Chapter 372: An Army of One

“There’s something ahead,” Allison warned, raising her blade.

As they drew closer, torchlight began to cut through the haze. Flames shivered against the cold wind, scattered like embers stubbornly resisting the storm. Ahead, between shadow and snow, a line of soldiers emerged, exhausted, crusted in ice, but still standing.

Arrows whipped through the air, skimming past them.

“We’re friends!” Quinn shouted, brandishing a torch and waving it so the archers could see them.

The volleys stopped. As the torches approached, silhouettes on the tower grew clearer. There was no one else around, only them, the cold, and the drifting snow.

“Commander Ronan?” one of the guards called down, voice uncertain.

“Status, quickly. We don’t have time,” Ronan answered, his tone clipped, the wind swallowing much of it.

The guard dropped from the tower, landing hard in the snow. His face was pale, eyes hollow. “Visibility’s awful. People don’t even know which way the castle is. We’re marking the route.” He pointed to lines of burning wood laid out on the ground, arranged like a giant arrow. The fires fought to stay lit, dwindling under the icy gusts.

Other soldiers climbed down, some carrying torches, others scanning the darkness with fearful eyes.

“Just follow the wind,” Luke said. “It’s blowing straight toward the castle.”

They exchanged information in quick, clipped bursts. With each sentence, the situation revealed itself as worse than they’d feared. The biggest threat were the Guardian Generals, but Luke knew the invisible Captains could be nearby as well, unpredictable and deadly.

Danger hummed in the air, as if the atmosphere itself might snap.

They ran on, boots sinking into the drifts, their footfalls lost beneath the keening wind. They passed rows of abandoned cannons, laced with a fine crust of ice. Flags hung limp from their masts, shredded and colorless.

When they finally reached the main line, the scene opened into a panorama of frozen hell. Undead swarmed in every direction, tearing into soldiers who fought in tight circles, backs pressed together, trying to hold any semblance of formation. Screams, the clash of metal, and the crackle of failing bonfires blended into a chaotic chorus. As the group arrived, several undead pivoted and surged toward them.

Princess Charlie wasted no time. Sword in hand, she lunged forward, cleaving a path through the onrushing bodies. Soldiers rallied behind her, spears and shields raised. Wardens roared and struck with brute force, while Ronan bellowed orders, steering men through the chaos as best he could.

A short distance away, a Guardian General hammered into a cluster of archers attempting to encircle him. Arrows glanced off his armor, scattering harmlessly.

Luke’s gaze drifted toward the third fortress. Even through the blizzard it was visible: torches burned along the ramparts, and a fire was gaining ground inside the walls, throwing an eerie light across the night. Another General battered the wall with massive fists, widening a breach. All around them, the battlefield unraveled. Fireballs streaked across the sky and shattered against the ice, each impact making the ground tremble.

“Go!” Ronan shouted. “I’ll deal with this General. Help the people in the fortress, I’ll make a way!”

Ronan charged forward like a wall of iron. His gauntlets flared as he activated Iron Skin, and his first punch shattered a corpse’s skull with a sound like splitting stone. He shoved what was left of the body aside and kept moving, plowing through the horde with crushing blows.

“It’s Ronan!” one of the soldiers shouted, loosing arrows to cover him.

“If I heal you, you can still fight,” Jack said, his tone steady, unshaken.

More undead closed in. Luke spun the kukris in his hands and hurled one into the nearest creature. The blade punched through its skull.

[You have slain a…]

Another lunged. Luke ducked, pivoted, and slit its throat.

[You have slain a…]
[You have slain a…]
[You have slain a…]

Everywhere he looked, the horde stretched endlessly—a sea of death and screaming steel. And in the middle of it all, one thought cut through his focus like a blade: how the hell were they supposed to get the civilians through this and into the castle?

“Luke!” Allison’s voice snapped through the noise. She was already beside him. “We have to take out the Generals! We’re running out of time!”

He nodded, falling into stride beside her.

Charlie ran with them. The fortress wall loomed ahead, its rear section blown open—proof that a General had already come through. They slipped through the wreckage and entered the inner courtyard. The sight froze their blood. Wardens everywhere. Dozens of them, scattered among mangled corpses. No civilians in sight. Arrows rained down from the towers above, the defenders firing in desperation.

“Where is everyone?” Allison shouted up to one of the archers.

“They’re inside the building! Locked themselves in!” came the answer.

Charlie didn’t hesitate. She tore through the enemy line, each punch igniting with a burst of fire. Every hit from her Flaming Fist lit the courtyard in flashes of orange and gold. At the center stood the Guardian General, hammering against the main doors where the civilians hid. Each strike made the gate quake, splintering wood and shaking the ground. Soldiers tried to intervene but were swatted aside like insects.

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Charlie sprinted forward, leaping high. She focused every ounce of stamina into her fist. The air cracked as she triggered Steel Fist. The impact landed clean across the monster’s head, a sharp, thunderous blow that echoed across the courtyard. The General was sent flying, crashing into a cluster of Wardens and undead. From the walls, archers seized the chance. Arrows poured down in a storm, thudding into the creature’s black armor.

Allison followed up, katana drawn. She leapt with a double jump, sliding through the air, and shouted, “Target the undead and the Wardens! Thin their numbers!”

The General rose with a roar, blue fire leaking from fractures in its armor. Charlie and Allison moved in tandem, striking from both sides—fast, ruthless, relentless. Then came a sound that made every fighter freeze. The courtyard’s main gates blew open with a detonation that rattled stone and bone alike. A second General stepped through, dragging massive chains coiled around its arms.

[Midnight Warden General — Lvl 80]

Behind him, the horde poured in. Undead of every kind—soldiers, beasts, grotesque abominations—shoved and clawed their way through the breach, desperate to flood the courtyard.