Heavy clouds in the Germanian sky match the pall that seems to hang over its capital city. The gates are closed and guarded, soldiers stalk the streets and the people are afraid. There had been some sort of commotion in the Imperial Palace the day before and shortly thereafter the death of the Emperor had been announced; followed shortly by the date of his eldest son's coronation.

All of this was unknown to those aboard a sleek skycraft that drifted through the rough weather above the nation. The elves manning it were tense enough without knowing of the chaos they were sailing towards. Their 'guests' had made sure of that.

Now the vessel's captain had the distinct displeasure of having to speak with one of said guests; arguably the most unpleasant of the lot. The giant woman was, if acerbic, at least somewhat honest in her nature. She did not like them and made no secret of it; not stooping to any name-calling more detailed than 'heretic' and avoiding socialising with them as much as possible.

This… woman… was different. Where the rest of her people were guarded and cautious she seemed perpetually amused by him and his fellows. She was constantly at ease as if they couldn't even hope to pose a threat to them. It was… vexing.

"This is as far as we shall take you.* He'd stopped what he felt to be a safe distance from her where she stood; near the ship's prow with one foot upon the railing as she leaned over the edge and stared down at the clouds. "Any closer and we run the risk of our ship being detected."

When he didn't get a response he cleared his throat and continued. "We'll stay at this height until nightfall, and then put you down." Even then, for a time she said nothing. Then, just as he was considering speaking up again, she snorted and shook her head.

"Honestly, what fool granted your kind the name of Álf?" The horrible woman turned to stare at the ship's captain; contempt burning golden in her gaze. Almost literally, in fact, as the unholy light that took form in her gaze moved and flowed like liquid metal rather than actual illumination. "Clearly, they had never met ones truly deserving of the moniker if they would say it of cowards such as you." Fearsome or not, the insult still caused the elf the bristle with impotent indignance. He did not seek to stoop to her level, however, and merely rebuked her with a polite tone.

"We do not fear the humans in the least. Conflict with them is beneath us." Something about his statement must have greatly amused the otherworldly visitor because she grinned nastily at him and shook her head; turning her back to him again with nary a care in her stance.

"And that is why they shall ruin you, in the end. You seek neither to destroy them, nor to make peace with them; relying on fear and old stories to keep them at bay, and your old magic when that inevitably doesn't work." And now it was his turn to be a little smug. Regardless of what the witch-woman thought, their 'old magic' had proven effective time and time again at repelling even the greatest assaults that humanity could bring to bear against them.

"It has yet to fail us in that service." Although he was forced to recall that, not a few days hence, it had failed twice in rapid succession; once before the warhammer of the armoured titan standing on the prow, and once beneath the abominable blades of this hateful harridan. Once more, however, she seemed to only find amusement in his attempt at rebuttal.

"Well then, as thanks for transporting us thus far I shall leave you with these parting thoughts." Her tone was conversational, yet dripping with disdain as surely as her eyes dripped with golden light. The smile she wore was openly mocking but somehow threatening as well.

"Fear is more powerful a motivator than your kind can scarcely imagine. And old magic?" She spun the dagger she'd been playing with all this time around in the air, its strangely shaped blade drawing an impossible line in the air as it dropped straight into her forearm sheathe. Then she stepped up onto the railing and looked him dead in the eyes.

"Old magic shall always abandon you, in the end." And at that, Yas'dei the Farstrider let herself fall backwards from the rail; dropping like a stone towards the ground below. The captain, aghast, watched her drop; only to realise that her crimson-cloaked fellows were doing the same all around him. Wood creaked and the door to the lower decks opened to reveal the armoured titan stepping forth with purpose in her stride.

The captain watched in stunned silence as she too, perhaps a half-ton of metal and muscle, walked up to the edge of his ship and jumped the railing with nary a glance back at him. Around him his crew were equally disoriented. They'd been warned by the huge woman that this would happen, but knowing about it was nothing compared to the reality of having their memories so viciously clouded. Eventually he managed to compose himself.

"... turn around. We're going home. They can… find their own way back." And as he said that, even with the fine details of almost every exchange he'd had with the strangers aboard his vessel already beyond his reach, not one bit of him doubted that they could.

A farmer examining the thunderous crash he heard the night before would later find one massive and inexplicable crater in the middle of one of his fields. There was no way for him to locate the similar, much-smaller markings around it as they were no more than crushed grass. Although he could have followed the clear and heavy footprints out of the crater he was far too shocked by its presence to do so; and in any case, the one who had made it was already long gone by the time he'd come to investigate.

Hours before he'd even got out of bed, yet mere minutes after the sound that had caused him to awaken earlier, its maker could be found sprinting across the landscape; more or less unencumbered by her massively heavy armour. That, Yas'dei mused, was one of the benefits of being one of the Blooded. While her own position certainly carried benefits the impossible advantages afforded to Red, the Iron Wolf, were certainly to be envied.

