The blade of the Sun Sword blazed crimson as it tore through the Imperial Guards’ armor and weapons like straw. Even wrapped in Aura Fire, their condensed energy couldn’t match the density of an Aura Blade. Equal output didn’t mean equal strength. Leon’s dominance was clear.

With his first strike, he cleaved the front guard and his weapon clean in two, plunging deep into the formation and cutting down all around him.

Even with the White Peak Palace flooding them with power, each Imperial Guard fell easily when faced alone. The problem was their number—thousands strong—and their precision as a unified fighting force.

One-on-one, they were no challenge. Even one against ten, Leon could overwhelm them. The issue was that it was more. Against fifty, or a hundred, he’d be forced to slow.

He realized it the moment he collided with their tight formation.

I need to clear as much space as possible in the front... or we’ll get caught up here!

The instant his boots hit the ground again, more than ten guards tumbled away, their bodies blackened and charred. Ten wasn’t anywhere near enough.

A charge that could have shattered a thousand-man battalion had only felled a few. Considering he’d used both the Sun Sword and Icarus Wing, the result was pitiful.

Their defensive ability was abnormally high. Even accounting for their Master-level output, it far exceeded expectations.

Let’s test something.

Instead of rushing in again, Leon raised the Holy Sword high. If he could identify the source of their defense—and shatter it—he could break through the formation in half the time.

He stepped forward, and from his right shoulder, the sword came down in a heavy diagonal arc aimed at the guard’s head. The intent was clear—split the man from helm to groin, a single fatal cut.

But the guard, impossibly fast, raised his sword to block with a loud clang. A shrill metallic scream filled the air as the guard’s blade bent like heated iron. Even with Aura Fire reinforcing it, Leon’s raw power crushed it easily.

The impact didn’t stop there. The shock shattered the guard’s gauntlet and visor, and blood poured from all seven orifices of his face.

After just one parry, every organ in his body had ruptured. And yet—

“Tch. As I thought.”

The guard didn’t die. No, he wasn’t just alive—he was healing. His shattered shoulders, knees, and spine reformed rapidly, muscles and nerves knitting back together. At this rate, he’d be ready to fight again in under ten seconds.

Leon, realizing that, delivered the finishing blow. The guard’s head flew clean off, and only then did the body collapse.

---It seems wounds struck directly by the Holy Sword can’t regenerate.

El-Cid’s calm voice echoed in his mind, and Leon responded, Still, their durability’s ridiculous. Shockwaves and fire aren’t enough to stop them, and their bodies are as hard as steel.

---They’re closer to chimeras than to exolaw undeads. Less about ‘not dying’ and more about ‘surviving.’ Destroy the brain, though, and they’ll lose control over their Aura and their combat memory.

How is Elahan doing---

Before Leon could finish his thought, a thunderous explosion shook the air.

A handful of guards struck by the Holy Iron Breaker flew off like pebbles, their helmets and skulls smashed to pulp midair. Unlike Leon, who used lines of strikes, Elahan used surface area.

Each swing of her massive mace struck with the force to topple city walls. Shields, spears—none of it mattered.

“I pity you, stripped even of your own will,” Elahan called out between blows. “But devotion to the wicked is nothing but sin! My duty is to return the lost souls to the Goddess’s embrace!”

Muttering as if to steel herself, she swung again. Guards holding shields and spears alike were crushed without distinction. Their armor, reinforced with Aura Fire, had the defensive ability of near-sixth-tier magic, yet the strength of the most powerful Saintess in history surpassed even that.

Unlike Leon, who broke through with speed and firepower, Elahan advanced one heavy step at a time. She never stopped, not even slowed.

---That girl’s their natural predator.

El-Cid murmured, ---Against regenerators like these, blunt force works better than blades.

Wider, crushing blows were more effective than clean cuts. The Holy Sword could stop regeneration entirely, but unless the blade directly severed vital points, the wounds were too shallow.

Leon understood that Elahan could handle herself. He only needed to focus on his own front. He dispelled Icarus Wing and lowered his sword, and blinding light began to flow from its edge.

A tremendous amount of Aura condensed into a single, fine line. He couldn’t distort space like Cedric’s Ten Thousand Severing Strikes, but at this concentration, no physical defense could hold. The Imperial Guards would be sliced apart like straw.

Leon stepped forward and swung down, then across. Guards split apart into halves and quarters, spraying blood like fountains.

