Havoc knew it would not be that easy. Wolf's Requiem was many things. She was cruel—her treatment of the Enforcers proved that much. She was patient—she would not have breached the fortified slums otherwise. She was a monster, and she would die for it. But above all else, she was powerful.

He did not need to see her tear through hound-flesh and flame to know her strength. He could feel it. Dense waves of terrible might rippled from her with every breath.

It was suffocating. He could have drowned in it—choked by the sheer instinct to flee.

Instead, he smiled.

His heart pounded. His blade-hand shook. But the smile did not fall.

Even as streak after streak of lightning crashed upon her. Even as she loosed a cry that split marrow—her fur-matted hide scorched black, a sulphurous reek drifting over the yard—he did not blink.

Trepidation clutched tight in his chest. But it never reached his eyes.

'I… am going to… tear you apart,' Sylvia screeched, as another bolt lanced through her and dropped her to her knees.

The hounds did not relent. The merciless storm burst their flesh—organs and bone scattering across the withered grass. But even broken, they sludged back into form and hurled themselves once more upon the woman they once called mistress.

They would not have long. At a glance, Havoc could already see Naereah faltering. Sweat streaked her pale-blue skin. As though a grey cloud loomed overhead, she was drenched in the strain of her efforts. Each layer of her forest-green skirt—split at the front to ease her movement—clung to her thighs. Beads of sweat dripped from the tapered points of her ears. Even her lightly armoured bodice was soaked through.

Havoc doubted Bethany was faring much better, but she wore the burden well. If not for her bone-crushing grip, her weighted breaths, and trembling frame, he would not have guessed at the toll of sustaining the Severing Scream.

Soon, they would both collapse. Sylvia, though—Sylvia would still be standing.

That was fine. That was the plan.

He would not have wanted it any other way—if it meant ending the monster with his own blood-soaked hands.

'Mistress!' Iris wept, struggling against Anton's bestial grip—her arms outstretched toward the woman who had broken her.

It was a pitiable sight. But Havoc did not blame her. She had been twisted by pain, reshaped by hopelessness, and soothed in time-warped dreams until her will collapsed. What she had become was not of her own making.

But it mattered little now. She was a monster—just like him. The only difference was power.

Once the lightning stopped falling, once the hounds ceased their baying, there could be no intervening.

Anton was too soft. That failing had long since boiled to vapour in Havoc's soul—burnt away in the flames of the evils he had already done. Whatever traces remained had been expelled in the reforging of his resolve.

With cutting finality, he unleashed his blade. It swept across the field—cleaving through the weakened Enforcers like a sickle through grain.

As they mended, the blade passed again.

And again.

And again—until not even the faintest glimmer of Harmony lingered in their cores.

'They're not a threat anymore. Stop this!' Anton roared, flinging himself over Iris, shielding her with his body.

Even under the stress of maintaining the thunder-born runes, Naereah glanced at him. There was sadness in her pitch-black eyes, but something steadier lay beneath it. Acceptance. Havoc knew—he just knew he would have done the same even if it would make her hate him. But his heart still felt lighter that she did not turn away.

Bethany also looked his way. She pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed—long and deep. Then she nodded and turned back to the battle.

Sylvia staggered to her feet. She threw herself from the path of a lightning bolt, breath catching in relief—only to choke as the bolt curved mid-flight, striking her square.

All across the field, the resistance—and the few surviving hostages—wore expressions that shifted by the moment. Some blankly gawked, palms to mouths, heads snapping in every direction as though questioning their own eyes, uncertain of what was real. Others cast weeping eyes down at the ruined corpses of loved ones—cradling flesh-torn bodies, rocking back and forth, heedless of anything but their grief. Still others glared at the turncoats. Or at Sylvia. Or both—a mixture of fear, pain, and fury burning impotently cold behind their eyes.

None of them could avenge their losses. They had the will, not the might. Even the rage of heaven could not keep the wolf pinned for long—still less the hounds, surely bred in hell itself. No, their grief, bound to their bones, could reach no further. Not across the infinite chasm between the weak and the mighty.

But their cries did not fall on deaf ears.

Havoc heard them.

He could not avenge them. Vengeance was hollow. Justice, empty.

All he could do was rid the world of a sickening taint. If doing so helped others mend—so much the better.

But the deed itself was worth enough.

Such confidence, his Captive Spirit mocked, though Havoc could feel its excitement thrash against his core.

He did not reply.

He prepared.

His breathing slowed, as did the pounding of his heart. His blade steadied in his grip. And the spiritual mists poured from his frame to engulf him.

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Then, like a great geyser gushing to greet the clouds, the mist surged skyward.

Through his Anchor, he could summon the mist. From the Spectre's Band, he could shape it. But the final piece—the key to forging something new—he had found within the Nightmare Desert.

The Dreamwalker's Mask.

Useless to most. It allowed the body to blend into the intangible—but only while within the immaterial. It was no defence. Some Remnants allowed their users to slip through physical blows. This was not one of them. Only within an ethereal realm should it have held any use.

But Havoc carried the ethereal with him.

He was the mist. And as a being of mist, he could now shape himself as he pleased.

Do it, his Captive Spirit cried, glee thick in its tone.

