At her shout, the two witches immediately raised their hands. With just that gesture, pitch-black veils formed around their bodies—but Jaxon didn’t stop.

No, to be more precise, he had already drawn the item meant to tear through that veil.

The moment the black shield appeared, Jaxon naturally swept his left hand across his chest—and before anyone realized it, a short dagger had appeared in his grip.

"Flow through every moment like water."

That was the principle of aligning with the Blade of Coincidence.

Above all, it was a situation he had predicted. Insight born from experience had accounted for a moment like this.

A witch of that caliber wasn’t going to just stand there and take a blade unguarded.

He gripped the dagger in a reverse grip and pressed the end of the hilt with his thumb. It was a stance perfect for stabbing downward.

He was a handler of relics. To be more specific, among the Mad Order of Knights, he was the most proficient at wielding relics and spell-objects.

And now, Jaxon held a dagger in his hand—a replica of a relic known as Spell Breaker, specialized in ripping apart magic-based shields. The blade itself had been forged by a dwarven craftsman, and the enchantments engraved upon it were Esther’s handiwork.

The hilt was curved to fit perfectly in Jaxon’s hand—courtesy of the dwarf’s craftsmanship.

It was forged from Valerian steel, mixed with Noirian wrought iron, making it strong and sharp on its own, but also clearly crafted for a specific purpose.

His thoughts were brief, his movement swift.

Before even making eye contact with the red-eyed witch, Jaxon stabbed the barrier with the reverse-gripped dagger.

Thunk!

As the blade pierced the barrier, a pulse rippled across its surface and shoved him back. It felt like getting tackled by a bear beastman.

It was because of a telekinetic spell that activated upon impact, designed to automatically push attackers away.

He could have resisted with brute force, but instead, Jaxon let his body yield slightly, going with the flow. As he was thrown back, he lowered his body into a shadow born from the scattering sparks of the firestorm being slashed apart.

Only then did the red-eyed witch notice his presence. With her head lowered, she glared up—fierce and furious.

You dare? Who do you think you are?

That’s what her eyes said.

Just ~Nоvеl𝕚ght~ then, a harsh cracking sound echoed—the blade embedded in the barrier began to fracture.

What now?

The red-eyed witch couldn’t even finish the thought.

Boom!

The moment she realized the blade was splitting—it exploded.

It had always been a one-use item.

A tool that fragile needed to be unstable to detonate under such impact, but Esther had managed to stabilize it just enough with her own skill.

There were two conditions for detonation:

First, it had to be swung with force above a certain level.

Second, it had to meet a construct formed from mana.

Both conditions had been met.

They couldn’t use materials like true silver in the replica, but the effect was more than sufficient.

As the dagger detonated, the shield shattered. There was no dramatic sound of magic breaking—the black veil simply dispersed like broken glass, fading into the darkness.

Fragments of the broken dagger struck the witch’s body, but they were useless. Her body, transformed to gemstone-like hardness, easily deflected the shards.

However—

Crack. Krkkrkrkk.

A stiletto, belonging to the assassin who had approached unnoticed, sliced through her neck.

Of course, that assassin was Jaxon—the one who had stabbed the anti-barrier dagger and been thrown by the psychic backlash.

He had hidden in the shadows, then dashed forward low enough that his chest almost scraped the ground, slipping behind her once again.

To put it simply: he let himself be pushed by the shockwave, used the darkness as cover, crouched low, then, as soon as the shield broke, rushed in and slashed her throat with a stiletto.

Simple to say—not simple to execute.

All of it happened before Enkrid even had time to catch his breath three times after slashing the firestorm.

One of the two witches now had her head hanging loosely. Black blood flowed from her severed neck, though not in the quantity of an ordinary human. The thick, sticky blood clung to her skin like pine resin.

Of course, unlike resin, the witch’s blood reeked of rot.

“Release your power!”

The priest shouted upon seeing the severed head.

The red-eyed witch, her throat half-cut, began gurgling and letting out hideous screeches—grrrrk, glaaarrgh, GYAAAAGH—as black foam bubbled up from her wound. The blood that flowed started to boil.

Jaxon had seen it before he even struck—how she vomited black fluid earlier.

In other words, he attacked already knowing she wasn’t human.

