Katherine after the charge…

  The ground didn’t shake. It screamed.

  Katherine led the charge like a storm wrapped in denim and stitched socks, her breath coming fast, the cold air slicing through her lungs like it wanted to join the fight too. The Left Sock Division surged behind her, a patchwork army of volunteers, memers, and absolute lunatics wrapped in grey jackets that flapped like war banners.

  She activated her Juggernaut skills mid-stride. Her body surged with weight and power, every step punching deep into the earth, her massive sword raised and gleaming like a fallen star.

  The first wave met them hard. Shambling foot soldiers roared and rushed, [Bone Reavers] trailing behind like rusted machines. They should’ve slowed the charge.

  They didn’t.

  Katherine crashed into them with a wild laugh, her blade cleaving through rotted steel and bone like butter under the sun. A necrotic blade swiped her side, deflected, absorbed, punished. Her return swing obliterated three at once.

  One head went flying, helmet and all.

  Her veins thrummed with ecstatic fire. Behind her, the Sock Division surged. Weapons, magic, even the flute screamed battle-music through the chaos. To her left, someone was dual-wielding spoons. On her right, a mage lit his jacket on fire intentionally to cast harder.

  They were insane.

  They were beautiful.

  Gatei was a living catastrophe ahead of her. No spells, no chants, no reason. He simply existed at velocity. Every time Katherine blinked, he was somewhere new. Hurling demons with one hand, kicking another into the sky, laughing with unhinged glee.

  “Come on, socks! Mercy is for a shirt division!” he howled, catching a javelin mid-air and eating it like a snack.

  The demon who’d thrown it paused, weaponless and clearly questioning all its life choices. Gatei simply winked at it and spat the javelin-tip back with the force of artillery fire, launching the unfortunate creature into a cluster of its comrades.

  Katherine’s grin stretched wider. Gatei landed beside her suddenly, lightly jogging backwards as she charged forward. “I’ve decided! You’re promoted!” he yelled, casually grabbing another demon’s blade, bending it into a pretzel shape, and handing it politely back to its very confused owner. “You’re now the Right Sock Commander!”

  “Right Sock?” Katherine shouted back, cleaving a demon in two without slowing down. “We’re called Left Sock!”

  He shrugged, vaulting effortlessly over a charging hound. “Exactly! Now we’ve got both!” And then he was gone again, vanished into a tornado of inexplicable violence, leaving Katherine laughing hysterically amidst the blood-soaked chaos.

  They were cutting through the backbone of the demon army like scissors through wet paper. The Foot Soldiers fell in droves, and the [Bone Reavers] couldn’t match the sheer unreasonableness of their assault. Left Sock didn’t hold formation; they broke it on purpose. They tangled and flowed like a drunken river, colliding with overwhelming force before sliding out to crash again from a new angle.

  Not a single casualty.

  Not yet.

  Katherine slammed her blade into the ground, sending a tremor through her Juggernaut talent. The nearest [Bone Reaver] stumbled, and she flipped forward over it, landing blade-first on another. Her sword sang. Her muscles burned. Her fans were probably losing their minds.

  Then came the real monsters.

  The [Revenant Knights] rode in silence, towering undead juggernauts on skeletal steeds, black lances lowered. Behind them, [Ruin Warlocks] poured shadows into the battlefield, warping geometry, making the world bend wrong.

  “Finally,” Katherine grinned, spinning her sword. “Boss music.”

  Gatei didn’t wait. He never did.

  The moment the [Revenant Knights] appeared, he was already in motion, a blur of old cloth and divine nonsense. One of the skeletal steeds let out a shriek as Gatei appeared mid-air above it, upside-down and cackling. “HELLO, HORSE!” he bellowed, and then… he body-slammed it.

  The entire knight-rider combo crumpled into a heap of shattered bones and confused entropy.

  Katherine’s sword spun as she darted through the warped terrain, ignoring how the world buckled under the Warlocks’ influence. Her Juggernaut field held steady, barely. The edges of her vision rippled like dirty water, and the taste of copper hit her tongue, but she grinned through it.

  A Knight thundered toward her.

  She met it head-on.

  Blade to lance. Juggernaut against Revenant. Sparks screamed. Her sword howled. The sheer impact cracked the corrupted ground, and she used it, slamming her foot down and triggering another shockwave that sent the Knight flying.

