The Second Strongest

BALISARDA SUMMERNOR CASTLE | THE EMPTY VAULT ABOVE SUMMERNOR’S DOMAIN

Jabari’s roar–“CHRIS!!!!”–tore through the cacophony below, a raw, visceral vibration that hung in the air for a fractured second before the screaming wind ripped it away. The gale clawed at Chris’s clothes and stung his eyes as Balisarda’s stone sword hammered Jabari backwards into the void. Far below, the courtyard dissolved into a swirling mosaic of glinting steel and thrashing figures, their desperate cries thinned and warped by the vast distance. Above, the bruised purple and ochre expanse of the sky offered only cold, indifferent emptiness.

From that emptiness, Chris descended. Not a helpless fall, but a deliberate, diagonal drive, a human comet forged from worn homespun and scarred knuckles. The air itself seemed to resist, compressing into a visible, rippling wall of heat-haze that distorted the castle’s jagged spires beneath him. His focus was the physical heat behind his narrowed blue eyes, fixed unwaveringly on the shattered opening where Jabari had breached the throne room. The pressure wave preceding him carried the acrid sting of lightning and the choking scent of scorched ozone, thick enough to coat his tongue and burn his throat, a promise of raw power focused to a killing edge in his palms.

“You all must be blind.” Balisarda’s voice, cold and clear as ice-melt trickling over stone, rose effortlessly through the buffeting wind and distance, slicing into Chris’s awareness.

The words registered just as a shadow detached from the highest spire. Sunlight fractured against brutal, angular planes – not a leap, but a deliberate unfolding. Kaelus Gravemancer solidified against the bruised sky. Silver steel, polished to a predatory gleam, encased him in layered plates reminiscent of some primordial, armoured beast. Every joint, every seam, erupted in vicious, needle-sharp spikes. Pauldrons flared like the barbed wings of a hunting raptor. Gauntlets terminated in articulated claws. Long hair, black threaded with the silver of old scars, streamed behind a face carved from cold marble: sharp cheekbones, a blade-straight nose, and eyes the colour of frozen mercury, utterly devoid of warmth or recognition. Twin katanas, sheaths whispering minimalist death, hung at his hips. He dropped, a silent, honed shard of malice descending with terrible inevitability.

Chris felt the shift – not the atmospheric compression he commanded, but a sudden, chilling vacuum where focused intent radiated. He twisted violently mid-plummet, the coarse weave of his tunic snapping taut against his lean frame. Kaelus was already there, filling his vision, a storm of spiked silver and lethal grace. The katanas flashed free in a single, liquid motion that seemed to dim the surrounding light. Kaelus’s arms pistoned downward, not with brute force, but with the terrifying, surgical precision of a master calligrapher inscribing a death sentence. The blades, edges whispering silence, arced towards Chris’s forearms.

Instinct screamed along Chris’s nerves. His calloused hands snapped into a desperate cross-guard – left forearm hammering down at a sharp angle, right forearm thrusting upwards, palms facing outwards like weathered shields. He registered the impacts not as cuts, but as twin bolts of nerve-deadening cold that instantly ignited into white-hot agony deep within his bones. The katanas parted worn leather, sun-toughened skin, and the muscle beneath with obscene ease. Blood, shockingly bright and vital, atomised into a fine crimson mist suspended between them. The thick, metallic tang flooded Chris’s mouth and nostrils, clashing violently with the ozone crackle clinging to his skin and the cold, sterile scent of oiled steel radiating from Kaelus’s armour. The brutal kinetic force vibrated up Chris’s arms, halting his descent as abruptly as if he’d struck solid rock.

Kaelus settled onto an unseen current, hovering with unnatural stillness. Blood evaporated from his pristine blades in wisps of steam before it could mar the silver. A slow, predatory smirk stretched his lips, a grotesque counterpoint to the glacial indifference in his frozen mercury eyes.

“Who are you?” Chris forced the words through gritted teeth, his voice strained with pain, his bloodied forearms trembling uncontrollably.

