Cain clenched his teeth and swung his sword, parrying the throwing knife shrouded in aura.

Steel rang out, and the deflected blade spun off into the undergrowth.

He could already feel the fifteen enemies moving around him and just a few steps behind, his three surviving companions trembled with fear, weapons rattling in their grips.

"By Lord Goldenveil, we die!" Cain roared without a shred of fear, his eyes shining with determination as he advanced toward the one who appeared to be the group’s leader.

All of them were clad in black armor, steel breastplates covering their torsos, each etched with the same strange symbol.

"Oh... the boy has courage!" The group’s leader cackled with scorn, swinging his sword in a careless motion.

In that instant, the young talent of the Goldenveil Guard planted his feet firmly on the damp ground and activated the fourth form of imperial fencing, striking toward the enemy.

The two swords clashed, perfectly parried by one another, and yet a scream filled with pain echoed through the forest as a deep gash opened across the face of the scouts’ leader.

"H-how?" He had no time to question it, for Cain’s sword was already slashing toward him again.

Once more he tried to defend himself, but this time it was even worse.

Two new cuts opened across him, one tearing through his chest, the other slitting his throat.

Blood sprayed out, and the leader crumpled without another sound.

Feeling the aura heart burn in his chest, Cain halted his use of Imperial Fencing, his reserves dropping to less than half in just two attacks.

He remembered Doran’s words, that forms beyond the third were not meant for those below the third stage to use. They were forms for true experts.

He was weak. As weak as he had been on the day he saw his friend plunge the sword into his own father’s chest, unable to do anything.

Cain forced himself to focus his mind as, with a guttural scream, one of the invaders charged toward him.

"You killed the captain, you son of a bitch!" The rage-filled roar echoed through the trees, and an axe tore through the air toward Cain.

Forcing himself to be strong, he twisted aside by a hair’s breadth and drove his sword into the man’s neck.

He spun just in time to see the last of his four companions collapse miserably onto the dirt, and with a roar, he simply ran.

Even if he died, he had to warn his Lord about the invading force, no matter the cost!

"Shit, go after him!" The second-in-command of the group bellowed, grabbing the bow from his back and pulling the string, his aim locked on Cain.

He released, and the arrow tore through the air at terrifying speed toward the young guard’s back.

Cain clenched his jaw and twisted his body just enough for the arrow to miss his internal organs.

Still, it punched into his shoulder, pain bursting down his arm as blood spread across his armor.

He didn’t stop running, his heart pounding erratically as he pulled an item from the pouch tied at his waist.

It was a goblin horn, used to signal enemy attacks, taken as a souvenir during the goblin assault on Goldenveil a few months back.

Keeping up his pace and filling his lungs with as much air as he could, he blew into the horn with all his might.

***

Four people entered the Goldenveil greenhouse, where rows of beds housed only the highest-quality herbs.

Ethan and Evelyn wore faint smiles on their faces, while Elena studied the high mana density with curiosity.

Her eyes soon fell upon Alice, who held the spellbook of the leader of the Brown Mages’ Tower in her hands.

"Shall I begin, husband?" the golden-haired beauty asked Ethan sweetly, and he replied with a slight nod.

Smiling brightly, Alice let the book float before her and extended her hands, her monstrous mana reserves moving with perfect control.

Even though she wasn’t fully accustomed to third-stage mana, her SS-Rank talent ensured she would have no trouble at all.

She activated the rapid growth spell, and in mere seconds, over five hundred high-quality herbs sprouted from the soil and reached full maturity.

With a flick of her finger, her mana plucked the herbs carefully and swiftly. A second flick sent them drifting off toward the storeroom, and a third drew hundreds of seeds from the sacks stored in the corner.

Even Elena, who had already seen mages at the peak of the sixth stage in action, couldn’t contain her shock.

That was mana levitation, a power that should only be attained in the fourth stage, or at the very least, at the peak of the third!

How powerful must the circle Alice had formed on her chest have been?

No... how powerful was Alice’s mind, for her to control so many threads at once, and so carefully?

Elena turned to Ethan, who maintained a gentle smile on his lips, and then to Evelyn, whose face also carried an impressed expression.

Hearing the sighs of admiration behind her, Alice blushed slightly and pushed herself even harder.

In just one minute, she managed to extract over a thousand herbs.

That meant, on average, over a million herbs a day, a quantity so absurd that even all of Goldenveil couldn’t consume it in a thousand years.

In the end, Ethan simply shook his head, impressed.

The Brown Mages’ Tower possessed the most powerful magical spells ever created for humanity, and he was glad that it was now in his hands.

"You two know what that book of Alice’s is, and that it can’t leave here under any circumstances, right?" he said, turning to Evelyn and Elena, who nodded in silence.

Neither of them had known about the Brown Tower, since they had both been dead by the time it came into being, but seeing the power of the spells in that book, they understood exactly what it meant.

Even sixth-stage experts would give anything for spells like those.

Ethan smiled with satisfaction and approached Alice, his palm drawing back before landing a firm slap on the plump curve of her ass.

"I’m proud of you, love, just-..." Ethan’s words died in his throat as the deep blast of a war horn tore through the air from beyond the walls.

At once, he rushed out of the spirit greenhouse. Doran was already sprinting toward the walls, and Ethan quickened his pace to follow.

[NT: I’ll try to keep up this fast release pace (at least 4 Chapters a day) for the rest of the month, but I need all your support with privs, since I want to hit the goal of 5,000 priv unlocks and get the tier 2 bonus!

Because of this, it’s important to keep buying privs Chapters, since every unlock counts! If I see that it’s going to be impossible to reach the goal, I’ll go back to the standard release rate.

Thank you so much for reading this far, and don’t forget to leave an honest review!] (Golden tickets and gifts are always welcome too, hehehe)