Chương 192: B3 - Chapter 26: Showdown

"Seriously?" Henry muttered as he also stared at the rankings.

"Their contributions are even higher than they were three days ago." Seth kept his eyes on the floating names.

"Who are those three?" Henry grimaced.

"Elite soldiers who've been participating in multiple battles. Even Captain Michaelson and Sergeant Tirus don't have much information on them. They use concealment artifacts, so getting details has been extremely difficult." The squad leader turned toward Seth.

"Jaz is supposed to be a Guardian—a one-man front line who can hold back entire squads by himself. Celess is an Elementalist. From what we've heard, she can wipe out groups in just a cast or two." Then Henry paused, and his expression hardened.

"But the worst one is Morsh." The name alone seemed to carry weight, causing Eddin and a few other people nearby to stir.

"He's an assassin," Henry continued.

"Cuts people down like it means nothing before they can flee. Squad leaders, Priests, anyone important. Those are the ones he targets first." Seth frowned as he thought it through.

"Do we know what they look like?"

"Jaz, yes," Henry answered.

"Big guy with long blond hair. If he's in the squad against us, we should recognize him pretty easily."

"And the other two?" Henry shook his head.

"Not sure." He paused again, then added, "There's another issue." Seth glanced at him.

"What?" Henry's jaw tightened.

"All three of them have contracted beasts." Seth's eyes widened, yet before he could ask anything else, Henry continued, as if he already knew the incoming question.

"And no, we don't have information on those either." Eddin, on the other side of Henry, glared in the direction of the Empire.

"Hard to gather details when almost everyone who fights them ends up dead." A tense silence settled over the nearby soldiers. One of the newer recruits behind them spoke up, unable to keep the worry from his voice.

"What if they're in one of our battles?" Selena answered before anyone else could.

"Then we kill them like any other soldier." A few heads turned toward her. Henry barked out a laugh.

"Yeah, and we've got our own monster." He jerked a thumb toward Seth.

"I'd be surprised if any of those three earned as many points in a single battle as he did. Even in the larger clashes." Several soldiers glanced at Seth, and the fear in their faces eased just a little. One muttered a curse-laced chuckle while another tightened their grip on a weapon with renewed purpose. The entire formation's mood seemed to lift.

'Do you think they have Legacies?' Nightmare asked through Link.

'I doubt it,' Seth replied inwardly.' The Empire is going to war over six of them. If those three already had one, it wouldn't make much sense for them to care this much.' His gaze lingered on the names.' But Seeds? Almost definitely.'

'How do we get those if we kill them?' Nightmare asked. Seth's thoughts drifted back to his conversation with Hector, the administrator of the Primalist Den in Asethka. The man had mentioned that there was a method to extract a Legacy—or a Seed—from a dead body, though it was forbidden outside times of war.

'No idea,' Seth finally answered.' I didn't ask Hector how it worked back then.'

'I'll rip open their chests and check,' Nightmare said with a growl.' Those things could make us stronger for the next battles.' Seth nearly snorted.' I'd be surprised if it's sitting somewhere specifically. You absorb a Seed through your whole body.'

'We'll see,' the direwolf replied. Seth's discussion with Nightmare was cut short when a fresh portal tore open in the distance. The gate's violent light spilled across the plain as squads' names formed above them. Henry straightened at once, then lifted an arm in signal. The other squad leaders did the same to motion their people forward, then the whole formation began to move. Seth fell in with them, boots striking the ground as they crossed the plain toward the waiting Rift.

His gaze drifted over to the Empire's side, intending to study which enemy squads were gathering at the opposite side of them, but movement from a Rift to their left caught the edge of his vision. He turned, and his breath caught. Devus stumbled out of the fading light. He was barely recognizable. The heavy plate armor that had once made him look indomitable hung in scorched, twisted pieces from frayed straps.

Ragged wounds covered him from head to toe, some barely stitched shut, others actively leaking blood that darkened the steel. He moved with a staggering, unnatural gait, half dragging and half supporting a soldier at his side. The man looked already dead. That person's left arm ended at the shoulder in a stump, and his vacant eyes stared at nothing, as if whatever mind had once lived behind them had never come back through the gate. Stolen story; please report.

Devus lifted his head, and Seth met the Guardian's gaze. For the first time since they had known each other, there was no grin waiting on Devus' face. No loud confidence. No stubborn spark. They held each other's stare for a brief moment. Devus's face tightened, the muscles in his jaw trembling as if he were trying to hold back a scream his whole body begged to release. Seth's core stirred in his chest, dark emotions boiling. Soldiers from Kastal's side broke from the sideline and rushed toward the Guardian.

Priests, officers, shaken soldiers who wanted to help. Seth gritted his teeth and kept marching with his squad, but slowed when Devus's voice rose behind, cracked raw from pain.

"Jenna?" Seth looked back over his shoulder.

"She's injured," he said, loud enough to carry.

"But alive." Relief and anguish warred across Devus's bloodied face. He gave a single nod, then allowed the two men and three women who had reached him to take the dying soldier from his grasp. Seth turned forward and once again continued his walk toward his own Warfare Rift. By the time his squad came to a halt before the hovering portal, anger had settled deep in his chest. Around him, Henry and the others tightened their grips on their weapons while they waited for the Spirit's signal to enter.

