As Zeke landed among the scorched and squirming corpses, a rumble traveled through the earth. He paused for a moment but ignored it. Less than a second later, the mountain facing them exploded in a shower of stone and dirt. The ensuing earthquake was coupled with a booming voice that seemed to resound both from within his head, and outside.

"YOU! D-DEMON SPAWN!!!!! You have shown the power of the great demon! You! You have called him here, haven't you?! The Great Demon! The Defiler! You've called him here with your heretical arts!!! I-I must kill you and flee! I m-must flee from his w-wrathful glare! RAGGHHHHH DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

The Warlord's voice crescendoed into a screech as its paranoia reached its peak. Mattias and Mai jumped off the pod, landing beside Zeke as it tumbled to the side from earthquakes. They watched in horror as barbed tentacles slowly wormed their way into the sky, through the dust and rubble of the mountain. Hundreds of limbs, each several miles long, shook and curled in both fear and anger.

Mattias nervously chuckled and joked, "H-ha... That's one angry nutsack..."

Mai glanced at the two of them, and with cold sweat forming on her brow, she asked, "Z-Zeke...? W-what did you do?"

He smiled at her. A smile that conveyed both pride, and fear. "The Great Demon and Defiler both refer to the same person. Basillius. This one fears our lord so much that I fear my little light trick triggered its PTSD... It was probably a lucky survivor of an encounter with his glorious cleansing flames. We quailed at the sight of this creature, while it in turn quivered at the mere thought of the Redeemer... Truly, this has shown me yet again, that our lord is assuredly not a mortal."

Mattias turned his gaze from the screeching horror pulling itself free from the mountain for a moment and looked at Zeke's calm expression. "Zeke? W-why are you so calm?"

Zeke turned to the distance where the glow of firelight and smoke could be seen on the horizon and pointed as he spoke calmly, "Because, I can feel them... My brothers and sisters in worship. They have noticed the aetheric fluctuations of the veil energy here, they can feel the Warlord's anguish."

As soon as he finished his sentence, a green light popped up on that smoky horizon. Then they began popping up one after the other, totaling up to dozens. The figure leading this group streaked ever closer like a green comet soaring across the horizon. This person zipped soundlessly between the trio like a blur before coming to a jarringly abrupt stop.

Before them stood a young woman with long black hair and dark caramel skin. Her eyes still glowing a fiery green offsetting her serene expression. Zeke knelt before her and bowed his head, "High priestess Maria! May his light forever illuminate your path!"

Finally, the others arrived. Dozens of people Mai recognized, all the way from other grunts like her, to the commander of this ground op herself, Maria.

Maria gently pulled Zeke up by his shoulders and gave him a bright smile, "Acolyte Ezekiel, stand. Be free, little brother. As for your job here, we will handle it. Please, continue to cleanse these anguished souls that survived the missile barrage."

Zeke stood up and nodded at her nervously. Maria glanced at Mai and Mattias and grinned. "There is no need to worry so. We can handle a single lowly Warlord."

She looked around at her fellow believers and nodded slowly. Her calm amidst the backdrop of the raging Warlord struck a cord in Mai that made her yearn for that same confidence. Maria's gaze drifted toward the Warlord and with her right hand she pulled out an Azarian fanged hilt with a spine made from a Warlord's nine-foot fang. With her left, she pulled out something that looked like a bony double-barrel shotgun with spines made of Azarian fangs and barbs.

She held her sword out and pointed it toward the Warlord as she yelled in her soft voice, "Brothers! Sisters! Hear me now! From this point forward you are free to move in his glorious light unhindered! For better, or worse, we will unveil ourselves before his majesty and assist him as he walks this bloody path! Long live the Great Redeemer! May we forever bask in his numinous glow! May he forever illuminate our path!"

The other members of the church of redemption behind her began pulling out blades or guns made from the flesh and bone of Azarians. Swarms of nanites pooled around these weapons, completing them with Basillian steel and arcane runes. With Maria at the fore, the dozens of redemption priests chanted simultaneously.

"Basillius, haksha demo feldent! Haksha demo vre'ta trensda malkana feldent! Haksha demos talo to shekkat tet feldent ket kel'tor dema wagato!"

First, their bodies began to glow with the veil's arcane energies, followed by green tendrils of energy wrapping around their arms and legs like a fiery set of gloves and boots. The energy sizzled constantly but didn't seem to burn them. Next, their blades or guns began to glow with green flames as the runes upon them took on an emerald sheen.

