Seven days.Nura stood on the wall, watching the horizon, and counted them down one by one. Six days now. Six days until a level 140 creature arrived to test everything they'd built.COUNTDOWNHerald arrival: 6 days, 23 hours, 47 minutesThreat level: ABSOLUTEPreparation status: ACCELERATINGMorale: TENSEBehind her, Ironhold hummed with desperate energy.Hunters ran drills. Mages carved runes. Blacksmiths worked through the night, forging weapons that could hurt void creatures. Everyone had a job. Everyone worked. No one slept.Nura hadn't slept in three days."Commander." Kara appeared beside her, frostbow in hand. "Torvin wants you in the war room. New information."The war room was crowded.Torvin stood at the map table, his massive frame blocking half the light. Joran sat nearby, the Starlight Scepter across her knees. Varik leaned against a wall, looking older than Nura had ever seen him. Miraen sat in a corner, her empty eyes distant, seeing things no one else could.And Kael

Dawn came cold and grey over Ironhold.Nura stood at the gates, watching the survivors of the Herald battle limp back to their duties. Thirty-one dead. Fifty-eight wounded. And now, four weeks until the first of seven generals arrived each one stronger than anything they'd faced before.WAR STATUSTime until First General: 27 daysCurrent forces: 264 huntersNeeded: ThousandsMission: Find allies across the realms"Still standing there?"Varik appeared beside her, his old face lined with exhaustion. He'd lost friends in the battle people he'd trained, people he'd led. But he was still standing."Thinking." Nura didn't look away from the horizon. "About where we go from here.""West." Varik's voice was certain. "There are guilds beyond the Frostheart mountains. Old guilds. Strong guilds. They've been fighting the void for centuries."NEW INFORMATIONWestern guilds: The Sunken KingdomsDistance: 500 milesTerrain: Mountains, desert, seaReputation: Legendary"Five hundred miles." Nura c

The rift closed behind Thera with a sound like a door slamming.She stood alone in the middle of nowhere.Not a planet. Not a space station. Just empty void with a few rocks floating nearby. The stars looked wrong here. Dimmer. Older. Like they were tired of shining.[ Location: Universe 10 - The Frontier ][ Status: Unexplored ][ Nearby Worlds: 0 ][ Nearest Life Sign: 3 Days Travel ]Thera read the numbers and wanted to cry. Three days just to find the first world. And she only had thirty days total."System. Give me something closer. Anything."[ Scanning... ][ One Life Sign Detected. Distance: 4 Hours. ][ Warning: Signal is faint. Possibly a trap. ]Four hours. Thera opened a rift and stepped through.---The signal led her to a ship.It was old. Really old. The metal was rusted. The windows were cracked. It floated through the void like a ghost, its engines long dead.Thera landed on the hull. Her boots stuck to the metal. Ice crystals formed around her feet.[ Life Sign insid

The journey back to Ironhold took less than a day.Morwen opened a gate a massive one, wide enough for armies to pass through. Nura stood at its edge, watching the soldiers of the Sunken Kingdoms march into the snow. Ten thousand people, leaving behind warm seas and floating cities for frozen mountains and a war they didn't choose.FORCES ASSEMBLEDSunken Kingdoms: 10,700 soldiersFrostheart Compact: 264 huntersDawn Guard: 12 knightsTotal: 10,976Expected reinforcements: 20,000 (arriving over next 3 weeks)But they didn't have three weeks.The First General was coming. Nura could feel it a pressure at the edge of her consciousness, a weight in the void that grew heavier every hour.SYSTEM ALERTFirst General: APPROACHINGLevel: 150Distance: Unknown (void-adjacent)Time: 5-7 days (estimate)WARNING: Timeline accelerating"Morwen." Nura found the ancient seer directing her void-touched warriors through the gate. "How long until the first general reaches us?"Morwen's blind eyes turne

Ironhold was no longer a town. It was a graveyard with walls.Nura walked through the ruins at dawn, stepping over broken stone and frozen blood. The Second General's final assault had collapsed half the buildings. The guild house was gone.The barracks were rubble. The wall their great wall, the one they had built to keep the darkness out was a mouth of broken teeth.IRONHOLD STATUSBuildings destroyed: 70%Wall integrity: 15%Inhabitable: NoStatus: Abandoned (within days)Behind her, the army moved like ghosts. The survivors of three armies Frostheart, Sunken Kingdoms, and the reinforcements who had come too late to save the town. Eleven thousand, six hundred and eighty soldiers. Half of them wounded. All of them exhausted.FORCES REMAININGTotal: 11,680Wounded: 5,831Fit for combat: 5,849Time until Third General: 6 daysSix days until a level 170 general arrived. Six days until they had to fight again. And they had nowhere to fight from."Commander." Varik appeared at her side,