Chapter Ten – The Daydream Ends at Dusk

      A World without Misery (Interitus 1: Book 0)

Chapter Ten – The Daydream Ends at Dusk

 

A strong wind blew through the streets, rustling countless trees and leaves. Unlike other cities in Agrideī, Pomasylva had many trees scattered through the streets. The trees stood at every street corner, in between all the buildings, and sometimes even in the middle of a dirt road. As a result, the buildings and blocks were farther apart than in other cities. Many sections of the city looked more like a forest than civilization. Nevertheless, the rustling branches were quiet compared to the stampede of people, all running from the monster at the heart of the city. However, Hatasuko could hear the storm of souls screaming in his mind, even more loudly than the worried shouts and crashing footsteps. 

            “I thought that my victory set their anguished souls to rest, but I guess that was wishful thinking. If it’s all the same, I need their screams as fuel. If I am to strike the Interfecti from this world for good, then I need all the help I can get. So please, restless souls in the tempest, give me your strength,” Hatasuko whispered as he dashed between buildings and trees toward the Interfectus.

Hatasuko stopped in the middle of an intersection so that the screaming abyss could grant his wish. As soon as he became motionless, a glowing inscription appeared on the ground beneath his feet. It illuminated with a golden glow; it was the same symbol that had appeared when Madeline sacrificed herself. It was the same array that let him transform back in Sentia. Hatasuko suddenly felt a lost soul burning away, and then a burst of black fire engulfed his body. He could feel a surge of energy recharge the power that he used against the last Interfectus, and then the black flames faded. The array of black fire disappeared from the ground as quickly as it had appeared. With his strongest weapon refueled, Hatasuko burst into motion and charged toward the demon. A symphony of screams echoed from the shadows.

            The sky-high layer of transparent blackness illuminated with a golden glow. Every eye turned to the sky to watch this transformation. Even as Vaida and the volunteers led large groups of people through the forest, they all stopped to watch the sky. Hatasuko was stunned because he had never seen anything like this before.

“Don’t stop running, boy! The Interfectus is the living avatar of devastation. Seems like they’re through with playing passive,” Lazaro yelled from the next block over.

With the sky faintly illuminated by the golden glow, the Interfectus stopped levitating all at once. Its massive feet came crashing through a building on both sides of the street; both homes blew apart in a burst of smoke and shambles. The shadow demon took a step forward, blowing through another house, and then it unleashed its first weapon. Hatasuko watched its sword of shadows accelerate toward Lazaro at an extraordinary speed, but Lazaro deflected the attack with his black shield. The blade did not pierce his shield, but the impact threw him back into an aterpomus tree. The Interfectus then attacked again by swinging its shadow sword with a clockwise spin. When Hatasuko saw the blade approach him, he readied his sword and glared at the building through which the weapon would arrive.

This diamond-hard blade of shadows ripped through two wagons, a woman dashing in the street, and the building that he had been watching. The bloody blade tore cleanly through the home and accelerated at Hatasuko, but it flew over his head in the blink of an eye; he did not even have a chance to counterattack. And though the Interfectus had not tried to slash him, the debris from the broken home barreled toward his body. Hatasuko jumped backward, ran back several steps, and then knocked a falling rock out of the way with a swing of his sword.

“Stay down!” Lazaro shouted from the next block.

Hatasuko crouched low and dashed away from the broken home, but as he ran, he saw the Interfectus slam its foot against a small building and a massive tree. Both were ripped from the ground in a heartbeat; the monster kicked so hard that the tree and the crumbled building shot into the sky. These projectiles flew with incredible speed, leaving behind a cloud of rocks and leaves, until they came crashing down upon a small group of people fleeing the city. Two volunteers were killed on impact; four evacuees were pinned beneath the wreckage.

Though Hatasuko was too far away to see this, he could feel their anguish pouring into the tempest. In the very next moment, the Interfectus slammed its massive foot down upon the middle of the street. A huge burst of dirt and debris flew into the air; the entire city shook from the shockwave. Nevertheless, Hatasuko rose to his feet and resumed running through the trembling streets.