That thought aside, they were all at an advantage here. Her own runes were recharging at a blistering pace compared to home. All of the little tricks she'd normally squeeze out of them in a desperate flight from a murderous creature could be used with impunity. Her speed had increased noticeably as she realised this; with her compatriots accelerating soon thereafter to match her in kind.

Amusingly, the slowest one of their group was Red herself; though from seeing the horrifying turn of pace that the Holy Warrior was pulling off one wouldn't think so. In the end, Yas'dei slowed to keep pace with her and told the others to spread out. One took lead, one the rear, with two to each side for a diamond formation. Another two, meanwhile, roamed afield and returned to report back while replacing two of the others in a rotating sequence.

This way, the Entitled One received information about the landscape from her followers that more than made up for the delay of reducing their speed to match their charge. Their movement rate was exaggerated enough by the high-magic environment that such a loss didn't particularly bother her.

Yas'dei slowed now and then as they ran; taking a moment to sniff the air and stare at ground and sky both. The other Ki'rai paid their leader no mind; too focused on watching their sides as the group moved quickly across the unfamiliar terrain. Red, however, noticed as keenly as anyone could.

Perhaps half an hour after landing they stopped on a hill overlooking the city that was their target to discuss their entry. It was there that the topic was at last, as Yas'dei predicted, broached by her main travelling companion.

"You seem ill at ease, Farstrider." The Entitled One glanced at her titanic compatriot and fell into an easy smirk. Obfuscation came so easily to her that it could be said to be her first nature, rather than her second and so she diverted the concerns with nary a moment's hesitation.

"It is our way to be so, Iron Wolf. Relaxing is for the dead." Such a response clearly didn't put Red at ease. Her stance, already guarded, tightened up. She was a consummate warrior through and through; clearly ready to shift to battle at a moment's notice and, judging by her tone of voice, more than willing to do so.

"Do not keep secrets from me." Yas'dei snorted but nodded; looking away from the other woman and to the city below them. If it came down to it the group of Ki'rai could kill the woman, albeit at a grave price; though, that would be somewhat like slitting the throat of a prized laying hen just because it scratched at you when you got too close.

"There is something here. So much magic, so thick, but behind it I can feel something... foul. It is on the air, and below the ground. Foul... and, perhaps, familiar." Concern filled Red's face at those words. Anything familiar to a Ki'rai could be nothing but bad news for everyone else.

"You suspect something." That drew a laugh from the smaller woman; as sharp and mirthless as her hollow grin.

"Always, Red. Always. But this... what I suspect ought to be impossible." Her smile faded into a dark frown as she continued to regard the city below; eyes burning with molten gold as she saw it for what it really was. "Unfortunately, my experiences with impossible things tell me they rarely care about the fact that they are so."

Red nodded, but didn't respond. She was one of the chosen of the Gods themselves on top of all of her other accomplishments. Her life was nothing but a series of what lesser men may have called impossibilities; particularly the specific one that had brought them to this world.

"... Kenneth should be in there." She inclined her head towards the city beyond in lieu of continuing their discussion. Most likely, Yas'dei thought to herself, she was unwilling to pry into anything that could visibly rattle the Entitled Ki'rai. "From what those 'elves' knew of the human lands, it sounds like this 'Germania' would most appeal to him."

Yas'dei nodded. From what little she knew of Kenneth Manson, which was obviously far less than his wife, he was liable to gravitate towards a country that had a language he was particularly comfortable with. It would be eerie how similar this 'Germanian' was to the Dwarvish tongue she was familiar with if it weren't for the simple fact that Yas'dei found almost nothing to be so these days.

She'd seen far too much for low-class linguistic contrivances to unnerve her.

"Let's go." Red started down the hill; unslinging her warhammer and holding it near the head as she broke into a run again. One hand gesture from Yas'dei brought her Ki'rai to her side. As the hero drew away from them she pointed them at different targets and gave instructions with her other hand. One by one they flickered away as crimson blurs towards their appointed tasks and the Entitled One nodded with a faint smile. Then she pulled on her own mask and set off behind the crusader.

It was the noise that first roused the gate guards. At the time it was still within the early hours of the day; dawn was imminent but not yet arrived and their shift had been a long one. Anyone, save perhaps their rather demanding Captain, could have forgiven them for being a little slow on the draw.

Could have, but would not have to; for the first cracking sound from down the road brought both of them quickly out of their stupor and into a ready position with muskets in hand and bayonet-spears fixed. Yet neither man was prepared for what he saw approaching them from down the road.

A titan of steel was descending upon them. Their first thoughts were that one of Halkegenia's increasingly rare giantkin had descended from the distant mountains to attack their city. Yet this was impossible for a number of reasons; chief amongst which was the aforementoned steel that clad this figure from head to toe.

