The Broken Halo

The armoured Greater Demon landed in the middle of the ruined street with a heavy thud.

Dust rose around his boots, but he did not move immediately.

His eyes swept across the destruction before him.

A large section of the road had sunk into the ground, while another part had been violently pushed upward. Broken slabs of stone stood at strange angles, and several deep cracks stretched toward the surrounding buildings.

The abandoned bathhouse was completely gone.

All that remained was a mountain of shattered walls, broken pillars, metal supports, and pieces of what had once been its roof.

Beneath the wreckage, the underground tunnels had been torn open and exposed to the surface.

The smell of blood, burnt flesh, smoke, and demonic energy filled the air.

Guards moved across the street while civilians cried out around them.

Some of the guards dragged wounded demons away from the unstable ground, while others entered the damaged buildings and searched for anyone trapped inside.

Not far away, three healers knelt beside an overturned carriage. One of them pressed both hands against the chest of an injured demon while pale green light flowed from her palms.

The Greater Demon looked toward the nearest guard captain.

The captain noticed his gaze and quickly approached him.

"Commander."

His armour was covered in dust, and blood stained one side of his face.

"How bad is it?" the commander asked.

The captain glanced toward the ruined street before answering.

"We have confirmed fourteen civilian deaths. More than thirty demons are injured, but the healers believe the number will rise once we search the remaining buildings."

His expression became heavier.

"The foundations of several buildings have cracked. Two of them might collapse if we do not reinforce them soon."

The commander’s jaw tightened.

"Move every civilian away from the damaged buildings. Send for earth users and formation masters. I don’t want the rest of the street sinking while we are standing on it."

"Yes, Commander."

The captain turned and immediately shouted orders at the surrounding guards.

The commander crouched beside one of the large cracks in the road and placed his palm against the broken stone.

His demonic energy flowed from his fingers and spread beneath the street.

He remained in that position for several seconds.

The deeper his senses travelled, the colder his expression became.

There were remnants of a destruction formation beneath the bathhouse.

However, the formation had not activated properly.

The lines connecting its explosives had been torn apart before they could release their power at the same time. That was why the explosions had occurred in different sections of the underground structure instead of combining into one devastating blast.

But something else had happened before that, and when he realized this, he was surprised.

The surrounding earth had been forcefully pulled upward.

Not just a wall.

Not a single tunnel.

The entire underground safehouse had been ripped from beneath the street and dragged toward the surface.

The commander slowly removed his hand.

"That was not caused by the explosion," he muttered.

A guard standing nearby overheard him.

"Commander?"

The Greater Demon rose and looked at the exposed tunnels.

"Someone forced the underground structure upward before the formation detonated."

The guard’s eyes widened as he looked at the scale of the destruction.

"That much earth?"

The commander did not respond.

He stepped onto a broken slab of stone and descended into what remained of the underground chamber.

Several guards were already there.

Two of them were lifting pieces of rubble from a wounded Archfiend, while another group gathered weapons and other objects scattered across the floor.

The commander’s gaze moved across the corpses.

Some had clearly died during the collapse.

Their bodies were crushed beneath stone or torn apart by the explosions.

However, others had died before the structure was destroyed.

One Archfiend’s neck had been twisted until his face looked backward. Another had two small wounds in the side of his throat, while a third had a deep indentation in his chest.

The commander crouched beside the corpse with the broken neck.

"These wounds were not caused by the collapse."

"No, Commander," one of the guards replied.

The guard was standing beside a shattered table. He held a bloodstained sword in one hand and a folded black uniform in the other.

"It looks like there was a battle before the formation was activated."

The commander rose and walked toward him.

"What is that?"

The guard unfolded the black uniform.

At first glance, it resembled the armour worn by Velmora’s city guards. However, the material was cheaper, and the crest sewn onto the chest was slightly different.

The commander took the uniform from him and examined it.

"This is meant to look like one of ours. Who made this trash?"

"Sir." The guard reached into a broken wooden box and removed several identity tokens. "We also found these."

The commander took one of the tokens.

Velmora’s crest had been carved into its surface, but when he rubbed his thumb across the rune marks, his eyes narrowed.

"The city mark is copied, but the fourth rune is wrong."

He turned the token slightly beneath the light.

"This is forged... just like the uniforms which are fake."

The other guards became more serious.

One of them approached from the other side of the chamber with several rolled maps in his arms.

"Commander, you need to see this."

He placed the maps on the remains of a table and opened the first one.

It showed the eastern side of Velmora.

A red line had been drawn from the eastern storage depot, through the lower road, and toward one of the routes leading to the rift site.

The second map showed the expected positions of the guards escorting a convoy.

Numbers had been written beside them.

The third contained a list.

Spatial materials.

Hell stones.

Stabilization cores.

Formation supplies.

Medicine.

The commander’s expression became grim.

"They were planning to attack the convoy."

The guard beside him nodded.

"It looks that way."

"Send someone to the eastern storage depot immediately," the commander ordered. His voice was low, but the coldness in it made the surrounding guards straighten. "Tell them the route has been compromised. Nothing leaves the depot until every guard, worker, and storage artifact has been checked."

"Yes, Commander."

The guard rolled up the maps and hurried away.

A shout suddenly came from the western side of the exposed safehouse.

"We found two more!"

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