The Interfectus then activated its third weapon and created a scattershot of shadow spheres. Though it usually aimed its cluster of luminous bombs, the Interfectus instantly unleashed its deadly weapon; it shot every shadow ball at Hatasuko. He reached into the bag on his back for a rock, but Arken was even quicker; he shot an arrow from somewhere nearby and struck the shadow ball closest to Hatasuko. It erupted in blue fire just as before, but it was too far away from the rest of the cluster. Massive fireballs rained down upon this segment of the forest city. Trees and buildings were thrown from the ground in a burst of blue flames. One shadow sphere detonated in the block where Lazaro had been, and Hatasuko had no way to tell if his friend was alright.

“This darkness ends with me,” Hatasuko muttered as he activated his Astrodeus power.

            A surge of unparalleled power flooded through him all at once. The energy illuminated his body and enwrapped his left arm with a powerful glow. He then twisted and launched the rock in his left hand with unbelievable strength; the rock flew so fast that it broke the speed of sound and unleashed a shockwave as it tore through the air.

In the moment before the rock would have struck its skull, the Interfectus blocked by summoning a shield of swirling shadows. The rock blew apart on impact; the shield glowed white in the place where it was struck, and then it faded altogether. The strong breeze carried the stench of smoke and ashes as Hatasuko raced toward the monster. As he approached, the Interfectus unleashed its shadow claw once again. The high-speed arm tore a tree to pieces as it struck a nearby intersection; Hatasuko heard the clamor of a blade striking Lazaro’s shield.

“There’s a wagon! That’s my chance!” Hatasuko exclaimed.

As he heard a body get ripped to pieces by the shadow claw, Hatasuko jumped onto a wagon and then jumped onto a rooftop with a reawakened fury. Through the cloud of smoke and dust, Hatasuko saw from the rooftop that Lazaro held a child in his left arm as he blocked the shadow claw with his shield. Pieces of a person littered the street. Hatasuko ran across the rooftop at full speed, pulled his sword back behind him, and then jumped into the smoky sky before the Interfectus could retract its shadow arm. In midair, Hatasuko activated his power, enchanted his right arm with inconceivable strength, and then crashed his sword against the arm of the Interfectus. His slash was so powerful that he destroyed the demon’s left arm in an explosion of black shards, but the recoil from this impact threw him down onto the street. He crash-landed on his back so hard that when he rolled to his feet a moment later, he saw a small crater shaped like his body.

Hatasuko felt disoriented from crashing into the ground, but he noticed that the Interfectus did not show signs of pain. Even as shadow shards rained down onto the street, the monster did not stop its onslaught. While the transparent layer in the sky glistened with a golden glare, the shadow demon leveled a row of homes with a single kick. Hatasuko could sense that the debris had crushed or impaled several people, and then the houses flew off into the sky and broke apart in the wind. The city shook again from the force of this kick. Hatasuko stumbled as he climbed to his feet, but Lazaro ran up and helped him stand the rest of the way.

“This Interfectus has good aim. We’ve already lost a lot of volunteers. Seems like everyone wants to escape by going deeper in the forest. We’ve got to keep the monster distracted,” Lazaro explained as they ran together toward the beast.

Hatasuko glanced down and saw that blood and bruises covered Lazaro’s body. His left forearm looked like it had been smashed earlier in the fight, but he still lightly clenched a rock as he ran forward. Hatasuko figured that they could run closer to the Interfectus without being attacked, since it was currently regenerating its broken arm. However, it then surprised him by summoning a scattershot.

“ARKEN, SHOOT IT!” Lazaro shouted since he had seen its speed before.

Just like before, the Interfectus immediately unleashed its shadow spheres without any hesitation. Through the corner of his eye, Hatasuko saw Lazaro throw a rock while Arken jumped from a rooftop and fired his arrow. The scattershot flew so swiftly that the arrow missed, and Lazaro’s rock harmlessly flew between two spheres. Both defenses had missed; they had failed to prevent the inferno.

