Slam.The sound cracked like thunder through the dim war chamber, echoing off stone and steel.
Diyana's fist slammed down on the ancient table that formed the center of the underground council command bunker. Dust trembled loose from the ceiling. The glow-crystals embedded in the stone flickered as if startled.
Her breath came in sharp, shallow bursts, every inhale filled with rage, every exhale a silent scream. Her claws had gouged deep into the rock beneath her gauntlets, and still—still—it wasn't enough.
A hand touched her shoulder—gentle, but firm.
"Don't waste your energy," said Kergen, his voice low, the weariness in it hiding behind steel resolve. "You'll need it... when the fighting starts again."
That was all he said.
But the silence that followed was heavier than any words.
Roth Mayers, seated to the side, couldn't help but think how morbid it had all become. A council bunker once meant for negotiation and unity, now serving as a last bastion, a tomb-in-waiting.
Then, without warning, a surge of light—and Uruua appeared.
She didn't speak immediately.
Her face—usually unreadable, composed with the discipline of centuries—was now drawn and grim. Her robes, once white and silver, bore the smudges of teleportation burns and magical backlash. And her eyes—gods, her eyes were hollow.
"I've managed to seal off the northeastern sector of Has," she said finally. Her voice was soft, but it landed like a hammer.
"A barrier—divine in nature. It will hold for now."
She paused. The next words came out brittle.
"The rest..."
She looked up, meeting Diyana's burning eyes.
"Gone."
A breath caught in Kergen's throat.
"North, overrun by the demons. They came through the cracks like worms in a rotted corpse, feeding, multiplying. I tried to stop them—I swear to the gods—I tried."
"South," she continued, her voice tightening, "has fallen to that thing—that being we still don't understand. The one with the golden light and endless voice. I felt it... felt it reaching for everything. Faith, memory, reality itself."
"And the central sectors..." she stopped, jaw trembling.
"They're gone too. Not taken... destroyed—by Martimus."
Diyana's body stiffened.
Uruua finished it quietly.
"He broke. We don't know why. But the self proclaimed magic king of Has... the man they cheered for only two days ago... is now carving through what's left of Has like a god of wrath given form."
Silence.
For a moment, no one could breathe. It was as if time had paused to grieve.
Then—Diyana's claws retracted. Her hand trembled as she pulled it back from the ruined table. Her eyes burned, not with anger alone, but shame.
Her voice cracked for the first time in years.
"I was supposed to protect this land..." she whispered. "I was born for this. Raised for this. Trained and forged like steel in the flame..."
"And I've failed."
The word—failed—tasted like ash on her tongue.
"My people are scattered. My city burns. My soldiers—my brothers—are dying. My father... I don't even know if he's alive. What was it all for?"
Her legs buckled, and Kergen caught her.
She didn't resist.
In the shadows, Roth muttered under his breath, eyes locked on the table's center map, now nearly irrelevant with most of Has swallowed by chaos.
"This wasn't a war," he said, almost to himself. "It was a cleansing. Something... someone... wanted Has wiped off the map."
_____________________________________
Two days ago...
The sun was beginning to set over Has, painting the sky in burning hues of orange and crimson. The festival continued in full swing. Laughter echoed, music played, and the anticipation for the tournament's final rounds filled the air with electricity.
But Adam couldn't breathe.
He was running.
Hard.
Each footfall slammed against the cobblestones like thunder, echoing louder in his ears than the festival fanfare behind him.
His breath came in short, erratic bursts—gasp, gasp, gasp—like his body had forgotten how to inhale. His heart raced not just with adrenaline, but with terror, pure and formless.
He didn't know why.
That was the worst part.
There was something—something terrible, just out of reach in his memory. Like the ghost of a dream you know mattered, but no longer remember. His mind was blank, but his soul screamed.
Run.
Move.
NOW.
"Adam?!"
A voice—sharp and concerned.
Ferosa.
She had just stepped away from the girls, leaving them laughing by the vendor stalls, to check on him. She hadn't expected to find him like this—wide-eyed, pale, trembling like an animal sensing an earthquake before it strikes.
"What's wrong? Why are you running?!" she asked, placing a hand on his shoulder as she kept pace beside him.
But Adam didn't answer.
He couldn't.
Words felt foreign. His tongue was heavy. His mind—static.
There was nothing left in his head, but one thought, looping, clawing at the walls of his skull:
"Something's wrong. Something's wrong. Something's very, very wrong."
