The Crusade marched.
Tens of thousands of holy warriors, paladins, and priests moved across the land.
They were prepared for war.
For a battle of steel and magic.
For a fight that would decide the fate of the world.
But war was not what awaited them.
Because their enemy did not fight battles.
Their enemy did not conquer with swords or siege engines.
Their enemy did not need to fight at all.
Unmaking was already among them.
It had been since the moment they set out.
And now, as they marched toward what they believed to be their first great battle—
They were already falling apart.
The Crusade's ranks were strong.
Their spirits were unyielding.
But even the strongest army can be undone if its soldiers forget why they are fighting.
And so, the Forsaken moved.
Not through attacks.
Not through open warfare.
But simply by being present.
They did not need to speak.
Did not need to kill.
They only needed to exist among the Crusaders.
And the unraveling began.
The Crusaders were trained to fight demons.
To battle monsters, dark sorcery, and unholy abominations.
But they were not prepared for this.
Not prepared for the quiet, creeping sickness that had begun to spread among them.
It started with small things.
A soldier forgot the name of his captain.
A cleric forgot the words to her prayers.
An entire battalion misremembered their marching orders.
The Inquisitors tried to counter it.
They cast spells of clarity, of divine guidance.
But the spells only revealed a terrible truth—
That the forgetting was not a curse.
Not an illusion.
It was real.
And that made it unstoppable.
An army is only as strong as its leadership.
And now, that leadership was breaking.
The first high commander to vanish was not taken in the night.
He was not killed.
He was forgotten.
His subordinates woke up one morning, gathered for their strategy meeting—
And no one could remember why they had expected someone else to be there.
They knew something was wrong.
But they could not explain it.
And so, they moved on.
Because to them, he had never existed.
The Crusade had set out as a unified force.
Now, it was turning against itself.
They had seen Unmaking destroy cities.
They had heard the whispers.
And now, as they felt it creeping into their own ranks,
They began to suspect each other.
Who was still whole?
Who had already begun to break?
Who could be trusted?
Who was already lost?
Accusations began.
Soldiers distrusted their officers.
Inquisitors questioned their own paladins.
And fear took hold.
Not of an enemy army.
But of themselves.
And fear, once it spread, was impossible to contain.
Veyrath had allowed the Hollowed to be captured.
Had let the Crusade find them.
And the Crusaders had believed they could be saved.
That with divine magic, exorcisms, and purification rituals—
They could bring them back.
They were wrong.
Because the Hollowed were no longer victims.
They were instruments.
And as the first exorcisms began—
As the priests called upon the light to drive out the corruption—
The Hollowed did not scream.
They did not resist.
They only smiled.
Because they had already won.
The Crusaders had not purified them.
They had allowed Unmaking into their very presence.
And within a week, the entire purification camp was silent.
Not because it had been attacked.
But because it had never existed at all.
By now, the Crusade was breaking.
Some refused to believe it.
They prayed harder.
Fought to hold onto their memories.
But others had already given up.
They could not fight what they could not see.
Could not battle an enemy that did not take the field.
So they left.
Not in a panicked retreat—
But simply walked away.
Some fled to their homes.
Others simply vanished into the wilderness, unwilling to be part of a war they no longer understood.
And by the time the Crusade's leadership realized how many had left—
It was already too late.
Their army had shrunk by thousands.
Without a single battle.
There was only one man in the Crusade who was not breaking.
The Grandmaster of the Radiant Order.
He was not just a soldier.
Not just a paladin.
He was a relic of an older age.
A warrior who had fought true evils before.
And he understood something the others did not.
That this was not a war of steel.
That this was not a battle they could win through numbers alone.
So he did what no one else had thought to do.
He stopped the march.
And instead of rushing toward a battlefield—
He turned his gaze toward the source.
Toward the true cause of this war.
Toward Veyrath.
And he spoke a single command.
"Find him."
"Find the one who started this."
