In the middle of an otherwise continuous ridgeline lay a massive natural depression that had become the center of the battle. The surrounding ridge rose nearly thirty meters above the basin, forming a natural defensive position that had saved countless lives over the past two days. Below, however, the depression had transformed into a sea of black and purplish creatures that vaguely resembled the animals of Earth. That resemblance disappeared the moment anyone looked closer, as every corrupted creature possessed something fundamentally wrong about its appearance that instinctively unsettled every human who saw it.
At the center of that horrifying tide stood the defenders. A battered shield wall stretched across the narrowest section of the depression, with hundreds of spears repeatedly thrusting forward into the advancing horde. Every soldier understood that retreat was not an option. If the creatures managed to force them completely out of the depression, the defensive line built upon the surrounding ridge would almost certainly collapse.
For two continuous days, the defenders had fought without ever truly leaving the battlefield. Every meter of ground had been contested countless times as the corrupted creatures relentlessly threw themselves against the human formation. Bodies covered nearly every part of the depression, making it difficult to distinguish where the battlefield ended and the front line truly began. The only thing keeping the monsters contained was the stubborn determination of the soldiers refusing to yield another step.
Positioned behind the shield wall stood the remaining archers assigned to the border defense. They fired arrow after arrow into the advancing creatures with almost mechanical precision, never slowing their pace despite the hours of continuous combat. Under ordinary circumstances, such an expenditure of ammunition would have been impossible to sustain. This battle, however, was anything but ordinary.
The military had authorized unlimited purchases of arrows and crossbow bolts through the System marketplace. Whenever an archer's quiver emptied, another was immediately purchased without hesitation. Demand had become so overwhelming that the marketplace itself had quietly begun increasing the prices of arrows and bolts as available supplies struggled to keep pace with consumption. Even so, no commander dared complain about the rising costs while thousands of lives depended upon maintaining a constant barrage.
The importance of archers had also increased dramatically since the introduction of the class system. Many individuals who were originally mages eventually switched to archery after realizing the profession was better suited to them than being a mage. As a result, the number of skilled ranged combatants had grown far beyond what anyone had anticipated during the early days of the System. Every one of them now played a critical role in holding the defensive line together.
Behind the archers stood the final layer of the defense: the mages. Whenever they weren't actively casting spells, they sat in quiet meditation to recover as much mana as possible before unleashing another barrage upon the advancing monsters. Fireballs exploded across tightly packed enemy formations, ice lances pierced through multiple creatures at once, and massive blasts of stone tore open entire sections of the corrupted horde. The battlefield resembled something pulled straight from a fantasy novel.
Those spectacular spells, however, represented only a fraction of the mages' true contribution. Most no longer relied upon individually casting Magic Missile, the spell that had once served as every novice mage's primary attack. Although reliable, the spell simply lacked the destructive power necessary for a battlefield of this scale. The military quickly realized that continuing to fight that way would waste both mana and manpower.
Mages naturally possessed exceptionally high Intelligence, making them ideal candidates for complex cooperative casting. Rather than scattering them across the battlefield, commanders grouped them into carefully organized formations centered around individuals who had already reached Stage 0.3 in their class progression. Those more advanced mages acted as anchors, allowing dozens of others to synchronize their magic far more efficiently than before. The result was an enormous increase in both firepower and mana efficiency.
Fortunately, nearly every Stage 0.3 mage had already unlocked the Magic Rituals skill. That ability fundamentally changed how battlefield magic functioned by allowing multiple spellcasters to combine their mana into a single coordinated attack. Given enough preparation, those rituals could unleash devastating spells that no individual mage could hope to cast alone. It rapidly became one of the military's most valuable strategic assets.
As the mages continued advancing through their classes, many gained access to another exceptionally useful skill: Elemental Manipulation. Although the finer details behind its mechanics remained difficult for most ordinary soldiers to understand, the practical applications quickly became obvious. By altering the properties of mana within familiar spells such as Magic Missile and Magic Shield, mages dramatically increased both their offensive and defensive capabilities. Even simple spells became far deadlier when enhanced through precise elemental control.
Naturally, those improvements made the mages highly attractive targets. The corrupted flying creatures seemed intelligent enough to recognize just how dangerous organized spellcasters had become. Eliminating a ritual formation before it completes its casting sequence could potentially save hundreds of corrupted creatures from annihilation. Under different circumstances, the birds would almost certainly have concentrated their attacks upon the mages.
Unfortunately for the flying creatures, the battlefield offered very few opportunities. Hundreds of mages remained clustered together behind layers of infantry, archers, and dedicated bodyguards prepared specifically to protect them. Every spellcaster eagerly waited for the birds to descend within range, hoping to eliminate them before they could disrupt another ritual. Faced with such overwhelming resistance, the corrupted creatures wisely chose to remain high overhead instead.
It disappointed many soldiers that the birds refused to commit themselves. Countless archers and mages had spent weeks developing specialized techniques specifically designed to eliminate aerial threats. Yet the creatures stubbornly refused to provide the opportunity they desired. Instead, they patiently circled above the battlefield while waiting for isolated targets or moments of weakness to appear.
Unfortunately, those moments were becoming increasingly common. The defenders had gone two full days without anything resembling a proper night's sleep, and exhaustion was finally beginning to overcome even the most disciplined veterans. Fatigue slowed reaction times, clouded judgment, and made maintaining formation increasingly difficult. Every passing hour brought fresh signs that the soldiers' bodies were approaching their absolute limits.
