Chapter 2966: The Line and Cage |
By every calculation Gwen had made, the infected should have begun thinning by now.
They should have burned themselves out against the barricades. Slowed beneath the constant resistance. Fragmented into smaller waves that could be managed and contained.
But none of that happened.
They did not slow.
They multiplied.
Every street Gwen cleared was filled again within the hour. Every defensive point she reinforced came under even heavier pressure the moment it stabilized. The corruption no longer behaved like a spreading fire that would eventually run out of fuel.
It behaved like a tide.
And somehow that tide had decided the central avenue was the shore it intended to drown.
The only reason the defensive line still held—the only reason any of them were still alive at all—was because Gwen was no longer fighting alone.
Then entire households began arriving together.
The lower-realm clans of District Three had finally joined the battle.
Branches of forgotten families and declining factions whose names no longer carried weight beyond the district walls. The Greymoor clan. The Ashfen household. The Duskwater kin. The Thornhill family and the scattered remnants of the Verdic line.
Hours earlier, Klea had sent warnings throughout the district calling every available cultivator to prepare for the worst and reinforce the city.
Some clans had fled.
Others barricaded themselves within their estates and chose to wait for the chaos to pass.
But the secured zones established by the Earth faction—and the resistance led personally by the so-called Star Maiden—had finally given many of them the courage to step back into the streets and fight.
Several clans even sent their elders.
None of them were truly powerful by the standards of major factions. Most were merely one-cosmos Grand Magus cultivators, the kind of figures great powers would barely spare a glance toward.
But against a city outbreak filled mostly with low-grade infected, a one-cosmos Grand Magus was still a wall capable of stopping entire streets from collapsing.
Elder Toval of the Greymoor clan fought at Gwen’s side, an old man with a spear of grey light who claimed not to have drawn blood in forty years and moved as though he had never once stopped.
"You hold the center, Star Maiden," he said between strikes, never breaking rhythm. "We’ll hold the flanks."
And they did.
For a while, it was almost enough.
Then the infected began to snowball.
Not from the north alone now — from the eastern junctions, from the collapsed western blocks, from streets they had already cleared, as though the corruption were folding back in on itself, drawn toward the one bright line still standing in District 3. The thousand civilians at Gwen’s back became an island. The flanks bent inward, foot by foot.
And then she felt it.
From the northern gate — past the press of bodies, past the teleportation district they had bled three blocks to reach — something pushed against her spiritual sense like a palm pressing slowly on an open wound.
The source.
Whatever had turned a refugee panic into a massacre — it was there. It had been there the entire time.
"What is in the north?"
Elder Toval felt it too. "The north gate is open," he said grimly. "They’re coming in from outside the wall. No wonder it’s such a mess."
A pulse ran through the talisman at Gwen’s collar — Nyx’s relay from the perimeter — and for the first time in four hours it carried something other than casualty counts.
*The factions outside the wall are moving — but they’ve been pinned down by another horde of infected.*
"Why are there suddenly so many of them?" a voice cried from the ranks behind her. "Where are they all coming from?"
Gwen’s mind raced. The infected were only multiplying, and her resistance was thinning by the minute. She could not afford to wait the hours that help would take. She turned to the old Grand Magus at her side.
"Senior," she said. "We need to secure that gate."
The elder looked at her, and understood at once that there was no way Gwen could carve a path to the far end of the street. The crowd she had rallied simply did not have the power for it.
So he made the decision himself.
He broke from the line and launched toward the north gate alone. The Grand Magus charged in, and dozens of grey spears erupted around him, piercing the incoming infected and forming a temporary fence of light. He reached the gate. He raised his hands to seal it shut —
Then suddenly—
More than a dozen infected figures burst out from the shadows around Elder Toval at the exact same moment, moving with terrifying coordination completely unlike any mindless creatures Gwen had seen before.
The old Grand Magus reacted instantly, gray spears erupting around him, but the attacks came too fast and from too many angles.
One infected locked his spear arm.
Another tore through his defensive barrier.
Then multiple fangs and claws pierced into his body simultaneously in one perfectly coordinated assault, blood bursting violently across the northern gate as Elder Toval staggered under the overwhelming attack.
Gwen saw the entire scene clearly, and the shock of it rooted her completely in place.
These were not ordinary infected acting on instinct.
Something intelligent was controlling them.
