Far away from Silver Blade City.
"Down!"
The command tore through the air like a blade, sharp and heavy, as boots thundered and steel clanked in unison.
Dozens of horses stampeded across the cracked dirt path, hooves smashing the ground with force that echoed like rolling drums of war.
Their riders—knights in gleaming black armor trimmed in silver—pulled taut on reins, halting with violent grace.
The carriages behind them rocked, the ornate wheels skidding into formation, their crests marked by the sigil of Black Vale Territory.
Then silence.
For a moment, only the breathing of horses and the creak of leather straps could be heard. Around them, in a wide arc of looming shadows, they came. Spawns. Demon-spawns.
Their heads resembled sickly, pulsing octopuses—slick with a sheen of mucous, veins pulsing beneath translucent skin. Eyes blinked erratically across their surfaces.
Their bodies, however, were grotesquely humanoid, but no two the same.
