The morning sun was a pale, sickly disc struggling to pierce the coastal fog of Patrain. It clung to the damp stone of the inner keep like a shroud, muffling the rhythmic clank of armored boots.
Arthur led his small company through the secondary gates, his breath hitching slightly in the chill. Beside him walked Alfia and Meteria, their youthful faces set with a gravity that belied their years. Nana followed, her hand resting protectively on the shoulder of the newcomer, Cecil Blackliza.
To the common infantrymen shivering at their posts, they looked like a motley collection of strays. But as they approached the high arch of the audience chamber, the veteran guards didn't lower their halberds.
They remembered the night the Earl's wife, Lady Freya, had been turning blue, her life leaking away into a silent, neurotoxic void. They remembered the young man who had walked into the room, identified a poison from the Gauss Kingdom that had baffled the court physicians, and stayed his hand only when the cure was administered.
Arthur didn't need an invitation. He had earned the right to knock.
Inside, the air smelled of beeswax, old parchment, and the metallic tang of whetstones. Earl Eral Ashur was hunched over a sprawling mahogany table, his silhouette framed by the flickering light of a dozen candelabras. He was a man built of granite and scars, his voice a rich baritone that seemed to vibrate the very floorboards.
"Arthur," Ashur said, not looking up. His finger traced a supply line on a map of the northern border. "My seneschal mentioned you arrived with a sense of... gravity. Usually, you're more interested in my library than my war room."
Arthur stepped forward, the heels of his boots clicking with a steady, unhurried rhythm against the polished marble. He did not bow with the subservience of a peasant. He stood with the quiet poise of a peer in spirit, a man who knew the value of the information he carried.
"My lord, I apologize for the intrusion," Arthur began, his voice calm. "But the ruins to the north are no longer merely 'ancient.' They have become a nest for the Yatan Church."
The Earl's head snapped up. His eyes, sharpened by decades of both political maneuvering and literal warfare, swept over the group. They lingered on the twins, then finally landed on Cecil. He took in the raw, purple bruises on her wrists and the hollow, haunted look in her eyes.
"Hooo... Yatan's Believers," Ashur murmured, the logistical nightmare of the Gauss border momentarily forgotten. "The God of Destruction's lapdogs. The black stain that never truly fades. Go on."
Arthur gestured toward Cecil. "This is Cecil Blackliza. We pulled her from a sacrificial altar in those ruins less than twenty-four hours ago. They were attempting a 'Demon Summoning' through virgin sacrificial ritual. This wasn't a wandering band of fanatics, my lord. They've fortified the Blackthorn Forest. I counted at least a dozen stationed in the outer ring alone, led by a High Priest." Arthur paused, a cold flicker in his eyes. "Whom I have already neutralized."
The Earl leaned back, his fingers drumming a rhythmic, predatory beat on the table. "The Blackthorn ruins... they've been silent for thirty years. If they are conducting rituals of that magnitude, they aren't just praying for the end of the world. They're anchoring a gate. A bridge for something worse to walk through."
His gaze narrowed, weighing the risk. "But sending a full battalion of my knights into an unknown magical meat-grinder is a gamble I don't care for. The forest is a labyrinth, and Yatanists thrive in the dark. What is your proposal, Arthur? You didn't come here just to report a fire; surely you came with a bucket."
Arthur unrolled a hand-drawn map of the ruins' interior. It was drafted with terrifying precision, every corridor and alcove marked with the clinical detail of a man who had seen the 'fog of war' lifted by a god's-eye view.
"The terrain is rugged, and the main gate is a kill zone," Arthur explained, pointing to a series of narrow lines. "But there are ancient drainage flumes—remnants of the old plumbing—that bypass the primary sentry posts. If we strike at dusk, we catch them in the transition of their ritual cycles. Their mana will be focused inward, toward the altar, making them blind to what's coming from behind."
He tapped a cluster of pillars near the central sanctum. "We don't need an army. An army is loud. An army is slow. We need a scalpel. Twelve knights. High-tier, Level 160 or above. Any more, and the collective mana displacement will alert their sensory wards. We go in fast, we sever the head, and we vanish before the forest wakes up."
"And their magic?" Ashur asked, his voice low. "My knights are brave, and their steel is sharp, but Yatan's followers are made of shadow and spite. Steel doesn't always cut a curse."
Arthur glanced back at Alfia and Meteria. "For that, I'll only ask for your assistance once again. Alfia and Meteria, they've already proven they can disrupt Third-Tier Yatanic circles but that's only possible because we caught them off guard. For this operation, I need experience. With your own battle-mages providing the heavy wards we can easily unraveling the enemy's spells before they can even manifest."
Ashur smiled—a thin, dangerous line that held no warmth. He looked at the twins, whom he had recently taken under his wing as disciples, recognizing the raw potential hiding behind their youthful features. "It seems my investment in these two is already paying dividends. Very well."
