“RaaAAGGH!!”

With a roar of exertion, Spike pounded his fists into the ground, instantly cratering the dirt and throwing up chunks of debris to obscure his location. As soon as he did, Sky bounded forward, emitting blasts of flame from her feet and hands to accelerate herself through the air and burst out of Spike’s makeshift debris cloud, her flames washing over two of the Chaos Knights. Just as the flames nearly reached the Knights, however, they suddenly curled upwards — and then backwards, no longer under Sky’s control as the fire homed in on her location.

“Tch—!” Sky clicked her tongue in irritation, already making to retreat — until a wave of water swept in front of her, extinguishing the flames. Immediately following the waves were two streaks of silver light as Twy shot her bow at the Knights, but her arrows of light merely deflected off of their shields; amidst the attacks, the Knight in front lunged forward, enveloping his own hands in flames as he charged straight at Sky.

“Chaos Cannon!”

A Mach-speed projectile crafted of purple energy shot through the air, slamming into the Pyrotechnic Knight and stopping him in his tracks. As soon as he stopped, Spike bounded forward, using his superior strength to pounce on the Pyrotechnic — only to be blasted off by a searing-hot burst of flames. The Pyrotechnic soon took to the air, with Phoenix running up and extending her hand toward him, preparing to attack once more. “Chaos—!”

In the middle of her invocation, a sudden blow to her chest sent her flying across the dark outpost grounds. Just as she landed, another of the Chaos Knights suddenly appeared over her, having dashed across the grounds to her at supersonic speeds; the Velocitechnic Knight raised her foot in clear preparation to stomp Phoenix’s back, only to suddenly wince, giving Phoenix a chance to roll out from under her foot — and Gavon a chance to intervene, using his Gravitatechnism to lift and suspend the Velocitechnic Knight in the air.

“Chaos Siphon.”

“Ngh…!” Gavon grunted in exertion, his entire body growing weak as another of the Knights approached, his hand outstretched toward the Black Suns officer. Phoenix immediately whipped around, stretching her own hand towards the enemy Chaostechnic — but just as she called out “Chaos Cannon,” the Chaostechnic Knight muttered, “Chaos Nullify.” In an instant, a purple projectile shot out of Phoenix’s hand, streaking straight towards the Knight — only to disappear into thin air before it ever reached the enemy.

They’re a Void type! Phoenix thought to herself, quickly backpedaling in an attempt to make some distance. With their annihilation-based attacks… I don’t know if I can beat this one! With that thought, she shifted her attention back to Gavon, who appeared to be struggling against a sudden onset of exhaustion. Chaos Siphon must be sapping him of Chaos Energy, which means—!

“Overdrive: Whirlwind!”

“Shit!” Phoenix scowled, flinching back as the Velocitechnic Knight — now free from Gavon’s aerial suspension — activated her Overdrive. As soon as the Velocitechnic touched the ground, she moved to run a tight circle around Phoenix and Gavon, quickly spinning up an incredible whirlwind. A second later, the fierce winds began to lift both Phoenix and Gavon into the air… and a second after that, the whirlwind spontaneously dispersed. Kestrel soon appeared out of thin air, revealing her control of the local winds as an invisible Conrad landed on the ground and quickly rendered Phoenix invisible. Caught by surprise, the Velocitechnic and Chaostechnic Knights were unable to properly respond before Kestrel blasted them both away with fierce bursts of wind, followed by Phoenix firing off several Chaos Cannon shots from within Conrad’s veil of silent invisibility; amongst the attacks, Gavon was finally able to recover from being Siphoned.

But a second later, searing flames washed across the ground, licking away at Phoenix, Conrad, Kestrel, and Gavon’s shields — followed almost immediately by Spike, who had been launched through the air by the Pyrotechnic Knight. As Spike tumbled to the ground, Kestrel quickly manipulated the air to part the flames around them — only to stagger backwards as fierce blasts of lightning rained down on the Keys, fiercely lighting up their shields… but even so, the shields remained intact.

“Nil’KIIIIN!! GET BACK HERE!”

“Tch—!” The Dra’kis scowled, turning away from the Keys and Gavon just in time to dodge a massive ice lance that Rebehka threw at her. A second lance soon followed, but this time Nil’kin grabbed it out of the air and shattered it in her hands with a burst of electricity, followed by using her powerful legs to lunge towards Rebehka faster than the Dean could react. In an instant, Nil’kin had grabbed Rebehka around her chest and moved to throw her to the ground — only for the two to suddenly be swallowed by a massive spire of ice, freezing them both in place. Rebehka quickly manipulated her ice to free herself, but just as she did, Nil’kin channeled an incredible burst of lightning through her body to shatter the entire spire, showering the surrounding area in shards and flakes of ice that glittered in the floodlighting.

