[Author's Note: I have changed the pairing of Cassian with another close-combat user and Sylvie with Lyra.]
The two students stumbled through the rubble-strewn streets, their breaths ragged. The boy with the longsword kept glancing over his shoulder, his grip white-knuckled around his weapon.
"Why the hell did we run into them this early?" he hissed to his partner, a girl clutching a short spear.
Before she could answer, the shadows beneath their feet twisted.
Dark tendrils lashed out like living things, coiling around their ankles and yanking hard. Both fighters crashed face-first into the cracked pavement, their weapons skittering out of reach.
"What the—?!"
A whisper of steel.
A red line flashed across their throats.
For a heartbeat, they lay there, stunned. Then their bodies dissolved into pixels, vanishing from the virtual battlefield.
Kyle slid his tachi back into its scabbard with a quiet click.
"Good work," Eleanora said beside him, her voice calm.
