By the time Ryn reached the right flank, the fighting was already in full swing.
The people of Deimos, composed of both knights, mercenaries, and adventurers, had engaged the monsters on a full frontal assault.
Everyone was together in a chaotic, uneven line—shouting, pushing, swinging. Dust blew across the field, turning the entire section into a blur of motion.
Perfect cover. Ryn pulled up his hood even higher.
Nobody had time to look at anything else except the monster in front of them, giving him the perfect opportunity to gain some stats.
He stepped into a gap between two struggling knights. To them, he was not Ryn Eden Arctis, just another fighter rushing into the fray.
The line widened as soldiers fanned out. Smaller beasts darted around while the front group was engaged with a massive Dire Boar.
A wolf lunged at a nearby spearman's blind side.
Ryn tightened his grip on the blade and blitzed over.
He cut across the creature's neck in one clean strike, ice extruding from the wound.
The spearman looked back, startled. He blinked. The wolf suddenly died?
A centipede burst from the ground two meters ahead, dragging an adventurer down in a flailing mess of limbs. Ryn pivoted, driving his blade down the creature's torso and twisted hard. The monster convulsed, hissing as it died.
The adventurer gasped, wide-eyed.
"Was that—who—?"
Ryn was already gone, swallowed by the shifting formation as another boar plowed into the line.
He moved with the chaos, not through it—timing his steps with the rhythm of soldiers surging and retreating, slipping into openings as naturally as a veteran fighter.
Every time someone turned to see who had saved them—he was already moving. All they saw was the monster's corpse, frozen.
By the time he steadied his breath again, the right flank was littered with bodies—wolf fur, green skin, shattered plating, all blending into the soil.
Ryn wiped his blade on a fallen goblin's cloak, feeling oddly calm, almost detached, like something inside him had clicked into place.
And then the system hit him.
[STR: 10 → 13]
[DEX: 11 → 14]
[END: 11 → 14]
[INT: 13 → 16]
Ryn flexed his fingers slowly, marveling at how much faster they responded.
Then, a sudden, guttural roar split the battlefield. A heartbeat later, three knights were thrown into the air like rag dolls, crashing down in twisted piles of armor and limbs.
Adventurers screamed as an entire cluster of fighters was knocked aside, bodies scattering across the blood-soaked dirt.
For a moment, everyone froze.
"What—what was that?!"
"Something's cutting through the line!"
Ryn's head started to hurt, his [Enhanced Senses] picking up on one thing…killing intent.
Then it stepped out of the dust cloud.
An Orc General—towering over the battlefield, eight feet tall, muscles coiled tight beneath thick, rune-carved armor that pulsed with a faint violet glow. Its cleaver dripped with fresh blood, still steaming from the force of its last strike. Its breath came out in heavy, rumbling growls.
A B–Rank monster, borderline A-Rank if it had high intelligence.
The Deimos commander's face went pale.
"Back!" he bellowed, voice cracking with urgency. "Everyone fall back! Make space—! FALL BACK!"
The soldiers scrambled away, dragging the wounded, pulling surviving adventurers out of the Orc's swing radius. Shields were abandoned, spears dropped, anything to create distance.
Ryn fell back with the others, boots skidding across dirt. He spotted Amelia struggling to anchor her stance, fire gathering at her fingertips but her breaths uneven.
He moved to her side, close enough for her to hear him over the chaos.
"Ryn… I've never fired something this close to people," she whispered. "If I miss—if I don't hit him hard enough—someone could die."
Ryn angled himself beside her, keeping his eyes fixed on the monster.
"You'll hit him," he said calmly. "And even if you don't finish the job…"
He stepped back to give her room, a faint, confident smirk tugging at his mouth.
"…I'll clean up whatever you leave behind."
Amelia swallowed once, the tremor in her hands steadying as Ryn stepped back. His confidence settled something inside her; the fire coiled up her arm grew hotter, more controlled, the glow tightening into a dense sphere of heat that warped the air.
The Deimos commander shouted,
"LADY AMELIA—NOW!"
She drew in one sharp breath, focused everything she had—
and whispered the words that carried through the roar of battle:
"Solar Lance."
The world flashed white.
A spear of incandescent fire tore across the field, ripping through the air with a howl of heat so intense the nearest monsters ignited instantly. The blast hammered into the Orc General with an eruption that shook the wall, dirt exploding outward in a violent shockwave.
Soldiers ducked. Adventurers threw themselves flat. Even Ryn lifted an arm to shield his face from the sheer force of it.
For a moment, the battlefield was nothing but blazing light.
