The battlefield y in eerie quiet, the st echoes of war retreating into the darkened sky. The acrid stench of blood, charred metal, and brokeh g to the air, mingling with the ghostly whispers of the fallen. Men as alike y motionless, their final moments frozen in time.

  Garett stood at the heart of it all, motionless, his polearm resting at his side. The armor he bore was no longer pristi was marred, its metal scored by bde and fire. The Azeroth Drive pulsed against his chest, slow and measured, a rhythmic drumbeat against the silence. He did not bask in the glory of victory. He did not revel in the cheers that would iably e. Instead, his eyes—hidden behind his greathelm—were fixed upon the scattered remains of his enemy, the knight who had stood before him with suyielding resolve.

  A wind swept across the field, cold and sharp, carrying away the st traces of the knight’s form as if the world itself sought to erase his existence.

  Then, from the hushed reverence, a voice rose.

  Soft at first—a whisper, an exhale of disbelief. Then, like a tide breaking against the shore, it spread.

  The townsfolk and adventurers erupted into a thunderous cry, their voices crashing together in raw, unfiltered relief. Some wept, others fell to their knees, and a few raised their ons skyward in salute. The battle was over. They were alive. They had won.

  Yet, in the face of their triumph, Garett remaiill.

  Then, he raised his hand. Not in celebration, not in aowledgment—but in remembrance.

  “Honor them.”

  The revelry stilled, as if the very grouh them demanded silehe weight of the battle, of the lives lost, settled upon them like a cloak of iron. A victory, yes—but at what cost?

  Wulfric stepped forward, his massive frame battered, his expression unreadable. For a moment, he merely studied the Helmed Man. Then, with a broad grin that spoke of boundless relief, he seized Garett by the waist and hoisted him onto his back as though he were little more than a sack of grain.

  “Behold our savior!” Wulfric bellowed. “The Helmed Man!”

  The cheers returned, but now they were different—no longer wild, no longer reckless. Now, they were ced with something deeper. Awe. Gratitude. The knowledge that, for a moment, they had stood at the precipice of death and survived.

  Otlefield’s edge, Lyra watched, arms crossed, her chest rising and falling in measured breaths. Nyx perched upon her shoulder, eyes of infinite depth refleg the flickering torchlight.

  Leona and Nissa k at Cedric’s side, w with deft hands to mend his wounds. The st of healing salves mixed with the metallig of blood. Cedric’s face ale, his breathing ragged, but when his eyes fluttered open, they locked onto Lyra.

  “Lyra…” His voice, hoarse but steady, carried more weight than any battle cry.

  She k beside him, g his hand. “Father…!”

  A tired smile touched his lips before his strength failed him once more. Yet, he lived. And for now, that was enough.

  Beyond them, Anya, her injuries no longer severe, wahrough the wreckage. Her fingers brushed against somethiled among the ruins, something that pulsed with an inner glow. She lifted it, turning it over in her hands—a fragment of Luminite, humming with residual energy.

  She furrowed her brow. “Strange…”

  Lyra, now standing beside her, exhaled a soft chuckle. “There’s an old legend,” she mused.

  Anya looked up, intrigued. “What kind of legend?”

  Lyra turhe fragment over in her hands, its glow refleg iray eyes. “A knight from the lost era,” she murmured. “A man who climbed higher than any other, who gathered power beyond reing. But in the end, he lost it all. His friends. His kingdom. His own self. He became something… else.” She shrugged, tossing the fragment lightly back to Anya. “But it’s just a story.”

  She turned away before Anya could respond.

  Anya, however, remaiaring at the Luminite, as if it carried an answer she had not yet learo read.

  As dawn broke over the battlefield, the scattered remnants of the enemy still lingered. Not all of the ghouls and manticores had perished alongside their master. Some, sensing the knight’s fall, had fled into the woods or the ruins of Elderwynd, seeking to escape. But they would not find sanctuary. Adventurers and Anya’s men, bloodied yet uook up their ons once more. They huhe fleeing creatures through the mist-den streets and the bed trees, cutting them down before they could regroup. It was not a battle, not anymore. It was a reing. And with each strike of steel and bolt of fire, they ehat no shadow of the enemy would remain.

  And across the field, as Wulfric’s etion dimmed, a grim realization dawned. His fingers curled into fists, his jaw tightened. He khere was only one man who could have orchestrated this attack.

  “Lyrius Drais.”

  He spat the name as if it were poison.

  Bckfrost Keep loomed iernal twilight of the north, its jagged towers stretg toward the storm-ridden sky like the talons of some great beast. Frost g to the obsidian walls, glimmering in the cold glow of the void-nterns that lihe great hall. A presence dwelled here, ohat did not belong to the living.

  At the heart of the chamber stood a sarcophagus, vast and a, a relic of an age beyond mortal reing. Its surface was not of stone, nor metal, but something otherworldly—a dark, seamless alloy inscribed with luminous veins of shifting energy. It pulsed, slow and steady, a heartbeat encased iy. Symbols, long fotten by even the oldest schors, wove intricate patterns across its face, shifting as if whisperis to those who dared listen.

  Lyrius Drais sat upon his throne, his fingers steepled, eyes fixed upon the monolithib before him. The light of the chamber barely touched him, as though the shadows themselves recoiled from his presence. Slowly, he rose, his midnight cloak trailing behind him like the wings of a specter. He stepped forward, reag out with a gloved hand to trace the sarcophagus’s surface.

  A smirk, cold and knowing, curled upon his lips.

  “I did promise you a glorious end this time around.”