####
If someone followed the endless river of infected pouring through the north gate—past the outer walls of District Three and several dozen miles deeper into the barren hills beyond the city—it would eventually lead them to a hidden underground facility buried beneath the mountain itself.
And there, the same chaos consuming Dawnstar above was unfolding once again.
Only this time, the collapse had begun from inside the prison itself.
Deep within the lower sectors, containment chambers were opening one after another.
Varkul moved quickly through the prison corridors, activating the release runes cell by cell while Boraan used his monstrous strength to physically rip open the heavier reinforced gates with his bare hands.
"Go," Varkul ordered firmly while ushering frightened captives into the corridors. "This facility is compromised. Get out while you still can."
It did not take long for the breakout to be discovered.
Occultist Magus and Red Dawn guards rapidly closed in from multiple corridors at once, attempting to seal the lower sectors before the prison collapse spread further.
But among the detained prisoners, Boraan’s crew had uncovered dozens of Magus-realm cultivators.
Members of Baeldum sects.
Faction retainers.
Wandering cultivators.
All of them captives who understood far better than ordinary civilians exactly what kind of place this facility truly was.
They needed no convincing.
The moment their restraints came off, they armed themselves with whatever weapons they could seize and immediately joined forces with the Midnight Brotherhood to fight their way out.
For a short while, the tide actually turned.
Several occultist squads were forced backward through their own corridors while garrison guards were cut down one after another in brutal close-quarter fighting.
Then suddenly—
The corridor ahead filled completely.
Not with a mob.
A formation.
More than a thousand infected advanced together in perfectly silent ranks, their ruined faces fixed forward with a discipline no mindless creature should have possessed. Their movements were synchronized. Ordered. Directed by something intelligent.
At the front of the formation walked a thin man dressed in occultist gray robes, a brand shaped like a broken moon burned visibly into his throat.
Varkul immediately went still.
"Aeric..."
He spoke the name the way a man spits out a broken tooth.
The occultist leader recognized him just as quickly.
The two organizations had once operated alongside one another during the reign of Maldrin.
Aeric sneered openly.
"Hah... look at you now," he mocked coldly. "Reduced to beating down stray dogs and now you dare ruining my plans."
Varkul remained calm despite the hostility.
"Dawnstar has a new ruler now," he replied steadily. "If you’re smart, you’ll either fall in line behind him or stay out of his way."
Aeric laughed harshly.
"Varkul... the phantom blade... perhaps the old you might have intimidated me." His eyes narrowed dangerously. "But I know you’re still wounded. This is the perfect chance to wipe out your Brotherhood and claim Dawnstar for myself."
Meanwhile, several levels higher near the upper exit tunnels, another battle had already erupted.
Kayelin found herself facing Hendrik directly.
The commander of the Red Dawn Royal Guard swung his massive broadsword forward as cosmic power erupted violently around him. His muscles tightened beneath his armor while two-cosmos pressure filled the corridor with overwhelming force.
A genuine powerhouse.
Kayelin answered with light.
With a simple gesture of her hand, two tiny fairy-like spirits appeared beside her body, each no larger than a human palm yet radiating astonishingly concentrated power. One was surrounded by spiraling cosmic wind while the other burned with golden flame.
At the same time, countless glowing vines rapidly spread outward beneath Kayelin’s feet as her plant domain expanded across the chamber walls.
The first collision shattered Hendrik’s opening strike entirely.
BOOM!
The corridor exploded apart beneath the clash while Hendrik’s expression visibly changed for the first time.
His confidence cracked immediately.
On another side of the upper tunnels, Klea faced the masked figure alone.
She had marked him as dangerous from the moment he appeared.
Too calm.
Too clean.
Untouched by the chaos consuming the entire facility around him.
Unlike the occultists, he carried no visible marks or corrupted aura. Beneath his hood rested a smooth silver mask without any ornament or symbol.
Not an occultist.
Not Midnight Brotherhood.
Moonlight Syndicate.
Klea’s eyes narrowed sharply.
"What kind of twisted scheme are you running this time?"
For the first time, the masked man seemed mildly surprised.
"You are Kleopatra of the Earth faction," he said slowly. "Sharper than the rumors claim."
Then his voice gradually cooled.
"You and your little circle have ruined our operations far too many times already. I think this is the perfect moment to settle that score."
The next instant—
The masked figure finally released his cultivation fully.
And Klea’s entire body froze.
Not two cosmos.
But a Three Cosmos powerhouse.