Not even an hour after she rejoined the fight, Alissa’s cleaned clothes and armor were soaked thoroughly in blood once more.

She must have slain at least a hundred if not more demons during that hour – sometimes it was hard to tell when they fell off the wall after she struck them, so she couldn’t get confirmation either way – and defused at least half a dozen situations that threatened to spill out of control. There was barely any chance for her to rest during that hour.

At best, the times when she managed to slow down to a light jog while patrolling her area between situations she needed to defuse served as her “rest”.

By that point all the people who went off-shift to rest with her were already back on the wall, fighting. Some unfortunate ones were already dying, even. Some of the younger soldiers did not adapt well to the lack of rest coupled with an all too short period of rest and failed to do their best, losing their lives as a result. Fortunately, even the demons started showing signs of fatigue after all the fighting as well, which was a boon to the defenders of the fort.

The demons were the most vicious during the past two days, but apparently they decided to make their final push then because their own people were starting to fall victim to fatigue as well. High morale and suicidal courage did little when their own bodies started to fail them, after all. The demons clearly tried to break the defenders while they were still at their best, but that effort had failed and the intensified combat of the past two days started to affect the demons as well.

As such, Sir Inolet had speculated if the fort managed to last another week at most, the demons would either be forced to pull back to rest their troops – which would give the defenders a chance to recuperate and reset the battle condition – or make a true final push where they’d commit everything they dared to commit. It was either one or the other.

Tension was high amongst the fourth tiers – as well as Alissa’s party – as they were aware that if such a final push were to come, it would likely happen soon. They couldn’t afford to slack off in their duty while they were on-shift, in case the attack happened to hit right then. The constant tension frayed on their minds even though the threat had yet to manifest itself.

And then, all of a sudden, it happened as if someone opened the floodgates of a dam.

The demon forces surged almost like a wave and struck the wall with overwhelming force before most of the defenders could react to the sudden ferocity. Those who expected it coming were prepared, however, and they immediately did the best they could to blunt the assault from their respective positions. Alissa also heard the bell atop the tower at the center of the fort being rung, a signal for full mobilization.

As in they were calling everyone still able to hold a weapon and fight, even if they were still resting or recovering, back to the walls. It was only done in emergencies but clearly Sir Inolet had either decided that the demons were committed to their final push. People were running from the interior of the fort towards the walls but Alissa couldn’t pay any attention to it.

All her attention was taken with the unfolding situation at the section of the wall she held, where she rushed from place to place to relieve the defenders of the pressure by either taking down or driving back their assailants. She was rushing towards another problem spot when a shadow suddenly covered her, which triggered her instincts to put up a defense.

None too soon either, as mere moments later a heavy blow landed against her shield and nearly slammed her arm into her face. The force pushed her back, though she managed to keep her ground with some effort and bracing against the impact using her whole body. The culprit behind the blow was a burly, hairy, ape-like Ragah-Fiq demon with white fur, who had struck at her using its weapon, which looked like a spiked mace head on the end of a long, metal pole.

Alissa was just about to engage the demon – a fourth-tier one close to level ten – when she noticed another demon climb to the top of the wall behind it. She recognized the demon as the axe-wielding [Champion’s Retainer: Cleaver of Bones] that she fought once before. The female demon – another Nevilosk – stood beside the burly Ragah-fiq and faced her together.

That forced her to fight more carefully as she was fighting against two. If they saw fit to send two at her location, then likely the others would be facing similarly tough opponents. A glance from the corner of her eyes showed that indeed, nine undead abominations were attacking the wall at different spots, and she noticed a couple others being engaged either by the abominations or by other demons.

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The two demons didn’t give her time to think or formulate a response either, as the Ragah-fiq gave a hoarse bellow and swung its pole-mace towards her once more. As she had experienced the demon’s strength earlier, Alissa didn’t try to block this blow but instead took a short leap to the side to get out of its way.

A deafening noise sounded as the macehead slammed into the walkway and cracked the stone.

Before Alissa could make use of the opening and counterattack, however, she found that the [Champion’s Retainer] had already closed in on her and swung the pair of axes she held in her hands. Alissa caught one axe on her shield and pushed it aside, and blocked the other one with the shaft of her spear.

At least this demon wasn’t stronger than her, so Alissa made full use of that advantage to shove the demon’s weapon aside and viciously stabbed with her spear.

