Night fell normally over the Duchy of Douglas.
The mana-saturated clouds, as had already become customary, shimmered and rippled across the sky. The mana descending toward the earth continued creating rainbows before slowly fading away with the arrival of darkness.
The mages in the defensive towers, accustomed to watching the edges of the forest, detected an unnatural movement.
Then came the stampede.
"This is strange... it's behaving strangely," whispered an apprentice, his fingers trembling over the mana crystal.
"Sound the alarm..." another replied, watching as monsters began to emerge between the trees.
The city's shield activated immediately. Runes glowed across the walls.
That should have been enough.
While reinforcements arrived from other locations, the barrier could hold. The mana consumption was terrifying, but they had enough magic stones to keep the shield active for hours.
From the surrounding forests, members of the demonic cult guided the creatures.
Beings created through experiments and knowledge delivered by demons. Monsters raised with demonic mana.
From atop the walls, panic began as they witnessed the scene.
"Breaches to the east!"
"And to the north as well!"
"Three... four... six!" —the voices multiplied together with the alarm—. "There are too many!"
The commander of the guard, his cloak marked with mana symbols, activated the emergency protocol.
"Calamity-level threat. The entire city is now on maximum alert. Let the mana trumpets awaken the warriors and the tamers."
Or a version with a little more impact:
The commander of the guard, wrapped in a cloak marked with mana symbols, activated the emergency protocol.
"Calamity-level threat. The entire city is now on maximum alert. Let the mana trumpets awaken every warrior and every tamer."
In a hidden clearing deep within the forest, the leader of the demonic cult gave instructions.
"Wait until the infiltrators destroy the defenses. After that, guide the creatures toward the city."
The scene looked like a nightmare made real.
Creatures of all sizes and forms gathered in concentric circles, from lesser monsters to corrupted magical beasts.
During their breeding, their minds had been destroyed, leaving behind only empty shells. No instincts, fear, or will remained. Only obedience and an insatiable hunger for demonic mana.
Every step they took left incandescent marks across the ground, while dark and rotten mana emanated from their bodies.
The demonic leader raised his arm, and an ancient roar shook the forest.
"Listen," —his voice reverberated like breaking stone—. "The duchess is not alone, but her allies are divided. This is our opportunity. Lord Vordrak guides us. He himself will come to this place."
"The monster armies, scattered and hungry for mana, will be our spearhead," one of them added. "The intermediate cities will send messengers, but they will not arrive in time."
Vordrak, whose skin was marked with glowing runes, made a gesture with his hand.
"I have fed the beasts with my own mana. Their levels have increased exponentially. The humans who attempt to resist will be dragged into the beyond."
Inside the city, the foreigners who had arrived as simple merchants finally moved.
"It is time."
They left the inn and headed toward the center of the city, directly to the mayor's residence, where the core maintaining the barrier was located.
Inside the administrative hall of the Duchy, a vast and solemn space located in the heart of the capital, Sofia remained standing before a map spread across the table, pointing at routes, cities, and outposts.
Around her, garrison chiefs, strategist mages, and beast tamers discussed every detail of the situation.
"Reports from the scouts continue arriving from the peripheral cities," said a captain. "Monster activity has decreased in the nearby forests. Herbivores with high mana levels are fleeing in stampedes toward the interior of the kingdom, and the predators are following them."
The hall doors burst open as a soldier entered in alarm.
"My lady! The city of Norvind has activated the alarm! Red-level emergency!"
Sofia frowned, calculating times and distances.
Each city was located between thirty and forty kilometers from the capital, a distance that normally allowed messengers and patrols to move quickly. But in a situation like this, any delay could prove fatal.
"Reinforce the patrols on the roads between cities," she ordered. "Every scout is to deliver a detailed report and return immediately. Beast riders must be prepared to escort any convoy and respond to any attack."
A brief silence followed as everyone processed the magnitude of the problem.
"We must do everything possible to contain it," one of the mages said. "But if this reaches the main city... it will be a disaster."
Sofia raised her gaze, cold and resolute.
"Prepare the magical beast riders immediately. We depart for Norvind."
The Duchy of Douglas stretched out like a diamond: the capital at the center and, around it, six strategic bastions that watched over key routes and protected villages, roads, and nearby ecosystems.
Each bastion was a core of defensive power.
Mana barriers capable of repelling both physical projectiles and magical attacks.
Area defensive spells capable of trapping and incinerating wild beasts before they reached the walls.
Anti-mana shields designed to block any attempt to saturate the area with external energy.
Magical archery towers whose incandescent projectiles could pierce level fifty creatures with ease.
And anti-monster runes capable of disintegrating beasts corrupted by demonic mana.
Under normal circumstances, any horde would have been annihilated long before reaching the walls. A scout warning would have ended only in a controlled deployment of fire and destruction, with few human casualties.
But this time...
They could not afford to be careless.
In the city of Norvind, the mayor's residence burned in flames.
The attackers had been contained, and their bodies remained piled upon the blackened ground.
Ulric Douglas, a member of a distant branch of the ducal family and current mayor of the city, observed the corpses with a grim expression.
All of them bore the mark of the demonic cult.
Although the contaminated mana emanating from their bodies already made the truth obvious, that removed any remaining doubt.
The demonic cult had destroyed the city's defensive core.
Ulric felt a chill run down his spine.
Had it only been a coincidence... or was this part of something far greater?
Cold sweat began running down his neck.
"Inform the duchess immediately!" he ordered. "The demonic cult is attacking us!"
At the same time, atop the walls, soldiers began repelling the first waves of monsters.
Demonic energy spread across the entire wall, saturating the air and the earth.
The soldiers felt suffocated, but they could not abandon their positions.
Above the walls, mages cast spells without rest. Explosions of fire and bursts of mana destroyed dozens of creatures, but those beasts were too many.
Those that died were immediately trampled by the others.
The mages watched in alarm as those creatures seemed completely unfamiliar with fear.
Or a more intense version:
Demonic energy spread through the walls, contaminating the air and the earth.
The soldiers could barely breathe, but no one abandoned their post.
Above the walls, the mages unleashed spells incessantly. Fire consumed monsters by the dozens, yet the horde continued advancing.
The fallen creatures were crushed beneath the stampede of those behind them.
And worst of all...
Those beasts knew no fear.
The herbivores, creatures that once fled at the slightest sound, now slammed themselves against the walls with empty eyes and an aggression impossible for beasts of their level.
The carnivores, which normally would have hunted the herbivore monsters, mixed among the horde, prowling and waiting for the right moment to attack.
All of those creatures had grown under demonic corruption.
Their muscles were tense as steel, their senses capable of detecting mana from kilometers away, and their jaws could shatter enchanted armor.
The most powerful beasts even distorted the environment itself.
Around them, mana stirred like an invisible storm. Their fangs and claws looked carved from dark mineral, and every roar made the Duchy's magical barriers tremble.
And then there were the elites.
Waiting farther back.
Monsters capable of bringing down entire buildings, waiting for the moment when the chaos reached its peak.
The Duchy still possessed a terrifying military force: thousands of Lord- and Magister-rank soldiers, trained to fight with steel and mana.
But when the hordes began advancing —thousands of equally powerful, corrupted, and organized creatures— even that force no longer seemed sufficient.
And then it happened.
The wall gave way.
An entire section collapsed amid explosions of stone and mana.
The mages standing atop it fell together with the rubble. Some died upon impact with the ground. Others were devoured by the stampede before they could even rise.
The horde entered the city.
Ulric and the commanders led the desperate defense of the streets, fighting as best they could while waiting for only one thing:
For reinforcements to arrive before Norvind disappeared.