The clouds began to roll in, but Charles' shiny golden armor was still gleaming as the sun gradually covered the clouds.
- I won't fall like this! - Charles shouts as he drops to his knees.
- Aye?
Then the Feudal Lord began to utter a few lines in a language that the Imperial Hero himself didn't know.
- Linhal pal phoval, ki di uk pausha da liu padil.
An aura begins to appear over Charles' body.
- But what? - The Hero comments in amazement.
He stands up, wields his sword and speaks in a serious tone.
- This is the blood of my family! This is the strength of the Fifteenth Imperial Warrior family, the Kirbom!
"So he has this trick... But I have mine too!"
The Feudal Lord goes on the attack trying to stock him up, the Hero in turn tries to fire his arrows while dodging his attacks.
"Damn!"
Just as the Lord of the Seven Lakes dodges another of the Hero's arrows, he pulls out a knife hidden in his waistband and, in the blink of an eye, comes face to face with him.
- That's it!
But with his high reflexes and agility, Charles blocks his attack with his sword.
- It's not going to be that easy!
- Is it?
In a split second, he sees the Hero's bow transform into a crossbow, which he then fires at him, hitting him in the chest.
The explosion throws him backwards, causing him to crash into the wreckage.
It doesn't kill him, though, because in addition to the magic that amplifies his physical abilities, the armor managed to cushion the impact at the cost of a notorious crush.
- You bastard! I really didn't expect a Kirbom to force me to do that.
Charles comments seriously as he stands up.
- That's what my family's philosophy is! As long as you have the strength, you can still fight!
Drawing his sword again, he takes up a combat stance.
- That's why! I'll never give up! As long as I live, this fight is not over!
His aura grows stronger and begins to turn yellow.
- Hum, that light won't do any good when I have your head in my hands! - The Hero says seriously and arrogantly as he prepares to fire another shot in a serious manner.
However, at the very moment he fires the arrow, Charles attacks him, which he narrowly manages to dodge.
"What?!" - He asks himself, surprised by the speed of the Lord of the Seven Lakes' sudden attack.
He looks at his arm and notices a long gash in his armor.
- My armor! - Shouts the enraged Hero.
And so they both face each other.
- You may be the Imperial Hero, but you clearly don't have much combat experience.
- So what? I can still kill you in an instant if I want to, I'm just playing around a bit.
- Joking? No, you don't seem to be joking, it's clear that if you could do it, you would have already done it. - Speak seriously, Charles.
He continues.
- You're too proud to be a hero, and your pride will bring you down and your pride will bring you to ruin.
He becomes even more enraged and quickly prepares a triple shot.
- Look who's talking! A worm like you doesn't swim in luxury!
- Worm? You don't even know what I have to sacrifice to run my fiefdom!
The arrows are fired, but with a horizontal leap into the air, Charles evades all the arrows and launches a counter-attack.
As the fight rages, Rubion is on horseback leading the coup troops back.
- Damn! This army wasn't expected, damn it! Where did the Kirbom get this army from?!
Then a messenger rides up to him.
- Sir! An urgent message from the North City!
- I hope they're good messages.
As he reads the letter, he gets a little excited.
- At least this city is ours, that's something.
He contemplates the smoke billowing out and explosions happening in various corners of the Feudal Capital, accompanied by the deafening noise of legalist gunfire.
"Now, I need to secure support to fight even harder, but how am I going to do that without the Feudal Capital in my possession?"
But his thoughts were interrupted when a noise, previously low, began to get louder and louder, and it was coming from the sky.
- Where is that damn sound coming from? - He asks himself in a low voice.
His soldiers look up and point to the sky. Noticing all this movement on the part of his subordinates, he also looks to the sky and sees 20 dots in the sky.
- What are those things? - shouts the surprised old general, now leader of the coup.
Magno, meanwhile, finds himself together with Cobalsk also commanding the legalist forces in the Capital, just as Charles was before the Hero of the Bow's attack.
The two of them also hear the same sounds that Rubion was hearing, the loyalist soldiers coming from Wiki Town rejoice the moment they hear the noise increase, and start fighting more vehemently.
But he just looks up to see those dots passing in the sky while he comments to Cobalsk.
- They're here, they're finally here, it's time to intensify the advance.
It was airplanes, which, after briefly flying over the capital, began a dive towards the insurgent troops.
They despaired as they realized the imminent attack.
- Fall back! Everyone out of the Capital - shouts Rubion from outside the Feudal Capital.
The machine-gun fire from the planes ends up killing many who were retreating and the explosions resulting from the bombs dropped on them.
Chaos overtakes the coup ranks, turning the retreat, which should have been orderly and swift, into a disorderly, desperate and deadly retreat.
- Kill everyone you can! - shouts a sergeant on the front line fighting the coup plotters.
