The shrill, deafening sound of metal cutting air rang sharply next to my ears, and my blood froze.

Bullets whizzed past my face at the same time, the pressure from the twisting wind warmly stinging my cheeks like I'd been slapped by my father, like I'd become a child again. But even though it happened so quickly, I still knew what I had to do:

I didn't think a moment longer before throwing my body forward, raising my longsword in a defensive posture as I felt a heavy-handed strike meet my blade, sparks flying and metal screaming as I fought to parry it.

What hit me was no Dark Rose Footman, it was just too strong to be one.

Hell, even an evolution wouldn't have hit so damn hard.

When I managed to put a safe distance between me and my attacker – ending up right next to Bertrand – I lowered my sword in disbelief. The entire blade was trembling, shaking slightly in voiceless bouts of pain.

I looked up towards my attacker... and unexpectedly, it was a human. She was clad in a full set of slender onyx armour without a helmet, intermittently replaced by dark leather near the joints, sides, back, inner thighs, and other parts necessary for flexibility. On her right hand was a lance, oozing brutality from the extended, heavy-looking blade.

No matter how much I looked, it was a human woman, nothing more. But the more I looked, the less human she seemed.

Her star-like silver eyes oscillated between the 2 of us with a deadly glint, her blank stare unnervingly calm.

"Now," I breathed out, "What the fuck is that...?"

"It's another enemy."

Bertrand replaced his empty magazine with a mechanical click.

"Yeah, I can see that, you bastard," I scoffed, "What I mean is, there's no way she's just an ordinary opportunist."

Banditry had become more or less uncommon ever since the 3rd Main Quest started, not because the monsters in the No Man's Land had gotten weaker, but because the Avatars themselves had acclimated better and become stronger, more prepared.

Still, there were always greedy people. The problem was that she didn't look to be one of them.

From her armor, to her weapons, to her countenance, she didn't look like someone in need of being a highway woman. Maybe she was from a local Faction? Or even one of the King Of Rats's scouts looking into this area? Or a military woman...?

"Hey," Bertrand caught my attention, "Look at the disgusting light around that spearhead for a second."

"What?"

"Just do it. Quick."

At Bertrand's serious and anxious voice, I looked again without questioning him. On the spear's blade that was cleaved into the ground, I saw an aura of refined ivory like a second skin, glowing subtly with a metallic edge.

The foreign, grotesquely organic swirling of it made goosebumps rise throughout my body. Since MP worked directly to enhance the spirit and the physique, the senses of Avatars were also advanced to balance it out and prevent their minds from falling apart.

Of course, it was much more nuanced because of the Attribute system, but I didn't need any special stat to guess what that was:

An otherworldly magic.

A thing that could only used by something like Challengers right now.

"What..." My voice cracked, "w-What do we do?"

My voice was shaking, but I swallowed dry, trying to gulp down my worries.

The nervousness inside me was temporarily suppressed as I waited for Bertrand's say. While I was the soldier on the front lines, Bertrand was the general who stoically strategized. Naturally, I trusted his judgment a great deal – even more than mine – although I despised him a fair bit. It blunted my trust most of the time, but I knew when to shut it out.

"We can't run away from her, so we'll have to fight this one," He laughed dryly, without any mirth at all.

"..."

"Don't show such a hopeless face." He palmed the trigger of his gun, "You saw that, right? She's faster than we can handle."

"She's stronger when it comes down to raw strength, so we'll be at a terrible disadvantage if we turn our backs on her. Instead, our chances will only go up if we fight her head-on."

"...Is it really like that?"

"Unfortunately, yes. If only we had a bit more people, we could've..."

He started mumbling something to himself as my heart was wrapped up in a turmoil of emotions.

With no other way out, I grit my teeth hard to try and block out the fear, brandishing my blade tightly. The female Challenger before us wrenched her spear from the ground and placed it to rest on her shoulder, ripping up the Dark Rose Footman's corpse even more.

'Haha, I guess I'll have to test my new Skill on her instead.'

I tried to give myself renewed confidence, but it didn't work out too well.

She slowly came forward with a steady stride and a cold light in her frosty silver eyes, which seemed to have the same sharpness as her spear. The same feeling from that time came rising from within me:

An overwhelming sensation from acknowledging the disparity of strength between us.

But even then, she was no Roderick Powell; I could feel the gap between us wasn't as large as it was with him. And even if it was, I wouldn't run away again like that, my fear and everything else be damned.

 

I knew they were much stronger than the Dark Rose Footmen judging by how the young man with golden-dyed points played around with them without worries, and the other one had a so-called Skill that could read the moves of their foes. This...

