[h1][center]✧༝┉｡❅˚*❋ -ˋˏ ༻ ᯽ ༺ˎˊ-❋*˚❅｡┉༝✧[/center][/h1]




The battle reached its breaking point.

The smaller elk-aberration lunged again, intent on tearing into Ironbelle’s unarmored flank. Its limbs clattered across the ice, joints snapping with every unnerving step—

—and the mecha met it head-on.

Ironbelle’s fan-shield slammed sideways into the creature’s face just as Axol barreled in.
Steel and brute strength worked in tandem: the mercenary’s greatsword swept low, catching the creature mid-charge and hurling it upward toward the shield’s rising arc.

The two impacts collided into one devastating blow.

The elk-thing hit the ground in a twisted heap, ribs shuddering, legs twitching in spasms that no living beast should make. Steam belched from its jawless maw as it tried to rise—

—and Bromann’s arrows found their mark.

Two shafts punched cleanly into what passed for its skull, sinking deep until the fletching kissed rotten bone. The creature froze in place. The greenish vapor leaking from its wounds flickered—

—and then its entire frame collapsed into the snow with a soft, anticlimactic whump.

The smaller beast was down.

Across the clearing, the larger bear-wraith strained against the swarm of undead tearing at its exposed flesh. Andrea’s risen dead clung to it with relentless purpose—skeleton fingers raking through sinew, rusted blades driving repeatedly toward the open wounds already carved along its ribs.

The monster heaved upward in one last violent surge—

—only to swipe into empty air.

Andrea’s dodge carried her clear of the blow, snow spraying beneath her weight. She struck back immediately, her blade plunging into the same ravaged cavity her undead had already weakened. The impact drove deep into corrupted tissue; the wraith’s massive frame lurched sideways, a guttural gurgle rattling through its half-sludge throat.

The wound pulsed violently, green light stuttering inside the creature’s ruined chest.

And then Rachel reached it.

Her dagger—wreathed in newly summoned flame—drove directly toward that failing heart-glow. Fire met envy-light with a sickening, warping sound. The corrupted energy recoiled—then destabilized entirely. Heat flared outward from the point of contact, not burning the bear’s flesh so much as unraveling it.

The monster buckled.

Its chest collapsed inward as if the fire were eating it from the inside out. Andrea’s undead seized upon the failing structure—pulling, tearing, dragging with mindless precision. The envy-tainted glow flickered…hissed…
and finally went dark.

The bear-wraith crashed to the ground in a spray of deadened frost, its bulk sinking into the snow as its animating force extinguished completely.

For a heartbeat, only the wind moved.

Then Andrea’s undead began to crumble—bone turning brittle, flesh collapsing into slush. One by one they slumped back into the frozen earth, claimed again by the cold that had once preserved them.

The clearing returned to its unnatural quiet, broken only by the hiss of settling frost and the distant rumble of siege engines battering the Bastion behind them. The air tasted of iron and smoke and something older, something sour—envy rotting at the edges of the world.

For a long moment, nothing moved.

Then the wind shifted, brushing snow over the fallen creatures as though eager to bury them and whatever foulness had animated them.

The ascent toward the western outpost carried the travelers through a narrowing ravine where the wind whistled low, threading between stone and snow like a muted warning. The storm had left drifts piled high along the road’s edges, softening every footprint behind them but preserving the ones ahead—scattered, frantic, pointing toward the hilltop structure.

Near the first rise, the snow told a story.

Bootprints overlapped in chaotic patterns.
A shield lay half-buried.
A snapped spear lay discarded like a broken limb.

But there were no monster trails.

Only human ones.

As the outpost came into fuller view, its state became unmistakable.

The wooden gate hung crooked on its hinges, forced outward as if someone inside had pushed desperately to flee. Splinters lay scattered across the frost, the exposed break still sharp—recent, not weathered.

Inside the courtyard, silence ruled.

Tools remained where they’d fallen: an overturned bucket frozen mid-spill, a lantern left burning until the oil ran dry and the frost claimed its glass in a sheet of rime. Snow drifted lazily through an open shutter, settling over everything like a burial cloth.

Then the bodies appeared.

The first scout slumped against the barrack wall, head bowed as though in exhausted sleep—but the deep crimson at his collar told otherwise. His skin carried the pallor of cold, not corruption. His gloves were torn, his knuckles scraped raw. Signs of a struggle, but not against beasts.

The second scout lay half-hidden beside an overturned bench, a dagger still gripped in one stiffened hand. A shallow cut marred his cheek; the far deeper wound under his ribs explained the rest. Snow had only just begun to gather over him.

Bootprints led in all directions from the scene, some ending abruptly, others doubling back, many smeared into the telltale chaos of close-quarters fighting. A fight had occurred here—among soldiers, not against outside forces.

The barracks door stirred in the wind, creaking open to expose a sliver of darkness. 

[hr]

Ooc: We are out of combat. Feel free to have your characters inspect the bodies or look around for things that might seem to point towards how this mess happened. Or head towards the barracks.