The Defense of Britus

The signal for the raid went up. We broke off training at once, threw on our gear, and sprinted for the village gate.

By the time we arrived, the militia had already taken up positions along the palisade, and the mercenaries were still pouring in behind us.

"...Damn, they're fast."

A mercenary muttered it under his breath — a small, telling scrap of proof that their bodies simply weren't in the same class as ours. Among everyone who had started at roughly the same moment, our party's speed was in a league of its own. We reached the gate first among the mercenaries and climbed straight to the stretch of wall assigned to us, right beside the gate itself.

The militiamen who'd been holding the post handed it over the instant we stepped in.

In the distance, gold-furred gnolls came charging toward us. Just as we'd been told, it looked like five full centuries' worth.

"That's a lot of them."

Even our party had rarely seen numbers like this come at us all at once. We'd driven hunts through the Labyrinth, but the corridors there were narrow. Watching them pour across open ground like this was something else entirely.

A thread of tension ran through the group.

"We've got the palisade, and allies all around us. Whether they'll actually be any help is another question, but it's still a lot better than nothing."

"...Right. I suppose so.... Hah."

"Don't forget — prioritize our own people over the rest. I won't stop you from helping someone else if you've got the room, but we come first."

"Of course."

That was all I needed. The gnolls preferred not to kill if they could help it, and if only three people had been dragged off alive so far, I figured the village had been holding the line reasonably well.

"Shit, they're back again...."

"Those fuckers... what the hell do they even want?"

Murmurs rippled around us. Looking over the mercenaries and the militia, they seemed even more wound up than we were.

Meanwhile the charging gnolls pulled up at a considerable distance and began to fan out, slowly, into a wide formation. They meant to rush us all at once.

"They're coming, they're coming, they're coming...."

A militiaman nearby kept repeating the words like an incantation.

It must have always gone the same way. At a signal from the centurions, the gnoll horde surged forward in a roaring mass.

"They're coming! All hands, ready for combat!"

"Don't let them drag you off! Hold as long as you can!"

"Krrngh! Krrngh! Krrngh!"

The pack closed in. Before long their barking was right on top of us.

"Casa!"

A rush of flame bloomed in the air. The moment the gnolls entered range, Na-yeon summoned her spirit and loosed spirit magic. Against a crowd, Casa was far more useful than Sylph.

The blast hit with a thunderous crack. Some of the gnolls charging our section went up in flames and tumbled across the ground, screaming. The ranks behind them couldn't stop in time; they trampled the burning ones underfoot and crushed them in an instant.

Na Seoyun followed right after, cutting down another handful with her own magic. But the ones that fell were only a fraction. The horde still stretched on and on.

Once both sisters had loosed their spells, the archers' arrows came down in a rain. A few gnolls took shafts and dropped, but most of them didn't even flinch. They just kept driving for the palisade.

"Krrngh! Krrngh!"

They closed the last stretch in a heartbeat and began to swarm the wall, one after another.

This village had been hounded by Golden Gnolls for years, and the palisade stood taller than the one at Monus Village. Even the gnolls couldn't simply scramble over it. But they were still monsters. Difficult or not, they used that raw physical power to haul themselves up, one by one, and reach for the people above.

"Die!"

The militia and the mercenaries smashed their weapons down from the top of the wall. The gnolls shrieked in pain — and even then they grabbed at the blades, writhing, trying to drag a human down with them by ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠any means they could.

One came up right in front of me and stretched out an arm. I took its head off in a single cut and swept a look along the wall. Every last gnoll was making the same grotesque effort — not to kill the humans on the palisade, but to seize them.

It looked insane.

"Gyaaah!"

One of them sank its teeth into a militiaman's arm, hung there by its jaws, and used its own weight to try to haul him off the wall.

"Hold him! Hold him!"

The mercenaries and militiamen around him locked onto the bitten man and hammered at the dangling gnoll's skull. It clung on with its teeth until the moment it died.

Watching that, our party went even tighter.

"...Why are they like that? It's as if they've completely lost their minds...."

"I don't know. For now, we deal with the ones in front of us."

If this was how they fought, I could understand the passivity. These things were lunatics. The militia and the mercenaries were clearly more interested in dodging attacks and knocking off anything that latched on than in killing the gnolls outright.