He didn't know what had been taken from him—but he could feel the shape of its absence.
A cold, hollow crater in his mind.
His eyes glazed over the crowds, the lights, the laughter.
They meant nothing.
All that mattered now was the arena—the heart of the city, where the tournament's final days would be held. His legs pushed harder.
Ferosa tried again, more softly this time.
"Adam... are you—are you sensing something?"
"I don't know," he gasped. "I don't know what I'm feeling. It's like something just... vanished. Something critical. And now every part of me is screaming that I need to get there—before it's too late."
Ferosa hesitated. She had seen mages with instinctive senses before—those who could feel disturbances in the leylines, magical shifts in fate—but this wasn't that.
This was different.
Primal.
It was as if Adam's entire being was echoing the aftermath of something... cosmic.
Something that left behind no evidence, no trace—only a void of pure fear.
She glanced up at him—this strange, secretive boy who claimed to be human but who carried the presence of something far older, far more broken.
She nodded.
"I'll go with you."
And together, they ran.
Toward the arena.
____________________
Martimus leaned over the edge of the viewing balcony, eyes glittering with childish delight as he watched the combatant below weave through strikes like a dancer in a dream. The crowd roared as Danmel, the current favorite to win the Tournament of Kan, parried yet another blow with ease—no, not just ease, but with an eerie anticipation, like he had read the script of the fight before the curtain ever rose.
"Man… this Danmel guy seems pretty strong!" Martimus shouted over the cheers, his voice booming with excitement.
He turned, grinning wide, expecting to see Uruua rolling her eyes at him like she always did whenever he got too into things.
But—"...What do you think, Uruua?!"
No response.
"...Uruua?"
He turned around fully now.
"Uruua?! Uruuaaaaaa?!"
The seat beside him was empty. Not just empty, but cold—like it had been that way for a while.
He blinked.
"Did she seriously ditch me again?" he mumbled, throwing his arms up dramatically. "Did she get bored of the only exciting thing going on right now?! Bah!"
He pouted—genuinely, like a disappointed puppy denied a treat.
"Bet she's off doing something way less fun. Probably more meetings. Or magical paperwork. Bleh."
He gave Danmel another glance—saw the man land a flawless counterstrike without blinking.
"Oooh, but that was cool though," Martimus muttered, quickly distracted. He leaned forward again, grinning, already forgetting Uruua's absence as his focus returned to the fight.
Unaware that far away, in a sealed chamber where divinity and disaster were beginning to clash, Uruua was standing at the center of a gathering storm...
____________________
The air crackled with a pressure that bent reality itself.
Uruua stepped into the subterranean chamber, her heels clicking softly against the ancient obsidian floor carved with infernal runes, all pulsating with red light like a heartbeat. The scent of ash and sanctified blood stained the air—a demonic ritual had taken place here, one so potent it warped the very rules of existence.
In the center of the ritual site stood a being not wholly of hell, nor wholly of heaven—an angel, but twisted, its wings metallic and unnaturally jointed like blades, its halo fractured into jagged, orbiting shards of crystalized light. Its form was beautiful, yet wrong. Sacred, yet sickening.
Uruua's expression was unreadable, but her voice cut through the oppressive energy like a sharpened blade.
"What is this? What deity dares trespass into the mortal realm?""Did your pact with the Earth Elemental mean nothing? Or perhaps her absence gave you… courage?"
The angel's head tilted, unblinking. And then—
A bolt of lightning, no—something faster, purer, a ray of divine punishment—snapped toward her at light-speed.
For anyone else, it would have meant instant death.
But Uruua was not "anyone."
The moment the bolt entered her domain, time itself froze.
The energy hung in midair like a jewel suspended in amber, sparking violently but unmoving, its brilliance casting deep shadows over her now calmly raised hand.
She sighed, annoyed.
"Tch… I thought I could talk this out."
In a breath, she vanished.
One blink later—she was above ground, standing midair with no visible support, suspended like a goddess of war beneath the churning clouds. Wind tore at her cloak, but her eyes were calm. Focused.
She raised her hand slowly, then made a clawing motion—and swiped.
The air screamed as space itself shredded.
Within a nanosecond, the underground chamber, the surrounding foundation, the air, the stone, the angel—all of it—was torn asunder. Atoms peeled apart. Dust ceased to be dust. The very idea of the angel was erased from the world.
But then—
A heartbeat.
A soundless note of divinity.