“…What a pain in my fucking ass,” Nil’kin growled as she focused on Rebehka, and her still intact shielding. “…Unbreakable shields? And Densalin’s damn Overdrive, too!”

“Whatever it takes to stop you!” Rebehka retorted, as she crafted a platform of ice under Nil’kin’s feet — and then catapulted the Dra’kis woman into the air. Rebehka immediately followed by rapidly summoning a giant spire of ice to trap Nil’kin again, in the hopes of stalling her for just long enough to follow up with another attack. However, the Velocitechnic Knight zoomed onto the scene, enveloped in the torrent of air she had created after activating her Overdrive to fly straight at the ice spire at supersonic speeds and smash it to smithereens, allowing Nil’kin to drop to the ground, blasting away at Rebehka with lightning the whole time.

“Flying Velocitechnics… whatever’s next?” Gavon muttered apprehensively as he watched the Velocitechnic Knight fly through the air — and then disappear into the darkness beyond the floodlights lighting the outpost. The Black Suns officer then snapped his attention back to his immediate surroundings, using his control over gravity to fling the Chaostechnic Knight into the air just as the Knight made to target him with an attack. As soon as the Chaostechnic was lifted off of the ground, Kestrel swooped down to ‘grab’ him in a cushion of air and then launch him far into the distance, where he disappeared into the darkness beyond the outpost. Kestrel then flew off as Phoenix disappeared with Conrad, leaving Gavon to pursue the Knights.

I don’t know what I expected… Gavon mused as he manipulated his personal gravity to fly through the air. Big Chaotic fights like this always devolve into chaos — even moreso with so many young, untrained combatants. He then glanced to the side, noting two Chaos Knights still standing near the disembarkation ramp of their ship while cautiously watching the battle unfold. And there’s still two Knights sitting out. I know the Knights — those two wouldn’t be here if they weren’t Chaotics. But they haven’t done anything yet, so it’s impossible to know what kind of Chaotics they are. Looks like I’ll have to force the issue!

Taking advantage of the outpost’s dark surroundings, Gavon flew out of the range of the nearby floodlights and then held out his left arm. Quickly, he opened a small compartment within his prosthetic arm, revealing a handful of thin metal rods — a modification that he had recently requested that Kaoné make to his prosthetic, given that typical hidden weapons were a no-go with Kaoné’s Overdrive. While the thin rods seemed innocuous on their own, Gavon swiftly removed one of the rods and then applied his Gravitatechnic powers to it, causing it to ‘fall’ horizontally straight towards one of the idle Chaos Knights. The rod rapidly accelerated through the air, but as soon as it re-entered the light, the two Knights noticed it — and one jumped in front of the other. Amongst the chaos of battle and his distance from the Knights, Gavon couldn’t hear either Knight say anything, but he saw a spinning orb of purple energy appear around the two Knights just in time to deflect his rod.

That’s Chaos Deflection, Gavon immediately observed. So the Knights have a second Chaostechnic with them — a Defense type. But if they were solely a Defense type, then surely they’d be taking a more active role in protecting their comrades; I’d wager they have a second type. And if they’re standing back, then—! Gavon scowled as the Chaostechnic suddenly looked directly at him, despite him still standing in the darkness beyond the floodlights. They know where I am! That must be Chaos Detect — a Support ability! And if they know, then—!

Immediately, Gavon threw himself to the ground while applying an upwards gravitational force of 3Gs to his surroundings — just as he felt a large, fast object barely miss him. There was only one explanation for what had just happened: the Support-type Chaostechnic Knight had informed the rest of the Knights on Gavon’s position over their private comms, and the flying Velocitechnic had used that information to try and attack him, missing only due to Gavon’s last-second evasive actions. With a Detect-using Chaostechnic on their side, hiding in the dark will do nothing but hinder us, Gavon quickly mused, already altering his own gravity to fly back towards the outpost, and the Pyrotechnic Knight that was pressing the assault against Sky, Spike, and Twy. With his control over gravity, Gavon rapidly accelerated through the air — but not fast enough to escape the Velocitechnic, who closed in on his position right as they both re-entered the light. But just before the Velocitechnic could reach Gavon, she slammed into a nigh-invisible wall, arresting her of all of her momentum and stunning her.

