There was now a gaping hole right through Eisengeist’s torso, its edges and inner walls still smoldering royal-blue as the dragon’s immortal blood filled the gap, its flesh reaching across in an effort to heal itself as it howled - nay, screamed - in searing agony, its good tendrils thrashing and wrecking its surroundings. Teutobochus itself stumbled back from the dragon, the stolen tendril falling away from the titan’s hand before it turned its head towards the four women and raised its hand in thumbs-up. Then, the titan collapsed onto its back.

“Hearts three through five destroyed. Heart six overheated. Heart seven is arrhythmic. Primary spinal signal highway severed in nine places; approx. half a ton of nerve material missing. Reactor… Damaged, leaking, but stable. Total success.”

“Socketing Ignis core into Dawnwolf Belt. Setting ejection point… That’s the maximum range?” Victor wondered as he realized just how far Teutobochus could send him.

“Unfortunately, the damage we sustained has slashed the ejection range to less than one-fifth of nominal. It should still suffice.”

The current maximum range was nearly half a kilometer. Victor willed Dawnwolf to strip itself off of him and transform into its servitor form the moment it could, and thereafter sent himself as close to the steam tower as possible. Not a moment later, he felt himself expelled through a greywashed realm where the ground was a mercurial sea and the floating city of Karga shone as a beacon far in the sky. His flight through the Sea of Fog lasted but a moment, and he found himself careening through the air straight towards the ground.

Well before he could formulate a means of impact mitigation he felt the armor slip off him. He landed upon a predatory steed of devilbone and titanflesh. Koschei’s key was in its place, on his chest, and the Oculus was wedged under one of Dawnwolf’s ribs well within reach. What would become his belt was currently placed on the back of Dawnwolf’s neck, where one would expect a sturmgandr’s dashboard. He impelled his steed to take him to the nearest high spot, so he could assess the situation and see the Black Rod being launched. When Dawnwolf took off sprinting and bounding upon blasts of bonefire, Victor pinged Jorfr’s and Zel’s tablets just to see if he would receive a reply. A lack of response from Zelsys was no surprise given the distance, but Jorfr was concerning. He knew for a fact that he had the device on him.

Sounds and sights of terrible exertion made themselves known from the steam tower’s summit. One after the next, circle after circle, seven glyphs of varying sizes were carved into the air in its path.

Three seconds passed. Eisengeist stirred in place, ever so slightly.

The Black Rod didn’t so much fly forward as it snapped. One moment it was hovering ominously over the steam tower, and the next, it had gone right through Eisengeist to the trembling of the ground and the terrible shockwave of a massive thunderclap. Its surface alighted with ominous magenta that made his eyes hurt, and at that moment, Victor knew it had gone to plan, that he could head to the Hulson longhouse without worrying about the dragon.

As his steed carried him there, he sent a message to Zefaris: “Status?”

Zef’s reply was not a thought-impulse, but a voice message: “Alive. Completely exhausted, barely able to move, bleeding from… Every hole on my head. Can’t open my left eye. Karmesin’s head exploded, but she’s fine now… I think. Fryg froze solid. Yvonne says she has done this before, that it’s a way to hold the Black Rod together until the Revenant King arrives. Head to the Hulson longhouse to provide support.”

“Already on the way,” he replied.

The Seven Suns Equinox.

He barely knew anything about it, save for the fact it meant the Revenant King, hopefully with Zelsys in tow, would likely arrive in Oasis City ere long. How long it would be… He could only guess.

A terrible feeling in the back of his head told him that it would be too late for the Hulsons if someone didn’t intervene. The source of that feeling was, perhaps, in part instinct, and perhaps in part his hypercognition… But it was mostly the vast number of corpses surrounding the burning building and the horrific noise emerging from within.

All hope seemed lost for the Hulson household. No matter how many the Hulsons and their allies slew or wounded, their foe just filled the gap and kept up the pressure. With Zefaris’ absence, the enemy had grown so bold as to go in through the windows of the clan members’ personal rooms, bursting out of them to assail those upon the walkways. The Heiasons battled valiantly, with Gjúki summoning up thirteen flameborne spectres of his own father armed with twin blazing swords each, but even this prodigy’s nascent ancestor-summoning didn’t suffice.

Indeed, all hope seemed lost. Jorfr lay dead, despite Merete’s best efforts, and Rikke had spent what little spare mass she had possessed, now a skin-wrapped, spiky skeleton of a woman. Gunnar still raged against them in defiance. Riddled with blades and arrows, the berserker smashed down Eisen, Buhaug, and Aase alike, and even Ismaar dared not approach him, instead throwing quills in the hopes that one would hit. None of them did, and a few of them even struck and killed Ismaar’s own men.

Eventually, the blinding light of the Inverse Array tore in through the longhouse’s windows and holes, casting ominous godrays through the haze of smoke and mist that hung in the air. Gunnar was noticeably slowing down, and even the Heiasons had grown tired. Corpses littered the great hall and blood pooled freely.

Ismaar closed the distance, smug as could be, quill in hand.

“I ought to strike you down with this, old man… But I’d much rather tear your throat out with my own teeth. Won’t be long before Eisengeist gets here - can’t hear that stomping outside anymore, can you? The dragon walks quietly, unlike that ridiculous thing, what was it? Thirty Bugs?!”

He seemed to find his horrid non-joke absolutely hilarious.