Lazaro stopped running, threw Hatasuko on the ground, and then jumped on top of him with his shield outright; this was their only defense. The scattershot of shadow spheres struck sixteen spots simultaneously. The blue flames engulfed many trees and buildings. Windows were blown out by the shockwaves. The explosion destroyed a building right beside Lazaro and Hatasuko, and its ashy rubble came crashing down upon them. They were both curled up so that they could hide behind Lazaro’s shield, but Hatasuko was too large to hide completely. He felt the searing touch of fiery debris fall upon his legs. Heavy stones and wooden beams struck his shins. The fallen building had swallowed them whole.

            The Interfectus stood menacingly in the heart of the smoky city; broken branches and crumbled buildings scattered the ground around its feet. Before the smoke even settled, it prepared its next scattershot. It spun its massive body so that its golden eyes glared at the forest that stretched southward. It saw scores of silhouettes moving that way, and so it created a second scattershot of shadow spheres. Arken ran through the streets and desperately hooked his arrow to his bowstring, but he knew that he could not stop this onslaught. The Interfectus had spun its body for a reason; it used its massive back to shield its spheres from an arrow. It then unleashed the scattershot as fire illuminated its back.

The scattershot spread out as it blasted through the smoky sky at a transonic speed. The Interfectus produced more shadow spheres than usual, since its only enemies were buried beneath the rubble of a burning building. Twenty-eight shadow spheres descended upon the southern horizon and exploded with a deafening boom. Twenty-eight blue bursts of fire engulfed the forest. Several people were lost to the explosion, but the rest were now trapped. A wall of ravenous flames now blocked off the southern side of Pomasylva.

             “How could this happen? My friends must be in trouble. I have to go,” Vaida whispered as she and her group came to a halt. She had been running with several families and two other volunteers. The fiery shockwave had nearly knocked them down, since they stood close to the place where the shadow spheres landed.

 “But where are we supposed to go? Where are we supposed to run?” asked one of the volunteers in a frantic voice.

“I don’t know. Try to run around the flames! Please don’t hate me for leaving,” Vaida said, and then she ran back toward the Interfectus.

A woman in the crowd said, “I knew it was over as soon as I saw it. It doesn’t matter if the Astrodeus has come to save our souls. His victory was a fluke. I’m not delusional enough to believe we ever had a chance.”

The two volunteers and the other evacuees watched in horror as the woman ran toward the inferno. She sprinted without fear and without hesitation. When she reached the edge of the searing flames, she jumped in and let the forces of fire free her from the devastation. Her body turned to ashes, her soul was ripped out, and then another scream entered the tempest of souls in Hatasuko’s head.

And though he was buried beneath the flaming wreckage of a fallen building, Hatasuko became overwhelmed by the lamentations in the abyss. He threw Lazaro aside and then activated his power for a rage-fueled counterattack. His extraordinary strength lifted the shambles and launched them at the Interfectus. The golden-eyed demon watched the flaming debris fly closer, but by swiftly summoning its shadow shield, it blocked the wreckage. The crumbling shambles rained down like a cascade of smoke and rubble. 

As Hatasuko stood back up in the street with his sword in his hand and his lungs heaving from each breath, he saw that the southern horizon glowed with fire. He saw that the Interfectus had blocked off the city’s best escape route, so he swerved to face the demon. The Interfectus turned its head so that its glowing eyes glared directly at him, but it did not attack. It stood in silence as its shadow arm continued to slowly regenerate. A strong gust carried a cloud of ash and leaves across the wreckage of the forest city.

