The battlefield trembled beneath the weight of monstrous war beasts, their roars drowning out the screams of dying warriors. Fire, sand, and blood mingled in the air, but amidst the chaos, two figures stood out—Jhon Rackham and Boris Thorson.
Their eyes locked across the burning wreckage of the Iron Foot camp. Jhon's grip tightened around his sword, muscles coiled like a predator ready to strike. Boris, atop his war beast named Gor'Mhagar, a hulking, tusked behemoth covered in spiked iron plating, smirked with savage amusement. In his hand, he held a massive greataxe, its edges still dripping with the blood of fallen enemies.
Then, as if bound by fate itself, they lunged. Jhon sprinted forward, boots kicking up dust and ash, his sword raised high. Boris, with a roar, yanked the reins of Gor'Mhagar, sending the monstrous beast charging ahead, crushing debris beneath its immense hooves. The sheer force of its advance sent shockwaves through the ground, throwing wounded warriors aside like ragdolls.
Jhon leaped at the last second, rolling beneath Gor'Mhagar's swinging tusks, feeling the scorching heat of its breath against his skin. As he landed, Boris swung his axe in a downward arc meant to split him in two. Jhon barely twisted away, the blade carving through the air where his head had been just moments before. The force of the swing split the ground beneath them, sending up a shockwave of sand and shattered stone.
Boris snarled. "Fast for a dead man."
Jhon smirked. "Slow for a warlord."
The two clashed again, their weapons colliding with bone-rattling force. Sparks flew as steel bit against steel, the impact ringing out over the battlefield. Jhon weaved, sidestepped, and struck, his blade slicing through Boris' side—but the warlord barely flinched. Boris retaliated with a brutal kick, sending Jhon skidding backward, coughing dust from his lungs.
Gor'Mhagar roared, swinging its tusks wildly. Jhon rolled to the side, avoiding a fatal impalement, but the beast's sheer size and weight crushed an already wounded Silver Axe warrior beside him, bones snapping like dry twigs. Blood splattered across Jhon's face, and Boris laughed.
"You came for vengeance," Boris taunted, pointing his bloodstained axe at Jhon. "But tell me, how does it feel to watch your allies die all over again?"
Jhon wiped the blood from his face with the back of his hand, his expression darkening. "I'll show you exactly how it feels."
Without hesitation, Jhon sprinted toward Gor'Mhagar, using the fallen bodies as stepping stones. Boris narrowed his eyes, gripping his axe tighter, waiting for Jhon to strike—but Jhon had no intention of fighting fairly.
At the last second, he veered left, leaped onto a broken spear lodged in the ground, and vaulted onto Gor'Mhagar's back. The beast bellowed in rage, trying to shake him off, but Jhon had already swung his blade, cutting deep into the thick flesh where the war beast's armor left a vulnerable gap.
Gor'Mhagar shrieked in agony, staggering as blood gushed from the wound. Boris howled in fury, turning just in time to meet Jhon's descending strike. Their weapons collided again, the sheer impact creating a deafening clang that echoed across the battlefield.
Jhon gritted his teeth, his knees trembling beneath him. Blood dripped from a deep gash across his chest, his breath ragged and sharp. Every time he swung, Boris countered with brutal precision. Every block sent shockwaves through Jhon's arms, numbing his grip. The difference between them was undeniable—Boris was a warrior born and bred, his every strike a calculated execution. Jhon was fast, reckless, and filled with fury, but fury alone could not bridge the chasm between them.
Boris smirked as he landed another devastating blow, sending Jhon skidding backward, his boots dragging trenches into the bloodstained sand. "You fight like a man with nothing to lose," Boris taunted, resting his axe against his shoulder. "And yet, you've lost everything already, haven't you?"
Jhon coughed, tasting iron in his mouth. He barely managed to stay on his feet. His vision blurred, the battlefield spinning. Boris was toying with him, enjoying the slow collapse of his strength.
Then, a shadow loomed behind him.
Torgo.
The Silver Axes' king moved with the weight of a storm, his massive axes gleaming under the blood-soaked sky. Without hesitation, he swung, forcing Boris to parry and take a step back. Torgo stood beside Jhon, his expression unreadable beneath the streaks of war paint and sweat.
Jhon, still gasping for air, looked up at him in disbelief.
Torgo didn't spare him a glance. He simply rolled his shoulders and faced Boris.
"Enough of this," he growled.
Boris barked out a laugh, his sharp teeth flashing. "Ahh… and there he is," he mocked, twirling his axe. "The great Torgo the Black." He cocked his head, eyes glinting with wicked amusement. "Come now, have you grown soft, old man? First, you let this fool grovel at your feet, and now you're his babysitter?"
