5th Sukurach of Meruriel 1236

Beno's POV

If I had to attack a fort, I have to attack one that would definitely hurt them, yet still won't be easy to trace me back. Currently, I'm flying around the southern coast of this continent. Damn, I'm still not used to flying for such a long time, my wings hurt... 1 hour seems to be the maximum of my current flight time. Any more and I feel like my wings would literally just pop off. So I literally had to do my search with breaks in between... At least I'm still being able to search. 

The search isn't going well. A lot of the forts are either too close to large settlements or are too small and can even be considered as abandoned. Of course, I noted the location of the abandoned forts to see if I could scavenge something. Speaking of which, should I use another name when fighting them? Beno sounds weird when I am a girl now... wait, why do I feel weird, was I a boy before? I feel that there are still some memories missing from me... The emergency fix doesn't did much in that part... So a new name... Bryn? That sounds generic and I don't feel like using it. So Bella sounds better, but not my taste, Belgrynd... Sounds like a mix between two names, it's a girly name that doesn't sound too generic while also have that cool feel with it. Alright, my name starting from now will be Belgrynd! 

The search is taking so long, that I even have time to literally change my name to a suitable name... Cant, there be a more easy fortress to attack.  Maybe I should try harder targets... Well, it's almost night, they won't have a better vision so let's do it. Nighttime or not doesn't matter for me, it matters for them though. 

I found a fortress to my liking on the southwest side of the continent. It looks like your average square-shaped fort with 4 taller watchtowers at each corner. There is a gate at the south and west side since those two-direction connects to a town while the other two lead to the vast flatlands that have no life at all. Plantlife excluded of course. On top of the watchtowers are 4 braziers that are not lighted up, if I had to guess, if there is an emergency towards the fort, the people there will light it up and request support from the nearby towns and others forts. Makes sense. 

That means I have to kill those people nearest to there first. Then those that are heading towards there. Next would be the messengers that are going out, or... I could try to jam the gates... It uses a chain to pull the gates up so breaking them would disable the gate. Alright, after forming a plan on what to do with the guards within the fort, if it can be called as a plan, I readied my double gunblades and start aiming at the watchers on top of the watchtowers. I am going to ignore the guards that are patrolling for now.

*bang* *bang* 

There we go two dead with their head blasted. Because of the distance between me and the fort, they didn't hear the sounds of my gun. Nor did they notice the two guys that are dead due to me shooting them. Well, if you are not going to notice it, then I will send you to them too!

*bang* *bang* *bang* *bang* *bang* *bang* 

Alright, the guards on top of the watchtowers are dead. Yet no one notices them... arent the soldiers in this world having too little training? Or was they underpaid that they don't really care about the fort... Suits me! I landed on top of one of the watchtowers and stored the bodies into my inventory, and dismantling them of course. Though I immediately discard away all of the silage, bones, armor, and swords. The only thing I'm keeping is the meat and money! I switched the ammo of one of my gunblades into the AP ammo and shoot towards the chains holding the gate. 

*bang* *clink* *bang* *clink*

With two shots, the chains holding the gates are broken. Damn this bullet is strong, it could even penetrate iron chains. This however though alerted the humans near the gates. Doesn't matter.  Time to bring a gun into a sword fight! Though I'm bringing a gunblade... and two of them. 

*bang* *bang* *bang*

I am just shooting at the guards that are on top of the walls because they are trying to reach the braziers of course. Even though it would be good to alert more humans to come and kill me, I don't really want that to happen so fast. It is better that they don't know who does these raids first. If possible I don't want them to even know there is a dragon here killing humans here and there. 

While I was talking to myself internally, the guards on top of the walls are all dead... They still haven't found me... WEAK! Should I just go down and show myself? Nah, let's just continue to snipe them from here. It is a good training for moving targets exercise. Especially those that are running around aimlessly. I just love their faces when it is their turn to get sniped off one by one! 

After what seems like an hour of just me sniping the human guards one by one without them even remotely close to knowing what is happening, I got bored and decided the remaining guards should be enough for me to handle in medium-close combat.

