Dmitriy crushed another one of the spiders under his mace as it crested the wall, then was forced to rest both mace and shield on the ground for a moment, just to stop the agonizing burning in his arms. He saw how a spider's leg flashed over the wall and pierced straight through a shoulder before it was severed by a blade. Another person to join the increasing pile of wounded which the Fixer Uppers could not keep up with.

They had planned to fight in shifts, but the sheer amount of beasts had forced their breaks to keep getting shorter, so he'd ended up fighting through most of the night.

Thinking slowly through the tired haze that had settled over his body, he turned to check the progress of the swarm of the bats. Those were coming down soon - they'd have to move to protect the archers.

He cursed as a piece of rock blasted right past his head, ducking and looking out to see another wave of the rock-throwing gremlins coming in. At least thirty of them. Men with shields ran forward, calling out Abilities as they activated them.

"We need Carrie! Where is the Witch?"

He looked around for Tasha, too exhausted to scold them for using that inappropriate nickname. When was the last time he'd seen her?

To his right, a wiry-thin builder held off two spider's legs, as long and thick as arms, plucking them straight out of the arachnid's body before smashing its head in with a hammer. Others picked up rocks that had to weigh nearly two hundred pounds, hurling them over the walls like they weighed nothing. They were all getting stronger by the hour, but exhaustion would catch up with them soon.

To his left, on the southern flank, a piece of rock slipped between Momentum shields and crushed a man's head, killing him instantly. Down in the courtyard there was a chaotic queue of groaning people clutching their wounds, waiting for the mere ten Fixer Uppers they had in service.

He finally spotted Tasha coming up from a short break, dark bags under her eyes. She was carrying a quiver of the heavier, metal arrows. Those would be necessary to kill the green-scaled beasts.

He gave her a nod and a quick pat on the shoulder, then looked up again.

"Flyers incoming! Shields and arrows!"

There was a short moment of hope as a few volleys of arrows took the bats down by the score, but the remainder spread out and then there was chaos.

Deafening screeching drowned out orders as a row of fluttering black wings and claws filled his vision. He spun, swiping his heavy mace through the air to crush the beast's heads and destroy their wings. He caught a flash of three archers caught by a cluster of the beasts, then activated his latest Ability, [Accelerate Self].

Its use was far more limited than [Accelerate Object], which would also work on people, but it had the added benefit of not losing precious seconds having to select oneself with the targeting system. All he had to do was think about moving forward, then brace and hop at exactly the right time.

It had taken days of nonstop exercise to be able to use this without falling to the ground, but now he smoothly zipped past a line of fighters, smashing two bats on his shield, and then he was standing right in front of the beleaguered archers. A bat scratched him on the arm, but a few seconds of bashing and swinging with mace and shield had them freed up and firing their arrows again.

He spotted Kobe, leaning back as he launched some kind of gleaming ball up, catching at least three of the bats before it came shooting back, blasting through a bat's wing on the return trip. The man caught it smoothly and pivoted to swipe his spear around, before his two wires snaked out into another bat, quickly electrocuting it.

There were screams as he saw a few of the bats making it down to the civilians, but the fighters posted there were already responding to the threat.

His attention was gone for a second too long and a bat tried to sink its teeth into his shoulder. It barely managed to pierce his reinforced hide though, so he simply pulled it off and crushed its head in his hand. It added a couple more holes to his increasingly tattered armor and clothes, having taken more than a few strikes over the last day.

The swarm was thickening to the south, where defenders were focused on blocking the thrown rocks, and he made to flash back over, until he saw Tasha make short work of the bats.

Her eyes closed for focus, she raised her hand and made a handful of daggers rotate in a circle. They started off slowly but then flew faster and faster until the individual daggers blended together into a blur of moving blades, which Tasha moved up and down through the swarm of bats, mowing them down with ease.

Pieces of bone, wing and splatters of blood rained down over the battlements and further down into the town as the cloud of bats was decimated.

