Vortex-2

The very air still trembled from the shock of Baldor's perfect evasion.

In the wake of his sudden reappearance beside the very spear he'd once forged with his own hand.

The battlefield, once a chaotic tapestry of swirling vortexes and clashing weapons, seemed to hold its breath.

For an instant, time itself appeared to slow, each heartbeat echoing like a distant forge's hammer upon cold stone.

Baldor Ironhammer, the steadfast dwarf whose passion had always been the craft of creation rather than the thrill of battle, now found himself thrust into an art he had never truly wished to master: the dance of life and death in combat.

Ebonis, the Eclipsian whose every movement dripped with derision and lethal intent, advanced with an effortless grace.

His dark eyes, glittering with both malice and satisfaction, surveyed Baldor's counterattack with a predator's calculation.