Through that crimson storm, the golden-sworded Hero pressed on with the goal of striking down one enemy with each stroke. Unlike before, his movements were quick, sharp, and precise.

“Oh?” Cedric, following behind the two, let out a chilling grin. “Interesting. Imitating my style?”

Like Leon, his swordsmanship was clean and precise. Rather than dispersing his power broadly, he gathered it along the blade’s path, cutting down everything within its trajectory.

No matter how fine their weapons or how much power they drew from the palace, the Royal Guards couldn’t withstand his Ten Thousand Severing Strikes. Behind Cedric lay mutilated bodies, twitching in pieces on the floor.

He glanced down at his blade with an unsatisfied look and scolded, “What, you can’t eat these things?”

At his words, Dainslife trembled faintly, as if to agree. The guards weren’t sustained by life force, but by the mana flowing from the White Peak Palace itself. Cedric’s cursed sword fed only on life, meaning that it had no ability to absorb mana.

It couldn’t even suppress their exolaw-based regeneration. The guards Cedric had carved apart could reanimate within minutes.

“Useless scrap metal.”

The sword quivered indignantly at the harsh insult but didn’t dare protest aloud. Cedric smirked, clearly expecting that reaction.

Meanwhile, Valter was having a harder time with his own opponents.

“They can still move after being burned to the bone?”

His Aura Blade, named Blaze, could shape flame into forms he controlled freely like extensions of himself. Flames born from ultra-compressed Aura carried terrifying, destructive power and could even burn spirits and abominations that defied physical laws.

And yet, the ones he had burned black as coal rose again and again.

“Ssshh... haaah...”

“Ghh... grrr... huuuh...”

The sight of their muscles, bones, and organs regenerating was grotesque. Their armor had melted away, leaving them bare as Aura Fire once again flared to life over their bodies.

“That’s enough! If burning your bones isn’t enough, I’ll erase you completely—leave not a single speck of flesh behind!”

The Guards didn’t stop, no matter how many he struck down. Finally, Valter’s Blaze bared its fangs.

The crimson Aura around him swelled, burning hotter, brighter. The explosive attribute of his Aura didn’t just destroy. It amplified his own power. For a brief time, he could surpass even Leon and Elahan.

“Explosive Technique: Dragon-Shaped Sword.”

The air around Valter shimmered violently, the heat bending light itself and warping the scenery. A dragon of fire surged from his sword, its molten body twisting into form as it roared to life.

It wasn’t truly alive, but when its jaws opened, the air itself trembled, and the surrounding Guards were blown away several meters by the sheer shockwave.

This was the true face of Valter the Blazing Knight. He molded his Aura into a semi-autonomous entity—his second weapon.

“Begone! You wretches who were stripped even of your right to die!”

As Valter swung his sword, the fire dragon writhed and lashed out. The speed and power were overwhelming. The instant its flames brushed a guard, armor and body alike turned to ash. When not even a scrap of flesh remained, regeneration was no longer an option.

It consumed his energy rapidly, meaning he couldn’t sustain it for long. For that brief moment, however, Valter’s advance even outpaced Elahan’s.

“Your Highness! Now!” Gilbert shouted, and Lyon dashed forward, seizing the opening carved by the four ahead of them.

If they fell behind now, they’d be isolated. While Gilbert, who had already stepped into the realm of Master, might withstand it, Lyon would be crushed in moments.

Dammit...! Lyon clenched his jaw so tightly it bled. If I’d only reached the Master’s realm already, I wouldn’t be such a burden...!

Unable to even protect himself, he was only slowing Gilbert down. The shame burned worse than the battle’s heat.

However, he couldn’t afford reckless pride. As a registered direct heir of the imperial line, Lyon was the only one holding back the palace’s defense system. If he died, the remaining six would be in mortal danger.

“Goddammit.”

Seething at his own weakness, Lyon looked around at the fierce combat raging around him and soon realized something was wrong.

“Someone’s missing...?”

He instantly knew who. Among Leon’s group, there was one woman who should have stood out the most because of her looks, but actually had the quietest presence. Now, she was completely gone.

She hadn’t fled or hidden out of fear. If she intended to do that, she’d never have joined this mission in the first place.

Then where is she... and what is she doing?

He couldn’t find her—none of them could. Not even the other Masters sensed a trace.

