The golden titan moved.

  It was not the hesitant, clumsy lurch of a man unfit for his machine. It was precise—an elegant display of controlled power. The Solarion-Lupus Revise, bathed in the sun's amber glow, shifted forward, the Azeroth Drive whirring within the cockpit. The once-stagnant relic, a cruel jest of nobility meant to remind Garrett Fenralis of his magical impotence, was now a fully realized war machine. His war machine.

  Leona Leonis watched in silence.

  Her Direhound-Command stood beside his mech, its blue armor streaked with golden highlights, The lion-shaped pauldron on its left shoulder gleamed under the midday sun - a silent herald of its pilot’s lineage. The massive shield mounted on its left arm, both barricade and blade-scabbard, was planted firmly into the ground like a waiting executioner’s axe.

  Leona had barely spoken since they arrived in the Emerald Forest, a thick expanse of towering verdant giants that stood several kilometers north of Vallorien. That silence was unlike her, and Garrett knew why. The Iron Revenants had been sighted here. Undead ogres clad in power armor. Perverted corpses of warriors long slain—She had seen one during their recon. She had remained still, expression unreadable, yet he had seen her knuckles whiten on her controls.

  Garrett, even from inside his cockpit, could sense the chill of her restraint. It was a quiet thing, sharpened by years of discipline, yet fragile at its edges. The Fallen House of Leonis. The butchered heirs of her bloodline, their bodies raised to serve as part of Draconis’s undying legions. The scars left behind were more than just history. They were wounds that festered beneath her armor.

  He switched on their private comms. “Leona… are you alright?”

  A brief pause. Then, steady as steel, she answered, “I’m fine.”

  Garrett frowned. “Leona.”

  Silence again. Then, she exhaled, long and slow. “You already know the answer.”

  “I do,” he admitted. “But I also know you don’t have to carry it alone.”

  A soft scoff crackled through the comms—not amusement, but something brittle, something old. “Don’t I?” Her mech shifted slightly, fingers tightening around her greatsword’s hilt. “You weren’t there. You didn’t see them drag my brothers away. Didn’t see my father’s face when they raised his sons as mindless weapons against him.”

  Garrett’s grip tightened on his controls. There was nothing he could say to undo that pain. He could only stand beside her now.

  “I’m here,” he said. “That’s all I can offer.”

  Leona was quiet for a moment. Then, barely above a whisper, she said, “Then fight with me.”

  Today, they would test the Azeroth Drive. And today, they would hunt Iron Revenants.

  The Battle in the Emerald Forest

  The thunderous steps of the Iron Revenants shook the ground long before they came into view.

  Six of them.

  Massive, grotesque behemoths of rotting flesh and steel, their power armor patchworked together from ruined warframes, their cores burning with necrotic energy. Their eyes—if they could be called that—glowed with an eerie green light, the dim remnants of stolen souls trapped within their monstrous frames.

  Leona’s voice cut through the comms, cold and precise. “No hesitation. They are not men. They are mockeries.”

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  Garrett exhaled sharply. This was it. The Solarion-Lupus Revise’s first true battle.

  The moment they saw the two mechs, the Revenants charged.

  Leona moved first. Her Direhound surged forward, a shockwave rippling outward from the sheer force of its acceleration. The massive shield met the first Revenant head-on, sending it reeling. Her greatsword flashed out, cleaving through armor, carving deep into rotted flesh beneath. The Revenant staggered, but did not fall.

  Garrett followed.

  His golden warframe, sleek yet armored, maneuvered with unnatural precision. The Azeroth Drive processed thousands of magical calculations per second, adjusting micro-movements, optimizing his reaction speed. Fortifying armor. Creating barriers. He was not simply piloting. He was in symbiosis with the machine.

  A Revenant lunged at him.

  Garrett’s plasma-edged saber snapped into position. He sidestepped—not dodging, but redirecting—his blade carving through the Revenant’s left arm in a fluid arc. The severed limb fell away, sparks and necrotic filth spraying from the wound.

  Another came from his flank. A warning flashed. The Solarion-Lupus twisted on instinct, its golden gauntlet grabbing the enemy’s wrist, leveraging momentum to slam the Revenant into the earth. A metallic heel crushed its skull, ensuring it did not rise again.

