A soldier, clad in azure armour, fell from the skies as Gaius sliced off his head in one blow. It was most likely a commander of sorts, as it had been leading a few more soldiers around to menace the Territories’ elites from the flanks, and its sudden death had thrown its men into disarray.

The knives in the boy’s hand flashed out as he made a complete U-turn, arcing towards the closest enemy. At the same time, another soldier exploded, bisected violently by Gaius’ Dragoon, and under the cover of dealing so many casualties in a short moment, Gaius closed in on the last three soldiers, who finally responded by sending out blasts of power at the boy. Buffeted by the wind, Gaius shuddered slightly as he narrowly dodged the incoming attacks, but his trajectory didn’t change.

He unsheathed the Terminus, and with another burst of speed, closed the gap completely, the dagger’s edge bearing down on his target. The soldier raised its sword, but it, along with its wielder, shattered into countless bits of blue light — the Terminus, and the way Gaius had used it — was nothing an ordinary Knight could stand up against.

The last member of the nearly-destroyed squad took a few steps back — Gaius could somehow sense fear from its body movements — but before it could flee, the boy had pulled out the Moonshot, blasting its head apart a second later. The disappearance of a small squad, however, didn’t matter all that much when over a hundred fliers were fighting on each side, especially when the bunch Gaius just took out was scouring the periphery.

In the middle of the battlefield were the Lords. Six of them on each side, but the boy had the feeling that Conrah was simply matching the strength deployed by the enemy. Entering that area, where attacks the size of a barn wall were being thrown at each other, would destroy any Knight utterly.

Sigils trailing behind the allied Lords winked out as Gaius watched, and the air around them distorted as they unleashed a concerted blast. For an instant, almost every Knight flying in the air staggered as the air thickened, with fatal results for some. But everything happening in the battlefield was nothing compared to the attacks Gaius’ allies had let loose upon the enemy.

An ear-splitting explosion rumbled across the battlefield as the solid wall of energy met the enemies’ defences, and the fighting stopped for a moment as everyone turned blind. When the light died down, half of the enemy Lords had vanished, and the other half were leaking pale blue energies from all over their body. Cheers rang out across the battlefield, and with the enemies’ premier forces now out of commission, the Eastern forces redoubled their efforts.

Gaius looked at the artefact he’d pinned on his shirt. The number ‘Five’ was written on it, but if he were to simply dive into the fray, he wouldn’t score that many kills either.

The Moonshot unfolded, transforming into a longer, sleeker weapon. This was the Moonshot’s long-ranged form, although the boy rarely used it for that purpose. Gaius was unable to attack with his own qi against enemies more than twenty metres away, so a pre-loaded artefact would have to do. His fingers flickered, drawing out multiple sigils that arranged themselves in front of the Moonshot’s barrel.

Gaius peered through the scope on it, seeking out targets that were presently unoccupied. The sigils floating in front of the Moonshot were quickening sigils, which increased the current speed of anything that passed through them by one-fold.

He’d learned the quickening sigil from a manual related to the one he’d picked up in Heritage Basestation, and had tested it once in a while. It worked on anything — from little wooden sculptures to gemstones — and the best part was that he didn’t need to redraw them that many times.

The little dot in Gaius’ vision fell onto an enemy Knight, which was busily shooting arrows at the human forces. It was a prime target, if nothing else, and the Moonshot shook slightly as Gaius pulled the trigger.

Time slowed as Gaius focused his mind onto the projectile flying out of the Moonshot’s elongated barrel. As it charged through sigil after sigil, the projectile of qi seemingly ignited, and the boy’s target dropped from the skies as what looked like a shooting star slammed into it. A high, harmonic crack echoed all around the chaotic battlefield a heartbeat later, but it wasn’t anything that Gaius couldn’t endure.

Gaius peered through the scope again, after ensuring that the sigils were still active. The quickening sigils winked out after three uses, but during the tests the boy ran, one of them had stopped functioning after the boy slid Nexus through it for some reason. He had never been able to replicate that malfunction ever since, but it was something worth taking note about.

The dot in his scope fell onto a Knight that was hell-bent on chasing its quarry down, and as the Moonshot shook again, its horizontal speed slowed slightly. A body plunged into the chaotic battlefield below, and through the scope, Gaius could see the chased Knight look around in surprise. The boy couldn’t blame him — the shooting star from Gaius’ Moonshot lasted for less than a second. Following the trail of fire it left as the qi projectile blasted into an enemy was something only people who were aware of these shots could do.

Gaius glanced at the card-like artefact on his chest, which was now reflecting a ‘Seven’. Satisfied, the boy went back to the scope, but as another harmonic crack rang out across the battlefield, his instincts felt an impending danger. Without wasting any time, the boy warped across the battlefield, crossing hundreds of metres in a single second.

His fingers flickered, drawing more quickening sigils as he turned back to his former spot, where three enemies had suddenly appeared in a ray of blue light. Someone — and Gaius didn’t need to guess too much — had teleported them over to his former position. Only his instinct had saved him from a potential ambush…but before Gaius could repay the favour, a shudder ran through the assembled troops belonging to the God of Water.

As one, the troops in blue receded, from both the air and the ground theatres. The battle had ended. Other than a decisive victory on the side of the Eastern Lords, the skirmish between the elites of both sides had ended without much difference.

Gaius sent a piercing gaze at the retreating wave of blue. After waiting for the little card-like artefact to reach him, the boy joined his allies as they retreated back into the land still under the East’s control.