‘Commit the damned reinforcements—now!’ Adarin hissed.

  But Liora’s voice came back calm and steady. ‘No. Promise me you’ll prevent Rüdiger from killing the prisoners. They’re wounded. They’re in danger.’

  Adarin screamed in frustration—bloodlust, rage, and panic mixing in his gut like a toxic cocktail. It took all his discipline to keep his voice calm and controlled. ‘Liora, we made a plan. We need to—’

  ‘I don’t care,’ she cut into his explanation with adamantine resolve. ‘You won’t do this.’

  Adarin looked around. The enemy—Marholians and Seaguardians alike—were rallying. Another wave of reinforcements, some of them walking wounded, came through the gatehouse.

  He relaxed his jaw and let some of the urgency and anger bleed into his voice. ‘Liora, I need those troops yesterday. We can talk about it later.’

  Liora merely sent an even more resolved mood over the link. ‘No. You swear it to me now—by whatever is holy to you—or I won’t send the reinforcements.’

  Adarin hissed in rage—silently, in the privacy of his mindspace—as another volley of musket balls tore into his broken, slowly healing body. He was already reforming, reconnecting by channeling Living Wood—but it needed time.

  Time Liora’s reinforcements were supposed to buy. Very well. Can always go back on it later.

  ‘Okay, Liora. I’ll see what I can do. Now send—’

  But her voice cut like ice. And Adarin felt the other presence. Yara—again.

  That part of her. The one that surfaced sometimes. Cold. Steady. Dangerous.

  The last rational part of his mind filed it away. So her resolve only sharpens when Yara rises. How much of Liora is her—and how much is that other presence pulling the strings? And why the hell is she interfering with my plans now?

  Adarin sniffed angrily. How does this help her? Maybe I can make Yara rise to the surface on purpose? Finally get some real answers. It would be nice.

  He shot a few contact protocols over the link between them. The first few dozen returned nothing. Suddenly some change. A red light flowed into his mindspace. Words sprouted from reality itself.

  Connection Request to [Entity Reference Error] denied. Corrupted ability detected.

  A sharp wave of pain came over the link. From Liora's side.

  Then he registered it—her demand again, echoing like iron. ‘Swear it. On whatever is holy to you. Now.’

  The reinforcements were advancing—Seaguardians—cutting down his zombies, clawing back from the verge of defeat.

  Adarin ground his teeth. ‘I swear—by my oath to the Security Directorate of the Internal Security Service—that I will help. That I will prevent the hostages from being executed. Are you happy now?’

  Traitor. He hissed and barely held back the last word. Amateurs on the battlefield. I wish we could spend a few reeducational days together.

  But finally, black skeletons, the twisted form of the Abomination, and a black skeletal swamp troll lumbered into the gateway.

  Without warning the earth shook as if God had dropped a moon from the sky. A hail of splinters pelted him.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  Adarin realized it three milliseconds after the hit: Rüdiger had dropped the first rock.

  Where an open inner gatehouse had stood—spilling reinforcements by the dozen—now squatted a boulder the size of a house, blotting out dust and screams alike.

  He reattached the last leg just as the wave of dust engulfed him.

  Soldiers were screaming. Coughing.

  Many had gone down with the stone splinters.

  Adarin’s bark creaked with the strain of a grin. Opportunity doesn’t knock—it drops from the sky. He went through a calming protocol, shoving the emotions about the Liora situation into a sealed compartment of his mind.

  He scurried out of the dugout into the dust.

  ‘Rally the undead. Send them all toward the gate. Attack. Attack. Attack.’ He sent the orders over the noospheric link to the necromancers controlling the horde.

  With renewed alacrity, the zombie soldiers moved. Liora's reinforcements were somewhere behind. Hopefully they arrive without another extortion attempt.

  Adarin started cutting down enemy troops—stumbling, wounded, confused—within the suffocating dust cloud. It settled slowly as he advanced and reached the fifth barricade.

  He climbed over it. The air was clearing enough that he could make out the splintered ruins of the final gatehouse.

  The zombies flowed towards it like a tide.

  And the human soldiers fell—one by one—into the meat grinder.

  Liora’s forces had made it halfway down the corridor.

  Without warning, another bright flash consumed Adarin's world. He was blind. His accelerometers suggested he was airborne, spinning. Next—impact. He slammed against the fractured stone wall. What—?

  An inferno erupted next to him. Undead and enemy soldiers alike died by the dozen. The dry heat washed over him in a painful wave. A few percent of his recovering optical fibers wilted.

  He shook his head like a wounded bull and scanned his surroundings. His visual field recovered slowly as he cast Thousand Eyes. Dozens of splinters and embedded projectiles littered his frame, but his systems flagged new threats.

  The adventurers. High-level. Not the trash I’ve just cut through. Where the hell is Rüdiger? Taking care of those bastards is his only damned job.

  They stood atop the rubble of the gate in a perfect line—five of them. Posing like wannabe heroes. What wouldn’t I give for a squad of snipers.

  The attacker: a man with a goatee—nowhere near as magnificent as Rüdiger’s—pressed down on a ball of fire between his palms, as if trying to crush it. The flame resisted.

  The source of the inferno.

  Another still pointed at the crater where Adarin had just been thrown.

  Explosive specialist. Explosive spells. Fuck. What is this—a theme? Explosives, always explosives. The world really wants me burned to cinders.

  He recognized one of them. The guy using the same magic as the bright mage from the last group looked like the late wizard. Just a few years older.

  The others?

  Three melee fighters. One woman. Two men.

  A hammer. A dagger and buckler. A spear.

  The spark-wielder stepped forward and pointed directly at Adarin. “Any last words? Or are you just a golem creature?”

  Adarin opened his mouth to respond.

  The man cut him off with a sharp gesture. “You killed my kid brother, you fucker. Lucien.” He turned to the fire mage. “Burn that thing.”

  Adarin scrambled as the Pyromancer turned and pushed the fireball forward.

  It drifted toward him with the lazy inevitability of a carrion bird, wings outstretched, hunting something already dead.

  Adarin scrambled—then cursed as the truth hit: no matter where he ran, the spell was hunting him. I really need to figure out how to make my skin fire-retardant. One day I’ll make this bark fireproof. Until then—I’ll just keep burning.

  Inevitably, all his scrambling was for nothing.

  The ball hit.

  Adarin was engulfed in a blue glow. Tge glow of fire parted around him. Defensive barricade spell. What? How?

  A silhouette in a trailing coat fell from the sky like a judge’s gavel—Rüdiger.

  He landed with a swirl of dust, made a theatrical gesture, and bowed deeply before the enemy adventurers.

  The adventurers gasped and took an involuntary step back. Recognition rippled across their faces—and fear followed like a shadow. Apparently, they recognized Rüdiger. And feared him.

  “Now, my dear adventurers,” he said smoothly, “he is not the villain in this play.”

  Rüdiger’s eyes narrowed, his grin splitting into something predatory.

  “I am.”

  Thanks for reading — let me know in the comments what you thought about the chapter!

  Upload Schedule: Mon–Fri at 4:47 PM EST / 10:47 PM CET

  Want more? Want to support my journey towards being a full-time writer? Join my Patreon for 30 extra chapters (6 weeks ahead):