Upon the Cradle of the Sea, the grandest of its myriad isles—Castello Island—stood defiant.
Nineteen Fra'ow Aether Masters, clad in resplendent purple-gold robes, led over three thousand warriors in a relentless assault against a primitive bulwark wrought of stone and timber.
In the forefront of the Fra'ow offensive, ten psychic adepts, flanked by a thousand warriors, concentrated their onslaught.
Atop the ramparts, facing the blistering psychic barrage of these ten Aether Masters, stood a woman wielding a wooden staff crowned with the skull of a sea-beast.
Her features were sharply defined yet softened by grace, her forehead broad and unblemished, her brows thick yet finely sculpted, resembling delicate strokes of ink.
Her tea-brown eyes blazed with righteous fury as she raised her pale, delicate left arm. A bolt of azure lightning tore through the heavens, coiling around three of the psychic adepts.
Countless minute arcs, alive with malevolent intent, burrowed into the Fra'ow, eliciting a cacophony of crackling bursts.
Amidst the flickering blue radiance, the Aether Masters spewed blood from mouth and nose, their white hair reduced to charred ash as their trembling forms collapsed.
The remaining seven psychics, undeterred, raised their staves in unison, unleashing a torrent of destruction upon the walls. Driven by the cunning instincts of void-pirates, they diverted their wrath toward the weaker islanders, seeking to exhaust the formidable foe before them.
Tongues of flame roared skyward, mercilessly consuming several islanders firing Vostonian lasguns.
A handful of defenders, wielding chainswords to parry Fra'ow warriors, were hurled aloft by invisible forces, crashing into their comrades scaling the ramparts.
The psychics' savage onslaught left dozens of islanders grievously wounded in mere moments.
The female shaman, her full lips pressed tight with resolve, aimed her staff at a commander beside her, his body half-ravaged.
As bioplasmic energies surged forth, his bronzed flesh mended at a visible pace.
The commander, bracing himself against the ground, rose unsteadily, his gaze falling upon the shaman.
"Shaman Marlena, flee while you can. We cannot hold."
"No," Marlena replied, her straight nose lifted, her voice resolute. "I have seen it. The Mother of the Sea revealed to me a giant descending from the heavens, come to save our homeland."
The commander cleaved a Fra'ow warrior scaling the wall, kicking the corpse from the eleven-meter parapet.
He tilted his head toward the cerulean sky, where three Elyfa, their bellies orange-yellow, soared with azure wings.
A bitter smile curled his lips. He had trusted the shaman's prior visions—of xenos invasion and Vostonia's delayed aid—but now deemed this prophecy a fabrication.
[She speaks only to bolster morale.]
As he began to avert his gaze, a crimson speck in the sky grew steadily larger.
The commander rubbed his eyes, then bellowed with frenzied hope.
"They're here! Salvation has come!"
Marlena's lips curved upward. Raising her staff with both hands, she summoned the entirety of her strength.
Within dozens of meters before her, the hearts of every Fra'ow pounded frenetically, their blood surging in a torrential boil, their skin darkening instantaneously.
Amidst anguished roars, they lost consciousness, collapsing in heaps.
The seven surviving Aether Masters, sapped of vigor, crumpled to the earth.
Marlena swayed, leaning heavily on her staff to remain upright.
She lifted her head, beholding a figure that filled the sky—a giant, identical to the vision she had glimpsed in the Coral Sea.
With effort, she turned, her eyes tracing the colossus's descent.
He crashed amidst the xenos with cataclysmic force, the ground quaking, the walls shuddering.
Over a hundred Fra'ow were obliterated by the impact, hundreds more flung to the ground.
The Aether Masters, barely risen from the "Blood Boil," were seized by a titanic force from behind, hurling them skyward.
Straining to turn, their wide fields of vision caught only a fleeting glimpse of the giant before oblivion claimed them.
The commander gaped as seven formidable xenos lost their heads in an instant, deep purple ichor drenching the battlefield, spattering his open mouth with mud.
Spitting out the filth, he stared at the carnage—severed xenos strewn across the ground.
Nimrod pressed forward relentlessly, Maria and her two companions in tow, carving a bloody swath through the Fra'ow.
From his aerial vantage earlier, overlooking Castello Island, he had seen vast swathes of the isle ravaged by xenos plunder, with only this major city and three smaller settlements still holding fast.
As Nimrod slaughtered the xenos, Szczesny leapt from an assault boat with exultant fervor, plunging into the azure sea.
The moment his body met the water, he felt unshackled, as if a fish returned to its native depths.
An Aether Master, drawn by his cry, hastened to the shore, levitating above the waves with telekinetic might.
From the assault boat, two warriors of Vostonia's Fourth Regiment raised their lasguns, beams lancing toward the Fra'ow psychic.
The Aether Master flicked his hand, conjuring a "protective field."
The beams struck the shield, rippling with aetheric distortions.
As the psychic deflected the attack, he felt his ankles seized.
Before he could summon aetheric power, a colossal force yanked him downward, plunging him into the sea with a resounding splash.
He struggled to wield telekinesis to repel Szczesny, but the Vostonian felt the xenos's resistance.
Illusory fish-scales shimmered across the backs of Szczesny's hands, his fingers tightening with frenzied strength.
The Aether Master, wracked with pain, opened his mouth, seawater flooding in.
Though his head resembled a shark's, the Fra'ow were not aquatic; like any drowning creature, his struggles hastened his descent.
The "Sailor" Beyonder, however, thrived unimpeded. Szczesny had tested his limits, diving over seventeen minutes without gear.
The xenos, dragged deeper, was no master of bioplasmic aethercraft, unable to conjure oxygen—a fatal flaw for a breathing Fra'ow.
Szczesny sensed the weakening resistance, yanking sharply and encircling the xenos's neck with his arms, twisting with lethal force.
As a "Sailor," his prodigious strength shone even underwater, snapping the Aether Master's neck.
Kicking the corpse into the depths, Szczesny ascended.
In seconds, he surfaced from over a hundred meters, only to sense an unnatural disturbance in the currents below.
Drawing his waterproofed chainsword, finger poised on the activation stud, he peered warily into the abyss.
[The xenos corpse has vanished.]
His vigilance sharpened, eyes scanning the surroundings.
Finding nothing after a moment, he surfaced reluctantly, duty calling him to lead his forces against Trinio, the Cradle's second-largest isle.
Five hours after descending upon Castello Island, Nimrod had purged it of xenos.
His gaze met the female psychic he had noted from above, locking onto her tea-brown eyes. To his astonishment, her pupils merely contracted, betraying no agony.
[Her will is resolute. Facing my gaze, she feels discomfort but not torment. She surpasses even Howard and Maria, the strongest soul I've encountered since crashing upon Vostonia.]
As Nimrod pondered, the shaman bowed, speaking in Vostonian Low Gothic.
"Marlena Skala offers her gratitude for your salvation."