The remaining Veynar warriors, watching the giant and the silent horde of over fifteen hundred Coalition soldiers completely encircling their broken ring, felt the last embers of their determination vanish into ash.

They were already exhausted, their essence reserves severely depleted from holding the line against the Coalition’s numerical superiority.

Now, seeing their Warchief paralyzed, their High Shaman grounded on the ridge, and their own comrades thrusting spears into their backs from behind, the last threads of their famed Veynar determination snapped completely.

A collective, devastating realization settled over the army: It was over.

Their arms grew heavy.

The weapons they held raised for hours slipped downwareds.

The Warchief and High Shaman were paralyzed, and their own elders had sold their blood for survival.

...

Chief Bruga stopped ten paces away from where Veylara lay kneeling in the dust. He looked down at her, his lips curling into a cruel, mocking sneer.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk... look at what the great Warchief of the Veynar has come to," Bruga drawled, his voice carrying clearly over the trembling ranks of broken warriors. "The fiery wolf of the Veynar... reduced to crawling in the dirt like a wounded dog."

Veylara didn’t lift her head, but her teeth groaned as she ground them together, a thick trickle of dark purple blood running down her chin.

"Where is that unyielding pride now, Veylara?" Bruga mocked, stepping closer and using the tip of his club to lift her chin, forcing her to meet his cold, gray eyes. "You used to hold your head so high when you looked at us.

You used to speak so grandly. And now? You can’t even lift your own spear to save your children from being slaughtered by your own blood."

"Bruga..." Veylara rasped, her voice sounding like dry slate scraping together. "Kill me... but let... the young ones... go..."

"Let them go?" The Marauder Chief roared with laughter, a loud booming sound that caused several weakened Veynar soldiers to wince and drop to their knees.

"There are no ’young ones’ anymore, girl! There is only meat for our fires and slaves for our quarries!"

Thorne, standing nervously behind his tight semicircle of guards, immediately trotted forward, his curved dagger held low as he bowed repeatedly before Chief Bruga, with a sickeningly sweet, subservient smile, "Chief Bruga speaks the absolute truth!"

"Great Chieftain!" Thorne praised, his voice oozing with desperate subservience. "As promised, the poison has severed their roots! The Veynar are yours! I have cleared the path and purged the stubborn fools who refused your wisdom!"

Chief Vane looked down at the sniveling elder with naked disgust, but he offered a brief, dismissive nod. "You have done well enough. Now, step aside."

While Chief Bruga and Thorne savored the agonizing surrender of the Veynar vanguard, the Chief Vane of the Zharun Clan, whose face was twisted into a hideous mask of unadulterated hatred... did not stop to watch the spectacle.

His eyes were locked squarely onto the center of the clearing.

There, flanked by two young girls lay Sol.

The Zharun Chief’s chest burned with furious heat.

In a single watch, this black-armored monster had pulverized the elite vanguard of his tribe.

He had slaughtered Malphas... the absolute pride of the Zharun lineage... brutally skinned Gorr, and turned their most feared champions into broken meat.

The Zharun tribe’s standing had been shattered today, and the responsibility lay entirely on this single, motionless outsider.

But now, the black armor that had struck absolute terror into the hearts of three clans was now kneeling.

Sol was slumped forward, one knee buried deep in the limestone gravel, his right hand still locked around the hilt of his sapphire blade.

He was breathing in slow, shallow hitches, his head hanging low, completely motionless.

Even though he still had enough essence, his Free Use reserves were dead empty; and due to the over expeniture earlier, he was nothing more than an exhausted, hollow vessel.

Beside him, Kira and Zeyra stood with their blades drawn, their knuckles white, their faces drained of all color as they shielded Sol’s motionless form with their own bodies.

"You..." Vane snarled, his voice vibrating with a terrifying, primal rage. "You slaughtered my son... You tortured Malphas... You turned my vanguard into red dust!"

Vane began to stride toward them, his heavy steps shattering the gravel with every step. The aura of a Layer 4 powerhouse exploded from his body, creating a suffocating pressure wave that hit Kira and Zeyra like a solid wall of stone.

"Capture those two Veynar wenches!" Vane roared over his shoulder to his personal Zharun guards without breaking his stride.

"Do not kill them! I want them alive. Once we return to the tribe, I will personally ruin them thoroughly, then strip the skin from their bones, inch by inch, while this black-armored bastard watches!"

A dozen Zharun elites instantly lunged forward, their ropes whistling through the air.

Kira swung her short blade with desperate, screaming fury, parrying the first rope, but another slammed directly into her chest, shattering her collarbone and throwing her backward into the dust.

"KIRAAAA!"

Zeyra raised her blades trying to save Kira, before a Zharun captain stepped past her defense, slamming the heavy pommel of his axe into her temple.

Both girls collapsed into the dirt, coughing blood, their limbs instantly bound.

With the girls neutralized, Vane stopped directly in front of Sol.

Vane was towering, glowing with a furious purple aura, his muscles bulging with killing intent. Sol was motionless, silent, a broken man barely kneeling.

"Look at you," Vane hissed, his face inches from Sol’s helmet, his breath smelling of copper and raw meat. "Where is that grand power now, boy? Where is that arrogant pressure? You thought you were a god among us? You thought you could come into our lands and slaughter our lineage without price?"

Sol did not answer, his head still down as he breathed weakly.

The faint, shallow rise and fall of his chest was the only sign that life still lingered inside the dark casing.

"Answer me, you piece of garbage!" Vane screamed, his rage boiling over.

Vane pulled his leg back and delivered a brutal, heavy kick straight into Sol’s ribs.

CRACK!