So, as he cut her throat, he pulled out three more daggers and drove them into her body—one into her stomach, one into the back of her head, and another into her thigh.

The whole movement looked almost like he was fixing her clothes or supporting her.

Jaxon danced.

It was a lethal, close-combat killing technique he had never shown even during training.

The first move—he grabbed the daggers embedded in her stomach and skull and pulled them.

Rrrrrk.

Not as strong as Audin or Enkrid, but Jaxon also possessed well-trained strength.

And he knew how to add Will to that strength.

The embedded daggers carved black lines across her body. From those wounds flowed black resin-like blood. He didn’t pull the blades all the way out. After cutting roughly a hand-span, he left them.

Normally, the killing art required pulling the dagger and stabbing elsewhere—but he had adapted.

To be blunt, he didn’t have time to move them.

From the bubbling black foam, a sharp hand burst forth—a hand growing from the severed neck.

It lunged at Jaxon’s nape, its nails raised like blades, sharp enough to pierce through steel.

The red-eyed witch was confident those claws could even pierce enchanted steel—assuming they hit.

Jaxon dropped two of his daggers and dodged the strike—and even that showed impressive talent.

Dodging at such close range was instinctive. The claws sliced only air.

Jaxon’s hand reached for the handle of the dagger embedded in her thigh.

He was already crouched low, nearly hugging her leg.

This time, it wasn’t a reverse grip—it was a hammer grip.

Grasping the hilt tightly with all five fingers, Jaxon used the witch as his pivot and spun in a full circle.

The movement was as fast as a squirrel fleeing a predator. His afterimage appeared to wrap around her, then vanished.

Skrkk.

The dagger twisted in her thigh, slicing through flesh and releasing a gush of blood—her leg now half-severed.

He ripped the dagger from her thigh and immediately plunged it into the other leg.

As the wounds multiplied, more appendages sprouted from the witch—hands, feet, jagged fangs. Her human form had already vanished.

But Jaxon didn’t stop.

His dance continued—gripping, slashing, cutting, stabbing. He slashed the transforming witch, who now foamed with black blood, while standing directly before her.

Before the witch could complete her transformation, she had her head cut off, her legs torn apart, and her insides half-spilled.

At the end of that furious dance, the red-eyed witch was a much lighter corpse. One arm remained—her left hand, with only the index and middle fingers still intact, dragged her across the floor.

“Sa...”

Whatever she meant to say was never finished.

Crack.

Jaxon drew another blade the length of a forearm and drove it into the back of her head—turning it into a gravestone.

That foul mouth had already been torn apart and reappeared on her back. And now, Jaxon’s blade had pierced the mouth that had formed there. The double-layered sharp teeth confirmed once again that she was far from human.

And just like that, one witch died.

“Ahhhhhh!”

The watching priest let out a scream, and the crystal-armored bulk began stomping the ground with a heavy thump, thump.

A Death Knight—an imitation knight made from a modified body.

To some, it might have been a threat. To others, the stuff of nightmares.

But its opponents were Ragna, Pell, Rophod, Audin, Teresa, and Lua Gharne.

“We just have to cut them down, right?”

Pell spoke as he stepped forward, light on his feet. He was already raising his sword, ready to bring it down—applying the vortex technique he’d trained into his body through endless practice.

The crystal-armored knight displayed knight-level strength, thanks to the modified body.

The heavy stomping monster blurred into afterimages and streaked forward like a line—an abrupt shift in speed. Pell, who had stepped ahead, swung his sword just as the monster pushed off the ground.

He adjusted to the altered tempo, bringing his sword down faster, like yanking it into the strike.

Crunch!

The scariest thing about the monsters with crystal armor was that they didn’t slow down even as their bodies broke apart.

As Pell’s Idol Slayer split open the creature’s head and embedded in its chest, the spirit inside almost dissipated into the weapon. Yet, the crystal sword clutched in the creature’s hand still came flying at Pell’s neck—a frighteningly fast strike.

It was nearly impossible to dodge that blow after having just committed to a powerful strike.

Pell instinctively curled his body. If he was going to get hit anyway, better to minimize the damage.

It was a split-second decision—but it turned out he didn’t have to.

He wasn’t alone here.

Clang!