While hidden by this cloud of ash and smoke, Arken lifted his bow and fired an arrow straight into the sky. Though the thin arrow flew swiftly, the smoky gusts quickly blew it off a straight path, but Arken had expected this all along. The arrow flew exactly as he planned, and then it stabbed directly into the monster’s glowing left eye. It unleashed a deafening roar; the whole sky shook from its fury. The Interfectus slammed its massive feet against the ground so that the shockwave destroyed every tree and building on either side of the street. The city shook from this shockwave; even the airwaves pushed away the dust clouds in the street. Despite the earthquake and waves of smoke, Hatasuko knew that this was his best chance, so he braced himself and barreled through the shockwave. He charged through the smoldering debris until he reached the same street as the Interfectus, just a few blocks away.

Almost every building between Hatasuko and the Interfectus had been blown to shambles. Fire spread across countless homes and trees; fiery light reflected on the dark surface of the demon. Despite the damage inflicted on the monster, it transformed its right arm into a spear of shadows and prepared to strike. Hatasuko pulled back his sword and prepared to use his power, but then he realized that he was not the target. The demon’s shadow blade blasted through the roof of a building, tore through a wall, and then stabbed through Arken’s chest in the street outside the building. Arken’s eyes grew wide as the blade slammed into the ground, breaking his right shoulder on impact.

“Bastard!” Lazaro shouted as he raced toward the archer with his warhammer drawn.

The Interfectus swiftly slashed its blade upward and tore straight through Arken’s skull. Blood and hair rained onto the street as Lazaro raced forward to avenge his friend. He swung his warhammer at the edge of the shadow spear, but the Interfectus outpaced him; the demon retracted its weapon before it could be struck.

Hatasuko retaliated by activating his Astrodeus power; he threw a rock with a strength fueled by lost souls. The rock broke the speed of sound, unleashed a sonic boom, and then struck the right shoulder of the demon with enough power to snap its shadow armor. The Interfectus roared again as its broken armor rained down, but it did not counterattack. Hatasuko suspected that it rested for a moment so that it could regenerate.

A golden symbol appeared on the ashy street beneath Hatasuko’s feet. The array shimmered, engulfed his body in a flash of black fire, and then faded from the ground when the black flames died away. He then charged across the smoldering street as the Interfectus stood motionless in the glow of fire. As he ran, he saw that the monster’s eye had healed. Its right shoulder quickly regenerated, and its left arm was still being pieced back together. Hatasuko ran faster so that he could interrupt the regeneration, but the Interfectus saw him coming.

The shadow demon lifted its massive feet off the ground, but it levitated upward at a very slow rate. Hatasuko saw that he had a shot to stop the Interfectus before it got too high, so he accelerated to a speed faster than ever before. As he ran, he sheathed his sword, grabbed his whip, and then jumped onto a smoldering pile of wreckage. The flames illuminated the debris of what was once a large building, so he quickly jumped higher and higher. As soon as he reached the top of the wreckage, twelve feet from the ground, Hatasuko jumped into the sky, just beneath the jagged foot of the shadow demon. He swung his whip forward and cracked it against the Interfectus, but he had nothing to grab onto. The whip harmlessly bounced off its shadow armor, and then Hatasuko fell toward the ground.

Though its right shoulder had not healed all the way, the Interfectus transformed its arm into a shadow sword and swung it at Hatasuko. He could not dodge since he was still falling, so he dropped his whip and prepared to counter the blade-arm with his power. But in the moment that the Interfectus slashed its deadly sword, something wrapped around Hatasuko’s ankle and jerked him out of the way. He slammed onto the ashy street with a heavy thud, and he continued rolling until he hit a half-broken tree. Vaida stood behind the tree with her whip in her hand and her eye wide with fear.

“You almost killed yourself!” Vaida exclaimed as the shadow sword tore down a tree on the other side of the street.

“Get down!” Hatasuko yelled, and then he grabbed her while throwing himself down.

The Interfectus slashed its blade so swiftly that it effortlessly tore through the half-broken tree. The edge of the blade had slashed just a few inches from the top of their heads. As adrenaline coursed through his veins, Hatasuko watched the tree crash into a leveled building right behind them. A burst of leaves and smoke flew through the street.