And from the motes of obliterated light, it reformed—limb by limb, wing by wing, its halo fusing into a perfect ring once more. But its face had changed.
It was smiling now.
The angel hovered above the shattered pit, fully restored, its voice echoing with dozens of others, overlapping and terrible.
"You bring force to a war of belief.I am made not from power—but from purpose.You cannot kill what was ordained."
Uruua's eyes narrowed, the temperature around her dropping.
"Then I'll unwrite your purpose. Let's see what happens when a god fights something older than faith."
And with that, the sky split open.
the dragon uruua vs the newly borne angle Ferdinand
one might think this battle is close...one would be wrong
______________________
Within the stone halls of the Greyhound Estate, a place long untouched by time yet not forgotten by war, the air grew thick. Thick with memory… with violence. And at its heart stood Alder—once the Hammer of Has, now a quiet beast in twilight.
He hadn't truly slept in years.
Just listened. Watched. Waited.
Now, his time had come again.
"Father, it's happened," said the voice—his son, armor barely on, breath still catching from the sprint. "Sister Diyana has sent the order. All forces ready for battle."
The words echoed in the hall like a funeral bell.
Alder didn't speak. He merely opened his eyes.
They were yellow—not with age, but with instinct. They did not blink. They did not waver. They saw.
He stood, his massive frame cracking under years of stillness. A mountain reborn.
By the door, rested the ancient weapon—Vyrmhold, a spiked mace forged in demon blood and god-forged metal. He lifted it as one would lift a cane. To him, it was nothing. To others, it was the end of stories.
The mansion doors swung open before he even touched them.
And Alder breathed.
The scent of demons. Foul. Familiar. Metallic and wet. It coated the wind like a poison he'd swallowed before—and spit out alongside broken bones.
He didn't ask where the battle was. He didn't need maps.
He could smell the war.
With no more words, Alder stepped forward—then jogged—then dropped to all fours, beast-mode ignited. With a snarl that could shatter nerves and shake gods, he launched forward—
And broke the sound barrier.
The ground cracked beneath his claws. Trees blurred into streaks of green. Mountains watched as he passed—too proud to bow, too wise to stop him.
Behind him, his children followed.
Not just warriors—but legends in the making. Some on two legs, some on four, some half-shifted, all marked by heritage and hunger. The Greyhounds ran again, not as nobles, not as council members—
But as the protectors of Has.
Their bloodline was never meant to rule.
It was meant to fight.
_____________
The cave pulsed with warmth and whispering wings, a place where moonlight dared not enter, and voices were often lost in the sound of talons scraping stone. The Batfolk were ancient—pale, cunning, and cloaked in shadow. Some claimed they were the first true monsters of Has before "civilization" grew teeth of its own.
And there stood Kergen, unflinching. A living statue in a den of creatures who considered most mortals snacks.
"Master Kergen~how delightful of you to grace us with your presence..." purred the Bat Matriarch, draped in leather and blood-gold jewelry. Her voice dripped like honey off a knife.
But Kergen—stone-faced, winged, glowing ever so faintly from the runes embedded in his arms—offered nothing in reply.
Instead, his eyes swept the chamber. The Batfolk shifted. A dozen pairs of glinting crimson eyes stared from the walls and ceilings, hanging like gargoyles. But no tension bled from him. No fear. Only resolve.
Then he finally spoke—voice as calm as a still pond hiding a leviathan beneath.
"It's time.""You're hungry, aren't you?""Well… there so happens to be a buffet of demonic cuisine not far from here."
He turned his back to them.
"It will be night soon. Strike if you want. If not… do not get in my way."
And with that, he walked away. Not with arrogance—but with certainty. One didn't beg bats. One offered blood or stayed out of the sky.
He reached his protégé, who was waiting just outside the shadow of the cave. Kergen grabbed him without pause, wings unfurling wide—feathered and steel-threaded—and took flight, the winds howling behind them as they vanished into twilight.
"M-Master Kergen…" the protégé spoke, voice wind-shaken, "was that really the right thing to do? Aren't they—you know—violent? Unpredictable?"
Kergen didn't glance at him.
"Doesn't matter."
His voice cut clean through the rushing air.
"Lar… in the future, if you take my place, you'll need to command the avian races. If you can't earn their respect, earn their fear. Understand?"
He banked left, the horizon bleeding crimson.
"Now go. Call the hawks, the ravens, and the crows. Wake the sky-born and the corpse-feeders. This war will show Has's enemies why it is the oldest nation—"
His eyes narrowed, burning like sunfire against the dusk.