Gavon glanced down, briefly noting Obra running out of the outpost. The Black Suns officer offered him a quick nod of acknowledgment, but Obra ignored him completely as he ran towards the stunned Velocitechnic, his hand outstretched. Just as Obra went to create a barrier to bisect the Velocitechnic Knight and kill her outright, however, an incredibly sharp twinge of pain shot through his head, forcing him to stumble and preventing him from creating the barrier. “Damn… outsider Overdrives…!” Obra growled, his hand held to his head — though before he could recover, Spike appeared by his side, picked him up in his arms, and then bounded through the air — just as a perfect sphere of pitch-black darkness suddenly swallowed the space where Obra had been standing, only to disappear a second later, bringing some of the dirt below with it.

“The fuck—?!” Obra began to remark, only for Spike to cut him off.

“You needa keep movin’!” Spike declared as he landed on the ground some distance away and set Obra down. He quickly fabricated a personal shield device and threw it at Obra, saying, “if you stay in one spot, you’re dead!”

“What? But the Dean’s Overdrive—!”

“Doesn’t work on Chaostechnics,” Spike quickly replied. “So if you wanna keep livin’—!”

In the middle of Spike’s words, the Velocitechnic Knight raced onto the scene, her leg whipping around to try and slam into Spike. However, Obra quickly created a barrier between her and Spike, stopping the attack from connecting — and allowing Spike to immediately counter with a lunge towards the Velocitechnic. He successfully grappled her to the ground, his superior strength preventing her from getting the leverage that she needed to launch herself away.

“Chaos Siphon.”

Immediately, Spike could feel his strength leave him, and fatigue set in as the Void Chaostechnic Knight approached, his arm outstretched. The Velocitechnic took advantage of Spike’s moment of weakness to kick him into the air, with the Void Chaostechnic’s eyes locked onto Spike in preparation to attack — but Sky blasted onto the scene, grabbing Spike out of the air right before the Void Chaostechnic could call out “Chaos Void.” Immediately after, a large wave of water crashed down on the two Knights, knocking them both off of their feet and allowing Twy to plink away at their shields with more arrows from her bow.

A second later, just as the Velocitechnic and Chaostechnic almost recovered, the water that Twy had swamped them with suddenly froze over — right as Nil’kin slammed into it with such force that the ice immediately shattered into tiny twinkling pieces. While the other two Knights remained stunned, Nil’kin jumped back to her feet just in time to shoot her leg out and hit Rebehka in the chest as she approached, knocking the Dean onto her back. The Major then blasted the Dean with lightning blast after lighting blast, keeping Rebehka locked down just long enough for the Velocitechnic and Chaostechnic to recover and move to continue attacking everyone else, leaving Nil’kin to deal with Rebehka.

But then, as Nil’kin went to strike Rebehka once more, she found that her lightning failed to manifest. Her eyes grew wide with surprise — and then a second later, Hackett tackled her to the ground from behind, with a CENT generator dangling from her waist. No longer able to use her Electrotechnic powers, Nil’kin was left to wrestle with Hackett using her strength alone — and Hackett’s upper-body strength proved superior. But as a Dra’kis, Nil’kin still had incredible power in her three-segmented legs; as Hackett attempted to pin Nil’kin to the ground, the latter simply drew her legs in and then shot them out, slamming both of her feet into Hackett and sending the Earthian tumbling across the ground.

With Hackett out of the way, Nil’kin no longer found herself in a CENT field. But as soon as that was the case, a myriad of things seemed to happen all at once: the Support Chaostechnic Knight shouted out “Chaos Assist!”, Rebehka moved to trap Nil’kin in a spire of ice once more, and Saito charged onto the scene, with his own CENT generator in hand. A second later, Nil’kin was embedded in ice, and Saito had approached to place her squarely within his CENT field — only for the ice to suddenly shatter under Nil’kin’s own incredible electricity, defying the Chaos Energy-negating powers of the CENT field.

“Shit—!” Saito scowled, rapidly backpedaling as Nil’kin turned to glare at him — and promptly destroyed his CENT field with her lightning. I heard that Assist invocation — it’s the one Chaostechnic ability that can counteract a CENT field, even if only temporarily. If we’re going to subdue the Knights, then that Chaostechnic needs to be dealt with—!