Kaelus tilted his head, silver-streaked hair catching the fading light like polished onyx. “I am Kaelus Gravemancer,” his voice resonated, a smooth baritone devoid of exertion or emotion. “Ranked Principal Nine. What is your name, ephemeral one?”

“Chris,” the name rasped out, defiance a burning coal in his chest despite the agony as his blue eyes locked onto Kaelus’s frozen gaze. He wouldn’t yield his sky.

“Chris,” Kaelus repeated, the name sounding flat and insignificant, like a discarded pebble. The smirk deepened, etching cruel lines beside his mouth. “A whisper soon swallowed by silence.”

Kaelus uncoiled. There was no blur, only a terrifying, liquid transition from utter stillness to lethal motion. He flowed through the turbulent air like ink through dark water, closing the distance in the space of a panicked heartbeat. The right katana lanced forward, a silver needle aimed with chilling precision at the pulse point thudding in Chris’s neck. Chris reacted, battered forearms rising on pure survival instinct. He met the blade’s edge with the hardened ridge of his left palm. The clash sent a shower of orange sparks cascading into the void and a fresh, searing jolt of agony lancing up his wounded arm. Before he could register the counter-pain, Kaelus’s spiked right boot snapped upwards, a piston driven by coiled steel. The reinforced toe plate connected squarely with the angle of Chris’s jaw.

The world dissolved into silent, blinding white light. Chris’s skull vibrated like a cracked bell. His head snapped back with brutal force, neck vertebrae shrieking in protest. Consciousness frayed at the edges, a fragile thread unravelling. He tumbled backward, limp as a discarded sack, the wind roaring like a furious beast in his ears. Instinctively, he arched his back, muscles straining against the spin, hands flailing upwards above his head in a disoriented, useless parody of defence.

Kaelus was a phantom of spiked silver beside him. No hesitation. Both katanas reversed in his clawed gauntlets with a metallic snick. With the detached precision of a surgeon excising flawed tissue, he drove them downward. The points punched through the thick muscle of Chris’s biceps, just above the elbows, sinking deep with a sickening, wet resistance felt more than heard. Chris’s scream tore from his lungs, a raw, animal sound instantly ripped away by the rushing wind. The blades pinned his arms wide apart, a grotesque crucifixion enacted in the merciless sky. Blood streamed down his arms in dark ribbons, whipped away by the slipstream.

Kaelus released the hilts, leaving the katanas quivering obscenely in Chris’s flesh. He drifted closer, the jagged spikes on his armour catching the dying light like malevolent constellations. His clawed hands shot out. The left clamped like a hydraulic vice around Chris’s right ankle, cold metal biting through worn leather into the bone beneath. The right seized the left ankle with identical, crushing force.

Then, Kaelus spun. Using his own dense, armoured form as an anchor, he whipped Chris around him in a brutal, widening gyre. Once. Twice. The world became a nauseating smear of bruised sky, jagged castle stone, and the blinding white agony radiating from his impaled arms. Blood streamed from the wounds, flung in crimson spirals that stained the air before vanishing. The centrifugal force threatened to tear his limbs from their sockets, joints shrieking, the wind howling past with hurricane force, filling his mouth with the coppery taste of blood and the suffocating tang of primal terror. Kaelus’s expression remained impassive, a sculptor observing formless clay on the wheel.

On the fifth rotation, at the zenith of momentum, Kaelus opened his clawed hands.

Chris hurtled away, a broken arrow shot from a monstrous bow. The embedded katanas ripped free with brutal finality, tearing fresh channels of searing agony through his arms as he spun wildly, uncontrollably. He arced across the vast, open sky, a tumbling mote against the darkening canvas, the castle shrinking to a grim diorama below. The ground rushed up – not the distant courtyard, but the very threshold of Balisarda’s domain, where the shattered gate yawned open onto the carnage within.