Swing too freely and a gnoll would grab your weapon and drag you down with it. And it wasn't as if these people were skilled enough to drop every climber in a single stroke. Commit to a real fight and they'd burn out in no time — and the second they slipped, they'd be hauled off the wall. Being aggressive was actually the harder choice here.

Not as much of a mess as I expected.

No — as far as the fighting itself went, it was a mess. Still, I could give them some credit. I'd assumed "holding back" meant they were slacking or stalling, but that wasn't it. From Rusell's point of view as village chief, of course he'd want them to kill as many as possible and drive the pack off even for a little while. From theirs, their own lives came first.

And they weren't abandoning the ones who got grabbed, either. When someone was in trouble, the people who'd banded together hauled them back and kept grinding it out. You could say they were doing their best, in their own way. I had no idea who'd set this situation up, but from where I stood it was almost funny.

If this kept going, the fighting would drag and drag. The mercenaries would make a little more coin. The village would take a real loss from work left undone. And the militia detachments sent here could at least be satisfied they weren't dying.

Most of the gnolls were clinging to the palisade, reaching for the humans above — and then something odd started to show. The number of them coming our way was growing. Every one of them was staring at Na-yeon and Na Seoyun.

"...What? Them?"

Na Seoyun realized the gnolls were looking at her in that strange, intent way and frowned, puzzled.

I knew why they were staring at the sisters almost at once.

Are they picking who to take?

It wasn't because they were women. There were women among the mercenaries too, and the gnolls weren't throwing themselves at those with anything like this intensity. The likelier reason was that both of them were using magic. Casting threw off a lot of mana, and I suspected the gnolls could sense it.

If that was the case, I only needed to test it. I turned to Joo Ha-yeon.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

"I'm going out."

"...Already? Wouldn't it be better to wait a little longer, until after they've worn themselves down?"

"The attacks are drifting toward us. Eun-ju's taking the worst of it."

That was the truth. As the pressure tilted our way, Nam Eun-ju was the one paying for it. At this rate she'd be the first to burn out.

Na Seoyun could step in, of course — but that would mean losing magical firepower, and I didn't want that.

"...All right. Please be careful."

"Of course."

Joo Ha-yeon poured holy power into me at once and cast Solid Shield of Earth.

"It'll last more than thirty minutes. If it's you, Shin-hoo, the shield won't break before then. I'll recast it when the time's up, so please come back for a moment when you need it."

"Sure."

I moved straight to the edge of the palisade.

Our party looked at me as if to say, Already? The rest of the defenders just stared, wondering what the hell I thought I was doing.

"Hey! What are you doing up there? That's dangerous!"

"Get down, you lunatic! What do you think you're doing?!"

What did it look like. I was going out.

I hauled my mana up hard. That was all it took to prove the guess right.

Every gnoll's gaze snapped toward me.

Mana. They really were hunting the ones who had a lot of it. It had to be tied to why they were taking people alive.... Were they offering them up as sacrifices somewhere?

I cut down the gnolls lunging at me in a single sweep and jumped — off the palisade, down toward the ground outside the village.

"...He's insane!"

"What the hell is he doing?!"

I could feel every eye in the place lock onto me. Their stares weren't my problem. The point was reputation and fame. Experience was a bonus. For that, I jumped.

The gnolls around the wall came boiling toward me. Some of them even leapt down off the palisade to get at me.

As I fell, I drew a weapon I hadn't used in a long time.

I hadn't had a reason to use it since the ninth-floor dungeon. A plain iron sword felt more natural in my hand, and the Labyrinth's terrain had never suited a blade this size. So the thing had just sat there, neglected, until now.

The huge greatsword bloomed out of empty air, and startled shouts went up all around me.

"Magic?!"

"There's three mages?!"

"No — it could be a magic weapon. ...Does he have a spatial pouch?"

I switched grips in midair and brought the sword down on the gnolls below.

The ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠impact hit like a thunderclap. I even triggered the option that used mana to bump the weapon's weight at the moment of contact, and the sound that followed was enormous. The gnoll whose head took the blade was smashed past any recognizable shape.

But as I'd already seen, they weren't in their right minds.

