Ethan's molten stream shot forth from the mouth of Revok with such force that the wall defenders were momentarily blinded before their bones turned to ash in the wind. The blast from [Storm of Revok] hit the inner wall and immediately melted it down, turning it and the grand doors to Lucent palace to nothing but bubbling tar that flopped down to the dry earth below.

And the people of Lucent who were cowering inside finally looked upon the faces of the Demon Hat.

And he looked back at them, taking in their shuddering, malnourished forms and pallid faces. He reckoned that they'd probably gone without proper hygiene for weeks. If he had to guess, it was the Greycloaks who had ended up rationing their food supplies for their war effort.

Are you sure you want to do this? Sys asked Ethan again. There's at least fifteen thousand people still in this city. Even if you got one Core a pop from them…

My goal is not to wipe out humanity, Sys, Ethan answered as he looked upon the shuddering forms of the civilians. We both know who has to die here. The question is: do they?

He strode forward and saw the last of the Greycloaks – a paltry sum of twenty warriors and a team of five Magi – rush to the frontlines of the humans behind the melting palace walls.

One of the Magi – a brash looking young man clad in red dragonscale armor – drew a blade and brandished it before the people.

"Men and women of Lucent!" he cried. "Before you stands the demon itself! Gaze upon it now, but fear him not! For we are the chosen people of Kaedmon, my brothers and sisters! We are the jewel of the West! And we shall never falter. Our feet shall never waver on the path. Come now with us, brothers and sisters, children of the one true God! Come with us and take the heads from this –"

Ethan let out a single [Roar] that shattered the armor of the vanguard to pieces. They fell back, bemused, as he then stepped forward, closed his eyes, and began to talk to the people of Lucent directly.

I have a simple counter-offer, he said, projecting his voice into their minds in the same way Jun'Ei had done. Any human who slays these men shall be spared the wrath that has been visited upon this city. I will allow you to go in peace, as I did the citizens of Sentinel before you.

He scanned the befuddled faces of the crowd, watching as they gripped their children close to them. The children, he could see, were too full of fear to even think. But their parents – in their eyes, something different was happening.

And the Greycloaks could see it, too.

For too long have you obeyed the laws of your Greycloak defenders, Ethan said. But now that the Last Archon is cometh, here they are before you, asking you to lay down your life for your God. The God that has turned away from even his own Lightborn. Look at them now, people of Lucent.

They did. They followed his eyes to stare down at the naked Greycloak retinue that lay before them on the melting steps of the palace.

And a few of them began to take a few steps forward.

"Back!" the leader of the Magi said, brandishing a firebolt in his hand. "Step back. Now!"

How easy it is for them to turn on you when they want to, Ethan continued above him. They were the ones that came here and turned your fair city into a private fortress. They are the reasons you have gone without food, water, and basic amenities for these past months.

By this point, most of the Greycloaks had drawn their weapons.

"Stand back!" the leader shouted again. "I warn you, peasants, we will not hesitate to-"

See them for what they are. Enforcers of a Law that is done. Guardians of a world that is gone. Their time is up, people of Lucent. Are you really going to die with them?

There among the crowd – the throngs of desperation. Ethan could hear it in the collective, beating heart of the rabble. And a hunch he had was becoming more and more self-evidently true: taken individually, humans were capable of rational thought. But taken together, they were so so easy to manipulate.

Just like on earth…

The [Farmers] took up their pitchforks. The [Blacksmiths] hefted their hammers. The [Courtesans] revealed their hidden blades.

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"I warn you!" the Greycloak leader wailed one last time. "One more step, and -!"

His last words were swallowed by the roar of the crowd and the palace descended into chaos.

The Greycloaks fought against the tide of the civilians. Blood was spilled on both sides. It took perhaps fifty men to bring down two Greycloaks. But bring them down they did. Even the great defenders of men could not stem the desperate tide that came against them.

And Ethan watched as, inch by bloody, inch, the Greys were forced back up the grand stairs of the palace away from the baying crowd.

Even the Greycloaks who threw down their swords had their throats cut where they stood or knelt. The people of Lucent were not taking prisoners.

The Greys unleashed their spells and Skills against the crowd, immolating whole swathes of them before, finally, the throng of people managed to push them up against the palace walls and choke the life out of them through sheer numbers alone.

"Fall back!" the red Magi leader barked, eyes darting up to see the Archon standing high above the crowd. "Fall back to the throne room!"

