Letting the other group take the lead, John remained in the back and observed their behavior.

They had twenty-nine members, and surprisingly, at least eighteen behaved as if they worked together before.

Could they be the group that earned the world's first kill for the Sector Overlord?

It made sense. After all, Sgt. Harrison jumped to the second place on the Fate-ladder and getting the reward for world first would explain the sudden increase.

"What are we working with?" John overheard the conversation between the sergeant and two of his scouts.

"Undead, Sir."

"The path is empty all the way to the clouds, but from there as far as we could see it is blocked by dozens of undead beasts, ranging from normal E-grade up to normal D-grade," John heard the other one report.

"Good job. Secure a position and wait for us there. Do not engage before everyone is ready."

A couple of Yes sirs later, a five-man squad quickly advanced, leaving the rest of them behind.

"Did you hear?" John asked Ishikawa with a slight nod in their direction.

"I did, and I think it's for the best," she turned so her back was to the rest of them and winked. "After that craziness, we are finally safe. I don't know about you, but I need a rest, so I am going to keep back and let them deal with the rest."

That's not a bad idea to make it seem like we are tapped out.

"Yeah, I barely slept last night, so any rest sounds great." He stretched out to emphasize the point and then looked at the Adolescent Shimmerfang that was following him.

"What about you, not-so-little guy?"

Seeing the attention, it tilted its head as if confused and slightly increased its pace until it halved the six-meter distance between them. Its crystalline eyes kept shifting from side to side, carefully observing everything around it.

John noticed some people either shy away or throw uncomfortable or downright hateful glances at it, but no one was stupid enough to push the issue further.

I've made my stance very clear, he nodded to himself, thinking about his conversation with the others at the foot of the mountain. Were anyone to attack the Shimmerfang unprovoked, John would protect it with everything he could.

"Tell me about Japan, how is it holding up?"

Until now, they were always either fighting, planning for a fight, or practicing with Fate, so this was actually the first time they were able to stay back and let the others deal with the shit ahead.

"The first day was rough," she said with a small hitch in her voice. "After that, we got together and pushed back. I am not sure how much you know about Japanese culture, but there were some complications we had to overcome first."

"Not much, I was never an explore-the-world kind of guy," John admitted.

"You see, I served as a bodyguard to a son of the patriarch of a very wealthy family, and…"

Getting lost in the conversation, the time quickly flew by and they realized they were nearing the peak.

"Do we help?" Ishikawa asked, watching the groups tackle a trio of D-grade monsters blocking the path to the flat plateau on the peak.

"Sure," John smiled and pointed at the feline creature on the left, covered in ugly sores on its rotting fur.

[Bloated Plaguebearer {D}]

"That one?"

"Yes. Cut its limbs first, then finish it off," Ishikawa suggested and they got to work.

"Careful! Don't let it touch you!" Yelled a bulky guy with a tower shield, desperately trying to hold it at bay.

"Mhm," John agreed, neatly moving between the two close-range combatants who were pressing on its flank and he stabbed his javelin with all his considerable might into the monster's side.

The horse-sized monster tried to retaliate, but a well-placed lightning bolt and a sharp spike of glass made it momentarily twitch, giving John the fraction of a second needed to safely pull back.

Using its lapse of attention, one of the guys on its other side followed up with an empowered blow to its lower back, and the moment it switched attention to him, Ishikawa rushed in and unleashed her ability into its foreleg.

Hitting it perfectly above the knee joint from a downward angle, the thin wave cut through the patchy hide and rotted ligaments, severing the leg and harmlessly passing into the ground.

Playing it safe, everyone backed away, preventing it from striking back. The monster feebly snapped its jaws in Ishikawa's direction, but having only three legs to support its weight severely limited its range of movement.

"Careful! No stupid mistakes now" yelled out the shield guy. "My main ability is ready in fifteen seconds and after that, we finish it off."

The creature tried to attack, but everyone kept their distance and let a few ranged hits pass between them. A couple of seconds later, the tank gave the sign to attack. He materialized a string of black runes and sent them toward the beast with a flick of his mace.

"Attack while it's weak!

The rest used the opening to step in and use their—mostly augmented—weapons to shred its ugly hide into ribbons and break its bones like kindling. The effect lasted only four seconds, but the damage was done and moments later they finished the crippled monster off.

Damn, that must have been some kind of weakening debuff. Very useful, especially in a larger group.

"Good job everyone," congratulated the shield guy and left to join the second half of Sgt. Harrison's group.

Leaving the Shimmerfang to its meals, John and Ishikawa followed after them, reaching the summit.

"Woah, is that…" John spoke out in awe, staring at the bus-sized skeleton curled around the rocky peak. The remains bore too much resemblance to the Celestial Shimmerfang to be called a coincidence, but the most surprising thing was the three-meter-long wooden spear going through one of its eye sockets and into the back of its massive skull.

