​The wall of dust didn’t arrive politely; it exploded.

​One second, the battlefield was filled with the thunderous clash of metal and the roar of burning patriotism. The next, a gray tsunami dozens of meters high surged from the southern horizon, swallowing everything in a silent fury. The soldiers standing in the front lines didn’t even have time to draw a final breath. They simply vanished, sucked into a dust cloud moving far too fast for human logic to process.

​Orchid had already leaped back several steps before the tongues of dust could lick his position. He narrowed his eyes, enduring the sting of coarse grit pelting his face. Krit. He tightened his grip on his red sword—the energy blade pulsed low, as if warning its master of something alien.

​Beside him, Khaleed did the same. His fire cleaver remained ignited, yet its flames seemed to shrink, flickering uneasily as if reluctant to touch the creeping chill emanating from behind the dust. The stench began its assault: the aroma of long-rotted flesh, damp graveyard soil, and something sharper—the smell of a death forced back into wakefulness.

​The first sound to escape from behind the dust wasn’t a war cry, but a scream born of pure terror.

​A Brassvale soldier emerged from the gray fog, crawling backward. His black armor was torn at the shoulder, his face covered in blackened gashes. His eyes were wide, staring vacantly at the darkness behind him. "Hah... that... they aren’t human!" he shrieked, his voice cracking. "They won’t die! Why won’t they die?!"

​Behind him, a shadow moved.

​The first figure emerged with jerky, staccato movements, like a wooden puppet whose strings had been pulled by force. It was a man with skin turned pitch black, his jaw hanging loose, held only by a single remaining strand of muscle tissue. He hobbled forward, his left leg broken with the bone protruding, dragging his steps across the red earth. Srak... srak...

​His blueish fingers clamped onto the Brassvale soldier’s shoulder. The soldier screamed, spinning around to drive his sword straight into the figure’s chest. Slurp. The steel blade pierced withered lungs, but no blood emerged. There was no groan of pain. The figure kept its grip, pulling the soldier’s head closer, and then... Srak!

​It wasn’t a mere bite. It was a brutal tearing. The flesh, tendons, and veins of the soldier’s neck were ripped out all at once. Fresh blood sprayed across the living corpse’s face, providing a horrific crimson contrast against its rotting black skin. The soldier collapsed, convulsing briefly with hands clutching his hollowed neck, before going still forever.

​Then, one by one, the horror multiplied.

​From behind the dust, dozens—no, hundreds—of figures began to crawl out. They weren’t just former soldiers. There were small figures with shriveled skin, women in tattered ball gowns, and farmers still clutching rusted hoes. Their movements were unnatural and unsynchronized, yet they all moved in one direction: toward anything that still held a heartbeat.

​Plagueborne.

​On the other side, similar chaos struck the Ignis-Sol army. A war mage cast a spell with trembling hands, hurling a massive fireball into the center of the corpse horde. Boom! The explosion incinerated three figures instantly. Yet, even as their bodies burned fiercely, they did not stop. They continued to march as living torches until the fire extinguished itself for lack of fuel, and still, they moved forward.

​"Why won’t they stop?!" the mage screamed, retreating in a panic.

​"They’re already dead, you fool! You can’t kill what has no life!" his comrade barked, grabbing his collar to flee.

​The once-orderly battle formations crumbled into ruin. Enemies who had previously been aiming for each other’s throats were now running past one another, no longer caring for the color of the opponent’s banner. Officers tried to shout commands, but their voices were drowned out by the neighing of warhorses being forcibly brought down and swarmed by a dozen hungry mouths. The sound of snapping bones, krak, krak, filled the air.

​Amidst the slaughter, Orchid and Khaleed stood back-to-back. There was no written pact, only a survival instinct that forced them to cover each other’s openings.

​"Hmm, you have any idea what these things are?" Khaleed asked. His breath was coming in ragged gasps, but he tried to keep his tone stable. His fire cleaver swung in a circular arc, decapitating two Plagueborne that tried to close in. Their bodies fell, but their upper torsos kept crawling, fingers reaching for Khaleed’s legs. Crunch. Khaleed crushed a head under his boot like a ripe melon.

​"No," Orchid answered shortly. His red sword moved with terrifying precision. A thrust to an eye socket, a horizontal slash to a neck. Efficient. Cold. "But whatever they are, they haven’t come to negotiate."

​"Tsk, aren’t you surprised at all? This is insane."

​"I’ve seen too many insane things lately."

​Khaleed let out a short, dry laugh. "Insane? This isn’t insane anymore. This is Hell changing its address."

​Then, a new sound emerged from behind the southern dust.

​It wasn’t the groan of a corpse, nor the scream of a human. It was the sound of horse hooves. But the sound was heavy, possessing a metallic rhythm that struck the earth. Thud, thud, thud. The dust ahead thinned slightly, revealing a rider frozen in the middle of the chaos.

