By Richard James Wilkinson

The command tent pulsed with warmth and revelry,

Laughter rolling like thunder through its canvas walls.

Insults flew like arrows, stories were shouted over spilled drinks,

And the crackle of fire cast dancing shadows across proud faces.

But beneath the mirth, something festered.

An undercurrent of unease slithered through the ranks

Eyes flicked sideways; voices dropped to whispers.

The memory of yesterday’s encounter in the grove would not be silenced.

The mad druid, wild-eyed and stinking of peat and blood,

Had spoken through shattered teeth:

"On the day beyond Beltane, when dusk falls... he shall come."

And now, dusk had fallen.

Finn approached; his steps were steel. His gaze was iron.

He leaned close to Cole, words low and deadly.

Only fragments drifted to nearby ears:

“The poisons… they're already in the camp…”

Before questions could rise,

The night itself shattered.

A war cry tore through the dark like a blade through flesh:

“BANE! BANE! BANE!”

The cry of the Baneintes—faithful only to madness,

Mouths foaming with zealotry,

Eyes alight with ruin.

Mugs fell, chairs crashed, and the Fir Cruthen lunged for steel.

Jokes died in th

roats now filled with battle screams.

From the edge of the firelight, they came.

Charging like a wave of plague-ridden beasts,

Weapons raised high; teeth bared in lunatic joy.

The first clash rang out like the cracking of the world.

Steel met steel.

Blood hit the dirt in great red arcs.

Screams of pain rose, tangled with howls of devotion and fury.

The night became war.

Baneintes fell like rabid dogs.

But not before they tore into their foes,

Ripping, stabbing, dying with grins carved into their faces.

Fir Cruthen blood spilled beside their own,

And the sacred soil drank deep.

Over it all, chaos reigned.

No formation, no order, just survival and slaughter.

The air pulsed with death,

And in the hearts of all, a single truth:

The mad druid had not lied.

He had warned them.

And Bane had come.

A flash of silver moonlight sears through the night, casting its cold glow upon the battlefield, a figure emerges from the darkness; the champion of Cymrja; Finn Second War leader of the Fir Cruthen and Champion of Cymrja's Heart, his grip tightening around the moon sword. Fury radiates from his face, an unstoppable storm in the night, his eyes burning with vengeance.

With a howl of defiance, he leads a savage counterattack, cleaving a bloody trail toward the gates of the camp. Each strike parts armour, bone and flesh of the advancing Baneintes, halting their relentless charge. They are trapped, pinned like cattle before the slaughter, their fate sealed by the unyielding wrath of the Knight Exemplar of the Ridre Dragan

At the back of the baneintes mob, broken shadows of bodies fly through the air, the very ground trembled beneath the monstrous weight of Avagddu, Bane's promised war hound.

In his eyes burned a trinity of flame, madness without end, fury without mercy, and bloodlust without reason. They did not flicker, hey fed. And where his gaze fell, slaughter followed.

Finn surged forward, the Moonsword gleaming like silver vengeance, a war cry ripping from his throat but one blow was all fate allowed. In an instant, he was slammed to the earth, broken and breathless, the charge crushed beneath the weight of Avagddu fury.

But Brynn rose.

Wreathed in the primal force of the Umdra, the raw might of the Fir Cruthen nations surging through her veins, she became a hurricane given form. With every step, the earth cracked; with every strike, the ground howled. Her fury was the land’s own ancient, wild, merciless.

She met Avagddu head-on, fists and blade raining down like meteors. Each blow shattered stone and sent tremors through the battlefield, forcing the monstrous God to stagger, reeling away from the mangled bodies of her fallen kin.

She did not plead. She did not pause. She was wrath incarnate.

The night air howls with searing fury as Avagddu’s wrath erupts into brutal, blinding reality warriors are hurled like ragdolls, Armor split and smoking, blood hissing on scorched stone.

The few still on their feet charred, broken and bleeding lash out in a frenzy, blades flailing against the nightmare that was once their god. But the War Hound is unrelenting, a titan of malice and ruin.

Then like a thunderbolt cast from Lugh wrath Aggro Maccormac strikes. The blazing glory of the Sunspear in hand, she hurls herself into the fray, the weapon humming with divine rage. She pierces Avagddu’s iron hide, wrenching his murderous gaze from the fallen.

