Ragnar opened his eyes.

  Grahm’s body lay crumpled at his side, lifeless and pale. Perhaps he had tried to heal him. Nearby, Shayara lay sprawled in the mud, a defensive mage shielding her with trembling hands as wraith-skulls circled overhead, shrieking with despair.

  Ragnar’s breath hitched. The battlefield blurred. Then he saw them, Marius’s assassins, shadows slipping closer, their intent unmistakable. They meant to drag Shayara away as intended.

  His hand clenched around his sword. No more restraint. No more hesitation. If this was to be his end, he would burn it all away. Moloch could not be allowed to walk this earth alive.

  Ragnar charged, Elof’s enchantments lacing his body as he cast Regression.

  Moloch’s black eye fixed on him. With a contemptuous kick, he hurled Arin aside. “I was playing with him until you arrived. Let us continue.”

  With a flick of his chain-wrapped hand, a storm of wraith-skulls and shadow-spears erupted across the sky.

  “Not Regression!” Arin’s voice cracked through the chaos. “Causality!” He signaled to Elof, who poured every ounce of strength into him.

  Ragnar faltered for a heartbeat, then understood.

  Arin’s hands glowed with volcanic glyphs. The ground ruptured as magma spewed upward, cascading over Moloch. Ragnar bent the weave, chaining effect before cause. No matter how Moloch tried to shrug it off, the molten rock clung to him, burning, gnawing, stripping away the last of his ward.

  The air froze in Ragnar’s lungs as he turned. Arin stood rigid, his body already paling, frost crawling across his skin. His fire had burned too hot, and now the cold consumed him.

  Elof remained at his side, steady and unyielding, even as Arin crystallized into ice.

  But then, his voice came ragged but steady. “General… thank you for the honor. But I am at my limit.” He sank down beside Arin’s crystallized form, his hand resting on the ice.

  Ragnar stepped close, lifting a fallen infantry shield. “Take this. Use it to guard yourself. Fall back slowly.”

  Elof gave a faint, pained smile. “I can’t, not anymore. My body will burn away now. Such is the price of magic.” His eyes flickered once toward the field. “I saw Marius’s men take her. At least she will survive.”

  He leaned back against the ice, closing his eyes. “General… please. Win.”

  His breath left him, quiet as ash on the wind.

  Ragnar turned from Elof’s still form. Ahead, Moloch wrestled against the surging magma, each movement shrouded in smoke and ash. The ground quaked, searing heat rising in waves, the very air burning to breathe.

  There was no time to grieve. No time to falter.

  Ragnar tightened his grip on his sword. Then, with fire in his veins and fury in his heart, he charged.

  Moloch screamed as the last of his wards shattered. He raised a finger to the sky, and lightning split the heavens. Bolts crashed down in a torrent, engulfing him and the field in blinding radiance. Ragnar braced behind his protective charms, each impact shaking him to the bone.

  At last, the storm faltered. The lightning stilled. The magma, too, guttered out.

  When the smoke cleared, Ragnar saw Moloch standing opposite him. The iron of his armor had melted and fused grotesquely with flesh; his broken helm had run down into his face like molten tar. His breath rattled in jagged gasps, and the usual gleam of contempt was gone.

  “Suits you,” Ragnar said evenly, stepping forward as he cast Regression to break apart the creeping aura of despair.

  Moloch’s voice was lower now, stripped of mockery. “I’ve played with you long enough. Now you’ll see the blessing of His Almighty.” His chains writhed as he gathered power, weaving a spell that made the air itself tremble.

  Ragnar’s grip tightened on his sword. Such power needed focus, precision—any slip would cause backlash. He’d seen it with Arin. Zealots who pushed too far were easy to break.

  The chains around Moloch writhed as he began weaving a spell, glyphs burning into the sky like scars of despair. The air thickened, alive with the taste of ruin.

  Ragnar steadied himself. This wasn’t the first time he’d seen power collapse under the weight of pride. He remembered the academy, remembered how words had broken an arch-mage faster than steel ever could.

  “You speak of despair,” Ragnar called out, his voice carrying over the storm. “But what despair is greater than your master’s? Shraak—bound, chained, forgotten beyond the veil.”

  The glyphs flickered. Moloch’s black eye locked on him, burning with hate.

  Ragnar pressed harder, each word like a blade. “You worship a prisoner. A god who could not even save himself. And you? You’re nothing more than his chained dog.”

  “Silence!” Moloch’s voice cracked, fury surging through him. The glyphs twisted out of shape. His concentration snapped, and the spell buckled under its own weight. A backlash tore through him, molten chains searing into his flesh. He staggered, roaring in agony.

  Ragnar didn’t waste the opening. Sword in hand, he closed the distance and drove steel into Moloch’s side. Black ichor sprayed, hissing as it burned into the ground.

  The demigod howled, more wounded than before, yet not broken. His breaths came ragged, his body fused with iron and flame, his eye a void of hate.

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  Moloch bellowed, his rage blinding him. He charged through the field like a juggernaut, iron chains lashing, each step cracking the ground beneath his weight.

  This was the opening Ragnar had waited for.

  The magma scattered across the field had begun to cool, its glow fading to dull embers. Ragnar stretched out his hand, feeling the threads of law strain against him. Not regression, not causality alone but something different.

  Hot and cold. Order and chaos. Aver’s truth.

  The embers flared. The magma bubbled violently, turning liquid once more even as the air grew sharp and icy around them. The ground steamed, hissing under the sudden clash of extremes.

  Ragnar gritted his teeth, blood welling in his nose. “Causality,” he whispered. The threads tightened. The molten rock surged upward, coiling like serpents.