That dwarven-made sword, once declared a fine blade by its own smith, met the crystal sword.

Rophod had thrust out his sword like a spear to intercept it. The crystal weapon, striking the length of Rophod’s blade, stopped in place.

Rophod felt a jolt ripple through his arm muscles. He had no choice but to block it with raw strength.

If he had tried to deflect it instead, Pell would’ve ended up with a stylish new scar across his body.

“You owe me,” Rophod said.

Pell uncurled his neck and yanked his sword free.

The crystal armor that had served briefly as a scabbard collapsed to the floor, the pieces scattering freely.

Whatever had been inside was gone now. The crystal armor had turned into a mere rock, rolling across the ground.

Pell eyed the lump of stone and muttered,

“I’ll forget what you said earlier.”

Rophod immediately understood.

“As an oath?”

“I swear it.”

“Good. Let’s call it even.”

Rophod had made the mistake of claiming even witches could be charmed by his demonic charisma—and now Pell was letting him off the hook.

If Pell had taken that seriously and harped on it, Rophod might’ve had to hear about it for months.

Or maybe not just months—he might’ve dragged it back up every time Rophod least expected it.

Not a bad trade for just one swing of a sword.

There were more crystal-armored knights. Counting sheer numbers, there were over ten.

Internally, these weren’t true Death Knights. They were bodies remodeled with spirits stuffed inside and soaked in potions.

But Enkrid and the others had no way of knowing that.

All they knew was that these were formidable foes.

“That sword!”

The Apostle of Red Foot cried out again, shocked yet again—this time because of Pell’s weapon.

A sword capable of slaying evil spirits?

It seemed to strike precisely at the weakness of the crystal-armored knights.

His surprise didn’t last long. The Apostle still had a job to do.

“All of you, get out there!”

At his shout, more monsters surged out like a tidal wave.

Some came alone, others in clumps of dozens.

Lua Gharne saw it and raised her flame whip and looped sword—one in each hand—then swung and lashed forward.

The crystal-armored knights were one thing—but these newcomers were bizarre in their own way. A three-armed ogre, a troll with horns sprouting from its belly—these were monsters even she had never seen before.

There was even a ghoul with three legs that couldn’t balance properly and had to hop while holding up one leg.

What the hell are these things?

She had the thought, but it wasn’t something she could afford to dwell on.

They weren’t even that interesting.

These were personal collectibles the Apostle had been keeping inside the Thornbriar Fortress. And now, to them, they were just more enemies to kill.

So while Lua Gharne focused on her task, Shinar stood before the Magic Spirit, as if she had chosen her opponent from the very beginning.

The Magic Spirit lowered her longbow to the ground and drew her sword.

Schrkkk. Ting.

As the sword was drawn, the hilt ring struck the sheath, announcing the weapon’s presence.

It looked like a needle—but its tip was hooked, designed to tear flesh. Because of its shape, the ring around the sheath had to be struck in order to pull it free.

Even when drawing it, the blade had to be tugged forward at the end—and that’s what the Magic Spirit did as she spoke.

“Did you come to be nourishment for the demon realm, you undeveloped low-born?”

The Magic Spirit could talk all she wanted—but she had chosen the wrong opponent.

Shinar, self-proclaimed fiancée of Enkrid, was a fairy who had spent a long time by his side.

With a calm face, the fairy opened her mouth.

“...Nourishment? Me?”

Fairies are known for never lying—but that didn’t mean she couldn’t dig into someone’s nerves.

Shinar shrugged—not a gesture that suited her at all—then held out her empty palm and gently waved it to the side, as if to say, Look around you.

If you had eyes, you’d know who was winning.

So then, who’s really going to become the nourishment?

That was the unspoken message.

The fact that she said nothing and let the opponent interpret it? That alone made it a master-level provocation.

“Meeeee?”

The way the Magic Spirit dragged out the word only amplified the effect.

Shinar added one more thing.

“Wouldn’t it be more accurate to say you’ll end up as fertilizer? Or no, not nourishment—more like demon shit. You half-sprouted potato shoot of a bitch.”

Shinar had learned to mix human insults into her fairy speech.

It wasn’t something one would expect from a fairy—and that unpredictability made it hit even harder.

The Magic Spirit’s navy face lost all expression.

She was seething with rage.