Impact. A bone-deep shudder transmitted through the earth more than heard. Dust and blood-soaked soil geysered upwards in a choking cloud. Chris struck the broken stones at the courtyard’s entrance, limbs splayed at unnatural angles, his simple tunic now a sodden rag of dirt and dark crimson. Dust motes danced lazily in the settling silence, slowly revealing his motionless form amidst the wreckage. The only movement was the slow, dark seep of blood welling from his ruined arms and staining the thirsty, churned earth. High above, Kaelus Gravemancer hung suspended, a silent, spiked monument against the bruised heavens, his frozen mercury gaze fixed impassively on his handiwork. The air hung thick and still, saturated with the iron stench of fresh blood, the fading ozone tang of shattered power, and the chilling, absolute finality of Principal Nine’s arrival.

Chris lay sprawled in the churned mud at the courtyard’s threshold, the world reduced to fractured, overwhelming sensations. The thick, metallic taste of his own blood filled his mouth, coating his tongue and throat, coppery and suffocating. Each ragged breath scraped like gravel in his lungs, carrying the vile cocktail of voided bowels, charred wood from distant fires, and the sharp, fading ozone residue of his own shattered power. Distant screams – raw, guttural sounds of dying men – echoed through the haze of pain, punctuated by the rhythmic, wet crunch of heavy boots on blood-slicked stone. Dust motes, illuminated by shafts of fading amber light, danced in the settling air, catching on the dark crimson saturating his tattered tunic.

His arms screamed. White-hot agony radiated from the twin punctures where Kaelus’s katanas had torn through muscle and tendon, pulsing in sickening time with his hammering heartbeat. The cold, viscous mud beneath him seeped through his clothes, a clammy, sucking counterpoint to the feverish heat radiating from his injuries. Above, the bruised sky swirled and blurred, distorted by the unshed tears of pain and crushing frustration stinging his eyes.

Fuck. The thought cut through the delirium, sharp and venomous. He said his name is Kaelus Gravemancer.

A memory surfaced, tactile and auditory, not visual. The cool, damp air of the military strategy room deep beneath headquarters, smelling of stale coffee and old leather chairs. The low, urgent murmur of Master-ranked officers hunched over maps. A specific voice, grizzled and tight with unspoken dread, cut through the background hum: “Before the war... intelligence on Sumernor’s inner circle. His Principals.”

Chris’s mind replayed the sound, not the words, but the tones. The dry rasp of a wooden pointer dragging across a tactical board. The sharp, involuntary intake of breath from the officer beside him. That same voice, dropping lower, weighted with grim certainty: “Remember this: the higher the Principal’s number… the stronger they are.”

A sudden gust of wind whipped across the courtyard, carrying the salt-tang of distant sea air beneath the overwhelming coppery reek of slaughter and the faint, acrid bite of lingering magic residue. It lashed strands of caramel hair against his sweat-slicked forehead and pressed down on his broken body like a physical hand.

“I know there are only ten” The realisation crystallised, cold and absolute, slicing through the pain fog. “If this man Kaelus holds the rank of Principal Nine.”

The implications unfolded like a slow, icy blade being drawn from its sheath.

“That would make him.”

Kaelus’s frozen mercury eyes flooded his memory. The spiked silver armour’s terrifying, effortless precision. In his silent presence, the turbulent air had stilled and bowed. The sheer annihilating force behind the throw that had shattered Chris’s skyward assault and pinned him to the earth.

“the second strongest.”

The truth landed with the crushing weight of Balisarda’s stone sword. It wasn’t a thought; it was a physical blow. Chris’s body jerked involuntarily in the mud, sending fresh waves of white-hot agony tearing through his arms. His breath hitched, trapped in a vice of icy dread and profound understanding. The distant screams, the clash of steel, the pervasive stench of death, all receded, drowned out by the deafening silence of that single, terrifying fact.

Above, Kaelus Gravemancer remained a spiked silhouette against the darkening sky. Watching. Waiting. A silver monument to power that rendered the surrounding carnage insignificant. The second strongest. Not merely a barrier, but an abyss. Chris lay broken at its precipice, the taste of blood and utter futility thick on his tongue, the suffocating weight of the Ninth crushing the last embers of his defiance into the cold, reeking mud.

