The remaining Warrior around Uncle Adam froze for a single heartbeat, shocked at yet another of their number falling to the thin young man who should have been a corpse.
Damian did not give them time to recover.
He continued relentlessly even as he heard the roars and charging of what seemed to be a wild beast behind him. The Butcher was coming. The ground shook with his footsteps. The air itself seemed to recoil from his rage.
But Damian had seconds, and seconds were enough.
He appeared behind the remaining Warrior who was attacking Uncle Adam. The man tried to turn, tried to defend against this new threat, his hand crackling with Mana as he swung toward Damian's head.
Damian swooped down to evade.
The Mana-enhanced blow passed over him, close enough that he felt the heat of it brush his hair.
And he used the blunt jagged end of the broken spear, putting every ounce of his weight into the thrust as he plunged it into the chest of this Warrior.
The crude weapon was not sharp on this end. It did not need to be. With enough force, with enough desperation, even a broken stick could pierce flesh and find the heart beneath.
The Warrior looked down at the wood protruding from his chest with an expression of profound confusion.
Then his eyes went dark.
Right after, Damian felt the blazing eruption of force behind him.
He rolled aside on pure instinct, his body moving before his mind could command it. The Butcher's serrated blade cut through where he had just been, so close that it split the air beside his ear with a sound like tearing cloth.
The blade continued forward.
It found the dying Warrior instead.
The Butcher bisected his own man from shoulder to hip, the body falling in two pieces that tumbled away from each other in a spray of crimson glory!
...!
The Butcher breathed out heavily.
Steam pushed out of his nose like smoke from a beast's nostrils. His chest heaved with exertion and rage. His eyes burned with something beyond mere anger.
"..."
Everything turned eerily quiet.
Because at this time, to the ridiculous incredulity of all present, The Butcher stood alone.
Unbelievably, all his Warriors had fallen one after another.
He was the only one that remained.
...!
The silence stretched across the bloodied center of the Purple Stone Tribe. Bodies lay everywhere, both his men and the tribe's defenders. But the count was clear. The count was impossible. A force that should have swept through this small tribe with ease had been reduced to a single man.
And that single man now faced opposition he had not expected.
Damian also breathed heavily as he reached Uncle Adam's side.
The unease in his heart settled lightly as he looked at the old Warrior. Blood covered Uncle Adam from head to foot, some of it his own and much of it belonging to others. His spear was gone, lost somewhere in the chaos. His hands were red to the wrists.
But he was alive.
"You okay, old man?"
Damian's voice was rough from exertion.
"I'm sorry to have put you through that."
He knew it must have been horrendous for Uncle Adam to watch his chest cut open like that. To think he was dead. To believe that after all those years of protection, after all those sacrifices, the last scion of the fallen empire had died in a meaningless skirmish against a band of raiders.
Uncle Adam already blamed himself for many things that had happened back then. Damian did not even want to know the thoughts that had gone through his mind when he believed he had failed to protect him as well.
At this time, Uncle Adam kept his gaze on the infuriated Butcher.
The enemy's snaking tendrils of Mana shone with even greater intensity now, his power rising as his rage built. He was more dangerous than ever. A cornered beast with nothing left to lose.
But Uncle Adam could not help himself.
He asked something that caused a faint tremble in his body.
"Young Lugal Vakochev..."
His voice was barely above a whisper.
"You can truly use Mana again? Are you... back?"
...!
Young Lugal.
The word was heavy for him to hear.
In the great Neolithic Empires that dominated vast swathes of the Lands of Stone, a Lugal was more than a prince. It was a title reserved for those of imperial blood who had proven themselves worthy of inheriting power.
Not merely born to rule, but destined for it. A Lugal commanded armies before they commanded nations. They were trained in warfare and governance from the moment they could walk. They were the future made flesh, the continuation of dynasties that had shaped the Lands of Stone for generations.
Damian had been named Lugal before his tenth summer.
Before the empire fell.
Before everything burned.
He had hoped Uncle Adam would not call him by this name. It truly did not represent him right now. He was not a Lugal. He was a farmer with a broken spear and clothes soaked in blood. He was a young man who had just learned to sense Mana again after years of emptiness.
But he understood the old Warrior's sentiment.
The body of this old soldier trembled with hope and possibility. The moment he had seen the situation around Damian, the blue flames and the miraculous healing, he must have already begun to have thoughts on what could be possible.
About the right that was stripped away from him.
About revenge and about restoration.
About everything they had lost and everything they might reclaim.
But Damian was not worried about this right now.
He replied while picking up a stone axe, prying it from the dead hands of a Warrior whose grip had not yet loosened in death. The weight was good. The edge was sharp. It would serve.
"I don't know, old man. We'll figure it out later."
He turned to face The Butcher, who stood alone amidst the carnage, his serrated blade dripping with the blood of his own man.
"For now, this monster looks a bit angry so... let's take care of him."
...!
Behind them, Chieftain Ayala and two other Warriors who were less injured came to support them. The Chieftain still clutched his side where his wound had not stopped bleeding, but his stone sword was steady in his other hand. His eyes held the fire of a man defending his home, his people, his daughter who still hid somewhere in the chaos with mud smeared across her face.
Five against one.
The odds had ridiculously shifted.
The future could have as many possibilities as it wanted. Dreams of restoration. Visions of revenge. Plans for reclaiming what was lost.
But a lot of the time, those who wanted to survive in the Lands of Stone had to be very, very present.
The dreamer who sat around imagining Treasure Mountains, becoming a Chieftain of a large tribe, and consuming the panacea meat of Primal Beasts... more often than not, they were pulled out of their huts and eaten by Primal Beasts in the dead of the night.
Their dreams died with them, forgotten by a Land that did not care.
In the Lands of Stone, to even dare dream and think of the future, one had to have power.
And power, right now, meant killing the monster that stood before them.