  One down.

  Two.

  Three.

  The fourth got close enough to scrape her jacket.

  Unacceptable.

  She spun, ducked low, then rose with a brutal uppercut that snapped its helmet in two. “Don’t. Touch. The Sock.”

  Gatei crashed down beside her, skidding through a pile of screaming geometry. He had something in his hand. “Is that…?” she blinked.

  “A shadow priest!” he announced proudly, holding it like a cat he wasn’t supposed to bring home. The creature screamed, melting between his fingers like black butter.

  Gatei licked one.

  “Ew!” Katherine recoiled. “Do not taste the undead!”

  He shrugged. “They taste like dirty secrets.”

  “Put that down and go explode something!”

  “On it!” he saluted, then yeeted himself into the nearest cluster of [Ruin Warlocks] with the enthusiastic shout of, “Taste the pommel of my hammer!”

  He hit the ground like a divine airstrike. Magic screamed. Reality hiccuped.

  Katherine slammed another Knight into the dirt, then panted, grinning, surrounded by spectral wreckage and a division of complete lunatics in embroidered jackets.

  The flute was still playing. The Left Sock Division roared.

  They surged again.

  Magic erupted all around her. The [Ruin Warlocks] twisted their staves, reality fracturing into spirals of decay. But they couldn’t focus. Not with flutes playing war songs, bombs exploding underfoot, and reckless sock warriors vaulting through shadows with daggers and fireballs.

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  They broke the line again.

  One [Revenant Knight] tried to flank Katherine. She met him head-on, her sword igniting with Juggernaut’s fury. One swing shattered the lance. A second shattered the rider. She kept moving.

  They were winning.

  Prince Don, leading from the rear, stepped onto the battlefield with reluctant grace, his boots sinking slightly into the churned, blood-slicked soil. Sunlight caught the gold-etched command spells scrawled across his gleaming armor, each rune pulsing faintly with resonance. His cloak, untouched by ash, billowed behind him like a banner of royal expectation.

  But his eyes, those were fixed not on the chaos, not on the ruin left by the charge, but on Gatei. “You,” he spat, voice cracking like a Charlie’s whip.

  Gatei tilted his head with exaggerated curiosity, standing atop a still-twitching revenant. “Me? I’m just a friendly grandpa on a stroll!” he chirped, spreading his arms wide, still smeared with soot and glory.

  Before Don could respond, Gatei winked and vanished. Not in smoke or sparkle, but with a pop of displaced air, as if reality had gotten tired of tracking him.

  In his place, Teorn stepped forward, robes still radiant from his last cast. Healing spells shimmered faintly along the fabric, the light slowly bleeding off. His boots crunched softly over broken bone and dying embers.

  Katherine blinked through the smoke, confused. “Wait, he fights? Charlie said he’s strong, and a pervert, but…” Teorn unsheathed his sword with a whisper of steel, the sound audible despite the roar of spells and screams.

  Don faltered for a moment, surprise flashing in his eyes. “You? What are you doing here, master?”

  Teorn’s expression was unreadable, calm, yet hard, like carved marble. “I am disappointed in you, Don.”

  “I fight for the Kingdoms. I fight for Queen Irwen!” Don shouted, his voice rising, brittle with urgency. His grip tightened, and he surged forward, blade arcing in a silver blur.

  Teorn met the blow with effortless grace, steel ringing against steel. Sparks danced. “Your loyalty should have been with the Duke. Not the throne.”

  Their blades collided again. And again. Now it was no longer conversation. Don fought with a fury, each step a blend of footwork and raw, unfocused desperation. His strikes were forceful, quick, yet unrefined. Similar to Katherine’s.

  Rage gave Don speed. Fear gave him strength. But neither could give him control, and Katherine smirked. This fight was going to be in the highlights of her stream!

  Teorn, in contrast, was stillness in motion. Every movement exact. Every counterstrike mixed with quiet finality. He fought not like a warrior, but like a man who’d long since accepted the cost of justice. They blurred through smoke and ash, dodging burning fragments and skirting pools of molten stone. Magic cracked the sky above them, casting their duel in flickering red and violet.

  “We’re on the same side!” Don cried, breath hitching.