That finally took some of the pressure off, but he could already see a fresh line of wounded stumbling down the stairs. From the southern battlements, there were cries of people running out of PE. To the west, what he thought were giant frogs were starting to break their lines. Kobe and a group of defenders were rushing over to support.

They were fighting on a razor's edge and he feared they would reach a tipping point very soon.

He noticed more rocks starting to slip through from the south, so he ran over and activated [Reduce Momentum]. When he noticed the immediate pull on his PE from the unceasing barrage of projectiles and the row of exhausted defenders screaming that they were running low, a dark sense of hopelessness began to settle over him.

Tasha had taken out five of the green-scaled beasts already with spinning arrows, but now she was forced to spend her focus and PE on saving people from projectiles. He could already see her swaying slightly as she stood, arms hanging low, bleeding from scratches on her neck and cheek. It seemed like each time she blinked, it took longer for her eyes to open again.

Other fighters around him weren't much better off. Another wave of beasts would soon be pushing against the gate. If they didn't take those damn gremlins out right now they would be doomed.

"We'll have to abandon these battlements and strike out from the gate," he said with a grimace, then repeated it more loudly when nobody confirmed.

He could see nearby faces going pale with grim realization. Their energy was dwindling and it felt like the smell of defeat was hanging in the air. To strike out was a terrible option, and more than likely to be the beginning of the end for them. But what other choice did they have?

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"Shit, he's right. We don't have any more shield specialists in reserve. We're going to have to sortie."

"Alright! We'll begin a staggered retreat and form a strike team! Those who have some PE left… What the hell is that?"

A young man with short, black curls and what looked like a casual, sporty outfit was calmly walking towards the group of green-scaled rock-throwers. Dmitriy watched with a frown as two sleek, curved white swords suddenly appeared in his hands, and then the man turned into a blur.

Suddenly he was at the line of beasts, blurring forward, visible only in the brief stops where he changed direction. Where he passed, green-scaled bodies slumped down as their heads rolled over the ground. In no more than a few seconds, the line of beasts had been decimated.

There was a moment of stunned silence, people gazing at the killing field with their mouths agape, then at each other as if to confirm that this was real.

"Who the hell is that guy?"

The young man looked up at them and spoke. Despite the distance and the fact that he didn't raise his voice, it somehow sounded crisp and clear in Dmitriy's ears.

"Get ready to defend against attacks from below. There are beasts burrowing below ground."

The man was gone in the blink of an eye, leaving no time for questions. Dmitriy swallowed as he turned towards the town, which was packed with women, children and wounded, with only a few defenders sprinkled throughout the mass of people.

How was he going to protect them now?

***

Two hours of sleep while hooked up to a Fixer Upper was enough to get Kobe's leg moving normally again, but it hadn't done much more than that. His arms felt like lead as he brought his spear around for what felt like the thousandth time. Increasing his Strength and Durability seemed to help to stave off total muscle failure, but it was no cure against the building exhaustion.

He cursed as the man next to him narrowly evaded the sticky tongue shooting from a giant frog's mouth, only to be stabbed through the neck as the frog whipped around its bone-tipped tail. Kobe rammed his spear through its head and kicked it off the wall, then turned to fire his metal ball at another one that had landed nearby.

Looking out over the battlements was enough to fill anyone with despair. An endless wave of the monstrous black frogs was coming their way, their deep, twisted croaks blending together into an ominous melody. The pace they were losing people at was simply too high to keep fighting for much longer.

He grit his teeth to stop from crying out in frustration and pushed his tired legs to move, cutting at one frog's inflated throat as he launched his wires to electrocute another.

It was partly his fault that they were in this mess. Dericka's too, of course, for failing to disclose the risk involved in the so-called mission he was sent on.

He'd risked his damn life going out on those deliveries, lying to a number of teams to get them to abandon their Quests. Only to find out later that it was exactly those failed Quests that triggered this calamitous Challenge.