The vigor of the troops is still very high, despite almost two hours of intense urban combat, in which everyone caught collaborating with the insurgents has been summarily executed and their homes occupied by Magno's troops.
In addition, entire families fled their homes to avoid being caught up in the fighting.
Meanwhile, Charles is getting more and more tired fighting the Hero, who is even more motivated by the sounds of the planes.
- I won't give up while I still have the strength! I will never surrender!
He attacks again with his sword, but makes a blunder, opening up a large space for a counter-attack.
- He - The Hero smiles evilly.
Without missing an opportunity, the Imperial Hero fires an arrow right into his ribs, but his armor protects him at the cost of destroying the part that hit him.
"Damn! If he keeps this up he could...."
Suddenly the Hero fires another arrow extremely quickly, he can't even see the arrow being drawn back into the bow.
- Did you think I was going to wait for you to attack again?
His magic-enhanced reflexes are very fast, making this surprise attack easy to dodge.
- Nice try, but you'll need more than that to kill me.
- Fine by me. - The Hero replies with a sadistically confident look, as he prepares to fire more shots.
In the blink of an eye he fires again, Charles dodges, but it was a trap, and the Lord of the Seven Lakes has just fallen.
The Hero appears behind him firing an arrow, which he narrowly misses, thanks to his reflexes.
- But what? - Charles exclaimed, surprised at what he had just witnessed.
The Imperial Hero was moving so fast around Charles that he seemed to have created clones, all pointing their bows at him.
Then the shots were fired all at once.
- Die! - Shouts the enraged Hero.
A huge explosion occurs, in which Magno, standing far away, hears the bang and sees the smoke rising into the sky, leaving him confused.
- What was that?
The result was catastrophic for Charles, who was extremely injured and couldn't get up properly.
- I... I'm not giving up.
Crawling to pick up his sword, the Hero stomps down hard on his right hand as soon as he gets close to it.
With an evil smile, he takes advantage of seeing the Feudal Lord of the Seven Lakes Fiefdom on the verge of death.
- What's up? You can't even stand up, can you? Well, that won't save you.
- No... No - mutters Charles, without much strength to get up, he sees the Hero draw his sword.
- Well, since I can't get your armor, I'll have to make do with your sword.
- Evil... di... to, damn you!
As soon as the Hero takes the sword, he goes over to the Lord of the Seven Lakes, now lying on the ground.
- And now that I have a new weapon, it's time to baptize it, and your blood will be great for that.
He tries to drive the sword into Charles' neck, but he doesn't give up and with his last strength in his body, he grips the blade of the sword with his hands, which makes the Hero angry.
- You're useless, you worm! - shouts the Hero.
And so, after trying so hard, the sword that Charles used in his battles became the one that brought about his end.
And as he takes his last breaths, Charles reflects.
"This isn't how I wanted to die, at the end of it all, I'll end up joining my father and mother, and I'll also be able to Luiza, my dear wife, I couldn't protect you or myself, even though I gave it my all, please my brother, live and ..."
The Hero begins to laugh with rage and joy as he watches the Lord of the Seven Lakes bleed to death from the neck down.
- That bastard made me use almost all my power!
So he leaves Charles' body right there and takes his sword away, returning to the rooftops of the houses, he sees the coup troops being completely expelled.
"Bunch of incompetents," he thinks arrogantly.
With all this, he sneaks out of the Feudal Capital to break the good news to Rubion that the main figure in the Feud is now dead.
His superhuman strength and agility meant it wasn't too difficult to locate the coup leader, who was surprised to see him with some battle wounds and a lot of blood on his suit.
- My goodness! What happened?
- It doesn't matter, what matters is that although I clearly lost this battle, I managed to sever the snake's head.
- Don't tell me that...
- Yes, I assure you that Charles Histol Kirbom is dead.
To show that what he had just said was true, he shows Charles' sword, which makes Rubion happy.
- Wonderful! So it's only a matter of time before they accept the fief's new authority, let's get going then, you deserve a hearty meal. - Says the old general, now in charge of the insurgency against the Kirbom, expressing a sadistic smile.
- I hope that's right, he was a lot more complicated than I expected.
So, after the silencing of the guns, the legalist victory was declared in the Feudal Capital, but it was also the beginning of a war.
Unaware of what had happened to his brother, Magnus was happy with his first military victory, and greeted his general cheerfully.
- Well done, general.
- You too.
Noticing the ceasefire, Lavinha, who was inside a house, being treated with healing magic, in which her belly wound had been bandaged, woke up and seeing her lying on the bed, whispered.
- Where am I? - Still a little disoriented.
- You're finally awake! - A girl's voice shouts.
Then she feels someone hugging her.
- I'm glad you're better. - She hears the same voice as before.
