Ares spat blood onto the cracked battlefield. His crimson energy flickered, his divine presence wavering for the first time. Across from him, Lucius stood atop the monstrous behemoth, shadows curling around his abyssal armor like living tendrils. His mismatched eyes gleamed—one icy, one burning with the void.
The war god's grip tightened on Phobos. Around him, his summoned warriors were faltering. The battlefield, once filled with the deafening roars of battle-hardened souls, was now filled with screams.
The behemoth moved again.
Its shifting form lashed out—an amorphous fusion of fangs, claws, and writhing abyssal limbs. It crushed a dozen legionnaires beneath its massive foot, impaled a line of samurai with blackened tendrils, and cleaved through a squad of knights with a swipe of its colossal claws.
"Stand your ground!" Ares roared, his voice shaking the Underworld itself. "You are warriors of Armageddon! You do not fall!"
But they were falling.