The moment Sebastian stepped forward, he lifted one hand and fire erupted in a sweeping, circular surge around the clearing, an expanding wall of molten-orange flame that rose higher than the trees themselves. It didn't behave like ordinary fire, it was curling upward in spirals, forming a flame barrier that sealed the Scoia'tael and Redanians apart.
Heat rolled outward in crushing waves, leaves ignited and branches cracked and hissed as sap boiled within them.
The Redanian line staggered back instantly.
"What the hell is that?!" one soldier shouted, stumbling away from the advancing flames.
"Fall back.. FALL BACK!" another barked, voice cracking.
"That's not witcher sorcery, what the fuck is that?!"
A third man raised his crossbow instinctively, then hesitated as the fire wall towered higher, swallowing his entire vision.
"Is that a demon?!"
"Do witchers do this?!"
The captain himself didn't know what to say.
Behind the barrier, Faelorn stood frozen for a moment, bow lowered slightly as even he stared at the impossible sight.
"…So much for capturing him," he muttered in disbelief. "The bastard was one step away from butchering us himself."
Yarvik let out a low, impressed whistle.
"Well I'll be damned," the dwarf said, gripping his axe tighter. "That's a walking siege engine."
The female elf, who had captured Sebastian didn't speak at first.
Her eyes were locked on the fire wall, on the way it emerged from him.
"…He really let me capture him, how foolish I was.." she whispered, almost disbelieving.
Faelorn glanced at her briefly.
"Are you really thinking about that now?"
She didn't answer.
On the other side of the inferno, Sebastian stood alone.
The fire reflected in his golden eyes, painting him in shifting orange light.
Then he turned his head slightly.
"Stay here."
He wasn't waiting for agreement.
Faelorn opened his mouth, but Sebastian had already stepped forward.
Into the flames.
The Scoia'tael behind him tensed instantly.
"Wait!" Yarvik started.
"Let him go, It's not that we can stop him, this damn witcher is a mystery." Faelorn said quietly, eyes narrowing.
Inside the burning ring, the Redanians saw him emerge through the fire like a shadow ,some of them instinctively fired.
Crossbow bolts ripped through the air and passed straight through him.
No blood.
No impact.
Just the faint distortion of flame bending around his body as the projectiles disintegrated mid-flight into ash. "What the?!" a soldier shouted, backing away. "Fucking hell! I'm sure I didn't miss!"
"He's no regular mutant!"
Sebastian walked forward slowly, blade already drawn.
Steel glowing faintly from his own flames, but now even that seemed secondary, his body itself unleashed an unnatural heat.
A Redanian soldier charged him first.
Sword raised and a panicked shout tearing from his throat.
Sebastian sidestepped once.
A single smooth move and his blade came up,
A simple quick cut.
The soldier froze mid-step, then collapsed without finishing his momentum.
Two movements total.
Nothing more. Then another man lunged from the side.
Sebastian didn't even look at him.
He pivoted slightly, parried the strike with the flat of his blade, and a counter followed immediately.
A controlled, precise slash across the attacker's center mass, the soldier dropped before he even understood he had lost.
Behind them, someone screamed.
"FORM UP! DON'T LET HIM CLOSE!"
But Sebastian was already close enough, moving between them like smoke.
A third soldier thrust wildly.
Sebastian tilted his head slightly, letting the blade pass inches from his shoulder.
Then he tapped the man's wrist once with his sword, the weapon fell.
A second tap to the chest.
The soldier dropped to his knees, stunned, breath knocked out of him.
Sebastian stepped past him without even looking back.
"Hold him down for fuck sake!" someone yelled desperately.
Three crossbows fired at once.
The bolts screamed through the air, and dissolved into sparks as they reached him, swallowed by the heat radiating from his body alone.
One soldier froze in horror.
"What kind of witcher is this…?!"
Sebastian expression was detached, almost bored as he ignored their screams. He moved again.
One step, then another.
Each movement he made ended a life.
A slash to disarm, a pivot to avoid a panicked swing, a backhand strike to knock a man dead before he could scream
There was no anger on his face just sheer focus on the task that is killing the redanian soldiers now, and behind the flames, Faelorn watched in silence, jaw slightly tight now.
Yarvik exhaled slowly.
"…Remind me never to piss him off."
