For a long, breathless moment, no one spoke.

  The figure lounging on the dead Alpha was unmistakably male, his features angular and ethereal. His eyes held not pupils, but a swirling, luminous field of starlight. Yet, for all his divine appearance, his expression was one of profound melancholy, a deep and weary sadness that seemed to weigh down his very posture.

  Beside him rested a golden jar, intricately carved. The man lifted it, tipped it back, and let a stream of glowing liquid pour into his mouth. The substance was thick like honey, glowing faintly gold as it passed his lips. He drank deeply, then sighed—a sound that carried strangely through the chamber, soft but resonant.

  A sudden growl cut the silence.

  A lone wolf, less unsteady than the others, gathered itself and lunged at him with a snarl. The man didn't even look. His hand shot out with casual, impossible speed, catching the beast by the scruff of its neck as easily as a man plucking a rabbit from a hutch.

  “Entertain me,” he said, voice low and beautiful, echoing like music through the cavern. “I need more distractions to lighten my mood.”

  He tipped the golden jar again—not into his own mouth, but into the wolf’s. The creature thrashed, gagging on the glowing honey. Then it went limp, eyes glassy, legs wobbling. It gave a hiccup and promptly fell flat on its snout.

  A faint smirk touched the man’s lips.

  Lucon swallowed hard. “We should go,” he whispered to Mavor and the others. “Now.”

  Mavor didn’t take his eyes off the figure. “The hunt’s not over, milord. There are still beasts about…though I wonder…” He tilted his head slightly. “Could he be friendly? If he killed the Alpha, we may have similar aims.”

  Kaeson frowned. “Or he may have killed it for his own reasons. Either way, I wouldn’t count him as an ally yet.”

  The men murmured uneasily, torn between awe and fear. None could look away from the haloed stranger.

  Lucon’s gaze lingered on the golden light circling the man’s head. His mind took him back to his time in the Merciful Temple, looking at the sacred imagery painted on its walls. “That halo…could he be from Nimbora?”

  One soldier’s eyes went wide. “The divine realm?!”

  The others began whispering among themselves—fragments of prayers and curses alike.

  “Quiet,” Lucon hissed. “We don’t even know what he—”

  A low growl cut him off.

  They turned. One of the wolves was staring straight at them, its glowing eyes half-lidded, body swaying drunkenly—but its fangs were bared.

  The memory of the man they’d lost earlier flashed through Lucon’s mind. Reth also perished. He couldn’t lose another one.

  “Shield wall!” he barked.

  The men obeyed on instinct, shields smashing into place just in time as the wolf lunged. The impact rattled through the formation.

  “Hold!” Mavor shouted, already surging forward in a blaze of Aura. Kaeson followed, sword drawn, both Arisen striking in unison.

  Lucon watched in mounting dread—the beast was staggering, uncoordinated, but its blows still cracked shields, its claws still ripped through steel. It was as strong as the last one.

  He glanced back toward the dead Alpha being used as a throne. The golden jar gleamed there beside the haloed man, faint trails of glowing liquid still dripping from its mouth. That honey…Whatever it was, it was no simple drink. It was changing the wolves—molding them, strengthening them.

  Lucon’s felt his adrenaline surge.

  The man with the halo was staring at them, squinting, his starlit eyes narrowing slightly as he seemed to study the skirmish. He tilted his head, as though trying to decide what he was looking at.

  But Lucon had no time to ponder his intent. More wolves were approaching, their gait uneven, their breath thick with alcohol that made his eyes sting.

  There were many of them.

  Panic prickled under Lucon’s skin. If all of them were empowered by that strange drink, they wouldn’t stand a chance. The men around him—brave, loyal—had families, children, loved ones waiting at home. He thought of their faces, of their laughter fading to silence under House Edelyn’s banners if he failed them. He thought of what would happen if both Arisen died here—the barony’s strength would drop. Rival houses would seize the moment, tearing everything his family built to pieces.

  He had no choice.

  Drawing a breath to steady his shaking voice, Lucon lifted his head and shouted toward the figure with the halo,

  “Please—help us!”

  The shield wall buckled.

  A powerful, drunken lunge from a second wolf shattered the formation, sending men flying. Kaeson cried out as he was thrown against a crystal cluster, his sword clattering from his grasp, his arm hanging limp and useless at his side.

  “Reform the line!” Mavor bellowed, his voice straining with effort as his Aura flared in violent red. He alone stood his ground, blade sweeping arcs of red light, barely keeping the creature’s claws at bay. “Form up! Reform the wall, damn you!”

  But the men were staggering, dazed, disoriented. Mavor wouldn’t last well enough alone.

  Another wolf threatened to bite his head off.