“If you activated your power in the air, the recoil would slam you to the ground and kill you!” Vaida warned as she scrambled to her feet.

“I didn’t even think about that! Wow, I owe you!” he answered.

“It’s too far off the ground. You’re gonna have to throw if you want to hit it,” Vaida said as she stared into the sky.

“But it’ll just block with the shield! I can’t hit the Interfectus unless it tries to use one of its weapons,” Hatasuko explained. But as if it had heard them speak, the Interfectus suddenly spun so that its massive back faced them. Since many volunteers tried to lead the evacuees toward the west, the Interfectus summoned a scattershot of shadow spheres; it sought to block off the west edge of the forest city just as it had done to the south. 

            Hatasuko saw his chance and took it by activating his Astrodeus power. His whole body shimmered, his left arm became luminous, and then he launched a broken brick at a supersonic speed. The Interfectus moved quickly enough to jolt in the way and block the brick with its diamond-hard back. The brick blew to pieces and shattered the armor in this place, but now all countermeasures were gone; the Interfectus launched its scattershot on the western horizon. Lazaro threw a rock with all his strength from a couple blocks away, but the rock was too slow to strike anything. Every shadow ball fell upon the clusters of trees and detonated blue fire. Nineteen explosions illuminated the sky with a powerful blue flash. The shockwave shook every smoke-stained tree. The deafening sound made Vaida cringe, but Hatasuko was paralyzed by the souls pouring the tempest.

“Hatasuko! Get your ass in gear, boy! It’s not cornering these people just for fun!” Lazaro yelled as he dashed into the street.

Hatasuko glanced up at the demon of flashing blades and shifting shadows. Though it levitated over the trees and rooftops, it moved quickly toward the west. The layer of transparent blackness pulsed with golden light as the monster moved. Hatasuko knew that this was critically dangerous, so he burst into motion and ran after the Interfectus. He could hear Vaida and Lazaro running after him from behind, but they could not keep up with his Astrodeus body. When Hatasuko reached his full speed, he noticed that he sprinted westward at the same speed as the monster, but he still had to navigate past many obstacles. The streets were littered with burning debris, crumbled buildings, fallen trees, and sometimes even corpses. The Interfectus avoided all of this by simply levitating over the city as it approached the wall of fire.

Hatasuko kept his eyes on the street so that he could jump over debris or run around trees, but he intermittently glanced at the Interfectus as he ran. He could see through the fiery glow that its arms had almost completely healed. Even the crack in the armor on its back regenerated slowly. The newest souls in the tempest screamed louder than anything else, but he accepted their screams and used their anger to fuel his adrenaline. The adrenaline rush allowed him to speed up as he chased the monster; it let him ignore his own exhaustion. But despite his fatigue, the Interfectus hardly had a single scratch on its body.

Every volunteer and evacuee had watched the Interfectus fly closer over the past many minutes, so everyone near the firewall tried to disperse. Many people ran northward through the forest so they could escape into the grasslands, but many others had to run south toward the other wall of fire. But as the Interfectus closed in on the west part of the forest city, it began moving toward the south. 

            Hatasuko heard several shrill screams over the crackling fire and howling wind; these shouts came from people who would be cornered in seconds. Two volunteers tried to run around the Interfectus by leading a large group eastward, but the demon was so close that they had no escape. It used its first weapon to extend a shadow sword at an extremely fast speed. It shot out so quickly that it impaled the two volunteers, and then the sword slashed swiftly to the right. The shadow blade was so fast that it sliced through every person and every tree in the blink of an eye. Fifteen human bodies and twenty-one trees all slammed onto the ashy ground.

“THIS HAS TO END!” Hatasuko roared as the surge of the tempest overwhelmed him.

