It's far worst than I imagined.

Though we are a few days away from Lucas the number of people who are on the road to either leave the village for good or to look for loved ones is staggering.

Our paths crossed some of them offered to travel back with me in hopes that could find their missing family and friends. Apparently, some people decided to stay in the village despite the demon attack.

They say that they came up from the ground like fish and fed upon them like feed sprinkled on the water's surface... Corcovantis might have been among the ones witnessed. Snapjaw is its common name. Though I doubt that anyone wants to hear about that at such a time.

Though it's vague and laced with more hope than logic I do tell them that someone might already be out there helping to bring their loved ones back.

Small comfort perhaps, but it's the small trails that kept me from giving up on finding her. Though chances are stacked against it I truly hope more than ever to be proven wrong.

Sophie - July 19th, 2764

Andrew

His fingers rattled as he absorbed another lethal blow from the giant leg of Dawn. Deflecting the strike with his father's blade it blazed past Andrew and tears through the wall behind him with a mighty crash. Dust and rubble exploded on impact leaving Andrew staggered but free to slip on by the giant hunk of deadly metal thanks to the new opening. Having blocked multiple kicks with the same destructive force put behind them Andrew’s been forced to put all the energy he could muster just to defend himself. He’d landed a few counter strikes on it in the beginning but he quickly learned to his dismay that they'd been deflected off an almost invisible barrier.

It’s a lot like knights armor, but how?!

All living things had knights' armor, or rather they all have the energy and potential to tap into the planet's will to gain knights' armor. Only artificial things were the exception. At least that’s how Andrew came to understand it. This new reality he was facing was like seeing pigs fly or a hen bark. It was uncanny, it just doesn't happen.

Andrew staggered back against another wall as Dawn entered into the room it smashed a hole into. That hole is blown bigger by the bullet-like speed Dawn rushed in. Cramped and cornered Andrew gritted his teeth-his eyes widened. Channeling his energy onto his sword he tilted the blade to its face and swung it with all his might. Like swiping a great fan his channeled energy was unleashed and blasted off like a giant sneeze. At that moment the powerful gale exploded within the confounds of the room, Andrew was slammed back against the wall from the sheer force of it as he and the shabby and vacant mats that had been excused for bedding were plastered in place from the desperately escaping air. Dawn although too big to be squashed against the wall staggered back a little instead, that was all the opening Andrew could hope for.

By the time and violent gust subsided Andrew had already made himself scarce by slipping along the wall and ramming the door (the real way in or out.) next to him. Back in the hallway, Andrew sprinted towards the stairwell for all he's worth, his body warm from exertion but skin cold from his rising nerves. Although he got a good headstart Andrew could already hear Dawn gaining on him-man is it fast!

Slamming the door open Andrew tore through the step upward four at a time, he was practically jumping up the steps with each stride and he felt that he was making good time-that he would make it. Suddenly the shaft just below him exploded in a blinding mix of white and purple through his thermal goggles. Then came another explosion this time closer. Running up the steps Andrew was engulfed by the flames only then able to stumble and crash into one of the stairwell exits, his knight armor protecting him from being cooked alive within his flesh. Escaping with overheated clothes and the smell of his hair on his face Andrew tumbled into the hallway with a roll before he forced himself to his feet. Legging it to the stairwell on the other side he hoped to make it and continue his ascent. The door was in sight now along with the large painted sign labeled ‘G4’.

Just four more floors, I’ve got to keep this thing off of me for four more floors!

A giant leg came breaking through the floor below him blocking his path. Skidding to a halt Andrew tried to steady his breathing as he faced his sword in front of him and lowered himself into a defensive stance.

Dawn rose up from the rubble like a dog leaping out of a heap of snow before setting its cockpit lights upon Andrew.

“You don’t break easily do you?” Dawn said with a sigh.

“Not as easy as you broke the silence,” Andrew spat back.

Dawn huffed to himself in amusement.

“I’ve crushed knights before, flame knights, aqua knights-even some steel ones. All were confident that they could cut me down and yet failed. And even so, you feel different to them somehow.” Dawn said.

“If different doesn't include me being unable to cut you down either then I fail to see the benefits.”

Although he was acting cocky his mind was racing a mile a minute. He did not want to talk to Dawn but he welcomed the respite it gave him and so he aimed to try and do it for all it’s worth. The fact was that knights' armor or not Dawn's defenses was too tough for him to cut through it with normal means. Unless he was able to channel more energy-more will into his blade then he’ll end up with the same results. Luckily he had just one such move but he needed time to orient himself and reflect on Dawn's attack patterns first otherwise it could backfire drastically if poorly done. If it landed at all it would be a big break, if landed perfectly it could turn the tables, perhaps even end the fight.

Stop wishing for miracles. He thought.