Chris lay half-submerged in the churned, crimson mud at the courtyard’s threshold, the world a haze of pain and sensory overload. Each ragged breath drew in the thick, metallic perfume of blood and the cloying, faecal stench of voided bowels, layered over the fading ozone tang of his own shattered power. Distant screams and the wet, meaty crunch of battle echoed like phantoms in the settling dust. White-hot agony radiated from his impaled arms, pulsing against the cold, sucking mud beneath him that leached the warmth from his bones. His vision swam, the bruised sky above blurring into a nauseating smear of purple and grey.

Gritting his teeth against the shrieking protest of torn muscle and nerve, Chris forced his trembling left arm to move. Agony, sharp as shattered glass, lanced through him as fingers slick with his own warm blood fumbled towards the cold, wrapped leather hilt of the katana embedded deep in his right biceps. The texture felt alien against his feverish skin. He grasped it, knuckles whitening, and began the excruciating process of pulling the blade free. Steel scraped against bone, a deep, visceral vibration felt in his marrow, sending fresh waves of nausea crashing over him, bile rising in his throat. Blood, dark and viscous, welled thicker around the wound, dripping onto the mud.

A shadow blotted out the bruised sky. No rush of wind, no cry of effort – only a sudden, chilling pressure descending like an anvil, pressing the humid, blood-scented air from Chris’s lungs.

Then, impact.

A spiked silver boot connected with the side of Chris’s head with the force of a falling monolith. The world exploded in silent, blinding white light. His grip on the katana hilt vanished instantly. Consciousness fragmented into shards. He felt himself lifted, not upwards, but forwards, ploughing face-first through the mud and blood-slicked earth like a discarded ploughshare. Cold, gritty filth filled his mouth and nose, thick with the taste of iron and decay. Momentum carried him, tumbling and scraping, carving a ragged furrow through the courtyard muck until he slammed to a jarring stop, limbs tangled, his face pressed into the reeking earth, tasting dirt and blood.

Dust and a fine mist of blood settled slowly. Chris lay prone, gasping, spitting clods of cold mud, the fresh, coppery tang of blood sharp on his tongue. Every bone felt jarred, his skull ringing with a deep, resonant pain. The agony in his arms was a distant throb compared to the fresh, pounding devastation radiating from his temple and jaw.

Kaelus Gravemancer stood where Chris had lain moments before, untouched by the mire. Mud seemed to recoil from the pristine spikes of his silver armour, repelled like an affront. He took a single, deliberate step forward, his clawed boots sinking soundlessly into the churned ground. He stopped beside Chris’s prone form, looking down with those frozen mercury eyes, devoid of triumph, only detached assessment.

“Chris.” His voice cut through the distant din, smooth as river-polished stone, unnervingly calm. He gestured languidly with a clawed gauntlet towards the mud, the blood, the shattered stones surrounding them. “You wouldn’t find yourself drowning in this filth,” he stated, the sterile scent of oiled steel faintly detectable beneath the courtyard’s reek, “if you possessed the wisdom to recognise futility. Targeting Master Balisarda Sumernor?” A faint, chilling amusement touched the smooth baritone, like frost forming on glass. “A moth hurling itself against the sun.”

He took another step, circling Chris slowly. The spiked plates of his armour caught the dying light, casting sharp, malevolent reflections on the churned earth. “Every desperate soul who claws their way towards him, fuelled by rage or vengeance or misplaced valour…” His claw traced a slow arc through the blood-tinged air. “…they all share your fate. Broken. Buried. Forgotten in the mud long before they even glimpse his shadow.” He paused, his glacial gaze pinning Chris like a specimen. “Look at you. Blades broken in your flesh, choking on the dirt of his courtyard. For what reason?” The question hung heavy in the blood-scented air. “Why cling to this pathetic struggle when the only outcome bleeds so plainly from your wounds? Why court annihilation with such… tedious persistence?”

