Shion took a slow, painful breath. The smoke was still burning her lungs, her side was throbbing where the knife had caught her, and her shoulder ached every time she adjusted her grip. But as the cold air hit her chest, she realized something: the sword was finally hers again.
Inside the house, the weapon had been a total liability. Every wall stole its reach, and the furniture just got in the way, forcing her to use it like a clumsy shield or a heavy pole to shove people back. Out here in the open clearing, with nothing but sky above her, it could finally do what it was designed for. It was a weapon that demanded distance, the kind of blade that made a crowd of opponents think twice before stepping up.
Her stance shifted slightly. To an untrained eye, nothing had really changed, but her feet repositioned, the heavy sword lowered, and the tip angled away from her body. She wasn't planning on chasing anyone down anymore—she was daring them to come to her.
The bandits got the message. They'd just watched her kill their men inside a cramped, smoky house while she could barely breathe. Now that she actually had room to move, nobody wanted to be the first to test her, so the first few seconds ticked by in tense silence.
Naturally, the man with the axes stayed in the back. Shion wasn't surprised; he wasn't the type to rush in just because he was the strongest. He had waited for the smoke to give him cover, using his magic to mess with her footing and create openings for his men. Every single wound she'd taken so far was because he was making everyone around him way more dangerous, rather than trying to defeat her himself.
Breaking the stalemate, two bandits moved in from opposite sides, careful not to enter her range at the exact same time. They had clearly learned their lesson from inside the house and weren't charging blindly anymore. But before they could settle into position, Shion stepped into them, swinging the greatsword with zero hesitation.
The first bandit barely managed to block the strike. The sheer impact rattled through his arms and shoved him back several steps, his boots plowing into the dirt. The second bandit tried to exploit the opening, but right then, the air shifted.
Shion felt it before she saw it. The dirt beneath her boots shifted just enough to throw off her stance. It wasn't enough to knock her flat, or even make her totally lose her balance, but it was just enough to make her next move a fraction of a second too late. The bandit she'd been pressuring recovered, his blade scraping across her ribs and leaving another shallow cut before she managed to force him back with a quick swing.
It was just another small cut and another tiny mistake, but it was exactly the kind of thing that would wear her down. Meanwhile, the axe-wielder didn't even move. He just watched, waiting for the next moment someone else could finish the job.
From the sidelines, Eren finally saw the pattern. She looked from the man at the back, to Shion, and then straight to his hand—the same hand that had moved every single time the momentum of the fight changed. It was the same detail she'd missed inside the house, the same split-second she had ignored before.
Her grip tightened around her own sword. She wasn't going to miss it a second time.
As another bandit approached Shion and they traded blows, the axe-wielder took a small step sideways to get a better angle and raised his hand. But Eren didn't wait for the magic to happen. Forgetting all about perfect stances, distance, or proper technique, she just sprinted straight at him.
The man didn't notice her until the very last second. For the first time all night, his expression cracked—not with fear, but pure surprise. His spell went wild, sending a burst of wind shooting past Shion to blast into the trees, scattering leaves and bending branches.
An instant later, Eren slammed her shoulder right into him, tackling them both hard into the dirt. One of his axes flew from his grip and vanished into the tall grass. As they hit the ground, the man looked genuinely rattled. It wasn't because he was badly hurt or overpowered, but because someone had finally stopped focusing on the bandits in front of them and started fighting him instead.
The man with the axes slowly got back to his feet, the surprise completely gone from his face. The brief moment where Eren had managed to break his composure totally vanished as he brushed the dirt from his coat with one hand. He looked almost exactly like he had when they first arrived at the farm—well, almost.
The difference was small, but it was there. Before, he had looked at them like a man welcoming travelers into his home, and then like a hunter watching an animal stroll straight into a trap. Now, he just looked at the bodies piled near the broken doorway, the damaged house behind him, and the bloodied men still standing around the clearing. His expression didn't change at all, and honestly, that was what made it worse. The annoyance in his eyes wasn't born from anger; it was pure disappointment, like a craftsman looking at a tool that had failed him.
One of the wounded bandits was trying to push himself up nearby, pressing his hand against a nasty wound in his stomach. His breathing was uneven, and his legs completely gave out the moment he tried to stand. "Boss..." the man gasped between breaths. "I can't."
The axe-wielder didn't even turn his head. "Get up," he said. His words were calm, almost bored.
The bandit stared at him for a second, looking as if he hadn't heard correctly. "I said, I can't."
A heavy silence followed. The man with the axes finally looked at him, but not with anger or frustration. It was like he was looking at an object that had already lost its purpose. "Then die quietly," he replied.
Nobody said a word. Not the injured man, and not the others. For the first time since the fight started, the remaining bandits looked less afraid of Shion than they did of the man standing right beside them. The welcoming farmer was officially gone. In fact, the polite host who had offered them a warm meal and a place to rest had never existed in the first place; it had simply been another tool, just another way to get people to lower their guard before the knife appeared.
Shion adjusted her grip on her greatsword. It was a tiny movement, but Eren noticed. They were both injured and exhausted. The cuts across Shion's arms and side were starting to stain her clothes, and Eren could still feel a sharp pain in her leg every time she shifted her weight. But something had changed—they were no longer trapped inside the house, and they were no longer fighting alone.
The first bandit moved, not because he wanted to, but because he realized that standing still wasn't an option anymore. He rushed toward Shion with a shout that sounded way more like fear than courage. She met him halfway, bringing the greatsword down in a wide arc that forced him to throw himself aside. He managed to avoid the edge, but he moved exactly where Eren wanted him to go.
A few days ago, Eren would have waited, blocked, countered, and returned to her stance. That was what the guards had taught her—a straight line, a neat formation, a predictable exchange. But Shion had spent every single morning forcing her to abandon those habits because real fights don't follow drills, and people don't wait for you to make the correct movement.
Eren kicked the loose remains of a broken fence post toward the man's legs. It wasn't enough to knock him down, but it was enough to make him look and hesitate, and that was all Shion needed. The flat of the greatsword slammed into his chest, throwing him back into the dirt.
Another bandit tried to take advantage of the moment and lunged toward Eren's injured side. Shion's eyes shifted for a split second. "Left," she barked. No warning, no explanation.
Eren moved instantly without even thinking about it. She stepped sideways, letting the attack pass right where she had been a moment before, then grabbed the man's wrist and pulled him forward using his own momentum. The move wasn't elegant, but it didn't have to be. The man stumbled directly into Shion's reach, and the greatsword stopped just inches from his neck—a warning, not a strike.
For a moment, the clearing went quiet again as the remaining bandits hesitated. It wasn't just because of the sword, either; they were seeing something they absolutely hadn't expected. Here were two wounded mercenaries who should have been completely spent and making sloppy mistakes. Instead, they were beginning to fight like they had known each other for years.
The man with the axes watched the whole exchange, his expression remaining totally controlled. However, his fingers tightened just a fraction around the handles of his weapons. It was the smallest crack in his composure, and the very first sign that the fight was no longer going according to his plan.