The Thirteen Knight

Chapter 22- The Lure

The North Woods were not silent. They whispered.

I sat in the back of the armored transport crawler, my boots ankle-deep in mud that had leaked through the floor grates. Rain lashed against the reinforced viewports, turning the world outside into a gray smear of twisted trees and fog.

Behind our vehicle, on a massive flatbed sled pulled by four steam-golems, lay the Aethelgard Chassis. It was covered in a heavy tarp, but the orange glow of the Wrathguard heart pulsed through the fabric like a fever. Thump. Thump.

"Estimated time to Rift Zone: five minutes," the driver announced, his voice cracking with nerves.

I adjusted the strap of my tool belt. My left foot throbbed. The pebble I had taped into my boot was grinding a hole in my heel, but the pain was a grounding anchor. Every wince was a reminder: You are Chase Royce. You are clumsy. You are weak.

"Check the stabilizers again, Royce," Professor Kael barked from the front seat. He was staring at a monitor, watching the energy readings of the demon heart. "If that heart wakes up fully before we’re in position, every demon in a ten-mile radius will swarm us while we’re still moving."

"Stabilizers green, Professor," I said, my voice shaking just the right amount. "But the rain... the moisture is getting into the rune-circuits on the Sun-Eater."

"Then dry it when we stop," Commander Vane said.

She was sitting opposite me, arms crossed, her eyes closed. She looked like she was sleeping, but I knew better. She was listening to my heartbeat. She was waiting for the rhythm to change.

The crawler lurched to a halt.

"We're here," the driver said. "Zone Zero."

The back ramp dropped with a hydraulic hiss. The smell hit us instantly—ozone, rotting leaves, and the metallic tang of an open Rift.

We were in a clearing. The trees here were dead, their bark bleached white by mana radiation. In the center of the clearing, the air was fractured. A vertical tear in reality, about twenty feet high, hung suspended above the ground. It was quiet now, but the edges were vibrating.

"Deploy the asset!" Vane ordered, stepping out into the rain.

The steam-golems dragged the flatbed into position. Kael began shouting orders to the squad of six mages who had accompanied us. They set up a perimeter, planting warding spikes in the mud to create a barrier.

"Uncover it," Vane told me.

I limped over to the flatbed. I grabbed the edge of the heavy tarp. My left leg buckled slightly—a genuine reaction to the pebble—and I stumbled, catching myself on the metal railing.

"Careful, Royce," Vane called out, her voice dry. "Don't trip over your own shadow."

"Slippery, Ma'am," I mumbled.

I pulled the tarp off.

The Aethelgard Chassis stood revealed in the rain. It looked even more menacing in the gloom. The rain hissed as it hit the hot plating of the chest. The orange light from the heart reflected off the wet metal, making it look like the machine was bleeding light.

"Activate the Lure," Kael commanded from the safety of the armored crawler.

I climbed the maintenance ladder on the Chassis’s leg. I opened the access panel on the chest and flipped the inhibitor switch.

The hum of the machine deepened. The heartbeat grew louder. THUMP. THUMP.

It was a beacon. A dinner bell.

Almost instantly, the Rift responded. The purple crack in the air widened. Shadowy tendrils spilled out, grasping at the dead trees.

"Here they come," one of the perimeter mages whispered, raising his staff.

First came the Scuttlers—armored insectoids the size of dogs. They poured out of the Rift like black water.

"Fire!" Vane shouted.

The mages unleashed a volley of fireballs and lightning. The Scuttlers screeched as they were blasted apart, but there were too many of them. They were the infantry, the fodder meant to exhaust our mana.

I stayed perched on the Chassis’s shoulder, clutching my wrench. I was supposed to be monitoring the Sun-Eater cannon, but I was really watching the tree line.

"Target confirmed," Kael shouted over the comms. "Heavy signature emerging!"

A massive hand gripped the edge of the Rift.

A Void-Stalker pulled itself through. It was twelve feet of lean, corded muscle and obsidian skin, with no eyes and a mouth full of needle-teeth. It moved with a terrifying, jerky speed, phasing in and out of visibility.

"Focus fire on the Stalker!" Vane ordered.

The mages shifted their aim. But the Stalker was fast. It teleported ten feet to the left, dodging a lightning bolt, then leaped.

It landed on the barrier shield. The warding spikes screamed under the pressure.