This time, the Empire's soldiers across the field made no attempt to unleash a wave of bloodlust. They had learned. Or perhaps they simply had something else in mind. Seth looked at the Spirit. Though the formless creature didn't bear a smile or anything similar, he could feel its satisfaction rolling through the air. All because one of its favorite toys is back? Seth wondered bitterly.

When he turned to look again at the Empire's lines, he caught sight of Kaelen with his sister among a group of soldiers positioned near another portal. Their eyes met across the field. Kaelen held the stare for a breath, then slowly turned his head toward the two hundred soldiers assembled before Seth's own gate. Seth followed the gesture. There, among the ranks, stood a hooded man. He'd blended into the other combatants at first glance, but only at first. The air around him felt tight and extremely sharp.

Only part of his face was visible beneath the shadowed hood, though Seth could feel the man's gaze. Feral Instinct reacted instantly. The wild energy lurched in his chest with more violence than it ever had for any Iron-Tier opponent. Not wasting a second, Seth cast Intermediate Identify.??? Class:??? Rank:??? (???) Subclass:??? Strength:??? Arcane Power:??? Toughness:??? Well Capacity:??? Agility:??? Regeneration:??? Morsh, Seth immediately thought. The assassin.

The hooded man's mouth slowly curled into a vicious grin devoid of warmth. It was the hungry look of a creature that had already tasted blood in the air and was about to savor the chase. Seth's eyes flicked to the Empress. High atop her seat of jagged stone and hammered gold, she wore the same expression, hers colored by a touch of cruel satisfaction. The Spirit's voice rolled across the plain.

"Squads of Battle Thirty-Six… enter the Warfare Rift." Henry moved first, and the rest of the formation advanced behind him. Seth lingered, staring at the hooded man as his core pulsed violently in his chest. So they sent their best killer to break morale by cutting me down, he thought. A matching smile spread across his face, and he began to advance toward the Rift. Good. If that man thought he was the predator walking into this fight, Seth would enjoy teaching him otherwise.

The sensory transition was less intense than the previous one or the Ice Cave's. Seth, Henry, Eddin, Selena, and the rest of the four squads materialized in the middle of a vast, wind-scoured plain. Seth wasted no time and swept his gaze across the new battlefield. To the north, jagged mountain peaks clawed at the grey sky like the teeth of a buried giant, while the eastern and western flanks were swallowed by the dense, shadow-choked canopy of a forest.

Between those borders stretched broken ground of open fields, thorny thickets, and sharp ridges of shale and granite. Seth tilted his head back and looked up. The Spirit hovered high above in silence. That same sensation returned at once—the feeling of being watched, measured, as if moving across someone else's chess board.

"There!" Henry said, snapping an arm toward the tree-covered foothills at the mountain's base.

"We take the high ground. Move!" The soldiers surged forward, boots pounding over the grass. Seth examined the forest. Unlike the scorching desert of their last battle, this terrain was rich with possibilities. The dense foliage and broken sightlines would set a perfect ground for the kind of guerrilla warfare he and his squad would excel at.

"I'm heading into the woods to scout," Seth said, catching Henry's shoulder as he passed.

"I'll find the best spots for an ambush." Selena stepped up beside him, hands on the hilt of her daggers.

"I'm coming too." A refusal rose to Seth's lips, then died there. The determination on her face made it clear she wouldn't stay behind even if he ordered it. And with Morsh somewhere on this battlefield, this might be the last moment she could move freely before the assassin slipped into the trees himself. And it would allow them to learn the forest first. Seth gave a short nod.

"Let's move." They broke away from the main force and sprinted toward the left side of the tree line while the rest of the squads veered right, where a brutal climb toward the mountain awaited them. Captain Michaelson and Sergeant Tirus had already prepared for the possibility of a forest Warfare Rift. Their strategy was simple in theory yet effective: establish multiple fortified positions along the heights, chart layered retreat routes between them, and turn every path into a killing ground.

Traps would be buried, ambush points prepared, and every narrow pass would be used to offset the Empire's superior average Rank through short, controlled clashes fought on favorable terms. For it to work, they needed complete knowledge of the terrain along with every trail, chokepoint, or route the enemies might use. The moment Seth and Selena reached the first towering oaks, black smoke burst from the teardrop necklace. Nightmare emerged at full stride, paws barely brushing the moss as he matched their pace.

'I'll find the best places to spill blood,' the direwolf said through Link.

"Be careful," Seth warned aloud without slowing.

"We don't know how far they spawned from us. If it's like the desert, they should be at least an hour or two away at a run—but if you spot anyone, retreat immediately."' Understood.' The direwolf vanished into the deeper shadows as Selena kept running at Seth's side.

"That was Devus back there, wasn't it?" she asked, her voice tight.

"He looked... he looked like he'd crawled out of a grave."

"But he was alive," Seth answered. The words felt cold even to his own ears.

"In this war, that's the only thing that matters."

"Yeah," Selena whispered as she hurdled a fallen log, eyes scanning the dark thickets.

"Do you think we'll actually survive until the end of the Iron Phase? The more other squads get slaughtered, the more frequently we'll have to come back. Eventually, the numbers just won't add up." Seth's hand clenched instinctively into fists.

"I'll make sure we do."

"There's a limit to how much one person can do," Selena muttered, her gaze turning to him with a mix of pity and realism.

"Even for you." Seth didn't answer. Deep in his chest, his core churned again with a defying surge of energy. He was tired of the limits. He was tired of being told what was possible for a single Wielder. It was time to show them that some limits were meant to be shattered.