Swind creased his scaly brow as he looked at the horde of monsters and Darkness creatures that were approaching him and the rest of the world tree's army.

Of what he had heard from the people around him, the four generals of Ythmagobla had already arrived. Swind would be lying if he said that he wasn't worried about Rachel's safety. Of course, he cared about all of the Wanderers, but Rachel held a special place in his cold heart.

Swind couldn't describe it. Perhaps it was love, perhaps it was something else. Regardless, he sincerely wished that she would be safe and return alive. Swind couldn't help smile very softly at his own hypocrisy.

Only a few minutes had passed since he was talking to Fep about how to ignore the threat of death since it was ever present, but here he was fearing that very thing. Maybe it was alright to be a hypocrite though. He wasn't worried about his own death. Swind's only worry was about the life of the young girl whose heart she had gifted to him.

"You're smiling? You really are incredibly brave," Fep pointed out. Swind's seemingly relaxed attitude has calmed the changling's nerves a bit.

Swind glanced at Fep. "I'm not brave, Mr Fep. I'm just a fool."

"Depending on the perspective, the two are the very same thing," Fep pointed out. "By the way, Swind, who do you think I should change into for this fight?"

Swind frowned. "Mr Ratolas-ss would be useful for the normal monsters-ss, but Mr Immortus-ss is-ss my ss-suggestion for the Darkness-ss creatures-ss."

"So the King and Lone, huh?" Fep held his chin thoughtfully. "Okay, I'll do that. Even if I can only copy a fraction of their powers, I guess it's better than nothing, huh?"

Swind looked at his blue-skinned friend and replied, "Of course. I am truly envious-ss of your people, Mr Fep. Lemurians-ss have no ss-special racial traits-ss except for perhaps-ss our tails-ss."

"Every species has something special about it, Swind." Fep wasn't a fan of how little Swind valued himself. No one was, but at the same time, that humility was one of the Lemurian's many attractive features. "Even the humans. They're the only sapient race that can breed as much as they do."

"I'm not ss-so ss-sure." Swind had read the records of his clan. Not a single Lemurian in history was ever special in any way shape or form.

Sal'ta, the army's grand general, suddenly raised her voice as well as her bow. "All troops, prepare for battle!" She looked incredibly majestic riding atop of the Three-eyed White Bear that was her familiar and fighting companion.

The bear slowly paced back and forth on the front lines as she addressed everyone present. "The hordes of Ythmagobla shall be upon us in a few moments! I have only one thing to say: Kill as many of these despicable vermin as you can! Many of you will die today! Even I might fall, but know that I will not be bested until I have taken at least a thousand of these foul beasts with me! Be proud to fight for the world tree! Be proud to die for the world tree! And lastly, be proud to live for the world tree!"

Roars and screams filled the air as Sal'ta turned her bear around and faced the approaching army of monsters and Darkness spawn. "Charge!"

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Breena darted from shadow to shadow. She focused most of her efforts on the monsters since the spawns of Darkness required a lot more effort to kill.

A dagger found itself in the throat of a lumbering Ogre Bruiser, while two needles were sent flying across the battlefield into the ear and eye of an Orc Lord and a Lesser Earth Drake respectively. The three mightly beasts toppled over grandly.

Breena nodded her head. 'Effective poison. It shouldn't be too long until I get the Alchemy skill, or maybe the Poison Mastery one... With this, I can be even more useful to Master.'

Breena hadn't just been sharpening her Dagger Mastery and Throwing Mastery skills after Lone and Sophie's harsh training. She had realised just how underpowered she was. Even with her supposed genius and Darkness awakening, Breena felt like it wasn't enough.

Letty had noticed this and suggested that she go to The Adventurer's Guild branch on the tree to see if they had anything that could help her. They apparently offered several training courses in different things ranging from crafting and living skills, all the way to fighting and alchemy.

It was common for Elves to coat their arrows in poison since it could be used to paralyse enemies, or in some rare cases, kill faster. Breena had only been training in this art for a single day, so the poison she was currently using was a powerful neurotoxin invented and created by her alchemy teacher, Libso, who was a Fairy, of all things.

Breena was like the Grim Reaper of the battlefield. Wherever she went, monsters fell in droves. The girl didn't have an unlimited supply of poison, so she was exclusively using it on the higher ranked monsters.

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Meanwhile, on the other side of the plains, the Demon Princess was valiantly fighting. In one hand, she held a greatsword made of alterion that was enchanted a few times over, while in the other, she was wielding her race's speciality, dark-flame magic.

She was currently in no danger, so she saw no need to draw the legendary sword strapped to her back. Ever since Lone had told her that she was relying too much on the weapon, she had made a pact with herself that she would never wield it again unless the situation absolutely requiring her to.

As she fought tooth and nail against the Darkness monsters with the council elders and yellow teams, the Demon Princess couldn't help but think of home. '... Would father be proud of me? I want to return to his side and show him how much I've grown. I'm not a snobby brat anymore! I'm a mighty warrior of the Red-Skinned Demon Tribe!'