She dances through ruin, a blur of blood and fire, evading hammering strikes meant to pulp her into the earth. Steel clashes, snarls rip through the dark, and with every parried blow she carves

into his side.

But as she rears back, the Sunspear coiled for the final judgment—Avagddu moves. With a speed that mocks his monstrous bulk, he crashes a bone-shattering blow into her side. Armor caves, bone cracks, and Aggro is sent hurtling, broken, into the blackened dust.

Bane, the would-be King of All, strode into the camp like a storm given flesh, the very air recoiled from his presence, his Warcry a challenge to the fabric of reality itself, Fir Cruthen warriors hurled themselves at him in blind defiance, blades raised and cries fierce all for naught, his blows crumpling armour and shredding flesh lives ended as if they were no more than insects cast into a gale.

Into the heart of the maelstrom, she strode

Louenaa Arwen of Manx.

Dagger in hand. Shield at her side.

Chief Alchemist of the Fir Cruthen, flame of her people,

Unyielding as the three legs of Manx.

She faced the Bane.

The earth quaked beneath his tread,

His lightless eyes locked on hers,

A gaze like death incarnate.

And still, she did not falter.

Still, she did not fear.

For the fire of Manx beat within her chest like a war drum.

From the carnage, another rose:

Nathan, his blade slick with Bane's Bane.

That poison-pain, forged for this moment.

He struck with silent fury,

A blur of vengeance made flesh.

The blade bit deep across Bane’s face.

A wound that drank poison like wine.

And the godling staggered.

For the first time since he began his assault on the Pantheon and Fir Cruthen people.

Since he defiled the Gael Bolg and shattered the Moon Sword,

Since he brought desecration to Gaffon’s Forge

And broke the back of the God Bel.

Since he twisted the Spring King into a thrall of agony,

Since he ravaged Avaddu's soul with chains and flame.

Now.

At last.

Retribution stands within reach.

And the blood of a fallen god runs red upon the earth.

The first blow comes like a god’s whisper.

A spear hurled with sacred wrath lances into Bane’s side.

Agony flickers across his monstrous face, as he stumbles.

Then comes a axe, Its crimson smile glinting in the firelight

As it sinks deep into his shoulder, bone crunching like dry wood.

A sword follows, singing through the air, opening flesh, spilling ichor.

But Bane, even wounded, fights with the fury of wounded beast.

Every retaliatory strike is an earthquake

Warriors are hurled like rag dolls, bones shattered on impact.

Healers are lifted from the ground, flung like leaves in a hurricane.

And yet for everyone crushed beneath his wrath,

Two more rise, blades biting, driven by vengeance.

His roars no longer invincible.

Now they tremble with pain.

Bane collapses to one knee,

Black blood pouring from a dozen wounds,

The venom of Pain coiling through his veins like fire.

A screaming warrior charges.

A hammer raised to end him.

But Bane snatches the life from her in an instant,

The body blackened in his grasp.

A spear slams into his back.

The bearer swatted away,

Their limbs trailing behind like broken flags.

And then

Garruk.

Thunder in his eyes.

The Sword of Manannán in hand.

Each strike cracks Bane’s armor,

Each blow feeds on divine blood,

The weapon screaming hate.

Driven to desperation,

Bane hurls himself forward,

Dark energy crackling in his palm.

He slams it into Garruk’s chest

And steals the life from him in a single breath.

The warrior falls, silent.

But behind him.

A presence.

Del, Head Druid of the Fir Cruthen,

Voice of the sacred grove,

Chanting in a tongue lost to all but the gods.

Power gathers.

Some say they saw the silhouette of Núada, King of Kings,

Towering above him, his movements mirroring Del’s.

The sky tightens, the wind stills,

And from Del’s mouth come the words that shook the Fir Cruthen:

“I will have the head of any who stand against the Tuatha Dé Danann.”

He unleashes the rite.

A torrent of silver flame erupts,

Crashing into Bane like the fist of a dying star.

Bane screams

Not in rage.

In fear.

Blood and divine essence burst from his skull.

As a burning silver hand

Etches itself into his brow

The mark of judgment.

The sign of his doom.