Chapter 23: The Real War Begins Part 1

Yihizo Ye Langa, Limpopo

 

The desert was still.

A silence so sharp it pressed against the ears of every man and woman stationed at the AZO base.

 The soldiers waited behind sandbags and steel barricades, their rifles humming faintly with spiritual charges. Hunters lounged nearby, sharpening blades, loading magazines, or chewing through nerves with hollow jokes.

 

Farther back stood the Ten—shoulder to shoulder, backs straight, their breaths in rhythm. The second line of defence. The ones meant to hold the walls when the first wave broke.

And behind even them, apart from the chaos, Ava, Luna, and Kent lingered in the shadows of a crumbling watchtower. Reserved. Waiting. Because everyone knew who they were meant to face when the time came.

 

Christian’s voice carried through the base, quiet but steady.

“This night decides whether the seal holds… or the world burns. Stand firm.”

 

 

Sahara Base , Mauritania

 

High above the Sahara, the Order’s fleet moved like vultures in the dark. Carriers purred, engines muffled, shadows stretched wide against the stars. Soldiers filled the decks—armoured, faceless, waiting for the call.

 

At the center, Aries stood with arms crossed, half his body still swaddled in bandages. A grin tugged at his lips. His blood boiled for the clash.

 

Noelle paced the deck, flask in hand, her lone purple eye glowing like a coal in the dark.

“Strike fast. Leave them no time to breathe.” Her words were simple orders.

 

Anya said nothing. She only drew her blade once, the sound of steel rasping out against the wind, and the silence that followed was answer enough.

 

Below deck, soldiers loaded the bombs. They pulsed with unstable spiritual essence—spheres of light that hummed as if alive, desperate to detonate.

“When the bombs fall,” the commander barked, “so do you. Break them in the chaos.”

 

The Blitzkrieg

 

The first bombs dropped.

They streaked through the night sky like false stars, dozens of them tearing down toward the sand.

High above, an Order pilot gripped his controls, whispering “Glory to the Order” as he dove, teeth clenched, knowing he was little more than a torch to be snuffed out.

 

Sirens wailed across the AZO base.

“Contact! Contact!”

 

The first explosions hit. Buildings crumbled in fire and dust. Shockwaves tore men off their feet. The very air burned with spiritual residue—suffocating, electric, wild.

 

Hunters cursed and scrambled to position, rifles spitting in the smoke.

AZO soldiers tried to regroup, but the ground itself betrayed them—shifting with every new blast.

 

Then the Order descended.

Silhouettes cut through the flames, soldiers diving from the carriers above, blades drawn, rifles blazing. They landed in the chaos and drove forward like wolves, their battle cries lost beneath the thunder.

 

The AZO counter-strikes

 

“Formation!”

Given’s shout snapped the Ten together. They surged forward as one—shields raised, blades flashing, rifles thundering in sync. Even in the storm, their unity held.

 

One soldier after another fell before them. The Ten were the spine of the AZO, their presence alone was enough to slow the blitz. But even they strained under the weight of it.

 

A soldier barely out of training scrambled behind a barricade, hands shaking too hard to reload. His rifle clattered in the dust as he pressed his helmet down, muttering prayers that no one could hear over the thunder.

All around them, men and women clung to life in the storm, caught in the wake of powers they could never hope to match. The clash of mortals against gods.

A soldier too young to shave screamed as Order blades broke the line.

A Hunter dragged him back, swearing, “Stay alive, kid!” before vanishing again into the smoke.

 

Kent’s First Arrow

 

Then came the second bomb.

A bomb bigger than the rest—its glow filling the night, casting the battlefield in a white halo.

 Soldiers froze at the sight. Even the Hunters stopped in mid-swing.

 

Christian’s voice cut through the chaos. “Brace!”

 

The bomb whistled down.

 

Kent’s fingers twitched. His bow snapped into his hands, string already drawn. A single arrow—small, thin, unremarkable—burned in the air before him.

“Don’t blink,” Kent muttered, loosing the arrow.

 

He loosed.

 

The arrow became light. A streak faster than the eye, faster than thought. It split the bomb in half mid-air, the detonation scattering into harmless sparks before it could touch the base.

For a moment, the battlefield was silent.

Then soldiers roared—AZO voices rising in relief and fury.

 

Ava smirked, arms folded. “Hmph. Not bad kid.”

Luna didn’t answer. She only felt it—the tremor in the air, the shift in the sky. Something else was coming.

The arrow tore forward, ripping through smoke and flame, cutting clean through the shockwave of the explosion. Even the carrier’s steel hull groaned as the force warped the air around it.

 

On the deck above, Noelle stood poised, violet eye blazing.

For an instant, the arrow seemed destined to pierce her heart. She simply narrowed her gaze—her left eye shimmered purple—and the arrow bent, warped, and disappeared into nothingness, erased from the battlefield as if it had never been loosed.

 

The battlefield swayed, minute by minute.

 

The Real War begins

The battlefield seemed to pause.

 

Smoke swirled in unnatural currents, flames bent sideways as though the air itself recoiled. A pressure rolled across the desert, crushing lungs and stiffening spines.

Three figures stepped to the edge of the lead ship.

 

Aries cracked his knuckles. The bandages that bound his arms caught fire, burning away in a blaze of blue light.

Noelle sipped from her flask, eye narrowing as she watched the smoke curl below.

Anya gripped her blade, still silent, still unblinking.

The ground itself seemed to tremble—as if the seal buried deep beneath the sands began to wake & wail.

 

Aries grinned into the firestorm, teeth sharp in the firelight.

 

“Now… let the real war begin.”