Chapter 5: The Martial Master

After breakfast, I turned my attention toward the southwestern shores of the continent.

The reports of increased monster activity had become too frequent to ignore, and although such matters would normally have been beneath the level of concern that required my personal intervention, there was something about the situation that warranted a closer look. I had no intention of allowing an unnecessary disturbance to spread across my continent while I remained comfortably seated in my castle, waiting for someone else to resolve it.

I left the castle behind and stepped into the open sky.

The castle stood exactly where I had always wanted it to be—in the center of the continent, atop the highest peak of Sky Mountain, towering above the clouds like a monument built to overlook the entire world. From that height, silence reigned. There were no noisy cities, no distant wars, and no sounds of ordinary life rising from below. Only endless horizons stretched in every direction, with mountains, forests, rivers, and plains spreading beneath the vast sky.

And beneath those horizons lay my garden.

Or rather...

My continent.

I took a single step.

Space immediately bent beneath my feet to my will, folding with the effortless obedience of silk drawn between invisible fingers. Magic surged silently through the air, unseen and unrestricted by anything except my intent. The world itself seemed to contract around me, drawing me forward rather than forcing me to cross the enormous distance through ordinary movement.

The landscape blurred into streaks of color.

Mountains, forests, rivers, and plains vanished almost as soon as they appeared, reality carrying me across the continent like an invisible current. There was no sense of traveling in the conventional meaning of the word. One moment I stood beneath the quiet sky of Sky Mountain, and the next—

I stopped.

A massive stone fortress appeared before me.

The enormous stronghold stood against the waves of monsters pouring from the Mist Rift, its walls surrounded by a battlefield that had already been stained crimson. The air itself seemed heavy with blood and smoke, while countless creatures surged across the land in an advancing tide.

It wasn't the sound of trumpets that announced the beginning of the battle.

It was screaming.

The voice of a man crying for help suddenly cut through the chaos before falling silent, followed almost immediately by the brutal sound of metal striking bone. Somewhere nearby, a spell exploded and briefly illuminated the battlefield with pale blue light, only for the red mist hanging over the land to swallow its glow a moment later.

Then came another sound.

Footsteps.

Thousands of feet struck the earth at once, causing the crimson ground beneath the soldiers' boots to tremble. The sound grew louder with every passing moment, until the earth itself seemed to be warning them of what was coming.

And then, from behind the curtain of mist, the monsters emerged.

They did not come in ranks. They did not advance like an army capable of understanding order, discipline, or strategy. They simply surged forward like a catastrophe given flesh, a massive tide of bones, twisted limbs, claws, and monstrous bodies crashing over itself as it advanced. Smaller creatures were trampled beneath the feet of larger ones, their bodies crushed into the earth, only to be replaced by countless others immediately behind them. Pain seemed to have lost all meaning in this place. There was no hesitation in their advance, no concern for casualties, and certainly no instinct to preserve their own lives.

One of the soldiers raised his shield.

"Hold the line!"

The first monster charged.

It was twice the height of a man, its grotesque body supported by four powerful arms that ended in black claws. It crashed into the shield with such force that the metal shattered instantly beneath the impact. The man holding it suffered the same fate, his body breaking beneath the overwhelming strength of the creature.

The entire line took a step backward.

"Mages!" one of the officers shouted. "Now!"

A group of mages immediately raised their hands. Magic circles ignited across the ground, dozens of symbols overlapping one another as pale blue-white light spread beneath their feet.

"Fire!"

The front line erupted.

Pillars of lightning tore across the battlefield, striking through the advancing monsters and ripping apart their bodies. The creatures were reduced to blackened masses as smoke and steam rose into the air, and dozens of monsters collapsed beneath the attack.

But the wave did not stop.

The creatures simply leaped over the bodies of their fallen kind, climbing over one another and forcing their way through every gap that appeared in the ranks. The spell had killed dozens, perhaps more, but against the endless tide pouring from the Mist Rift, those deaths meant almost nothing.

One of the mages stared at the approaching creatures, his expression slowly changing as he realized the truth.

"...Impossible."

There wasn't enough time to cast another spell.

One of the monsters reached him.

He raised his hand, desperately attempting to complete the spell before it was too late, but a massive claw pierced through his chest before the magic could take shape. His body froze for a moment, suspended between life and death, before collapsing lifelessly to the ground.

"Mark!"

His companion's scream barely escaped his mouth before he turned toward him and found a massive mouth opening directly before his face.

His head disappeared in an instant.

The remaining mages retreated.

That single moment was enough to break what remained of the formation. The soldiers began falling backward, their discipline collapsing beneath the sheer pressure of the advancing monsters.

"Fall back!"

