Chapter 391| All He Could Do Was Wait.

?There was no more time to think.

?Rianor snatched a blank piece of paper from the stone table, dipping his quill into a small ink bottle. His handwriting was rushed, nearly illegible, but the message was clear. The obsidian walls around him still pulsed faintly with deep purple runes, seemingly indifferent to the chaos unfolding in the surrounding tunnels.

?"Borch and Thorne," he ordered, shoving the first note at a young courier who had just burst in, his breathing heavy, his face smeared with volcanic ash. "The side tunnel, third junction, the narrow path behind the mossy stone pillar. It’s a shortcut to the throne room. They have to get there before the black-ops unit."

?The courier snatched the paper, gave a stiff nod, and sprinted out without looking back.

?Rianor scribbled the second note. "To the throne room. Warn the King. Hide, lock the doors, and hold out until reinforcements arrive."

?"For how long, sir?" the soldier asked, his eyes filled with an anxiety he tried hard to conceal.

?"As long as possible."

?The soldier vanished into the dark corridor, his rapid footsteps quickly fading into the distance.

?Rianor penned the third note, writing even faster than the first two. "To Riven. The western tunnel. Attack now. Before they consolidate."

?The third courier grabbed the paper and bolted down the hall.

?Rianor turned his gaze back to the relief map, his finger tracing the line of the main tunnel. From outside, the roar of the battle at the bridge still echoed—the clash of metal, desperate screams, and the heavy thud of collapsing stone. Every sound traveled through the stone floor, painting a vivid picture of the carnage without him needing to witness it firsthand.

?His eyes stopped at the intersection of the main and side tunnels. The Iron Empire’s third and fourth divisions had just entered; they hadn’t advanced far, and their formations weren’t fully tightly packed yet. He could read it from the inconsistent rhythm of the vibrations—too much variance in the distance between footsteps for a mature, disciplined formation.

?They weren’t ready.

?Rianor clenched his jaw. There was nothing more he could do from here. The Arcanotech Bracer on his left arm was completely dead, and the limb itself shot with pain every time he moved it. All he had left was a working mind and a body no longer capable of executing anything on the front lines.

?In the western tunnel, near the ruins of the bridge, Riven received the order via the third courier, who came half-running, half-stumbling down the passage. The axe in Riven’s hand was still slick with blood from the first wave. The bandages on his left arm were soaked through again, but he didn’t care.

?He glanced over his shoulder. The twenty Dwarven warriors still held their formation, panting heavily, their armor dented in several places, but the runes on their axes and warhammers glowed with a steady, fierce light. Their faces were exhausted, but not a single one wavered.

?He looked across the chasm. The remnants of the Iron Empire’s 1st and 2nd Divisions were still struggling to reform their ranks, thrown into absolute chaos by the bridge’s destruction. They couldn’t cross—the path was gone. They could only watch from afar, separated by a sea of boiling lava.

?He turned his attention to the mouth of the tunnel. The Iron Empire’s 3rd and 4th Divisions had just poured in—their formations loose, bottlenecked in the narrow passage. They were on the same side of the chasm as the Dwarves, trapped between the ruined bridge and the main tunnel. The marching of thousands of boots made the stone floor tremble. The gap between them was roughly fifty meters—but that distance would be closed in a matter of minutes, maybe less.

?Riven raised his axe.

?"One chance!" he roared to the Dwarven phalanx, his voice piercing through the rumble of the lava below. "Crush the vanguard before the rear can reinforce them. After that, we pivot and hold the line. If you hesitate, we die."

?The red-bearded warrior with the nasty scar across his cheek gave a firm nod. "Your orders?"

?"Charge."

?The twenty Dwarven warriors surged forward like arrows loosed from a bow. Riven spearheaded the assault, his axe held high, the runes on its blade burning a brilliant, blinding red.

?The closest soldiers of the 3rd Division hadn’t even raised their rifles before Riven was in range. His axe came down, cleaving straight through two centimeters of solid steel armor. The first soldier dropped instantly.

?A second soldier lunged with a bayonet. Riven parried the thrust with his axe handle, driving a knee into the man’s chest and sending him flying backward.

?A third soldier tried to flee. Two Dwarven warriors flanking Riven caught him before he could take a single step.

?The onslaught was brutal, blistering, and ruthlessly efficient. The 3rd and 4th Divisions, already struggling to assemble, completely crumbled under the sudden pressure. There was no room to retreat—the ruined bridge lay behind them, the charging Dwarves tore into their front, and a boiling abyss waited below. A few soldiers tried to press themselves into the crevices of the walls to hide, but the space was far too tight to offer any real sanctuary.

?Some desperately opened fire. Steam rifle rounds ricocheted off the narrow tunnel walls, catching their own comrades in the crossfire. Others tried to hold the line with bayonets, but the runed Dwarven axes melted their steel in a single, searing strike. Screams of sheer panic quickly drowned out whatever disciplined military commands were left.

?Less than an hour later, the remnants of the 3rd and 4th Divisions were no longer an army. They were just a mass of terrified men scrambling aimlessly, pinned between the unforgiving stone walls and the searing magma chasm.

?Riven ground to a halt, his chest heaving, a mixture of sweat and blood dripping from his temple.

