Chapter 8: The Siege of Ironhold

The alarms rang across the city as Ironhold's defenders rushed to their positions. Soldiers and mercenaries grabbed their weapons, mages reinforced the barriers, and archers lined the battlements. The city was built to withstand siege warfare—but this was no ordinary battle.

Above them, the sky still bled open, the wound in reality widening as more Wardens descended.

Rheon ran alongside Garran, Hadric, and Elara, moving toward the lower wards. The ground trembled with unnatural energy as the first Warden stepped through the city's gates.

A warrior near the entrance—a massive man wielding a greatsword—charged forward with a battle cry. He brought his blade down with all his might—

Only to swing through empty space.

The Warden had not moved. It had simply ceased to be where the blade fell.

A heartbeat later, it appeared beside him, reaching out with one pale, fractured hand.

The warrior had no time to scream before he was gone.

No corpse. No blood. Just... erased.

The other soldiers hesitated. Fear took root.

Garran's voice cut through the chaos.

"Stand your ground! Do not let them breach the inner city!"

The hesitation broke. The defenders fought back.

Arrows rained down, enchanted bolts crackling with runes designed to pierce magic itself. Mages unleashed torrents of fire, ice, and lightning. Swords clashed, and shields locked together.

For a moment—just a moment—the Wardens slowed.

But then, they adapted.

The next arrow never landed. The fire vanished mid-air. The blades found nothing but empty space.

The Wardens didn't dodge. They didn't block.

They erased the attacks before they could touch them.

One Warden raised its hand toward the outer gate—

And the entire section of the wall disappeared.

Not broken. Not shattered. Simply erased from existence.

A section of Ironhold that had stood for centuries was now nothing.

The defenders faltered.

Garran cursed under his breath. "They're unraveling the city itself."

Lorien wiped sweat from his forehead, eyes darting between the approaching Wardens. "This isn't a battle. This is a god rewriting reality."

Dain growled. "Then we make it bleed before it finishes writing."

Rheon took a breath, gripping his spear tightly. "We need to force them into a real fight."

Hadric barked a laugh. "Oh? And how exactly do we force walking paradoxes to play fair?"

Rheon met his gaze. "We give them something they can't erase."

The others stared at him.

Then, understanding dawned in their eyes.

The blackened spear.

The relic that had resisted the System's will.

Rheon looked at the nearest Warden, its cracked porcelain mask turning toward him.

The moment its gaze locked on him, Rheon felt it again—the weight of the System's attention.

It was no longer watching from afar.

It was here.

And it was afraid.

Rheon didn't hesitate. He raised the spear and charged.

---

The First Wound

The Warden moved in a blur, its fractured hand stretching toward Rheon—

But this time, it didn't erase him.

The spear pulsed with golden light as Rheon thrust it forward.

The moment it touched the Warden's robes, the fabric burned.

Not erased. Burned.

A shriek—not a sound, but a ripple in space—burst from the Warden as it reeled back. Its mask fractured further.

The System had made a mistake.

It had erased warriors, cities, history itself—but it had never faced something like this.

The spear was something beyond its control.

The first true wound had been struck.

The other Wardens froze.

A ripple passed through them, as if they were reacting to something deeper than orders—as if they could feel it.

Then—they moved.

No hesitation. No slow approach.

They all turned toward Rheon.

Hadric cursed. "Oh, now you've done it."

Garran stepped forward, raising his blade. "Then we hold the line."

The defenders roared, rallying behind their leaders.

The Wardens descended as one.

The battle for Ironhold had begun in earnest.

The Battle for Ironhold

The Wardens descended in eerie silence, their forms flickering between existence and nothingness. They weren't soldiers. They were executioners.

And now, they had judged Rheon as the primary threat.

The air itself warped around them, reality bending under their influence. The defenders of Ironhold fought bravely, but swords and arrows vanished before they could land a hit.

Yet Rheon's spear burned.

He surged forward, feeling the weight of every life hanging on this moment. The Warden he had wounded recoiled, its mask fractured, something seething beneath.

But there was no time to hesitate.

They were outnumbered.

Hadric met the first Warden head-on, his war axe cleaving through where it should have been—only for the Warden to flicker and appear behind him.

Before its fractured hand could erase him, Garran struck.

His enchanted blade clashed with the Warden's form, and for the first time, a Warden staggered.

Hadric grinned, rolling aside. "Not so untouchable, are you?"

Another Warden turned toward Elara, its presence distorting the air around her. Shadows wrapped around her frame, her assassin's reflexes kicking in as she vanished into the darkness.

She reappeared behind it, twin daggers flashing—

But the Warden turned too fast.

Its hand reached for her—

A golden spearhead flashed between them.

Rheon's spear tore through the Warden's arm.

A new shriek rippled through the air as its form twisted unnaturally.

The Wardens hesitated for the briefest moment. And Ironhold's defenders pressed the attack.

---

The System Strikes Back

High above the battlefield, the rift in the sky pulsed.

The System had calculated.

It had seen the resistance. The anomaly. The spear that defied erasure.

And so, it adapted.

The air cracked.

A new presence emerged.

Not a Warden.

Something worse.

A System Herald.

The ground trembled as the being descended. Unlike the Wardens, it had form. A figure clad in white-gold armor, its helmet smooth and featureless.

Unlike the Wardens, it did not flicker.

It was real.

And it was here to finish what the Wardens could not.

Lorien gasped. "That's not—" He choked as he collapsed to his knees, clutching his head. "I—I can hear it—"

The Herald spoke.

Not in words, but in commands.

Rheon felt it pressing against his mind. Obey. Kneel. Submit.

But he did not.

The spear pulsed. The whispers from the forgotten grew louder.

He gritted his teeth, staring up at the Herald. "No."

The Herald descended.

And the true battle began.