The wild wind over the flats rose sharp, like knives skimming the grass.

Lance began his casting, rings of azure mana flaring out one after another.

Sir Mervyn—called the “General”—had been cowed by Lance’s momentum, yet he kept his composure.

He saw Lance preparing a spell. He set his stance to counter and sneered, cold as iron. “Kid, you forget? Spells don’t work on a Sky Rank Knight.”

“I know.”

As his words fell, the chant finished—a Level-5 Elemental, a mid-tier spell: Fog of War.

A clear horizon drowned in thick mist within a heartbeat.

Visibility collapsed. Soldiers lost contact. Travelers on the road saw nothing of what unfolded.

Naturally, before the “General,” the knight youth’s silhouette vanished as the fog diffused.

“Trying to flee? Useless!”

The “General” let his voice ring and ignited his Battle Aura.

A Sky Knight’s aura needs no praise. The instant it flared, air went screaming, nearby waters rippled, the earth quivered. It felt like the world itself cheered. A final bolt fell, and the “General” wore a pale-golden nimbus of Battle Aura.

With that blazing halo, he stood in the typical battle form of a Sky Knight.

In form, Sir Mervyn opened his aura-sense. He quickly fixed Lance’s position in the fog.

“Watch me crush you!” the Sky Rank Knight declared and surged forward.

“You’re wrong,” Lance murmured.

When the fog hid him completely and the murk was dense enough to smother all sight, Lance loosed Dual Incarnation.

The knight youth in the mist dissolved like vapor—then gathered again.

“Because I’m the one who’ll crush you,” Fulin said as she stepped out of the haze.

“What!?” Sir Mervyn felt the aura source vanish. He stopped, startled.

Instinct caught a foul wind and a blurred yet undeniable sense of peril.

The threat hit him hard. His whole body shivered.

It was a feeling from long ago—when he faced imperial high knights, or elder Blood Clan and awakened demonfolk from the Shadowspirit Legion.

The first scenario was impossible. Since the Dark Spirit invasion that shook all Nordland decades ago, the Empire didn’t send troops to the front unless for major campaigns.

As for the second, a thought flashed. Had the Shadowspirit Legion bypassed the coastline? Had Midway Port fallen?

He didn’t ask his foe. He asked himself and answered with steel.

The moment he sensed Lance’s aura gone and another power rising, he flared his Battle Aura higher and hurled a technique at that source.

First came Woundfear Blade, his signature strike.

A vast, tangible sweep forged of surging aura—a blow that could shatter a host of ten thousand.

A lethal arc rolled toward Fulin, harsher than what he’d thrown at Lance, and struck true.

Yet seconds passed. The source didn’t waver.

Had it been unraveled? the “General” thought, doubt creeping in.

“Then take this!” He cut off thought and launched the next technique.

Piercing Mirage—his other signature.

He crushed his aura to the limit between his hands, then drove it forward, unleashing a torrent that pierced everything along its path.

Again, he felt that clean, solid hit.

A true hit should destroy the target.

So why did the source still stand, not dimmed, not wounded?

Impossible. It’s impossible! Sir Mervyn roared inside.

“Let me see what you really are!”

He leapt and hung in the air, then shot toward the airborne source. That’s when he heard—

“Alright. My turn.”

Fulin cast the Arcane Mage’s hallmark arcana.

In Legend of Dawn, the late-game, core-caster class Arcane Mage fights in three output modes.

First, Quickcast Magic—almost instant, slinging low-tier spells without even raising a hand.

She didn’t pick it. One volley might not end him.

Second, Counter Magic—also instant, and it can fire mid-tier or higher. But the enemy must cast a spell or use a time-gated skill to trigger it.

In fact, she’d planned to use Counter Magic.

Twice, though, Sir Mervyn’s attacks weren’t judged as “skills.” The trigger failed.

“Is it some Talent?” Fulin considered, but time was gone. She chose the highest mode.

Ultimate Arcana—an output mode that lets an Arcane Mage cast high-tier and even legendary spells beyond that tier.