However…
The Orc General straightened slowly, armor glowing molten red but unbroken. Cracks of light pulsed along the runes carved into the breastplate, absorbing the worst of the blast. Smoke curled from its tusks as it lifted its cleaver again.
Amelia's breath hitched.
"That— that should've burned straight through—"
Ryn stepped beside her, eyes narrowing.
"Fire–resistant enchanted armor."
Now he was even more sure of the Cult's involvement. Whoever orchestrated this event wanted Amelia gone…and they were thorough about it.
The creature grinned—a wide, horrible, teeth-baring grin.
Ryn rolled his shoulders, blade humming faintly as he stepped forward.
"Alright," he muttered. "My turn."
Amelia's hand shot out, grabbing his sleeve.
"Ryn—wait."
Her voice wasn't loud, but in the sudden lull before the next clash, it cut through the tension like a blade. Ryn paused, glancing back. Hesitation plastered all over her face.
Ryn's expression softened, if only slightly.
"It'll be fine. Have a little faith in me."
Her breath caught.
For a heartbeat, she stared but said nothing—before nodding her head.
Right as Ryn broke from Amelia's grasp and took his first step toward the Orc General—
A hand clamped onto his shoulder.
Ryn spun around, blade half-drawn—
"Easy," a familiar voice said. "It's just me."
Haywood stood there in his usual composed appearance, somehow spotless despite the battlefield chaos.
"Curator???"
He held something out toward Ryn.
A carved white half-mask, smooth and cold to the touch, adorned with faint wing motifs curling along the temples. The features were serene, almost divine—yet blank enough to erase the wearer's identity entirely.
Ryn blinked. "This is… a little dramatic."
"Exactly," Haywood said. "But it accomplishes your goal, does it not?"
Ryn hesitated only a moment before fitting the mask over his face.
It settled perfectly, light and comfortable across his face. The world seemed to narrow through the eye slits, sharpening into clean lines.
Haywood stepped back, studying him.
"…Good."
Amelia blinked once.
"…Wha—what are you doing?" she demanded, stabbing a finger at Haywood. "And who even IS this guy??"
Ryn gave her a small, guilty smile through the eye slits.
"Long story."
"Ryn—don't you—!"
He was already lowering his stance, cloak snapping as he dashed forward before she could finish.
"…What do you mean 'long story'—!!"
Ryn shot out of the dust like a streak of movement, boots carving lines through the dirt as he closed the distance. The Orc General turned at the last second, its molten-red armor still steaming from Amelia's Solar Lance.
It saw the mask first.
A faceless white specter rushing at it with a blade drawn.
The monster snarled, then swung its cleaver in a brutal horizontal arc, wide enough to wipe out a dozen men with it.
Ryn planted a foot and slid low.
The blade whistled past his head, cutting through the air where his neck had been half a second earlier. Dirt exploded behind him as he kicked off the ground and drove forward.
He skimmed along the Orc's flank, boots barely touching the ground as he carved a diagonal slash across its ribs.
Sparks flew but it barely left a scratch.
Ryn clicked his tongue and shot past the monster, cloak trailing like a smear of white in the dust. He kicked off a shattered shield, angled upward, and brought his blade down across the Orc's shoulder.
Another shallow cut.
The Orc roared and swiped behind it with surprising speed, shattering the shield Ryn had just used as footing.
Ryn flipped back, twisted in midair, and landed in a low crouch just out of reach.
The Orc General charged, cleaver raised high, the ground buckling beneath every heavy stride.
Ryn exhaled.
"Aquila."
The world snapped into razor clarity.
A burst of light-blue aura flared across his legs as the blessing activated —a sudden, explosive acceleration that kicked up dirt and tore the air behind him.
Soldiers gasped as the masked figure blurred into a streak of motion.
Ryn saw the path of light once again, routing him towards the creature's neck, a part where its armor hadn't covered.
He rocketed upward, twisting behind the arc of the descending cleaver. While ascending, Ryn plunged his sword into its nape.
The strike hit dead center.
Though he felt as if it hadn't gone deep enough. Nonetheless, blood burst in a thick spray.
The Orc howled, stumbling forward on one knee, cleaver plunging into the dirt as it tried to catch itself.
Ryn landed hard, sliding backward from the recoil. His boots carved deep lines in the ground as he steadied himself.
He didn't even get to raise his blade again before a second column of scorching fire tore past his shoulder, ripping through the space between him and the kneeling Orc.
The blast hit the General dead-on, slamming into the fresh wound Ryn had carved open.
The impact lifted the Orc off its feet and hurled it back across the battlefield, knocking over trees and land.
Ryn straightened slowly, chest rising and falling under the mask.
Amelia lowered her smoking arm, eyes wide.
Yet… it stood back up. This fight wasn't over so easily.