Between the demon slightly altering the attack’s trajectory by striking the shaft of Alissa’s spear with one of her axes and the way the Nevilosk contorted her body to get around the strike, Alissa only managed to cause a cut on the demon’s clothing instead of actually hurting her. That was also all the time she had to strike at the demon as the Ragah-fiq struck at her once more.

Alissa had to bend her body backwards to avoid the blow, which was aimed at her head, and even then one of the mace’s spikes still scraped against her forehead near the hairline and left a bleeding wound. That distraction in turn gave the [Champion’s Retainer] time to regain a proper stance and strike again towards her.

This time, however, Alissa took a different approach as she forcefully sprung forward and intercepted the axes before they would swing properly using her shield. While she used her spear to push the Ragah-fiq’s pole-mace further away, she also pushed hard against the Nevilosk and leveraged her greater strength to force the demon back.

Caught off guard by her sudden tackle, the [Champion’s Retainer] failed to brace herself against Alissa’s push and was forced back until her feet stumbled upon the stone railing along the wall’s edge. Together with the force of the push, that gave Alissa enough force to shove the demon off the top of the wall just before the Ragah-fiq struck at her once more and forced her to evade.

She had much more confidence taking on the Ragah-fiq one against one, as the burly, broad demon was rather ponderous, if very powerful. As it happens, Alissa had many skills that were practically designed to hurt or incapacitate a tough opponent, so she immediately began applying them one after another, coating her spear in layers of iridescent light.

It was a shame that she already made use of [A Small Step] to help out another group just a short while ago and the buff’s duration had already expired, while its cooldown had not finished yet.

Instead, she activated all but one of her combat buffs at the same time. [Perforate the Stars], [Grasp the Soul], [Unravel the Firmament], [Truth is a Bitter Pill to Swallow], and [Lies may Please, but it Doesn’t Heal] were all layered over each other on her weapon, with only [Moment of Truth] held back as Alissa doubted she would need it against this particular opponent.

What she wanted was to take her enemy down or at least incapacitate them as soon as she could, before the [Champion’s Retainer] could get back into the fight. In order to do that, she couldn’t exactly hold back much, especially when her opponent looked like the sort who likely had high durability to boot. She would probably need every help she could get from her skills.

Her opponent also noticed the skills activating and instantly became warier. They – it was hard for Alissa to tell any difference between the genders, if any, when it came to the Ragah-fiq – even adopted a more defensive posture rather than carry on with their assault as they had done so far, Her opponent likely already activated their own skills, though Alissa had no idea what they could do.

The Ragah-fiq parried her first spear strike using the shaft of their weapon, and gave a short swing to force her to step back in turn. Her second attempt at a strike – going low this time – resulted in a similar scenario playing out, so Alissa decided to mix things up a little bit for the third strike. She still had another active skill, one she learned relatively recently, that she had not applied to her spear as it didn’t help too much there, but she had long found another use for it.

Alissa made a third strike much like the previous ones, and her opponent deflected it carefully as before, but this time she dove in close before they could force her back with a swing of their own. Her left arm with the shield was naturally cocked back due to the stance she took to thrust with her spear, and she layered her skill, [Weight of Responsibilities], Around her fist and the tip of her shield.

What the skill did was to cause the force of an impact to “echo” inside whatever she struck, and while it wasn’t of much use with her spear unless she was to strike someone using the shaft, it suited her habit of using her shield offensively. With a twist of her body, one that flowed from her toe to her ankle, along her leg to her waist, through her torso to her shoulder and then through her extended arm, she threw a perfect straight punch aimed around where the solar plexus would be in a human’s body, a bit below the center of the chest of the Ragah-fiq.

The demon failed to stop her blow in time and the tip of her shield dug into their sturdy flesh, followed by her gauntleted fist behind it, and discharged the entire force of the blow into the Ragah-fiq’s body, amplified by her use of the skill.

Even the burly demon had to step back after such a blow and coughed up some blood, likely due to an internal injury. Alissa didn’t miss the chance and shifted her grip along her spear to be able to stab better with it up close and stabbed right into the side of the demon’s throat, causing a large, profusely bleeding wound, then followed it up with another stab to the chest.

Impressively, the blows proved to be less than immediately fatal on the burly demon, and while they dropped their weapon in order to clasp at their pierced throat with one hand, their other hand grabbed the shaft of Alissa’s spear with a vice-like grip and refused to let go.

Meanwhile, the axe-wielding [Champion’s Retainer] had just climbed back up the walls and set upon Alissa with a bellow of rage.