To be sure, Fulin chose the latter—a wide-area flame that erases all within sight.

Starfall Flame.

She raised her right hand. One finger pointed up. Above, the void pooled an endless, fathomless fire.

“Be destroyed,” she breathed, and tossed the doomfire down with ease.

“What—?!” Sir Mervyn hadn’t closed the gap yet. A sun-sized fireball surged toward him.

It flew slow. He tried to dodge. No use.

It exploded before it arrived.

Boom.

A cataclysm of flame. A wave of heat that crushed breath. A deafening thunder that swallowed thought. No one at the pass was spared.

The map, erased. A landslide’s maw. The crescent of the pass razed flat.

“What happened?!” Two Earth Rank Knights from the Committee arrived late.

Here’s why—

Mid-plan, they found the mage corps more heavily guarded than expected. Abel changed the plan. The two Earth Rank Knights who were meant to assassinate the “General” took black crystals—Earth Mother’s Tears—to cripple the mages. Abel and others would watch the scene. But they were seized by the “General’s” guards. The plan unraveled.

The Committee’s two Earth Rank Knights assumed failure. They were turning to leave, hearts heavy, when Crescent Pass erupted beyond belief.

They saw only desolation—and a battered knight youth clawing his way out from under fallen stone.

“You’re the Blazing Fire Knight?!” Joy and shock struck the two Earth Rank Knights at once.

They knew at once—the “General” had been defeated.

But how? And where was Abel?

Lance said, “Mr. Abel used another Earth Mother’s Tear to trigger that blast. He fell heroically at the end. He completed the mission beautifully.”

There was no “other Tear.” Yet Lance’s performance was flawless. The Earth Rank Knights believed and wept, moved to the core.

“And—”

If the first line was a cover, the next was for something else.

“Before he sacrificed himself, Mr. Abel left a wish—”

“That the Republic might one day let everyone live in peace and happiness, without more blood,” Lance said, pointing at the ruins.

The Committee often achieves its aims through blood. A cadre wouldn’t say that. But—

“So we’ve been wrong all along…” The two Earth Rank Knights turned and looked at the scarred land, heads bowed, grief heavy.

Lance, shameless and gentle, said, “It’s not too late to change. Besides, didn’t you succeed?”

They straightened.

One knight called, “Yes. We did it.”

The other vowed to Lance, “We’ll pursue peaceful forms of movement from now on.”

They thanked him deeply.

Rain came, hard and sudden. On ravaged earth, green began to bud.

With Crescent Pass resolved, Lance’s company returned to the road.

The Committee provided a wagon.

On board, Yuna kept glancing back through the window—back at the ruins left by that upheaval. Worry clung to her voice. “Master, is this really right?”

Lance stayed breezy, eyes on the blue sky and white clouds that show only after rain. “Judge by results. Don’t drown in process and meaning.”

Vielrit munched local comfort snacks, full of praise. “As expected of the Blazing Fire Knight~~”

Crick found new faith. “With the Knight leading us, we’ll succeed.”

Though all of this was for Fulin’s goal—only for her—

The role of “Lance” had to be for everyone, even if it wasn’t heartfelt.

So Lance kept their spirits high. “Yes, we’ll succeed. Believe it—at the end of the road, success is waiting!”

Even Celestial Spirits who scorned human social games chimed in.

“The knight’s right!”

“Yeah, yeah~~!”

Singing carried them on, and the distance to Midway Port shrank.

The end of the journey felt closer with each mile.

Closer to the front, soldiers thickened along the road. More than there should’ve been. They were questioned in passing, but the wagon rolled through without trouble.

“We’re here. This is Midway Port, Valtan,” the driver told them before a well-ordered city.

“By United Legions regulations, wagons can’t enter Valtan. I’ll wait here.” They agreed and stepped down.

Valtan, a critical resupply city, was under strict United Legions governance. The order surpassed expectation.

You felt that order at the gate.

“From where, going where? What’s your home? Can you read? Purpose?” The officers examined every entrant without fail, Lance’s group included.