"And end him before he ends the world."
Veyrath had been content to let the Crusade collapse.
To let fear, paranoia, and Unmaking spread through their ranks.
To watch as their leaders forgot themselves, as their soldiers deserted, as their faith cracked.
But one man had not broken.
One man had seen through the illusion.
The Grandmaster of the Radiant Order.
He did not waste time with politics.
Did not hesitate, did not fear.
He understood what few others did.
That this was not a war of armies.
That Unmaking was not a battle to be fought with numbers.
That if they wanted to stop this,
They could not strike at the Hollowed.
They could not purge the Forsaken.
They had to kill the source.
They had to kill Veyrath.
And so, the Grandmaster did what no one else in the Crusade had done.
He hunted.
The Grandmaster was not like the others.
He was no blind zealot.
No arrogant noble playing at war.
He was a warrior of legend.
A man who had fought in battles long before this Crusade was even conceived.
He had slain things that should not exist.
Had purged demons, banished curses, and shattered eldritch horrors.
And that meant he was not afraid of Unmaking.
He had faced corruptions before.
Had seen forces beyond mortal comprehension.
And he had never lost.
Now, he had set his sights on Veyrath.
And unlike the others, he would not falter.
He would not forget.
He would not break.
Veyrath knew the Grandmaster was coming.
He did not need spies or informants.
The Crusade had already revealed their desperation.
He could feel the shift in the air.
This was no longer an army seeking to reclaim lost land.
This was a single blade seeking his throat.
And so, he prepared.
Not by fleeing.
Not by hiding.
But by ensuring that when the Grandmaster came—
He would find nothing but death waiting for him.
The Forsaken had already proven their power.
They did not fight.
They did not kill.
They simply existed—
And reality unraveled around them.
Now, they would be used deliberately.
Not to erase a city.
Not to spread Unmaking in whispers.
But to deceive the Grandmaster himself.
To warp his reality.
To lead him into a battle where he would not know truth from illusion.
Because if he could not be broken by fear—
Then he would be broken by the collapse of reality itself.
The Ascended were not mere warriors anymore.
They were commanders, strategists, hunters in their own right.
And now, they would be the first line of defense.
They would test the Grandmaster.
Would measure his skill, his reflexes, his power.
Would learn his strengths and his weaknesses.
So that when Veyrath finally met him—
It would not be a battle.
It would be an execution.
The Hollowed had been used to spread Unmaking.
Now, they would be used to lure the Grandmaster forward.
They were left along the path of his hunt.
Not hidden.
Not disguised.
But placed deliberately.
Some pleaded for salvation.
Some spoke of Veyrath's whereabouts in broken, half-missing memories.
And some simply stood, staring, waiting—
As if they had been left behind as warnings.
The Grandmaster saw them for what they were.
A trap.
But he did not turn back.
Because he had no choice but to walk into it.
The Grandmaster moved with precision.
He did not hesitate when he found the first Ascended.
Did not waste time on words.
He simply drew his sword—
And attacked.
And in a single movement,
He killed one.
Not Unmade.
Not erased.
Killed.
It was the first true death among the Ascended.
And that meant he was not just another soldier.
He was a real threat.
One that Veyrath could not afford to ignore.
The Grandmaster had proven himself.
Had cut through the first obstacles.
Had resisted the Forsaken's influence.
Had ignored the Hollowed's whispers.
Had slain an Ascended.
And now, he was coming for Veyrath directly.
But Veyrath was not waiting to be hunted.
He was waiting to spring the final trap.
And when the Grandmaster finally arrived—
He would not find a sorcerer waiting to be slain.
He would find a god in the making.
And he would learn the truth.
That no matter how strong he was—
No matter how powerful, how righteous, how determined—
Unmaking did not care.
It did not fight.
It did not yield.
It did not lose.
It simply erased.
And soon, the Grandmaster would be nothing more than a memory—
And then, not even that.