One cry became another, and then dozens of voices joined together.

"To the fortress!"

"Fall back to the gates!"

"Don't break formation!"

But the formation had already broken.

The soldiers retreated while dragging their wounded comrades behind them. Some limped with blood covering their legs, others carried men who could no longer walk, and some could do nothing more than clutch bleeding arms while desperately trying to keep moving. A few carried nothing but broken swords, the weapons that had once represented their ability to fight now reduced to little more than useless pieces of metal.

One of the fighters tried to stand.

His leg was trapped beneath the corpse of a monster, leaving him unable to follow the retreating soldiers. He looked toward his comrades as they ran toward the fortress, and for a brief moment, there was something almost peaceful in his expression.

"Go..."

He raised his sword with a trembling hand.

"I'll buy you some time."

No one stopped.

It wasn't cowardice. Everyone understood the truth. If one of them stopped, ten would stop with him. And if ten stopped, no one would reach the fortress. There was no time for individual heroism when the survival of the entire formation depended on everyone continuing to move.

The monster charged toward the stranded fighter.

The man raised his sword.

Then the shadow descended upon him.

But before the claws could reach him, the ground exploded.

Flames erupted from beneath the battlefield in a sudden, violent burst. It was not a random explosion or an uncontrolled discharge of magic. It was a wall of fire, rising from the earth all at once as though someone had torn it directly from the heart of hell and unleashed it upon the battlefield.

The flames swallowed the monster.

They swallowed everything behind it.

For a brief moment, the monsters stopped.

Even the retreating soldiers froze.

Amid the smoke and flames, a man stood.

His black armor was covered in ash, and his red hair moved in the intense heat surrounding him. In his hand rested a massive sword whose edge glowed with a dark orange radiance, its surface reflecting the fire burning across the battlefield.

He slowly raised his head.

His eyes were steady.

There was no anger in them. No shouting, no panic, and no unnecessary display of emotion. There was only the terrifying calm of a man who had seen more war than any man should have had to endure.

One of the five great heroes of the Marilz Clan.

The Martial Master, Alexander Marilz.

Alexander looked first toward the approaching monsters, then toward the soldiers still retreating toward the fortress.

"No one looks back."

His voice carried through the chaos with surprising clarity.

"Return to the fortress."

One of the officers hesitated.

"But, sir—"

Alexander turned toward him.

"I said..."

Flames ignited around his feet, spreading across the ground beneath him.

"...return."

The officer fell silent.

For a brief moment, none of the soldiers moved. Then Alexander stepped forward.

Just one step.

The tip of his sword touched the ground.

BOOOOM!

The battlefield trembled beneath his feet.

And in the next instant, flames erupted.

In the next instant, flames erupted from the earth before him. At first, they were nothing more than a thin thread of fire, slowly carving its way through the crimson soil. Then the thread widened, spreading farther and farther as smaller branches began to split from it, glowing beneath the surface like veins of red light.

And within a single heartbeat—

the thread became a river.

Then it exploded.

Flames swept across the crimson battlefield in rapidly expanding circles, branching out like a network of glowing cracks, flowing between the monsters' feet and curling around them.

The monsters recoiled .

Some attempted to leap over the flames, desperately searching for a path through the burning earth, but the battlefield had already been transformed.

But the earth itself had already become a trap.

FWOOSH!

Pillars of fire erupted from between the ranks.

One.

Then two.

Then ten.

Pillars of flame rose toward the sky, blazing with scorching orange light as they swallowed the front ranks of monsters and filled the battlefield with their screams. Bodies collided with one another as the creatures desperately attempted to force themselves through the narrow gaps between the flames, but wherever they managed to cross the fire, Alexander was already waiting.

But whenever one managed to cross the fire—

Alexander was waiting.

His eyes remained unnaturally calm amid the chaos, carrying neither fear nor hesitation as he raised his sword and brought it down with a single decisive strike. The monster before him split apart under the blow, its enormous body collapsing into a cloud of dust and ash that scattered across the burning ground.

Alexander turned before the ash even touched the ground.

A second strike.

His sword rose in a swift arc.

Then descended.

The head of another monster separated from its body.

A wave of dust swept across the battlefield, obscuring the view for several seconds.

Only moving shadows and the flickering glow of flames could be seen through it.

Then—

Silence.

Not true silence, for the battlefield was still burning and countless monsters were still moving beyond the veil of smoke, but the sudden stillness surrounding Alexander made it feel as though the entire battlefield had paused to witness what stood at its center. There was something frighteningly simple about his movements. He was fast, but never hurried; calm, but never passive; and with every step he took, another monster fell.

Alexander surged forward.