"—and why it's still alive."
_____________________
The ink bled onto parchment like dried blood soaking back into flesh.
Roth Mayer stood, back straight and cloaked in tailored black, his gloved fingers poised with careful intent as he signed the document. The Adventurer's Guild Manager—a portly man with clever eyes and a sly smile—clasped his hands together as if a festival had been approved.
"Mr. Roth... the Guild accepts your offer."
His tone was slick, transactional, but not without a touch of respect. "For every demon an adventurer kills, they'll receive two copper. A fair price, I'd say—especially when multiplied by thousands of infernal corpses."
He chuckled, folding his hands over the parchment as if it were a divine covenant.
"I'm sure our dear adventurers will be most enthusiastic. Blood always sells."
Roth gave a tired sigh—not of weakness, but of someone already calculating the next ten moves.
The guild manager prattled on, but Roth only half-listened. He was already considering the logistics—how to redirect the eager, fame-hungry adventurers toward the most dangerous fronts without tipping them off. How to make their deaths meaningful, if inevitable.
This war couldn't be won with strength alone. It needed paper, promises, and pieces moving in silence.
The manager bowed lightly.
"Please, if you need anything else, you need only ask…"
Roth nodded, folding the signed document neatly into his coat. His voice, when it came, was soft and sharp as a knife beneath silk.
"I will. But for now, inform your handlers to prioritize distribution to all branches—make it sound lucrative, righteous, heroic."
He turned to leave, coat trailing like a shadow.
"If Has is to survive this, it will be because we planned the war before the first trumpet ever sounded."
_____________
Hertha stood at the center of the supply room, her expression a mixture of relief and tension as the final crates of food were stacked in the corner. Her hands, though well-manicured and soft, trembled slightly as she adjusted her glasses. Her mind raced with calculations—how many meals per day, how much for children, for the elderly... could they stretch it further?
She glanced at the assistant who had just delivered the report. He was out of breath, his uniform caked in dust from the transport. He wasn't used to this kind of work. But this wasn't a time for delicacy. This was the war.
"Madam Hertha... that's the last of the supplies. This should be able to feed at least all of Has for a year... maybe more if rationed."
Hertha nodded quietly, though in her mind, she was calculating the next step. Rations. That word, alone, weighed heavily on her heart.
She had always believed herself to be a caretaker, a nurturer of lives—spending her time with her gardens, making sure people were well-fed, tending to the finer details of Has' nutritional needs. But now, as she stood at the helm of an operation that could determine whether or not her people starved, the weight of it all pressed down on her.
The Committee Building was a fortress of knowledge, a hub for the most brilliant minds in the land—but even this vast structure, as vast as it was, wasn't designed for a siege of this magnitude. Thanks to Ms. Uruua's magical prowess, the building had been made capable of housing millions—miraculously amplified by enchantments to defy the laws of space—but no one knew how long they could last.
Hertha had a simple task compared to those on the front lines or strategizing the war. She wasn't called to fight, but to sustain.
"You've done well," she said to the assistant, offering him a thin, tired smile. "But remember, we'll need a team to oversee the distribution—proper rationing can make or break us. Every scrap counts."
The assistant nodded quickly. "Of course, madam. The list of volunteers is already being organized."
Hertha turned to the supplies, her eyes scanning the vast amount of stored food. The wagons had barely fit through the doors, and now they stretched out in rows, crates of grain, salted meats, dried vegetables, and fresh fruit that had been stored in enchanted chambers to last far beyond the expected term.
Her fingers lightly brushed the edges of the crates. "Let's hope it doesn't come to that." She whispered softly, the weight of those words sitting heavily in her chest.
________________________
Sara's chambers, once lavish and dripping with allure, were now a twisted mockery of their intended purpose. The air was thick with tension, electric and charged, as Wrath stormed through the shattered remains of the wall, his armor clinking with a fury that matched the fire burning inside him.
"SARA!!!" His voice bellowed, raw with rage, the very foundation of the room trembling under the force of his fury.
She stood there, unmoving, a vision of seduction and sin. Her blood-red lipstick had already begun to melt away, her smile as wicked as ever. She was dressed in the attire of a demoness who knew the power of temptation, but there was no hint of fear in her expression. Only anticipation.
"Barry!" Sara's voice, silk and sweetness, pierced the tension. She almost purred his name, a delicate, deliberate slow-motion. "Barry is dead... I killed him."
