The ruins of the city had become a furnace. Blue steam hissed from cracked vents, rising through the skeletal remains of towers now drowned in shadow. The metallic tang of burnt nanites filled the air, thick enough to taste.
The battlefield had turned into a lung collapsing on itself — smoke, steam, and dust inhaling and exhaling between skyscraper skeletons with each shockwave.
Karl stood at the center of it all — or rather, Erevos did — a titan wreathed in dim, flickering azure light. The once-brilliant armor was marred with claw marks and heat fractures, the gears along his spine slowing to a sluggish crawl. Each rotation gave off a tortured creak, like metal begging for mercy.
The royal azure light that once burned like a sun across his frame now trembled, dimmer with every pulse.
Inside the cockpit, Karl's breathing was ragged. The Drive Regulator's status bars across the HUD were dipping rapidly — Vythra at 19%... 16%... 12%.
Erevos staggered through it, shedding broken gears and cracked armor like dying feathers.
Blue fire sputtered from his vents — no longer majestic, now ragged and unstable.
And inside, Agnes wasn't speaking anymore.
She was growling.
A distorted snarl cut through Karl's headset as she rerouted pressure systems.
"Sssstay with me— stay—stay—! Move, move—MOVE, Karl, I SAID MOVE!"
Her voice wasn't human now — deeper, layered, glitching between sensual fury and animal command.
The Feral mode was in full bloom.
The external sensors flared red — dozens, then hundreds of demon heat signatures closing in again. From the city streets, shadows surged like a black tide, the demons' eyes glowing scarlet through the dust.
Erevos pivoted, throwing up a Nanite Shield just in time to intercept a barrage of organic projectiles. The shield shuddered, gear edges spinning, but the pressure was unrelenting.
Karl forced Erevos forward, but the joints groaned under him.
A Berserker demon tackled him from the side, pinning him into a building wall. Cracks spiderwebbed across concrete. The weight crushed the mech's ribs inward.
The impact nearly fried Karl's neural link.
White-hot pain lanced through his temples.
"Ghh—!"
He bit down hard, hands shaking on the controls.
Agnes let out a feral roar into his ear.
"HOLD STILL— I'LL—TEAR THAT THING—OFF YOU—!"
She overloaded the left arm actuators.
Erevos's limb spasmed, then punched so hard the entire forearm armor cracked.
The demon went flying.
Karl sucked in a breath, chest tight.
"Agnes— the arm—"
"SHUT UP— YOU NEED IT GONE—!"
The cockpit rattled violently as another wave of demons crashed into them.
Rendracers swarmed the legs, gnawing through the plating.
The HUD flickered.
[SYSTEM ERROR: MOTOR COIL TEMPERATURE CRITICAL]
[VYTHRA OUTPUT: 10%]
Karl wiped sweat off his brow — though his hand trembled noticeably.
The exhaustion was creeping in at the edges of his voice.
"There's too many… dammit— dammit, Agnes, they're not stopping."
Agnes hissed — a raw, guttural sound like a wild animal being cornered.
"Then we don't stop. You hear me? YOU. DON'T. STOP."
Her words shook with primal fury, but also something almost desperate underneath.
Karl braced as Erevos's left leg nearly buckled mid-stride. The demon horde didn't hesitate. They swarmed like black insects spilling from every alley — Rendracers, their bodies serpentine and razor-scaled; Nyghouls, skeletal and fast, weaving through shadows; and worst of all, the Berserkers — hulking demons with molten jaws, their silhouettes burning red against the blue haze.
Every swing Karl took left trails of light and sparks.
Every hit he absorbed sounded heavier than the last.
Karl exhaled sharply.
"I'm slowing down."
That set her off.
"NO— no no NO you don't get to say that—!"
Her tone fractured between feral protectiveness and raw panic.
"Karl— Karl look at me— LOOK— at— me—"
He lifted his eyes to the flickering portrait on the screen.
Agnes's hologram was corrupted — hair floating in digital static, one eye glowing beast-blue, the other glitching violently.
Her fangs showed as she snarled through pixel distortion.
"You… you STUPIDLY— PRECIOUS… human— you listen."
Her voice was half-growl, half-plea.
"I am holding your heart rate, your nervous system, your muscles, your pain receptors— I'm running EVERYTHING— I'm juggling your LIFE with my bare claws—"
Erevos took another step, barely.
The knee joint almost split open.
"—so don't you DARE… give me that tone."
Karl smirked painfully.
"Since when do you call my tone 'stupidly precious'?"
Agnes snarled — but it trembled.
"Shut up. Shut up and FIGHT."
He lifted the arm again — but it was slow. So slow.
A Rendracer lunged, claws slashing through Erevos's chest plate. Nanites scrambled to reseal the tear, but they moved slower now, sluggish and weak. Karl countered with a piston-fueled punch — the impact shattered the creature's spine in a burst of steam, but the cost was obvious: his forearm armor cracked, molten heat leaking through.
Inside the cockpit, warning alerts screamed.
[ALERT: COOLANT FLOW FAILURE — RIGHT ARM ACTUATOR COMPROMISED.]
Even he felt it.
The drag.
The weight.
The burning of his lungs, the weakness crawling down his arms.
The fear — the kind he never admitted — quietly tapping at the back of his mind.
Just a tap.
Just enough to remind him:
He was running out of time.
A Nyghoul leaped from above. Erevos didn't react fast enough.
It slashed across the driver core housing, leaving a glowing red mark.
The core flickered violently, sputtering arcs of blue lightning.
Karl stiffened.
"That was… too close."
Agnes screamed— digital static bursting in every syllable.
"MOVE! MOVE! DON'T LET THEM TOUCH THAT AGAIN—!"
The demons swarmed thicker. Hundreds. Maybe thousands.
Erevos's lights dimmed, flickered, then steadied again — weak, faint, like a dying heartbeat.
Agnes's feral growl rattled the cockpit.
"KARL— your Vythra— down to twelve— systems collapsing— I—I can't patch the core in time—"
Karl's breaths grew shorter.
Not panic.
Not fear.
Just… the quiet crushing weight of a man fighting his limit.
"Agnes…"
His voice cracked for the first time.
"If this keeps going— we're done."
Agnes froze.
Then her voice dropped into a soft, dangerous whisper.
Still feral.
Still trembling.
But with an edge of heartbroken rage.
"…I know."
The swarm closed in — walls of claws and teeth.
Karl tightened his grip.
His vision blurred.
The HUD dimmed.
Agnes's feral snarl lowered, almost a growling whisper against his ear.
"Karl… don't you dare.
Don't you DARE leave me."
For a fleeting moment, the sound of the battlefield dulled — replaced by the whine of overtaxed servos and the low hiss of dying pressure lines. Steam trickled down Erevos's armor like blood.
He forced a small exhale.
"I'm not planning on it."
Karl's eyes burned. His whole body ached from feedback overload. He looked down at the glowing dial and the faintly flickering USB port, both pulsing like fading embers.
The lights dimmed once more, and Erevos straightened up — slow, mechanical, deliberate — as the army of demons surged forward again.
The demons roared, their voices blending into a single monstrous chorus that shook the ground. Karl turned toward the noise — a sea of glowing red eyes waiting just beyond the smoke. His visor glowed faintly, royal azure fighting against the crimson light.
He rolled his shoulders, flexing Erevos's cracked joints, forcing the nanites to realign one more time. The HUD flared faintly, the driver's coils pulsing with light as the Gearstorm Nova orb flickered — unstable but still alive.