As we approached the execution platform, the atmosphere was a thick soup spiced with anticipation and cruelty. Emerald, Solace, and Quint looked utterly defeated, their once-proud demeanors crushed under the weight of public humiliation.

  Em's entire body was covered in rotten fruit pulp and the remnants of various food items hurled by gleeful citizens, gray robe stained. Her gold-orange eyes were red-rimmed from crying, her proud posture reduced to a hunched, trembling, broken form.

  Solace and Quint fared little a better as Emerald was the one who had received the brunt of the crowd's hate.

  We walked to an open spot in the back by the fountain, paying a few drunken peasants a bag of copper coins to clear us the fountain space. I climbed up onto the marble ledge to stand tall and waved merrily at the prisoners, until the trio of soon-to-be-executed Omnids spotted us.

  The Executioner-Bard stepped forward, his bright blue robes swirling dramatically. A theatrical trumpet blast erupted from his Nuntix Kitlix, silencing the rowdy crowd.

  "Citizens of Shandria!" he proclaimed, his voice magically amplified by his crystalline kitten to reach every corner of the square. "The taunting is over! Time has come for justice to be served! Please welcome Pyromancer Igjuvius Tuh and his Ignix Kitlix Blazy!"

  A tall, lean, black haired pyromancer dressed in gold robes with red trim stepped forward, his dark red and black Kitlix glinting on his shoulder with orange sparks.

  The crowd cheered.

  Igjuvius bowed dramatically. His familiar mimicked his bow, creating miniature arcs of flame dancing through the air.

  Executioner-Bard Agrikolish stepped forward, his voice booming across the square. "Condemned! Do you have any last words before the sentence is carried out?"

  Emerald's head snapped up, her fruit-covered scales a total mess. Her gold-orange eyes were digging into me, angry at my betrayal. I winked at her.

  "Do you think that you effin' bastards can break me?" She snarled. "You're nothing! Less than nothing! I AM EMERALD STRATOS! MY CLAN WILL BURN THIS ENTIRE CITY TO THE GROUND FOR THIS HUMILIATION!"

  Ah, Emmy, never change.

  The crowd went silent.

  "I DECLARE A BLOOD VENGEANCE AGAINST EVERY SINGLE PERSON IN THIS SQUARE!" she screamed, frothing and shaking. "MY FAMILY'S SCRUTIMANCER WILL FIND YOU! MY KNIGHTS WILL HUNT DOWN AND SLAY EVERY SINGLE ONE OF YOU! YOU WILL ALL SUFFER!"

  "Y-yeah!" Solace declared, staring at me and trying very hard to follow the script I told her to follow over our late-night Voicecast conversation from this morning. "We're gonna curse your city! Curse it... extra hard! Behold!” She stood up, glancing at the time on the clock. “Your ruination begins now, for Lord Zalimar brings his army of the dead to your door! Fall!"

  She pointed a finger at the cyan Infix Tower looming over the city and snapped her left hand like a gunshot.

  "Shhhhh," I whispered into my Voicecast bracelet, sending a command to Shash.

  Rumbling booms resounded across the city like thunder crackling across the clear sky. Citizens began looking around nervously, their cheers transforming into murmurs of uncertainty.

  "What?" The Executioner-Bard sputtered. His eyes went wide as the massive Infix Mage Tower began careening forward.

  "By her Shadow." He choked, his voice still carrying across the entire gathered crowd. “That Mage Tower… it’s coming down!”

  The crowd turned, staring at the tower as it came down.

  Many screamed and began to retreat, bumping into each other as the massive tower fell right onto the Arx Bank building, obliterating itself and the Bank it struck with a crackle of magical detonation, crystal shards flying into all directions and raining across the city like glittering rain.

  Dust and residue billowed through the square.

  Emerald's gold-orange eyes went wide with shock. Solace and Quint stared in disbelief. I smiled at them.

  From the flying dust formed from the tower’s impact, a massive logo began to manifest in the sky - a laughing skull with three eyes and a dark crown.

  I dove into the water behind the fountain and activated Lance’s anti-scrying wardstone.

  “Voicecast Solace Exill, team Dreadful Delvers Knight,” I ordered.

  The bracelet vibrated for a second. Then Solace picked up, accepted the call inside her forehead mouth with one of her tentacle-threads.

  “Solace,” I ordered. “Time to act. Stand up, point your finger at the skull in the sky, magnify your voice as much as you can and be as dramatic as possible, repeat after me… ‘It’s the mark of our Master!”

  "It is the mark of our Master!" Solace stood up and pointed at the skull in the sky. She howled, laughing dramatically as she spoke the words I was whispering into her head. "Tremble, foolish mortals! Tremble and despair! Run and hide, for soon his army will march into Shandria from the catacombs below and feast upon your flesh! The invasion has begun!"

