"Hyah!"
Another clean slash from Djeeta cut down a monster, and without stopping she rushed forward, pushing the group closer to the factory.
The others followed right behind her, cutting down every monster in their path. Even Stan, after finishing the monsters behind him, was now moving forward with the determination to catch up.
Djeeta kept slashing, dodging, and using monster bodies as stepping stones, killing another enemy every time she moved.
They were getting close—so close that Djeeta gathered more energy into her blade the moment she saw the final stretch.
"Reginleiv: Recidive!"
She swung her sword, sending multiple waves of energy slashing forward, left, and right.
Every monster in front of her was instantly sliced clean in half, clearing a wide path straight to the factory.
"C'mon everyone! I cleared a path for us!"
She called out and sprinted ahead, everyone running after her.
"Djeeta, the factory is protected by a magic barrier," Katalina warned as soon as she sensed the mana circulating around the structure.
"I know."
Djeeta closed her eyes, feeling the strong strength of the barrier.
It was much stronger than normal barrier, it's really obvious why because Aviza need strong barrier to protect the factory from all the monsters.
She could break it, but if they wasted too much time here, the monsters around them would surround them again.
"Boundary…"
Her eyes opened.
The warm brown color vanished—replaced by glowing blue, filled with Boundary Power.
"Vorpal Blade!"
She jumped high into the air and delivered one powerful downward slash.
A clean cut tore through the barrier.
"Everyone, get in!"
They rushed inside the factory, and as soon as they were in, Djeeta reached back toward the sliced barrier.
"Ughhh—!"
She grunted, gripping the edges of the broken mana with her bare hands.
It was something normal people could never do—grabbing a barrier made of mana, something that shouldn't even have a physical form.
But Djeeta wasn't normal.
not with the Boundary's power flowing through her.
With one last push—
Click.
The barrier sealed itself shut again, fully restored.
No monster outside would be able to follow them now.
"Phew, good job everyone."
Djeeta wiped her sweat and gave everyone a thumbs-up.
"Hahh… hahh… that's the most monsters I've ever fought…" Jessica said, completely out of breath.
For someone like her—who usually fights with a cannon from long range—fighting this long at close distance was exhausting.
"But that was fun, right? Today is also the first time I fought that many monsters."
Aliza stretched her arms with a grin.
Between the fight on Tarvi Island and this underground battle, she had fought more in the last few hours than she expected.
They were all so focused on the earlier battle that none of them realized Stan had been fighting together with them as well.
Stan stared at both of his trembling hands, still covered in monster blood.
"Heh…"
He let out a small laugh, shrugged, and clenched his fists.
Even though it was his first real battle—and he messed up several times, nearly slipping while dodging, or panicking when surrounded—he still felt it wasn't a bad first experience.
In fact… he was proud.
Then suddenly, water began floating around him, swirling softly before enveloping his arms and clothes.
"Huh? What is this?"
He froze and watched as the water absorbed the blood and dirt from his body.
"Don't move too much, Stan. I'm cleaning you," Lyria's voice said.
He looked toward her and saw her crystal glowing blue—the power of Leviathan. She was using it to clean everyone at once.
A few seconds later, everyone's bodies and clothes were completely clean, without a single drop of monster blood left.
"Wow, thank you, Lyria," Therese said while checking her clothes.
"Hehe, no problem," Lyria replied with her usual bright smile.
Stan looked down at his clean hands again.
A small part of him felt disappointed—the blood and dirt he wore were proof of his first real fight. He wanted to feel that sensation a bit longer.
But it was gone now.
With a soft sigh, he muttered, "Oh well… there's next time. If I don't want Aliza to leave me, I need to get stronger."
Suddenly, a hand rested gently on his shoulder.
"Good job, Stan. It seems like you're slowly turning into a real man," Katalina said with a warm smile.
As an ex-Erste commander, her awareness was far wider than anyone else's. She had noticed Stan fighting alongside them.
"Thank you… Katalina."
Stan's voice trembled slightly as he held back tears.
His efforts hadn't gone unnoticed.
After a short moment of catching their breath, they finally decided to move deeper inside and explore the factory.
Opening the large double doors, they stepped in carefully, not lowering their guard for even a second.
They were greeted by a wide, circular chamber with three doors—one directly ahead, one to the left, and one to the right.
"Weird… I thought we'd be greeted by machines or something, but it's only a room?" Lyria said, looking around curiously.