"Is it dead?"

"I don't think so…"

"But what if…"

The people began discussing among themselves, but a sudden movement brought everyone into focus.

From crevices all around the peak began gushing a nasty liquid, pouring all over the ivory bones and coloring them black in the process.

[Rotblood Nightmare {D★}]

Oh shit!

The bones sucked the blood like a sponge, and before anyone could come up with any strategy, the spear fell out of its skull and the whole skeleton shifted.

[Reanimated Monarch of the Sunlit plane {D★}]

Please, be vulnerable, John hoped as he focused on its weak points.

Yes! Extremely weak to the blessed affinity.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

"You look surprisingly calm," John heard Ishikawa's steady voice from his side. "Almost as if you are glad to see it."

"Just glad that it's gonna be finally over."

"What do you suggest we do? I am not going to throw my life away against an opponent I have no chance to beat."

"Yeah," John winced. "The only advice I have is, do not be afraid to use the escape sigil. This is going to devolve into a battle of attrition so playing it safe and stalling for time is our best bet."

The monster seemed content staying near the peak, giving them time to prepare, and seeing Sgt. Harrison, two other members of his group, Jabari, and the other Harrison together, that was most likely what they were doing.

It took them a couple of minutes until they headed to their groups and started issuing orders. Ok, it only looked like issuing orders for the sergeant's group and it looked like a discussion among the Jabari's instead.

"It seems like we can do whatever…" John mumbled, before noticing one of the soldiers heading their way.

"Unless you have useful debuffs or long-range abilities that are good against the skeletal undead, you will stay away and assist our medical team," he ordered before pointing out three people who were clearing up a spot roughly a hundred meters away from the monster. "We mean no offense, but because we don't know what you are capable of, we prefer to rely on our fighters to hold the front line."

Nodding, John answered for both of them and they headed to the designated spot.

The reorganization took another couple of minutes and after that, there were four groups, ready to go. The first, led by the guy with the powerful weakening debuff, was made up of those who needed to fight up close, and the second, led by Sgt. Harrison was filled with the long-range fighters, the third, was best described as supporting staff, and lastly the fourth—including John and Ishikawa—were those unwilling or deemed not useful and became assistants to the trio of healers.

For John, this was the perfect place to be, but looking at an annoyed expression on Ishikawa's face, he spoke up to console her.

"Trust me, unless you have high Vitality and extra resistance against that black substance, you do not want to be in the front line."

"Mhm," she grunted but seemed calmer and more intrigued than before.

The battle began with a devastating opening salvo, painting the peak with a rainbow of colors as projectiles of all shapes and sizes peppered the right side of the massive creature before them. Its ribcage took the brunt of the damage, sending small chips of bone outward like shrapnel and surprisingly, three extremely powerful projectiles that impacted the fourth rib made the foot-wide bone break in two places and fall to the ground like a chopped tree.

John also joined in to throw his javelin, but he did not expect to make any difference. He planned to use the initial chaos to hide his next action, throwing his stiletto and aiming for the area behind its head. Seeing it clang off the monstrous skull, he willed for it to bounce off and perfectly fall into the small opening where the skull met its first vertebrae, forcefully jamming itself in and getting stuck.

Perfect!

The monster jumped forward, covering the first ten meters in a single hop, and then quickly advanced toward the closest cluster of people before it—the front- line fighters.

One of them rushed forward, holding his black tower shield before him and meeting the massive monster ten meters away from the rest of his group. At first, it seemed like a foolish action of a madman, but a fraction of a second before the monsters trampled over him, his shield flashed brown and tripled in size, turning itself into a dark-steel wall.

The monster ran into it head-first, making a deep reverberating sound like a gong, and lost all of its momentum. This was followed by two abilities from the support group, one summoning a silver chain around its front legs and the other painting a pale-blue rune on its skull.

"Stay vigilant, we don't know what it's capable of!"

The wall shrunk into its previous form, making the man tap it with his left hand and sprint away as his shield vanished into his bag.

The monster tried to tear the chain off and begin pursuit, but it held firm and severely impacted its movement. Unfortunately, the thing must have grown annoyed by the interference and formed a glob of black liquid in its mouth and spat it out.

The thing flew in an arc and quickly approached the feeling man's position.

Hearing the urgent cries of warnings, he managed to turn and catch the glob on his resummoned shield, but as the—over four liters in volume—projectile hit, it splattered all around, including the front of his feet.

Everywhere the black substance fell, grass shriveled up and died, and even the poor guy only made a few more steps in the direction of his group before he stumbled and fell on his face.

"Quick, get him to the medics!" Yelled their leader, directing a pair from John's group who rushed forward to assist.

"What happened to him?"

"Don't lose focus! It is about to break free!"

