Korvath died in waves.
The first wave was silence—unnatural, crystalline, perfect. Winter's Kiss Version Two had flash-frozen the city so thoroughly that even the echoes died in the air, trapped in frost. The streets became glass sheets. The towers became sculptures. Bodies became statues—some reaching, some shielding, some mid-scream.
The second wave came minutes later.
It was sound.
A far-off rumbling… then marching. Hundreds. Thousands. Metal on ice. Clubs dragging. Hooves clattering. The crushed growl of boots sinking into frozen slush.
The Valerian Empire had arrived.
And with them, the deep, guttural chanting of the Dargath war priests—voices like grinding stone echoing through shattered alleys.
The third wave came last.
It was shattering.
Cracks rippled through buildings. Ice fractured under the weight of armies. Roofs collapsed. Frost-coated walls buckled. Every collapse sent glittering shards raining across the city like dying stars.
Underground, beneath all that ruin, the survivors clung to flickering torches.
Hokuto Chika pressed her palm against the tunnel wall, feeling tremors crawl through stone. "That's not aftershock," she whispered. "That's marching."
Jose gripped his axe, breath steaming in the cold air. "Then we move before they find these tunnels."
Mikage Reiken punched his fist into his open palm, the crack echoing like a blade drawn from a sheath. "I sense three entrances already breached. They're spreading down here."
Across the chamber, Lia Shinsei stood with her staff braced against the floor, blue mana trembling around her like an unsteady lantern flame. She had already burned too much healing spells on partial-frozen survivors. She was pale. Breathing shallowly.
"Korvath is lost," she said quietly. "We shift to evacuation protocol."
A dozen adventurers nodded grimly.
Jyurei Miyata, a young but sharp-eyed archer, adjusted her bowstring with trembling fingers. "How many got frozen on the surface?"
"Don't think about it," Juweru Kasumura muttered, daggers twirling restlessly in her hands. "We're the ones still walking."
Fukugen Dokumizu planted the butt of his spear into the stone floor. "And we keep walking south. We survive."
A faint scrape echoed behind them.
Seikaku Entēki approached with a squad of guards, bow drawn. "They're in the tunnels. Move."
No more arguing. No more hope for holding ground.
They began the retreat.
But Korvath wasn't done collapsing.
A far tunnel wall burst inward—ice and rubble exploding as a massive ogre forced its bulk into the underground. Frost clung to its shoulders like armor, and two Valerian spear-soldiers slipped through the opening behind it.
The ogre roared, its breath freezing the dust midair.
Seikaku reacted first.
"Backline, fire!"
Kenji Katsuragi and Hana Hyakui dashed into view from another corridor, bows already nocked.
Kenji's voice boomed through the chamber. "Overcharge Shot! - Eagle's eye! "
The arrow he loosed cracked the sound barrier, streaking like a burning comet. Hana's shot followed a heartbeat later, a precise piercing strike aiming for a seam in the ogre's chest.
Both struck true.
The ogre staggered—but did not fall.
Frost reinforced its flesh like enchanted armor. It barreled forward.
Mikage sprinted past the archers, fists blazing with pale gold.
"Fist of Soul! - Requiem! "
His punch slammed into the ogre's kneecap with a thunderous snap. The giant creature collapsed sideways, shaking the whole chamber. Its howl rattled the tunnels, torches flickering.
Jose leapt in, axe burying into the ogre's throat.
"Down you go!"
The beast thrashed once, then stilled.
But the Valerian soldiers were already inside.
Anzuyi Bizen dissolved into shadows—the torches bent toward her like bowing flames—as she slipped behind one soldier.
"Shadow World - Twin Daggers!."
Her dagger flashed once, and the man fell without even a sound.
The second soldier spun toward her, spear thrusting, but Juweru crashed into him first, both daggers stabbing upward, finding a gap between helmet and gorget.
He dropped like a sack of stones.
More marching echoed from far tunnels. Too many.
Seikaku pointed south. "Move! Now!"
They fled deeper—corridors trembling around them, dust falling in tired trickles, the stench of cold iron growing thicker.
