The barrage was merciless, dozens of violet lances, each one forged with seventh-circle malice, screamed down in a coordinated storm. They punched through my already broken body. One tore straight through my side and out the back, ripping flesh. The pain was white-hot, blinding. I roared, but it came out wet and broken.
They were tag-teaming me with the seamless perfection of warriors who had fought together for years. The man was already charging again while I lay gasping in the crater, his next punch glowing with seventh-circle destructive force, aimed to pulp my skull. Time fractured.
I tried to roll, but my body betrayed me, too slow, too damaged. Sahara exploded in from the right with a thunderous war cry, her massive axe raised high. The heavy blade whistled through the air and met the enemy's fist in a cataclysmic clash. Sparks and shattered runes detonated outward.
Her deflection saved my life by inches, redirecting the punch into the earth beside me and carving a massive trench. But she wasn't strong enough; the warrior's superior power smashed through her guard. His follow-up strike caught her axe and sent her staggering back, blood already leaking from her mouth.
''Stay out of this, girl!'' he bellowed.
The mage redirected her barrage toward Sahara, forcing her to dodge desperately while still trying to shield me. ''Prince Arthur!'' She shouted, voice strained as she planted herself between them and me.
She swung her massive axe in wide, powerful arcs, buying precious seconds, but each block visibly rattled her. A glancing seventh circle punch from the warrior caught her shoulder, spinning her around. She refused to fall, roaring as she brought it down in a heavy overhead strike that the man sidestepped before driving a brutal knee into her midsection.
Sahara was sent flying across the battlefield. I forced myself up, claws extended, blood pouring from a dozen mortal wounds. The wild thing inside me was screaming, but my body was failing. The warrior grabbed me by the throat before I could close the distance, lifting me off the ground.
His grip crushed my windpipe, then he started beating me, a fist to the face cracked my jaw. An elbow to the ribs drove shards of bone into my lungs. A knee to the gut nearly folded me in half. He slammed me down into the corpse pile repeatedly, each impact worsening the damage.
The mage added to it, sending lances that pierced my limbs and pinned me to the ground like a specimen. The beast inside me thrashed wildly, but for the first time, it felt distant. Sahara refused to yield; she charged back in, axe swinging with everything she had, landing a blow across the warrior's back that actually drew blood through his armour.
''Get away from him!'' she screamed, positioning herself over me as I tried to rise again.
My Orc general took another punishing hit meant for me, her body jerking violently as a violet lance scorched across her side. But that was when I heard something, the others were coming. I could hear them now, distant at first, then closer. Selene's voice cut through the chaos.
Garrick was shouting orders. Evangeline's magic flared bright in the distance as they rushed toward us. The reinforcements were coming. But the two seventh-circle demons weren't done. The warrior raised his fist for what looked like a finishing blow while the mage prepared another lethal barrage.
Both ignored the approaching threats in their single-minded need to end me, who had destroyed their horde. The world narrowed to blood, pain, and the desperate swing of Sahara's axe as she stood over me, refusing to let them finish it. Then they arrived, Selene came first, a streak of silver and steel.
Her longsword flashed in a perfect rising arc, intercepting the warrior's attack with a ringing clash that sent shockwaves through the corpse piles. The impact forced the seventh circle brute back a half-step, his knuckles splitting open against her blade. She planted herself between him and me, blade held in a high guard, blood already streaking her armour from earlier fighting.
''Not another step toward my prince,'' she snarled.
Garrick was right behind her. He charged straight for Sahara, shield raised and sword flashing as he deflected a stray violet lance meant for her back. ''I've got you!'' he shouted, positioning himself at her side.
He took the brunt of the warrior's follow-up swing on his shield, the wood and steel groaning under seventh circle force, but he held, buying Sahara room to breathe and reposition her massive axe. Evangeline crested the ridge of bodies like a storm of light. Her magic shield bloomed around her in a radiant dome as she began duelling the mage directly.
Glowing missiles of pure force erupted from her hands, streaking toward the sorceress in rapid succession. The mage countered with her own barrage, violet against gold, the colliding spells exploding in mid-air with deafening cracks. For a moment, hope flared in my chest despite the agony.
But it wasn't enough. The warrior laughed, a deep, mocking sound, and pressed Selene harder. His blows came faster than she could fully parry, each one heavy enough to drive her back inch by inch. One punch glanced off her sword and caught her shoulder, spinning her halfway around.
She recovered with a vicious thrust that drew blood from his side, but he shrugged it off like a scratch. Garrick was faring no better defending Sahara. The warrior's raw power overwhelmed their combined defence. A sweeping backhand sent the old man staggering, blood spraying from his mouth, while Sahara's heavy axe swings grew slower, each block costing her more than the last.
A kick caught her in the ribs and lifted her off her feet, sending her crashing down near me. Evangeline's face was tight with concentration. Her magic shield held against the mage's assaults, but cracks were already spiderwebbing across it. She fired another volley of missiles, forcing the mage to dodge.