  Teorn’s blade slid past his guard, grazing his shoulder, burning the fabric almost gently. He stepped back with a sigh. “Then why are we enemies?”

  They circled. The wind carried the howls of war beasts. The ground quaked under the force of detonations. Still, they fought. A private storm amid a battlefield.

  Don lunged again, faster this time, desperation peeking through his guard. Their swords clashed like thunder. He pushed harder. Teorn countered with a flick of his wrist, parried, pivoted, and for a moment, his foot caught on shattered stone.

  He stumbled.

  Gatei appeared. “Tired, old man?” he teased, catching Don’s next blow with his bare hand. “My turn.”

  Don swore and fell back, vanishing in a shimmer of light.

  “Cheeky brat,” Gatei grinned.

  But the air was burning.

  Above, [Sky Reavers] dipped low, javelins flying. [Shriekers] screamed, shattering concentration. But the walls lit up with fire and lightning. Tramar’s support activated. One by one, the flying terrors were struck down, falling like cursed comets.

  Still, Left Sock began to fall.

  The volunteers, reckless and glorious, started dying one by one. Each death bought another second. Each scream was a verse in their chaotic hymn. Someone detonated an entire potion belt on a [Bone Reaver]’s face. Another tackled a warlock into their own dimensional rift. Katherine fought on, bloodied, exhausted, surrounded by flame and bone.

  She turned just in time to see Gatei leap high above the battle, laughing like a god denied nothing, his hands crackling with raw energy.

  Then, like a falling star, he slammed both fists downward. “SEE, MILA?! THIS IS HOW YOU FIGHT!” he roared, his voice echoing over the battlefield.

  Magic flared white-hot, brilliant enough to carve shadows across Katherine’s vision. The earth beneath Gatei erupted, an instant crater blooming outward in every direction, swallowing dozens of demons. A shockwave of force shattered armor and bone alike, launching knights, warlocks, and monstrous beasts skyward, screaming and spinning, helpless before gravity reclaimed them.

  At the heart of the eruption stood Gatei, straightening slowly, dust and flames swirling around him like obedient servants. He cast Katherine one last look, eyes alight with delighted madness. “Keep squeezing them, Sock Division!” he bellowed, raising one hand in an extravagant wave. “I’m off to cause trouble elsewhere!”

  And then he vanished, not stepping, not teleporting, just simply ceasing to exist where he’d stood, leaving only a single smoldering footprint stamped deep into the fractured earth.

  Katherine’s legs shook. She swung. Her blade caught a knight’s helm and split it clean. Another strike. Another body. Another spark of glory in the chaos.

  Then it happened. A lance pierced her side. The impact stole her breath, fire flooding her lungs, agony flashing red across her vision. She staggered, blood blooming bright against the gray of her coat. But she didn’t fall.

  She spun.

  With a roar, she carved the Revenant Knight in half, blade singing through bone and black armor. Its body collapsed into two smoking pieces.

  More came.

  She didn’t stop.

  Her boots slid through gore and ash. Her coat burned at the edges. Her knuckles bled through the hilt. But she moved. For her fans. For the Sock. For Charlie.

  For style.

  Every swing was a statement. Every step, defiance.

  A [Ruin Warlock] screamed, she cut it down mid-cast.

  A Knight charged, she caught the lance, broke it, and buried her sword in its chest.

  Her health ticked down. Alarms flared. Blood soaked her vision.

  Still she roared, voice cracking from exertion, laughter spilling between gasps. She was dying, yes, but she looked amazing doing it.

  Then.

  A blade from behind. She turned too slow. The strike landed. Her body jerked. Vision blurred. Sound fractured into static.

  Katherine dropped to one knee, sword still clenched tight in her hand. “I looked cool, right?” she whispered, grinning through the blood.

  The world tilted.

  She fell.

  Katherine leapt from her pod, yanked her clothes into something vaguely presentable, she was still on stream, after all, and dove straight for her computer.

  “That. Was. Insane!” she shouted, breathless with adrenaline as she turned on the camera and switched over to the stream overlay.

  The numbers hit her like a second wind:

  Katherine grinned, flushed and buzzing. “Look, stream!” she whooped, swapping the source to Riker’s field feed just in time to catch it. The Reckless Charge had succeeded. The enemy elites were shattered. The front was holding.

  The cost?

  The Left Sock Division.

  Every single one.