His warriors laughed at the insult, their voices rising in cruel amusement. Torgo remained unfazed. He tilted his head, cracking his neck, and let out a slow breath. "You talk too much, boy."
Boris grinned. "And you fight too little."
His axe swung faster than Jhon could follow. Torgo caught it with his axes, the impact shaking the ground beneath them. Sparks erupted where the two axes met. A silent challenge passed between them—one of strength, experience, and unyielding will.
Jhon stumbled backward, clutching his wound. He could only watch, helpless, as the battle shifted away from him.
And all the while, Boris sneered, eyes flickering back to Jhon for just a second.
"That's right," he jeered. "Let the grown men handle this, little pirate."
Torgo's grin widened, his war paint cracked with sweat and blood. He rolled his shoulders, letting the weight of the battle settle into his bones. Then, with a single fluid motion, he unslung his twin axes—Ifrit's Fang and Shamsiel's Wrath—wicked crescent blades forged in the blood-soaked furnaces of Sol-Minora. Their edges shimmered under the chaos of battle, pulsing with an eerie crimson hue, as if still thirsty for more.
Boris smirked, adjusting his grip on his massive war axe—Jibral's Judgment—a weapon as heavy as it was fearsome, its broadhead etched with runes of conquest. It was an axe meant for execution, a tool of sheer, merciless destruction.
The air between them thickened, charged with the weight of their legacies. And then—Torgo moved. Like a desert wind turned violent storm, he lunged forward. Ifrit's Fang sliced in a wicked arc, aiming straight for Boris's throat, while Shamsiel's Wrath carved a ruthless path toward his ribs.
Boris twisted his body, narrowly avoiding decapitation, but the second axe bit into his shoulder. He grunted as blood sprayed across the battlefield. But before Torgo could capitalize, Boris retaliated, swinging Jibral's Judgment with the force of an avalanche.
Torgo ducked—barely. The sheer power behind Boris's strike shattered the ground where he stood a second ago. Sand and rock exploded into the air, turning the battlefield into a choking storm of dust.
Torgo used the moment to counter. He spun low, his axes flashing like twin fangs of a great beast. Ifrit's Fang caught Boris's leg, carving a deep wound just above the knee. Boris staggered, but his grin never faded.
"Finally," Boris rasped, eyes alight with savage glee. "A real fight."
Jibral's Judgment came crashing down again, and this time, Torgo blocked it head-on with both axes. The impact sent shockwaves up his arms, but he gritted his teeth and held firm.
The clash of steel rang through the battlefield as they pushed against each other, both warriors grinning like madmen.
Boris's muscles screamed as he swung Jibral's Judgment, the force behind his blow enough to split a man in half. Torgo met the strike with both of his axes, Ifrit's Fang and Shamsiel's Wrath, locking steel against steel. Sparks erupted from the impact, and the very air around them quivered with the raw, unrelenting force of their struggle.
Boris snarled, his boots digging deep into the sand as he pushed forward, his massive axe pressing down with the weight of a warbeast. But Torgo twisted, shifting his stance like flowing water, slipping under Boris's crushing strength. With a sudden snap of movement, he brought Ifrit's Fang down in a vicious arc, aiming for Boris's side.
The blade bit deep. Flesh parted. Boris let out a guttural growl, staggering slightly as blood gushed from his side, staining the sand beneath him. But instead of pain, his lips curled into a smile—a mad, ecstatic grin.
"Good," he spat, wiping his mouth with the back of his gauntlet. "It's been too long since I bled."
But Torgo wasn't done. He pressed the attack. He spun like a desert storm, the deadly twin axes flashing under the battlefield's cruel light. Shamsiel's Wrath carved through Boris's thigh, cutting through muscle, severing tendons. Boris buckled, but he didn't fall—he refused.
"Come on, Silver Axe's King!" Boris roared. "Show me your wrath!"
Torgo answered with a final, decisive strike. He shifted his grip on Ifrit's Fang, his body coiling like a serpent ready to strike. Then, in a single brutal motion, he swung.
The curved blade sliced through Boris's shoulder, rending flesh and bone.
And then—
The warlord's left arm was gone. It didn't fall cleanly. The muscle and sinew clung desperately, strands of flesh snapping apart like taut strings before the limb finally dropped, hitting the sand with a wet, meaty thud. Blood gushed from the severed stump, dark and steaming in the cold night air.
But Boris?
He didn't scream.
He didn't even flinch.
Instead, he laughed. A deep, guttural chuckle that grew into a roar of pure, insane ecstasy.
"Yessss!" Boris howled, his body swaying, his teeth bared in a bloodstained grin. "This... this is what I wanted!"
He looked at Torgo with something terrifying—not hate, not rage, but gratitude.
