The position Xaren’s fingers were pointing at and the dire Ilya’s eyes were looking at overpped and she pulled the trigger on the crossbow with a thunder-like speed.

  Each bolt she fired had a small whirlwind around it, tripling the speed with which it shot through the air and pierced the hides of the Treants.

  Xaren twisted his lips after the third, befrabbing onto her hand and redireg her trajectory just as she pulled the trigger.

  He noticed one leader he had missed and ged her trajectory to make her shoot it before it retreated behind the cover of three others; what’s more, the arrow she fired didn’t just have a whirlwind but a fming trail.

  It didn’t diminish in speed, and its pierg power seemed to double, allowing it to easily puncture the bark of the Treant targeted. Then, Xaren’s bck fmes erupted, spread out across the Treant by the st burst of wind on the arrows and covered a se of its body in fmes.

  “…what did you do?”

  Ilya wasn’t blind, so she could see that he had added fmes. As such, her question was not about the fmes, but the reason for the sudden spike in the pierg power of the arrows.

  “I doubled its weight. It’d pa extra punch, and wouldn’t fall off easily…”

  Redireg her hand, he made her pull the trigger and fire at one of the leaders who ripped out the arrow she shot in it earlier before finishing his statement.

  “…et ripped out like that guy did.”

  Ilya nodded in silence before asking him to point out the one and they tinued shooting the leaders while the Fire demon from earlier protected their backs from the elven mages who wao stop them.

  **PUK! PUK! PUK!

  The two emptied all the crossbow bolts on the leaders, and Xaren’s fmes burst on impact, lig their barks with seari.

  These Treants were all at least Level 70, and they were all buffed so even with their bo, Xaren and Ilya couldn’t take them down in a sirike.

  However, their as still had a meaning. Ilya raised her void yelled.

  “Demons! trate your attacks on the ohat have arrows and bck fmes!”

  “Ou!!”

  “Let’s go!!”

  The leader Treants didn’t look ordinary anymore and now had rge signs differentiating them.

  Immediately after giving her order, Ilya tossed the empty crossbow aside and dashed towards one of the Treant leaders.

  Her speed was even faster than before, and Xare like the air around her shimmered with an almost imperceptible disturbahough he couldn’t dis what exactly was causing it.

  As Ilya closed in oarget, the Treants seemed to rea a disjointed maheir branches and limbs appearing tment and splinter in the wake of her approach. It was as if some unseen force was slig and dig through them, though Xaren could see nothing but the aftermath.

  He was sure it wasn’t her as her hand remained on the grip of her sheathed Runebde, barely moving as she ran forward.

  With all the Treants around her mysteriously losing their limbs, Ilya had free passage to the leader who swung its massive limbs with all its might.

  Yet, its powerful strikes were met with unseen ters, with Xaren barely catg sight of something ‘dark’ at the point of impact.

  Ilya finally drew her bde with a siion, cutting through the air in a blur. Each swing was apanied by a gust of dark, whirling wind that carved out its bark.

  The Treant's responses grew erratic as it not only had to watch out for Ilya’s sword, but the invisible force slig at it from all angles.

  Ilya stabbed her bde into the hole created by her and Xaren’s arrow bo, releasing a focused bst of wind that destroyed a huge k of its body.

  Then she swung her bde and cleaved through the injured part, slig it in two.

  The surrounding Treants, now without their leader’s buffs, faltered and began to crumble uhe sustained assault from the other demons.

  Xaren, who had ignored Ilya’s fight sihe moment she drew her bde, darted among the t Treants with dexterity granted by lightening his weight.

  He leveraged his agility and gravity manipution to perform acrobatic feats, leaping from oreant to another and with every bound, he drew his sword in fast but heavy sshes that carved through the bark of the creatures.

  His attacks were like a series of miniature explosions, causing splio scatter in all dires, f the Treants to recoil and stagger.

  By targeting the Treants closest to the paths the other demons o take, Xaren cleared the way for them to reach the leader Treants.

  “Carack! We will mobilize a detached force! Take that grey demon!”

  Ilya suddenly gave out this order and before Xaren could even figure out who ‘Carack’ was, the Fire demon from earlier dashed over and grabbed onto him.