The clouds shrank, condensing into human form.

Let me taste it again.

It hardened like a shell—Havoc melted within.

Together, my boy—we do this together, his Captive Spirit howled.

The ivory shell bled scarlet. Scabrous red coiled across Havoc's frame as horns jutted from either side of his forehead.

Catharsia—give me Catharsia.

Havoc's dual magics whirled within his core. As though striking a match, he brought them together—flaring, burning, grinding. Power that shuddered his soul and would have torn his body apart—

—if he still had one.

When he had used this might within the Temple of Desire, he was only a Servant. Now, as a Soldier, it was vastly more potent. But far more restrained. He controlled his movements. The Spirit? The flow of power. It withstood the storm that would otherwise have shredded his untempered soul—letting only the excess to gently trickle through.

He held his hand to his face. He clenched and unclenched. It was not his full might. But it would be enough. He would make it enough.

****

The deluge of lightning ceased. The hounds began to unravel—collapsing in twitching heaps, their sinew unspooling like frayed rope.

Sylvia held herself on arms and knees, glaring through blood and ash toward the Enforcer. Toward that bitch—still clutching the now-crumbling flute in her contemptible hands.

She must have thought herself clever. Turning the Dogs against their mistress. Dispersing them before the spell could expire.

She was not clever.

She was dead.

Still breathing. Still standing. But dead all the same—her time was simply taking a moment to catch up.

Oh, she would suffer before the end. Months would pass before Sylvia grew bored of her screaming.

She would make her a thing. Unsex her. Blind her. Burn out her tongue and shove it down her throat.

Then, she would bathe her in potions—spare no expense. Restore her, piece by piece.

And do it all again.

The slave would get off easy. A bitter pill—but one she must swallow. The method of extracting a Heritage did not spare the life.

With ragged breaths, Sylvia rose, leaving bloodied prints across muck-blend soil, broken stone, and wilted grass. Her muscles spasmed. Her face twitched without command. Every step was searing—each nerve lit with pinprick agony that forced a whimper past her lips.

But that whimper became a growl.

She wiped blood from her eyes. The stench of her scorched skin turned her stomach—but she was alive. She would mend.

They would not.

She swayed, then steadied. As the world's haze cleared, her gaze rose—and widened.

A phantom devil surged toward her.

It whirled within rolling white. Faceless, save for two curved, scarlet horns—and the jagged breaks that formed a wicked smile.

As if a suit of armour had found a will of its own—white and scabrous red—it hurtled nearer. From its back, spiked tendrils unfurled.

Before she could blink, she was skewered—arms, legs, chest.

She howled—a raw, fearsome cry. Pain. Fury. Indignant terror. With a savage sweep of her claws, she severed the spines. Then, clenching every shredded muscle, she forced them out.

She was weakened, not weak. Woe unto the fool who forgot that. Who forgot who she was.

Wolf's Requiem. Who tore into the Dire Beasts throat with her teeth. Crushed its skull with her bloodied stump of her arm, and reformed the lost limb with its blood, bone, spirit, and soul.

Nothing.

She had been handed nothing.

All that she had, she had taken.

By force.

By will.

By her might alone. She would not be parted with anything she seized. Not her claim to the slave. Not revenge on the Enforcer. Never her life.

They thought they would bring her low. With tricks. With traps. With ambushing blows.

Futile…

A candle fizzled into being. It melted black wax and burned a black flame. She gripped it like a sword, even as the knight closed in. Then, holding it forward, she unleashed its power. Tar-black streaks—each a screaming maw. Unnumbered. Vicious. Ravenous. They lunged toward the knight, howling to tear him apart.

Crimson wings burst from the knights back, and it took to the sky.

The fool.

The gnashing storm rose to meet him. He was engulfed.

It was over.

But then… It was not. The black haze rippled then burst, countless crimson blazed cutting through the cloud like a storm of swords.

He dived toward her.

She was ready.

A collar gleamed at her throat. Her muscles bulged. Her claws sharpened. Her fur turned a matted green. Tight around each wrist—armlets. She raked the air as if it were ground. With tooth, bone, and claw—she would tear him apart.

She did not wait.

She gripped the solid air and hurled herself up.

The sky was his?

No. She would take it, too.

****

The sky thundered above. Bethany stared into the impenetrable clouds. She flared the last wisps of her Harmony into the Inquisitor's Gaze—but even as they tinged scarlet, she still could not pierce the mist.

A Champion.

He was facing a Champion.

Everything Bethany knew told her it was no fight at all—only slaughter. Even weakened, even brutalised, Sylvia should have killed him in a single blow.

But he endured.

No.

By the anguished howls ripping through the night—he was winning.

'Don't think too much on it,' Sedrick said, dropping to his knees. 'That one's secrets wrapped in secrets. But he's a good sort—and he'll get the job done. Spent enough time beside him to say that with grit.'

Bethany shifted her gaze to her lieutenant, then returned it to the sky.

'I'll have your full report,' she murmured. 'Do what we can to patch the wards. Then we'll share words. Is that under—'

She paused.

Something fell.

An arm.

A leg.

Rivers of blood.

Then a head—Sylvia's.

Eyes frozen. Frantically wide. Dead.

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