist, his arm. It spread upward, covering his shoulder, his chest, his face.
But it didn't stop there.
The black steam began to form.
Shapes emerged from the darkness hands, reaching and grasping. Legs, bending and flexing. Heads, turning and looking. Mouths, opening and screaming.
Dozens of them. Hundreds. They clawed at the air, at each other, at Lancelot. They wrapped around him like a second skin, like armor, like a prison.
Lancelot stood at the center of it all, his red eyes staring at nothing, his tears still falling, his smile still frozen on his lips.
The black shapes moved around him like worshippers around their god.
Darlington stared.
His mouth hung open. His eyes were wide. His mind that brilliant, calculating, arrogant mind had gone completely blank.
What
He couldn't finish the thought.
What is this?
The black shapes continued to form, to move, to live. They surrounded Lancelot completely, a swirling mass of darkness and malice and power.
Aronde glowed brighter. The black steam poured faster. The shapes grew more defined, more real.
Darlington's breath caught.
Could it be
His heart what passed for a heart stopped.
The blade's fourth ability.
He had wondered. After seeing Connect, after witnessing Curse, after analyzing Hype he had wondered what the final ability could be. What power could be so terrible, so dangerous, that Lancelot had never used it. Never even mentioned it.
Now he knew.
This is it.
The black shapes continued to form, to grow, to become. And at their center, Lancelot stood motionless, his red eyes staring into nothing, his smile frozen on his lips, his tears still falling.