Oh... it seems like a big shot is finally coming out. This will be fun~

Fort Commander's POV

What is going on, what is with the noise outside!

" Jerod what is going on outside, tell them to calm down damn it," I said to one of the soldiers on standby outside the door.

" Sir, the chains holding the gate have been broken, and the guards on the gate are all dead!" Jerod answered with a hint of panic.

" Tell the rest of the soldiers to gather up at the courtyard. This could be the attack of one of the rebels. They are probably attacking the town right now. The disabling of the gate must be so that we can't go out in time and assist the local guards. Tell those darumas to start gathering at the south gate, I will have them pull up the gate while we attempt to lock it down to allow our units to pass through. Tell the third squadron to start searching for the intruders. They must have planned a lot for this. I will personally head out to lead the troops to fight against the intruders and their allies." I said towards Jerod and a few other soldiers near me. Just who could have ordered such an attack, is it the pope? I heard he has gone missing some time ago, did he hate the royals until he wants to retake the kingdom by force? Or was it the young prince, his popularity has been rising up due to the propaganda he made? Doesn't matter, we will hold this fort and prove our worth! But I still hope the duke could increase our raise though, it's been getting harder and harder to survive these days.

After equipping my armor and weapons, I start to go out of the fort citadel to command the soldiers, but the moment I went out, what I could only see is only a scene of carnage. Dead soldiers everywhere trying to kill a single enemy who is wearing armor that we have never seen before. If I had to guess, the one inside the armor would be a little girl, seeing her quite long hair flowing out behind of her helmet. That helmet looks weird, it has two horns sticking out at the top of her head, is it to create a menacing feel? Whatever feel it was to emit, it's working a lot, just by looking at that girl I can feel death coming up to my heart...

" Good morning Mr. Human, You must be the commander of this fort here," the little girl said, that sound definitely belongs to a little girl, just who in the right mind would train little girls to do this kind of stuff... my own daughter at this age would only be playing happily with her friends, not sneaking into a fort killing dozens of men with a risk of being killed.

" I am the commander of the fort here, Casper is my name, may I ask what is your name and your purpose of doing this attack?" I asked, trying to at least bait out some info, but somehow, I feel that... I won't be leaving here alive... if only someone could bring this info out, the other forts could defend better.

" Belgrynd is my name human, bring that name to your afterlife, as you won't be coming out of this alive. And before you ask, I do not serve any of you human scums, I came here on my own, and my reason huh~" the little girl doesn't belong to any faction? Or is it because she is not obliged to say it out. I never heard someone with that name near here before, is it from the other side of the continent? Or could she be from outside of the continent, but that's impossible, the demihumans can live here as we are protected by the holy barrier!

"Let's see~ I got bored and want to kill some humans for fun, got a problem with that?" that kind of reason... does this girl kill only for fun???

" Looks like someone is angry~ Well guess what, after seeing you like this acting all mighty, I feel a bit angry too!" this girl... she is taking this too far! Taking human lives as if it's trash! Even if I don't survive here, I am sure some of the hiding members would be able to bring the info of this monster called Belgrynd to the other forts!

" All surviving units, surround this monster! We will kill her right here right now!" I said as I took out my sword and pointed at that monster.

Belgrynd's POV

This guy sure got guts, he saw his men got slaughtered yet still tried to attack me with this little amount of soldiers? I don't know whether he is crazy or he just wants to protect those hidden units of his. Don't think that I can't find them, well it's not like I have to tell him that those hidden soldiers that he is so proud of are already inside my inventory... well the meat is, the bones are all discarded already.

" Very well, I am itching for a good fight! Let's see how well will you do against my gunblades! Commander Casper!" I said as I readied both of my gunblades towards Casper. Casper can be seen readied his sword to receive my blades, but sorry, not now.

*bang* *bang*

Two archers that are hiding within the fort citadel got shot down.

" Well since you guys are already ganging up on me, you wouldn't mind if I didn't say start before attack right?" I said, provoking them. I can see some of them becoming angry at my provoke. Well... Who cares about how you feel? But since playing with food is bad, I will end this quickly.

