[West Gate (the back gate) Battlefield]

When Delaia reached the West Gate—the city’s back door—the last foes were swept aside like leaves after a storm. They were only dozens, not even Regido-tier, tossed in like pebbles to jam a river.

“I’m Delaia of the Royal Guard. I’m taking full command.” He flashed a seal and a branded mark like a blade catching sun, and the sentries on the crucial hinge sprang the gate open.

Relief burst from them like rain on parched fields. “Lord Draela, why are you here? Thank the heavens, thank the heavens...”

“Report. Now.” His stride hammered the stones like war drums, urgency cresting before his words.

“During the shift, our ‘mates’ suddenly sprang at us like snakes from grass. We struck back, and only then saw they weren’t ours. We found rebel insignias on them.”

“Rebels? Those relic traitors of the old era?” Delaia ground his teeth, a black tide surging in his chest like a moonless sea.

“Stop! Who are you?”

“Royal Guard. Delaia. Here’s the seal. Where’s your captain?” His words snapped like frost under foot.

“It’s you! Thank the gods. We don’t know the full situation now. The captains were invited to a feast by Marquis Powell, and with this... it seems...”

“Powell? Where is he?”

“Vanished, my lord—like mist at dawn.”

“My lord! Bad news! Look at the main gate!” A sentry pointed with a shaking hand, like a reed in wind. The far gate yawned open, and a flood of black-gold cavalry poured in, cutting and trampling like iron hooves over wheat.

Through the haze, they glimpsed a menagerie—bandits in beast masks, snow-white cuirasses, black-gold plates, and common guard livery, all mingled into a tide well beyond ten thousand.

“Assemble every fighter. Fall back to the Lachesis perimeter. Move! Move!” Delaia’s voice cracked like a whip, and he vaulted from the wall like a hawk diving.

[Sia City, within the walls]

The iron cavalry had broken into the streets like a wildfire in dry reeds. The gate gaped, and scattered guards tried to stem the tide, only to be crushed under hooves, their guts in ribbons like torn banners.

“Aaaah—! You devils!” The city’s guards rallied and formed a wall of a thousand, a cliff of shields holding the cavalry’s wave. With heavy shields and tight ranks like stone teeth, the riders dared not rush.

They stamped and snorted in place, seeking a gap like wolves nosing a fence. The air shook like a drumhead under hooves.

Everyone knew the hourglass bled fast. The army behind would arrive in ten minutes, like thunderheads rolling closer.

[Off Sia City’s coast]

“Commander! Commander! Bad news! Sia City!!” Iling’s cry snapped like a sail in a gale as she slipped from the rigging, and Medith caught her like a net catching a falling gull.

Fear flashed first, cold as spray. “Is it hit?” Medith’s voice was so calm it chilled like winter water.

“Not sure... but flames stab the sky, and I hear faint slaughter, like steel under fog. Your premonition may come true...” Iling’s eyes and ears were twice the crew’s, honed like a hawk—thanks to Medith’s “training.”

“What?! Sia City is under assault?” Spears and ropes nearly fell from hands like stones. Medith nodded, heavy as an anchor dropping.

Sais and the others drove the ship hard, wind in canvas like cheeks in a shout. Ten minutes, and they’d kiss the shore.

Medith stood on the prow, high as a mast, drew her sword, and her voice rang like a bell over water. “Whatever happens, your home is under the knife. The enemy will gut everything you love like wolves in a fold. Don’t hesitate. Don’t soften. No matter what you see next, you have one goal: raise your weapons and hack the enemy’s heads off like chopping rotten wood. Otherwise, Sia City won’t live to see tomorrow’s sun.”

“Bastards...”

“Lead us.”

“Lead us.”

A hundred elite guards dropped to one knee in unison, like wheat bending to wind. They came from different banners, black or white, but their core burned the same: protect home like hearth-fire.

“Good. All guards with me! Captain, turn the ship around. Find whatever cove feels safe, like a gull to a hidden rock.”

“There’s a small island nearby. The enemy shouldn’t know it.”

“Then go. Guard my stuff—I’m coming back for it. And don’t eat all the food, or Milia will shut down like a clam.”

“Heh-heh...” Her steady poise, like a cliff above surf, bled the panic from the deck like warmth from snow.

Medith raised her longsword, urged the ship, and it surged for the shore like an arrow loosed.

“Look, that’s our ship!” Sharp-eyed guards pointed, pupils bright as stars, at the vessel knifing the waves with uncanny speed.

“Quick! Open the gate!” Dozens spun the capstan wheels, iron groaning like an old tree, throwing the doors wide to welcome Medith.

[Main Gate Battlefield]

More guards flowed in like streams feeding a river, and the defense thickened into a wall. The cavalry fell back a pace, but the army behind arrived like a storm front. A swarm of soldiers in mismatched gear trampled a carpet of border-guard corpses, clogging the gateway and the ground outside like ants over carrion.

From the press of riders pushed a man with pheasant plumes. He yanked his reins, dropped from the saddle like a boulder, and strode forward, momentum rolling like thunder.

White armor sealed him head to toe like frost, only a pair of cool eyes showing, flat as winter lakes. His snow-white plate cut against the black-gold ranks like moon against soot.

“You the enemy commander?” Kasda stood before the line, his panther eyes burning, a blaze you could feel like heat on skin.

The man curled his right hand and tapped his brow, a salute like a hammer on a gong. The Eastern Nation guards nearly saluted back on instinct, like strings tugged by a hidden hand.

No one expected an ‘enemy’ in Royal Capital issue armor to use their salute. Armor can be faked. Banners can be faked. Movements can’t—unless drilled from childhood, the weight and angle betray you like a crack in ice.

“Yes. We’re the Segireneto coalition. My dear juniors, you’ve grown like bamboo after rain. Your presence and skill outstrip mine when I took command. The young are fearsome...” He saluted again, the gesture sharp as a blade.

“Hmph. A coalition? You scrape up feral strays and call it a coalition?” Kasda’s gaze was a knife, but inside his gut roiled like a storm tide, a bad guess pounding at his skull.

Bandits behind him clenched weapons at “feral,” their throats rumbling low like hounds on a chain.

The man drew a silver-white spear from his horse’s flank and slammed it into the earth like lightning finding a tree. “I am the Fourth Commander of the Dike Guard: Erig.”

“What?! The fourth Commander?!” The words cracked from throats like split wood.

“What is this...”

“Steady!” a voice cut, sharp as flint. “The fourth Commander was the ‘Fool-King’ Ostos’s top ‘merit-maker’! You turned black to white and muddied right and wrong like silted water! Even when the king went mad, you wouldn’t pull him back—you called it ‘loyalty’! You cut down every loyal minister and vassal who tried to stop him, like reaping wheat! His Majesty Ostos spared you once for the Dike Guard’s service and let you walk. And this is how you repay him?”