Eisengeist stirred into motion and instantaneously rose to its feet; one of its tendrils fell off from the sudden motion, having held on only by nerves. The gaping hole in its body was plugged by the jade dragon, which looked as if it were trying to act like a part of Eisengeist. The sapdragon screamed, seemingly reinvigorated as veins of jade-green light spread across its body from the dragon-construct. The many holes in its flesh were being filled by jade.

There came the sound of tearing flesh and breaking glass, and a gaping wound in the world opened up right above the sapdragon.

Fryg smiled.

“Just on time…” she uttered.

Zefaris turned her focus that way, forcing herself to open her left eye despite the terrible ache that pounded through her head.

It wasn’t the Revenant King who stepped out.

Nay, a lightning-wreathed, screaming madwoman leapt out. Her form was wrapped head-to-toe in the dark-coloured heat insulation bandages bestowed by the Manbear Hermits who dwelt at the Immortal Throne’s base, but her identity was unmistakable. There was not a soul in all Borea with hair like that, let alone one who could produce serpents of lightning tens of meters long. She lashed her Thundergods to the scruff of Eisengeist's neck and used them to pull herself there.

The figure which followed in Zelsys’ wake was, against all of Zefaris’ expectations, somehow even more imposing a presence than her. She’d never seen him, yet the blonde gunwoman instantly knew it to be the Revenant King, from his massive stature to his armor, beard, and a presence so mighty it made Eisengeist seem insignificant by comparison. He simply stepped out of his own gate and let himself freefall, with the world-wound collapsing behind him.

Zelsys smashed into Eisengeist’s head ere it could act, dodging the lashing of its good tendrils and the jade dragon-construct alike. When she reached its eye did Zefaris manage to push her left eye to zoom in far enough, finally noticing what it was that glistened in her raised hand. A maniac grin had utterly transformed her face, her eyes blank, glowing nearly pure white as lightning trailed behind them.

The moment when the Revenant King landed on Eisengeist’s back was the exact moment when the Skinless One’s Brass Stake contacted the sapdragon’s Dragonstone. Eisengeist collapsed, losing even the strength to stand. The golden light of its draconic essence now shone in Zelsys’ hand, while its third eye, now cracked, snapped shut. The Revenant King, meanwhile, drew his sword and set it forth to strike down Kristina’s jade serpent-dragon. Drawing his hand back, the blade spun in drill-like fashion by his side as the serpent-dragon blindly reared back to strike at him. The moment it opened its maw, the Revenant King leisurely gestured ahead. His blade ripped forward many times faster than the speed of sound, yet somehow didn’t produce so much as a sound. In fact, it seemed as though it had never left his side. The only sign it had even moved was the fact that the serpent-dragon suddenly shattered into a million pieces, as if something had just run it through end-to-end.

“NOW…” he uttered, a cold fury in his voice. “...REVEAL YOURSELF, USURPER. DESTROYER. NIDINGR.”

Once more, the Revenant King’s sword left his side. This time, it returned carrying the skewered form of Kristina Ramdall. It had run her through the midsection, carrying her on its flat by the ribcage.

Beyond utter wild-eyed terror, Kristina’s mind swirled with maddening rage. It was not at the Revenant King himself, for even she was not immune to his presence, but at the thrice-damned homunculus at his side. That freakish bitch who in her hand held a token of the Skinless One, a token screaming with Eisengeist’s very essence. That golden light shone out between her fingers, yet she seemed entirely unfazed by it. Even with those insulating bandages, it ought to scorch the skin and scour the pneuma from one’s flesh.

How did she withstand contact with it? How dare she take a piece of the dragon’s power, and how did she know such a thing could even be done to begin with? Why had she been permitted to do so? Who was she to stand by the Revenant King’s side as if she were his equal?!

“YOU… TO THINK RAMDALL’S OFFSPRING WOULD CAST SUCH DISHONOR UPON HIS NAME. TELL ME. WHAT LED YOU TO SUCH ACTS, CHILD?” so saith the Revenant King, not with anger, but with sadness and disappointment. He had clearly hoped the perpetrator to be a foreigner at least, though he knew it to be incredibly unlikely. Even knowing the overwhelmingly likely truth in advance, he had still hoped for another reality.

She didn’t answer.

He couldn’t compel her to do so. Not yet. Not here.

Two weeks passed.

In the immediate aftermath, the Revenant King remained in Oasis City. In order to conduct the investigation and overlook the repairs, he raised from the ice a heretofore hidden throne-fortress well past the city’s northmost edge. From there, using the floor as a huge scrying mirror, he took command. Furthermore, he also temporarily relaxed the restrictions on the druids so that they could capture conspirator-clan members who might seek to escape judgment, as well as so they might better aid in disaster relief.

With Eisengeist subdued and badly wounded, the King summoned several other Sapdragons from the Crescent Jungle.

Edelweiss, a hundred-meter-long, two-headed springspitter. Its body bristled with armored scales and its tail ended in a huge blade. It bore a royal-blue Dragonstone in its forehead.

Sprengfaust, a manslayer ape two-thirds as tall as Teutobochus. It possessed a draconic tail, horns, claws, and great wings. A truly demonic countenance. Its Dragonstone was blood-red.

From his cityside throne-fortress, the Revenant King impelled Edelweiss to share of its flesh with its sibling. Eisengeist, in the end, lost two of its tendrils and much of its pride, dragging itself into the Crescent Jungle in shame for having been tricked into doing the whims of what he saw as an insect, immortal or not.