...Could be somewhat a problem for me.

 A very minor issue, but still.

'Wow, where am I getting all this confidence from?'

'No,' I chided myself, 'Let's keep my head in the game.'

I'd heard enough from behind that destroyed car to realize they needed to utter the keywords out loud to activate them. And since I'd also got a grasp on what their main – or at least their most frequently used – Skills were, I already knew how to react to them.

'It's not a problem if I just hit them preemptively so they can't say it, or if I make sure they can't speak.'

Whether it be cutting off their tongues or their vocal cords, I'd still be able to do it if I tried hard enough.

Having finished thinking, I put strength into my lower body and bent my knees, releasing the accumulated pressure moments later to launch myself forward like a ballista bolt. The sword-wielding one reacted quickly and pounced on me, glinting blade raised high and mouth opening, while the other guy jumped back to make some distance while also shouting.

"Earth Striker!"

"Foresight!"

A sword covered in jagged dark brown energy came crashing down upon my head with surprising speed, and I saw 2 eyes glint with soft scarlet light from the peripheries of my vision.

Their reaction speed was good and although their teamwork was quite clumsy, they already had the experience to make up for it at such young age. But they still lacked sheer strength, and I knew that lack of power was hard to conquer even with good teamwork.

The kind of brutal power that cruelly suppressed everyone in its path.

Numbers alone couldn't close the gap created by it.

'If they don't have that, then my chances of winning improve.'

And even if I lost, I still had a trump card up my sleeves.

The only time I'd ever seen such power was when an F-Rank Gate warped and mutated into an E-Rank, spawning the D-Rank Gate Leader, Toxic Rock Drake of the Sub-Dragon family. The thing had a very humbling effect on me:

It tore through my strongest teammates like paper, which was why my Solar Knights Guild was disbanded.

'Unless they have that kind of strength there's no way I'll be in mortal danger.'

I blocked his blade, but a sudden kick connected with my stomach and I winced. I forcefully swung my heavy spear again to throw him away right as a burst of bullets rained down on me, drowning my ears with the sound of metal hitting metal as my body shone ivory. Thankfully, the bullets didn't seem magically enhanced, but I felt there was definitely something special about them.

I didn't have the time to think much about it as the swordsman lowered his position, taking advantage of the fact that I was still reeling from the attack and groaning in pain as he rushed forward.

While an F-Rank would be in danger if they fought against someone with a gun, E-Ranks only had some trouble with it.

That didn't mean it didn't hurt like a bitch, and I'd still have some damn nasty bruises.

The guy in front of me was probably taking the fight seriously, as he didn't show any of his previously relaxed attitudes. I decided to exerce cautiousness too as he lifted his sword, shooting forward and performing an overhead slash as if to dissect me.

"Acceleration!"

'Oh, I haven't seen him using that one yet.'

An electric pale aura covered his feet as a pair of regal, thunderous pale wings sprouted from the sides of his boots, his body blurring around wildly as his speed increased tremendously in a matter of seconds.

"!"

I only saw the brilliant haze of his longsword coming closer before I managed to react — my eyes widened as danger sirens blared in my head and my body jumped to the left instinctively, avoiding a blade that slashed horizontally at my chest.

Somehow, the sword had changed directions mid-strike, from a straight to a horizontal one.

His frame blurred, retreating then charging again to strike in a single breath's time, and making my forehead crease as I focused on defending. Although he had weaker muscle power than me, and the rapid speed that his so-called Acceleration Skill provided him was clunky and unnatural with mechanical, rigid footwork, he could still be fairly threatening.

Was it a secondary ability of his Skill? It didn't seem like it, but I wasn't in the position to ponder further than that.

The blade in his hand slithered in the air like a snake whenever it came closer to its target, or me in other words, and shifted to hit at angles that were awkward to defend against. Still, I held on like I wouldn't have been able to even dream of in the past.

'But even if it's like this, I can still hold on fairly well.'

He wasn't like the Dark Rose Footman who lacked self-preservation instincts and defied the laws of energy conservation. In a way, his sapience was actually making the fight easier for me was he wasn't very inventive in the way he attacked.

My thoughts were cut short as my body flinched and screamed again, a burst of bullets hitting my upper back.

The damage was reduced similarly to the first time by white Force Aura, but in that short moment, I tensed up in surprise and allowed the swordsman to slash at my left thigh instead of my right arm. I cursed myself inside my heart for being so unprepared.