In the midst of his thoughts, a sudden and fierce blow from the Velocitechnic Knight sent the Colonel flying through the air toward the darkness outside the floodlights. Just before he left the lights, however, a soft cushion of air caught him as Kestrel flew to his side; Phoenix then appeared out of thin air and flew over to Saito, held aloft by Kestrel’s air as she reached out toward the Colonel and muttered, “Chaos Other Armor.” Translucent purple armor soon covered the Colonel’s body, at which point he realized that Phoenix and Kestrel both were sporting similar armor — only for a fierce tornado of flame to interrupt their gathering.

Quickly, Conrad rendered the whole group invisible as Kestrel let Saito down to the ground before blasting the flames with air, mitigating them just enough to spot the Pyrotechnic standing in the center. As soon as the Knight became visible, Phoenix snapped her hand in his direction and shouted, “Chaos Cannon! Chaos Cannon!” With Phoenix’s invocations muted by Conrad’s constant veil of silent invisibility, the Pyrotechnic was unable to react before the purple projectiles slammed into his shields and flung him across the outpost grounds. Now out of immediate danger, Saito offered a quick nod towards Phoenix, Kestrel, and Conrad — or at least, where he thought they were, given that Conrad was currently rendering all three invisible. “Focus on taking down the Chaostechnics!” Saito shouted, and then ran off to the side, leaving Phoenix, Conrad, and Kestrel to take to the air once more — just in time to catch Twy as she tumbled through the air, having been launched by the Velocitechnic Knight.

But shortly after Twy’s arrival, and just before any of the group in the air had time to respond, the Void Chaostechnic Knight also came flying through the air, carried by the flying Velocitechnic. “Chaos…!” he started, his hand stretched toward Phoenix, despite her being invisible — but before he could finish the invocation, a small metal buckler slammed into him from below, knocking the Chaostechnic and Velocitechnic apart. Immediately, Phoenix whipped around and shouted out “Chaos Cannon, Chaos Cannon!” to knock away the Velocitechnic Knight and prevent her from saving her Chaostechnic comrade — who Spike had just leapt at. He grabbed the Chaostechnic’s arm and then hurled the Knight at the ground so hard that the impact cratered the dirt.

As Spike dropped down to the ground next to the Void Chaostechnic and Twy plinked away at his shields with her bow, the other Chaostechnic Knight began moving to assist. Before she could take two steps away from the Knights’ ship, however, she stopped herself, calling out “Chaos Deflection!” just in time to deflect another of Gavon’s incoming rods. But just as she began to turn towards Gavon, Hackett flew onto the scene from behind her, accelerated through the air by Gavon’s Gravitatechnism. The Major slammed hard into the Support Chaostechnic, both of their shields flaring brightly from the impact as they tumbled across the dirt — but Hackett was able to latch onto the Chaostechnic’s arm, preventing the two from separating. The Major then re-activated her CENT field before moving to pin the Chaostechnic to the ground, which she was easily able to do; the Chaostechnic appeared to be a Nimalian or Citan woman with a much smaller stature than Hackett’s 6-foot frame.

A mere second later, the Velocitechnic Knight blasted onto the scene; while a CENT field would prevent her from voluntarily accelerating or decelerating, it wouldn’t cancel out any momentum that she had gained before entering the field, allowing her to slam into Hackett with the aim of separating her from the Chaostechnic. But Hackett’s grip proved too strong, as both she and the Chaostechnic were flung through the air and into the darkness beyond the floodlights. The Velocitechnic immediately crouched down to pursue, only to slam into a nigh-invisible barrier that had just appeared in front of her. Irately, she whipped around towards Obra, who was running up to her; she immediately attempted to pounce on him, only to slam into another barrier.

“Stupid-ass outsiders—!” Obra began to remark with a smirk, only to stop and wince as searing flames washed over his shields and licked at his head. While his shielding protected him from harm, the golden lights blocked his vision, effectively blinding him and allowing the Pyrotechnic Knight to easily approach — until Phoenix slammed him with a Chaos Cannon shot, flinging the Pyrotechnic into the waiting arms of Spike, who readily slammed him into the ground.

“Chaos—!”

Upon hearing the word, Spike immediately bounded away from the Pyrotechnic, just in time for the Void Chaostechnic to finish his invocation of “—Void!” A pitch-black sphere appeared in the air where Spike had just been standing, and then silently disappeared a moment later. In its wake, the Void Chaostechnic kept his eyes on Spike, already moving to target him again until Sky suddenly blasted the Knight with fire and then whacked him twice with her summoned staff. A sudden and fierce blast of lightning blasted Sky and the Chaostechnic apart as Nil’kin barged onto the scene, with spires of ice and frozen lances following her every step, but never managing to overcome the Major’s Electrotechnism.