?He looked back.

?The vanguards of the 3rd and 4th Divisions had been utterly decimated. But across the chasm, the 1st and 2nd Divisions were beginning to move. They were looking for another way around.

?"Defensive formation!" Riven commanded. "Use the bottleneck! Don’t let them spread out!"

?The twenty Dwarven warriors fell back a few paces, forming a tiered phalanx right at the narrowest point of the passage. Runed axes and warhammers were raised, creating a wall of blistering heat that completely blocked the path.

?From the tunnel’s mouth, the surviving troops of the 3rd and 4th Divisions attempted a desperate counter-charge. The first soldier to enter the kill zone was met with three axes at once—his armor slagged instantly, and his body was thrown backward, crashing into his comrades and staggering the entire line.

?The second, third, and fourth soldiers tried to push through using a testudo formation, raising their steel shields to protect their chests. But the passage was only wide enough for four men shoulder-to-shoulder. No more. The tight, dense formations that made them virtually unstoppable on an open battlefield turned them into sitting ducks with nowhere to dodge here.

?A faint smirk crossed Riven’s face through his heavy breathing. It was the exact same chokepoint. Only now, they were facing the opposite direction.

?"Hold the line!" he roared.

?His axe whirled, smashing into the first shield and severely denting it. The Dwarven warrior beside him drove a runed spear right through the gap between two shields. Blood sprayed. The Iron Empire soldier crumpled.

?A second wave crashed into them, larger and more tightly packed. Riven took a half-step back, letting the Dwarven warriors behind him rotate to the front line for a moment. He needed to catch his breath. The wound on his left arm throbbed agonizingly.

?"How long can we hold them?" the red-bearded warrior beside him asked, his voice nearly drowned out by the deafening clash of metal around them.

?"Long enough," Riven replied, "for Borch to reach the King."

?"Are you sure they’ll make it?"

?Riven didn’t answer. He simply hoisted his axe and lunged back into the fray. Behind him, the Dwarven warriors tightened their grips on their weapons and followed without another word. There was no time for lingering doubts. There was only a wall of steel in front of them, and their only choice was to hold it back for as long as possible.

?Deep within the dark, damp side tunnel—far removed from the sweltering heat of the main passage—Borch and Thorne moved as fast as they physically could. Rianor’s courier had delivered the message: the narrow path behind the mossy stone pillar, a route completely unrecorded on the old Dwarven maps because it was far too cramped for a large army to traverse. It was barely wide enough for two people.

?"Four black-ops," Thorne said softly, his short spear drawn, his eyes warily scanning the pitch-black path ahead. "They have a massive head start."

?"They have to take the long way around," Borch replied, a dagger gripped tight in his right hand as he checked every corner. "We’re cutting straight through."

?The walls on either side were rough, choked with stone-roots hanging from the cracks above. The air here was freezing and damp, a stark contrast to the blistering heat radiating through the main tunnel. Only faint slivers of light seeped through the cracks in the rock, providing just enough visibility to see their next step, and nothing more. Borch took point, with Thorne guarding their six. They moved in near-perfect silence, far faster than a standard sprint thanks to years of grueling training.

?Borch stopped dead in his tracks.

?Ahead, the tunnel split in two. Left and right. There were no markers on the walls, no readable footprints on the ground. Just the exact same impenetrable darkness swallowing both paths.

?"Left or right?" Thorne asked, his voice steady despite the ticking clock.

?Borch closed his eyes for a split second, recalling the stone relief map he had studied the night before in the strategy room. Those faint, nearly invisible lines now materialized clearly in his mind, one by one, as if he were staring directly at the map itself.

?The left path led to the communal kitchens. The right path led to the rear corridor of the throne room.

?"Right," Borch declared, opening his eyes immediately.

?They resumed their sprint, their footsteps completely muted against the narrow stone floor, accompanied only by their increasingly heavy breathing after running non-stop for so long.

?Back in the command post, Rianor still stood before the relief map, cold sweat dripping down his temples. His right hand was pressed flat against the stone surface, reading the vibrations traveling from the main tunnel. The battle was still raging; Riven was still holding the line. The erratic, spiking rhythm of the tremors meant the close-quarters combat had yet to yield a clear victor.

?Then, he felt another tremor. Fainter. More rhythmic. Coming from the side tunnels. Footsteps. Four of them. Moving incredibly fast—almost exactly as fast as he had calculated.

?Rianor clenched his jaw. There was nothing more he could do from here. The Arcanotech Bracer on his left arm was completely dead, and the limb itself shot with pain every time he moved it. All he had left was a working mind and a body no longer capable of executing anything on the front lines.

?All he could do was wait.

?"Hold on," he muttered to himself, his voice so faint he could barely hear it even in the cramped room. "Hold on."

?Outside, the roar of battle continued to echo through the stone corridors. Deep within the underground city, two hunters and four shadows were converging on the exact same point—the throne room, where the Dwarven King waited with only two guards by his side, completely unaware that his life was being gambled away on two entirely different fronts.

?Rianor stared intensely at the relief map, as if he could bend the physical distance between them through sheer willpower alone. But the stone map was indifferent to his desires. It only showed what was, not what he wished it to be.

?Time continued to tick away, uncaring of who wasn’t ready.