Rex’s eyes softened, pity cold as winter rain. “Poor puppet.”

The Heavenly Spirit Empire forbade humans in its vassal states from birthing the strong, yet strength sprouts like spring shoots—no law can pluck them all.

So once a Sky Rank Knight rose among humans, the empire seized him like a hawk taking a hare.

First came a knightly order to shackle him. Then the Church of the Light Deity sent Celestial Spirit adepts to brand his mind with a godspell, bright as a searing brand.

After the rite, the knight’s self was ash. Family and past vanished like fog at dawn—only a mask remained, nailed to the face.

He became a machine for killing, iron-cold, and he would die on some wind-scoured field.

It kept human power from shaking their rule, and spent those blades on the blade’s edge.

The Heavenly Spirit Empire sent these human Sky Knights deep behind enemy lines, into the Dark Spirit Empire, like wolves loosed into a fold, to ravage and slaughter Dark Spirits.

To the Dark Spirit Empire, such raids were smoke and knives. Dozens of cities went out like snuffed candles; in that sense, human knights were monsters in human hides.

This Sky Knight glowed with indigo Battle Aura, and his mouth ticked like a stuck gear. “I’ll butcher you Dark Spirits…”

He was a veteran of the warhammer, a storm given weight.

He whispered, eyes locking on Rex as if a spear had found its mark.

Then he burst, thunder through bone.

He blink-stepped to Rex in a flash.

With brutal speed and weight, he heaved the hammer and chopped for Rex’s skull.

Boom—!

Rex slipped aside, of course. He peeled away with a perfect backflip, a falling leaf on an updraft.

Even so, this was a Sky Knight’s blow—power like mountains cracking and seas tipping.

The miss still shattered the ground; the blast bloomed like a black flower.

The explosion punched out a shockwave. Winds howled like winter wolves. Gravel rose as a river of knives.

The pebbles were small, but each carried his Battle Aura like poison in a barb.

Even the ordinary turned lethal, a rain of arrows hissing at Rex in sheets.

Good thing Rex was a Sky Knight.

Facing aura-ridden shrapnel, he chose in a heartbeat to ward his body with Battle Aura.

Deep-blue ripples unfurled, water in the air. A rippling field shook every stone away like reeds shedding rain.

He finished the motion and landed light, a cat on a branch.

His foe reset the hammer across his guard and studied Rex like a wolf scenting blood.

“Detestable Dark Spirit…”

“Pitiful puppet. Be glad you ran into me—”

Rex set his twin scimitars, moon-curved and hungry. “I, Rex, the Knight of Ruin, will free your tortured soul from its flesh.”

This time, Rex took the initiative.

He flared his aura. Time thinned like stretched silk. In a blink, he closed on the human knight.

The hammer wielder wasn’t helpless; a Sky Knight too, with matching sinew and reflex, he read the blink-step and coiled to meet it.

As Rex entered range, the warhammer roared out.

It seemed he’d be swatted away, but Rex dipped low, a swallow under eaves, and the head passed over.

With a rising-dragon surge, he gathered Battle Aura to his right-hand scimitar—

Sky Rank Combat Art: Shattering Stream!

Water-aspected Battle Aura arced perfect as a crescent tide. He smashed the human knight up into the air like a breaker lifting driftwood.

Rex leapt and chased, a shadow on wind. With a falling-dragon plunge, he drew aura to his left-hand blade—

Sky Rank Combat Art: Infinite Darkness!

Water, then shadow. A Sky Rank Knight who wielded two forms, Rex carved down with a ruthless crosscut.

Boom—

The human knight hit earth like a falling star.

The crater’s ragged mouth told the story of that force.

Yet two heartbeats later, he stood again, calm as stone. “Damn Dark Spirit…”

“Heh. I don’t mind making this long and painful. Come on!”

In a blink, they crashed together again. The world cracked and howled; the air rang like iron.

From afar, Shelika watched, breath caught like a kite in a gust. “So this is a battle between Sky Rank Knights…”

The scene was wild. Trees toppled like scythed wheat; the forest peeled back; open ground spread like a stain; ruin multiplied like frost.

As their battle swelled, the forest’s beasts panicked, hearts like drums, and fled in all directions.

In minutes, almost every beast strained to escape their storm.

Yet a dozen did the opposite. They gathered, drawn like moths to lightning.

Threat prickled Shelika’s skin. She ignored ribs that had only just set two breaks. She spread her wings and shot up, hiding in the shade of a giant bough.

Once sure she was veiled and unseen, she fixed her gaze and watched, eyes steady as a lake.

What she saw made her breath hitch.

Those dozen beasts were the mission’s prize: phantom beasts, the Galia Lion-Wolves.

And not only Lion-Wolves. Once the pride settled like crouching statues, two more slid in.

Not Lion-Wolves, but pythons—giants, each the size of a three-story house, moving like rivers of muscle.

If Shelika remembered right, they were phantom beasts too—the vicious Accursed Great Serpents.

The Lion-Wolves came first.

They occupied the thicket where Shelika had rested, took the ground like a fortress, and watched the distant duel of Sky Knights with ember-bright eyes.

Phantom beasts were special, minds keen as knives, no duller than a human’s.

If Shelika guessed right, there’s a saying: the fisherman takes the prize.

These Lion-Wolves were waiting to harvest once the two decided a winner, like crows watching a duel.

After all, the one playing Shelika—Fulin—had, during her stint playing Lance, the Blazing Fire Knight in the Doran Kingdom, raised a phantom beast herself.

She got it by chance. Leopard body, house-cat habits; it kept her company through long, idle hours. She called it Big Cat, warm as tea.

Someone had warned her then: phantom beasts approach with a purpose.

Now Fulin thought back. Maybe Big Cat came to her out of reverence for strength. The thought fell through her chest like cool ash.

She let it go. The moment tugged her mind back to Shelika, taut as a bowstring.

Not long after the Lion-Wolves arrived, the two Accursed Great Serpents slid into view, tongues tasting the air like flames.

Clearly, they came for the same reason—to steal a share of the spoils.

By rule of the wild, different beasts are enemy and prey, wheel and blade.

Phantom beasts are no exception.

So the Lion-Wolves and the Accursed Great Serpents met like old rivals. The air tightened like drumskin. A clash was a single spark away.