Nessos finished his roar, pivoted, and sprinted for the gate like an arrow slicing through rain. “Little thief! Where do you think you’re going!” Euticles sprang forward, bamboo sword raised, the blade shooting like a green lance. A chill like spilled frost ran down Nessos’s spine; he whipped around, both fists lifting to meet the strike.

Clang—! Fist met spear-point like thunder kissing steel, neither yielding, and the impact hurled them ten meters past the gate like leaves caught by a gust. Nessos didn’t counter; he detonated upward like a rocket and flew a dozen meters, every line screaming of escape.

Euticles watched that iron-willed back and felt a ripple of doubt, like a stone skipping on a dark pond. Before he could place it, a tide of terrified voices broke behind him like shattered surf.

“Ah! It’s that old monster!”

“Boss! Boss is ditching us?!”

The Mountain Bandits, stripped of their spine, sagged like trampled reeds. After seeing Euticles’s swordwork, none dared face him, especially now with both chief and captains gone like scattered crows.

“Elder—” Medith vaulted down from the wall like a falling blossom. Pain burned under her skin like banked coals; her last treatment only dulled it. But her resolve was a drawn bow. “Elder! Don’t let him run! If this man lives, he’ll return with ten times our foes and swallow us whole! He must die!”

Tat-tat-tat-tat— Melia, Rita, and Milia arrived like beating drums, and moments later Lina sprinted out, longbow in hand, like a crescent moon pulled taut.

“Sis… sister?” Tears flooded Rita’s eyes like a burst dam; she flung herself into Lina’s arms, ignoring the battlefield’s blazing storm. Lina stroked her hair, her own eyes wet like dew. “Enough. We’re still on the field. Cry later, cry till you’ve got no tears.”

“Mhm… mhm…” Rita sniffled, eyes shimmering like lake light. Medith and the others saw Lina and their eyes reddened like twilight clouds; even Medith had thought Lina dead. They didn’t know how, but joy rose like spring.

In a heartbeat Medith snapped back into a commander’s calm, like ice sealing a river. “Lita Sisters and Melia, back to the wall and rebuild the line. Milia, take the City Guard and the Elder’s fighters—kill every bandit inside. Leave no one.”

“The city’s under Iling and a host of battle-ready Sprites; the hearth won’t go cold. Kill—!”

“Yes—!” The troop moved like a flock wheeling to one mind.

Meanwhile, ding-ding-ding-ding— a strange chime rang from the sky like icicles clicking, and a phantom orange halo burst wide, racing to blanket two hundred meters outside the gate and all of Xurenxus City like a second sunrise.

Nessos had sprinted to a hundred and ninety-five meters, and at the last step slammed into that phantom ring like a bird into glass; the halo bounced him back several meters like a coiled spring.

“Damn it! Time’s up!” Fear flared in his eyes like lightning trapped in ice as he stared at the ring.

“Hahahaha! So that’s it! You didn’t ruin our barrier—you only muted it! Time’s up, you’re not getting out! Little thief, leave your life—” Euticles charged, joy bright as fire on his face, his sword thrusting at Nessos like a shooting star.

Nessos leapt several meters high, retreating like a startled stag. “You’re their leader?!” A lark-like cry rang behind him, but to his ears it was Death’s whisper through reeds; he raised a guard in a blur.

Ting— Nessos felt pressure crash into his bones like a meteor striking a bell. Thud— The ground under him sank into a pit like dough punched down. “Ah—ha—” He shoved both fists up, the razors on his knuckles skimming an exquisite woman’s chin by a hair’s breadth like a drawn thread.

Crack— She pressed her skirt’s hem, half-crouched like a hunting cat, eyes razor-cold as winter stars pinning Nessos in place.

He took in her armor and insignia like reading carved stone, then her face. “You’re Sais of the Elven Queen’s Royal Guard?”

“So you do know me. Talk. Where’d your intel come from?” Sais stayed crouched, twin blades spread like a hawk’s wings, gaze predatory.

