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"Are the tank traps secure?!"
"Ready the fire oil! Boilers to maximum!"
"Combat teams, into the funnels! Now!"
Chen was barking orders like a veteran drill sergeant. It was time to see if 20th-century military engineering could hold up against Zaunite alchemy.
Outside the pipe entrances, Silco watched the smoke rising from the Sanctuary's perimeter. "I'd like to see how they plan to defend a hole in the ground," he murmured.
The Sanctuary, or The Last Drop, was essentially a massive cylindrical cavern. The only ways in were through the circular ventilation pipes. Now, every single one of those entrances was choked with "Czech Hedgehogs"—static anti-tank obstacles welded from heavy I-beams.
These things were designed to stop sixty-ton Tiger tanks. Chen didn't believe for a second that a Shimmer Warrior, no matter how much purple juice was in its veins, had the torque of a Panzer.
The first wave of Shimmer Warriors hit the traps with a sickening crunch of metal on bone. They threw themselves at the beams, trying to tear them apart with brute strength, but the mechanical geometry of the traps was a nightmare for them. They couldn't push them, and they couldn't crush them.
"You idiots!" Sevika roared from the rear. "Crawl through the gaps!"
The mutants dropped to all fours, trying to squeeze their bulk through the iron "X" shapes. But Chen had measured the gaps specifically for his own Turbo Chemtank. Since the Shimmer Warriors were wearing the same bulky, chem-infused armor, they got stuck—wedged tightly between the cold iron beams like corks in a bottle.
Inside the Sanctuary, the Firelights erupted in cheers. "It worked! They're actually stuck!"
"I don't know what a 'tank' is," one worker shouted, "pero these iron stars are the best thing we've ever built!"
Chen didn't let them celebrate for long. "Don't just stand there! Treat them to some spicy hot pot! Pour the oil!"
Scalding fire-oil rained down through the pipes, drenching the stuck mutants. A single spark ignited the fuel, turning the entrance tunnels into incinerators. The Shimmer Warriors couldn't move forward, and they couldn't retreat. They simply burned.
Chen reached over and covered Jinx's eyes. "Not for children."
"I'm not a kid!" Jinx snapped, trying to peek around his hand to see the "roasted monsters."
Silco didn't look worried. He just adjusted his coat. "The boy always has a surprise. It doesn't matter. Marcus won't dare fail me. After all, what's more devastating than the loss of a daughter?"
While the Firelights were cheering at the gates, high above the "ceiling" of the Sanctuary, Marcus was moving in the shadows. He was on the Piltover side of the ventilation grid.
"Don't blame me," Marcus whispered, his hands trembling as he diverted several massive alchemical exhaust pipes directly into the Sanctuary's intake. "For my daughter... I'm sorry."
An hour passed. The attacks at the gates stopped. Ekko wiped sweat from his brow, a feeling of dread pooling in his stomach. Chen, too, felt a familiar, burning sensation in his lungs—the same toxic "Grey" he'd felt when he first arrived in Zaun.
"Something's wrong," Chen wheezed. "The tree... the photosynthesis should be cleaning the air."
He looked up. The vibrant, glowing leaves of the great tree were turning a sickly, brittle yellow. Above them, he saw the muzzles of the exhaust pipes pouring a thick, greenish fog into the cavern.
"They're pumping in alchemical exhaust!" Ekko shouted, horrified. "They're gassing us!"
"Reverse the fans!" Chen barked.
Jinx and Ekko rocketed toward the ventilation hubs on their boards, but they were back in minutes, their faces grim. "The vents are sealed from the other side! We're trapped in a bottle!"
Silco sat in one of the outer pipes, swirling his wine. "Do they think I'm helpless without my monsters? When I fought Vander, we had no Shimmer. We had nothing but our will." He looked at Sevika. "They're going to try to break out. Kill anyone who reaches the surface."
The air in the Sanctuary grew thin. People were collapsing, vomiting, their lungs burning from the concentrated toxins. The great tree, the heart of the Firelights, began to wither and droop.
"I can teleport five people," Chen said, his voice a hoarse rasp as he looked at Jinx and Ekko. "Just five."
Ekko looked at his people lying on the ground. He leaned his back against the dying trunk of the tree. "I'm not leaving. This tree is our hope. It's the future. If it dies, I die with it."
Chen understood. Ekko wasn't talking about wood and leaves; he was talking about the idea of the Firelights—the seed of a better Zaun. If they abandoned it now, the dream would never bloom again.
In that moment of absolute despair, Ekko's pure heart seemed to resonate with the dying forest. The tree began to glow with a pale, ethereal light.
"The Avatar of Wind awaits your command!"
A translucent, shimmering shield suddenly expanded from the tree, enveloping everyone in the cavern. The toxic fog hit the barrier and vanished. The Firelights began to breathe again, their lungs clearing as if by magic.
Then, a voice echoed through the Sanctuary—not a human voice, but the sound of a thousand whispering breezes.
"Say hello to the Winds of Change!"
A massive cyclone erupted from the center of the tree, spiraling upward with such force that it blew the exhaust pipes right off their mounts, clearing the sky and bringing the first breath of fresh air into the cavern in years.
Janna had arrived.
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