The air in Oakhaven didn't smell like spring anymore. It smelled of ozone, scorched earth, and the metallic tang of blood.
As the ground beneath the village square buckled, a G-Class Earth-Eater—a titan of jagged stone and ancient malice—erupted from the soil. Its emergence sent a shockwave that leveled the neighboring houses like dry parchment. Dust and the screams of dying neighbors filled the air, thick and choking.
"Sarah! Take the children!" Adrian roared, his voice straining against the cacophony of the monsters above.
He didn't wait for an answer. He leapt.
Matthew watched, paralyzed, as his father moved with a speed he had never shown before. Adrian struck the Earth-Eater's granite hide, his blade carving a glowing fissure into the beast. But for every strike Adrian landed, ten more monsters descended. Three Sky-Rending Wyverns dived simultaneously, their talons raking the earth where Adrian landed.
"Matthew! Emily! Into the cellar, now!" Sarah's voice was shrill with a desperation Matthew had never heard. She grabbed them both, her strength surprising as she shoved them toward the heavy oak trapdoor.
"Mom, Dad is—"
"Your father is doing his job!" she snapped, her eyes brimming with tears. "Now do yours! Protect your sister!"
They were halfway down the stone steps when the sky turned a bruised, sickly purple. One of the S-Class Behemoths—the massive, dark shape drifting above the clouds—opened a central, glowing orifice. A beam of pure, concentrated energy lanced downward, targeting the highest concentration of resistance in the village.
It was targeting Adrian.
"ADRIAN!" Sarah screamed.
She didn't run for the cellar. She ran toward him.
Matthew watched from the shadows of the doorway as his mother reached into her tunic and pulled out a small, pulsing sapphire pendant. She smashed it against the ground. A shimmering blue barrier erupted around the cottage and the patch of mud where Adrian stood, gasping for air.
"Sarah, no! That was your life-force anchor!" Adrian cried out, his sword arm trembling.
The Behemoth's beam hit the barrier. The sound was like a thousand glass bells shattering at once. The blue dome held for a heartbeat, then two—and then it splintered.
The explosion was blinding.
Matthew was thrown backward into the cellar, his head slamming against the stone. Darkness encroached on the edges of his vision, but he forced his eyes open. Through the settling soot, he saw them through the gaps in the floorboards above.
His mother was on her knees, her body frail and the light gone from her eyes. His father was draped over her, his back a ruin of scorched armor and raw flesh, still clutching the hilt of his sword. He had used his own body as the final shield for the woman he loved and the cellar where his children hid.
Adrian looked back one last time. His gaze found Matthew's in the dark. He didn't have the strength to speak, but his eyes pleaded for one thing: Live.
Then, the Earth-Eater's massive stone limb descended, crushing the cottage into a tomb of splinters and dust.
Hours passed. Or perhaps it was days.
Matthew lay in the suffocating dark of the collapsed cellar, his arms wrapped tightly around a sobbing, hysterical Emily. The air was thin, smelling of sulfur. Above them, the heavy thuds of monster footsteps eventually faded into a terrifying, hollow silence.
"Matt... I'm scared," Emily whispered, her voice hoarse from crying. "It's too quiet."
Matthew couldn't answer. His throat was constricted by a grief so sharp it felt like he'd swallowed shards of glass. He was the son of a man who had tried to hide his strength, and now, he was the son of a ghost.
Suddenly, the debris shifted. A beam of natural light—weak and grey—pierced the gloom.
"Survivors! Over here!" a booming voice commanded.
Heavy gauntlets tore away the broken beams of the cellar door. Matthew shielded Emily's eyes as they were lifted out of the hole by men in gleaming silver plate. These weren't the ragged local Knights of Oakhaven. These were the Royal Sun-Guard, the elite army of the Crown.
But as Matthew stood on the surface, his knees buckled.
Oakhaven was gone.
The market, the swordsmanship school he had dreamed of joining, the stalls where Silas had mocked him—everything was leveled. Ash fell like snow over a landscape of craters. In the distance, the S-Class swarm was a receding cloud on the horizon, moving toward the capital.
"Any others?" a Captain asked, his cape stained with monster ichor.
"None, sir," a soldier replied, looking at the crushed remains of Matthew's home. "Just the boy and the girl. Everyone else... there isn't enough left to bury."
The Captain walked over to Matthew. He looked at the boy's bloodied hands and the hollow look in his eyes.
"You're Matthew, son of Adrian?" the Captain asked.
Matthew didn't look at him. He was staring at a piece of his mother's blue dress fluttering in the wind. "They're dead. They died for nothing."
"They died so you could breathe," the Captain said, his voice surprisingly soft. He placed a heavy hand on Matthew's shoulder. "The King has ordered all survivors of the S-Class Descent to be brought to the Citadel. You have nowhere else to go, boy."
Matthew looked at the line of armored carriages waiting on the road. He looked at Emily, who was clutching his hand so hard her knuckles were white. He looked at his own trembling hands—the hands of the "weak" child everyone had mocked.
"I'm coming," Matthew said, his voice devoid of the warmth it once had.
As the Royal Army led them away from the ruins of their lives, Matthew didn't look back. He only saw the path ahead—a path that led to the heart of the kingdom, where he would either find a way to become the strength his father wanted him to have, or die trying.