Heavy plate armour on their legs and arms. Brigandine and lamellar adorning their chest. A snarling wolf's head embossed on to the full helm. All topped up with a massive warhammer held lazily in one hand. The cracking noise that had roused them was plainly seen in the surface of the road; the huge, land-devouring strides of the thing approaching them shattering the paved surface at every impact.

A shot rang out; surprising even the guard who fired it. He'd only meant to level his weapon at the potential foe and call out a warning. The reverberation underfoot had unnerved him, however, and his unsteady hand had accidentally pulled the trigger. Even more shocking was that his errant shot was, even at the great distance the figure was approaching from, still on target.

Yet the greatest surprise of all was that the shot struck the figure's suddenly outstretched palm and ricocheted off it into the road below. Followed by their rate of approach inexplicably increasing.Before either man could think to shout and sound the alarm the titan had arrived; skidding to a semi-halt as they quickly adjusted the grip on their hammer and, rather than swinging it, thrust it forward.

The head hit the closed gate top-first and exploded in a blast of blue light. And yet at the same time not light but fire, not fire but glass, not glass but water. Flowing and shattering and burning all at once as it translated magical energy into raw kinetic force that saw the momentum of the strike pass beautifully into the wood of the gate until it reached its limits and then, rather unceremoniously, surpassed them.

Inside the city the confused guards at the first watch post, who had just started to prepare for their day when they'd heard some sort of commotion from outside the gate that had culminated in a shot being fired, suddenly heard a tremendous crash upon the gate; followed by the foot-thick wooden beam used to secure it cracking loudly and then snapping in the middle. The gates exploded open with enough force to cause the massive hinges to warp; thus bringing each huge door to a screeching halt almost as quickly as they had jerked open.

Stepping through them, flagstones cracking beneath their feet, came a three-meter tall figure clad all in armour and pulling a hammer back into a rest position on their shoulder. Outside the gate were two guards standing still with their weapons slipping from their hands; each as broken as a man could be while his body was still whole.

"Ah… alarm! Alarm! Open fire!" The soldiers lowered their muskets and shot as best they could at the already departing figure, to little effect. Those shots that were accurate seemed incapable of piercing the armour worn by the monster. Bullets bounced off at sharp angles if they hit the plates, or else struck the lamellar to no discernible effect.

Nevertheless, the cries spread faster than even the monster assailing their city could run. Guards were mustered, Knights were rallied, and the forces of the city sallied forth in defense of their home.

When the metal behemoth reached the inner wall, and with it the gate to the palace, they were confronted by an armoured pike hedge. The sound of hoofbeats could be heard from the streets to either side; still some distance away but maneuvering for a charge from the rear to drive this foe into the waiting pikes. Yet more important still were the Nobles.

They were not amongst the rabble; having used their various magics to acquire higher ground from which to bombard this most curious foe. One chanted in the ancient tongue; calling upon the elements and their founder to incinerate their enemy. However, nothing would come of it. Just as they were finishing the spell there was a flicker of movement, a memory of colour and then a thick spray of blood from the man's throat.

His fellow Nobles who had happened to be facing him felt suddenly disoriented; a memory of something moving incredibly quickly in their minds that lasted a moment before a similar fate befell them. Not a one among them was able to get a spell off as crimson spectres descended upon them like the shadows of death.

Below them their target had not even slowed its stride. It sprinted directly into the waiting polearms; shattering their shafts under the force of its charge as it went directly through the obstacle. Men and weapons alike were pushed aside with contemptuous ease until, at last, it reached the doorway.

A wave of flaming blue light exploded outwards from the roaring figure. It moved like water and shattered like glass and cleared a wide circle around its origin by literally flinging men out of its way in the manner of a far more physical wave than its appearance would imply.

The Germanian soldiers could only watch in horror as the thing adjusted the grip on its greathammer and swung it in an almost lazy arc that nevertheless made a sharp whistling with its passage. When the head struck the wood the sound was thunderous; force transmitted down the weapon's handle into the armour, down the arm, down the body and straight into the ground. The stones beneath them snapped outwards in a spider-web pattern just as surely as the middle of the gate was rendered into so much kindling.

And there, standing beyond the gate, was their new Emperor.

None of them had seen the Crown Prince in weeks. Longer, even. He'd left to 'find himself', as many knew, and returned only a few days since in a fine carriage yet concealed from the public eye. Then his father had perished suddenly and the palace had been sealed to visitors save the most loyal courtiers and nobody knew what was going on.

Now that they saw him the assembled soldiers, and few remaining Nobles, wished they had not.

His appearance was frightful. They'd always known the Prince to be a somewhat homely lad with a certain fondness for baked goods that had lent him an almost porcine appearance that was, in its own way, almost charming. In spite of this, or perhaps because of, he was known to be studious and more-or-less kind and at the very least rather earnest.