A burst of energy surrounded the young teen. Power flowed through her veins. The Demon Princess had finally broken her bottleneck and had become an S-ranker!

A tornado of dark-flames enveloped the girl and she directed it and herself into the heart of the Darkness monsters. The mindless creatures flung themselves onto her and her fiery magic, but there was no resistance like there usually was. All of them were burnt to a crisp instantly.

Of course, the Demon Princess couldn't kill everything by herself and her mana points were rapidly draining as she performed this new racial skill of hers, but she was happy. Even if she was only denting the forces of Darkness, that dent was bright and glorious. The young princess was certain that if he could see her now, her father would be incredibly proud.

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Swind, while powerful with his Mythic-rated sword, Redemption, and his mechanical limbs, was still only an F-ranker. His stamina was very limited, so he focused his efforts on directing his squadron and only acting personally if someone near him was in critical danger.

Fep was rampaging about as Ele'hunda while he was protecting Eko with all of his might. The Monk in question was busy charging a double Holy Palm.

"It's ready!" Eko shouted.

Fep nodded and grabbed Eko before he flung him into the air. "Holy Palm!" Two beams of palm-shaped holy energy covered a space of thirty-feet. These massive hands crushed the monsters below with ease and burrowed themselves into the earth, creating two massive holes which the unintelligent beasts that hadn't been hit by the skill fell into as they tried to reach the other side.

Fep quickly transformed into Lone and jumped across the holes to catch Eko and bring him back behind friendly lines. During their return, Fep made full use of his new tails to skewer several more of the monsters that had been smart enough to not simply run straight into the crevices created by Eko.

Once they were back, Eko began sweating heavily. "I can barely move."

"Ul'ka," Swind said as he looked at one of the Wood Elves under his command. "Help Eko to the healing unit. ss-See if you can get Her Highness-ss to restore his-ss ss-strength. He is-ss desperately needed here."

Ul'ka nodded his head and grabbed one of Eko's arms before he slung it over his neck. He hobbled off with the exhausted monk, leaving the battlefield.

Fep quickly reassumed Ele'hunda's form and left for battle once more.

Swind frowned. He could feel something looking at him. He couldn't quite explain where this feeling was coming from, but it was certainly there. Swind didn't know how he knew this. Maybe he was only sensing this now because of the adrenaline pumping through his cold veins.

As if on instinct, Swind drew Redemption and swung it down to his left. A shady figure clad entirely in black appeared out of nowhere and backflipped several times to safety. From what Swind could see, he had somehow blocked a sneak attack from this person. If his eyes weren't deceiving him, this mysterious attacker was a Grey Elf.

Swind was only able to tell this from their posture, the backflips they had performed, and the fact that they were invisible until he successfully blocked their attack. These were all definitive traits of the elusive and thieving race of elves that was the Grey Elves.

it wasn't like these things were unique to Grey Elves, but Swind had seen one of their kind before. The very same one that had stolen all of Lone's gold. Swind couldn't tell if this Elf was that man or not, but their mannerisms were strikingly similar thus far.

The man clad in black didn't give Swind any more time to think. He merged with the wind and disappeared.

Swind instinctively moved his body. He wasn't fast enough to raise his sword this time, but he was able to block the incoming sword strike with his mechanical arm. The longsword cut through the metal and only stopped once it had gotten a third of the way through. it would seem that the Fairy-forging had prevented the man from cutting the limb clean off.

Jumping back once more, the man's eyes frowned. "Not a fluke?"

A third attack, fourth attack, fifth, sixth, seventh. It was on the eighth stealth attack that something inside of Swind changed. Despite his now broken and cut up body, his eyes were frighteningly vivid.

At this point, both his tail and mechanical arm were gone. All that was left were metal scapes and copper-plated wires hanging from his fleshy stumps. Swind severed his mental connection to the broken tools, letting them fall to the ground. He focused his mind and held Redemption firmly in his one remaining hand.

A loud slashing sound filled the air. Swind had attacked first! Blood gushed out of thin air. The Grey Elf suddenly appeared and he was clutching his stomach as the red sticky liquid flowed from it like a river. "You... How?"

Now that the man was injured and out in the open, the many B-rankers and A-rankers that had been waiting for an opportunity to intervene, launched everything they had at this mysterious intruder.

Swind could see the graveness in the man's eyes from within the cracks of his facial wrappings. With lightning fast speed, the Grey Elf pulled an orb out from within his robes and shattered it. His body vanished in a swirl of mana. 

"A teleportation orb?" Swind muttered.

He was quickly ushered to the healing unit to patch up his numerous injuries, but Swind didn't pay any attention to that. All he saw was a single system message. It was a notification that gave the Lemurian a feeling that perhaps he wasn't so useless after all.

Congratulations! The host has awakened their ancestral power at the first stage! The host has developed the racial skill: Lemurian's Sixth Sense.

For the first time since he was born, Swind burst out with uproarious laughter while several healers used nature magic on his body. They were startled by his outburst, but they just assumed that he was delirious after losing so much blood. 'Mr Fep was right... I am special...'