As the walls of the palace crumbled around him, and the once-pristine stairways filled with blood, Viscount Mobius sat on the throne of Lucent in quiet contemplation.

"Kaedmon," he whispered into his folded hands. "Grant me the strength to do what I must. To play the role that I now see I was always destined to play. Let me sup from your goblet of courage, and steady me, that my feet do not waver on the path."

"My Lord!"

He opened his eyes and peered through his spectacles at the sight before him. Five Magi, coated in blood, faces bruised and swollen from the fighting downstairs and in the streets, had come before him. The leader among them knelt and bowed, letting his frayed, jet-black hair fall down his shoulders. His breath came in short rasps and his build was rather large for a Magi.

"I recognize you," Mobius said with a wry smile. "Magister Raxel Baren and his squadron. You did our people proud out there, sons of Krea."

The leader of the mages looked up at him then, his face aghast and as unyielding as granite.

"My Lord," he repeated. "The city is lost."

"That much was obvious the moment the Archon came for us."

"We know our duty, Lord Mobius. We are here to stand with you in this hour."

"Oh?" Mobius croaked. "You mean to die by my side, then?"

"Yes, My Lord."

"That's a foolish notion."

The Magi recoiled at this rebuke. Raxel rose to try and talk some sense into his commander, but found that the old man had already made up his mind.

"My Lord, we ar-"

"I'm not your Lord, son," Mobius groaned. "I am Mobius, Gatekeeper of Caer Krea, bearer of Kaedmon's secrets and watcher of the darkening skies. I was never your leader. Nor was Carliah Argent. You have one Lord, Greycloaks. And it is to Him that you must answer."

The Magi looked to oneanother in confusion. Behind them, sounds of battering fists could be heard on the barred doors to the throne room.

"You have done your jobs admirably," Mobius continued, casting a frail, death-pale hand over them all. "Now, I implore you: take a message to the Greycloaks of Eastmarch at Caer Weiburn. Tell them what has become of Westerweald. Tell them the jewel of the West has fallen."

The Magi looked not to each other this time, but to the man they had reluctantly called their leader in the absence of Commander Argent. They'd never understood why such an old, corpse-like man had been deserving of the mantle of leadership.

And yet, as unbelievable as it seemed, here he was sitting on the throne of Lucent. Knowing his life was forfeit. And making peace with it.

"I ask you this not as your Lord or your Viscount," he said. "But as your brother-in-arms. You don't think this old rat will be going out without a fight, do you?"

The Magi hesitated. Then, bent up with youthful determination mixed with suicidal pride, the leader spoke again:

"We…are Greycloaks," Raxel said, ignoring the constant shrieks of fury and sounds of blade scraping across the palace doors now. "Demons flee when they hear our names. Archons die when they feel our blades. By the light of Kaedmon, we shall stand by your si-"

The tiny click of Mobius' fingers as they snapped a teleportation sigil over the five Magi stopped Raxel's heroic speech. The old Gatekeeper-turned-Viscount had decided that if they didn't want to run away, then he'd just have to force them.

"Very gallant," he chuckled. "But our time is up, young men. Now, you shall carry the torch of Krea."

The boys vanished almost as rapidly as they appeared. And with their banishment, the beating of the peasant hands on the palace door suddenly came to an abrupt halt.

Mobius inclined his head and smiled. There could only be one reason for that.

Sitting alone, head bowed and suddenly very cold, he closed his eyes and recalled a distant memory from his childhood. A lesson he had been granted from the time after Gelsadra's death, when the Greycloaks had truly established themselves as the most powerful military force in all of Argwyll. There had been a strict policy of education established across the kingdom instructing the people in Kaedmon's teachings. The teachings of the one true God.

As the old gatekeeper sat on the throne, feeling the palace windows vibrate behind him, he recalled one such lesson from an instructor on the nature of the God's Law:

'"Since all our actions are preordained, then we cannot feel guilt or pride at anything that we do. We are playing out the form of destiny, much like a river plays out the softest path through stone. It wants for nothing. It desires no significance. It simply flows as it must, until it spills out into the sea.""

His smile grew as he thought on those words. Hearing them as an ignorant youth, he had left class wondering when his river would spill out. When would his time be up and, at that moment, could he truly face his demise pure and unwanting?

The sound of the palace windows smashing apart told him the time for such contemplation was over. He turned, looked on the faces of the Archon, and decided that there was, in fact, one little thing he wanted in this moment:

To die standing.

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