The town immediately descended into chaos. A Wave hadn’t happened in years, and it would have been weird if it did, considering this was a farming town directly under the Capital. For a Monster Wave to turn up a ludicrous mismanagement must have happened, but the Adventurers had all been doing their jobs properly.

There was no way that it was natural, a thought that naturally crept up in the minds of all people familiar with the management’s capability.

But they could not do anything about it, no matter how close they were to the truth. The only thing to be done was evacuate the civilians and get ready for a final stand. Nobody thought that they would be able to survive this. Even the most casual scout reports that had already spread among them estimated a number lower than ten thousand. Even if it was only Goblins, the sheer number would surround and then slaughter them.

But it wasn’t just Goblins. Orcs, Imps, Bladers and even Ogres have been spotted. A farming town that barely had log walls set up could never withstand it once that force made contact.

The only thing they could do was send out people in advance to avoid the chaos of urban combat. Goblins were quick and stealthy, they would hide well and surround. Ogres would bring down buildings with a single swipe of their tree-like arms, easily squashing people under the rubble. Imps would have no problem flying in and out, harassing every combatant they could see.

No, they could not afford to let them connect with the walls.

And so, as the evacuation was almost done and the brunt of the defenders had gathered, so came the orders.

“Everyone! This is what we’ve been paid so well for! Monsters have finally decided to descend on us to try once more to wipe a settlement from our maps! But they’ll see that we won’t make it easy on them! We’ve been living our best lives, drinking having fun and living in comfort, all so that we wouldn’t have regrets! TELL ME, DO ANY OF YOU REGRET PROTECTING THE WEAK ON THIS DAY!”

The crowd’s voice, their shouts, resonated as one. They knew what they were doing ever since they signed up for their jobs, be that as Adventurers or guards. Almost every person currently present was from this town in the first place, they had people they loved among the people trying to escape. They would do their best to beat down the fear they felt, all to buy even just another moment for them to escape.

And truly, no more words were needed as their conviction was clearly portrayed. The commander that took charge, the Guildmaster of the Adventurer’s guild and the strongest person present took the frontlines, leaving his back towards the people gathered here. It wasn’t a large force by any means, barely more than hundred. But their will was strong. And some among them were powerful enough to take down Ogres, so on a technical level they were strong enough to deal with this crisis.

They only lacked numbers or a more overwhelming strength. The kind of power that made numbers irrelevant. The Ability that the Twelve were said to have.

A crisis like this could really only be resolved properly by people on the level of the Royal Knights, but they could not move from the capital. The only comparable force that could move freely was the Twelve. Mages had already sent out requests for support, but it was unlikely that they would arrive in time.

People would die.

That was assured.

Their travel time only determined how many could live.

And with this knowledge and hope in their hearts, the brave people set out to meet the enemy in the middle of a field. The formation was simple, as their numbers didn’t afford them much leeway. They only spread out the frontline as much as possible, trusting in each individual’s strength to not be the link that breaks.

If any Creature made it past them and into their line of archers and mages, their firepower would take a drastic hit, making any more aggressive actions impossible. Despite the problems, they had to take the risk presented by this tactic. They couldn’t fight this defensively.

The people set themselves up, and not a moment too soon. The second they all got into position a scout jumped out from the treeline and behind the warriors to join the archers.

“THEY’RE A MINUTE AWAY!”

“BRACE!”

And so, the minute began passing. It was the longest minute in all their lives, as their senses heightened in the stress and fear of this situation. As their bodies worked in overdrive to support them. The warriors felt sweat down their backs, on their foreheads and their hands. The weight of their weapons felt heavy enough for them to drop them at any moment. They thought that the sweat would make it slip from their hands.

Archers stood at the ready, arrows nocked and eyes focused on the treeline. A single movement, and they would be the ones to open this dogfight with a volley of arrows. If they could hit and kill, they would weaken the initial charge, the most dangerous part currently. The weight of this task laid on that single arrow. They worried that they would not be able to draw the string in response.

Mages and Priests chanted non-stop. Shields were cast, traps were laid and warriors were strengthened. Attack spells were prepared and held. Some banded together to chant together, creating a larger-scale attack. The nervousness reached so far that they all feared they would bite their tongues in the middle of their chants.