"Don't let your guard down, Lyria. It's too quiet… no guards attacked us the moment we entered," Djeeta warned.
"There's three doors in front of us. Should we split into three groups?" Vyrn asked, glancing at the doors nervously.
"No, we should stay together. If we separate, we'll just get picked off one by one," Katalina immediately rejected Vyrn's idea. Staying together was clearly the safer plan.
"I don't think we need to separate," Lyria suddenly said, her expression turning serious.
"Huh? Why?" Aliza asked.
Lyria pointed toward the door directly ahead.
"I can sense someone behind that door."
Everyone instantly raised their weapons, aiming them toward the door Lyria indicated.
"Who's there?!" Djeeta called out. Now that she focused, she too could feel a presence behind that door.
"My, my… I didn't expect you all to find me so fast."
A rough male voice echoed as the door slowly creaked open.
From inside stepped a tall draph man—older than the thugs they'd been fighting, leaning on a cane with his right hand. He wore formal clothing, almost like he was trying to present himself as someone important.
[IMAGE]
"Aviza! You swine!"
Aliza's eyes widened in anger as she immediately recognized him.
"What the hell are you doing trying to destroy the town?!"
Seeing a familiar face, Aviza didn't look surprised at all. He simply said, "If it isn't Lady Aliza! What can my humble self do for you, my lady?"
"Don't play games with me! Tell me why you're doing this."
Everyone stayed silent, letting Aliza question her uncle.
"Why you ask? Of course because your coward father won't do the right thing for Valtz Duchy, so I need to do it myself."
"I need to destroy your father's work—this city. After it's all destroyed, I'm going to rebuild it stronger than ever," he said loudly, full of pride in his plan.
"Rebuild the city?? Are you crazy? Why are you even doing that!?"
"We of the Valtz nation, who have commanded machine technology since ancient times… It is we who are the rightful rulers of the skies! After I rebuild the city, we can start rebuilding and continue breeding more monsters. After that, we conquer the entire skies!" he said, slamming his cane down as he revealed his plan.
"What!? Conquering the skies—are you serious?? What kind of madman are you!?" Aliza shouted, shocked and clearly not expecting to hear that from him.
"Aliza is right. With mere monsters like this even with the technology Valtz Duchy has there is no way you can conquer the skies," Katalina said.
But Aviza suddenly started giggling to himself before bursting into laughter.
"Hahahaha! You thought my plan was only using normal monsters??"
He raised his cane again and slammed it on the ground several times.
The moment he did, the place where everyone stood began shaking, and the floor slowly began to open.
"Everyone, get back!" Djeeta shouted as she grabbed Lyria's hand and pulled her backward.
Everyone followed her order, stepping back just before the entire floor opened up.
A deep, dark pit revealed itself beneath them, bottomless at first glance. From inside, they could hear the sound of some kind of machine rising from below.
"This feeling!? Djeeta, I'm sensing something really familiar," Lyria warned her.
But before Djeeta could ask more, Vyrn suddenly yelled, "What the hell!? Everyone be careful—that's a Minotaur!"
A giant monster, taller than anyone in the room, rose from the pit. Two large horns, the head of a beast, and the body of a man. In its hands, it held a two-handed axe even larger and taller than its own body.
[IMAGE]
"Isn't that Minotaur different than usual?" Therese said, recognizing the creature.
"What's that collar on its neck?" Jessica asked, pointing at it.
"That's my masterpiece. I created it to control monsters easily," Aviza said proudly.
"But not just that—Minotaur, unleash your power!"
The Minotaur reacted instantly to its master's order, its eyes glowing red.
Minotaurs were already hard for normal Skyfarers to defeat, known for their strength and surprising speed thanks to their human-like bodies.
"This is…!?" Lyria said in shock, sensing something else coming from the Minotaur.
Suddenly, dark aura began leaking from the creature's entire body, and its glowing eyes became even brighter.
"ROOOOAAAARRRRR!!" The Minotaur's scream blasted out, creating a gust of wind.
"Dark essence!?" Katalina said, recognizing the power leaking from the beast.
The Minotaur grew stronger and larger as the dark essence continued pouring out of him, his body shaking with rage as he became even more furious.
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A/N: It's me again I'm planning to rewrite the first few chapters of this fanfic because holy damn it's so bad what the hell, i still try to create more new chapters for this though every 2 to 3 days don't worries.
But if there is not a chapter for more than 3 days I'm probably stuck rewriting just want to let you know so anyway see ya~