Florian rode in the bed of a pickup truck driven by one of Tom’s traders, the vehicle bouncing along the abandoned highway with practiced ease. This was despite the multitude of cars that littered the road from when Worldbreak had first occurred, many of their windows smashed in and human remains still occupying their seats as grisly reminders of the new way.

The road was thankfully empty of monsters, and Florian was able to conserve all his Control for when he would need it. Still, the drive was longer than it would have been, and four hours later – around noon – they pulled up to the once-proud castle. Its tall walls, so indomitable in the past, had been torn down. Smoke billowed in the air, a clear indicator of the fires that the fortress now contained.

His stomach sank. The driver put on more speed, clearly as eager as him to see if there was anything or anyone left to save. Parking the car as close to the fortress as they could take it, Florian saw not a single thing move except for an orange light that ebbed and flowed, barely visible in the full midday light.

Running as fast as he could, and using his spear as a crutch to propel himself forward faster than he might be otherwise capable of with his peg leg, Florian burst through Dover’s gates. It stank of iron, and a few armored warriors lay collapsed against the stone. Chunks of their necks had been torn out, their eyes open wide in horror and pain. Florian stopped, shocked. Green eyes. The warrior closest to him had green eyes.

Memories that he’d tried to suppress sprung back in full force, and Florian nearly puked. But he shoved the emotion and horror down, bottling it up. As he did so, Florian took a step back in wonder. The man in front of him had blue eyes, not green. In fact, he was quite familiar to Florian: Andrew.

The man had been nothing but an asshole to him, but Florian remembered the warrior always choosing the equipment Florian created over the other smiths. It had been born out of a selfish desire to get the cheapest armor and weapons that he could get, but it was that desire that had seen Florian remain a ‘valuable’ member of society. Florian didn’t think he really owed the man any debts, as their ill-fated relationship had been transactional, but Florian hated to see someone he once knew look this way.

Particularly now that it looked like Andrew had fought on the front line. The Andrew Florian knew would have hidden deep within the fortifications, potential exile be damned. Risking his life for the sake of Dover… Florian would have never expected that of him. Despite all the harassment Florian had suffered at his hands, Andrew had gained his begrudging respect. Something had changed during the time he was gone, and Andrew had died a warrior’s death because of it.

He gently closed Andrew’s eyes, and after doing the same for the other warrior, Florian took a deep breath and began his grim walk through the ruins of Dover. All the structures he once knew were smashed, only portions of the building left still standing. The Hellwolves wouldn’t have been able to cause such devastation. Florian hurried to the smithy, hoping that against all odds, maybe George had found a way to survive.

Instead, he found the source of the orange glow. The entire structure had been burnt to the ground, no doubt the result of the flames of the furnace going on a rampage after the furnace itself was destroyed. The stone remained behind and was covered in black. The little hope Florian had been nursing disappeared, and he stepped on the foundation of the building, inching as close to the fire as he dared.

Among the soot, Florian found three charred corpses. Their features were all but burnt away, though Florian recognized one of them immediately. Its patchy grey hair give it away as being George.

His legs carried him forward on autopilot, and when he reached the old man, Florian collapsed. He clutched desperately at the old man: his mentor, friend, and family. But there was nothing to be done, as the life had long faded from George’s ruined body. He screamed, then.

It was a primal thing, filled with the pain and sorrow. In that moment, Florian didn’t care that there might still be enemies lurking within Dover’s stone walls. His emotions, bottled up and potent, demanded release. They came out as a torrent, and tears ran down his face like a river. He held George as he cried, his body trembling as a tree in the middle of a hurricane.

But his tears, like everything else in this cursed world, eventually ran dry. When they refused to come, Florian simply took in the sight of his dead mentor as sobs wracked his body. George, in his final moments, clutched something around his neck. Florian remembered suddenly of the times when George had faced increasingly impossible quotas, of the time when Taylor had come to send Florian to his death. The old man had held his hand to his chest, and it was as though the action had brought a well of calmness to George.

Taking George’s hand, Florian lifted it to find a small silver locket around the man’s neck. It was familiar; he had noticed the silver chain when they’d worked together in the smithy, but the locket itself had always been buried under his shirt. Carefully, Florian opened the locket, surprised to see it relatively unharmed despite the ruin around them. Inside was a picture of George and a beautiful young woman with hair the color of honey. Between the two of them was a young boy, just barely a toddler. His daughter and grandson.

A single tear ran down his face at the realization, though where it came from he didn’t know. All this time, George had been fighting his own demons, weathering grief that he had never shared with anyone. Even as he helped those around him heal from their own. Florian wondered if the woman and child were still alive, but if they were, Florian resolved himself to find them. The world had lost one of the few truly good men left, and Florian felt rage unlike any other he’d ever felt flood him in place of the sorrow he’d been overcome by just moments ago.

Standing, Florian noticed that the driver had witnessed everything, an automatic rifle in her hands as she scanned their surroundings. Florian approached her, but he was stopped by the sound of paws scampering over dirt. A grim smile overcame his features, and blue magic coated his spear tip.

He would make those infernal creatures pay for what they had done.