Reincarnated Lord: I can upgrade everything!

At high noon, the skies were bright and cloudless, but Asher felt something stir.

It began with a breeze, gentle, almost playful, as it rustled through the Whitewood canopy overhead. He paid it no mind at first. But soon, that breeze grew stronger, and then stronger still, shifting from a whisper to a steady force, as though the very air was being drawn from one single, unnatural direction.

Ahead, the hill loomed, shaped like an eagle's beak, its steep ridgeline slicing into the sky. According to Kaelor, once they crested that hill, the Wolf King's den would be in plain sight. But whatever awaited them on the other side was not waiting patiently.

The wind howled louder, but still, it wasn't enough to stop the march. They pressed forward through the trees, their boots crunching fallen leaves, their armor clinking in rhythmic unison. The rustling of the Whitewood leaves above turned into frantic flutters, like a thousand tiny flags screaming a silent alarm.

And then, without warning, It hit.

A monstrous wind roared down upon them like the wrath of the heavens. It howled through the forest like a beast unchained, carrying with it a cloud of dust and sand so dense it blotted out the sun. It struck like a wall, flattening trees, lifting cloaks, and tearing branches free.

Asher's eyes widened. He had never felt a force like this.

He barely had time to react. With a guttural shout, he plunged his sword into the earth and dropped to one knee, anchoring himself. His coat whipped violently behind him, hair lashing across his face as he pressed down hard to avoid being lifted off the ground. The air was thick with grit. Stones pelted his gambeson. Breathing became agony.

Around him, men and minotaurs alike struggled. Soldiers cried out as they slipped, tumbling backwards, boots dragging grooves into the ground. Some minotaurs, strong as they were, lost their footing entirely, flung through the air like broken dolls.

A few slammed into trees that then tore free from the ground with a deafening crack, their massive roots spiraling into the sky.

It was chaos.

One by one, towering trees were uprooted, hurled away like twigs by the storm's wrath. Their trunks snapped mid-air with thunderous crashes, taking unfortunate warriors with them. The battlefield had become a tempest of flying debris and screams.

"What is going on?!" Asher shouted in his mind, shielding his face. Blood trickled from a cut above his brow where a stone had struck him.

Then came the thunder, not from the sky, but from the hill.

A deep rumble echoed through the wind. Asher tilted his head just enough to see them.

Wolves.

Hundreds of them. Descending like specters of death, their shadows slicing through the dying storm. They fell from the hilltop in perfect unison, as if the gale had only been their herald.

Each warrior was massive, two meters tall at least, with the heads of wolves and the muscular bodies of men. Their bare chests rippled with power, cloaked only in war-skirts laced with steel plating and the golden furs of lions. One-handed axes gleamed in their grasp, fangs bared in savage anticipation.

The first wave landed hard, directly on the exhausted minotaurs. The impact of their descent kicked up clouds of shattered leaves and dust, but their fury was not dampened by the landing. They struck with merciless precision, their blades carving down toward necks and joints.

But the minotaurs were no prey.

Though winded, bruised, and shaken, they were clad in adamantine, an Eden-origin ore known for its unbeatable durability and immense weight. The wolves' axes rang out in sparks as they collided with those black-and-gold plates, leaving only shallow white gashes.

Then the Minotaurs roared back.

The ground shook as they surged upward, great axes cleaving in wide arcs. The wolves were quick, but the Minotaurs were mountains, each swing shattering bone, splitting steel, and turning bodies to pulp.

Blood sprayed the air like mist. The clearing became a maelstrom of violence and death.

Still, the wolves kept coming.

From the hilltops above, wave after wave descended, howling like demons, their numbers seemingly endless. They came not as scouts, but as a hidden reserve, an entire enclave of elite Wolf King warriors unleashed without mercy.

Asher stood amid it all, sword in hand, his eyes narrowed. This wasn't what he wanted, not in the slightest.

