The sixth checkpoint was a departure from the claustrophobic bottlenecks of the lower pass. Here, at the summit's edge, the mountain breathed open into a vast plateau known as the High Shelf. It was a natural amphitheater of dust and jagged granite, and for the first time in weeks, the Xian army didn't have to march in a thin, vulnerable line. They spread out across the dry, scorched expanse in a massive, terrifying crescent of black iron.

  The siege frames shifted their rhythm. They weren't just firing up the road anymore; they were staggered across the shelf, creating a crossfire that turned the air into a chaotic web of blue flame.

  "Aran!" Varek's voice was nearly lost to the howling wind. "They're flanking the east ridge! We don't have the numbers to cover a line this wide!"

  Duke Aran Valdris stood on the central bastion, his gaze sweeping the wide horizon. Below him, the Valdris guard was no longer holding a gate; they were holding a mile-long perimeter of trenches and low stone walls. Darius, his shield arm trembling from dozens of impacts, looked out at the sea of black iron. "In the pass, we could funnel them," he shouted over the roar of a falling boulder. "Here... here they're just going to swallow us."

  "Then we make them choke on the attempt," Aran replied, his voice hard.

  A volley of iron-shod boulders rained down, striking the dry earth with the force of falling stars. Dust and stone shards sprayed the air, obscuring the advancing Xian vanguard.

  "Finn! The ridge group!" Aldric bellowed, his earth mages desperately trying to raise miles of stone barricades to meet the spreading Xian front. "Mera, hold the center—stiffen the clay!"

  "I'm trying!" Mera cried, her hands glowing with a frantic, pulsing light. "But the line is too thin! There's too much ground to cover!"

  *Holding.* Her voice is thin as wire. *Barely. The relay—*

  The link flickers. For a heartbeat, Aran loses her. Then she's back, her presence shaky.

  *Still here.*

  Below, the Xian shield wall advances.

  Duke Goran of Agvara appears at Aran's side, his face grey with dust. "We can hold. But not forever."

  Another boulder strikes. The bastion shudders. Torval goes down—a piece of masonry catches him in the shoulder. Darius drags him back from the edge. "Medic! We need a medic!"

  ---

  The mental link tears.

  Lyra gasps. Her legs buckle. The glow in her eyes falters, then dies. Around her, the Guild mages stagger—Aldric's slab wavers mid-raise; Finn's next spell goes wide. But the Valdris and Agvaran soldiers don't break. Their heads turn as one toward the central bastion, looking for the flash of Aran's blade or the signal flags of the Agvaran command.

  "Lyra's down!" someone shouts.

  Varek's voice booms over the roar of the wind, his throat raw from years of command. "Signal Corps! Flags up! Archers, right flank—on my mark!" The command isn't whispered in their minds anymore; it is roared across the plateau.

  Darius lifts his shield, his eyes locked on the Valdris banner. "By the voice, then!" he shouts to the men beside him. "Hold the sector!"

  The stone perimeter crumbles under a fresh boulder hit. Xian soldiers surge toward the gap, sensing the loss of the mages' coordination. But they find a wall of shields waiting for them, held in place by discipline and the sight of their Duke's unwavering presence.

  "Wait for the flare!" Darius bellows, bracing his spear. "No one dies until I tell you to!"

  Aran's hand finds the Sword of Devouring. "Goran! Collapse the approach!"

  "We're out of mages!" Goran bellows.

  A wyvern sweeps low, rider firing a lance of blue flame. Aran swings the sword—it drinks the spell—but the wyvern is already gone. Another takes its place. The sky is full of them.

  *Is this it?* Aran thinks.

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  A shadow falls over the forward command post.

  Not a wyvern. Larger. A creature of pure, incandescent gold.

  A massive lion—its fur shimmering like polished gold, its wings spanning across the smoke with feathers crafted from liquid light—dives out of the sky. It slams onto the ridge with an impact that shatters the stone ground. It is Fortune, the beast of Elder Corin. The small cat's frame has expanded into a predator of mythic scale.

  Lady Seraphina is in the lead, dismounting with regal poise. But it is the two figures behind her that halt the world. Elder Corin steps down, adjusting his spectacles, and beside him stands a man in robes of crimson and soot—Master Chen Long, the Great Sage of Fire from the distant towers of Xian.

  And behind them, the silver wolf Tara leaps down, landing in the thick of the crumbling line.

  Before a single word can be spoken, Corin simply taps the tip of his wooden cane onto the dry earth of the High Shelf.

  The sound is like a bell tolling deep underground. For a heartbeat, the plateau goes perfectly still. Then, with a roar that drowns out the wind, the earth beneath the clearing groans and tears open. A massive rift, jagged and impossibly deep, erupts across the shelf, cleaving the mountain as if it were parchment. It doesn't just stop at the edge; it races down the slopes, splitting granite peaks like dry wood and creating a chasm that threatens to swallow the very horizon.

  Master Chen Long doesn't wait for the dust to settle. He raises a single hand, and the very air begins to shimmer with an unbearable, white-hot radiance.

  "Let there be a border," Chen Long says.

  From the depths of the rift, a surge of molten stone erupts. Lava, incandescent and thick, boils up from the chasm until it sits level with the plateau's surface—a glowing, churning river of fire that cuts the High Shelf in two. The heat is so intense that the Xian soldiers at the front stumble back, their armor beginning to smoke.

  Xian soldiers freeze. The Agvaran mages lower their staves. For a heartbeat, the only sound is the crackle of fire and the slow, heavy breathing of the golden lion.

  "Master Chen Long?" General Shen Ruo's voice finally breaks the silence, carrying across the brand-new river of lava. It is stripped of its commander's edge and replaced by raw, unbelieving shock.

  "A bit loud for a plateau, isn't it, Ruo?" Chen Long says, his voice carrying the heat of a desert wind. "Corin here was just telling me about a certain dream he was having about a quiet afternoon. You've made a mess of it."

  The two masters stand ten paces from the edge of the rift, looking casually across the lava at the Xian vanguard.

  "We were thinking," Corin muses, looking at Chen Long. "A ceasefire. Long enough for the mountain to grow some grass over these craters. Meanwhile, let us hear what you have to say about this battle."

  General Shen Ruo stares at the liquid inferno, then at the two old men standing casually on the High Shelf. He finally understands. This was a game he was only allowed to play because the masters were still asleep.

  "Ceasefire," Ruo whispers. Then, to his troops: "Lower the banners! Full withdrawal to the fifth checkpoint!"

  The Xian army doesn't flee in panic; they march back in silence, the weight of the masters' power pressing down on them.

  Corin looks at Aran, who approaches with his sword still drawn but lowered. "Terrible timing, Aran," the Elder grumbles, though his eyes twinkle. "Now, who's going to find us some tea? Something exquisite - suitable for the refined palate of Master Chen Long."

  "Corin! You know well I don't carry tea!" Master Chen Long complains. "You’re just using my name to satisfy your own cravings after that nap."

  Corin snorts. "Just play along, Long Ge. It’s been far too long since we last shared a pot, hasn't it?"

  With a casual gesture, Corin let the earth reshape itself, wood and stone rising to form a sturdy table and two simple stools amidst the ash. The stunned onlookers look at the two legendary masters in bewilderment as they simply sat down.

  ********* Chapter end *********