With the speed that normal humans can't react to, I pounced onto the guards next to Casper, heads flying off as my gunblade swiftly cutting through their armor like its butter.

" Serge! Damn it! Everyone attack! She cant handle us all if we all attack all at the same time!" Casper said while giving orders to the soldiers that are hesitating due to the sudden kill. Well, why having cold feet now? I already killed a ton of your friends, doesn't matter if I killed one or two more right?

Casper swung his sword horizontally towards me made me step back a little. Even if I know this armor is tough, I still don't want to risk getting it damaged. Some soldiers saw this as a chance and tried to poke me with their spears. Well too bad. I'm not using a sword, I'm using a gunblade, and what can a gunblade do? *bang* *bang* Shooting, of course, I shoot two of the soldiers that are trying to poke me with their spears, only with their head welcoming a new tunnel in their brain. Hope this cools your head a bit soldiers~ After shooting those two soldiers, I continue to step back and they immediately jump towards the other soldiers that are still trying to hit me with their spears. The swordsman is all near Casper so it is only the spearman who is doing the poking. I swung my gunblade towards the spearman which made me earned an extra kill. One of the blades misses though. It got deflected by a swordsman that is barely fast enough to help the spearman. Of course, even if it got deflected, doesn't mean I can't continue the attack. I use my other blade that isn't deflected and immediately swung it towards the swordsman, giving him a serious wound at the waist, successfully disabling him. 

With that, it's 6 dead soldiers among the 20 so that gathered. Excluding Casper of course, I am definitely going to leave the most fun part last! Now that the soldiers are starting to rush in, I also started to hasten my steps. Starting to side step here and there to avoid spear and sword thrusts, you know, you shouldn't do a thrusting movement with a sword, it's bad. I continue to dodge and shoot the soldiers. Each time doing a perfect headshot. Although I am a self-taught shooter, I am quite confident in my aiming abilities, after all, if I can shoot targets while flying at high speed, why can't I hit these targets when I am only walking and them rushing towards me~ 

After a few minutes, there are only Casper and 3 of his subordinates left. 

" So, what are you 4 waiting for? Waiting for me to have an opening?" I asked them, provoking them in the meanwhile.

" You might have deadly weapons, but you move like a novice! We have analyzed your moves monster!" One of the guards said. Hmmm, provoking me back? It's not use you know? Well, it does have uses. *bang* Which is speeding up your death.

" Whos next, or are you all going to finally attack me now?" I asked them, and then added " Cause if you are not attacking, I am." This certainly made them nervous. The two guards raised their swords while Casper is still staring at me with his sword in his hand, though not raised like the other 2 soldiers.

With a dash, two more heads went flying, the two heads of the guards of Casper. 

" So you are the last one Mr. Casper, how do you feel," I asked.

" As good as you can while watching everyone you know died, and I know monsters such as you will not know this feeling," Casper said, finally readying his sword.

" Not knowing how it feels when the people you know died huh... this is making me angry. I was supposed to be enjoying this, yet you made this feels so bad. It's making me angry." I said, gripping my gunblade harder.

" You know what, I really don't know how you feel right now. The same as you will never know what I feel before, because of this. I am going to give you a quick death. You made me understand one thing." I said while I leap forward towards him while cutting down his sword into pieces.

" No one will understand what you feel better than yourself. So don't ask others to sympathize with you." I said while I turn around and cut Casper's arms off. He is now yelling in pain, but I don't care.

" No one will care how you feel, no matter how hurt you are. They will only care about themselves." I said while this time cutting his legs off.

" At the very end, it is not you against everyone, it is you against yourself. As you figure out your place in the world, you will start adjusting yourself to the world. Even if said adjustment is to make yourself a monster," I said while this time, cutting his head off.

" After all, the one who can make someone a monster, is themselves," I said as I left the corpse of Casper there and left. I don't want to stay here anymore, I have enough food anyways.

Benokelvin

Phew, sorry for late chapter. I literally wasted an hour or more to think how to write a combat scene.

And literally writing the ending there is really brain wrecking. I don't really know what is the best way to end it like that.