The Interfectus heard his voice over the howling wind and the screaming victims. The demon swerved and unleashed its shadow sword so swiftly that Hatasuko never had a chance to defend himself. Vaida and Lazaro watched with horror as the blade blew through Hatasuko’s chest, smashed him through a building without slowing down, and then slammed into the ash-covered street. The blade had pierced through his body, and it struck so swiftly that the pressure jolted his veins. Every open cut on his body spewed out blood, but he was unconcerned with his other injuries now that the blade-arm pierced his chest. In the place where an ordinary human housed organs, the blade instead tore through a thick bundle of veins and arteries.

            “There’s no way. I can’t die here! I am the first Astrodeus. I am meant to save this world. Only I can save this world,” Hatasuko thought.

In the moment before the Interfectus would have torn him apart from the inside, Hatasuko activated his Astrodeus power. With a mighty slash of the sword in his glowing right hand, Hatasuko destroyed the shadow arm of the Interfectus. His sword struck with so much power that he shattered the monster’s armor and blade-arm all at once. Even the part that pierced Hatasuko crumbled into shards of black dust. Blood poured from his incisions now that nothing plugged the wounds, and he dropped onto his knees while paralyzed by pain.

“No! No, no, no! Hatasuko, please, please tell me you’re okay! Please don’t die,” Vaida said through a breathy gasp as she ran up to his side.

“There’s no way to deny the defeat. We’ve lost, and we’re going to pay the price with our lives,” Lazaro grumbled when he reached Hatasuko.

“I got impaled by the Interfectus. Holy hell… I actually had its blade inside of me. It hurts worse than I imagined,” Hatasuko whispered.

“You can’t die, Hatasuko! You’re the only one who can free this world. You’re the only hope anyone has left! You can’t just die,” whispered Vaida.

With the glow of fire flashing on the black surface of its massive body, the Interfectus spun so that its golden eyes glared at the three friends, locked below in the ashes and wreckage of Pomasylva. Crumbled buildings and fallen trees surrounded them; nothing could protect them from the demon of flashing blades and shifting shadows. Its arm slowly regenerated beneath the golden glow of the ceiling in the sky.

            As he lifted his shield and faced the Interfectus, Lazaro said, “I really hate that I have to confess this, but there’s no way to deny that she’s right. Only an Astrodeus can save this world from darkness. I lost everything I ever loved, offered my own life as a sacrifice to save the innocent, but I knew it wasn’t enough. I never had enough power to save anyone, and I’ve known that all along. In the moment you stood on that array of black fire, I had to accept that you would fulfill the dream that I’ve been chasing this whole time. I sacrificed everything, but you still stole my dream from me. The privilege of a dream is that it’s a fantasy, but if it happens, then it was never truly a dream to begin with.”

“Lazaro, why are you telling me this? What the hell… are you planning?” Hatasuko demanded as he lifted his eyes from the bloody ashes.

Lazaro looked down at his giant student and locked eyes with him. He answered, “You must understand how much is riding on your survival. Use your power on the ground and leave this place right now. From now on, everything is up to you.”

            Despite the intensity of Lazaro’s glaring green eyes, Hatasuko nodded his head.

            Vaida stuttered and said, “W-wait, Lazaro, why are you saying this? Why can’t-”

            But Vaida was interrupted when Hatasuko stood up and picked her up in his massive arms. Her blue eye became wide as she came to understand his intention.

            “Hey, let me down! Lazaro, we’re not gonna leave you behind! The world needs you; I need you! We aren’t ready to fight without you. Let me down!” Vaida screamed as she slammed her fists on Hatasuko’s back.

            “Vaida, shut the fuck up! This isn’t about me, and this sure as hell isn’t about you. This is the way it has to be. Hatasuko, get out of here!” Lazaro retorted.

            Hatasuko repositioned his feet so that his knees were bent and his calf muscles prepared to flex. In this position, he could activate his Astrodeus power, redirect the energy into his leg muscles, and catapult himself away from the battleground at a moment’s notice.