Just a few weeks of idleness had already made me this damn rusty?

I yelled in pain and jumped back, ignoring the heated mark that sliced across my leg as blood streamed from the deep wound his accelerated momentum had birthed and carved jaggedly into my flesh. It felt like a smoldering serpent was wrapped around my wound.

When I carefully turned my head around while making sure both of them were still in my line of sight, I saw that behind me was a stone-faced young man with light brown skin and teal-painted hair holding a rifle. The one with the Skill of Foresight.

'When-- No, just how did he get there without me noticing?'

I would've seen if he'd run there, and he couldn't have sneaked up behind me so quickly.

'Forget it. It's time to get serious here.'

Although I recognized that this fight wasn't one I'd win while taking it easy, I was still putting my efforts into saving up my strength so I wasn't left weak and helpless when confronted with another threat. Thinking ahead was just the basics.

But now, it seemed that I'd have to disregard that.

I put energy into my legs again, and then my shape blurred violently like his. A sense of satisfaction blossomed inside me as I watched the swordsman slow down with eyes as wide as saucers, but then quickly move again with even more surprise – this time mixed with tense anxiety – plastered on his face as a silver blade passed by close to his head.

He dodged, but a bloody line was drawn across his ear and his shoulder was cut up some, dripping crimson.

I'd only scratched the surface of Thunder Storm Footwork(D) in my previous fights since I didn't waste any Aura on it and relied solely on technique and my physical abilities, but now I was showing its truest potential:

The gap between our speeds was very short-lived.

His blade still hissed violently through the air in an effort to hit me, but he could barely counter-attack while properly defending himself, so most times it only came off as wild flailing that exposed his weak spots.

Such was the difference between the 'skills' and the Skills used by both of us, it seems.

 

'Ah, fuck.'

The woman's speed matched Leon's as she stabbed at him again and again, making blood fly everywhere as his body was littered with many shallow, painful wounds that slowly increased his mounting fear. Not before long, I saw him sweat coldly with slowing steps.

I couldn't offer him support this time since I didn't have a clear view of her, and I was scared myself that the distance I'd managed to quietly place between us like a barrier – which I did recognize as flimsy – would be broken before I could even react.

He was only avoiding great damage because his speed almost matched her's somewhat.

And then, my heart dropped as I noticed something, biting my lip hard enough to break the skin and draw blood:

That damned Skill of his, Acceleration was ending.

"Fuck! You damn cunt...!"

Suppressing his raging emotions with pure fury at being bested in the area he was most confident in, his agility and reaction speed, he held up his sword with bloodshot, unblinking eyes like that of the deranged killer he really was.

"Greater Impact!"

A powerful, thrumming emerald swirl of distortion wrapped around his blade, spinning violently and warping the air.

He slashed down and dark green energy spilled out like a crashing wave along with his sword, destroying the concrete pavement under its weight. It continued onward and broke the streetlamps around us, loudly flattening the collapsed poles and even grazing the nearby ruins. As it subsided and disappeared completely, all that was left standing in the middle of the street was him.

The only place left untouched was the piece of land he was standing upon, which now formed a rough circle of broken ground like an island inside the large crater he'd created, clogged with debris and cracked soil previously hidden beneath the street.

"Ha...Hahahaha!"

Laughing loudly, he gulped air down hard, and I could see the sweat rolling off his skin as his hair clung to his scalp, the red-ish golden setting sun reflecting on his glistening skin. Even I had to admit... he looked damn cool right now.

I knew that bittersweet feeling of MP being drained by using a powerful Skill, it was intoxicating.

His face showed arrogant thoughts along the lines of "Of course, not even a Challenger could survive my Skill" clearly. I wagered his entire body must be aching like a bitch right now, but when he was about to sit down, he stopped dead in his tracks.

'...The hell?'

Honestly, I was just as baffled as him.

A woman stood in front of us, holding a heavy lance covered in scarlet, looking like molten gold in the refracted sunlight. She stood just outside the ring of destruction caused by his ability, glancing down at the small ravine.

"Hey..."

"!"

"Was that your best shot?"

"Don't joke around with me..."

"If you were betting your victory on that, then I'm sorry to say it's kind of disappointing. A bit slow."

"h-How the hell could you...?"

"What, didn't you hear me? It was so sluggish it didn't even manage to scratch one of my hairs.."

It seemed our worries were the same.

'No... How, just how did the fuck did she...'

My vision darkened slightly and my head buzzed, but before I could make any more sense of it the female Challenger dashed forward, disappearing in a blur. I was rudely brought back to reality, but only briefly before my heart tightened:

"Ahh... a-Aahhh!"

