Ghruz broke into a sprint, the blur of trees rushed by as branches clawed at their bare torso. The sound of conflict grew louder and louder with the clash of blades singing through the air. The orc pushed out into the clearing, where the carriage sat on the road in the middle of a conflict. Several men adorned in wicked, angular armour and black cloaks had surrounded it, bearing swords that radiated darkness itself.

On top of the carriage stood Titania, with two pairs of ethereal wings sprouted from her exposed back. Her palms were spread out in front of her, and bolts of lightning crackled through the air, turning her victims to ash as more assailants spilled from the forest's edge.

One of them took note of Ghruz, shouted to their comrades in a strange - yet familiar - language, and three of them broke off their fight to converge on the orc. Ghruz reached for their axe, grasping at air, and cursed at themselves for leaving it behind.

The first attacker lunged toward Ghruz with blinding speed, who barely got out of the way as the blade cut through their arm effortlessly. The mark was shallow; Ghruz had no doubt that had they been any slower, it would’ve been much worse.

The orc positioned themselves behind the attacker, grabbing his collar and throwing him into the other two who were almost upon them. The trio recovered quickly, and slowly spread themselves around Ghruz, before attacking in unison.

They ducked under the enemies’ coordinated strike, swept a leg under one of them, and sent him careening into the ground with a thud. The other two leapt back, before swinging in for another attack. Ghruz dodged to the side and grabbed one of the men, then pushed him into his ally’s blade. The weapon slipped into his flesh like a blade in its sheath. The more fortunate attacker cursed in their foreign tongue, sliding the dead man off his blade, and held out his palm. Ghruz leapt forward, suddenly stopped by arms around their torso, the first man on the ground now having recovered. He began to chant, palm radiating a sickly green.

Suddenly, his wrist burst into blood, and his hand fell to the ground. Titania was standing right beside him. Her expression was one of pure, unadulterated rage, something Ghruz had seen only once, and it was still equally as terrifying. Titania flicked her wrist, and the man clutched at his throat as he gasped for air, collapsing to the ground and writhing in pain.

Ghruz snapped into reality, launched themselves onto their back, and crushed the dark figure wrapped around their waist. His grip went limp as a groan barely passed his lips. Ghruz leapt to their feet and left Titania’s side to assist the struggling guards, still surrounded by several of the dark soldiers.

The orc hurled themself onto one of them, launching a powerful strike into their face, and caved the helmet in entirely with a horrifying crack. To their left, one of the guards had fallen, cleaved cleanly in two. Ghruz rolled off the battered corpse, a dark blade narrowly missing their neck. The sheer cold of the blade froze the skin from a hair’s breadth away.

Ghruz panted heavily, their shoulders heaving. The orc stood hunched, ready for more, as their knuckles dripped red and their face was twisted in a snarl.

Suddenly, they heard a gasp, and spun around to see the queen shaking. Titania looked down slowly to see a black blade protruding from her stomach, frozen in shock. Her silvery gaze met with the orc’s own rich brown eyes.

Everything stopped. It felt as if the world was lurching, and reality itself began to bleed incomprehensibly. Glass fell from the sky, as the clouds turned a horrid, deep purple. Ghruz cried out as they ran to the queen as she slumped on the road with a dull thud, and the ground began to fall away, darkness wrapping the small battlezone.

Ghruz could only hear Silviana crying out to them faintly, before they lost consciousness entirely.

The orc opened their eyes, waking in a pool of fluorescent blue liquid. They could feel their stomach lurch as they sat themselves up in the shallow pool. Around them was a wide array of twisted flora, with trees so large they made the great tree in the elven city look like a sapling. Amongst the bushes, dark figures lurked, their predatory eyes staring directly at Ghruz.

They heaved themselves up and noticed several corpses littering the pond: the guards they marched with and the assailants alike. All face down, limbs missing. They limped over to the corpse of one of the queen's guards, reaching for a blade.

To their surprise they missed, and reached for it again, their hand swiping over top of it. They flinched in pain, the adrenaline wearing off, their skull suddenly searing in pain. Ghruz roared as they collapsed to their knees, and their fingers reached for their left eye. They felt a wicked bleeding gash over their brow, traced halfway down their cheek.

They grasped the blade slowly, and looked in the reflection of the blade, using the dull light of the pond to check out their face. Their left eye had been split in two, bone just barely visible through the tear in their brow. Ghruz cursed and tore a strip of cloth off the dead soldier’s regalia to wrap around their head.

They trudged through the glowing pool to the stony shore, and turned to give one last look to the bodies they were to leave behind, before disappearing into the forest.