When she regains consciousness, she notices Antonia sitting on a bench, looking at her happily.
- But how did you find me? Weren't you supposed to be away from here? You weren't supposed to be here.
Antonia, for her part, is happy, but just as she was about to reply, a soldier from Magno's army enters.
- It's just that Miss Antonia insisted so much that we had to go back, because the fighting was already over.
- I wish I'd said that! - Antonia shouts, getting angry.
- A thousand pardons, miss, I'm going to leave now.
As the soldier leaves the room, Lavinha smiles a little.
- You don't have to treat your subordinates like that, but how did they treat me? Was it some kind of magical cure?
- That's exactly it, they wounded you badly and called in all the magical healers they could just to save you.
In this way they continued talking, but then terrible news spread through the ranks.
- Sir! It's urgent! They're calling for you to come right away! - says the desperate messenger as he arrives where Magno and Cobalsk are.
- And what would that be? Such urgency? - Magno asks.
- Sir, I advise you to see for yourself!
Arriving at the scene, Magno stood motionless in disbelief at what he was seeing: he was standing in front of his older brother's body.
His mind soon begins to hallucinate and he sees his brother's body, and ends up seeing his father instead, while remembering what his brother had said in the past.
5 Years Ago.
Magno was walking through the castle with Charles.
- Brother, you know that the position I hold today is very dangerous, don't you?
- Of course, and it's also a rather boring job.
- Well, that's why I want you to promise me something.
- And why is that out of the blue?
- It's to make sure that if I die one day, you'll take over my position in the fiefdom.
- But isn't that already in the imperial rules?
- That's not a concrete guarantee, and I also want you to take care of our sister, in case that ever happens and she's still a child, even if she doesn't understand what I'm going to say now, but if that happens, it will be difficult at first, and I believe in your intellect in conjunction with feudal power, you can do incredible things, can you promise me?
- Yes, of course, I'll do it, because who could do that? That's very unlikely, you've practically wiped out everyone in the group that killed our parents, you've greatly increased security in the fief, we may not be the richest of the fiefs, but we're certainly one of the safest in the whole Empire.
- That may be so, but if that happens, know that I will always be with you.
Remembering all this, Magnus began to cry and vent his sadness, making his mask of an unshakable and confident leader crumble at the tragic sight in front of him.
- Brother! - Magno cries out sadly, as he tries to hug his body.
Cobalsk slowly approaches him after talking to the messenger.
- Sir, perhaps we've already found out who did this barbarity.
Magno turns to him seriously, with clear hatred on his face.
- And who did it?
- From the information I've received, it was one of the Imperial Heroes.
- The Heroes? Why would they be interested in supporting the coup plotters?
- I don't know sir, all we know is that it was one of them and that his mission was to kill you and your family according to the soldiers who found him and survived.
- My family?
- Yes sir, at first he came close to finding Antonia, but the Lavinha Feudal Guard managed to buy time to take the little lady away from him without her realizing it, however... She almost died doing that, according to our soldiers who were on the scene. He was probably the one who did it, my lord, since his mission was to exterminate your family.
- And by any chance, do you already know who specifically the Hero is?
- From the soldier's descriptions, the most logical one is the Hero of the Bow.
- Hero of the Bow? What would be his reason here? He's not even the Imperial Hero assigned to look after our region.
- We still don't know his motives, my lord, that's all we have so far.
Then he moves away from the body and kneels down, crying in rage.
- They'll pay for what they've done! - My brother, now I will have to fulfill what I promised you, but I will also make sure your death is not in vain, you two will not be forgotten. - He then murmured as his sobs and tears burst forth.
He collapses into tears.
"He always raised my self-esteem when I was sad, he always supported my ideas, but I still don't feel ready!"
Seeing all that Magno was doing, the soldiers left without saying a word and in a respectful manner, while taking the bodies of their fellow legalists away from the scene.
- Please wake up! Stop playing this bad joke with magic! - He shouts, still in a state of denial about the harsh reality in front of him.
Cobalsk finally reaches him and touches his shoulder.
- Sir, this is no joke," he says in a consoling tone.
And so he continues to cry as he remembers the past, the times when they played on the lawns, explored the forests and duelled sportingly with each other when they were both children.
- I couldn't even hear your last words! - He cries out mournfully.
Standing next to him, Cobalsk notices Magno's eyes turning red from crying.
- Does Antonia know about this? - He asks.
- No, my lord, I demanded their silence when they came near her, in case I questioned them about her dead brother's whereabouts.
- Well, make sure she only receives this information from me.
- Yes sir, your brother was a good and brave man, may God bless his soul.
With all this, Magnus gets up, stops crying, his sadness has just turned to fury, and leaves with a growing hatred in him.
"I'm going to impale that damned hero"