"Too slow."
Matthias’s voice cuts through superheated air as his body becomes a missile of flame and fury. Fire wraps around his legs like liquid metal, propelling him forward with explosive speed.
Leon’s elite mage zombie raises skeletal hands, but the intercept comes a heartbeat too late. Matthias slams into Leon’s gut with the force of a meteor, doubling him over around the impact point.
The blow launches Leon fifty feet down the marble hallway. He bounces twice off polished stone before skidding to a stop near a shattered pillar. His vision blurs. Ribs scream with each shallow breath.
Through the haze of pain, Leon forces himself upright. His legs shake like a newborn colt’s. Blood trickles from his mouth, tasting of copper and failure.
Another streak of fire screams toward his face.
Leon throws himself sideways, but the heat wave follows like a living thing. Superheated air slams him against the wall with enough force to crack marble. His coat erupts in flames. The skin on his left arm blisters and peels.
He beats out the fire with trembling hands, leaving charred fabric and raw flesh behind.
His warrior zombie appears at his side, spectral armor reflecting the inferno that rages throughout the hallway. The mantis blade gleams despite the heat distortion warping the air.
His elite mage positions itself between Leon and Matthias, purple energy crackling around skeletal fingers. The undead spellcaster’s enhanced intelligence calculates angles and trajectories, seeking weaknesses in their opponent’s seemingly perfect offense.
But Matthias moves faster than mathematics.
The flame berserker crosses sixty feet in a blink, his massive frame blurring with speed that shouldn’t exist in something so large. Fire trails behind him like the wake of a comet.
His boot connects with Leon’s ribs before either zombie can react.
The kick lifts Leon from the ground, sending him cartwheeling through a wooden room divider. Splinters explode around his tumbling form. He crashes into the window frame with enough force to spider the reinforced glass.
Blood sprays from his lips as he gasps for air that won’t come. His system interface flickers at the edge of his vision, health bars flashing critical red warnings.
The gap between A-rank and B-rank is a chasm measured in broken bones and spilled blood.
Matthias appears before him like a conjured nightmare. Massive hands seize Leon’s collar, lifting him from the debris with casual strength.
The first impact against the wall rattles Leon’s teeth. The second cracks the marble behind his skull. The third sends chunks of stone raining down like hall.
His elite mage fires a mana bolt at point-blank range. Matthias swats the attack aside without even looking, purple energy dissipating harmlessly against his flame aura.
Leon’s consciousness flickers like a candle in wind. His warrior zombie lunges with mantis blade drawn, but Matthias catches the undead warrior with his free hand.
The flame berserker slams the zombie headfirst into the floor. Spectral bone cracks like eggshell. Dark ichor spreads across marble in abstract patterns.
Matthias raises his other fist, fire coiling around knuckles the size of doorknobs. Heat radiates from his skin in visible waves.
Leon whispers through broken lips. A single word, barely audible over the roar of flames.
"Now."
His assassin zombie materializes directly behind Matthias, emerging from shadows that shouldn’t exist in the fire-lit hallway. The undead killer drives both knives toward the berserker’s spine with lethal precision.
For the first time in the battle, Matthias stumbles.
The assassin’s momentum carries both of them forward. Matthias twists in mid-air, flames erupting from his skin as he retaliates, but his perfect balance is broken.
The warrior zombie surges upright despite its cracked skull. Dark ichor streams from the wound, but fury drives it past damage that would cripple a living being.
It barrels into both Matthias and the assassin, driving all three combatants toward the shattered window. Glass explodes outward in glittering cascade.
They plummet into open air.
The assassin zombie drives a knife toward Matthias’s throat, seeking the gap between his body armour and enhancements. Steel finds flesh. Dark blood flows.
The warrior zombie grips Shadow-edge in spectral hands, driving the dark blade toward Matthias’s heart. The weapon punches through enchanted plate armor, seeking vital organs beneath.
All three bodies tumble through night air, locked in deadly embrace.
Leon slumps against the cracked wall, breathing in ragged gasps that send spikes of agony through his chest. His vision swims. His hands shake with shock and blood loss.
Outside the shattered window, the sound of impact echoes up the building’s face. Three bodies hitting stone with crushing force. The sound repeats twice more as they bounce off architectural features during their fall.
Then silence.
Leon waits, listening for movement from the wreckage below. For signs of who might rise from the carnage.
His broken ribs make each breath an exercise in controlled agony. Blood pools beneath him, dark stains spreading across marble that once gleamed with pride.
But he’s still breathing. Still conscious. Still alive.
The silence stretches, heavy with possibility and dread.