Under the cover of darkness, Eli’s black wings and ash-grey skin were nearly invisible. He carried Nyxie against his chest as he skimmed just above the waves of the lake, approaching the factory from behind. Despite the fact that he could see that the lights in the building were still on through several open windows, the lack of sounds from the industrial forges caused her to wave her fingers and cast a spell.

“Something feels off.” She said, the sound seeming to come from inside his ears. “The factory is never this quiet.”

“Maybe they stop working at night?” He hazarded a guess as he flared his wings and came to a midair stop. “What did you do? Why do we sound all…weird?”

“I cast a spell to allow us to speak directly without being overheard.” She explained. “And they never stop working, so I don’t think that’s it.”

“Could they have decommissioned the factory at some point while you were gone?”

“No, because I heard the hammers earlier today while we approached.” She pursed her lips for a moment, thinking.

“Want to call it off? We can still go home, right now.”

“No. I want to investigate.” She said finally. “We should know what is happening. It may affect us later.”

“Good point. I’ll put us on the roof then.” Eli replied.

With a flap of his wings, they were moving once more. He waited until the last possible moment to shoot upwards, firing past the windows in an unidentifiable black blur. The second he crested the edge of the flat roof he brought them to an abrupt stop before shooting forward once more and landing.

“Your flying needs work.” Nyxie said as she clambered down.

“My flying is great!” He countered, transforming back into his human form.

“Then at the very least you need a harness or something. Movements like that are… jarring.”

“You’re not putting a harness on me like some sort of horse.” He said flatly.

“No? I thought you enjoyed being ridden?” She smirked at him.

He stopped dead in his tracks. “Was…that a joke? A sex joke?”

“Come.” She waved him forward, ignoring his question. “I hear voices.”

The two of them moved towards the far edge of the roof, dropping to their stomachs to wiggle forward over the last few feet. When they reached it they saw a hastily-erected wooden stage with dozens of figures on it. The most easily identifiable ones were ratkin, but several figures stood with black bags over their heads while an Orryx commander kept watch nearby. In front of the stage was a crowd of worried-looking mousekin ringed by yet more ratkin guards.

“He’s talking about the Underpath.” Nyxie translated as a ratkin strode back and forth, chittering and squeaking in his native tongue. “It’s grown unstable. The last shipment of weapons from the factory was intercepted by…something. They’re not sure what.” She paused again. “He’s saying that anyone who refuses to traverse the Underpath will be punished.”

“That’s not great.” Eli frowned.

She shook her head and grinned. “In the immediate term for them, it’s bad. For us, it’s fantastic. It means our plan worked perfectly. That people would even dare to defy the Titans means that they’re terrified of using the Underpath again.” Her grin grew. “It will take months, maybe even years before the Titans can regain full control over all their realms again. And that’s assuming they’re able to kill Ares – which by the sounds of it they haven’t been able to.”

“I guess that means he escaped the shades somehow.” Eli muttered.

“That would be the logical conclusion, yes.” Nyxie agreed before pursing her lips. “They’re going to execute the mousekin on the stage as an example.”

“We have to stop them.”

She held out a hand. “Hold. A moment.” She paused again. “They’re waiting for someone else to arrive first.” She scoffed. “Must be someone high ranking and important for them to delay an execution. Orryx love those.”

No sooner did the words exit her mouth than a portal opened near the stage. Unlike the ones used by the ratkin to access the Underpath, this one stood upright. It was blue – the same way that Eli’s was – and swirled in a circle giving the illusion that it was a whirlpool made of water.

Out of the portal stepped a creature Eli recognized instantly. It had a 10-foot tall humanoid shape with onyx black armour that pulsed with magical runes. Pure magical energy shined between the tiny gaps in the thick plate, giving it the illusion of an otherworldly glow. Its head swiveled back and forth as the huddled masses kneeled, feeling the power of its presence.

For the first time, Eli heard a quiver of fear in Nyxie’s voice. “T-t…titan.” She whispered.