“Mm, mm. Blazing Fire Knight of the Kingdom. Those behind you are Celestial Spirits. They can go straight. Your name is—”

They said it mechanically, even to Lance. No special treatment. Until his name.

“Lance Morrison. Something wrong?” Lance said, casual.

The officers’ faces changed. They looked at each other. A superior in their uniform came over.

“Report?” He was casual too—until the name “Lance Morrison,” and the matter of a group of Celestial Spirits. His face shifted fast.

He approached Lance and bowed. “Mr. Lance, would you come with us?”

Lance’s companions looked uneasy. The officer assured them, “Don’t worry. We’ll arrange lodging for you.”

Lance felt no ill intent. “Go with them. I’ll be back soon.”

They rode a military carriage—a kind of war chariot. Streets had been smoothed to keep chariots from tearing them up, so the avenues shone clean.

On the chariot, you could feel the reverent eyes of passersby.

The officer spoke with pride. “This is a city under our management.”

“It’s impressive. Balancing war and governance must be rough,” Lance replied, polite and light.

“For Nordland,” the officer said, voice bright with honor. “We can do even more.”

That attitude moved Lance, like a breeze after rain.

No wonder. Since Fulin started wearing Lance’s face, every “soldier” she’d met was a bandit or a warlord, and an upright one like this was a clear moon after storm.

“We’re here.” The armored car thudded to a stop before a mansion, an iron beetle settling under stone eaves.

It was a mansion in name, but it screamed requisitioned. Ornate walls wore plain, stout braces like wooden ribs; cheval-de-frise and barbed wire sprawled before the gilded gate like thorny vines; makeshift watchtowers stood on both sides like bare trees.

Sentries saw the car, stepped up to question it, then snapped salutes like blades flashing, and swung the door open.

“Off you go.” The officer himself opened it for Lance, who looked tight as a bowstring.

The fault wasn’t Lance’s, nor the actress Fulin’s. In this life or the last, she’d never stepped inside a military building; she’d only seen them on TV, and by the script, places like this usually blew up soon after.

She put the nonsense aside and climbed down, breath steadying like ripples settling. “Pardon me, and thank you.”

The officer’s eyes held a strange blend of fondness, satisfaction, and surprise, a lantern’s warm halo in a draft. “Mm. Let’s go.”

They went in, crossing from sun into shade like stepping under a temple gate.

Inside, officers and soldiers hustled through scuffed corridors, footprints stamped like muddy leaves. They ran light-footed, ferrying orders up and down like swallows trading calls, drowning in paperwork like reeds in flood.

After a bath of salutes and a tide of stares, Lance followed the officer to the mansion’s deepest room.

“Go on.” He pointed at the door and held it open, a palm cutting the air like a fan.

It had been the master’s bedroom; now silk had given way to steel, and it breathed like a war-room.

The windows were boarded and nailed, reinforced with arcane materials, turning the light cave-dim.

Only one pendant lamp burned overhead, a pale sun. Beneath it sprawled a broad table, covered edge to edge with stitched parchments, a tactical map like a river delta; unit flags and charcoal sticks lay scattered like feathers and coals.

Several officers in the same uniform ringed the map, voices pecking one after another like sparrows over grain. Every face looked singed by worry, like cooks over a smokey hearth.

Tired as they were, they still noticed the newcomers fast, deer flicking an ear at a twig-snap.

The officer threaded through them and halted before the man at the center. He saluted, spine straight as a spear. “Reporting, Lance Morrison has been brought.”

Murmurs rose like wind through grass.

“What? That’s him?”

“Doesn’t look it…”

“Why now of all times? A few days ago, he—”

The central man spun his chair, and the whispers snapped shut like a lid. He faced the room, and Lance, then stood and clapped a hand to Lance’s shoulder, a solid thump like knuckles on oak.

“Well, Lance. Long time. You’ve gotten strong.” Lance’s father in name, the Golden Eagle Legion’s Legion Commander—the Steelheart Knight—spoke with no distance at all, his eyes measuring like a smith sighting a blade.