The female elf whispered again, almost reverent now:
"I've never seen someone fight like this…"
Faelorn finished the thought quietly.
"…I'm afraid he's fighting while still holding back."
Inside the inferno, Sebastian stopped for a brief moment.
The Redanian line had broken completely.
Some were even trying to run, but none were succeeding.
He lowered his blade slightly, watching them scatter.
A soldier lunged desperately from the side,
Sebastian ended it with a single step and a short, efficient strike.
Sebastian stood untouched by flame, and behind him, the forest burned a living ring of orange and white heat that turned the forest into a collapsing halo of ash and light.
Still the Redanians felt like there was no way out of this without killing the Witcher, a soldier charged in blind desperation, blade raised high, shouting something that vanished instantly into the roar of flame.
Sebastian's steel sword came up in a clean, minimal arc.
Steel met armor, armor met flame.
And in the same moment the man collapsed, his scream catching late as the flame on the blade transferred like a curse through metal and flesh alike. He hit the ground still burning, writhing once before silence took him.
Another tried from the side, they came together now, desperation taking over their senses, steel flashing, boots breaking through burning leaves, crossbows firing wildly into heat and smoke.
Sebastian didn't retreat. One soldier's sword arm was severed mid-swing, the wound immediately cauterizing into burning ruin before the man even understood what had happened.
Another was struck in the chest, lifted half a step off the ground by the force of the blow, then dropped as fire crawled through his armor.
A third tried to scream an order, Sebastian closed the distance and ended it with a short, precise cut across the throat, flame burning the wound.
Ash was falling like black snow in the forest.
Then panic broke completely within the few remaining redanians.
"RUN!"
"THE BASTARD IS A DEMON!"
"GET BACK GET BACK!"
But there was nowhere back.
Only fire, and only him.
Sebastian moved through them like he just stopped pretending to be merciful.
Until only one voice remained above the chaos.
The captain.
He was no longer commanding anything.
He was crawling on the ground, armor half-melted, one gauntlet gone, his face smeared with soot and terror as he dragged himself backward through burning grass.
"No...no, please.. please I didn't!"
Sebastian followed him while walking, the flames behind him painted him in shifting gold and red, until he no longer looked entirely like a man.
The captain saw him.
And froze, because what approached him was no longer a witcher.
To him it was death.
"PLEASE!" the captain screamed, voice cracking, almost animal like. "Mercy! I...orders! I was following orders!"
Sebastian stepped closer, slowly and the captain tried to crawl faster.
Sebastian tilted his head slightly.
Then, he said calm as ever, "Did you spare them when they begged for their life?"
The captain didn't answer.
He didn't even seem to hear what Seb said.
He was only shaking, only pleading.
"PLEASE! I HAVE GOLD... I HAVE PLEASE!"
Sebastian looked down at him for a long moment, then spoke again.
"I figured as much."
A single step forward.
The captain screamed as Sebastian severed one of his legs in a clean cut.
The man collapsed into the dirt, dragging himself back instinctively, leaving a trail through ash and blood.
"NO NO PLEASE, PLEASE I CAN!"
Sebastian did not listen, and raised his sword, for a brief second, the fire around them dimmed and The captain's eyes locked onto him,
And he saw it coming.
"PLEASE!"
Sebastian drove the blade straight through his mouth.
The scream ended mid-breath.
Flame crawled up the sword for a moment, then silence returned.
Only the sound of flames burning the forest remained.
Outside the barrier, Faelorn stood completely frozen, the flicker of firelight beyond the flames painted fragmented images across the smoke, shadows of men falling, silhouettes collapsing, sparks bursting.
Yarvik had lowered his axe without realizing it.
"Duvvelsheyss..." the dwarf muttered.
Then he said quietly, "He would've done that to us if we… fuck."
He swallowed.
"I can't even imagine it."
The female elf's bow hung loosely in her hand now.
Her eyes stayed fixed on the fire.
"…I've never seen any witcher, let alone a witcher kill," she whispered. "If they are all like this... no wonder the humans conquered us so easily."
Faelorn exhaled slowly through his nose, "No, don't be a fool." he said at last.
"I never heard of a Witcher than can use this level sorcery, this Witcher is probably unique."
A gust of heat rolled through the trees as another distant scream cut off inside the flames.
Yarvik finally looked away.
"I'll just act nicely with him once this is over."
/-\
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