  I raised my head a bit, tilting my fox-ears towards the stage.

  “Invasion…” The Executioner Bard choked, his voice still carrying across the entire square. “What?!”

  The crowd's panic intensified. People were now running in all directions, screaming about an impending invasion.

  Pyromancer Igjuvius looked utterly horrified. His Ignix Kitlix spun in circles around his shoulders, sparking with confused energy.

  Agrikolish Chime-Barnaby stood frozen, mouth agape.

  Emerald looked at Solace and then at my head sticking out of the fountain, not understanding what was happening anymore. Her Omnid eyes and ears were much sharper than the confused and panicking citizens of Shandria.

  An eerie wail of doomsday bells resounded across Shandria, the surviving Mage Towers igniting one by one, warped in shimmering shields as the mages inside powered up the wards to their maximum setting, terrified that they would be targeted next.

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  I grinned at Emerald.

  “What the fuck have you done now, human?” Her expression said as she stared at me.

  “Sir,” the pyromancer asked, my large fox ears catching their conversation. “Are we still… you know? Burning them alive?”

  “I… don’t freaking know,” Agrikolish snarled, rubbing his face. “Damnation. This is bad.”

  “Is this really… an invasion?”

  "Seems like it," The Executioner-Bard muttered, staring at the chaos unfolding around him.

  More explosions rocked the city as my hired adventurers detonated carefully placed beast core charges in various abandoned homes.

  I dove back into the fountain and narrated for Solace. “Behold…”

  "BEHOLD!" Solace continued her theatrical performance, repeating my words like a good puppet-worm, projecting her voice across the ground with her Omnid skill. "THE POWER OF LORD ZALIMAR! Your city will fall! Your banks will crumble! Your gold will be worthless!”

  “Worthless?” Agrikolish sputtered, his voice carrying over to where I sat in the fountain. “What are you talking about, you mad creature?!”

  “When the rest of…” I whispered furiously.

  “When the rest of your Guildnet Towers will fall, the dimensional barrier between Shandria and Undertown will shatter and Duskbloom shall flow up into your streets and all your magic will be devoured! Your Kitlix will be as useful as helpless kittens as the dead covered in Duskbloom will march from below! Mwa ha ha ha!" Solace boomed from both of her mouths, laughing madly, yellow claws out, looking like a proper supervillain minion now.

  That really did it. The final nail into the coffin.

  The crowd was in complete mayhem mode now, rushing away from the square like a tidal wave.

  "Duskbloom," the Pyromancer swallowed, smothering his adorable, flame-sputtering Ignix close to his chest. "I can't fight against Duskbloom! I have to protect Blazy... I can’t lose her to that cursed magic devouring mold-shite!”

  "Duskbloom. No. Shit, shit, shit!" The Executioner-Bard howled, watching as more citizens fled the square. “The prisoners…”

  "Forget the prisoners! The Watch can take them back to the catacombs, interrogate them again... about all of this!" The Pyromancer grabbed the Bard’s arm. "We need to find Ice mages or Frostix Kitlix now, you idiot! Those blasted mites will eat ALL of our magic when the Undertown-containing barrier falls! We'll fall asleep and then we’ll be ripe for the dead to devour! That must have been the Necromancer’s plan all along!”

  I grinned. “Flee mortals…” I whispered.

  "FLEE, MORTALS!" Solace cackled dramatically both of her mouths open wide, the flesh-petals of her face opening and closing. "FLEE BEFORE THE WRATH OF LORD ZALIMAR! DUSKBLOOM COMES FOR YOU ALL! Burn! You will all burn for opposing my Necromage Master! Behold! Your city is set aflame! Aha ha ha ha ha!”

  Another series of beastcore explosions thundered in the distance, bringing down a few more abandoned buildings. Harmless, albeit very thick black smoke began billowing from chemical smoke bombs set up by hired adventurers across town who thought they were doing simple delivery jobs.

  “By her Shadow! The city is burning down! We have to…!” The Pyromancer cried as he stared at the black rising smoke.

  Something broke inside him and he jumped off the stage and fled, likely heading to the nearest fridge or a gate out of town. Just as I expected, he assumed that wherever there was smoke, there would be fire too.

  The guards began abandoning their posts, some trying to maintain order but most of the low-level ones simply taking off, joining the fleeing crowd.

  The Executioner-Bard spun in one spot, helplessly yelling for everyone to remain calm. Nobody was listening to him anymore. The Shandrian Watch officers were frantically shouting commands, while the Voicecast mages were exchanging rapid communication with the confused higher ups.

  I hung up on Solace.