The inquiry resonated, cold and philosophical, heavy as the stone sword still propelling Jabari through the distant sky. It wasn’t merely mockery; it was the question of a being who saw struggle against the inevitable as the ultimate absurdity. Chris lay in the mud, the taste of defeat and cold earth thick in his mouth, the chilling presence of the second strongest Principal, a crushing, silent monument to the terrifying weight of Kaelus Gravemancer’s point.

THE EMPTY SKY ABOVE BALISARDA, SUMMERNOR’S DOMAIN

Jabari hung suspended in the screaming void, the wind tearing viciously at his tailored jacket, flattening the crisp fabric against his corded muscles. Balisarda Sumernor’s stone sword ground relentlessly against his stomach, a massive piston of solid rock propelled by unnatural force. It didn’t pierce, didn’t cut – the impact was a crushing, bruising pressure that drove the air from his lungs with each jarring push, threatening to snap ribs despite his formidable resilience. The rough, unyielding stone scraped against the brass buttons of his jacket, scoring the polished metal. Below the castle courtyard was a distant, chaotic smear of violence.

Gritting his teeth against the sickening pressure, Jabari roared, a raw expulsion of rage and defiance ripped from his core, swallowed instantly by the rushing wind. His massive hands, knuckles like river stones, clamped onto the stone blade. Muscles stood out like cables in his neck and shoulders, veins tracing stark paths across his temples beneath his short-cropped, sweat-dampened hair. He strained with every ounce of his titanic strength, tendons screaming, boots churning empty air as he fought to arrest the sword’s momentum, to wrestle it sideways, anything but backward. The stone groaned under his grip, shedding fine dust that whipped away instantly. Yet, the relentless force driving the blade forward was immense, an unstoppable tide against which even his power seemed frail.

Frustration, white-hot and desperate, surged. He couldn’t move it. Not like this. With a guttural snarl that tasted of blood and fury, Jabari released his left hand’s grip on the grinding stone. His right hand maintained its iron hold, bracing the sword against his ear, the cold, gritty surface pressing hard against his skull. His freed left arm snapped up, hand rigid, index finger extended like a blade itself, pointing unerringly back towards the shattered throne room window, towards the distant, glacial figure of Balisarda Sumernor.

Focus burned in his volcanic eyes, narrowing to slits against the stinging wind. He channeled every shred of his will, every ounce of his thwarted strength, into that pointing hand. It wasn’t just a gesture; it was a conduit for his fury, a silent scream of challenge aimed at the tyrant. Then, with a final, explosive grunt that vibrated through his frame, Jabari shoved his right hand forward with all his remaining might, releasing his grip on the stone sword at the peak of the thrust.

Propelled by Jabari’s desperate heave, the massive stone blade ripped free. It didn’t tumble; it hurtled back along the path it had come, a dark meteor launched with vengeful intent. It tore through the air with a deep, thrumming vibration Jabari felt in his teeth, trailing dust and the scent of scorched ozone. His gaze, fierce and hopeful, tracked its trajectory – straight towards Balisarda Sumernor, framed in the jagged hole of his throne room window. Jabari willed it forward, praying for impact, for the brutal justice of the tyrant being speared by his own weapon.

Balisarda watched the stone projectile scream towards him. He didn’t flinch, didn’t evade. He simply raised his right hand, palm facing outward, fingers relaxed. As the stone sword reached him, its jagged point aimed squarely at his palm, it didn’t strike. It dissolved. Like sand hitting water, the solid granite blade flowed into Balisarda’s outstretched hand. It lost all form and momentum, absorbed seamlessly into his flesh and bone without a ripple of disturbance. One moment, it was a lethal projectile; the next, it was simply gone, consumed as if it had never existed. Balisarda lowered his hand, his expression unchanged: cold, impassive, utterly untouched. The faint scent of ozone and crushed stone lingered briefly, then vanished on the high-altitude wind.

Jabari hung in the sudden stillness, the wind whipping his hair, the crushing pressure gone, replaced only by the vast, indifferent sky and the chilling sight of effortless power. The stone sword was gone. His desperate counterattack had amounted to nothing. Below, the war raged on, indifferent to the silent defeat played out high above its carnage.