The titan casually swept an arm towards the prisoners, decapitating them in one fell stroke with a beam of mana. Both the crowd and the soldiers backed away in mixed fear and awe at the display of raw power, causing a ring to form around the creature. By contrast, a rage bubbled up within Eli and Prometheus’ ring on his finger seemed to grow just a tad heavier.

“I’m gonna kill it.” Eli growled.

“What?” Nyxie asked, bewildered. “You’re going to get yourself killed!”

“I can take it down. And killing it now means that we don’t have to face it when we go to Origin.”

“Eli, you’re crazy! We should fall back now before it sees us.”

He turned to her as he transformed into his Nephilim form. “Fuck that. You wanna really throw them into chaos? Killing a Titan on their own turf should do the trick.”

“Unless you die.” She replied. “Then we all lose.”

“Ares managed to kill one.” He insisted. “If that dumbass can figure it out, I can too.”

As if to cut off their debate, a good chunk of the factory suddenly disappeared underneath them. Eli instinctively grabbed Nyxie as they dropped, his wings unfurling and flapping to prevent them from falling on to the factory floor beneath them. When he came to a stop just above the ground he glanced up at the Titan who was now staring directly at them.

Guess that makes the decision for us. Eli thought to himself as he dropped Nyxie the rest of the way, causing her to land on her feet lightly.

"Síl!”

Eli grinned as he disappeared from in front of the factory and reappeared on the stage behind the 10-foot behemoth, jabbing his fingers into the small holes in its enchanted armour. The movement cut his fingers to the bone but allowed him to ‘touch’ the Titan’s body directly, activating his mana absorption ability. For the briefest of moments he worried that he’d doomed them both because he couldn’t feel the mana empowering him in the same way it usually did.

The fact that the Titan let out a warbling scream of pain dissuaded that notion.

Both Eli’s hands and Prometheus’ ring began to glow gold, with the latter transitioning into a bright white. The glow quickly became so overpowering that everyone nearby – Eli included – had to shield their vision or else risk being blinded by it. Knowing that he was vulnerable with his eyes closed he flapped his wings several times, lifting the heavy body of the Titan into the air and out of range of the soldier’s weapons.

The world around them lit up as if a new star was rising in the sky. Confused mousekin and creatures alike peeked out of their homes and burrows, confused about why the sun had risen so early. When they realized that it wasn’t the sun they dove back into their hideaways, desperate to avoid whatever godlike powers were struggling in the sky above them.

Eli held tightly as the Titan’s roars of pain began to weaken before stopping entirely. He held onto the heavy empty armour as the glowing ring on his hand returned to its normal, deceptively innocent lustre. His gaze lingered for several long minutes, half expecting the ring to do something else.

Well that was…something. Eli thought to himself as he performed a mental inventory. I don’t feel like becoming a tentacled rage monster either, which is probably a good sign.

With a shrug, Eli dropped the armour. It fell into the stage and crashed through it, sending splinters of wood flying everywhere. He took a moment to magically heal his own hands before following it, floating gently downwards until his feet touched the ground once more.

“Nyxie.” Eli said, turning to his mousekin companion.

She stared at him, slack jawed in response. It was only when he advanced towards her and began waving his hands that she blinked, slowly coming back to reality. Her mouth opened and closed several times and her ears and tail began to twitch as she came back to life.

“Wha…?” She managed to finally say.

“Nyxie. Are you okay?” He asked, placing a hand on either shoulder.

“I…” She trailed off, unable to finish her sentence.

He glanced back to see that everyone nearby – the Titan forces and the mousekin – were all staring at him with a similar look of shock. “Why is everyone looking at me like that?”

“Because… you just…you just…” She started, still unable to process the words properly.

“I killed a Titan?” He asked, finishing the sentence for her.

“Yes.”

Suddenly, the paralyzing shock that temporarily overcame everyone seemed to pass. The world around them exploded into motion, with Titan soldiers throwing down their weapons and sprinting away from them. Mousekin leapt on their backs and tore into them with terrifying fervor, ensuring that none of them made it more than a few steps away.

