The damp, warm sensation against his trousers made Mark blearily open his eyes from his drunken stupor.
There seemed to be some strange, noisy commotion coming from below the city walls.
Today, the entirety of Brilliant City was rejoicing, celebrating the retreat of the demon army, so it was only natural for things to be a bit lively.
Mark felt his pants, his hand coming away slick and wet.
He instinctively raised his hand and sniffed it.
A thick, metallic scent filled his nostrils from the liquid on his palm.
Something felt wrong, yet he couldn't quite put his finger on what it was.
Mark looked up at the sky.
The moon was dark and the wind was high. As a sudden gale blew through, the clouds drifted away, revealing the hazy moonlight.
By that faint light, Mark looked down at the sticky liquid on his hand.
The dark red color instantly jolted him out of most of his drunkenness!
"Blood?!"
His squad mates were all lying on the ground, their chests no longer rising or falling.
Beneath them, that dark red, viscous liquid continued to flow and spread.
A briny, metallic stench washed over him.
"What... what happened?"
Mark squatted down in a daze and pushed the captain.
"Cap... Captain!?"
His hand trembled as he placed it before the captain's nose, but he couldn't feel even a whisper of breath!
Dead!
The captain was dead!
The squad members were all dead!
Everyone was dead!
At that moment, a whistling sound suddenly erupted from the distance!
'Whoosh!'
The piercing sound forced Mark to turn toward its source.
A streak of brilliant, orange-yellow flame cut across the night sky.
The massive fireball grew larger and larger in Mark's eyes.
'Boom!'
A burning boulder crashed violently onto the battlements of Brilliant City!
The section of the wall where Mark stood couldn't withstand such a massive impact and collapsed with a roar.
After a dizzying tumble, Mark scrambled to his feet. Covered in dust, he didn't even have time to be grateful he wasn't injured before he was frozen in place by the scene before him.
Less than twenty meters away, countless figures stood tall—a vast, black mass that stretched as far as the eye could see. At the front... was a group of demonized orcs!
"De... demons?"
Mark stared at the endless demon army, and the last of his drunkenness vanished instantly.
He looked back behind him; only severed limbs and broken bodies remained on the ground. There wasn't a single living person by his side.
Mark froze for a moment.
Suddenly, he let out a carefree, philosophical smile.
He took two steps forward and picked up a broken half-spear from the ground.
He looked back at the remains buried in the rubble one last time.
His gaze held a trace of cold, resolute determination.
"Captain, you always said I was the biggest coward. I never accepted that and always wanted to prove it to you. Well, watch closely today. I, Mark... am no wimp!"
He turned back to face the rows of ugly faces before him.
These orcs were often the vanguard of the demon army, partly because of their high reproductive rate and partly because their individual strength wasn't that high.
But that was only relative to high-level beings. in the eyes of ordinary people, these three-meter-tall giants were still formidable opponents.
Let alone average citizens, even soldiers on the battlefield didn't want to face such demon warriors head-on.
Mark took a deep breath and raised his broken spear, his mind flashing with images of his comrades and family.
Casting aside all distractions, he looked toward the infinite demon army.
He gripped the broken spear tightly and let out a hysterical roar!
He charged!
"Aaaaaagh!"
Mark had forgotten everything; the only thing left in his heart was the intent to die in battle.
Facing him directly was a thickset orc standing three meters tall, its greenish arms already thicker than Mark's waist.
The strength of the two sides was not even on the same level.
Facing this human charging toward the demon army, the orcs' faces twisted into cruel smiles.
They would use countless ways to make this human regret his actions today!
The demonized orc disdainfully raised its iron axe, waiting for the human soldier to reach it so it could split him in two with a single swing.
When the human soldier reached it, the orc swung the iron axe, but the expected spray of blood did not occur.
Instead, the orc itself went flying.
As it soared through the air, it saw a silver-armored knight on the ground holding a greatsword.
And in front of that silver-armored knight stood a headless orc.
That body... looked so familiar.
It looked exactly like its own body.
It... was dead?
This final thought became the orc's last moment in this world.
Mark stood with his broken spear raised, stopping in his tracks, completely lost.
He had been prepared to die, never expecting a miracle to appear at the very moment he was about to greet death!
"Kid, you're not bad. However... this is not where you should be right now."
Mark snapped back to his senses.
Those distinctive, narrow, inverted triangular eyes and the prominent aquiline nose confirmed the man's identity.
One of the eight Guardian Knights of Brilliant City.
Guardian Knight Cain.
"Lord... Lord Cain? Why... why are you here?"
Until now, no alarm had been sounded on the West Gate. Despite the violent explosions, other soldiers who heard them might have just thought it was some other issue rather than a demon attack.
Mark looked at the knight warily, after all, he had seen High Nun Martha's demonization earlier that day.
Cain looked back at Mark with a side-long glance, a hint of approval in his eyes.
"By the oracle of Her Highness the Saintess, tonight... we shall fight to the death against the demons. If you still have the will to fight, then return to the city and join another squad to fight together. The evacuation of the citizens has already begun. If you don't dare to step onto the battlefield, then go help evacuate the people."
Clad in silver armor, Cain stood at the foot of the wall. Faced with this single knight, the tens of thousands of demons actually seemed somewhat hesitant.
A level 50 Guardian Knight, though he hadn't yet crossed the level 60 threshold, held an absolute advantage over these ordinary orc troops.
Even if the demons wanted to wear him down to death, they would have to pay a staggering price!
Amidst a piercing screech, the massive city gates slowly opened, and over a hundred knights in silver armor filed out from within.
Hundreds of Temple knights, tens of thousands in the demon army.
The disparity in numbers was enough to drive one to despair.
However, not a single knight standing beneath the West Gate showed a hint of fear.
Their faces held nothing but a cold, expressionless resolve.
Rate on N.U.
