The winds howled across the abandoned military base, whistling through the skeletal remains of rusted towers and shattered walls. The once heavily fortified structure was now nothing more than a graveyard of broken steel and twisted memories, a silent witness to the apocalypse that had swept the world. Under the fading light of dusk, the old base was a storm waiting to awaken.
The zombies swarmed like a tide, their groans rising like an eerie choir. Their twisted limbs, once human, now thrashed and clawed through the debris, driven by an insatiable hunger. Mutant variants led the horde: two grotesque monstrosities with elongated arms, jagged bones protruding from their backs like broken wings, and pustules that pulsed with diseased energy. They pushed through the masses, their glowing eyes fixed on a single target — the young man standing defiantly at the heart of the chaos.
Noctus breathed heavily, his chest rising and falling with the rhythm of battle. Dust and blood smeared his face, but his dark eyes were sharp and unwavering. In his left arm, Artemis clung tightly to him, her arms looped around his neck, face buried against his shoulder to shield herself from the swirling madness around them. She was injured when trying to save him from the mutant zombies' tentacles, now unable to fight, but her presence reminded him why he could not afford to falter.
The tentacles — grown from some twisted mutant zombies' mouths — lashed wildly. They wrapped around Noctus and Artemis with relentless force, trying to drag them into the oncoming swarm. For a moment, the pressure around his chest made it difficult to breathe. But then something deep within him stirred.
It began as a spark, a whisper, the distant memory of a voice.
He remembered the day he had first awakened. The day Boboiboy stood before him and spoke those words that shaped his existence. The memory rushed back with the clarity of a storm breaking through the silence. He remembered the skies of the subconscious world, the endless horizon of swirling winds. He remembered the way Boboiboy's voice carried warmth and command simultaneously.
"You are a storm without borders, a wind that cannot be chained," Boboiboy had said. "But even the fiercest wind can become a blade if it finds its form. Tempest, will you fight for yourself… or let the storm fade?"
Those words were branded deep within him. Back then, he had chosen restraint. He had followed the balance set between him, Thunderstorm Earthquake. But now, everything was different. The rules of the old world no longer applied. There was no more balance to maintain, no master to follow. There was only survival.
The spark ignited.
The winds responded to his will.
First, they unraveled the tentacles. A sudden gust burst from beneath his feet, slicing through the constricting vines like invisible blades. The tentacles recoiled violently, shrieking with an otherworldly noise before being ripped apart entirely by a spiraling current that erupted from Noctus's body. Artemis gasped, feeling the pressure shift around them.
Then, the winds gathered.
They circled him like loyal beasts, picking up speed with each passing second. What began as a breeze quickly escalated into a full-blown hurricane. Dust, broken glass, and the decayed flesh of nearby zombies were swept up into the growing maelstrom. The horde, which had closed in confidently just moments ago, now found itself stumbling backward, unable to advance against the tempestuous barrier forming around Noctus.
The two mutant zombies roared in frustration, their claws digging into the ground as they tried to push through the gale. But even their monstrous strength was not enough to easily resist the storm's expanding force. The wind wrapped around them, biting into their skin like countless razors.
At the eye of this tornado stood Noctus, his expression transforming from grim determination to something fiercer, more primal. His hair whipped wildly in the storm, his clothes snapping like banners in the wind. His aura pulsed — not with the hesitant control of a restrained Tempest, but with the untamed fury of a liberated storm.
He looked down at Artemis briefly, her wide eyes reflecting the pale blue light swirling around them. She trusted him completely, and that trust became the final catalyst.
He raised his free hand toward the sky, feeling the storm answer.
"Gather together," he commanded, his voice merging with the howl of the wind. "Become a weapon that cuts through all chains."
The air itself twisted in response. The currents converged above him, forming a spiraling vortex that compressed tighter and tighter. Sparks of wind energy crackled, like miniature lightning bolts dancing through the air. The swirling pressure reached a crescendo, and then he brought his arm down like a conductor leading the storm to its climax.
"Awaken… Razorgale!"
The winds exploded outward, then collapsed inward all at once, taking shape in his grasp. What formed in his right hand was a weapon unlike any other — a scythe forged not of steel, but of condensed storm. Its crescent blade shimmered with a pale blue glow, swirling whirlwind patterns appearing and fading across its surface as if the weapon itself were alive. The handle bore faint wind etchings, ancient and flowing. This was Razorgale, the manifestation of the Tempest within him, reborn.
Noctus tightened his grip on the scythe. It was weightless yet carried unimaginable force. It was freedom itself, given form.
He turned his body in a single, fluid motion — a perfect 360-degree rotation — Artemis held firmly in one arm, the scythe arcing through the air with terrifying precision. As his spin reached its peak, he unleashed his attack.
"Crescent Edge!"
From the blade erupted a colossal crescent-shaped slash made of concentrated storm energy. It screamed through the air, its sheer velocity tearing up the ground beneath it, leaving deep trenches in its wake. The two mutant zombies sensed the danger and instinctively leaped aside, their monstrous agility barely saving them from the initial strike.
But they had underestimated the nature of a storm.
Mid-flight, the massive crescent split apart into dozens, then hundreds of smaller slashes, each one spinning violently like blades caught in a hurricane. They scattered in all directions, weaving unpredictable trajectories. The zombies didn't even have time to react.
The first wave struck the nearby horde. Bodies were lifted into the air and torn apart mid-flight, limbs severed, heads cleaved cleanly from necks. The mutants tried to shield themselves, but the smaller slashes converged on them like a pack of wolves.
Some slashes cut through their legs, others carved into their torsos, and still others spun around to strike from behind. Blood, black and foul-smelling, sprayed into the air, mixing with the dust and wind to create a grotesque storm of death.
The two mutants, once towering threats, were shredded under the relentless assault. Their roars of defiance turned into gurgles of pain before their massive bodies were torn asunder, chunks of flesh and bone hurled across the ruined base like scraps caught in a tornado.
The [Crescent Edge] storm finally dissipated, leaving only silence and the faint whistle of residual wind currents. Around Noctus lay a field of devastation — hundreds of zombies reduced to twisted remains, and the mutants reduced to nothing more than mutilated husks.
Noctus stood at the center, floating in the air, Razorgale gleaming in his hand, Artemis clutching him tightly. His chest heaved, but his eyes burned with a newfound intensity. This was not the hesitant Tempest of the past. This was Noctus — the storm unbound.
The winds circled him once more, not in chaos, but in reverence. The storm had chosen its master anew.