In a flash, it was all over. The mousekin silently moved around him once more before kneeling around the stage, their eyes downcast. His eyes went wide as the wave of movement rippled to the back of the crowd, the furthest ranks hitting the ground in reverence, awe, or terror.

“Nyxie. I need you to ask them to get up.” He said without turning.

When she didn’t respond he turned to look at her, only to see that she was kneeling as well. Shaking his head in frustration he moved to her, slipping his arms under hers and pulling her to her feet. Seeing that she still refused to look at him he slipped his hand underneath her chin and pulled it up until she couldn’t avoid his gaze any longer.

“Nyxie.” He said sternly. “Focus. No more of that kneeling shit.”

“You killed a Titan.” She said, blinking away tears. “A Titan.”

He furrowed his brow in confusion. “Yeah. That was the plan, remember? And you knew this already about Royal Bloods. We literally talked about it.”

“But… I didn’t think… I mean, I always hoped, but to see it myself...”

“Nyxie, what the hell are you talking about?” He pressed.

“We have hope again.” She said, meeting his eyes. “Thanks to you.”

Glancing back over the crowd, Eli saw that several mousekin were still covered in blood. “Look. We can talk about this later. Right now, I need you to be my translator. Can you do that?”

She blinked away tears before nodding, unable to find further words. He held her gaze for a moment longer, his eyes boring into her to make sure she was truly okay. When he decided he couldn’t wait any longer he wrapped one wing around her and turned to the crowd to speak.

“Anyone here who is injured, I need you to come to the front. If you’re too injured to move, send someone to me and I’ll come to you. Everyone else, you’re free to stand, move around, or go home if you like.”

A strange look crossed Nyxie’s face before she dutifully started to translate. At first none of the mousekin around him even twitched, causing him to think there must have been some sort of translation error. Then, one by one, injured mousekin began to move to the front of the stage. When he released Nyxie and hopped down they quickly backed up, but with some soft reassuring words he took the hand of the nearest one and summoned his mana.

“Guérir líkami!”

Life magic flowed freely from him into the injured mousekin, healing their body completely. The moment he was done he moved onto the next, then the next. His body never seemed to stop glowing gold as more mousekin came forward – not just those from the factory, but from the nearby city as well. At one point he had to ask Nyxie to form them into an orderly line for him to treat, sometimes jogging away from it to somewhere nearby where a wounded mousekin was laying.

When his substantial mana reserves finally started to run dry he backed off from the line and drank a mana potion before turning to the bewildered-looking mousekin resistance leader still standing on the stage. “Can you translate again?”

“Yes.” She said, finally finding her voice again.

“Good. Tell them I need some help. I’m going to open a portal at the back of the factory. I need some able bodies to pick up the durosine and carry it through the portal for me.” He paused, thinking. “Make it abundantly clear that nobody has to help me, but that I’d appreciate their help if they could spare it.”

He waited for her to finish translating into their chittering language before starting his trek around the factory. As one the entire crowd moved behind him, jostling to get closer to him the whole way. Realizing he needed to be able to give directions he leapt into the air and hovered over to Nyxie, picking her up with both arms before pulling her close to him.

“Th-thank you.” She stammered.

“Nyxie. Relax.” He replied. “It’s just me.”

“I…” She looked at him in confusion as she trailed off.

He stopped midair and pulled her towards him as he made a frustrated noise. “Nyxie, listen. I don’t want you treating me any differently just because I can kill a Titan. You and I were talking about a relationship earlier. We can’t have that if you’re treating me like some sort of divine saviour.”

Her cheeks burned bright red at his comment. She tried to look down to avoid his gaze but he picked her chin up again with two fingers, not letting her break eye contact. The moonlight above seemed to reflect off her pale skin, and her perfect pink lips parted slightly as he pushed a few stray strands of mousey brown hair back.

“There. Is my Nyxie back now?” He asked. “Because whoever that person was, it wasn’t you.”

She blinked several times. “Yes. I’m…sorry.”

“You can make it up to me by telling me all about your plans for when we win this war. Because you’d best believe we’re winning it now.” He grinned before looking down. “But uh…maybe tell me about it after we get this durosine loaded and back to Irandell.”