            Vaida whispered into the howling wind, “Wait! I know I’m too weak to change this! I know that my words won’t stop you. I know that you don’t care at all. But Lazaro, I have to know! Why do you hate me so much? It’s not that I blame you, and I shouldn’t care because I hate myself more than you ever could, but… I just have to know.”

            Lazaro shifted his gaze once again so that he could not see Vaida or Hatasuko at all. He held his shield in his hand and glared up at the golden glowing eyes of the Interfectus. As smoke and leaves danced through the street around his body, Lazaro explained, “If you didn’t have those burns, you’d be the spitting image of my little Serena. You’re even the same age… if she were still alive. The truth is that I never had a chance to come to terms with my ghosts. I hated your burns more than anything because they were the only thing that poisoned her reflection. They were a constant reminder of the daughter lost to darkness. Every time you got hurt, every time I heard you scream at the top of your lungs, another piece of me died because of her and because of you. And you wouldn’t let me leave you behind, so I had to relive my tragedy every morning when I fought myself awake from my own nightmares.”

            “But that’s not fair! You were the one who hurt me! You’re not-”

            But her words were cut off when Hatasuko activated his power. Just as he had planned, he transferred his supercharged strength into his calf muscles, and then he pushed off the ground with so much force that he left a tremendous crater in the wreckage. The impact forced Hatasuko and Vaida to shoot off into the sky at a speed faster than anything they had ever felt. It was such a sudden change that many joints cracked immediately; Hatasuko could feel a huge rush of pain from many points on his injured body.

The shockwave of the crater sent Lazaro flying through the wreckage; he spun himself in midair so that his shield hit a snapped tree trunk instead of his body. As the Interfectus loomed overhead with its feet hovering over the treetops, it created a cluster of shadow balls.

Though his whole body was bruised and aching, Lazaro reached into his sack, pulled out a rock, and threw it into the sky with the little strength he had left. But in the moment that he threw his rock, the shadow demon launched its scattershot directly downward; the rock and a shadow sphere collided in between the man and the monster. Every shadow sphere detonated and unleashed a cacophony of shockwaves and blue flames. Every tree was blown away by the blast; the shockwave slammed Lazaro onto his back, burned his body, and threw him backward at a high speed. The large man crashed into another tree stump as the flames died away. A numbness rolled through his legs because his back had struck the tree. As he stumbled onto his feet, Lazaro felt a wave of blood roll down his back and soak into his pants.

“I always knew that it would come to this,” he whispered.

The Interfectus attacked next with its massive sword of shadows. Lazaro kicked off the tree stump and threw himself aside in the moment before he would have been dismembered. The blade of the Interfectus struck the tree stump and destroyed it on impact; it blew apart in a massive shower of ash and woodchips.

“But now that the time has come, I want to reject the reality.”

The blade of the Interfectus slashed so suddenly that Lazaro did not have time to block with his shield. The shadow sword tore through his shins in a heartbeat. His feet flew off behind him through the ashes; his bloody body fell into the cinders. Just the pressure of impact had forced his wounds to reopen and spew blood. But as the Interfectus used one arm to level several buildings and trees, it used its other arm to unleash its final attack. The Interfectus forced its shadow spear to tear through Lazaro’s stomach and into the dirt behind him. Beneath the paralyzing pressure of physical pain, Lazaro could feel the curse of darkness seeping into his bloodstream; he could sense his eyes turning gold. He grabbed a dagger from his side pocket. But before he got the chance to take his own life, the Interfectus slashed its blade and tore his body apart in a single swift flick.

The two halves of Lazaro’s body slammed into the ashes at the same time. One part landed face-up, the other face-down. The infernos raged in the background because the fire was driven by the howling wind. Countless shouts echoed into the sky from all directions. The golden eyes of the Interfectus glared down from the sky and peered at the hopeless evacuees. They had finally given up on escape and survival.

All hope died on this battleground of flames and shadow. Despair spread across humankind like a plague. Hope was a daydream, and the darkness had proven that it was just as powerful as ever before.

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