Chapter Title: "The Blood Moon Rises"
"Brother and Executioner"
The southern border steamed with a mix of frost and boiling rage. Snow curled from cracked stone. Blood painted the dirt.
Silas stood tall amid the ruin, brushing snow and dust from his tattered coat. A sick crack echoed through the field as he used his thumb to push a dislodged tooth back into place.
He exhaled through a crooked smile.
"Little sister…"
He laughed. Softly at first—then louder. Louder. Until it became something deranged.
"Over and over," he muttered, voice tinged with contempt, "you cling to this rotten fate of yours. Always on the wrong end. Always doing something stupid. And me? I have to correct your mess every time."
His smile faded into a thin, disgusted line. "Even when I try to eliminate you, you crawl back. But no more."
He raised his palm to the air.
The skin of his hand peeled open an organic spiral unfolding like a bloodstained iris. Crimson liquid began to spin, rising upward in a slow spiral. It hovered in the air, small at first… then wider. Rotating.
His skin paled. Muscles shrunk. Veins surfaced.
"It's sucking me dry," he said with a grin. "But that's the price."
He didn't notice Asger blur forward.
She was already mid-air, the wind cracking around her. He leapt backward, retreating to reposition but he had become too slow.
When he landed, she was already there.
"—What?!"
Her arm had already shifted morphed into a blade forged of hardened blood.
SLASH.
The impact cracked the earth. Webs of stone fracture expanded outward as her blood-blade cleaved through Silas's defense. He raised his arms to protect his head, but the blade sank into his side with a horrific squelch piercing into it but he held her down for a bit, not completely taking his hand out due to his regenerative force still kicking in despite the injury.
"YOUUUU BITCHHHH!" Silas screamed.
Asger yanked the blade free, flipping backward midair. Her hands morphed again elongated, fluid becoming two blood-whips, sharp and precise.
She dropped from the sky like judgment incarnate.
Silas's blood sphere was still suspended above him, leeching his strength, slowing him down but it was settling down perfectly.
He couldn't move fast enough.
"Arise—Voremortis!" he roared.
Behind him, a grotesque entity manifested—a malformed blood-demon, its mouth wide as a split earthworm.
"Blood Bending: Voremortis Snake Hound!"
ROAAAAARRRRRRRRR—
Two serpent-like monstrosities launched from the demon's jaws, fanged and coiled midair. Asger's whips snapped once—twice.
The snakes were cleaved apart mid-flight.
They burst into vaporized blood, coating the field in a hot, sticky mist.
She landed, hard and activated her ability "Tissue Bending: Tentacle Pull."
Her hands pulsed once then ripped forward.
Inside Silas's body, his own veins betrayed him—snaking outward in spasms. They tore from his arms and legs like living ropes, yanking his body toward the ground.
"AAAAAGHHHH!"
He collapsed.
She stepped forward slowly, her voice low.
"I don't want to kill you, Silas…"
But her eyes were hard.
"…but I have to."
She raised one blood-laced palm to finish it.
Silas's voice dropped into a whisper.
"Blood Bending: Blood Prison."
His body dissolved into liquid having kept her at a close range with him, this technique would be deadly and effective.
Blood raced up and around her, forming a sphere mid-air that sealed her inside. It spun rapidly, dark red liquid swirling, drowning, choking.
From the mist, another Silas emerged—clean, upright while the other one Asger had confronted was what dissolved into liquid and attacked her.
He laughed quietly. "Steam clone. Switched during the snake detonation."
He stepped forward and looked up at the moon-like sphere hovering above.
"Thanks for giving my little friend the time it needed."
His voice dropped.
"Cursed Blood Art: Trinity's Creation—Voremortis Blood Moon."
The small blood sphere began to expand—massively. In seconds, it stretched to eclipse the sky, casting a red hue over the battlefield.
Sir Caelum, engaged with Jabari, looked up. "What the hell is that now?!"
Even Jabari turned toward it, wide-eyed.
"Ah… finally," Jabari grinned. "He's using it."
Caelum muttered, "Do these guys ever run out of new horrors?"
The Blood Moon loomed overhead massive, unholy, red as a dying sun.
It shimmered with pulsing rings of cursed energy, as if time itself had congealed around it. Every drop of blood spilled on the battlefield began to vibrate, rising faintly from the ground in beads drawn upward towards it.
Sir Caelum's voice cut through the hum. "Madagascar, move! That thing's drawing on blood it's going to pull us dry!"
Madagascar was already sprinting Shen frost launching beneath his boots as he conjured a narrow ice platform to shoot him backward and out of range. The air around them was becoming thick. Sticky.
"Not so fast," Jabari muttered.
He raised a hand.
"Stone Creation: Terracotta Qin Warrior."
The ground beneath him split.
From it rose a monstrous figure—taller than a building, its body forged from aged stone, ornate armor, and dusted crimson lacquer. Every inch was carved in ancient detail—etched scripts on its chestplate, a war helmet shaped like the head of an emperor's horse, its hands the size of coffins.
It moved slowly but with certainty.
The Terracotta Qin reached one massive arm to its side, and from the earth, a long stone spear materialized—coalescing from minerals like breath forming on cold glass.
With no further motion, it hurled the spear.
WHOOOOOM—
The air cracked as it sailed after Madagascar.
Caelum's eyes flared. "Chainsmile—extend!"
His chain-sword uncoiled with a metallic scream, lashing through the sky to intercept. It curved, curved—too slow.
SHHHNNK.
The stone spear ripped past Chainsmile like it wasn't even there.
Madagascar twisted midair—barely avoiding a direct hit. The spear clipped his side, shredding armor and drawing blood. He winced but didn't scream.
Below, Jabari chuckled. "You can't outrun history, boy."
Meanwhile—
Across the battlefield, Silas clapped once.
A soft boom spread through the air like a pulse.
"Shall we begin?" he whispered.
A seizure of sensation gripped the fighters across the field.
Their bodies tightened. Skin flaked. Lips dried. Tiny droplets of blood began surfacing—emerging from pores, scars, fingernails. Rising. Floating.
Drawn.
Toward the Blood Moon.
Sir Caelum staggered.
Jabari winced.
Even Madagascar, far as he was, felt the tug.
Inside the swirling Blood Prison, Asger floated midair, gasping as her veins pulsed with the pull of the curse. Her voice trembled.
"Damn it… the Family Blood Moon… he has that technique?"
She clenched her teeth as the blood prison thickened. "If it activates fully, they won't survive… none of them will."
At the western flank, the sky was grey, quiet, and cold.
Two SUHA hunters—Marcus and Boris, both S-ranked—stood near the shattered edge of a half-frozen canyon, surveying the enemy line.
Across from them, alone on a ridge of blackened snow, sat a single figure atop a frost-coated warhorse.
His armor was etched in crimson frost, his face veiled in ice-black shadows. In one hand, he held a long, blood-colored bow. His horse breathed vapor that hissed like smoke.
"That's him," Marcus said, jaw tight. "That's the one commanding this flank."
Boris nodded. "Looks different than the others."
"He feels different."
A low, distant rumble echoed above them.
Engines.
Marcus turned. "Jet reinforcements good."
But then
FWIP. FWIP. FWIP. FWIP.
Four red-tinted arrows whistled from the general's bow—instantaneous.
Each arrow hit a jet mid-flight. The aircraft froze solid in an instant, spiraled, and shattered mid-air into crystalline debris.
Marcus whipped around. "Goddammit—"
The Red Ice Walker General lowered his bow.
His mouth opened.
And from it, a hiss—a ghost-white cloud of vapor—drifted forward.
The breath of an ancient frost.