The road bent like a slow, tired sigh, leading them toward the stone silhouette of Korvath. Dawn hadn't fully broken yet—only a smudge of pale gold behind the clouds. The caravan wheels creaked, tired from the long sprint through the wilderness. Dust clung to every surface: their clothes, the wood, their skin. No one spoke.
Then the smell reached them. Not the scent of fields or morning forest dew—smoke. Bitter. Heavy. Thick with something that used to be alive.
Omina lifted her head from Yoshiya's shoulder.
"…Burning?"
Yoshiya didn't answer right away. He simply stared ahead.
Korvath, once scarred but proud, now bore pillars of black smoke rising from the rear of the city. The gates were open—not in welcome—but because they were tired of closing.
Soldiers stood guard, but their armor was dented, scratched, and blood-marked, their posture slumped rather than disciplined. Some had their arms in slings. Others leaned on spears not from duty, but because their bodies needed something to hold them up.
They passed through the gate.
Children were piling ash-soaked logs. Priests, red-eyed from weeping, were chanting. Funeral pyres crackled in long rows, each flame licking up toward the grey sky.
Yoshiya tightened his grip on the mana crystal in his palm until it dug into his skin.
Zentake whistled lightly.
"Well," he murmured, "someone's been busy while we were gone."
Even his grin lacked its usual wicked shine.
Nogare didn't slow the caravan.
"This is how a city looks after a war," he said. "Victory is not… clean."
A group of soldiers passed them, carrying a body wrapped in a scorched crimson mantle.
Yoshiya recognized the symbol on the cloth.
The War Hall standard.
Voices followed behind the procession:
"General Varric… didn't make it back."
"He held the line to the very end."
"We won, but… look at us."
"The Kobold King escaped. They say he vanished into the chasm."
The world felt too quiet for the noise in Yoshiya's head.
He looked at Omina.
Her lips parted, her voice barely a whisper.
"This is… what victory looks like?"
Yoshiya didn't have an answer.
He thought of Giggleburg, swallowed in blue fire.
The towers collapsing.
The roar of the crystal when Omina struck it—her berserk skill flaring like a star inside her.
He thought of how the city melted behind them, becoming glass and memory.
He thought of Zentake laughing.
He thought of the people who had lived there.
His chest tightened.
---
Nogare parked the caravan near the guild yard. He climbed down slowly, as though his bones were older than his body.
The yard itself was silent. No cheering crowds. No guild officers rushing to tally loot. Only survivors, sitting together on crates and stone, staring into nothing at all.
Mireina spotted them first.
She looked smaller somehow. Her hair was unbraided. Her bag hung unused at her side.
"Yoshiya… Omina…"
She tried to smile, but it cracked.
"You're safe. That's… good."
Omina stepped forward, gripping Mireina's hands.
"What happened?" she asked softly.
Mireina took a shaky breath.
"The siege ended two days ago. We held the walls, but… General Varric…"
Her voice wavered.
"He fought until the battlements fell. He saved us. And then he was gone."
Zentake scratched his cheek.
"Well. Less competition for my job market. Hero slots opening up."
Mireina looked at him with a stare that could have killed stone.
Zentake raised his hands.
"I was kidding. Mostly."
Nogare exhaled slowly.
"War takes. That is its nature."
Omina lowered her eyes.
"We burned Giggleburg. We left nothing standing…"
Mireina blinked.
"You… what?"
Yoshiya didn't answer immediately. His hand drifted once more to the crystal shard in his grip.
It pulsed—soft, rhythmic—like a heartbeat.
Mireina's gaze went to it.
"…What did you bring back from there?"
Zentake grinned, showing teeth.
"Treasure. Knowledge. Power. Very shiny power."
Nogare's tone cut him short.
"It is not a victory to celebrate."
They all turned toward the pyres.
The flames rose and rose and rose.
And the city of Korvath watched them burn.
Yoshiya took Omina's hand.
Before Nogare could speak, Mireina stepped forward, her voice unsteady.
"The Kobold King… is still alive."
The words fell like a stone in water.
Yoshiya's breath caught.
Omina stiffened beside him, fingers tightening around his.
Zentake, however, tilted his head—then grinned, slow and delighted.
"Well now. That means round two… and better loot."
Mireina shook her head.
"It's worse than that. During the siege, another creature appeared. Something we've never seen in these parts."
Her eyes darkened, remembering.
"The Ogre King. It tore through three units before we finally forced it back into the woods."
Omina swallowed.
"That's… two kings. Two armies."
Yoshiya felt the mana crystal pulse again—once, twice—like a warning more than a heartbeat.
Nogare exhaled, low.
"The world isn't done testing us."
Zentake slung his sack of glittering trophies over his shoulder, the trinkets and jewels inside clattering like laughter.
"Perfect."
He turned toward the city—toward the smoke, the pyres, the quiet.
"I've been getting bored."
Omina looked at Yoshiya, worry flickering behind her eyes.
He didn't hide his own.
Together, they watched Zentake walk ahead—smiling.
They followed—uneasy.
And somewhere beyond the horizon, two crowns waited in the dark.