Chapter 175: Equal Rank, Unequal Strength

"Cavalry, prepare to attack from the right!" one of the human unit commanders shouted to the soldiers.

Darius looked at the dust rising behind the low hill, then at the Rassasian lines beginning to curl around the human center.

"Open a path for them!" he ordered. "Third line, advance! Second line, fall back behind the shields and catch your breath!"

The soldiers moved immediately.

The human formation parted for a moment, and the beast-blooded horses thundered through the opening, their riders’ lances lowered toward the Rassasian army as they plowed through the soldiers in their path like sheep, meeting scarcely any resistance.

The cavalry force crashed into the exposed flank.

The lances pierced armor and flesh, lifting some of the pure-blooded Rassasians clear off the ground through sheer brute force, while the hooves crushed everyone who fell beneath them.

The Twilight Empire’s commanders once again drove the half-Rassasians into the horses’ path.

Some threw their bodies beneath the hooves, while others seized the lances even after they had pierced their chests, attempting to drag the riders from their horses as though they had been born for this purpose and knew it.

This time, however, the cavalry did not charge as deeply as before.

They veered away after the initial impact and returned through the passage Darius had opened earlier, leaving the Rassasian flank in disarray instead of allowing themselves to be surrounded.

This was the proper tactic when confronting a numerically superior enemy.

Strike, then withdraw.

"Advance!" Darius shouted, and the commanders repeated the order along the human lines so the entire army could hear it.

The human spears and shields moved as one, driving the spearheads through flesh and bone.

The Twilight Empire’s army retreated several steps.

The humans were fewer in number, but their formations remained far more cohesive, while the losses sustained by the half-Rassasians were finally beginning to affect the pure-blooded Rassasians’ ability to fill the gaps.

...

Karius remained motionless atop the rise.

He never stopped watching Frank and Caesar, but most of his attention remained fixed upon the opposing Rassasian company commander.

The man watched him in precisely the same way.

Their presence atop the two rises imposed an unwritten limit upon the battle.

Two faction commanders could face two faction commanders.

Malrik and the other unit commanders could confront the Twilight Empire’s Eighth-Rank fighters, while Darius led the rest of the Death Squad and the soldiers below.

However, if either company commander descended, the other would follow.

At that point, the entire nature of the battle would change, transforming it into a large-scale massacre.

"You’re still waiting, huh?" Karius said quietly.

The distant man could not hear him, yet he continued staring at Karius with a glimmer of anger in his eyes and...

Despair?

...

On the battlefield, Frank spread both arms wide.

His green aura erupted before splitting into four manifested arms that surrounded him from different directions.

’He can still summon four aura manifestations at once?!’ The Rassasian commander wielding the two crescent-shaped swords was shocked, though it barely showed on his face.

Manifesting four aura constructs at once while simultaneously using spatial rifts was the limit for most Seventh-Rank fighters, and only a rare few could summon another four after the first set had been exhausted. That was what surprised the Rassasian, as it meant Frank was no ordinary Seventh-Rank faction commander.

Frank advanced toward him with a murderous expression.

The Rassasian opened two rifts simultaneously and sent his crescent blades through them.

The first emerged above Frank’s head, while the second appeared beside his leg.

Two aura arms moved to block the blades as the remaining two shot toward the Rassasian.

The man opened a third rift and attempted to retreat through it.

But Frank was faster.

His real fist vanished into a thin green fissure that appeared before it, then emerged from another rift directly in front of his opponent’s face.

The fist slammed into his jaw.

The Rassasian’s head snapped violently to the side, and his body was hurled backward before tumbling across the ground.

He tried to rise, but one of the green arms seized him by the leg and lifted him into the air.

Frank slammed him into the ground once, then a second time, then a third.

The armor across the Rassasian’s back shattered, and he violently coughed up purple blood.

Both of them were Seventh-Rank fighters.

But equal rank did not mean equal strength.

The Rassasian released an enraged scream and opened a rift around his leg to sever the aura arm’s connection to it, then staggered free and raised both swords before his body, though with visibly less energy than before.

Frank gave him no opportunity to catch his breath.

All four green arms surged toward him again.

On the other side, the female Rassasian faction commander was attempting to put distance between herself and Caesar again.

Her ice spears moved around him constantly, one targeting his back and another his legs, while she used short-lived rifts to alter their trajectories after launching them.

Caesar opened a rift in front of one of the spears.

The ice spear entered it, then emerged from another fissure flying in an entirely different direction—straight back toward its creator.

Her eyes widened, and she shattered it with her real spear an instant before it struck her.

Caesar seized the opportunity and closed the distance, appearing directly before her.

His sword struck her spear once, then a second time, and on the third strike, the tip of his blade vanished into a small rift and reappeared behind her defense.

The sword tore through the side of her armor and left a long wound across her waist, from which purple blood poured freely.

She retreated while clutching the wound.

"You human bastard..."

"You were far more talkative when you were calling out to my commander up there," Caesar replied, pointing toward the hill behind him. "But it turns out you’re all smoke and no real fire."

The remaining ice spears rose around her in fury, but she did not aim them at him.

Instead, she turned them toward the human soldiers behind him.

Caesar frowned in anger as he understood her intention, but the distance between them would not allow him to stop them all with his sword.

The spears shot forward.

He opened two rifts in quick succession before two of them and altered their trajectories, causing them to collide and shatter.

The third spear continued toward the human line.

"Watch out!" Caesar shouted toward the distant human ranks.

Darius saw it flying toward them, but he could neither open a rift to intercept it nor project his aura away from his sword.

He had no choice but to intercept it himself.

Planting one foot firmly, he vaulted off one of the raised shields held by his fellow humans and lifted his sword with both hands.

He swung toward the ice spear hurtling toward the lines.

"Haaaa!" Darius roared as he poured all the strength he could muster into both arms.

The aura-coated blade collided with the ice spear.

This clash, however, was not evenly matched like one between two Eighth-Rank fighters, where the opposing attacks would cancel each other out.

Instead, frost exploded across Darius’s face, the armor covering his arms cracked, and he fell to one knee beneath the devastating force of the impact while spitting blood.

He had stopped the spear... barely.

Fragments of ice rained around him and cut into his face and shoulders, but he rose before the nearest Rassasian could exploit the moment.

His sword swept upward from below and tore through the attacker from his abdomen to his chest.

At the center, Malrik caught sight of what had happened in the distance. His manifested axe shattered the final spear formed from his opponent’s aura, then his real axe struck the Rassasian’s chest, cleaving him lengthwise and sending him hurtling through several soldiers behind him, the momentum of his corpse carrying them along with him.

Malrik then ran toward Darius.