​The horse... was no longer whole. Large chunks of flesh were missing from its neck, revealing a blackened spine. Its eyes no longer had pupils, instead emitting a cold, pale blue fire. The horse’s armor was rusted and dented, yet it stood with the tangible authority of death.

​Upon it sat a knight two meters tall. His black armor seemed fused to his massive frame, riddled with old sword gashes. His helm was sealed tight, leaving only two eye-slits glowing with the same blue fire. In his right hand, he dragged a massive greatsword—as long as a human body—which left a deep trench in the red soil. Sreeet...

​Death Knight.

​It stopped directly in front of Orchid and Khaleed. The dead horse snorted, emitting a hiss of steam from its rotting nostrils. Sssshhh. The Death Knight did not speak. He merely raised his colossal sword with one hand, pointing it directly at the two of them.

​"Hah... is he part of this ’weird’ entourage too?" Khaleed asked. His joking tone was gone. He tightened his stance, gripping his cleaver with both hands.

​"I suspect he’s the master of ceremonies," Orchid replied. He shifted his weight, bracing for an explosion of power.

​The Death Knight spurred his horse. The ground shook violently under the rhythmic gallop of the dead beast. The gap closed in seconds. The greatsword was raised high, cleaving the air with a sharp whistling sound.

​Orchid didn’t wait for the strike to land. He lunged forward, staying lower than the enemy’s reach. His target wasn’t the rider, but the horse’s legs. Sring! His red energy blade sliced through the horse’s front legs like a knife through butter. The horse shrieked—a high-pitched sound escaping from a cracked ribcage—and tumbled forward.

​The Death Knight didn’t panic. Before his mount hit the ground, he leaped nimbly, landing with a heavy metallic clang. His greatsword immediately swung horizontally toward Orchid’s waist. Orchid raised his sword to parry.

​CLANG!

​The impact felt like being hit by a massive sledgehammer. Orchid felt a violent vibration travel from his palms to his shoulders. Gulp. He swallowed hard, his feet pushed back three steps, carving small ruts in the red mud. The Death Knight gave him no respite. The next attack came from above—heavy, brutal, and filled with killing intent.

​Khaleed tried to enter from the blind side, his fire cleaver aiming for the gap in the black armor’s armpit. However, without looking, the Death Knight caught Khaleed’s wrist with his bare hand. The grip was like an iron vice.

​"Oh, damn it—" Khaleed groaned as his wrist bones began to creak. The Death Knight lifted Khaleed’s body and tossed him like a ragdoll five meters away. Crash.

​The Death Knight refocused on Orchid. He raised his sword high with both hands. The blue aura in his eyes flashed brighter. Orchid knew this strike would end everything if he made one wrong move.

​He didn’t retreat. Instead, Orchid took another step forward.

​As the massive sword descended, Orchid ducked so low his cloak brushed the dirt. He let the colossal blade pass just an inch above his back. Spinning, he thrust his red sword upward, aiming for the narrow gap beneath the opponent’s helm.

​Srak!

​The red energy blade pierced the Death Knight’s neck, severing the connection between armor and bone. The black helm was sent flying, rolling across the ground with a clink... clink... sound. The blue fire in the eyes within the helm flickered for a moment, then went out completely. The massive body remained standing rigidly for a few seconds, as if its soul were protesting the forced stop, before finally toppling forward with a deafening metallic thud.

​Orchid straightened up, his breathing steady but deep. He brushed the dust from his cloak, turning toward Khaleed who was picking himself up while clutching his bruised wrist.

​"Hmm, is that all?" Khaleed asked, trying to smile despite the pain on his face.

​"It seems so," Orchid answered shortly.

​But the victory felt hollow. Around them, the Plagueborne didn’t flee in terror at the sight of their leader falling. Quite the opposite. They seemed to lose all restraint. Their movements, once slow, became wild, brutal, and uncontrollable.

​A Brassvale captain nearby was swarmed by five living corpses at once. He screamed for help, but his cry vanished as one of the corpses tore his throat out with bare hands. This battlefield had become a massive banquet table where there were no longer friends or foes. There was only prey.

​Orchid stared at the sea of corpses continuing to crawl out from the southern dust. His hand gripping the sword trembled slightly—not out of fear, but because he realized a bitter truth.

​"We can’t kill them all, Orchid," Khaleed muttered, now standing beside him with his dimmed cleaver. "There are too many. Tsk, thousands, maybe more."

​"I know."

​"So? Do we run or die here?"

​Orchid didn’t answer. For the first time, he felt his sword wasn’t large enough to cleave through this storm of death. In the distance, behind the thick black dust, something far more massive was still waiting for its turn to step forward.