The sky had turned gray.
Not with clouds—
but with the weight of death.
Jarot—towering, blood-soaked, muscles swollen like boulders—kept his glare fixed on the soldiers, not on Ajin.
"You…" he growled, chest heaving like an enraged bull.
"…you are not my enemy. But they are. And perhaps… they are yours as well."
Ajin barely had time to respond.
A commanding voice tore through the forest:
"ARCHERS—READY!!"
The soldiers on the ridge pulled their bowstrings tight, flames crackling along their shafts.
"LOOSE!"
SWUUUUUSH!!!
A storm of fire descended upon them.
"MOVE!" Jarot roared.
But he did not move.
Instead—
he grabbed the broken trunk of a fallen tree, lifted it like it weighed nothing,
and swung.
THRAAAKK!!
He batted away at least half the flaming arrows.
The rest hissed into the river or struck the earth around Ajin.
Ajin rolled behind a large boulder as flames erupted across the grass.
The moment Ajin's back touched stone—
something cold awakened inside him.
That monstrous instinct born from Baja Angkara Batin.
The instinct to kill.
"CHARGE!!"
The commander's voice cracked.
Dozens of boots pounded across the forest floor.
Five soldiers rushed Jarot.
Three rushed Ajin.
Jarot responded with raw fury—
a whirlwind of brute force.
The first soldier raised his shield.
Jarot's punch obliterated it.
CRAAASH!!!
The shield split like wet bark,
and the soldier's helmet caved in with it.
Another soldier tried to stab Jarot from behind—
Jarot swung the tree trunk backward blindly.
THUD—CRACK!!!
The soldier flew ten meters, spine snapping midair.
On Ajin's side—
the battle unfolded very differently.
Ajin moved with the cold precision of a predator.
The first soldier lunged with a spear.
Ajin didn't dodge.
The spearhead scraped across his chest—
TING!!!
Metal on metal.
Ajin felt nothing.
He caught the shaft, yanked the soldier toward him—
and drove his knee upward.
KRAKK!!
A sickening crunch.
The soldier collapsed, screaming until the pain cut his voice.
The second soldier slashed horizontally.
Ajin reacted instantly—
grabbing the wounded soldier
and using him as a shield.
"WAIT—!!"
SHHRRIIIP!
The blade sliced deep into the soldier's torso instead.
Before the swordsman could recover—
Ajin vanished from front view.
He appeared in front of the third soldier.
And punched.
THUD!
A single, perfect strike—straight to the throat.
The man's windpipe collapsed.
He dropped instantly, choking on shattered bone.
Ajin exhaled slowly.
His body—battered, cracked, soaked in dried blood—
moved with terrifying ease.
Jarot, still battling three men at once, roared:
"BEHIND YOU!"
Ajin turned in time to see an archer drawing a flaming arrow aimed directly at Jarot's exposed back.
Ajin grabbed the dead soldier at his feet—
and hurled him.
WHOOSH—!!
The cadaver smacked into the archer, knocking him off balance.
The arrow missed, hissing into the river.
Jarot glanced at Ajin for half a second—
the giant's eyes softening, if only slightly.
He nodded.
A silent acknowledgement between monsters.
Jarot smashed two more soldiers into paste.
Ajin cracked another skull open with his bare hands.
They were not fighting "together"—
but they were killing in synchronicity,
flowing like two predators who had hunted the same prey their whole lives.
Then—
The forest trembled.
The commander high above the ridge narrowed his eyes.
He saw it.
A tattered red scarf—
burned, frayed—
wrapped around Ajin's arm.
His expression darkened.
"Wait…" he whispered. His eyes widened.
"That… symbol…"
He thrust a hand forward, voice cracking:
"FOCUS ALL FIRE ON THAT ONE!"
He pointed not at the giant.
But at Ajin.
Jarot stopped mid-swing, shocked.
"They… target you?"
Ajin looked up.
The soldiers' armor bore a familiar insignia—
A rising flame.
A burning crown.
Dahana.
Ajin's pulse exploded in his veins.
His vision reddened.
His heartbeat thundered.
"DAHANA!!"
He roared with a voice that shattered the forest's silence.
The soldiers faltered.
Even Jarot stiffened.
Ajin moved.
Not as a human.
Not even as a monster.
As vengeance.
The final soldier in front of Ajin raised his shield too late.
Ajin lowered his stance.
His fist hardened.
His bones vibrated.
His muscles swelled like coiled cables.
He invoked a technique he didn't know he had—
"ANGKARA RETAK."
(Cracking Wrath)
He punched.
BOOOOOOM!!!
A concussive blast rippled outward.
The soldier's chest exploded inward.
His ribs shot out through his back like jagged spears.
Blood sprayed in a crimson arc.
Every soldier in sight froze.
Absolute horror plastered on their faces.
Jarot—
for the first time since Ajin met him—
looked afraid.
Ajin lowered his smoking hand.
He glared up at the commander.
And the commander trembled.
"That boy…" he whispered.
"He's the one Dahana wants."
"The one the Fire Court marked."
"The target is AJIN. Capture him—alive or dead!"
Jarot turned sharply toward Ajin, staring.
"…Ajin?"
The name rolled through the battlefield like thunder.
Ajin didn't look away from the commander.
He didn't acknowledge the fear.
He didn't acknowledge Jarot's surprise.
All he saw—
was red.
Fire.
Everything Dahana had taken from him.
With blood dripping from his broken knuckles,
Ajin pointed at the soldiers.
"Come, then."
His voice was low.
Dead.
And filled with murder.
"Let me show you," he whispered,
"why your flames failed to kill me."