Max and his associates are forced to leave their hideouts and press ever deeper into Ileria, fleeing the advance of Alus’s troops. They don’t yet know that the threat they’re running from will disappear very soon in a clash with demons rushing to Earth through the intermediate Gates of Slyss. While it still hasn’t occurred to them that they will be the last line of defense— the only ones capable of stopping the creations of infernal marshes and preventing them from flooding the world with blood—will they manage to hold out? And at what cost?