Leon leaked out a sorrowful scream and swung his blade without aim, looking like he was in the eye of a deadly storm as his body was sliced repeatedly. They were heavier now, and it was clear he wouldn't be able to hold on alone this time.

I opened fired, bullets flying past him and almost connecting with her numerous times, but always missing at the last second. He gathered his MP, again and again, to try and hit her with Earth Striker, but his blade just dug into the ground. The more seconds passed, the more hopeless out efforts started to appear.

While I wondered just how she could move so fast in such rough terrain, he was forced down from his last bastion of hope and fell into the ravine he'd created around him. Fuck... How the hell could I assist him?

I didn't have any attack abilities that would be useful right now without hitting him.

Not before long, his Skill also ended and he panted even harder with exhaustion, not having enough strength left to even brandish his sword anymore as the wings on his feet collapsed. He looked directly at me, and my eyes trembled while looking at his visage:

His face was filled with unwillingness and pain and despair, but I could see the faintest twinkle of hope hidden inside his pupils, and I knew he hoped I'd saved him. God, how can this damned bastard even have skin thick enough to want my help right now?

He hated me, but also trusted my judgment and rationality better than his own.

To me, that was just pathetic.

The sword grasped desperately in his hands shattered into cold pieces as it finally gave into the numerous small cracks...

...And he stumbled forward weakly.

'He's done for...'

He didn't have a weapon, didn't have MP left for any Skills, and didn't even have any energy left to run away at all. He only had his weakening willpower left to keep him conscious, but he was running on fumes right now.

The pressure on his brain should be so heavy right now that he'd only have one thought left:

'I d-don't want to die...'

'Shit, I want to live...!'

I knew someone like him couldn't possibly accept that he'd die just like that.

Fuck, not even I could accept something like that. I'd wasted so many resources on him as one of my best subordinates just for him to end up dead like this, putting the responsibility of his demise on my hands like the selfish bastard he'd always been.

"Help me... h-Help me, damn it!"

With nothing else to do, he reached out to me with a trembling hand.

And I watched him die.

A merciless thrust from her spear stabbed through his chest and threw him forward, knocking him close to my feet. His body twitched for a few moments, but his eyes slowly turned glassy and fogged over as blood pooled beneath him, a metallic smell in the air.

His chest was empty with a fist-sized hole through it, with only gore leaking out.

The combined stench of blood, sweat, and death latched on stubbornly to the back of my nostrils, and I vividly felt like I could taste each of those things all at once. I felt the world spinning around me and my legs weakened, but I gripped my gun tighter and the feeling of the cool metal on my palm brought me some stability. Well, the most the situation allowed, anyways.

Now the only things left were her and me.

Her body was glowing like an ivory star clad in a black carapace, the silver slipping through the thin gaps as she held her spear behind her shoulder, the spearhead pointing towards the sky in a relaxed posture with her defenses down.

On its blade was a bleeding, pink-ish vermillion heart that twitched weakly, drenching the silver edge with a few last spurts of red that slowly traveled down the hilt and against her gauntlet.

'God...'

I swallowed dryly as she shook the spear roughly and let the heart drop onto the floor with a wet, slimy thump. I could feel the naked danger emanating from her, but there was also something else I saw... hidden beneath her.

Something dark roiled violently just beneath the waves of her flesh.

'We were stupid to think we had a chance...'

I laughed with a self-deprecating smile on my face. Challengers were described as powerful champions by the System, but we didn't take it to heart as none of us had ever seen or heard first-hand accounts of people fighting them.

To us, it would just be similar to fighting an Uncommon-grade monster or something like that. To her, this was probably something that only classified as mock sparring. We'd been deludedly thinking it was a serious fight from the beginning.

'Hah... It took me Leon's death to realize that we weren't her match from the very start.'

We were just so damn stupid...

But still, I wouldn't give up and die with my eyes still wide open like he did.

 

This was a pretty eye-opening experience for me, I guess. Just fighting against the Dark Rose Footmen wasn't enough for me to relearn the basics again, but fighting against actually intelligent foes who could strategize and organize themselves to some extent was different.

Other than that, this was actually pretty dangerous, since they actually kept some of their cards hidden.

It didn't matter whether they were stronger or weaker, everyone could die with just a single slip brought on by complacency.

I walked slowly, cautiously towards the last remaining foe and heard him muttering something softly under his breath.