What stood before them was sallow-faced and sunken-eyed; wearing the ceremonial armour of his station but without any of the gravitas of his father. There was a dark coldness in his eyes now, and he looked like he'd lost a great deal of weight very quickly. In his right hand was a long, thin-bladed sword that looked to be an estoc made of black glass while in his left hand burned a fire so dark that it seemed to create shadows in place of smoke.

"Who dares trespass upon this domain?" The voice was familiar to those who'd met him before. Familiar while being so very wrong. Surely their Prince had not been that sharp of tone, that harsh of manner? "If you bend the knee, savage, I shall ensure your death is a painless one."

No. This was not their Prince. But now it was their Emperor and they were duty-bound to serve; mustering as best they could to surround the figure from behind. The Emperor's own bodyguards, wearing full-helm and plate, stood ready at his side. They were wielding the same unfamiliar weapon as he did; swords of black glass that looked sinisterly serrated. Like instruments of cruelty rather than weapons of war.

"No quarter to heretics. No mercy to the unrighteous. No parley with evil." To their great surprise their silent enemy spoke; with a voice full of power and pride and even for all that, recognisably female. That this titanic being was a woman of some sort did nothing to soothe the wounded egos of the soldiers. Indeed, many bristled even harder with the knowledge. For his part the new Emperor frowned and then raised his flaming hand.

"So be it!" He gestured, and searing flames leapt the distance betwixt them; eating up the light to form a swirling vortex of ruin. His expression of disinterested contempt faded in an instant when a curious golden light shone from the woman's eyes, when the blue glass-fire surged forth and coated their armour and when she swung the hammer in a wide arc that harmlessly dispersed the incoming darkness.

She said nothing more in the moments that followed. They were mere moments; the Emperor's guards utterly unable to react to the rush that further broke the stones beneath her feet as she pushed forward. That wide swing was brought to an impossible halt and redirected into an overhand smash that shone with azure light and golden energy. The last thing the Emperor saw as he stared in mute disbelief was the monstrous face inscribed on the hammer's head before it introduced itself to his skull, brain, spine, collarbone, rib cage, pelvis and feet.

In that order.

While the soldiers stared mutely at the bloody, metallic smear that had been, seconds ago, their Emperor his personal guards reacted with fury. Black fires leaked out of helmets and on to their weapons as they moved to attack; only to find that they could not, in fact, move.

Figures in red cloaks were standing around them; each one having neatly pierced one of the six Royal Guards through the heart with a weapon of some description. Nobody could really say where they had come from, nor where they went to afterwards, nor if they had even truly been there. All they could really recall where that there had been someone in red, and then the Royal Guards had all collapsed while the titan made her way, unopposed, up the stairs to the palace.

"He is not here." Red spoke again as soon as she'd finished kicking open the front door to the palace. Yas'dei could tell she was frowning under the armour. Honestly, the Entitled One was doing the same behind her mask; but she wouldn't let Red know that.

"How do you figure?" She asked with only the vaguest hint of curiosity as she dropped down from above; having already entered the room through one of the now-broken windows above. The same scent she'd gotten from the Wights and that… whatever the 'Emperor' had been was thick here.

"Kenneth would have killed all Wights already." There was a note of pride in her voice as she spoke of her diminutive husband, but nobody present would disagree with her. For all his many, many, many flaws as a dwarf, a husband, and a person in general nobody could gainsay Kenneth Manson's combat record.

This was, after all, the same individual who had decided to propose to the foremost smith in all of Kelicho by presenting her with the severed heads of a dozen Ashwalkers.

"Fair enough." Her eyes burned golden again as Yas'dei stared at the ground, then back to where the Emperor had died. That distinctly unpleasant theory was getting stronger and stronger the longer she stood there. "So, now what?" Red hoisted her hammer on to her shoulder and strolled calmly through the entry hall; eyeing up the finery with an air of distaste.

"Ask if anyone has seen him. If so, I will go there. If not, the next capital city. In the meantime, kill anyone who tries to stop me." For all that she said that, it was notable that she'd not slain anyone yet. Well, except for the so-called 'Emperor'; but the Ki'rai didn't count unholy abominations as people.

"... we'd better hurry, then. Because I think I just found my impossibility." The tone of Yas'dei's voice was notably higher pitched and made Red pause for a moment. She then turned to see what the Entitled had seen and let out a low oath to her Goddess.

There, on the banners hanging from the wall on either side of the doorway, was a brand new image burned overtop the Germanian symbol. One that filled both women's stomachs with thick knots of rising dread as they took in exactly what that meant.

For there, clearly inscribed, was the sigil they knew as the Dawn of a Dying Sun.

The profane mark of the First Grave of Kelicho.

The unholy seal of the Death of Old.

The Symbol of Kormat: Dead God of the Dead.