Gravos answered with rage. He lifted his spear high, both hands tightening. The runes along its length burned brighter, violet shifting toward white. Mana converged so thick it warped the battlefield. Thousands of Vestige mages shouted in unison, channeling into their commander, amplifying his strike.

The sky itself bent downward.

Ervin's face hardened. Lightning burst across his arms, wrapping him in jagged arcs. Wind gathered at his feet, propelling him upward against the pull of that crushing mana. He hurled flame into the air, twisted it with wind into a spiral inferno, then encased it in stone shards hurled upward like meteors.

The spear came down.

Ren raised his hand. Black-blue fog surged upward in a wave. The erasure wall met the inferno-stone storm, wrapped around it, and both collided against the Titan's weapon.

Impact.

The world split.

A shockwave expanded outward, visible as a ring of distortion. Soldiers from both armies were flung like dolls, crushed beneath falling towers or burned in stray flames. Ships above staggered, struggling to stabilize. The earth sank a full meter where they clashed, trenches forming in spiderweb cracks.

When the dust cleared, Ren still stood. Ervin knelt beside him, coughing blood, his hands charred but steady. Vael crouched low on one knee, dagger planted in the ground to keep from collapsing. Elara clutched her ribs, golden light flickering as though it would die at any breath.

And Gravos?

The Titan was down on one knee. His armor was cracked open in three places, ichor spilling like tar. His helm was fractured, revealing half his face was twisted, monstrous, yet very much alive. His roar was weaker, but it carried.

The four against one had scared him. But he was not finished.

Above, the other commanders had not moved. They watched. Silent. Waiting. Testing.

Ervin's mind cut through the wreckage, precisely even while broken.

["He is not alone. They will not intervene until one falls. They want to measure us to see what each piece on this field can do. And then…"]

Gravos forced himself upright, spear dragging a furrow through stone. His eyes burned violet.

"…then you die here."

Ren lifted his hand once more. The black-blue fog coiled higher, denser, reaching toward the sky.

The Titan charged.

And the second chapter of the battle carved itself into blood.

★★★

The plain was no longer a plain. Every strike had reshaped it. Towers once raised by mage-work lay in fragments, craters bled with molten stone where spells had burst, and the very soil shivered beneath the weight of competing powers.

Gravos the Titan stood at the center of it, spear gripped in both colossal hands, his body taller than siege walls. Violet runes burned so hot along the weapon that even the air hissed. His roar scattered the chants of lesser Vestige mages, who scrambled to adjust their formations and pour more energy into their commander. The battlefield trembled each time he moved.

Ren stepped forward without haste. The black-blue fog gathered thicker, trailing around him in tendrils that erased debris where it touched. It was not force but absence, not weight but hunger. The Titan's spear struck toward him in a blur, its descent like a collapsing fortress.

The impact never landed.

The spear froze a hand's breadth from Ren's head, its edge crumbling where the fog devoured it. Sparks hissed, runes dimmed, fragments of metal vanished without trace. Gravos snarled and wrenched the weapon upward, tearing a trench through the battlefield instead. Mages on both sides screamed as they were hurled away by the shock.

Ren did not move. His eyes were fixed only on the Titan.

Then Ervin acted. Lightning coiled up his arms, followed by heat that burned white from his fingers. He hurled storm and fire in tandem, guiding it with razor wind. The spell struck the Titan's torso in a crashing spiral, forcing the giant back a step. Gravos' armor blistered and cracked, ichor spilling through the rents.

Vael was already in motion. His body blurred through the shadows cast by broken walls and shattered towers. He appeared beneath Gravos' left arm, dagger slashing upward. The blade tore across exposed flesh, black blood splattering. Vael vanished again before the massive elbow could crush him.

Gravos roared, swinging the spear in a wide arc. The sweep was a wall of annihilation. Mountain towers fell like dominoes. Hundreds of mages from both armies were caught in the radius. Arkenhall formations scattered. Vestige lines broke apart. Those who were not strong enough to shield simply died.