  “Wait, aren’t we the detached force?! Why are we splitting again?!”

  “Just go!”

  The demoness did little in the way of expining to Xaren, instead fog on charging at the neearing elves.

  They had almost gotten rid of all of the Treants, but it had taken too much time and the elves had sent forces towards this part of the Fortress to bat them.

  Carack pulled Xareo a broken part of the Fortress wall where eight other demons awaited while giving him the expnation he needed.

  “The ten of us would use a stealth skill to sneak in and finish our mission while the others would hold the elves out here.”

  “Oh, that makes sense!”

  Xaren responded and used gravity magic to lighten both their bodies, doubling their speed, much to Carack’s surprise.

  “You use some strange magic, grey demon.”

  “It’s Xaren. A’s get going before any elves notice us.”

  Carack spoke no more, instead grabbing a cloak and tossing it onto Xaren’s head. At the same moment, Xare darkness magic wash over them, signalling the activation of the stealth skill.

  “We Move!”

  Normally, any mage elves or very perceptive warriors would be able to detect them, but this was a battlefield; this level of stealth was enough.

  “While Captain Ilya is grabbing their attention, we will take over the trol room.”

  Carack repeated this for the sake of the ht demons and they nodded in uanding. They had fought with Ilya before so they khat whenever she said ‘detached force’ she meant them, so they had gathered even though they weren’t sure what she wahem to do.

  Even if they were young unranked demons without any proper training and just basiowledge from their Survival Guides, these guys had garnered months of experience so they didn’t fight thoughtlessly.

  The Mid-Ranks also didn’t pick Ilya as their captain for no reason.

  Xaren and the other nine demons moved quickly, slipping through the broken wall and into the fortress.

  Their path resembled an old, ed cave, filled with cobwebs and yers of dust that hi its long abando. Carack illuminated a small fme to examiheir surroundings, meticulously studying the room's structure before falling silent.

  Moments ter, he took off down the corridor leading them dowh like he had an internal map of the pce.

  They raced through the dimly lit passage for about five minutes, before rounding a er and ing face-to-face with an ued foe.

  “?!”

  It was a mohat resembled a serpent, with bark-like scales and gnarled antlers sprouting from its head—an Elderwood Serpent.

  It hissed at them and lunged forward and Xaren couldn’t help but curse as he jumped to dodge.

  “Fuck!”

  If a tree-like sh fangs lohan its mouth came charging towards you, it was impossible to not curse. In addition, the bastard was huge.

  As Xaren dodged its bite, Caragulfed his fist in fmes and threw it forward. His fist collided with the monster’s side a it flying, with two other demons lunging at it and swinging their hammers.

  *KRISSSAK!!

  The serpent made a hat was somewhere between a hiss and a yell as it rolled on the floor, its eyes glowing as it lu the demons once more.

  Xaren infused his bde with fmes and jumped at it, stabbing his bde into its side from the spot where the hammers had scattered scales.

  ‘ I use Attra to pull out its internal ans?’

  A moment after he had that thought, Xaren realized he had no idea what a serpent's insides looked like and doubted he could accurately target them.

  Instead, he chose a more straightforward approach: elling his fmes through the bde and triggering an internal explosion.

  It went without saying that the serpent screamed agony, its massive body writhing violently in an attempt to dislodge Xaren.

  The other demons took advantage and attacked its head, ung a coordinated assault. Arrows flew, spells erupted and swords sshed in a flurry.

  The bined onsught of ons and magic overwhelmed the Serpent and its thrashing quickly grew weaker.

  Xaren then removed his sword and vaulted onto its body. Using gravity attra, he yas head bad, with a fiery infusion, drove his bde deep into the weakened skull.

  The sword punctured the serpent's brain aed from the other side, leaving no room for a final roar before the beast crumpled to the ground, defeated.

  [Level Up]

  Without a moment’s hesitation, Xarerieved the monster’s soul while the others simply rushed forward behind Carack’s lead.

  Not long after, they heard hissing sounds and Xaren gnced back to see half a dozen pairs of greearing at them in the darkness.

  ‘Of course, there are more of them…’