The stench of burning timber and raw sewage clung to Guts's nostrils, thick and cloying. Ash fell like black snow, dusting the scarred leather of his coat and the rough iron of his prosthetic arm. He moved through the ruined village, boots crunching on shattered roof tiles and splintered bone. Every shadow seemed to writhe with the memory of screams, though the only sounds now were the crackle of distant fires and the rhythmic scrape of the Dragon Slayer against the rubble-strewn earth. A woman's muffled sob cut through the night, quickly stifled. Guts didn't turn. He had learned long ago that looking back only opened old wounds. His gaze remained fixed on the horizon, tracking the faint, pulsing glow he'd followed for three days. That was the beast's trail, the source of this destruction, and his only focus. A child’s doll, a crude wooden figure with painted eyes, lay half-buried in a pile of smoldering hay. Its vacant stare seemed to accuse him. He stepped over it without a pause. The rage that simmered beneath his skin was a familiar companion, a cold furnace that fueled his every step. It had been stoked by a thousand similar scenes, a thousand forgotten faces. The moon, a bruised orange disk, climbed higher, casting long, distorted shadows. It illuminated the grotesque tapestry of death spread before him. A merchant’s cart lay overturned, its goods scattered and looted. A dog, skeletal and whimpering, scavenged near a half-collapsed wall, its fur singed. The air itself tasted of copper and despair. Guts stopped by a well, its stone rim chipped and stained. A bucket lay discarded beside it, rope snapped. He saw no water, only a dark, viscous liquid shimmering at the bottom. The beast had been here, lingering, savoring its work. A low growl rumbled in Guts’s chest, a sound born of exhaustion and an unyielding will. He pressed on, his massive sword dragging a deeper furrow in the churned earth, each step a testament to his grim resolve. He felt the shift in the air, a subtle wrongness that pulsed with dark magic. It pulled him toward the village's edge, where the last of the hovels gave way to a scattering of ancient, leaning headstones. This was the place. --- The graveyard loomed under the blood-orange moon, a silent congregation of the dead. Twisted iron gates, long unhinged, lay half-buried in tall, dry grass. Moss-covered stones tilted at precarious angles, some cleaved by unseen forces, others worn smooth by centuries of wind and rain. Guts moved through them, his good eye scanning the deep shadows cast by crumbling mausoleums and skeletal trees. The air grew colder here, a damp chill that seeped into his bones, carrying the faint, sweet scent of decay. Then he heard it. A low, guttural chittering, like bats nesting in a crypt. It echoed from behind a massive, ivy-choked crypt, a sound dripping with malevolence. Guts gripped the Dragon Slayer's hilt, his knuckles whitening. He breathed in deeply, the coppery taste of the village replaced by the dusty odor of ancient stone and something else, something fetid and alive. He rounded the crypt, his stride silent for all his bulk. There, perched atop a fragmented sarcophagus, was the Apostle. It was a monstrous, bat-winged horror, its skin a stretched, leathery gray. Its limbs were too long, too thin, ending in wickedly barbed talons. A head, disproportionately small for its massive, hunched body, jutted forward, revealing a mouth full of needle-sharp teeth that perpetually curled into a leering grin. Two burning yellow slits of eyes fixed on Guts. They held a cruel intelligence, a mocking amusement that made Guts's gut clench. That sneering face, the gleam in its eyes—it was too familiar. A phantom pain shot through his right arm, the one he no longer had. The memory of other leering faces, other betrayals, flickered at the edge of his vision, sharp and agonizing. He saw the faces of old comrades, twisted into grotesque parodies, heard their final, despairing cries. His breath hitched, a sudden, unwanted tremor running through him. For a fraction of a second, he was back in that nightmare, helpless, broken. But then the rage surged, a tidal wave of fury washing away the specter of the past. He squeezed the hilt, the metal groaning under his strength. The Apostle gave another chittering laugh, its wings rustling softly, as if anticipating a meal. Guts didn't answer. His silence was heavier than any threat. --- Guts launched himself forward, the Dragon Slayer a blur of steel. It screamed through the air, carving a path toward the Apostle's grotesque form. The beast shrieked, a high-pitched sound like grinding bone, and flapped its massive wings, pushing itself off the sarcophagus with unnatural speed. It darted to the side, a dark, leathery shadow, faster than Guts had anticipated. The great sword bit into the ancient stone, sending chips and dust flying. The Apostle landed on a nearby tombstone, its talons gouging deep furrows in the weathered marble. Its yellow eyes glinted with malicious glee. It lunged, a flurry of razor-sharp claws aimed at Guts’s face. He ducked, the air whistling past his ear as the talons raked his helmet, leaving shallow scratches on the dark iron. He countered instantly, a powerful upward swing meant to bisect the creature. The Apostle, however, was unnervingly agile. It sprang backward, its body twisting in mid-air, before landing on another gravestone, its movements fluid and disturbing. Guts pressed his attack, ignoring the growing ache in his prosthetic arm, the dull throb in his old wounds. His movements were brutal, economical, driven by a singular, consuming hatred. The