By the time they reached the old southern shaft, the surface had already fractured open. Pale daylight spilled in through jagged holes where the surface ice had collapsed.
Jose climbed first, shouldering aside frozen rubble to widen the exit.
"Clear! But the city…"
They emerged into the ruins of southern Korvath.
Everything was breaking.
The giant tower at the city center toppled in slow agony, its frozen supports shattering like brittle twigs. It crashed down in a cascade of ice and powdered stone, sending a wind of glittering debris across the streets.
People screamed under the rubble. Some were alive but trapped inside ice that cracked slowly, painfully.
Valerian soldiers marched past them. Ogres smashed frozen houses apart. Dargath warriors dragged screaming survivors from hiding places.
And above it all…
that eerie blue afterglow still burned faintly in the sky.
Hana steadied her breath. "We can't fight this. Not all of this."
Kenji drew an arrow anyway. "We buy enough time for whoever we can save."
Seikaku grabbed his shoulder. "Kenji. You saw what they did to Frostholm. To Korvath. You know the truth."
Kenji's jaw clenched.
"…We retreat."
Lia raised her staff and uttered a string of blue-mana incantations. A thin barrier shimmered around the group—barely strong enough to block stray frost or debris, but it would keep them moving.
"Head for the forest," she whispered. "Orleaf is the fallback point."
They moved through collapsing streets.
Everywhere was death.
A frozen merchant snapped in half when a wall fell. Adventurers fought Valerian skirmishers in narrow alleys, their shouts muffled by the frost-filled air. A lone Ostorian guard, bleeding heavily, dragged a half-frozen child toward safety.
Hokuto sprinted to him and took the child. "Go! We'll cover you!"
The guard nodded once, then charged a Valerian knight with nothing but a broken spear.
He didn't last long.
An ogre barreled into their route, club raised. Jyurei shrieked and fired a desperate shot. The arrow bounced harmlessly off the ogre's frozen hide.
Fukugen stepped forward.
"Behind me!"
His spear glowed faint green—desperation igniting his mana.
He thrust upward, striking the ogre's jaw. The massive creature reeled. Mikage leapt in beside him, both men hitting the monster again and again until it finally toppled.
But one death did nothing to the tide.
More ogres marched from the north. Valerian troops encircled the plaza. The Dargath priests raised their bone staffs, preparing another frost chant that would bury this quarter in ice.
Lia gripped her staff tighter, eyes burning.
Her mana was gone. She had nothing left but will.
"We run!" she shouted. "All units—run!"
The group sprinted through the ruins.
Behind them, the Dargath chant unleashed a storm of blue shards that devoured the street.
Ahead, the south gate collapsed under the weight of icy rubble—but a narrow gap remained.
Their escape route.
Jose forced himself through first, breaking chunks of ice aside with bloody hands. "Through! Go!"
Hokuto pushed the child in first. Juweru helped Jyurei squeeze through. Mikage held the rear, smashing aside any soldier that tried to interrupt their retreat.
Lia crawled through, gasping as she felt real sunlight on her face.
Kenji squeezed through last, firing one final arrow behind him to deter pursuit.
They emerged into the forest south of Korvath.
The city behind them groaned—an entire metropolis collapsing in on itself. A final shudder, a sigh of ice, and then the central district caved, sending a plume of frost-dust into the sky like a dying volcano.
Lia leaned against a tree, shaking.
"Korvath… is gone."
No one answered.
The forest was too quiet.
Even the birds seemed afraid to sing.
Seikaku scanned the treeline. "We head for Orleaf. Stay low. Stay silent."
Hokuto nodded. "Anyone who fell behind… we honor them by living."
Anzuyi whispered from the shadows. "Valeria and Dargath will come south fast. We must be faster."
Jose hefted his axe. "Then Orleaf it is."
They walked.
One step.
Then another.
A long, painful march through the dark.
Behind them, Korvath continued to fall—stone by stone, memory by memory—until all that remained of the proud northern city was a glittering grave of frost and smoke.
None of them looked back again.
The survivors headed south, toward Orleaf.
Toward the next battlefield.
Toward the end of Ostoria.