Suddenly, a purple projectile shot out of seemingly thin air, slamming into Nil’kin and staggering her. The Velocitechnic Knight flew straight towards the source of the projectile, successfully ramming into Conrad to fling him away from Kestrel and Phoenix and render the latter two visible; at that same moment, Rebehka quickly took advantage of Nil’kin’s stun to launch her into the air with a pillar of ice, only for the Major to spin around in the air and zap the Dean twice with lightning. The Velocitechnic Knight zipped back to catch Nil’kin in the air and bring her down to the ground before dashing off again to prevent Kestrel and Phoenix from reuniting with Conrad; as the Knight left, a frustrated scowl overcame Nil’kin’s face. She quickly surveyed the battlefield before lunging to the side to avoid being trapped in another of Rebehka’s ice spires; as she did, she opened the Knights’ comms and shouted, “forget fighting the interlopers, and their damned unbreakable shields! All Knights, focus on annihilating the outpost!”

“Oh no you don’t!!” Rebehka snapped back, crafting a hefty prison of ice around Nil’kin — only for the Knight to blast it to pieces with her lightning once more before lunging towards the outpost walls. “Shit…!” the Dean muttered, already giving chase. “…Fuck! Overdrive: Ice Storm!!”

The instant after the words left Rebehka’s mouth, everything within several meters of her froze solid — from the now ice-slick ground, to Nil’kin, who had just barely fallen within that radius. A full set of armor, crafted entirely out of ice, appeared on Rebehka’s body while specks of white began to fill the air, clouding and darkening the floodlights all around the outpost… until a second after that, when fierce winds whipped up and the snow thickened into a full blizzard, blotting out the floodlights, dropping temperatures, and reducing visibility to zero around the entire outpost.

“Overdrive: Clear Skies!”

But then, just as quickly as the blizzard had set in, it ceased. The ground remained frozen, but the falling snow was no where to be seen, as the final Chaos Knight finally outed themselves as an Aerotechnic. The Aerotechnic promptly launched herself forward, using her powers over air to grab the Pyrotechnic Knight and swoop past Rebehka to unfreeze Nil’kin while also blasting the Dean backwards with an explosion of flame.

Nil’kin seriously brought a Chaotic JUST to negate my Overdrive?! Rebehka thought incredulously, already jumping back to her feet — but not before the two Knights could free Nil’kin from her frozen prison. A second later, Gavon slammed one of his gravity-accelerated rods into Nil’kin, knocking her to the ground; the Aerotechnic Knight promptly turned to engage him while the Pyrotechnic Knight began blasting Rebehka with flames, giving Nil’kin an opening to recover — just in time to dodge out of the way of one of Spike’s thrown shields. Immediately following that were a couple of Cannon shots from Phoenix and several arrows from Twy, but Nil’kin’s shields soaked up all of the attacks, and her Knights soon forced Phoenix and Twy to focus on them besides.

“Damn it…! NIL’KIN!!” Rebehka shouted, overpowering the Pyrotechnic Knight with the sheer cold of her ice. She then leveraged her Cryotechnism to take control of her worn ice armor and fly after Nil’kin, who herself was using blasts of lightning to launch herself into the air over the outpost.

But the Dra’kis paid her no heed, instead turning towards the roof of the nearest outpost building and blasting it with lightning so fierce that the silverish-black metal was rended apart. Nil’kin dove towards the new opening, only for Rebehka to nail her with an ice lance and catapult her over the side of the building; the Dean quickly made to follow, but was stopped as the Aerotechnic Knight flew up to her and captured her in winds — only for Kestrel and Phoenix both, now visible and without Conrad, to slam into the Aerotechnic and fling her aside. While keeping herself and Phoenix aloft, Kestrel focused on pushing back the Aerotechnic Knight, allowing Phoenix to take several Cannon shots at Nil’kin, thus giving Rebehka the cover she needed to approach more closely.