My eyes narrowed and I felt it wouldn't be the best idea to let him finish his chant. I rushed forward, holding my spear straight to stab into his chest just like the other as he reloaded his gun and continued the incantation at the same time. But unfortunately...

...By the time I got closer he'd already completed it.

His entire body collapsed into his own enlarged shadow that neatly melded with the ones of the cars and some intact streetlights, brought on by the red setting sun. My spear slashed through empty air before I quickly tensed my body again to prepare, and then shuddered with an uncomfortable expression as I felt something cold passing right above me, brushing against my forehead and hair.

'Just what is it with these damned things, they don't have any rules at all.'

I felt a presence appearing behind me before I quickly kicked the ground.

His body seemed to be remolding itself from the shadows around him, magically weaved from the darkness as he appeared into existence with his rifle already pointing forward. No way that wasn't cheating.

He looked surprised and flustered to see me already dashing towards him again but quickly regained his composure while taking a deep, shaky breath, closing his eyes for a second before opening them again.

There was a new light in them, and the faintest glint of coldness shining within.

"Spirit Bullet."

A sphere of intense aquamarine flames was conjured on the tip of his gun then blown forward rapidly, just like an actual bullet. It reached me in seconds, and I clenched my teeth while throwing my arm up to try and block it with my lance.

It detonated violently, showering everything near it with even brighter flames that warped the air with heat.

There was the same feeling I'd sensed from the bullets emanating from it, but tens of times stronger this time. It was like trying to compare the poison of common household arachnids to the poison of a funnel web spider; just incomparable.

'Damn it!'

I couldn't manage to strangle the scream in my throat as I felt scorching pain biting into my left arm, ravenously burning through my armour like a wild, rabid beast. My skin and flesh sizzled as they charred, clouds of smoke billowing out from my wound. When I stumbled to a stop and looked down at my arm I saw bright pink and red tissue surrounded by black markings like charcoal.

'The number of wounds I need to treat just keeps increasing.'

Knowing that I couldn't afford to be stunned, I clenched my teeth to bear the pain and lifted my lance forward with some difficulty. The man had already disappeared again and I felt cold energy flying next to me, but this time it was farther away than before.

I tried to estimate the rough location where it seemed to be concentrating just as the gunman appeared, confirming my guess that his Skill could be tracked down as his body was crafted from the ground up by the warping architect-like shadows.

"Spirit Bullet!"

I hurriedly activated Thunder Storm Footwork(D) to the limits again and blurred to the side, narrowly avoiding the 2nd flare.

Right after, I charged at him again in an erratic and wild pattern that resembled a jagged lightning strike, and he clicked his tongue before muttering something again. This time though, I got close enough to hear what he was saying.

"Darkness Jump."

His body wasn't there anymore when I'd finished my rush, so I breathed in and out deeply. Instead of just feeling the MP and guessing his location like last time, I breathed calmly and cycled Force Aura passively throughout my whole body.

I winced for a moment as the pain increased due to my senses being raised, but I deliberately guided my Aura to suppress that feeling of pain and focused on my other senses. It wasn't very good for my body, but I couldn't do much about it.

'It's not a technique I'm familiar with, but I've done it before a few times.'

The warmth inside me had to be precisely sharpened and refined, not like when I instinctively released it for explosive power.

I focused completely on the cold, fresh air, the metallic smell of blood staining it, and the tightly-clutched spear in my palm. I focused on the deep wound in my left thigh, the excruciating burn marks on my arm, the purple-black bruises on my skin, and the others too.

Even though it felt like my body had been chopped into pieces, battered and cooked, I still held on.

'Get it together, god damn it...'

Honestly, I could definitely see why it was classified as an intermediate technique.

And then, I felt cold energy passing by me again. I opened my eyes and looked intently at it, my intuition whispering to me that there was a way to stop his Skill in the middle. Paying attention to the movements of the freezing aura, I slowly grasped it — its fluid movements that seemed like the current of a river, the small consciousness inside it, and the incorporeal body encased by it.

The world seemed like it'd gone into slow motion.

'There he is, that bastard.'

A bright, string-like silver line appeared in my vision, connecting the tip of my blade to the center of the cloud.

For just a moment, I felt something that I'd never thought I'd experience as I stabbed my lance forward:

'God...'

The delirious and almost arousing feeling of strength.

'Ahh... So this is it...'

Of being overwhelmingly powerful.

'This is how they felt...'

And then, a scream rang out as I felt the sensation of something being hit by my heavy spear.

Laughter mingled together with his scream, and I murmured something so softly I swear it was carried away with the breeze.

"I've finally broken through my limits."