Hello guys, Aidka’s here.

I want to make clear that eblors are a race, just like humans. They are not monsters, but an intelligent race that has managed to develop a civilization just as great as humanity, or even greater.

There will be a couple of other races like this in the story. I will be introducing them as the plot advances.

…

Sixteen years ago, humanity was entangled in a fierce war against the constantly appearing dungeons.

The monsters coming from the dungeons were becoming stronger and stronger, to the point where some monsters were given the title of ‘calamity’, after the best Awakened of humanity failed to defeat them.

As consequence, humans lost a fifth of their land, and most of the sea became infected with high-level monsters.

Even so, humans never gave up hope. They sharpened their claws and thought of countermeasures to defeat the monsters. Even in that precarious situation, humans prided themselves as the rulers of the planet.

But everything changed when the first foreign civilization made contact with humanity.

The first contact between the two civilizations resulted in war, and the humans lost miserably. They lost ground against enemies that were stronger and better at using mana than them.

The situation soon worsened. A few months after the first foreign civilization appeared, another foreign civilization invaded the planet.

Just like the previous time, this civilization was stronger than humanity. Humans tried to make use of their technological weapons to face them, but the high-level individuals of this foreign civilization were mostly immune to modern weaponry, and some of them were able to receive nuclear weapons head-on.

After that, a third and a fourth civilization appeared, putting humans in a precarious situation.

Facing the four powerful civilizations, humans lost ground quickly. In just a few months, many humans were forced to abandon their homes as hundreds of millions of people perished at the hands of the foreign races.

The only thing fortunate was that the four races were not allies, but enemies. While they fought humanity, they were also fighting among themselves.

But that only delayed humanity’s demise and was unable to change the inevitable.

In the following five years, humanity lost four of the five continents, and most of the last continent had been lost as well.

The situation only changed when the Protector Duke appeared. He alone intimidated the four races and used his sword to divide Eurasia into three parts, declaring the middle part as human territory and declaring it off-limits for the other races.

None of the four races dared to disobey him, and thus, humanity finally got a bastion where they could recover.

But even after that, the war did not end.

The four races did not dare to invade the human territory, but they became the owners of the rest of the planet. Humanity, of course, was not happy with that and waged war constantly, trying to expand their territory and get more resources for the humans.

Just like that, hundreds of small wars and battles were fought within the borders of the World’s United Government, and the hatred between humans and the four races became stronger and stronger.

One of these races was the eblors, the first race to invade the planet.

They were similar to humans, but their eyes were lizard-like, and they had skin patterns similar to tree bark.

According to them, they descended from the ancestral trees in their world. That gave them their signature skin patterns and the abilities they were proud of.

Unlike humans, every eblor was born with the ability to control mana, and they could also resonate with the mana around them to borrow their power during battle and use it to do things impossible for humans.

Moreover, they could use ‘magic’, a method to use mana based on mathematical formulas that allowed them to use skill-like abilities without having a skill.

That made them very fearsome enemies. Generally, an eblor warrior could defeat a human Awakened of the same level easily.

And now, one of these warriors is in front of me.

Looking at the brown-skinned woman staring at me with her vertical eyes, my body became tense.

A feeling of danger that I did not feel when facing the monsters in the previous levels assaulted me, making my body freeze for an instant.

And in that instant, the woman in front of me disappeared.

My instincts honed inside countless battles in the dreamland reacted instantly. Without any hesitation, I threw my body aside, only to feel something cutting the place where my head had been just now.

From the corner of my eyes, I saw that the eblor woman had appeared beside me.

I did not have time to process the situation and rolled on the ground. At the same time, the eblor woman threw both of her daggers toward me, almost piercing my body.

The woman did not stop when she saw that her attack failed. She extended her hands and the daggers flew back to her. Then, she threw herself toward me like a cheetah.

I somehow managed to stand up and used the shaft of my spear to stop the two daggers, but the strength behind the daggers was so powerful that my body was pushed back while my feet left gullies on the ground.

The eblor woman pulled back her daggers and did a sweeping kick. I jumped backward to avoid the attack and distance myself from her, but the woman pursued me closely while brandishing her daggers at high speed.

The attacks were so fierce and intense that I did not have the opportunity to counterattack. I could only use my spear to block most of them while avoiding the remaining ones.

‘So strong!’

I was astonished in my mind.

I was aware that eblors were strong, but this has exceeded my expectations.

I dare to say that not many people have as much experience fighting other people as I; after all, I fight the demon every night inside my dreamland, but even so, I could barely cope with her attacks.

She was not only fast but also strong and precise. Every one of her attacks was interconnected in such a way that I could only block or evade, without the slightest chance to counterattack.

At this rate, it was just a matter of time before I lose.

Aware that I could not continue like this, I called upon the lightning inside my lightning seed and infused it into my spear. Then, when her daggers collided with my spear again, I discharged all the lightning I had infused into it in an instant.

The lightning traveled through the daggers to the eblor woman’s body. Instantly, the woman was hit by a powerful electric shock, and her body stiffened while twitching in pain.

Using this opportunity, I twirled my spear and aimed the tip towards her neck before thrusting it.

But at that moment, I felt the mana around the woman tremble.

In the next instant, a magic circle appeared below the woman's feet.

Then, a whirlpool of fire appeared around her and charged toward me.