Asher's body surged with power, muscles expanding, veins bulging and coiling beneath his skin like molten cords. His height climbed rapidly until he stood at ten feet tall, a towering figure. With a single sweep of his sword, six wolves were cleaved down, their bodies folding mid-air like broken dolls, but his face remained still.

He didn't linger.

In one fluid motion, he bent his knees and launched into the air, his form a streak of silver and black as he soared over the hill's edge, the wind rippling around him. He landed at the summit in a crouch, the earth cracking beneath his feet.

What he saw made his grip on his blade tighten.

Below him, stretching across the basin like a living tide, was an army. No, two armies, united under a single banner.

Behind the kings stood a sea of wolves, each standing at 2.6 meters, clad head-to-toe in gleaming heavy silver armor, wielding axes built for cleaving through even minotaur plate. These were no mere foot soldiers. These were the veterans, elites, bred for slaughter. The shock troops Asher had fought were merely their front wave.

Flanking them were the Werelions and they were something else entirely.

The males stood at three meters tall, with thick braided manes that ran down to their chests, broad chests left bare to showcase their hardened, scarred flesh. Their bodies were forged in battle and survival.

But the real spectacle were the lionesses, over 2.5 meters tall, their athletic forms wrapped in leather and iron: leather wraps over their chests fastened with crescent-shaped metal clasps, battle skirts woven for movement. Twin curved swords hung from each hip, their hilts gripped like they were part of their very limbs. They moved with the elegance of dancers and the lethality of assassins.

They wore no armor, not because they lacked it, but because they didn't need it. Their skin, Asher sensed, was like a tempered hide, hard as iron, yet supple enough to move with deadly grace. Their pride lay in agility, precision, and a warrior's honor. Their scars weren't hidden, they were displayed like medals.

One force, the wolves, moved in coordinated formations, a mechanical war machine of rotating axe bearers.

The other, the werelions, relied on skill, speed, and instincts honed through ritual combat and generations of brutal survival.

Together, they were terrifying. Together, they could raze a kingdom.

Even Asher, empowered and transformed, felt the weight of their might pressing on his shoulders like gravity thickening with every heartbeat. His breath slowed. His pulse tightened.

But still, it wasn't the armies that troubled him most.

It was those two kings.

He could feel it in the marrow of his bones. A presence. A power ancient and wild. Each of them could stand against thousands. Each had mastered their bloodline's path to the pinnacle. And both of them now looked up, directly at him.

The air turned cold.

The Werelion King exuded the aura of a battle-hardened monarch who has earned his throne through both ferocity and wisdom. His leonine face is framed by a mane of golden dreadlocks, braided with bones, fangs, and war totems that speak of ancestral glory and conquests. His piercing eyes gleam with ancient knowledge and regal pride, betraying the mind of a ruler, not just a beast.

He wore a mantle of thick fur draped over his shoulders, part armor, part cloak, made from the hide of an extinct behemoth. His muscular frame, clad in bone-forged armor, jagged and primal, adorned with trophies of fallen foes. His right arm, almost entirely encased in a monstrous skull pauldron and clawed gauntlet, a fusion of beast and war-gear, giving the impression of a living war god.

If the Werelion King is a sovereign of dignity and primal wisdom, the Wolf King was fury given form.

He was taller, leaner, and sharper, built for war. His snarl was ever-present, his eyes filled with cunning and bloodlust. A true apex predator draped in savagery.

He wore a grisly mantle of fur and bones, with a lion's pelt across his shoulder, perhaps a trophy from a former challenger or rival. The armour was mismatched but deadly effective, combining steel, leather, and bone. Spikes protrude from his back, adorned with blood-red banners and spears, a mobile warning to all who dare challenge him.

Clutched in his hand was a double-bladed axe, curved like a crescent moon, etched with war runes. His gauntlets are clawed, his feet bare, more beast than man. Unlike the Werelion King, who walks with command, the Wolf King was a beast of war.

"So," Kael'Zheran said, voice deep as a canyon, "you are the one that took Kaelor's ring. Tell me, what made him bend the knee to a human?"