Nessos held his tongue like a locked door. He lunged at Sais in a blur; Sais sprang like a loosed arrow, diving with both blades raised like twin scythes. He’d guessed it—he jumped and hammered both fists down like falling anvils.

Hiss— A wind kissed his cheek like a thin knife; he twisted aside, but a deep gash opened along his face like a red river. “Did you forget this old man?” Euticles lunged in, a stabbing thrust like a viper.

Nessos spun clear and opened a few meters like a sudden gorge. “An old fossil and a Royal Guard… don’t think that without that thing I can’t crack you.”

Bang—! His muscles swelled like coiled serpents, and hairline fractures webbed the earth like frost spreading; his weight seemed to multiply like lead poured into his bones, and his fists ballooned like iron mallets.

“What is that?!” Medith had just marshaled a detachment to rush the Strategist, and she wondered if it was her ignorance blooming like weeds. But Sais and the Elder wore the same stunned faces like statues struck by rain—Sais’s phoenix eyes wide as moons, mouth parted, and the Elder’s shock carved plain as chisel marks.

“Elder, should we strike first?” Sais’s brows knit like drawn bows, her stance braced as if facing a storm.

Even Euticles, seasoned by years like weathered stone, felt confounded as if mist swaddled the road. “Fall back!” He spared no explanations and sprinted for Medith like a gust.

Sais hesitated not; she vaulted skyward and flashed to Medith’s side like lightning changing hands.

“Haaah…” White vapor poured from Nessos’s mask like winter breath, wrapping him in a pale shroud. “Regido—” he bellowed, three syllables like runes without meaning.

Suddenly—rumble— the earth shuddered like a drum, the sky split like silk, and from his body burst a pillar of white that speared heaven like a glacier’s fang; the pure light smothered sight like noon sun on snow.

“—!” Medith and the others stared, as if lightning had struck their crowns. The pillar was pristine white, flawless as fresh jade, seeming to stand outside heaven and earth like a lone star; nothing of dust dared touch it.

Medith’s temples throbbed like hammers; pain climbed her skull like ivy at a ruin.

…

“…We lost…” The words fell in her mind like cold rain.

“A trap… it was a trap from the first step…” The thought curled like smoke.

“Medith… you must find it. Tell it everything. We will be defeated beyond doubt!” The plea rang like a bell in fog.

“So… all this was only… after all…” The sentence frayed like old silk.

“…their fate is in your hands now…” The weight settled like a stone on her palm.

“You, you’ve finally come to this point, haven’t you?” The voice smiled like a knife.

“We’ve been waiting.” The chorus breathed like the sea.

“Now, let it all return to the proper track.” The decree fell like a guillotine.

“What track?” Her heart stumbled like a deer.

“Toward…” The answer dissolved like rain.

…

“Medith! Medith!” Sais patted her cheeks like tapping a drumhead. Medith blinked back to herself, the voices draining away like tide; cold sweat soaked her like rain. The pillar still flickered, and above, clouds walled the sky like iron; lightning cracked and thunder rolled like a coming typhoon.

“Little one, are you alright?” Euticles’s concern was warm as a brazier; he eyed her pale face and the beaded sweat like pearls. Medith exhaled deep, wiping the chill from her skin like brushing frost.

Sais stroked her head, a touch light as a leaf. “Fall back. Leave the next part to us. The rabble behind aren’t done—go command.” Only now did Sais remember: this iron-blooded war-god was just a seventeen-year-old girl, a blade still bright with youth, and if the pillar rattled veterans black and blue, how could Medith not be shaken?

“I’m fine.” Medith gently pushed her hand away like parting curtains. “Sister’s right. This isn’t my battlefield, but I’ve got work to do. He’ll fight like a trapped beast; his counterattack will be savage as a cornered boar. Sister, Elder, be careful. Don’t grow careless.”

“Hah! In this long life, never thought a junior would warn this old man against carelessness. Youth’s fearsome like spring thunder… Rest easy. If I learned one thing, it’s that. Do what you must; we’ll guard your back like a wall.” Euticles watched the pillar fade like a dying star, resolve settling like bedrock.

