The autumn wind over the civic plaza died away into suffocating, icy stillness as five distinct planar tears opened across the square.
Through each fracture stepped a towering abyssal hound of the imperial court, clad in segmented carapaces and radiating lethal core density.
These were not astral illusions or disposable projections, but the five committed retrieval officers whose true cores were pledged to the crossing.
Hajin stood in the center of the terrace, his six bronze bands humming with restrained power as his companions took their designated positions.
"Identify your targets and read their approach vectors," he commanded quietly, keeping his gaze locked on the advancing vanguard.
"They did not come to skirmish... they came to bundle our household into an imperial recovery parcel."
"The extraction protocol is designed to treat living souls like freight cargo," Cessy explained, adjusting the quiver at her hip.
