A freezing northern rain lashed against the obsidian spires and bronze domes of Alika City, drowning the imperial capital in a shroud of gray mist.
At midnight, the great iron bell of the Central Citadel began to toll, its heavy, mournful strikes echoing across the cobblestone avenues.
Torches flickered through the fog as heavily armored regiments marched through the city gates, their iron boots drumming a grim rhythm against the wet stone.
These were not standard imperial city guards on routine patrol.
These were General Senraki's elite frontier shock troops, clad in dark plate and bearing the sigil of the iron coiled serpent.
Within less than an hour, every communications tower, granary, and imperial armory in the capital had been systematically seized without a single horn blast sounding an alarm.