He might well end up being remembered as the guy who doomed a settlement with several thousands of people inside.

Kobe cursed as a sharp tongue cut across his shoulder, then ducked underneath a whipping tail. He twisted, hacking through the tail with the tip of his spear, then repeatedly stabbing it down into the frog's head as he growled through clenched teeth.

"Die. You. Slimy. Fuck!"

All he could do now was take all of his anger and let it loose on these slimy beasts. None of these problems would matter if they didn't manage to survive.

It was already dusk again when he finally found a moment to breathe. He dumped some Value into additional PE Capacity, knowing that when his body failed him, his Abilities would be all that was left. When he closed the overlay, there was a man running between the frogs.

He blinked twice and shook his head, but the man was still there. There was something strange about the image. He thought it looked unusually bright.

The young man was wearing a comfortable looking set of navy and white jogging clothes, complete with white sneakers. Two sleek ivory blades were waving left to right over his head as he jogged between the frogs.

"He's going to get himself killed," Kobe breathed, fixated on the mysterious event.

The ominous croaking intensified as groups of frogs converged on the man, some even turning around from their climb up the wall. One black beast after another leapt, piling onto the young man until he couldn't be seen anymore.

"What was-"

BAM!

A bright light flashed at the same time as the explosion of sound rippled through the angry frogs. The beasts stumbled, falling to the ground as they rubbed their webbed feet over their eyes, their croaking turning into a more high-pitched, distressed sound.

Then, inexplicably, the young man was back, running at the pile of confused frogs. This time he was wielding his blades with deadly effectiveness, flashing across the field as he sliced through the black frogs with ease.

Kobe gaped as the man danced between the frogs, each well-timed step supporting the endless, flowing cuts of his blades. The way he sliced through the frogs, moving with such elegant, effortless grace, made it feel choreographed.

He looked around to find others mesmerized as well, staring with disbelief at a man who was not only single-handedly taking out an entire beastwave, but doing it with style.

"Damn," Kobe whispered to himself as he watched him execute a series of spinning cuts that took out a dozen of the frogs in only two seconds. The man was a godsend; if he kept this up just a bit longer, their defenders would be able to take a much needed break.

Then, shouts from the courtyard jolted him out of his reverie.

"They're going to come from below!"

"Burrowers inbound!"

His eyes widened as he realized the chaos that would cause. Taking another glance back at the one-man killing field, he decided that things were under control on this side, then ran past the defenders and down the stairs into the town courtyard.

Already, people were screaming and pushing each other aside as they desperately looked for safe ground. Kobe spotted Jakob coordinating people so he made his way there, pushing through the crowd.

"What's the plan?" he had to shout to be heard over the noise from the crowd.

"We're gathering anyone with high Strength! We need to push all the barracks together to create a safe platform-"

A ripple went through the crowd just a few meters to their left and the screams intensified. As the crowd dispersed, he could see a mole-like creature with massive claws crawling up out of the ground.

"Fuck. Get on the barracks! Climb to safety!"

Kobe lunged and only barely managed to shock the beast before it disemboweled a bystander, killing it with a stab to the neck. Leaning heavily on his spear, panting, he saw three different spots where the dirt was being kicked up and pushed aside by long claws.

Moving fast enough through the crowd to deal with all the threats was going to be impossible. Exhausted as he was, he could already barely run anymore.

As the crowd dispersed and he activated the program that shot and returned a metal ball by creating magnetic fields with opposite charges, he felt some kind of disturbance, an outside pull.

"The barracks..? They are made from metal," he muttered to himself, activating another magnetic field to sense the interaction. It lingered, anchoring itself to the nearest barracks, as opposed to quickly dissipating as it would in empty air. That was why he needed those discs to make his jumps.

But the entire town was covered in these barracks. If he could use them as anchor points…

"Where did I leave that damn harness?"

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