His expression turned stern, the weight of the Earl returning to his features like a physical pressure. "I will mobilize the knights. But know this, Arthur: if your scouting was flawed—if you have misread the depth of this cell—the cost will be the lives of men I cannot replace. I expect nothing less than total eradication. Do not leave a single ember burning in that forest."
"You have our word, my lord," Arthur replied.
As they turned to leave, Ashur's eyes lingered on Arthur's ragged breathing. To the Earl's heightened senses, Arthur looked fragile—a Level 12 body that seemed held together by sheer willpower and spite.
"You look like a stiff breeze would unmake you, Arthur," Ashur noted. "Your strength has suppressed, your breathing is shallow. Are you certain you want to be in the vanguard of this operation?"
Arthur didn't flinch. He looked the Earl in the eye with a confidence that defied the numbers on his character sheet. "I don't need to be the sword, my lord. I just need to be the one who points it. I won't let your men walk into a trap that I can already see."
As dusk began to bleed across the sky in bruised hues of orange and violet, the elite force assembled in the castle courtyard. Twelve knights, clad in silver-chased plate armor that caught the dying light, sat atop armored warhorses. Their Level 160 auras created a visible shimmer in the air, a hum of power that made the nearby stable boys uneasy.
Beside them stood Kaisel, one of the Ashur household's senior magicians, along with a secondary specialist. Their staves were capped with glowing mana crystals that pulsed like slow-beating hearts.
Arthur stood at the head of the column, dressed in simple, reinforced leather. His [Prodigy's Bow] was slung over his shoulder, the wood polished and ready.
"Arthur, you're really going alone with them?" Nana asked, her voice tight. She stood by the gate with the twins and Cecil.
"The knights are the muscle; the mages are the shield," Arthur explained, checking the tension on his bowstring one last time. "You girls stay here. Cecil needs rest, and I need to know you're safe within the city walls in case this draws out. I'm an advisor for this run, Nana. I won't be in the thick of it."
"Liars go to hell, Arthur," Nana muttered, though she stepped back, her hand lingering on Cecil's shoulder. She knew that look in his eyes—the look of a man who was already playing out the battle three steps ahead of everyone else.
Arthur turned to the knights, his voice dropping into a command tone. "Let's move. Silent trot until we hit the tree line. From there, we move on foot."
The journey into the Blackthorn Forest was a study in escalating tension. As they left the well-trodden paths, the woods grew dense and oppressive.
The sunlight died early here, strangled by the canopy of twisted, black-barked trees. Despite the massive level disparity—Level 160 knights against what should have been Level 40 or 50 zealots—the 'A+ Rank' quest marker in Arthur's peripheral vision glowed a threatening, pulsing crimson.
'Satisfy never makes it this easy,' Arthur thought, his eyes scanning the shadows. 'If the difficulty is this high, there's a variable the knights' levels won't account for. A hidden boss? A terrain debuff? Or perhaps... a sacrifice that has already begun.'
As they neared the ruins, the air grew sickly sweet. It was the smell of rotting pine needles mixed with the metallic, cloying tang of dried blood. Arthur raised a hand, signaling a dead halt. The knights dismounted in near-perfect silence, their training evident in how they handled their heavy gear.
"Do you feel that?" Aldric, the lead knight, whispered. His hand was already on the hilt of his massive claymore.
"The mana is curdling," Kaisel responded, his brow furrowed in concentration. He struck the base of his staff against the earth. A shimmering, translucent dome of golden light—[Aura of Sanctity]—enveloped the group.
"The Yatanists have laid a 'Languid Curse' over the entire clearing. Without this ward, your strength would drain by 1% every minute. It's a slow rot."
Arthur squinted at the ruins. The stone walls were jagged teeth rising from the earth, draped in bioluminescent moss that pulsed with a faint, rhythmic purple light.
"They're not just guarding the place," Arthur whispered, pointing to the shadows moving between the pillars. "They're feeding it."
He looked at the knights, their faces obscured by their visors, then at the mages. "Aldric, take six men through the western flume. Kaisel, you stay with them. I'll lead the other six through the eastern breach. We meet at the central altar. If you see a priest, don't wait for a prayer—cut their throats before they can speak a single syllable."
"Understood," Aldric grunted. "But Arthur... if things go south, you get behind us. The Earl will have my head if I let his 'prodigy' get stepped on."
Arthur offered a ghost of a smile. "Just worry about the shadows, Sir Aldric. I've lived in them longer than you think."
As the group split, Arthur felt the temperature drop ten degrees. The "March of the Twelve" had begun, but as they stepped into the ruins of Blackthorn, it felt less like a raid and more like a descent into the maw of something hungry.
The first scream, muffled and wet, cut through the air moments later. The hunt was on.