As an Assassin Master—the apex of all killers—Karen’s ability to erase her presence was practically godlike. Unless one possessed a detection-type Aura Blade, it was impossible to perceive her by ordinary means.

Having stepped half a pace beyond the physical world into a shadowed, illusory dimension, Karen blended seamlessly into darkness—beyond even the palace’s perception.

Good. Everything’s going according to plan so far, she thought.

If she released even a trace of Aura, she’d be exposed instantly. Karen, however, boldly slipped into the outer wall of the palace.

What unfolded before her eyes was a dazzling web of magic.

Like a system of glowing veins, immense mana channels stretched from the barrier’s core throughout the White Peak Palace. Even a single strand radiated power enough to cast a seventh-tier spell.

Cutting a few of these channels wouldn’t be difficult, but that prince said it would trigger a massive explosion afterward.

Unlike Leon, Karen didn’t take Lyon’s warning at face value. She thought that he might have lied to avoid damaging the palace itself. But after tracing the flow several times, she had to admit that he had indeed been telling the truth.

Even she, with her precise control, didn’t dare tamper with such an unstable flow. It was like trying to pour exactly one cup of water by tilting a lake.

Still, that didn’t mean there was no way.

“Hah... my first field test in a situation like this, huh?”

Wiping cold sweat from her forehead, Karen focused every ounce of her concentration.

While developing ways to compensate for the lack of destructive power in her Pitch-Black Dance, she had discovered something: she hadn’t even tapped a tenth of her potential with “shadow.”

A shadow wasn’t merely a void left by light. It was the surface of an imaginary dimension—one made of numbers that do not exist in the physical world.

“Pitch-Black Dance.”

Unseen by anyone, Karen extended her shadow. The faint, weightless darkness seeped into the mana conduit and spread along its surface, darkening the radiant blue lines.

Moments later, the flow feeding dozens of Imperial Guards flickered and stopped. The conduit lost its power entirely.

Valter, having recalled his Dragon-Shaped Sword after cutting another guard, frowned. He’d felt no resistance on his last strike.

“Hm? What’s happening?” he muttered as the same phenomenon began occurring throughout the corridor. It was too convenient to be a coincidence.

From beyond the wall, Karen smiled and muttered, “New technique, success.”

Once she succeeded once, she could do it again. Her shadow branched into ten streams, each creeping into the mana channels and draining their light.

It wasn’t a grand technique—just one born from understanding.

“Phantom, First Form: Formless Existence.”

It simply drew physical or magical energy from the material world into the imaginary dimension. Mana, Aura—it didn’t matter. Within shadow, such distinctions lost meaning.

A shadow was nothing. Anything pulled into the imaginary dimension beyond it ceased to exist. It lost form, lost presence, and returned to nothingness. Mana, being a formless energy to begin with, was even more vulnerable.

“Why destroy the conduits and risk an explosion when I can just divert their power elsewhere?” Karen said with a satisfied smile.

All the mana flowing into the Imperial Guards leaked silently into the imaginary realm. Karen couldn’t reuse that energy. What had become “nothing” could not be made “something” again. That was beyond the domain of shadows.

Her shadow spread farther, consuming fourteen conduits. As it absorbed their magic, the Aura Fire surrounding the guards flickered, as if about to vanish like candle flames on the verge of dying out.

The battle-hardened Masters didn’t miss their chance.

“They’re weaker! Both their strength and Aura are cut in half!”

Valter blasted through half a dozen Guards with a single strike, charging ahead with renewed vigor. Even so, the effort left him short of breath—it had been a long time since an enemy made him push this hard.

Leon could tell this was the opening they needed. With the Aura Fire weakened, wide-range attacks would be effective.

“Elahan!”

Leon’s voice rang out. Among the strike team, Elahan had advanced the farthest—she was the only one ahead of him.

The instant he called, she turned and answered, “Yes, Hero!”

“Jump up!”

She didn’t even ask why. She simply obeyed, leaping high without hesitation. That was trust.

“Grand Chariot.”

The Holy Sword, angled horizontally, shone with brilliant light. To strike as many enemies as possible at once, Leon unleashed his technique down the full length of the corridor.

“Heavenly Jade, Second Form: Merak.”

A radiant slash of swordlight roared forward. In the blink of an eye, it carved through the space just above the guards’ waists.

And in the next instant, over a hundred Imperial Guard upper halves slipped from the bottom, blood spraying like a burst pipe.