“Tch—!” Nil’kin scowled as she practically danced across the ground, managing to dodge around Phoenix’s Cannon shots was well as Rebehka’s ice lances. As soon as she spotted the slimmest of openings, Nil’kin blasted the ground with lightning, flinging herself high into the air over another of the outpost buildings. Rebehka quickly followed, crafting and swinging a massive ice hammer in the air near Nil’kin to try and launch the Dra’kis away from the building — only for Nil’kin to instead slam her thick Dra’kis fingers into the head of the ice hammer, successfully grabbing hold and using the hammer’s own momentum to swing herself around and straight toward the roof of the building.

“Chaos Cannon!” Phoenix shouted once more, attempting to knock Nil’kin off the roof with her projectiles — only for the Aerotechnic Knight to blow them off course with fierce gusts of wind. However, the Aerotechnic was then distracted as Sky blasted onto the scene, bathing the Aerotechnic in searing flames and allowing Kestrel and Phoenix to rush past, joining Rebehka in approaching Nil’kin — just as the Dra’kis called out, “Overdrive: Electrostorm!”

A dark cloud, practically invisible amidst the already dark surroundings of the outpost, appeared just overhead of the outpost building. Recalling the effects of the Major’s Overdrive from their time on Oriciid’kas, Phoenix and Kestrel quickly dove out of the way as a series of fierce lightning strikes began jumping from the cloud to the outpost roof, repeatedly blasting away at the metal and rending the structure to pieces.

“No—!” Rebehka shouted, quickly and repeatedly crafting sheets of ice in between the dark cloud and the outpost in the hopes of shielding it from Nil’kin’s lightning. Her ice did succeed in mitigating several of the lightning strikes, but they were ultimately too fast and too powerful for Rebehka to completely counter, resulting in the outpost’s roof slowly being blasted apart.

“You damn idiot…” Nil’kin growled, the lightning strikes ongoing as she turned to glare at Rebehka. “Just once! Just one time, Tchiréon! Can’t you see reason?! Your selfish desires would doom the entire galaxy!”

“All you want is an excuse to kill people, you fucking murderer!” Rebehka snapped back, turning away from the lightning cloud to form a sheet of ice under Nil’kin and launch her into the air, straight at her own lightning cloud. By that point, the cloud of lightning had already begun to disperse — but just as Nil’kin was about to disappear inside it, she instead slammed into an invisible surface, a surface that also dispersed the remnants of her cloud.

“What the…?” Phoenix questioned warily, already turning towards the front of the outpost, where most of the fighting was still happening — including Obra, who was dozens of meters away and distracted with the other Knights. Phoenix then looked back to the invisible surface, just in time for it to suddenly manifest as a small spacecraft, not unlike the one the Chaos Knights had arrived on. “What—?!”

“You brought even more Knights with you?” Rebehka retorted, eyeing Nil’kin as the Dra’kis slowly climbed to her feet after having been slammed into the ship overhead. “Just how afraid of me and Kaoné are you?”

“I’m not scared of you,” Nil’kin snapped, but had notably taken up a defensive posture as she eyed the ship uneasily. “But I’ll tell you this: that ship isn’t mine!”

“…What…?” Rebehka responded, clearly confused. She then snapped her attention back to the ship as it extended its disembarkation ramp towards the hole in the roof that Nil’kin had created.

“I must say… the Chaos Knights have been a true help. You have my gratitude, Major Nil’kin Dralis.”

“Who goes there?!” Nil’kin demanded, only for a short woman to suddenly appear on the ship’s ramp — a short woman swathed in heavy white robing, including an oversized hood that obscured the upper half of her pale face.

“…Wait!” Phoenix’s eyes lit up in recognition as both she and Kestrel took a wary step back. “…Those robes… You’re that Bleeder! Shade!”

“A Bleeder?!” Rebehka exclaimed in surprise. “…What the hell are the Bleeders doing here?”

“The Knights aren’t the only ones good at tailing, you know,” Shade replied coyly. “But I must admit, Dean Tchiréon — you and the Archoné were more slippery than I expected.” She then glanced at Nil’kin — only to immediately render herself invisible just as the Dra’kis lashed out with lightning. “…But I really must thank the Knights,” Shade continued, her voice seemingly disembodied. “After all, if not for you, then we wouldn’t be able to do…”

“THIS!”

An instant later, a woman appeared in the air — but not Shade. This time, it was nothing else but Feral’s visage that glared down at Rebehka with psychopathic glee, as she leaped from the ship’s disembarkation ramp towards the hole below. Caught by surprise, Rebehka, Phoenix, Kestrel, and Nil’kin were little able to react before Feral gleefully shouted just one, single word:

“CHAOS!!!”