Cid - Stops the Brute

Once it has it, the fearsome beast with its massive amounts of mana appears.

One stock-still knight’s choked comment echoes across the battlefield. “I-it’s the Brute…”

The beast’s overgrown crimson claws and fangs stand stark against the darkness.

It inspires instinctual terror in any who behold it, like a demon straight out of the world of stories.

The Brute leaps too quickly for those awed by it to follow and swings its mighty claws.

The blow it inflicts is despair incarnate.

“What…?! The wall—!”

With but a single attack, the Brute’s claws carve deep fissures into the university’s bulwark.

If that wall goes down, the base will be defenseless. They’ll get overrun in seconds.

***

At long last, the knights notice the obsidian blade that the Brute is impaled on.

It’s piercing the massive beast through from behind. Dark blood trickles down its tip.

A roar of agony erupts from the Brute’s mouth.

Then, slowly…

…its massive frame rises into the air.

Slowly—ever so slowly—the blade hoists the Brute aloft.

The beast has been reduced to nothing more than a helpless sacrifice.

Then, under the moon’s light, the obsidian blade flips over.

A moment later, the Brute splits in two. A torrent of black blood spills forth.

There, underneath it, stands the man holding the sword.

“I-it’s him…the Black Knight! The Black Knight is here!”

***

Volume 4, Epilogue