As Boris stood there, blood gushing from his severed arm, he lifted his head toward the heavens and began to chant.
The words that left his lips were not of any known tongue—not of men, nor of beast, nor even of the spirits. They were guttural, ancient, as if pulled from the very roots of existence itself. Each syllable rumbled across the battlefield, shaking the earth beneath them. The air grew thick, suffocating, charged with something primal and wrong.
Torgo took a step back, gripping Ifrit's Fang and Shamsiel's Wrath tighter. He had fought in countless wars, had seen horrors beyond reckoning, but this was something else.
Jhon's breath hitched. His instincts screamed at him to run. To flee. Something unnatural was happening.
Boris's body convulsed violently, his veins bulging beneath his skin like writhing serpents. His muscles spasmed, growing grotesquely, his flesh twisting, hardening, turning into something far worse than mere man.
Iron.
His veins darkened, solidifying into bands of living metal that spread across his body like a cursed exoskeleton. His remaining arm—twice the size it was before, pulsing with raw power—became encased in a gauntlet of serrated steel, each finger lengthened into clawed talons capable of rending through bone.
His face was no longer human. A helm of fused iron and flesh took form, sharp ridges splitting through his forehead like demonic horns. His eyes—once wild and filled with bloodlust—now glowed with a molten, otherworldly fire. His breath came out in deep, metallic rasps, his mouth stretching into a jagged, unnatural grin.
And then, his voice—no longer just Boris's, but something deeper, something eldritch—echoed through the battlefield:
"I AM IRON VEIN."
The declaration shook the very foundations of the land. Torgo felt his knees lock. Jhon's mouth went dry. The Silver Axes warriors took involuntary steps back, gripping their weapons tighter, their once-burning confidence now a flickering ember.
Boris—or what was left of him—laughed, the sound like grinding metal, like chains being dragged across stone.
Then he lifted his newly transformed arm and clenched his monstrous, clawed fist. Boris moved like a living calamity.
His massive, clawed arm tore through flesh, steel, and bone alike, cleaving warriors in half with a single swipe. Shal'Thuun roared in agony as one of his brethren was ripped apart, its massive body crumpling under the sheer force of Boris's unnatural strength. The battlefield, once a chaotic warzone, now became a slaughterhouse, dyed in the deep, arterial red of the fallen.
The Silver Axes warriors fought back desperately, their twin blades flashing under the moon, their war cries fierce—but they were nothing to Boris now. One after another, they fell, their bodies crushed like brittle twigs beneath his iron-clad fist, their spines snapped, their skulls caved in.
Even his own men were not spared. Iron Foot warriors, once loyal to him, screamed in confusion as Boris ripped through them without hesitation, his newfound form unable—or unwilling—to differentiate friend from foe. One tried to speak, to plead, but Boris's claw pierced through his chest, lifting him off the ground like a ragdoll before crushing his body with a single squeeze.
Jhon stood frozen, his breath shallow, his fingers clenched around his sword's hilt. It was happening again.
The screams, the carnage, the relentless bloodshed—it was all the same. His men were dying again.
He could only watch.
Torgo, however, did not move.
He stood there, watching the massacre with an eerie silence, his black skin slick with the blood of his fallen warriors. His golden tribal tattoos, once faint, now pulsed and flickered like living fire against his flesh, as if responding to the carnage before him.
Then, they erupted. A blinding golden light burst forth from his skin, consuming him entirely, casting long, flickering shadows across the battlefield.
For the first time, Boris paused. The monstrous warlord turned, his burning gaze locking onto Torgo. The Silver Axes king cracked his neck, rolling his shoulders, his entire body humming with an immense, raw energy. The air around him shimmered, warping under the sheer pressure of his power.
Then, in a voice that carried through the battlefield like a divine decree, Torgo spoke:
"Enough."
And then, he moved. Torgo's fist shot forward, a golden comet of condensed power, slamming into Boris's iron-clad chest with a thunderous impact.
The earth itself split open beneath them, the force of the blow sending shockwaves across the battlefield. The very air detonated around Boris, the metal of his monstrous form buckling and cracking under the sheer weight of the attack. A crater erupted beneath his feet, bodies and debris flung into the sky as the Silver Axes king unleashed the full might of his mutant strength.
Boris staggered—for the first time since his transformation, he was forced back.
Jhon could only laugh. An ironic, bitter chuckle, escaping from his throat despite the horror unfolding around him. Now he understood.
Why the Iron Foot and the Silver Axes were feared.
Why their clans had never fallen.
Why their kings were absolute.
Because they were not men.
They were monsters.
Mutants.
The very kind of beings that Edenia hunted. The same creatures that the Capitol Patrol Guard labeled as threats. And Jhon had thrown himself into the middle of it.