  And then it struck. The magma, hotter and fiercer than before, circled Moloch, clinging to his iron-fused flesh, searing into him with relentless force.

  The demigod howled, chains thrashing wildly as the duality tore at him—fire consuming, cold constricting, balance unraveling.

  For the first time, Ragnar saw him falter.

  Within Moloch’s howl, a spear of shadow tore from the ground. Ragnar was a half-second too slow. It slammed into his side, breaking his concentration.

  Pain lanced through him. His knees buckled. The aura of despair gnawed at his flesh, black veins crawling across his arm. He forced his gaze to his hand, and watched it wither as if rotting before his eyes.

  “I cannot fall here,” Ragnar growled, but the words came out ragged. His body refused him. Too many laws, too much strain. His frame was already unraveling.

  Moloch’s laughter rolled like thunder. “My Lord is almighty! It has been written. When He breaks free, your gods will topple like dust!” The echo of it spread across the battlefield, a sound more dreadful than the clash of steel.

  Ragnar tried to rise, but strength fled him. His vision swam. Demi-god… if only I were one. What makes the difference? Knowledge? Faith? Or simply piercing the veil completely?

  The questions blurred as darkness pressed in. His last coherent thought flickered like a dying ember and then vanished.

  Fire and ice. Light and shadow. Order and chaos. Life and death.

  Dualities blurred, each folding into the other until no boundary remained. A word surfaced, not thought, not spoken, recognized: Gli’th

  Ragnar had never heard it before. He did not know its origin. Yet as it thundered through him, the Veil itself unfurled.

  It was everywhere, woven through the air, the soil, his flesh. It was hot and cold, radiant and dark, creation and decay. It was life and death entwined, not opposed but whole.

  Ragnar opened his eyes.

  Moloch stood before him, chains quivering, black gaze wide with disbelief.

  “You should be dead by now!” Moloch roared, voice breaking through fury and fear.

  Ragnar looked down at himself. His cloak was torn, his armor battered, yet his flesh was unmarked. Life itself had been birthed from death, though he could not name what he had become. Demigod? Undead? Something else? It did not matter. His purpose stood before him.

  He stepped forward. The ground beneath him melted. Above, the sky split as hail screamed through storm-dark clouds. For a heartbeat Moloch saw only blackness—then blinding radiance.

  And in that clash of opposites, Ragnar was there. Sword in hand, his swing carved through the air toward Moloch’s neck.

  The demi-god raised his chains to block, but the strike did not land where he expected. It shifted, impossibly, and tore across his body, ripping away flesh in a searing arc.

  Moloch clawed at the Weave, trying to knit his torn flesh back together, but every spell collapsed in on itself, regressing before it could form.

  “I see it now,” Ragnar murmured, staring at his own steady hands. “Totality. Everything—all at once.”

  Moloch tried to roar, but his half-severed throat could only wheeze and gurgle.

  “One more strike,” Ragnar said, almost as though he were speaking to himself. “That should end it.”

  Step by step, he advanced. With each footfall, the weight of Totality pressed down, bending the air itself. Moloch reached again for Shraak’s blessing, but nothing came. The world had gone silent to him, only Ragnar’s approach remained.

  The final swing fell. Ice crawled across Moloch’s neck as fire licked through his flesh, the blade severing both in a single, inexorable stroke.

  The demi-god’s head tumbled, his body burning and freezing at once. In his last instant, disbelief curdled into horror. He was the chosen of Shraak. He was a demigod. No mortal should have touched him. The prophet had promised…

  And then there was nothing.

  Ragnar stood alone at the far end of the battlefield. In the distance, the war still raged, but here there was only silence. The ground was shattered, churned into ruin. No trace of his comrades remained. As the haze lifted, he felt the power ebb from him, as if the Veil itself demanded balance. The demigod was dead—so perhaps he no longer had need of it.

  A flicker in the corner of his eye. Ragnar turned.

  The Prophet stood there, watching.

  Ragnar moved to strike, but his body refused him.

  The Prophet stepped closer, his voice flat and cold. “So. You were the victor. Unexpected, but no matter.”

  “You and Arabus serve Shraak,” Ragnar said, his tone like iron.

  “No. Do not lump me with that fool. He was only an asset.” The Prophet’s lips curled faintly. “You glimpsed the Veil and came back. Beautiful. You saw something your gods could never give you.”

  Ragnar’s gaze flicked around. No scouts. No allies.

  “If you’re looking for them,” the Prophet said, “they’re already dead.”

  The Prophet tilted his head, almost admiring. “I do not wish to kill you, Ragnar. I think you could be useful. But your allegiance will never bend. I can read your heart. The gods, those so-called Firstborn, birthed of the primal Dawnshard, foolish hubris. One by one, they will fall. Only my master remains.”

  “Who is your master?” Ragnar asked, forcing calm, gathering what magic he could.

  “You are not worthy to speak his name.” The Prophet lifted his gaze skyward. “Oh Darkstar, gaze upon the world you will feed.”

  Ragnar struck, but his blow landed on nothing. The Prophet still stood, untouched, a few paces away.

  “It is your time to fall,” he said softly. From his hand, a stone emerged, its surface the very embodiment of darkness.

  A twisting force coiled around Ragnar. His body wrenched apart, piece by piece. Vision dimmed. He fought to cling to memory, Marius, Shayara, his comrades, his home, his kingdom…

  But one by one, they slipped away.

  Far from the battlefield, in the safety of the rear camp, Shayara jolted upright. The cloak of her insignia felt suddenly heavy on her shoulders. Marius, sat at a corner, said nothing. His spectacles caught the torchlight as he adjusted them, hiding his eyes as he contemplated the next steps for survival.