Wrath's eyes, coiling like the very flames that burned within his body, blazed with fury. His gauntlet-clad fists clenched, his gaze narrowing with utter disdain for the woman before him.
"Enough, Sara." His voice, thick with heat, rumbled like an erupting volcano. "Your little invasion... has gone too far. You've broken too many rules. The peace treaty is over. The thousand-year demon war... has officially been reignited."
The words hung heavy in the air, crackling with tension. As he spoke, the temperature in the room began to rise, the ground beneath them glowing with the molten fury of his power. He raised his spear—its fiery edge casting long, shadowed reflections on the walls—and hurled it at her with a force that could cleave mountains.
But Sara—Sara, that demon of lust—didn't flinch.
She smiled, a wicked, dangerous smile, her crimson lips stretching in amusement as the spear sped toward her. She didn't even bother to move, instead leaning into the strike, her chest absorbing the blow without a sound. Her eyes were alight with something dark and hungry.
Sara laughed. A soft, haunting sound that echoed through the chamber, bouncing off the walls like the chilling whisper of a shadowed nightmare.
"You're so predictable, Wrath." Her voice was sweet, almost loving in its mockery. "Did you really think that would stop me?"
The spear lodged into her chest, but there was no blood, no scream—just that damnable laugh, a laugh of someone who had already won.
She tilted her head, her eyes dancing with a cold, calculating pleasure as she reached out, pulling the spear from her chest with the ease of a lover discarding a trinket. She threw it aside, as if it were nothing more than a passing annoyance.
"This is just the beginning, Wrath." She stepped closer, the air around her shimmering with an unsettling energy. "You think this war matters to me? I've already claimed my victory. You'll see soon enough."
Wrath's eyes flickered with a molten rage, his spear now in her hand, forgotten. His flame-like body burned hotter, the very temperature of the room threatening to ignite the fabric of reality itself.
"Then let's finish this, once and for all."
But Sara wasn't done.
She reached out, brushing her fingers lightly against his flaming armor, a teasing caress that should have burned her to the bone. Yet, she seemed unaffected, unbothered by the sheer heat radiating from him.
Her voice softened, dripping with desire and mockery. "Oh, Wrath... you think this is about the war? No, no, darling. This is about us. This is about our dance."
________________________
Greed stood at the center of the chaos unfolding around him, his hands clasped behind his back in a posture of command. His eyes, sharp and calculating, scanned the room where the rest of his followers worked with a frenzy, preparing the final stages of his grand design. The air was thick with anticipation, the hum of magic and power swirling like a storm about to break.
"It has begun..." Greed's voice was calm, yet every word carried the weight of inevitability. "All parties are where we want them to be. Project Eden has launched successfully."
His smile spread, slow and deliberate, a predator tasting the air before the kill. It was a smile that knew it had already won, that saw the pieces falling into place like a carefully orchestrated symphony.
The room around him buzzed with activity, but Greed did not flinch. He watched as his loyal followers—his vessels of power—moved quickly, expertly, orchestrating the final steps of the ritual. Each movement was calculated, each action precise. The air itself seemed to crackle with the weight of forbidden magic, as the Project Eden began to bloom.
"Once this is done... I will be a god." His words were a promise, a declaration that resonated with finality. His eyes glimmered with an intense fire, not of warmth, but of pure, insatiable hunger. Greed was not just seeking power; he was going to become it, to transcend the limits of mortal existence and rise above all, unchallenged, supreme. The world would bend to him, worship at his feet, and all the others—those foolish enough to stand in his way—would be crushed beneath the weight of his ascension.
He stepped forward, his presence alone demanding the attention of every person in the room. His followers paused in their work, their heads bowing slightly in reverence as they awaited his next command.
The ritual was nearly complete. The gates to Eden had opened. The world outside, teetering on the brink of destruction, had been drawn into his grasp. The demons, the gods, and the mortals—everything, everyone—would soon come to recognize his power, his reign.
And the moment that final seal was placed, and Eden's perfect creation took form, Greed would be the only god left in this world. There would be no others. He would have everything.
The pieces, all of them, had been set into motion long ago. Every war, every conflict, every alliance had been a part of his master plan. Every betrayal was simply a stepping stone to his victory.
As the final preparations began, Greed's smile deepened. "Soon... soon I will have everything. There will be no more need for compromise. No more need for cooperation." His voice dropped to a dangerous whisper. "Only domination."