And yet, a minute had not yet passed. The tension rose, more and more as all final preparations finished up and silence descended.

Only a few more seconds until the first Creature would break through the trees.

Only a few more seconds until the first arrow would signal the beginning and the end.

And it was the most silent seconds they had ever experienced. The most stressful moments of their lives as they boldly stared Death in the face, aware that they were about to spit in its face, ready to receive its scythe.

Wind blew, no birds could be heard, but the sun shone brightly on this day. It would have been a perfectly calm day at any other time. But today the wind cooled down the bodies heating up from stress, the birds at run away in front of this danger and the sun reflected off of the metal of armour and weaponry with dangerous glints.

And these came not only from the defensive line.

The first arrow flew in the direction, following a tiny shine that was barely visible behind several trees.

And then it happened, as the first scream of pain broke the silence. The massacre had begun.

Goblins ran through the gaps in the trees while Bladers used those very same trees as springboards, leveraging their powerful legs that made them so dangerous. Arrows flew in, connecting and bringing down one after the other, weakening the power of the charge as they had to start running over corpses.

And that was just enough for the warriors to be able to handle it. Goblins themselves were slaughtered with ease by any Adventurer present, while the guards had a little trouble. Bladers, interspersed in this line were almost impossible for the guards to take, their wolf-like bodies giving them incredible agility.

One of them saw an opening and jumped in, only to be cut down by the massive battle-axe of the Commander. Another one took this chance to swipe at him with its blade-tail, but was rapidly shot down by the next volley of arrows. Normally, shooting this close to your frontline was a good way to decimate your own forces, but they were all desperate and the only Archers that did it good enough to not make that mistake.

Luckily, the first increment of the Wave was manageable with only minor injuries. Goblins and Bladers, dangerous if you’re careless, but ultimately easy for anyone of some skill to take down.

But it was far from done. In fact, another problem began propping up now.

“Guards! Fall back and form a second line protecting the archers and mages! You cannot hold up the front from now on!” The order came. It was a difficult decision to weaken their already lacking line even more, but it was better than having it break in the middle.

Fast, but weak Creatures usually formed the vanguard in Waves like this, and the Commander knew as much. There would be a short lull until the actual body would arrive, and it was already heralded by the falling of trees in the distance, with the Ogres peeking through the treetops.

Even a casual count revealed almost a hundred of them.

Tension that no one thought could be denser, grew once more as this information was shouted out.

But they would not retreat.

The Adventurers that now solely formed the frontline, only a few dozen individuals, were stalwart as they turned their burning gazes towards the forest. guards that now stood behind them, ready to pick off the few Goblins and Bladers that would run past them. Archers, once again in a firing line with a single arrow nocked each. Mages that would now begin letting their spells loose as the Wave arrived proper.

Once again as the Creatures moved past the trees arrows were loosened, but this time all manner of spells accompanied them. Lightning bolts, needles of ice, boulder-sized lumps of earth. They connected and made a mess immediately, breaking through trees and bodies equally. Steam rose up as several Orcs were fried from the inside, and others fell over as the needles stuck out of their heads like pin cushions. A wall of broken wood, blood-wetted earth and corpses had formed within mere moments, further holding up the rest.

Orcs began climbing over it, while Goblins and Bladers cleared the hurdle in one jump. Imps flew around but were largely picked off by individual arrows. guards took care of the ones that decided to target their aggressors.

The fight had begun proper. But they all knew, as they heard the sounds of collapsing trees coming closer each moment, that it would not hold much longer. The very moment that a hundred Ogres, heavily outnumbering the Adventurers that could match them, arrived they would fall without further resistance.

But still they put up the best fight they could, taking down Orc after Goblin after Blader. Imps crashed into the earth, Golbins cut into pieces and Orcs began bleeding out. The dirt was wetting to the point of becoming mud with the massive amounts of blood flowing.

And yet, they were being overwhelmed. Even before they sustained injuries, now people started dying. Individual mages and guards at first, but even one of the Adventurers fell. The situation was already worsening. They had all thought they could at least hold until the Ogres, but they were being proven wrong.

It was truly the end for them.

And that made them fight all that much harder.