True to his word, as John glanced back the creature was using its skeletal jaw to chew through the chains binding its forelegs together. Despite the silvery material resisting the bites, it was losing its lustrous sheen and turning dull-grey on the spots where the teeth touched the links.

"Arghh! Help me, please!" Sobbed the poor guy whose legs were turning black and rotting away before his eyes.

One of the healers was able to slow down the progress, but soon it was deemed too severe and the wounded man was forced to use his life-saving sigil.

Something was off about the trajectory of the spit, John thought with a frown. At first, his instincts told him that it would fall more to the left and also fly short, but instead, it smashed squarely into the fleeing defender.

"Ishikawa, did you notice anything odd about that spit's movement?"

"Now that you mention it, yes. I had believed it to be due to the influence of the wind, but it was far too precise to be a coincidence. Do you think it can guide its projectiles mid-air?"

"It might," John agreed.

A shout tore him out from his thoughts and he watched as a pair of survivors stepped out from the ranged attackers and timed their water-based abilities to create a large volume of water around the creature's head. Their actions were quickly followed by two powerful freezing abilities, turning the liquid to ice and momentarily freezing its skull to the nearly-severed chain between its legs.

"Now!" Commanded their leader, and all twelve of the front-line fighters surged forward, using its weakness to deliver their most powerful blows.

Shaking in desperation, the creature used its back legs to kick at the surrounding attackers. Most were able to evade its blind rage, but a man who seemed to favor strength over dexterity and wearing a massive plate mail armor was too slow to dodge and caught a glancing blow to his side. The problem was, a leg bone thicker than some of the trees smashing into his ribs was sure to leave a mark.

John watched the helpless body fly through the air like a cannonball, and crash into the group of long-range combatants.

Ouch.

Being one of the closest there, he sprinted forward, reaching the still form lying in the heap on the rocky ground. Next to him was a younger woman sporting a broken arm and an older man of Asian descent with a broken leg.

It seemed like the armor took the brunt of the impact, denting two inches in and breaking a couple of ribs, but saving the man's life in the process. Not having any medical training, John did the best he could think of and used his considerable strength to hoist the bulky man over his shoulder and carry him to the cleared-up place with the healers.

"He has sustained a high-speed impact injury and probably has internal bleeding." Diagnosed a shorter woman with a no-nonsense attitude. "I will stabilize his condition, but we need to get him out of that damned armor to make sure there are no other hidden injuries."

Seeing two of the assistants fumbling with the straps, she snapped out, "Cut through them. I don't care about his armor when there are lives on the line!"

Nodding, Ishikawa pulled out her thin blade and sliced through the straps, removing the front plates and revealing his battered chest.

"Good, leave the rest to us," advised a pudgy man with a prominent bald spot on the top of his head.

Being excused, John turned his attention back to the ongoing battle. The situation seemed stable and he noticed the first golden lines forming on the back of its skull.

Good, they just need to hold on for a while longer.

There were few noticeable injuries spread across its colossal form, but so far none were significant enough to suggest that they may kill it before his affinity overwhelms the undeath energies coursing through it.

Most of their success was due to impeccable work from the support team, whose members were perfectly combining their abilities to keep the monster suppressed, turning a devastating clash into a struggle where only those unlucky or too bold got struck or infected by its toxic substance.

Two minutes later, John was on his way to grab another 'flier' who landed close to the supporting group when he noticed another glob forming between its jaws. The front-liners immediately spread to minimize the impact, but John felt something off the moment it spat the nasty stuff out.

The arc seemed like it would splatter an agile woman standing between it and the cluster of the supporting staff, but John felt like they were wrong. Trusting his gut, he decided to do something either very brave or very dumb, and even he didn't know which it was.

Pushing his E-grade body to its limit, he sprinted before them while yelling out a warning.

As he expected, the glob didn't fall where it was supposed to and instead sped up into an unnatural trajectory heading directly into their midst.

If we lose the majority of the only people who can keep it at bay, we might as well give up.

Pushing off his feet, he jumped almost two meters into the air, pulled out his shield, and covered his face and most of his chest behind it.

The basketball-sized glob hit square in the middle of it, tossing him back and sending splatters in every direction. He was lucky the force of the impact was large enough to push his airborne body backward and prevent the majority of the vile liquid from flowing down on his legs, but despite that, his bottom half was covered in more than a dozen of black droplets that quickly soaked through his clothes and began rotting his flesh.

Ah, crap.

A glance behind him proved that his gambit was a success, because out of the nine people, only one got a small droplet on his arm, and was already sprinting to the medics before it caused life-threatening injury.

His state was much worse though, and the itching was beginning to morph into a dull ache. He was no longer able to move his legs, but he trusted his recovery to pull him through.

Well, there goes another pair of pants, was his last thought as he was grabbed by a pair of medical assistants and carried away.