The prophecy was no longer just whispered.It was spreading.From the streets where men lay broken, to the alleys where whispers traveled faster than fear, the name of Ares carried weight again. It wasn’t rumor anymore. It was proof, written in blood and bruises across Lin City’s pavement.And in the highest tower, Victor Wu finally understood something he had spent years denying: this war wasn’t going to be fought only through pawns. Sooner or later, he would have to step down from his throne....Ares sat slumped against the wreck of a van, his skin cold, his shirt soaked crimson. His eyes stayed open only by force of will. Reyes lay stretched out beside him, one hand pressed to a gash across his ribs, grinning through clenched teeth as if mocking death.Mira worked in silence, her hands trembling as she tore strips of fabric, pressing them against Ares’s wounds. She muttered prayers between sobs - prayers she hadn’t said in years. Every press of cloth drew more blood than it stoppe

Because neither could imagine a world where the other lived.Their bodies were wrecks now. Their fists, once weapons, had turned into sledgehammers of bone and blood. Each swing came slower, but every one carried the weight of everything they’d lost, everything they refused to surrender.Ares’s knuckles split deeper, skin peeling back to raw flesh. Victor’s brow poured blood into his eyes, staining his vision red. Still they swung. Still they connected. And the sound - meat on bone, bone on bone - echoed down the hollow boulevard....The crowd had grown. Not just stragglers now. People came out of shuttered windows, out of ruined shops, from the alleys. Lin City’s forgotten, the ones who had lived under Wu’s shadow for decades, gathered silently.They didn’t shout. They didn’t cheer. They just watched, their breaths held as if speaking might break the spell.For years, Victor Wu had been untouchable, a god in a tower. Now they saw him bled down to a man. For years, Ares had been whis

But not yet.Not tonight.Not while two men bled to prove the city’s fate.The square was a graveyard of silence and gasps, broken only by the crash of steel against steel, the grunts of exertion, and the soft patter of blood dripping to stone. Every soul watching could feel it - the fight had crossed into something beyond flesh, beyond even vengeance. This was two wills colliding until only one would remain.Ares’s vision blurred at the edges. His body screamed in revolt. His shoulder burned like fire where Victor’s blade had punched through muscle. His waist was slick with blood. He could taste iron every time he swallowed. Yet his legs still obeyed him. His arm still lifted his blade. His will remained unbroken.Victor Wu looked no less battered. His thigh bled freely, staining the flagstones in a widening pool. His shirt was ripped and dark with sweat. His breath came like a bellows, ragged and sharp. But his eyes still burned - mad, defiant, unwilling to concede.The duel dragged

“And the God of War was not done.”The words didn’t echo like some grand speech - they landed heavier than that. Like stone dropped into still water, sending ripples through every broken man who could still hear. Smoke clung to the air, thick and sour, choking the lungs. Blood steamed where it met the colder patches of ground. And there he stood, not stumbling, not bowing, but steady - scarred, breathing hard, eyes burning with that dark promise.Somewhere in the back, a soldier whimpered. He didn’t even know he had spoken aloud until his neighbor glanced at him in disgust. But they all felt it. They were looking at a man who refused to die, who had already clawed his way back from exile, betrayal, loss. A man like that… he wasn’t fighting only with his body. He was fighting with something they couldn’t touch.Boots slammed against the stone as another squad surged forward. Twenty men, maybe thirty, their weapons catching what little light the burning rooftops offered. They weren’t br

The doors began to groan.The sound was no ordinary creak - it was the low, tearing protest of steel forced against its will. Dust rained down from the ceiling, drifting through the flickering light like ash. Every man in the corridor froze, every weapon half-raised, because everyone understood the same thing at once: whatever was behind those doors wasn’t waiting politely to be invited. It was coming through.Ares shifted his weight forward, his body instinctively placing itself between Mira and Elijah, even though his son was still asleep, cradled in her arms. His knuckles cracked as he clenched his fists. He had heard that sound before - in Fallujah, in Kandahar, in the ruins of Grozny - when armored vehicles pushed through barricades. But this wasn’t the rumble of engines. This was raw force.“Back,” Ares said, voice sharp as broken glass. His tone left no space for argument. Men scrambled, dragging the wounded with them. Some stumbled, fear turning their legs clumsy, but they mov