With no other choice left to him, Kaelor stepped forward, crossing the collapsing root wall. It now barely reached his knees.
Ignis burned cold and steady in his grip.
Hound moved up beside him, shoulders squared, his twin Mountain Sabers ready at his sides. The Dreadclaws formed a line before them, blades lifted to chest level, their bodies tense with the instinct of predators preparing for the charge.
Ahead, the wolves snarled and crept forward, more than a sixty of them, muscle and fang and fury, poised to descend like a tidal wave of death.
Awoo!
The Wolf King howled.
Claws tore through the air. Jaws snapped. The first wave was inches away from striking the front line when suddenly, blue fire erupted.
The flames spiraled into existence with a loud whoosh, engulfing Kaelor and the bodies of the fallen direwolves scattered across the field. Shock rippled through the battlefield as the flames surged out of the Guardsmen, lifting them into the air, levitating above the wolves' reach.
The wolves below snapped and howled in confusion, unable to touch them.
And the corpses of the slain direwolves, also wrapped in flames, hurtled upward, pulled into the Guardsmen's rising forms.
Their bodies flared with light as the dead direwolves merged with them, bone with bone, sinew with sinew, instantly evolving them into something stronger.
At the center of it all, stood Kaelor.
Still, silent, and cloaked in a maelstrom of blue fire.
The flames danced over his skin like water, but when they touched the muscles of the alpha wolves, the alpha flesh melted.
It transformed into a glowing liquid and flowed into Kaelor's body, vanishing beneath his skin like mercury into steel.
His eyes flared.
Creases cracked across his forehead, like the bark of a tree under pressure. His body expanded in a surge, muscles thickening, chest broadening, arms swelling with dense power. His spine straightened with a crunch, and his canines extended by nearly an inch, glinting beneath his lips like the fangs of a beast.
The transformation was swift.
When it ended, Kaelor exhaled sharply. Steam puffed from his mouth. And everything became clearer.
His vision sharpened as though someone had wiped away a fogged mirror. The world shifted into high definition, the detail of every strand of fur, every droplet of blood, every twitch of a Dreadclaw's paw now visible to him.
He could hear it too.
The heartbeat of the wolves. The fluttering nerves of the townspeople.
Kaelor stood tall amidst the swirling embers, his gaze sweeping over the warriors at his back, twenty in total, each transformed.
Gleaming light-gray fur now covered their bulked frames, muscles rippling beneath the surface like coiled steel. Their eyes glowed with a fierce yellow luminance, alert and predatory.
But Hound stood out.
He had undergone the greatest change.
While the others had fused with the raw strength and essence of standard direwolves, Hound had been bonded with both alpha direwolf hearts, bones, organs, and the entire bodies of two other wolves. His transformation had elevated his strength that of a Saber master even though his true mastery remained at the Expert rank.
He was now a True Lord Dreadclaw.
Kaelor, in contrast, had fused with alpha tendons, hardened muscle fibers, and a torrent of blood, infused directly into his genetic code. The fusion had shaped him not just physically but fundamentally.
Hound now towered at two meters, a fearsome wolf-man, his upright frame armored in hardened sinew and patches of white fur that trailed down his spine and shoulders like the pelt of a northern beast. His ears stood erect, twitching slightly with each sound. His claws flexed.
And his crimson eyes burned.
So much bloodlust radiated from his body, the very air grew heavy as though even the wind dared not disturb his rage.
"For Redwood!" Hound roared, his voice thunderous.
Ignis ignited, flames bursting down its blade like a divine flare as Kaelor and the rest of the Guardsmen charged after him.
The wolves, so numerous, so confident just moments before, hesitated at the sight of Hound.
The Dreadclaws charged beside him, no longer simple warriors, but Alpha Dreadclaws, their blades drawn, movements faster, more precise, more brutal.
They met the tide of wolves head-on.
One Dreadclaw ducked under a lunging beast, slashing upwards, his Mountain Saber slicing clean through its jaw and up through its skull. Another leapt onto a wolf's back, driving his blade down into its spine, yanking it free just in time to meet another attacker.
Hound surged forward, a blur of gray-white muscle and death. He drove both sabers through two wolves simultaneously, then kicked one into the air, vaulted upward, and smashed his saber into its falling skull, bursting it like a melon.
All around Kaelor, it was the same.
One drove a curved claw into a wolf's chest and tore it open. Another slammed the pommel of his saber into a beast's throat, then slashed downward in a clean, merciless arc.
The wolves who had once ruled this forest, who had cornered and hunted the humans like helpless prey, now fell in waves.
The difference in strength was undeniable, instant and overwhelming.
Blood soaked the battlefield as both sides clashed with primal ferocity. And when they were overwhelmed, ganged upon by wolves, they embraced their bestial instincts.
They roared, ripped, and tore wolves apart, fighting on, even with wounds that would have crippled ordinary men.
Amid the chaos, Kaelor surged forward through the thick mud, flames licking the edge of his blade. With a mighty leap, he drove Ignis straight into the skull of a charging direwolf. The fire roared, consuming the beast's head in an instant, charring it black as smoke and heat hissed into the air.
But there was no time to breathe.
Three wolves came racing at him from behind, claws and fangs ready to tear him apart. Kaelor turned halfway, only to catch a glimpse of another, a fourth, leaping at him from above, saliva dripping from its snarling jaws.
He spun, swinging Ignis in a wide arc, keeping the three at bay, then twisted and slammed his free hand into the mouth of the airborne wolf.
Its teeth sank deep into his flesh, but the force of the blow knocked it from the sky, sending it crashing into the mud with a wet, bone-crunching thud.
Kaelor grunted in pain, blood streaming down his forearm, but he wasted no time.
He drove Ignis into the downed wolf, only for another to close the gap in that heartbeat of hesitation.
But before it could strike, Jon slammed into it with a shoulder bash, sending the beast flying. He spun with practiced fury, slashing the neck of another that dared to follow. As for the last, Kaelor turned, raising Ignis once more, and bathed it in fire. Breathing heavily, he glanced at the pommel of his sword.
The embedded ruby glowed faintly, but it was darker now. Dimmed.
He didn't know what that meant, but it didn't feel good.
Raising his eyes, he scanned the battlefield. His men were still fighting, still holding. Bloodied but unyielding.
And then he saw Hound.
Wounded, stained from head to toe in blood, he marched forward with grim purpose, closing the distance between himself and the huge white wolf standing at the edge of the carnage.
Kaelor's brow creased.
"Where's the other one?" he asked aloud, almost to himself.
Jon, still standing guard beside him, blinked. "Other what?"
Kaelor turned sharply. "Where is the Wolf King?!"
His heart clenched.
He spun around, eyes darting toward the town.
There, just past the battlefield, he saw it. A Dreadclaw lay still, lifeless, blood pooling beneath his broken form. And towering above the fallen warrior, the 7.5-foot-tall Wolf King strode with slow, regal menace, approaching the townspeople gathered near the gates.
They hadn't fled yet, frozen in fear, limbs trembling, eyes wide.