His flaming sword carved through the ranks of monsters as though their bodies offered no more resistance than empty air. Every strike opened a new path before him, while the wall of fire advancing behind him devoured anything that attempted to follow. From above, the battlefield would have looked like a vast crimson sea drowning beneath an ocean of flames, with monsters retreating in every direction as Alexander moved through their midst like a dark line cutting straight through the burning tide.

For a moment, no one watching could fully understand what had happened. The battle had changed so quickly that their eyes struggled to follow the sequence of events. One moment the monsters had been advancing toward the fortress in overwhelming numbers, and the next their formation had been torn apart, their bodies falling one after another beneath the Martial Master's sword.

Then the first monster fell.

Then the second.

Then the third.

One after another.

Soon, dozens were collapsing across the battlefield, followed by hundreds more. Massive bodies crashed into the scorched earth, sending clouds of dust into the air while flames continued to spread between them. The orange glow reflected across Alexander's black armor and illuminated his emotionless features, making him appear almost like a figure carved from darkness and fire.

And at the heart of all that destruction, he stood alone.

His chest rose and fell steadily as he surveyed the battlefield, the flames surrounding him reflecting in his eyes. Sparks dripped from the edge of his sword and vanished against the burning earth, yet despite the scale of the slaughter around him, Alexander showed no sign of stopping.

The assault was not over.

A monster suddenly charged from his side, its enormous claw tearing through the air toward his face with enough force to crush bone. At the final moment, Alexander stepped aside. The claw passed within centimeters of his face, its momentum scattering several strands of his red hair, but Alexander did not even bother looking at the creature.

Instead, he extended his left hand and seized its arm.

The monster froze.

For a brief moment, it seemed unable to understand what had happened. Then a small flame flickered inside Alexander's palm.

It grew instantly.

The fire surged along the monster's arm like a living serpent, spreading from its hand to its shoulder before racing across its chest and engulfing its entire body. The creature screamed and desperately flailed its limbs, attempting to extinguish the flames consuming it, but its efforts were meaningless. The fire was no longer merely surrounding its body.

It was burning inside it.

Alexander calmly released its arm.

The monster collapsed to the ground, its body already consumed by the flames. A heavy explosion followed, and the earth trembled once more beneath Alexander's feet as smoke and fire rose behind him.

He slowly turned toward the remaining monsters.

Flames continued to rise around his body, their light stretching across the crimson battlefield, but Alexander did not stop. He simply tightened his grip around his sword and continued forward.

"Open the gates!"

The command thundered from atop the fortress walls.

The soldiers immediately began rushing toward the entrance, dragging the wounded and carrying those who could no longer move on their own. Alexander glanced back toward them and saw the final group approaching the fortress. One man was carrying an unconscious mage over his shoulder, while a woman pressed one hand against the wound in her abdomen as she struggled toward the gates.

And he realized that time had run out.

He drove his sword into the ground and raised his hand.

Flames gathered around his body.

But this time, they were different.

The fire grew brighter with every passing moment until its orange glow began to disappear beneath an overwhelming radiance. It was no longer merely fire. It was becoming light itself, filling the battlefield with such brilliance that the surrounding flames seemed almost insignificant by comparison.

Alexander slowly opened his eyes.

"Bow."

The soldiers did not understand why he had given the command, but they had already learned not to question him in moments like this. One after another, they lowered their heads.

Then the flames exploded.

A massive wave of fire erupted from behind Alexander, rising above him like a colossal wall before surging forward across the battlefield. The wave swallowed the monsters in its path, consuming their advancing ranks beneath an enormous sea of flame while its radiance illuminated the entire sky.

For several moments, the crimson battlefield seemed to have transformed into a sea of gold.

The flames continued to burn long after the attack had passed, leaving behind a vast blackened expanse of scorched earth between the fortress and the surviving monsters. The battlefield fell strangely quiet, with only the crackling of the remaining flames disturbing the silence.

Alexander stood alone in the middle of the destruction.

His breathing was heavier now, and fire continued to drip from the tip of his sword. Yet beyond the scorched earth, movement had already begun again.

More monsters were emerging from the distance.

Hundreds.

Then thousands.

The endless tide slowly appeared through the mist, filling the horizon once more.

Alexander raised his eyes toward them.

He watched the approaching monsters for a moment before finally turning around.

Then he turned around.

The gates were closing.

The last soldier had entered.

Before the towering iron gates could fully shut, someone shouted:

"Sir! Come inside!"

Alexander did not answer.

He looked at the walls.

Then at the monsters.

Before entering the fortress through the towering gates, he slowly placed his sword behind his back.

Then he said calmly,

"Close the gates."

The gates began to close.

Then—

The gates slammed shut.