Things were looking dicey for the Glorious 14th army of the IMMORALL empire. The moment the barrier fell, a swarm of spiders met with the Imperial army. The Verrac'k started tearing through the ranks, limbs flying, blood spurting. Carrion eaters swarmed above, their gluttonous squawks reaching a crescendo over the massacre. Men and women stood side by side, facing the abominations that would snuff out their lives with steel in their eyes and sorrow in their hearts. The Void welcomes all comers.

Blood dripped from Zeva's brow. Exhausted, she still swung her mortal instruments. With arms like lead and blood leaking out of her various wounds, she could barely summon her wind. Still, every swing of her blades brought down another one of the hell-spawn.

Bodies lay everywhere. Many of them were from her side. Gritting her teeth, she resumed her grisly work. She wouldn't stop until she died or they did.

The barrier had bought them precious time to get reorganized. The flanks had moved back, and the shields were up. Archers were firing in full swing. Ranged magic peppered the Verrac'k, taking down their larger monsters. The front line was holding. Spearmen being replaced with fresh troops every push. The cavalry of armored quadrupeds flanked and herded the Verrac'k into the range of the Casters. Zeva and her Talons took on some of the larger abominations, sowing chaos amongst their ranks. Things were starting to turn around.

BOOM.

An explosion shook the battlefield, bodies flying everywhere.

A giant horned beast made of magma and breathing clouds of ash knelt in the center of a crater, a crater in the middle of their army.

"ROWWWWWWWWRRRRRR" bellowed the beast, a call to battle. Desperation filled the eyes of the regiment.

Twenty feet tall and radiating enough heat to melt armor, the Greater Pyre Daemon exhaled.

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A maelstrom erupted from its mouth, vaporizing those poor souls unlucky enough to be near its arrival.

Zeva fell to her knees. Taking on a lesser Daemon with full reserves was a task unassailable. Here stood a greater behemoth, reaping dozens by the second.

A meteor dotted the sky, its parabolic path tracing an incandescent line in the inky black expanse. The daemon lifted its head, sensing something. Wings of flame erupted from its back. It erupted from the ground almost as fast as the meteor it sought to meet.

The impact was cataclysmic, the resulting blast knocking the army to their knees. Visions were blinded by the light emitted.

The daemon had been knocked well clear of the army. Shaking its head, it bellowed in rage as its mangled arm hung limply by its side, snorting clouds of cinder. It lumbered towards a lone figure floating in front of it. The Xeral did not look pleased.

Flexing his dented gauntlet, he raised his Warhammer, now looking like a miniature sun. Roaring in challenge, the Leonid met the Daemon head-on. The daemon raised its arms high above, as though to pummel the lion into the ground. The Xeral thrust at the monster's face, forcing it to step back. Wasting no movement, he brought down the hammer on the monster's knee. A swift side spin building momentum and BOOM, the daemon flew into a nearby boulder.

Growling in impotence, the creature of ash and heat thundered out and towards him. Only to meet a hammer to its face that promptly pushed it back. The Xeral was brutal in his power and clinical in his movement. Meeting the Daemon's fist with his mighty hammer, knocking it aside ever so slightly with his long handle. He swung in arcs, forcing the monster into his rhythm. Building more and more momentum until he brought the hammer down on the chest of his assailant, cratering the ground. The Xeral held his foe down as luminous blood escaped the crushed chest of the Greater Daemon. Its mouth frothed and snapped, desperate to get back up.

The hammer emitting blinding light, veins bulging on the Xeral's hand as he channeled ever-increasing essence into his skill. The hammer and its prey sinking deeper and deeper into the ground as the weight of it grew tumultuously high.

A single pillar of light pierced the night sky, and upon its recession stood a smoking Leonid atop a carbonized corpse.