Andrew remembered that Natalie told him to lure him to the surface so she could face it in her element. But even so, Andrew was sure he could be more than just be the bait.

Besides, what if she doesn't make it on time? Memories of her promising the kids that she will get them home safe flash through his mind making Andrew grip his blade tighter.

“I was hoping to cripple you enough to drag you back to my master, that power you use… there is something different about it.” Dawn said, his contemplative voice barely a whisper.

“Just call me the black sheep,” Andrew had an amused smile as he said it but Dawn hardly seemed to have noticed.

“Either way you're on your last legs, once you fall it will be back to gathering those kids.”

Andrew's chest tightened to this but he made a conscious effort not to show it.

“Well crap, since I'm about to be beaten anyways I won’t be able to tell anyone what the hell is going on here or what you're up to if you told me,” Andrew said.

Dawn chuckled to himself.

“You think me a fool?”

“I think I'm good as dead, I just want one worthwhile story to take to the grave with me. Don’t tell me that you’ve stopped to talk for no reason.”

“No, it’s just...”

Dawn went silent to this as if honestly contemplating Andrew's comment. Andrew senses this as more time for him to prepare his last real trump card urges him to continue talking.

“‘You need someone else to gloat to.’ right? I get like that too sometimes."

Another silence fell as Andrew held his breath for the response.

“It’s just your affinity. They are a lot like my masters and yet they are different somehow," Dawn said.

And just like that, Andrew's façade of gained interest crumbled. Dawn sighed at this change in Andrew’s demeanor.

"So you do understand the severity of this, don't you?" Dawn continued.

Andrew’s mouth went dry, hardly hearing what Dawn had said. Someone else like him, someone besides him and his father with the same affinity.

"Just who are you, people?" Andrew mumbled.

"We are known as the Seven Stars of Halo," Dawn obliged. "For a moment, I thought that maybe you were perhaps also a part of his plan. The plan does require the first knights to gather. But it's too soon."

"What were you hoping to gain from all this?"

Dawn paused. An air of suspicion radiated off of him. With a chuckle, he answers anyway.

"I’d guess it’s for the creation of the perfect being."

Mouth ajar Andrew's cheeks began to rise as he slowly divulged into hysterical laughter. After being struck with the likelihood that there are other knights like him and then hearing of their goal he just could not help it.

"So you're saying that you screwed up all these lives just to make a perfect being? What a shitty hobby! You should get yourselves a new one," Andrew spat tauntingly.

This earned him the wrath of Dawn as he kicked him through the wall to his back and continued to chase him with a barrage of kicks. Andrew was ready for it but even so, the strike itself drew the laugh right out of him.

"Ignorant brat!! You have not the slightest idea the lengths gone to in order to reach the panicle!! The extent I have gone to stand upon its plane! I will not allow you to make light of it!!" Dawn shouted whilst unleashing his stream of kicks at him.

Andrew’s arms were giving way from fending off the sheer power of the Nova. Still unable to find the key moment to use his last trump card he turned around to retreat. He hardly took three steps before he was pulled by his ankles and tossed through the ceiling passing through two levels of ground and ceiling, with his sword placed in front as a makeshift shield being the only thing that kept him from taking the full force of it.

The world rings around him as his mind tried to recover from violent vertigo and near whiplash of being used as a wrecking ball. His sense of direction gone, he mustered all the focus he could to find his enemy whilst in among the falling rubble. Turning to his six whilst still airborne he sees it. The Nova whips its leg around towards his three o'clock at a speed still baffling for a thing that size. Feeling that this is a better moment than any he unleashed the skill known as a clockwise counter. He spun his sword in a clockwise motion like a helicopter between Dawn and himself whilst he expanded his knight's armor in front of him like a dish. Dawn's kick comes into contact with this makeshift propeller-like sword and dish-like energy deflecting it slightly. In the fraction it took for the leg to make contact with his energy and sword Andrew moves. To the outside observer, it almost looks like he bent the fabric of space-time to suddenly react to an attack that has long been launched with speeds only dreamed of by the demons themselves. Re-clenching his sword, Andrew cuts through Nova's cockpit in a flash.

The cut passed through the shields and slashed a part of Nova's leg. It was damaged however, it was not enough to stop its advance. Andrew seeing that his last card fell to the wayside could only smile at his lack of strength and brace himself for the punishment that the enraged Dawn will now inflict on him.

The thermal device over his eyes became static after instinctively avoiding an incoming attack he was certain he sensed and avoided. His movement was getting sloppy. Being blinded Andrew felt himself flinging in the air like a rag doll.

In a last-ditch attempt, he surrounded himself in as much knight's armor as he could muster. His dark mist like energy blankets over him like a thick second layer of skin as he feels the world spiral away from him and a sudden flash of white take its place along with a sound like a thunderclap, and then-