Elara dropped to her knees, golden light spilling from her palms. The fractured ground beneath their feet steadied, cracks mending just enough for footing. Where wounded Arkenhall mages had fallen, bones knit and bleeding slowed. Where stone had split into canyons, the edges drew closer, stabilizing the terrain. Her light was faint but relentless. Blood soaked her bandages, her ribs burned with every breath, but she kept her hands pressed to the earth.

Ren's gaze cut to her once. He gave no praise, no word. Only a single thought pressed through his silence.

["Even broken, she repairs what would cost us the field."]

The Titan was not finished. His spear glowed brighter, the runes shifting from violet toward white. The entire Vestige host shouted as one, their voices amplifying the weapon with layered chants. The spear became a pillar of condensed mana, a weapon designed to split mountains.

The sky darkened. The air bowed downward.

Ervin cursed under his breath and lifted both arms. Wind tore into a cyclone at his command, pulling shattered stone upward. He set it alight with fire, bound it with lightning, then hurled the storm in a screaming arc toward Gravos. The Titan drove his spear down at the same moment.

Impact.

The battlefield ruptured.

A ring of distortion spread outward, flattening mages by the hundreds. Spells collapsed mid-cast. Towers fell in sheets of rubble. The ground sank several meters where the two powers collided, creating a basin filled with molten cracks. The shock consumed friend and foe alike, leaving only chaos.

Ren walked through the storm as though it did not exist. The fog surged upward with him, devouring the spear's edge, breaking it apart inch by inch. Gravos strained, his colossal body heaving against erasure itself, his roar splitting the air. For every inch his spear descended, another foot of its length dissolved into nothing.

Then Vael struck again. From shadow to shadow he moved, a blur of black steel and blood. His dagger plunged into the Titan's thigh, deep enough to cut a tendon. Gravos faltered, dropping to one knee. His helm cracked further, revealing a half-twisted face filled with rage and ichor.

That was when Ren lifted his hand.

"Fall."

The fog exploded upward, a wave that consumed everything before it. The spear collapsed into fragments, the runes extinguished in silence. The erasure surged across Gravos' chest, devouring armor, tearing through flesh.

The Titan screamed once.

Then half his body was gone.

The other half toppled slowly, crashing into the basin with the force of a collapsing fortress. The sound echoed across the plain, a signal more final than any war horn. Gravos the Titan was no more.

Silence spread.

Mages on both sides froze. Even the ships above hesitated, their bombardment halting as though stunned. One of the five commanders was gone. Just like that.

Ren lowered his hand. His breathing was steady, but his cloak was torn, burns marked his arms, and blood traced lines across his neck. He was not untouched, but he remained unbent.

Ervin fell to one knee, coughing blood into his palm. His reserves were burned deep. Elara swayed, barely conscious, her light flickering faintly before fading to embers. Vael crouched low, dagger dripping ichor, his shoulder split open from a near miss.

Four of them still stood. But barely.

Above, the other commanders did not move to assist their fallen. They had been watching, testing.

Now they began to move.

The second commander stepped forward, her form cloaked in threads of void. One heartbeat she was on the flagship, the next she stood on the ruined plain. The air bent around her as though she was an absence given shape. Her pale eyes fixed first on Ren, then on Elara.

Behind her, the third descended with a flutter of obsidian wings. Feathers scattered sparks that burned through stone. His blade gleamed with cold hunger.

The fourth and fifth remained aloft, but their mana bled downward in choking waves. And above them all, the King of the Vestiges still waited, his shadow stretching like a storm across the sky.

Ervin tightened his grip on the corpse of the Mage King, still cradled in his arms. His thoughts cut through the haze with merciless clarity.

["One commander fell. Four remain, and the King untouched. We are alive, but not whole. The next trial begins."]

Ren's eyes lifted toward the second commander. The fog at his feet thickened again.

The battle did not pause. It only shifted.

The duel of the Titan was finished.

The true war pressed on.

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