"The cannon!" Vane yelled at me. "Royce, fire the Sun-Eater!"

"It... it's not locked on!" I shouted back, fumbling with the manual targeting wheel.

"Just point and shoot!"

I cranked the wheel. The massive cannon on the Chassis’s shoulder whined as it charged. The runes glowed red.

I lined up the shot. The Stalker was tearing at the barrier, inches away from a terrified mage.

I pulled the lever.

CLICK.

Nothing.

"Misfire!" I yelled. "The dampeners are wet!"

"Fix it!" Kael screamed. "Fix it or we all die!"

The Stalker shattered the barrier. The mage screamed as the beast swatted him aside like a fly. The creature turned its eyeless head toward the Chassis. It smelled the heart. It wanted the meal.

It crouched, ready to spring at me.

I had two seconds.

I could see the problem. The firing pin was stuck, rusted by the rain. I needed to hit it hard. But if I hit it with normal strength, it wouldn't budge. If I hit it with Apostate strength, Vane would see.

I looked down. Vane was busy blasting a Scuttler with her wand-rifle, but she would turn any second.

I had to use the environment.

I pretended to panic. I scrambled back along the shoulder plating, slipping on the wet metal. I flailed my arms, looking like a coward trying to run away.

"Help!" I screamed.

As I slipped, I kicked the heavy ammo hopper latch with my left foot.

The latch sprang open. The heavy iron lid of the hopper swung down, gravity doing the work.

CLANG.

The lid slammed into the stuck firing pin with the force of a sledgehammer.

HUMMMMMM.

The cannon roared to life instantly.

I threw myself flat on the metal decking. "Firing!"

The Sun-Eater discharged.

A beam of pure thermal energy erupted from the barrel. Because the Stalker had leaped at that exact moment, it was mid-air, right in the path of the beam.

The demon didn't even have time to shriek. It was vaporized instantly. The beam continued, carving a trench through the mud and blasting a hole through three trees behind the Rift.

The recoil shook the Chassis violently, nearly throwing me off.

Silence fell over the clearing, save for the hissing of rain on molten earth.

"Target neutralized," Kael breathed over the comms.

I lay on top of the robot, chest heaving. I checked my left boot. The kick had been precise—a calculated strike disguised as a slip. The pebble had dug deep into my heel, and warm blood was soaking my sock.

Good. Real blood meant a real limp.

"Royce?" Vane’s voice cut through the rain.

I peered over the edge. She was standing amidst the carnage of the Scuttlers, her uniform untouched by the mud. She was looking up at me.

"Status?"

"I... I slipped, Ma'am," I called down, my voice trembling. "I fell and hit the hopper. I think I knocked it loose."

Vane stared at me. Her eyes were calculating. She looked at the dead mage, then at the vaporized Stalker, then at me.

"You fell," she repeated flatly. "And accidentally repaired a jammed firing mechanism with your shin?"

"I... I guess so. Lucky."

"Luck is a statistical anomaly," she said. "You seem to have a lot of it."

She holstered her weapon.

"Secure the Chassis. The Rift is destabilizing. We're done here."

I climbed down slowly. My leg was genuinely screaming now. I hit the ground and hissed in pain, grabbing my ankle.

Vane walked over. She didn't offer to help. She looked at the blood seeping through the leather of my boot.

"You're bleeding," she noted.

"Twisted it again," I gritted out. "Or cut it. I don't know."

She watched the blood mix with the mud. It was red. Human red.

"Get in the crawler," she said, turning away.

I limped toward the transport. My heart rate was slowly coming down. I had survived. The secret was safe.

But as I stepped onto the ramp, a sound stopped me.

It wasn't a roar. It was a whisper.

Brother.

I froze. The voice wasn't in my ears. It was in my head. It was the same frequency as the Apostate Drive.

I turned around. The Rift was closing, but just before it sealed, I saw something.

Standing on the other side of the veil, deep in the demon realm, was a figure.

It wasn't a beast. It was humanoid. It wore armor that looked disturbingly like mine—black, sleek, organic. But where my lines were green, his were a violent, pulsing violet.

He raised a hand in a mock salute.

Then the Rift snapped shut.

I stood there, paralyzed. The rain ran down my face.

"Royce!" Kael yelled. "Move!"

I stumbled into the crawler and sat down, shaking uncontrollably.

It wasn't just monsters anymore.

There was another one. Another Knight.

And he knew I was here.