The Golden Gnolls came on anyway, utterly unmoved by the sight. From the way they went for my arms and legs, they meant to hang on and pin me — or, failing that, to break a limb and drag me off.

I turned with the swing and carved a wide arc.

The blade hummed. Then came the wet crunch of bodies giving way.

High physical stats. My strength had mostly come back, and with mana behind it the greatsword felt light in my hands. I swung the massive thing as if it were an ordinary sword, and the gnolls around me were cut, torn, and sent flying in pieces.

They'd been throwing themselves at me like moths into a flame. Once more than twenty of them had been ripped apart in a handful of breaths, they finally started to hesitate.

"Not coming?"

I let the greatsword hang toward the ground and looked at them.

"Fine. I'll come to you."

I said ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠it lightly and coiled the muscles in my legs. Then I reinforced them with mana, kicked off the earth with explosive force, and drove straight into the pack.

They hadn't closed on me — but they couldn't run, either. They staked their lives and came at me again.

The result didn't change. And besides—

Booms rolled across the field as Na-yeon and Na Seoyun's magic began to fall in, carefully placed so it wouldn't touch me. With the sisters' support at my back I swung the greatsword again, carving through gnolls without mercy — and then something stepped in and stopped the blade.

The impact rang out, steel grinding on wood, the greatsword shuddering in my hands.

Five gnoll centurions. Two of them had managed to get in the path of my sword.

"Oh?"

The remaining three came right after, weapons whipping toward my arms and legs. There wasn't enough space to dodge all of them at once. I yanked the greatsword back and twisted toward one side, catching one strike on the flat and slipping the other, and their attacks went nowhere.

"Not bad. Hey. You."

"Grrrrrr."

"Yeah. Figures."

You couldn't talk to something at a centurion's level. In the first cycle I'd never tried speaking to them head-on like this, so I'd wondered — but it was useless. A little disappointing.

I'd heard that chieftain-class and above seemed to understand speech.... Would a Hero be able to talk?

The Tower's language was unified, after all. If a creature had enough intelligence and standing, you could hold a conversation even with a monster. The ones under the System's management — dungeon beasts, Hunting Ground spawns — were the exception. But you could speak with the orcs that were the Middle Floor's main enemy, with ogres that hadn't gone mad, with beastfolk of other races, with elves. I'd even been able to talk to the mid-boss on the thirty-fifth floor.

People still believed they were speaking Korean. It was only after their levels rose and training lifted their standing that they realized the words leaving their mouths were no longer the mother tongue they'd always used.

"Guess I'll just kill them, then."

If there'd been even a hint they could understand me, I'd have grabbed one and made it play guide. A shame. It looked like I'd have to comb through their territory myself after all.

"Krrngh! Krrngh! Krrngh!"

I stood still for a moment, and the five centurions — who'd somehow already circled into a ring around me — all came at once.

Their weapons were the same as the centurion I'd seen at Monus Village: wooden clubs bound in iron. Sturdier than they looked, but not enough to trouble me. I wasn't about to lose to a handful of gnoll centurions.

I gave ground, slipping their rushes, then swept the greatsword in a threatening arc to break the encirclement and cut down the gnolls blocking my path. Once I was out of the ring and carving through the pack, the five centurions naturally ended up standing in front of me again.

A short burst would be fine. I wrapped Sword Qi around the greatsword and went at all five.

"Krrngh! Krrngh! Krrngh!"

Two of the century-captains split apart again, clearly meaning to catch my sword. Not this time.

The greatsword went through weapon and body together. Both centurions fell in a single cut. I turned with the motion and took the one coming in from the side as well.

I let the last two land.

The club-blows that hammered into me slammed against the barrier Joo Ha-yeon had laid on and never truly reached me. Three century-captains carved apart in a breath, and even the hits that connected did nothing — the remaining two broke into frantic, desperate howls.

The surrounding gnolls threw their lives away and rushed me. I ignored them, drove after the two centurions as they tried to fall back, and cut both of them down in a single pass.

That was when the rest of the horde began to shake with fear. This wasn't the mindless charge from before. Just as I'd seen at Monus Village, the gnolls of the Lower Floors turned into a rabble the moment their commanders were gone.

A blast crashed down among them, timed as if Na-yeon had been waiting for exactly that opening.

"Oppa!"

Na Seoyun came running to support me.