  “Vee, gimme your tag,” I ordered.

  The Thunderbird complied without questions, staring at the unfolding mayhem in front of us with wide gray-gold eyes.

  “Vee, Cinder, commere, sit in the water and hide under the edge of the fountain and make your faces look Omnid again!” I added.

  They obeyed, jumping in. Wet Thunderbird and Quetzalcoatl faces appeared above the water.

  "Make me look like my human self," I told Vee. "Okay, now make it look like we're bleeding all over and we're badly burned and injured. I want us to look like war-orphaned Omnid children."

  Cinder stared at me, looking completely lost as Vespera manipulated her Quetzi powers to readjust our appearances.

  I admired myself in the small mirror. My bruises and cuts actually chafed.

  "Perfect," I gave Vee a thumbs up. "Now for the final move."

  "What's the final move?" Vee asked.

  I smiled at her.

  "Voicecast Keeper Vassili," I spoke into Vee’s silver tag, making sure that Lance’s anti-scrying hexastone was still on. As the bank was utterly obliterated by the fallen tower, the dimensional bubble it powered up vanished and thus the call connected.

  "Yes, Miss Simmi?" the Domovoy's hairy face shimmered into existence over my wrist, his gravelly voice hissing slightly. "I… Mr. Glock? What is happening up there? Why are you… bleeding all over and swimming… in a fountain?”

  "Keeper Vassili," I yelled dramatically, splashing in the water. "I need you to transfer control of the Corpse Seeker to Vespera Simmi immediately!”

  "What?" The Domovoy's voice crackled with confusion. "Why would I hand runic control over of the Academy’s Seeker to a student?! Where's Captain Quint?!"

  "Keeper Vassili," I yelled. "Listen to me! Quint, Solace and Emerald were taken! They are imprisoned in magisteel cages, about to be executed!”

  “What?!” Vassili sputtered. “What’s going on?!”

  “I think that Shandria is under attack by one of them... God Emperors. Maybe it's that fat Dragon God Emperor. I don't know. Please! We have to get everyone out! We have no time! Some shrapnel from the explosion hit us! They’re about to kill our friends!"

  "What?! I... can’t just…" Vassili hesitated, staring between us. "The protocols..."

  "KEEPER!" I yelled, making sure my voice cracked with desperation. "THERE ARE NO PROTOCOLS FOR THIS! The Arx Bank above you is gone! You didn’t feel that magical explosion?! The entire city is on fire! They literally just dropped a fucking Mage Tower on the Bank above you! It's basically a massive pile of rubble now! We NEED to get home NOW! PLEASE! Only the Corpse Seeker can punch through the rubble that’s buried the stairwell home, claw through ten thousand tons of rocks!”

  I tweaked the view of the bracelet to maximum, as I momentarily rose above the water, panning the bracelet around, showing Vassili the devastation of the fallen tower, the obliterated bank, the billowing smoke, the fleeing, screaming citizens, the distraught guards, the trio of Omnids in metal cages and the laughing skull three-eyed crown logo looming in the sky.

  "Abyss," Vassili breathed out, eyes bulging. "What... What is happening up there?! All of the other students came through a one-way emergency portal, knocked out! I sent them all home…”

  "I told you already, Keeper, it's an invasion! Give Vespera Simmi control over the Corpse Seeker!" I yelled. "NOW Vassili! The Shandrian authorities think that we’re with the Invaders! Please!!! Before they cage all of us and you’ll have to explain to all of our parents and Instructor Zalimar in two weeks why we’re all perma-dead!!! Assign the Chapel’s Corpse Seeker as Vee’s familiar! She’s the only Omnid among us who can control the beast to get us all out safely and break through those magisteel cages and wards trapping Emmy, Sol and Captain Quint!”

  "Fine, fine, hol' your horses," Vassili grumbled with a Slavic accent. "I’m… Transferring control... now."

  A complex runic pattern flashed across Vee’s tag, blue sparks forming words above it. [Omnid Chapel Corpse Seeker Control: Transferred. Familiar [CORPSE SEEKER 77-84-1] assigned to Vespera Simmi!]

  "Thank you!" I yelled, hanging up on the Domovoy.

  “Vee! Call up the Corpse Seeker to us!” I ordered, handing her the token back.

  "Corpse Seeker!” Vespera declared, her eyes lighting up as she snapped the token back onto her Lazarus bracelet and pressed her finger into the shimmering blood-red hexagram above her token. “I order you to come to me! Full speed! 100% Power!”

  The blood-red hexagram answered us with an inhuman noise, almost like a distorted howl made from a hundred violins being played underwater strapped to a dying whale.

  The unstoppable, Omnicorp-bred, murder-beast-machine was coming.