The speed at which they cleared Creatures became faster, but so did the rate at which their wounds worsened. They were literally burning their lives for one last stand. A thousand creatures had been felled, but that was only a part of the mass.

And thus, as their concentration was focused entirely on each individual enemy in front of them, they naturally forgot to listen for the Ogres.

So then, when a crashing sound rang out so close to them, they all felt their hearts sink as one. They only then remembered the speed at which the Ogres were travelling. With their bodies in the terrible states they were in, they wouldn’t even be able to hurt them now.

Spirits were crushed but they were intent to see their duties through to the end and never stopped swinging their blades, firing their arrows or chanting their spells. They were now just waiting for the end to arrive.

When more crashing sounds rang out without anything appearing, some grew suspicious, although they had no leisure to follow that suspicion.

Of course, when an Ogre fell over and cratered the ground in front of them, they had no choice but to take a moment to consider what was happening. It lasted for but a second, but their hope grew as they continued their fight. Somebody was taking down the Ogres. They could hold for a moment longer.

That was the extent of their thoughts.

They didn’t believe that they would survive, as most of the Wave still remained after all.

But when a group of fully armoured figures began cutting through the Orcs as though they were mere paper, the situation became so absurd to them that everyone, without fail, thought they were dreaming while bleeding out.

When spells of an unseen magnitude for them flew overhead and resulted in even more Ogres falling over, shaking the ground under their feet, they began realizing the truth.

But it was only at the moment when a horse jumped over the Commander and landed in the middle of the fray that they fully felt that this was real. That there was in fact a chance they could be saved.

“…You have fought well. We will take over from here… Our Master will be here soon.”

Yes.

They would all be saved.

***

His great-sword was dancing through the air, drawing beautiful lines with a blue shimmer as it cut through the incoming waves of zombies with ease. Streaks of black blood and rotten flesh followed its swipes, as if drawing across an empty canvas.

His halberd pierced through the incoming ghosts, hitting them precisely in the chest and coming back out to pierce another within moments. Not a single pierce missed, not a single ghost survived, his stings were that precise.

His hammer smashed all skeletons with impunity, its ignorant power on full display. With each swing the ground cratered. A beautiful cobweb to look at and a terrible strength to be subjected to as the only thing that remained of the skeletons was the dust carried away by the wind that was kicked up.

It wasn’t even a fight, it was an absolute massacre.

The thousands of Undead had their number cut down by half within minutes, and he did not appear to be breaking a sweat. It was an absurd sight, a power so overwhelming that numbers could not help against it.

The only thing the Necromancer could push against him was numbers just as overwhelming, and he was doing his best to try.

Even though Ray had cut down the original army by now, the ocean that stood against him showed no signs of diminishing. In fact, it looked as if it was growing, slowly but surely. It would still not be enough to defeat him, but it could definitely buy time, something he did not want to give.

So he took a bit of a risk and gathered all his Mana.

The defensive zone he had been creating by constantly swinging his weapons shrunk in an instant. Undead rushed in, ready to rip him into pieces, but even as they started biting, slashing and bashing him, he didn’t budge. The only thing that was happening to him was a dark-blue haze forming around his body, one that grew by the second.

It looked as if he was being set aflame, as tendrils of this aura whipped around the area. At this point it had grown to the size of an Orc and enveloped him along with the crowd that buried him underneath. But that did not last.

The sound of glass shattering.

And along with it, the aura immediately expanded towards the ocean of Undead. All of them were caught in this light. All of them were evaporated without trace. The ground was left alone, and in the end, as the traces of aura diminished and dispersed, the park was once again empty.

Except for the black lines drawn across the ground, tendrils of Mana jutting out.

Except for the Necromancer who protected himself with a black bubble.

Except for the figure beside him, completely cloaked in shadows. Its red, glowing eyes were the only colour apparent on it. It appeared to still be halfway in the ground, but the ground was intact. Even then, it was already larger than an Ogre.

It was a Demon, there was no mistaking it.

And so, Ray finally decided to call it there for his training.

“Hey, Miss Stalker! I don’t like uninvited audiences, so how about you make yourself useful instead? Playtime’s over!”

Yes.

He would kill a Demon.