Once the chant was finished, Maria seemed to disappear in a blur, leaving behind only a green trail of light that lead to the Warlord that was dozens of miles away. The priests quickly followed suit with their weapons drawn.

Those who had taken up guns in the redeemer's name stopped a few miles short of the flailing Warlord. They leveled their weapons at it and pulled their triggers. The veil-enhanced bullets flew at FTL speeds, impacting the Warlord in an instant. Each 20mm bullet dug its way deep into veil-hardened Azarian flesh before detonating in a fiery blaze that scorched the insides of the mountainous creature little by little.

Maria lead those who had taken up the blade as she weaved through tentacles as thick as redwood trees. She casually aimed her shotgun at a tentacle in front of her and a green flash accompanied by a searing wave of heat flashed toward the limb, burning through it with ease. "May his holy fire cleanse you of your sins. I will free you from your darkness, fearful one."

The group behind her slowly fell behind as they were forced to lash out at the incoming sea of limbs with their blades to protect themselves. Maria on the other hand moved through this same sea of tentacles and barbs with unsettling ease. Her soft, calm expression never once betrayed a hint of effort as she weaved her way closer to the Warlord's body.

Finally, she could see the eyeball-covered exterior of the sickly-yellow creature's main body. She swung her blade down in a slow, deliberate arc. Following the arc, a crescent of flame appeared in the air that hung for a second before slamming forward through the last of the tentacles and into the Warlord's body.

The fiery slash scorched away several feet of skin only stopping once it burned away some of the muscle beneath. The Warlord screeched in pain and redoubled its efforts on killing Maria, throwing a veritable tide of tentacles toward her.

She took a light glance around and saw that there was no way around the assault as the redwood-like limbs enclosed the space around her. The first tentacle was close enough that she could hear the whistle of the barbs cutting through the air before she made her move. Dashing toward it, aiming her shotgun at it and pulling the trigger.

The shotgun blast sent a mile of Azarian flesh flying into the planet below at earth-shattering speeds. The double-barrel shotgun popped its break action and ejected two spent shells that were caught by arcs of green electricity. The runes engraved on the sides of the shells glowed with barely-restrained energy before slamming back into the gun. All within a few short seconds.

She flipped the action back as she swung her blade across another incoming limb, severing it clean and leaving only a smoldering stump behind. She turned and fired two more shots before switching back to an offensive with her blade. She danced through the attack consistently swapping between gun and blade creating a fiery and explosive dance in the sky.

Mai and Mattias could only stare at the scene in awe as they watched the deadly dance taking place just below the clouds. The constant hail of fiery ammunition from those who stayed behind, the near-impenetrable wall of blades that was slicing through the Azarian's assault slowly and methodically, and finally, Maria's utter domination of the beast that could be mistaken for a mountain.

The hundreds of savage limbs had been systematically reduced to smoking nubs, littering the landscape with mile-long craters and hills. It only took a few minutes for them to reduce a Warlord to little more than a disgusting, fleshy potato that they could finish off at their whim.

Finally, the Warlord no longer had the strength to keep itself afloat in the air. It began its slow descent back to the mountain range it had destroyed collapsing back into the rubble with a massive boom that sent a wave of dust in every direction.

The Warlord breathed heavily before yelling out its final words toward the sky. "Lord Disciple!!! Save me!!! The Demon-spawn learned the Defiler's heretical arts!!! Hurry and save me!!!"

Maria looked down at the writhing mountain of flesh below her with pity. "Anguished one... May his holy flame cleanse you and guide you toward a new path. You are far too great a sinner to send without thorough cleansing."

She brought herself down to the Azarian's body and embedded her blade all the way to the hilt. The other priests who had taken up the blade all stabbed into the Azarian as well. As one, green fires began to blaze around the hilt of their blades. The skin around where they stabbed rapidly blackened and smoked as they poured all of their energy into burning the titanic creatures' insides to charcoal.

After a full minute of ear-piercing screams ringing out in the minds of everyone within a hundred miles, the Warlord finally breathed its last. Maria pulled her blade free and hung it on her side along with her shotgun. She turned toward the other members of the clergy and gave them a contented smile.

"The Great Redeemer would be proud of us. Of you. Today, we cleansed thousands of poor souls, and we even cleansed a great sinner. Though they were all weaker than we've seen before, they were all still dyed with a darkness that tainted their very souls... Darkness, that we cleared away with his glorious light. A darkness that has felt his holy fire. We brought judgment... and peace. Once we return to the fleet, I will notify High Priest Savage that we are moving into the light."