  Leona, relentless as a storm, fought two at once. Her blade tore through them, hacking apart armor, shattering bones that should have never moved again. Yet they did. They always did.

  Garrett pushed forward, the Solarion-Lupus Revise proving its worth, the mech no longer a gilded mockery but a warrior reborn. A declaration. He had no magic, but he would carve his place in this world with his own hands.

  The battle raged.

  —----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  Lyra sat atop the wagon, the massive Warbisons snorting as they idly stomped their hooves into the dirt. The creatures were half-buffalo, half-horse, beasts of sheer endurance, built for the long marches across the Vale.

  Beside her, Nyx was still. Too still.

  She did not speak at first, only watching as the battle unfolded with an expression that was neither approval nor disappointment. Merely… calculation.

  Finally, she murmured. “It is fascinating.”

  Lyra glanced at her. “What is?”

  Nyx’s silver gaze remained fixed on Garrett’s mech. “That he was denied magic, yet refuses to bow to fate.”

  Lyra looked back at the battlefield. Garrett fought as though he had something to prove. Perhaps he did.

  “He’s proving he belongs,” she said.

  Nyx’s lips curled into a knowing smile. “Perhaps.”

  A pause.

  Then, she said, “You have done well to keep him close.”

  Lyra frowned slightly, sensing something deeper beneath those words. “You think he’s suitable?”

  Nyx did not answer immediately. Instead, she watched as Garrett and Leona stood victorious, their mechs towering over the remnants of the fallen Revenants. The battlefield was silent now.

  Then, she spoke, voice light as air, yet heavy with meaning.

  “Not yet.”

  The cockpit hummed with dying embers of battle—heat-dissipation vents hissing, diagnostics scrolling across Garrett’s HUD, his breath steadying from the fight’s high. His fingers moved across the interface with mechanical precision, recording the combat data into the black box. Every movement, every calculated shift in the Solarion-Lupus Revise’s frame, every fractional lag in response time—all of it would be studied, dissected, improved.

  Garrett exhaled, flexing his fingers. "Not bad for a first workout."

  Leona’s voice crackled through the private comms. "A little bit."

  Garrett blinked. That was… close to a confession.

  The ice was thawing.

  For a moment, he considered pressing her, teasing her about it even. But the silence that followed wasn’t uncomfortable—it was the kind of silence where words were unnecessary. Leona wasn’t one to spill her heart in one go. She let things leak, piece by piece, and this—this was something.

  He smirked to himself. Progress.

  Then, the comms flared to life, sharp and commanding.

  "This is Captain Anya Blackstark."

  The weight in her voice sent a ripple of tension through Garrett’s spine. Blackstark never wasted words. If she was speaking, it meant something.

  "We’ve swept Elderwynd. The Iron Revenants have been eliminated. The Guild deployed adventurers to aid survivors and provide backup for any stragglers. Damage is extensive. Casualties confirmed. But…"

  A pause. Then:

  "Ealdorman Cedric survived. He’s injured, but stable."

  Garrett’s breath hitched.

  Lyra’s father was alive. Barely, but alive.

  Leona exhaled sharply through her nose. Not relief. Not shock. Something else—something unreadable.

  Blackstark continued. "One of our Direhounds took heavy damage. We need Squires and mechanics dispatched for repairs. Please Prioritize that immediately."

  Garrett glanced toward Leona’s mech. Her fingers had flexed around her greatsword’s grip at the mention of Elderwynd. The fall of that city wasn’t just another battle. It was Lyra’s home.

  Garrett switched back to private comms. "Leona."

  She didn’t respond at first. Then, after a pause: "What?"

  "Lyra should know."

  Silence. Then, in a voice just barely above a whisper, Leona said, "I know."

  She didn’t want to be the one to tell her. But she would. Because that’s what warriors did. They carried the weight others couldn’t.

  Garrett leaned back, the golden titan of the Solarion-Lupus standing tall amidst the wreckage of the battlefield. The war was far from over. But today, they had won something.

  And tomorrow, they would fight again.