"Hey, hey, there is no way we can fight something like this with technology." Victor pressed his forehead to the hoverjet's cold window, a horrified look fixed on his face as the truth settled in. Outside, the Blood Dragon loomed through the shuddering darkness, its hide a living furnace of red seams and pulsing veins.

His blood-red eyes caught the creature's glow and tightened, as if something inside him knelt of its own will. His resolve thinned, crumbling before the urge to fight could even take shape.

Earlier, before the monster showed itself, when they had taken position to strike under cover of darkness, Adyr's voice had cut through the radio on a bed of heavy static and interference.

He gave the order to cancel the mission. The words were clear enough to obey but vague enough to confuse them. Even so, they were soldiers, and they withdrew from the area.

Now, faced with the reason for that cancellation, they felt a sharp relief that they had retreated before the invisible pressure outside could grind them to scrap.

Inside the cabin, red emergency lights stuttered to life and died and flared again, painting every face in flashes. The hull trembled in a deep, uneven rhythm, rivets buzzing, and floorplates thrumming underfoot, as if the hoverjet were about to lose power and drop like a stone.

As soon as the Blood Dragon showed, their comm rigs cut out. A little later, its red electric beam hit, and all hoverjets flashed the same error together, then collapsed into failure as the displays filled with static and warning symbols.

They were far from the strike zone, but it was still enough to knock out almost all functions and send them crashing.

"Sir, reporting." A soldier in an STF uniform stepped out of the cockpit and strode down the narrow aisle. He stopped in front of Rhys and Selina and snapped to a salute.

"Go on." Rhys gave a hard nod, gaze still pinned to the window where the night buckled and rippled around the distant monster.

"All hoverjets are experiencing technical malfunctions," the soldier said without wasting a breath. "AI and radars are offline. We stabilized engines manually. A full damage assessment is in progress."

Selina's brows drew together, the lines at her eyes sharpening as she measured the risk. "What about communications? Can we reach Adyr?"

She already understood the scale. This was beyond interference. They could not even witness the fight without paying for it. If they drew closer to that Rank 4 Spark, the unknown energy would tear through their engines and cook them where they stood.

At the question, everyone in the cabin-Eren, Dalin, and Evangeline included- fixed on the answer

In a situation like this, with their technology failing and everyone effectively blind, only Adyr could command them, reading the field and moving the pieces. He alone had the full picture and the authority to act.

"Negative." The soldier shook his head once. "We are trying to restore signals, but they look burned out from overload. We cannot repair them without returning to Headquarters."

Rhys let out a slow breath. "So we are as blind as a mole in this war." He thought a second, then made the call. "Prepare to pull back to the Pacthold. If we get nothing from Adyr, we leave in 30 minutes. There is nothing more we can do here."

They had already built a hidden shelter and a hangar in the Pacthold. The only sane path now was to return and repair the hoverjets.

"What about Adyr? Are you saying we leave him behind?" Eren rose from his seat. His frame towered over everyone in the cabin. The message in his posture was clear. He did not like that order.

Rhys glanced at him from the corner of his eye and did not yield an inch. "Sit back, big guy."

"Sorry, but the idea of running doesn't please me either." Dalin Ravencourt's voice cut in sharply. She leaned forward, her fiery eyes locked on Rhys, reading his order as fear.

Rhys's brows clenched. He was the highest authority here, and it showed how little he liked an open challenge.

He was about to reprimand them for breaking military order, but before he spoke, another voice joined in.

"I agree with Commander Rhys's decision," Selina said calmly, making a few faces flinch.

"Hey, hey, are you for real?" Victor stared at her. "We are talking about Adyr. You want us to leave him and run? Bullshit."

The cabin thickened with heat and words that had not yet been spoken. Logic lined up on one side, emotion on the other, and the two began to grind.

Selina did not raise her voice. "His last order was to retreat before the signal was lost. We will obey that order." She let the sentence hang a moment and then finished it cleanly. "Staying only creates more problems for him. I am sure he already has a plan, and we will believe in him and follow it."

Her absolute belief in him made everyone fall silent. Even in a situation like this, she believed Adyr was in control.

Rhys, seeing the calm return, turned back to the soldier who still waited. "Proceed with my order."

"Understood, Commander." The soldier pivoted for the cockpit. But before he reached it, something rapped against the hoverjet's side door, making everyone

pause.

"What is that?" Victor craned toward the window, trying to find the source.

He caught a dark figure hovering outside in the red flicker and the faint wash of engine glow. He blinked, then burst with excitement: "Open the side door...

He's back!"

Adyr hung in the air, wings idling in smooth strokes, knocking the door as if he'd come to a neighbor's house.

The latch turned, and the door slid open, letting a wash of cold air pour in while Adyr stepped through, folding his wings tight so the cramped cabin wouldn't

feel any smaller.

Relief swept through the cabin at the sight of him unharmed, and everyone

loosened for a moment.

"The situation doesn't look great, does it?" Adyr let out a brief laugh, noting the mix of tension and relief on their faces.

"Dude, what do you mean 'doesn't look great? There is a fucking Godzilla outside. We were about to run and leave you behind." Victor thumped Adyr's bare back with a few loud pats, the cabin answering with sharp, echoing slaps.

"Yeah, yeah, I wasn't expecting that either." Adyr kept the smile, but a grimness seeped in. "It looks like Sevrak sacrificed every living being in his kingdom to empower his Dragon."

The words sucked the air out of the chests, making them forget to breathe. "What kind of man would kill his whole race?" Victor whispered, stunned. The silence that followed answered him, and he felt how naive his words sounded. "So what are we doing now? Retreat?" Dalin asked. Now that Adyr had returned, the decision looked easy. They could run, with nothing tying them

here.

Adyr's answer cut that path cleanly. "Retreat? No, no, we do not have that option anymore."

From the small window, he watched the Blood Dragon in the distance and decided there was only a single path they could take now.