They were adventurers of Calais Town. When the town was breached and fell into peril, they could have escaped on their own, yet they chose to stay and defend it.
Beside them, several demi-human civilians fought shoulder to shoulder. A dog-eared youth tightly gripped a short dagger, its tip trembling slightly, yet he refused to take even half a step back.
A burly man with a lizard tail propped his shoulder firmly against a thick wooden plank, barely managing to block half of the breach.
The wooden plank groaned and rattled under the relentless battering of the monsters, and his feet plowed two shallow grooves into the hard ground.
A Multi-Headed Snake suddenly thrust its heads through the gap, attempting to force its way into the town.
She took a step forward and smashed her fist right through the snake's body. The sharp blades of her gauntlet impaled its flesh, causing foul, dark-green blood to spray out.
She grabbed the snake's heads and flung them aside, then immediately spun around to meet another lunging monster. Her clawed blades cleanly slit its neck. The monster's head rolled onto the ground, though its headless corpse still lunged forward from sheer momentum.
Stepping over the monster's corpse, she walked out of the breach and stood at the very front of the defensive line.
“Watch out!”
The dog-eared youth stared at her back, his warning instantly drowned out by the piercing screeches of the monsters.
The civilians behind the wall stared blankly at her solitary figure facing the enemy. A middle-aged man was the first to fall to his knees, his forehead slamming heavily against the gravelly ground. In a hoarse, choking voice, he cried, “My Lady, please save us!”
The refugees around him knelt one after another, some bowing repeatedly to pray for blessings. The gray-robed woman never once looked back.
At the base of the wall, a refugee with a severed leg leaned against the stone, his cloudy eyes fixed on her figure as she fought valiantly against the horde.
His lips parted slightly, but in the end, he only whispered a quiet prayer before slowly closing his eyes.
Her weapons of choice were a pair of dark-silver clawed gauntlets. Curved, razor-sharp blades extended from the knuckles, and a layer of scale-like protective armor covered her arms from the back of her hands to her elbows.
They fit her perfectly. As she flexed and clenched her fingers, her movements were fluid and natural, as if the gauntlets were a natural extension of her own body.
A Shadowmane Wolf ambushed her from the side. Without even turning her head, she relied entirely on her senses to smash her fist into the wolf's ribs.
With a sickening crack of splintering bones, the monster's internal organs ruptured, and a torrent of blood spewed from its mouth.
Another Shadowmane Wolf lunged at her from the front. She sidestepped to dodge, her clawed blades slicing through its throat, sending warm blood splattering across the ground.
An ogre on the battlefield noticed this troublesome opponent. Raising its heavy, massive wooden club, it swung down at her with brutal force.
She quickly leaped aside. The club slammed into the ground, instantly shattering the hard flagstones and sending stone fragments flying in all directions.
At the same time, a charging frenzy bear ambushed her from the flank, its massive paw sweeping toward her with a whistling gale. She ducked low, and the paw grazed just above her head, the sheer force of the wind snapping a few strands of her hair.
Seizing the brief moment as the frenzy bear tried to recover its balance, she delivered a precise strike, driving her clawed blades deep into the flesh of the bear's elbow joint.
Enraged by the pain, the frenzy bear let out a piercing roar and violently swung its arm, flinging her away. She nimbly flipped her body in midair, landing on her feet and sliding back several meters to steady herself.
The civilians behind the breach watched the battlefield intently, some unable to suppress low cheers.
But this glimmer of hope was instantly crushed.
The ogre possessed overwhelming strength, and the frenzy bear's hide was incredibly thick and tough. Her clawed blades could only inflict superficial flesh wounds, failing to damage their bones or deliver a fatal blow.
After several rounds of dodging and maneuvering, she was unfortunately clipped on the shoulder by the ogre's club. She was sent flying like a broken kite, crashing heavily into a pile of rubble.
Pushing herself up from the ground with great difficulty, she spat out a mouthful of bloody foam. The scale armor on her left shoulder had cracked open, revealing a gruesome wound that cut deep to the bone.
She glanced down at her injury, indifferently shook her arm, and once again charged back toward the monsters without a second thought.
A faint pinkish-purple mist swirled around the edges of her wound, slowly repairing the torn flesh. However, the healing speed was incredibly slow, unable to keep up with the damage inflicted by the battle.
By now, the town gate had been completely shattered, exposing the scene outside the town to everyone. The adventurers were desperately holding back the monsters.
Up on the battlements, the cat-eared Archer drew her bowstring to its limit, aiming her arrow squarely at the frenzy bear's eye. Yet, her hands trembled uncontrollably, and she didn't dare release the string to fire the fatal shot.
After slashing a monster with his short dagger, the dog-eared youth looked around, his eyes filled with utter despair. He muttered under his breath, “...We can't hold them off. We can't win.”
At the edge of the dense forest surrounding the town, a massive figure slowly stood upright.
The Gargantuan Magic Ape slowly turned its head, its cloudy, beastly eyes locking onto the gray figure darting and slashing through the battlefield.
It leaned down to grab a boulder. An earthy-yellow magic glow emanated from its palms, completely enveloping the stone, and the muscles in its thick arms instantly swelled.
The next second, the boulder shot forward with a fierce, whistling wind, flying low and fast as it hurtled straight toward the unsuspecting, gray-robed woman.
Sensing the mortal danger, her pupils shrank. She could only barely twist her body slightly to the side.
The boulder still slammed brutally into her flank. The immense impact sent her flying along with it into the forest, snapping several massive trees before crashing to the ground with a thunderous boom.
Dust filled the air, debris scattered, and the ground trembled violently.
The civilians behind the wall who witnessed this gasped in horror, completely struck dumb. Under such a terrifying attack, no one believed she could have survived.
The Gargantuan Magic Ape leaped down from its perch and approached Calais Town with heavy, deliberate steps.
With every step, the earth shook, and the dull thuds of its footsteps swept over the battlefield with an irresistible, oppressive force.
The cat-eared Archer's tense bowstring suddenly went slack, her arrow slipping to the ground as she bit her lip hard. The young adventurers' hands shook so violently that their sword tips drooped helplessly toward the ground, all courage to fight completely drained from them.
The lizard-tailed brute was already exhausted. Sharp splinters of wood had pierced his shoulder, and warm blood trickled steadily down his arm.
Some began to whisper the names of gods to pray for protection, while many more broke down in tears. Fear spread like wildfire, and they collapsed to the ground in utter despair.
The steadily advancing Gargantuan Magic Ape suddenly stopped. Its head whipped toward the depths of the forest, its ears twitching as it caught a distant sound.
From far behind the monster tide came a series of dense, low rumbles, as if some powerful entity was marching out from the depths of the forest.
The Gargantuan Magic Ape let out a short, low growl, then turned without hesitation and bolted at full speed toward the forest behind the monster tide.
It was incredibly fast, crossing yards with every stride. The ground cracked beneath its feet, and trees along its path snapped like twigs as its massive silhouette vanished into the dense shadows of the forest in the blink of an eye.
Everyone was left utterly bewildered; no one knew what kind of entity had appeared deep within the forest.
The threat of the Gargantuan Magic Ape had temporarily receded, but the overwhelming monster tide still showed no signs of abating. The ogre and the frenzy bear still stood before the defensive line, glaring menacingly.
Just then, from within the pile of rubble created by the boulder, a faint, pinkish-purple light slowly seeped through the cracks.
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