  In that moment of chaos, a memory flashed in Lucon’s mind: watching his brother Claude effortlessly channel both Mana and Aura in the training yard, jealousy burning him to cinders. Captain Mavor, then just a lieutenant, had stood beside him.

  "Do not waste your energy being jealous of the roar a lion makes, boy," Mavor had grunted. "Prove you are a lion in your own right."

  Lucon clenched his fists. That memory struck through the haze of fear like lightning.

  He surged forward.

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  “Mavor!” he shouted, sprinting to the Captain’s side. The wolf’s teeth were nearly closed around the Guard Captain’s head. Lucon’s pulse roared, and he thrust his fist forward, calling upon the only training he could rely on from the temple.

  [Merciful Fist]

  Light burst from his hand as his fist connected with the wolf’s snout—not breaking bone, but shoving it back with a concussive blast of force. The creature stumbled, its drunken legs failing it.

  “Now!” Lucon cried.

  Mavor didn’t hesitate. He spun, his Aura-blazed sword drawing a red arc through the air, and opened the wolf’s throat.

  Breathing hard, Lucon turned toward Mavor—only to see the Guard Captain glaring at him. “Stay back!” Mavor barked. “You’re still the lord’s son and we must protect your life over our own. Return to the wagons now while we cover your retreat!”

  Lucon ignored him, signaling frantically to the shaman. “Tend to Kaeson! His arm’s broken!”

  The healer ran to obey. Kaeson grimaced as the shaman took out a totem that radiated green light.

  “Too late for any of us to leave, Captain,” Lucon said with a grim countenance. “We’re surrounded.”

  Mavor followed his gaze—and his face went pale. The drunk wolves were closing in from all sides, staggering and swaying. Their breath filled the air with the sharp, cloying scent of that alcohol.

  “Shield wall! Reform!” Mavor shouted, his voice hoarse.

  The men obeyed, limping into place, some clutching shattered shields or bleeding arms. Kaeson rose shakily, his arm half-healed but willing to fight. Mavor stood tall in front of them all, red flames of Aura flaring, defiant.

  Lucon looked up into the cavern’s vastness and shouted, his voice breaking, “I humbly beseech the honorable divine of Nimbora—have pity on us lower beings who beg your aid!”

  The air shifted.

  Every sound seemed to hush—the drip of distant water, the groans of the wounded, the wheezy growls of the beasts. A white shimmer rippled through the air.

  The haloed man appeared suddenly above them before dropping down as gently as a leaf before Lucon. He swayed for a moment on his feet in landing, slightly unsteady from his drink, before regaining his composure with a dignified sniff.

  "How dare a lower being such as you," he slurred, his starlit eyes gleaming with haughty indignation, "address someone as lofty as I?"

  A few wolves lunged toward the men, oblivious to who had intruded. The haloed man didn't even look. He simply waved a dismissive hand.

  The wolves didn’t just die. They collapsed inward—crushed by unseen force, their bodies compressing until they were grotesque, spherical lumps of fur. Blood spattered the stone in wet arcs.

  Gasps rippled through the men. A few dropped their weapons. Others could only stare.

  Lucon fell to his knees, then fully bowed until his forehead touched the ground. “I am not worthy,” he said, voice trembling.

  He glanced frantically at Mavor, gesturing with his head toward the ground. The Captain hesitated, confusion flickering across his face. But Kaeson understood first—he bowed on the ground immediately.

  “We are not worthy!” he declared.

  Understanding dawned on Mavor's face, then followed suit, bowing his head and signaling sharply for the others to do the same. Together, the troop dropped to their knees, heads bowed to the stone.

  The divine figure's starlight eyes glowed brighter for a moment, a flicker of satisfaction passing over his melancholic features.

  "That's right..." he murmured to himself, so quietly only Lucon, who was closest, could hear. "I am still, in a way, divine to these lesser creatures…"

  Lucon didn’t understand. The words seemed not meant for them, but for himself.

  The look on the divine man’s face was one Lucon knew all too well. The same smug, practiced arrogance he’d seen in nobles who saw others as insects beneath their boots.

  The wolves began to stir again, growling impatiently.

  The haloed man sighed—irritated, almost petulant—and waved his hand once more.

  The entire pack convulsed, their bones snapping in unison. One by one, they folded in on themselves, turning into neat, perfect spheres of fur.

  The cavern fell silent but for the sound of dripping blood.

  The men could only stare—ashen and trembling—at the power they had just witnessed.

  Lucon’s gaze lingered on the halo above the man’s head.

  At first, it was mesmerizing—a perfect crown of golden light like a sun. But now that he was close, it appeared differently then what Lucon thought it would be.

  It wasn’t whole.