“Good!” Medith swept her longsword up like a banner. “First Squad, with me! We’re punching out beyond the barrier!” She dashed forward, the troop flowing after like a river, and the barrier to them was a door ajar, a threshold they crossed at will.

ROAR—! Not long after she cleared the rim, a lion’s bellow split the air like a drumbeat from the hills. “Rrraaa—!” Two lion heads burst forth like forked lightning, spearing toward Medith. Thoom—! They smashed into the barrier and stopped like waves against a cliff. Medith stared—the heads were black-maned lions, their eyes bleeding dark miasma like smoke, danger radiating like heat.

Their jaws peeled back in a rictus, as if to gulp prey whole like a pit’s mouth. Crack— The barrier fissured like ice under a boot. “Ah!” Medith reeled; Nessos’s weapon had changed like a snake shedding skin, and it could batter the barrier itself like a ram.

…

“Strategist! Boss is trapped! Even that form can’t pierce the barrier!” A wolf-head captain gaped at Medith’s charge and Nessos’s plight, voice shaking like reeds.

“Strategist, what do we do? Do we ditch the Boss and run?” Panic fluttered like sparrows.

“Run… we should run…” Cowardice crept like mold.

“Yeah… that woman’s too strong. The whole plan’s scrambled like eggs…” Gripes buzzed like flies.

“Back then the Strategist’s plan sounded like poetry, so pretty, and now it’s a mess like spilled stew. Why?” Doubt swelled like a boil.

The Mountain Bandits churned like a pot at boil. They’d come on a surge of impulse like a flash flood, bonded only by stink, not by blood; seeing the tide turn, hearts for flight sprouted like weeds.

“Shut your mouths!” The Strategist’s roar ripped the air like a whip, piercingly sharp. “Anyone who breaks the line, I’ll crush him now!” He barked, and the wolf-head squad drew their weapons like drawn teeth, and the mob fell silent like smothered coals.

…

The shout tugged at a girl in the shadows like a fishhook; she remembered her officer’s orders and went taut as a bow. She drew a slender arrow long as a pale reed, the bowstring curving like a new moon.

…

“Out of my way!” The Strategist fished a silver orb from his tunic like a plucked pearl, strode to the front, and raised it high like a torch. “The plan hasn’t failed! We’ve got another hand! With this Silence Bomb we’ll bust out the Boss, then everyone withdraw—we’ll return one day and trample their city like thunder! Are you men or just petty thieves?”

“Men!”

“Awoooo—!” Howls rose like wolves at dusk, and the Strategist nodded, satisfied as a cat with cream. “Now! With me! We charge and pull the Boss out!”

“Awooo—awooo—!”

Blades flashed free like fish fins; the Mountain Bandits quivered to surge like a swollen river.

“Forward—!”

They began to move, feet drumming like rain.

Boom— The long-prepared arrow finally flew for the conspicuous dog-headed Strategist like a falcon stooping.

“Ah—ambush—shields—!” Several wolf-head captains reacted, heavy shields lifting like iron doors.

Woooo—shing— The arrow tore the long sky like cloth, then swelled into a Cyclone that pressed down like a falling mountain.

“Ah—!” The wind sucked the air dry like a bellows in reverse, then collapsed into an invisible wall that slammed down like a god’s palm.

“We will—surely—win—” The Strategist sensed it too late; pressure crushed him like a meteor falling on his chest, and darkness swallowed him like a tide.

KRAK—! A ten-meter sphere of force bloomed from the arrow like a white-hot sun, and within it the Strategist and dozens of Mountain Bandits were flattened like pressed leaves; the ground sank five centimeters like soft clay, and blood and bone squeezed outward like pulp, leaving a pit as grotesque as a butchered altar.

“Ah…” A bandit who hadn’t run far froze, face gone blank like a wiped slate.

“Stra—”

“Strategist—!”