Berserker armor, dormant for too long, began to thrum. A low vibration started in his joints, a dark warmth spreading through his limbs. Shadows seemed to deepen at the edges of his vision, the world narrowing to just him and the Apostle. A growl ripped from Guts’s throat, raw and animalistic. He felt the familiar surge of strength, a desperate, dangerous power that threatened to consume him as it empowered him. The Apostle swooped in, its tail, tipped with a bony barb, whipping out. Guts brought up his sword, deflecting the blow with a clang that rang through the quiet graveyard. He used the momentum, pivoting, and brought the flat of the Dragon Slayer down in a crushing blow. The beast howled as the force slammed it into the ground, a cloud of dust erupting around its battered form. It struggled to rise, spitting a foul, black ichor. Guts didn't give it a chance. He was on it in an instant, a maelstrom of steel and fury. The armor pulsed, the world a red haze. He swung the Dragon Slayer in a wide, horizontal arc, aiming to cleave it in two. The Apostle shrieked, desperately throwing its arm up to block, a futile gesture against the sheer weight and force of Guts's blow. --- The Dragon Slayer met bone and sinew with a sickening crunch. The Apostle's shriek reached an unbearable pitch as its arm, the one it had tried to use for defense, was severed clean from its shoulder. It flew through the air, a grotesque trophy, landing with a wet thud near a broken angel statue. Black ichor sprayed, steaming on the cold stone, smelling of sulfur and burnt hair. The beast staggered backward, its balance lost, a gaping wound where its limb had been. Its yellow eyes widened, no longer mocking, but filled with a primal, terrified understanding. It thrashed, its remaining wing beating frantically against the air, trying to escape, to ascend into the crimson moonlight. But Guts was already there, a dark, relentless shadow. He brought the Dragon Slayer down with the full force of his body, a vertical chop that split the night. The blade cleaved through the Apostle's spine with a wet, tearing sound, exiting through its chest. The creature stiffened, a final, shuddering gasp escaping its throat. Its eyes rolled back, fixed on the moon, as if pleading with a forgotten god. Then, slowly at first, its body began to dissolve. The leathery skin peeled away, melting into a viscous, black fluid that dripped onto the gravestone below. Bones softened, collapsing into a heap of ash. The massive wings, which had seemed so formidable moments before, shriveled and tore, scattering like burnt parchment in the wind. Its screams, though fading, seemed to echo in the very fabric of the night, a chilling testament to its demise. The stench intensified, a thick cloud of decay and something chemical that made Guts's stomach churn. He pulled the Dragon Slayer free, the blade slick with the Apostle's dissolving essence. It hissed as it left the putrefying flesh, the residue evaporating from the cold steel almost instantly. He stood over the remains, chest heaving, the adrenaline slowly receding, leaving behind a familiar ache in every joint, every old wound. The air grew still, the only sound the faint, distant crackle of the dying village fires. The last vestiges of the Apostle's grotesque form vanished, leaving only a dark, oily stain on the cracked marble. Guts lowered his great sword, the heavy steel thudding against the earth beside him. He stared at the stain, a flicker of grim satisfaction mingling with the profound weariness that always followed these encounters. Another one down. Another life taken in a world overrun by monsters. But the emptiness remained. --- He stood there for a long moment, catching his breath, the weight of the Dragon Slayer a comfortable presence beside him. The crimson moonlight bathed the graveyard in an eerie glow, making the shadows long and distorted. The village behind him, still smoldering, seemed a distant, forgotten nightmare. Only the silent stones remained, monuments to forgotten lives and the horrors that now stalked this land. His gaze drifted to the ancient gravestone beneath his left foot, the one the Apostle's dissolving body had stained. It was an old slab, wider than the others, carved with symbols he didn't recognize. The black ichor had pooled in the grooves of these carvings, highlighting them with a sickening sheen. He saw a circular design, intricate and abstract, almost like a stylized eye within a web of lines. It was unlike any marking he had seen on a tomb before. The stain began to shimmer, a faint, sickly red light pulsing from within the etched lines. It wasn't a reflection of the moon. The glow deepened, a low thrumming vibrating through the sole of his boot. The circular symbol, once obscured by centuries of grime, now stood out with stark clarity, its edges glowing with an internal, malevolent energy. A slow, almost imperceptible crack began to spiderweb across the gravestone, emanating from the center of the symbol. The crack widened, tracing the outline of the central design, revealing a perfectly circular aperture. The pulsing light intensified, a harsh, blood-red luminescence. Within the newly formed opening, something shifted. Something dark and wet. Guts leaned forward, his fatigue momentarily forgotten, a cold knot forming in his stomach. The air around him suddenly felt heavy, charged with an unspoken threat. He heard a soft click, like a lid opening. A single, blood-red eye, perfectly round and utterly devoid of warmth, opened in the crumbling gravestone beneath Guts's foot, staring directly at him.

Crimson Moonlight, Iron Resolve