The consequences of that exhaustion could already be seen across the defensive line. Spears occasionally struck empty air instead of flesh, shields reacted a fraction of a second too slowly, and exhausted soldiers began making mistakes that would have been unthinkable only a day earlier. None of those errors seemed particularly serious by themselves. On a battlefield of this scale, however, even the smallest mistake could rapidly grow into a catastrophe capable of collapsing the entire defensive line.
Those small mistakes soon began to compound. In the middle of the depression, three Stage 1 corrupted creatures suddenly charged toward the defensive line, leading a concentrated assault meant to break the exhausted defenders. Two of the monsters were immediately dealt with, one being riddled with arrows while another was blasted apart by concentrated magic before it could reach the shield wall. The third, however, managed to survive long enough to crash into the front line.
The enormous tiger-like creature let out a deafening roar before swinging one massive claw through the tightly packed defenders. Three soldiers were thrown backwards as though they weighed nothing, their shields splintering from the force of the impact. Before anyone could close the gap, the monster continued charging forward, determined to punch a hole straight through the defensive formation. The soldiers desperately thrust their spears toward it, but their exhausted movements lacked the speed and precision they had displayed only a day earlier.
Following directly behind the Stage 1 creature came nearly one hundred late-stage corrupted beasts. They had no intention of remaining inside the depression. Instead, they rushed toward the newly opened breach, hoping to exploit the opening before the defenders could recover and execute a classic hammer-and-anvil maneuver by surrounding the human forces from behind.
For several terrifying seconds, it appeared as though they would succeed. The tiger and its followers tore through nearly a thousand defenders, leaving chaos wherever they passed. Men shouted conflicting orders while reserve formations rushed forward in an attempt to contain the breakthrough. The entire center of the defensive line teetered on the brink of collapse.
Just as the corrupted creatures prepared to leave the depression, a massive longsword descended from above. The blade cleaved downward with overwhelming force, aiming to split the heavily wounded tiger cleanly in half before it could escape. Although the strike failed to completely bisect the monster, the sheer impact was more than enough to finish it. The tiger collapsed lifelessly onto the blood-soaked earth, its momentum ending in an instant.
Without wasting even a heartbeat, the armored warrior ripped his sword free from the corpse and stepped directly into the breach. Standing alone, he blocked the opening that hundreds of corrupted creatures had hoped to exploit. His shield and sword moved with practiced precision as he bought the defenders the precious seconds they desperately needed to reorganize themselves. The seemingly unstoppable breakthrough had been halted by the arrival of a single knight.
Moments later, the soldiers of Legion 23 poured into the battlefield behind him. Despite having completed an exhausting three-day forced march, they immediately reinforced the crumbling line with disciplined efficiency. Their arrival injected fresh energy into the battered defenders, many of whom had already begun believing that the line would finally break. Across the battlefield, officers quickly noticed just how different Legion 23 fought compared to the other formations already present.
The difference was not that Legion 23 possessed dramatically stronger soldiers. Rather, they had spent months training together as a complete legion under the same officers, following identical doctrines and repeatedly drilling the same battlefield maneuvers. Every soldier instinctively trusted the person fighting beside them because they had practiced these situations countless times before. Their unity allowed them to react almost as though the entire legion shared a single mind.
The European Union officially possessed twenty-seven active legions. Of those, however, only seven remained fully intact organizations permanently stationed around major strategic cities, where they served as rapid reaction forces capable of responding to large-scale emergencies anywhere on the continent. Legion 23 belonged to that elite group, making it one of the few formations that continuously trained as a complete military unit rather than being divided across multiple assignments.
The remaining twenty legions had been broken apart in the month after the trial. Their companies, battalions, and occasionally entire divisions had been stationed throughout Europe's cities, military bases, and border regions to maintain a permanent military presence across the continent. This created roughly 20 separate military districts, with significantly heavier troop concentrations near land borders and major coastlines to deter potential invasions. While strategically sensible, the arrangement came with a significant drawback.
Training separately inevitably weakened a legion's cohesion. Every officer received the same manuals, doctrines, and official procedures, but no two commanders interpreted or enforced those standards in exactly the same way. Differences in discipline, priorities, and training philosophies slowly accumulated until units that technically belonged to the same legion no longer operated with the same seamless coordination. Individual companies fought exceptionally well on their own, yet combining them into a larger force proved far more difficult than it appeared on paper.
Legion 23 stood in stark contrast to that reality. Even though its soldiers were just as exhausted as everyone else after running nearly thirteen hundred kilometers in only three days, they still maneuvered with remarkable coordination. Squads covered one another instinctively, officers anticipated each other's intentions without needing lengthy discussions, and reserve units filled gaps almost before they appeared. The difference became obvious within minutes of their arrival.
Perhaps the greatest boost to morale came from the sight of their commander himself. Clad in towering armor and fighting at the very front of the line like a knight from ancient legends, Eloi became a rallying point for every nearby defender. Wherever he swung his sword, corrupted creatures fell in droves, and weary soldiers found the strength to continue fighting simply because they refused to retreat while their commander stood before them. As for how Eloi had ended up charging into the battle in full armor, that story began half an hour earlier, when he and Selvijs first arrived at Commander Afanasij's command tent.