But the woman was simply too strong, her counter-spells came faster, more precise, hammering Evangeline's defences until the shield began to flicker dangerously. I tried to push myself up, claws digging into the slick ground, but my body wouldn't obey. Blood poured from the holes in my side, my chest, my limbs.
Every breath was fire. The roar inside me thrashed and howled, demanding I rise, demanding I kill, but the man's brutality had pushed me past my limits. Broken bones ground against each other. Vision swam in red. Selene glanced back at me for a split second, her eyes fierce.
''Stay down, my prince! We'll hold them!''
The warrior roared and unleashed a devastating combination, a punch that Selene barely blocked, followed by a knee that drove her to one knee. Garrick tried to help but took a brutal hit across the back that dropped him momentarily. Sahara struggled back to her feet, axe heavy in her hands, but she was bleeding badly now.
Evangeline's missiles were growing weaker as she poured more power into her failing shield. The mage laughed coldly, stepping forward, her violet aura expanding. They were buying time. They were protecting me. But we were still being overwhelmed. The two enemy demons, who had nothing left to lose, had their coordination terrifying even against us.
I lay broken in the dirt behind my allies, and for the first time since the thing inside me had taken over, real fear mixed with the rage, not for myself, but for what would happen if these two monsters broke through. I forced one clawed hand forward, dragging my shattered body an inch closer to the fight.
The wild thing inside me refused to let it end like this. Not while my people stood over me. The battlefield still wasn't done with us. The pressure was mounting too fast. Selene's longsword rang with every desperate parry, but the seventh circle warrior was breaking through her guard more with each exchange.
Garrick's shield was cracked down the middle, his movements slowing as blood ran from a gash across his forehead. Sahara swung her massive axe in heavy arcs, trying to cover both of us, but her breathing was ragged, her stance unsteady. Evangeline's magic shield was fracturing under the mage's relentless violet assault, her missiles now sporadic and weak.
They were overwhelming us. The warrior laughed again, a cruel sound that echoed across the corpse field, and feinted at Selene before suddenly pivoting toward Sahara. His fist, wreathed in black-red destructive aura, cocked back for a finishing blow that would cave her chest in.
Time slowed to a crawl. ''No!''
The word tore out of me as a broken snarl. I roared louder than ever, drowning the agony. I forced my shattered body forward in a desperate lunge, claws digging furrows through the blood-soaked ground. I threw myself between them just as the punch descended. The impact was apocalyptic.
His fist slammed into my side instead of hers, and bones exploded. My left arm was torn clean off at the shoulder in a spray of blood and gore. The force continued through, ripping deep into my torso and shearing off most of my right leg below the knee in a wet, crunching tear.
Pain beyond anything I had ever felt detonated through me. I screamed, not a human sound, but something raw and inhuman that shook the air, as I crashed into Sahara, knocking her out of the killing arc and shielding her with what remained of my body.
We hit the ground together. She was safe. Bleeding, bruised, but alive.
''Arthur!'' Her voice cracked in horror as she tried to hold me up, her massive axe forgotten beside us.
The warrior loomed over us, fist raised for the killing strike. The mage smiled coldly, gathering a final violet lance meant to finish everything. Then suddenly the sky itself seemed to crack. A suffocating, overwhelming aura slammed down onto the battlefield like the judgment of an angry god.
The air grew thick, heavy with raw power that made even the seventh circle monsters stagger. Footsteps approached from behind us. I managed to look in the newcomers' direction and smiled when I saw who it was.
Virella.
She appeared like vengeance incarnate, her presence alone bending the space around her. Her face was twisted in pure fury, purple eyes blazing as she looked at my broken form, at the blood pooling beneath me, at the enemies who had dared touch what was hers to protect.
''You dare touch him?'' she hissed, voice layered with mana so dense it made my skin crawl even through the haze of pain.
The mage tried to turn, raising a hasty barrier, but Virella was already on her. She unleashed a devastating combo laced with crackling mana, a palm strike to the chest that shattered the woman's defences like glass, followed by an elbow that caved her ribs, then a spinning kick infused with explosive power that lifted the mage off the ground.
Each hit pulsed with visible mana, tearing through flesh and soul alike. The mage screamed once before Virella's final strike, a mana-charged thrust straight through her heart, which ended her completely. The sorceress's body crumpled, lifeless, violet light fading from her eyes.
The warrior roared and charged Virella in a desperate last stand, throwing everything he had into a seventh-circle haymaker. It was almost pathetic. She sidestepped with contemptuous ease and annihilated him. Her hand closed around his throat, mana flaring like a sun. She squeezed once.
His head exploded in a fountain of gore and shattered runes, the rest of his body dropping like a broken puppet. No struggle. No final defiance. Just instant, effortless death. The aura eased slightly as she turned toward us. The battlefield fell into stunned silence, broken only by the distant cheers of the legion that hadn't yet realised what had just happened.
I lay there in the carnage, one arm and most of a leg gone, blood pouring out in heavy pulses, the roar inside me finally quieting beneath waves of shock and pain. Sahara was still holding me, shouting something I could barely hear. Selene, Garrick, and Evangeline rushed closer, faces pale with horror.
That's when darkness claimed me once again.