The roar of cannon fire shook the clouds themselves, each blast flashing bright enough to paint the sky in bursts of white steam and orange flame. Ironhelm's anti-air batteries—massive steam-driven guns mounted along the full circumference of its walls—tracked and fired with mechanical precision, shredding winged demons out of the air the moment they came within range.
This invasion wasn't like the others. Not the scattered raids of a few hundred demons. Not even the larger assaults of a couple thousand.
Ironhelm was the most advanced city in all of Aetheria, a fortress of steel, gears, and ingenuity, wrapped in impenetrable walls and guarded by technology no other city could dream of matching. Taking it required an army, tens of thousands of demons, and so tens of thousands had been sent.
Two demon knights acted as consuls, each commanding fifty named horned demons of elite status, disciplined and deadly. Behind them marched legions of armed and armored fiends, hellfire siege engines, infernal cannons hurling molten shots. And above them all, leading the entire force, stood of course, a Demon Lord.
And yet, despite everything…
"We have yet to even breach their walls!" a demon knight in indigo armor snarled as he slammed his gauntleted fist onto the war table. The map rattled. A few carved unit markers toppled over.
"Their defenses are far more formidable than we expected," remarked a red-skinned, winged demon with one missing eye and a horn snapped clean halfway down its length. He spoke with a grim resignation that contrasted the knight's boiling temper.
The tent flaps burst inward. A demon knight in lapis-colored armor stepped through.
"Brother," he greeted, nodding respectfully to the indigo knight before glancing at the horned demon. "Axia."
"What is the situation?" the indigo demon knight demanded, pushing himself upright from the table, jaw clenched.
"We have made little progress," the lapis demon knight answered bluntly. His tone carried the flat exhaustion of someone who had watched too many underlings die for nothing. "Their contraptions continue to hold the line. The automata, steel constructs with blades, rifles, shock rods, tear through our soldiers before they can even get close."
The indigo demon knight let out a long, frustrated sigh, shoulders sagging for a moment. "And our siege engines?" he asked, holding onto a sliver of hope.
The lapis demon knight shook his head. "Worse. Something—some kind of long-range contraption—has taken out eight of our twenty engines." He reached into a pouch and set something heavy onto the table.
A mangled slug of metal. Nearly the size of his palm.
The indigo demon knight leaned in closer. "Is that…tungsten?"
"It is," the lapis demon knight confirmed grimly. "According to the few who survived the hits, the projectile pierces the plating cleanly—then explodes from the inside. We have not seen the sniper. Have not even seen the glint of their weapon. But if we do not find them, more engines are going to fall."
Axia exhaled slowly as another distant volley shook the ground, the tent's supports creaking.
The indigo demon knight clicked his tongue, jaw tightening. Winning this battle wasn't just unlikely. At this point, even reaching the city walls was starting to feel like an impossible dream.
"Axia, I want you to take the soldiers you trust most, lead them along the flank, close to the walls but away from the main assault, and try to disable the anti-air," the indigo demon knight ordered. Axia bowed his head in a crisp, disciplined motion. "As you wish, Sir knight." He turned and strode out of the tent, horns scraping lightly against the canvas as the flaps fell shut behind him.
The lapis-armored demon watched him leave, then shifted his attention back to his brother. "Do you believe he can succeed?" he asked, voice low and edged with quiet uncertainty.
The indigo knight studied the map spread across the table, fingertips resting on the inked outline of Ironhelm's massive walls. "I do not know," he admitted. "But I trust him." The lapis knight tilted his head slightly, a questioning expression hidden behind his visor, yet he chose not to voice his doubt.
The ground shuddered under another distant impact before the indigo demon knight spoke again. "Where is Lord Redgrave?" he asked, lifting his gaze.
"He went to the front lines himself—to confront the hero of the city," the lapis knight answered. The indigo knight's eyes narrowed behind the helmet.
"We have been absent from the battlefield for too long. Come, brother. I have no confidence in Lord Redgrave triumphing over the hero of this city." He pushed away from the table and made for the exit.
"Agreed, brother," the lapis knight replied, falling in step behind him.
Meanwhile, the front lines had devolved into a merciless slaughter. And if they hadn't been demons, one might have pitied them. They were David charging Goliath with neither strength nor strategy—just endless bodies feeding the steel grinder that was Ironhelm's defense.
An armored drakorath raised a warhammer to crush an Ironguard sentinel, only for the construct to drive its metal fist straight through the demon's chest, tearing him in half before stepping forward without pause, gears whirring, blades unfolding. Drakoraths were ripped apart. Imps were minced by rotary saws. Sharaykthun convulsed as shock-rods overloaded their nerves. Veinblood cherubs exploded into pieces as precision rifle fire shattered their bodies. Winged fiends—reylfs like Axia—were clubbed out of the sky by automated hammer-arms. It wasn't a battle; it was a systematic, methodical extermination.
Just as the demon ranks wavered and the first signs of retreat rippled through them, a streak of crimson carved through the battlefield. Ironguard sentinels split cleanly in half, their frames collapsing in showers of sparking gears and leaking oil. The bloodbath became an oilbath in seconds.
"No one retreats. You will push through!" the Demon Lord barked, voice cracking like a whip across the battlefield. Demons who had already turned began forcing themselves back into the fray.
Redgrave wiped a splatter of oil from his fingertips, frowning at the smear. Then he felt the presence behind him—the one he had come here for.
"There you are," he muttered, turning.
Standing amidst the carnage was a man with jet-black hair and lifeless raven eyes.
Aeron Wight. The One Feared By Death.