  Fractures split across its radiant surface. Shards were missing, edges chipped and jagged. The glow within the ring sputtered occasionally, like a candle guttering in the wind.

  Lucon’s eyes widened, his breath catching as memory surfaced—the painted walls of the Merciful Temple, the murals of divinity and judgment. He remembered the figures who had fallen from the painted heavens: outcasts cast down from Nimbora for breaking divine law. Around their heads, the artists had painted not radiant halos, but shattered crowns of dim light.

  “One of the Fallen…” Lucon breathed.

  He hadn’t meant to speak. The word escaped him like a beast refusing to be caged.

  The figure’s starlit eyes turned sharply toward him. For an instant, the faint melancholy that had haunted his features vanished. Fury flared in its place, burning bright enough to bleach the air. The space around him warped like cloth pressed to flame, colors bending, the Mana Crystals along the walls dulling in its wake.

  He waved his hand as if waving off a bug.

  There was no sound, only a wet, visceral thump. To Lucon’s left, a large swath of the men—soldiers he had watched Movar personally train, men whose names he knew—simply burst. One moment they were kneeling, the next they were a fine red mist and scattered viscera, drenching the survivors in warm, coppery blood.

  The survivors stared in horror and disbelief.

  Then panic broke. Shouts. Whimpers. Prayers. The shaman dropped his totem, trembling, the mages falling down with all hope lost.

  The divine figure drifted forward, reaching Lucon then lowering his head to speak right into his ear. His face was cold and black with fury.

  “I am a Celestari,” he said, each syllable carrying the weight of judgment. “Fallen or not, I will not suffer the disrespect of a bug like you.”

  Lucon tried to move, to speak, but the air itself crushed him.

  He couldn’t breathe. His lungs burned. The weight of divine power pressing down on him was unbearable—like the cavern roof collapsing, like an ocean crashing down. His body trembled; his arms gave out, forcing his face into the dirt. Spots danced in his vision, his lungs screaming for air.

  And then, through the haze, a moment of clarity. He remembered the sneering nobles, their faces twisting at whispered rumors about them. Now, this Celestari looked at him the same way—with the same disgust. The same arrogance.

  A roar of defiance broke through the pressure. Captain Mavor, his body blazing with crimson Aura, forced himself to his knees. Kaeson, burning beside him, could only manage to sit upright, his face a mask of strain. With a Herculean effort, Mavor raised his sword, the tip trembling as he pointed it at the Celestari.

  "Don't…you dare…harm the Young Lord!" Mavor ground out.

  Lucon panicked. Of all the times for Mavor to remain dutiful—this was not the time.

  The Celestari turned his head slowly toward the captain, fury twisting his beautiful face.

  “You dare threaten me?” His voice deepened, resonant and trembling with wrath. “Do even the lower beings look down on me now—because of a mere shattered halo?”

  The pressure shifted.

  Lucon felt the crushing weight lift from his chest just enough for him to gasp. In that fleeting clarity, instinct—or maybe desperation—took over. He summoned what modicum of holy magic he had been given.

  [Protect the Weak]

  Golden light burst across his skin, a simple blessing of strength. It wouldn’t last against divine might, but it was enough.

  Lucon forced himself upright, stumbled toward Mavor, and kicked him squarely in the chest.

  “Milord—!” Mavor wheezed as he fell backward, eyes wide with confusion.

  Lucon didn’t stop. He stomped down on him once, twice—each motion deliberate, exaggerated. The Celestari’s presence of wrath faltered, confusion mingling with curiosity.

  “How dare you raise your sword at one of the most beautiful creatures in all creation!” Lucon shouted, deliberately making himself sound something between reverent and hysterical. “One of the awe-inspiring, most exuberant beings that is a Celestari! You—” another stomp—“you fool! No one, not even Nimbora itself, knows how important the Celestari are to the world!”

  The Celestari blinked. His fury dimmed, replaced with something like mild intrigue. The crushing pressure lightened further.

  Mavor coughed, eyes wild and uncomprehending beneath his helm.

  Leaning close, Lucon whispered fiercely, “Play along.”

  Lucon picked up one of the dead soldiers’ sword and pointed it at his men then threatened, “I’ll kill anyone who dares to disrespect the most honorable, most benevolent Celstari! Can’t you recognize one of the most divine figures in all of Nimbora?!”

  Lucon turned to the fallen divine, the broken halo grabbing his attention again. “I wouldn’t be surprised if even Nimbora is jealous of someone as magnificent and perpetual as this!”

  He winced sensing he used the wrong word, “perpetual,” but the Celestari was no longer furious. In fact, the fallen being looked rather pleased with himself.

  I was right, Lucon thought. He is like a noble.

  All he needed to do was figure out a way to use his own noble sensibilities to their advantage…without them all being massacred.