"Greetings newbies. I am Kay and I will be in charge of the newbie unit for this battle."

Uncle Kay greeted the assembled newbies with a professional nod.

Everyone was staring at him in shock.

It's not every day that the commander of the Deathwalkers, a Knight of the Round, would be seen as a captain of the newbie unit.

I bet everyone would wonder why someone as powerful as Sir Kay would helm a unit with members whose lifespan in battle often lasted mere minutes.

I heard that Kay participates in the battle against daemons daily.

However, his responsibilities overseeing the Shield limited his participation to one battle per day.

When he took to the field, he commanded all units, directing roles and advising Unit Captains.

His strategic brilliance made him a force to be reckoned with.

It is said that when Kay enters the battlefield, an easy victory with minimum casualties is promised.

I looked at him and our eyes locked for a second. A shudder passed through my body and I understood why he was here.

To observe me.

A week had passed since I awakened my stigma, and my sixth battle occurred three days ago.

It went better than the previous ones since I used my stigma, Talent Echo.

Sure. Getting a crippling headache and being unable to use my skills afterward sucked but it was worth it.

Through experiments with Felix and Damien, I determined that upon deactivating Talent Echo, I would be unable to use my skills for the same duration I used the skills I copied.

For instance, five minutes of using the copied sword skills of Damien meant I'd be without my own skills for five minutes upon deactivation of my stigma.

The fact that I am a Linker probably saved my life since the condition doesn't affect my strand and codes.

So here's how I prepared.

I purchased different types of schattium weapons using Kay's allowance and my Deathwalker salary.

I bought swords, spears, bows, axes, and other weapons I was familiar with in my past life, ready to copy the skills of talented Deathwalkers.

I also acquired a curious gadget called Omni Contacts. They are contact lenses that are connected to my bracelet connected to Minerva.

It is mainly used to analyze and display information.

Sure, the Deathwalker bracelet can also give information but one would have to speak directly to it, and let it scan the object of interest.

If you are on a hunt it will not be a problem. But on the battlefield fighting daemons? That is quite hard.

With the Omni contacts, I could just look at the daemon or ardimal I face.

The contacts would analyze the ardor signature and appearance, communicate with Minerva through my bracelet and necessary info like the rank would be displayed in my vision.

The info will be displayed so that my sight will not be hindered at all.

Cool right?

All hail the future!

All hail technology!

Anyway.

This is my seventh and final battle as a newbie. After this, I will have a better room and a roommate.

I will also have full access to the workshop on the 30th floor alongside the choice to join a Unit or go solo.

Those are some major changes if I survive this battle and I fully intend to.

The ringing of bells that have become quite familiar to me echoed across the valley, heralding the arrival of the daemons and another battle in hell.

I crossed my daggers in front of me and entered my triquetra state.

Since becoming a beginner D rank a few days ago, I can maintain this state for fifteen minutes before collapsing.

I glanced at Kay's back as he gazed at the silent march of the emerging daemons atop his mechanima which looked like a magnificent steed with navy blue metal plates that matched his suit.

Yeah. He is going to battle in a suit. Go figure.

I'll show you how far this weak kid has grown, dear uncle.

*******

Things are going rather smoothly so far.

I can go toe to toe against D-ranked daemons and deal significant damage to them while also avoiding major injuries to my body.

Thanks to the omni contacts, I adeptly dodged higher-ranked foes before they even spotted me.

I'd nudge seasoned Deathwalkers in the right direction before retreating to a safer distance.

The sounds and sights of the battlefield have become familiar to me and I've become disturbingly unfazed by them.

Like, a daemon just chopped off the limbs of a young lady in her early twenties, picked her limbless and screaming self, and twisted off her head like a plastic bottle cap in less than five seconds.

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

I winced at the sight. It was horrifying yet oddly intriguing, a morbid analogy between a human body and a plastic bottle.

Who knew you could twist a human head in that way?

Observing skilled Deathwalkers, I mirrored their techniques to battle the daemons, cautiously adhering to Talent Echo's condition.

Due to the conditions of my stigma, I decided to use the copied skills for a minute before deactivating my stigma.

That way, I will be unable to use my skills for only a minute.

That is exactly what I am doing right now as I face an 8-foot-tall D-ranked daemon.

Sparks flew and blood swirled around the schattium spear as I deflected blow after blow from the huge mace held by the daemon.

With my transcendence state, I could track each ferocious attack and withstand them with my ardor-enhanced body.

I gritted my teeth as I realized a minute was about to end. If I continue to use these spear arts, I will be skillless for longer.

Suddenly, the daemon shifted its body and swung the mace at my side. I quickly blocked the attack with the spear.

This attack was way heavier than the previous ones but I endured the pain.

I allowed the attack to launch me into the air.

I twisted my body midair, spun the spear in my hand, and aimed at the daemon before it could do anything else.

Blood and ardor swirled rapidly around the spear and I launched it at the sucker.

A shockwave blew away the swirling darkness billowing from the daemon as the spear obliterated the arm holding the mace in an explosion of blood and ardor.

The daemon staggered back as its weapon dissipated into darkness.

Without wasting any more time I deactivated Talent Echo.

Immediately all knowledge related to my skills vanished from my mind.

Even my body cannot use them with muscle memory. One could say I am very vulnerable right now.

Well. If I was a Spiker.

As soon as my feet touched the ground I extended my arm toward the daemon and activated another of the codes Eravon gave me.

{Haema: Blood Bolt}

Blood-red runes appeared and spun around my arm. My blood swirled rapidly and formed a meter-long cylindrical projectile and shot toward the daemon's heart.

As soon as the bolt impaled the swirling chest of the daemon, it blew up in an explosion of darkness and crimson that shook the ground and splattered blood and black ooze everywhere.

The wailing crimson smoke of the wraith came right at me but I quickly jumped a good distance away by using blood acceleration to boost my body.

Through heavy breathing, I hunched over and tried to catch my breath.

Blood Bolt is the strongest code I currently have and it requires an absurd amount of ardor control and quickly saps up my stamina.

At my current strength, I can only summon one bolt to do the job but it is enough against a D-ranked daemon.

A minute has passed and I can now use my skills. I took out my daggers and got ready for the remainder of the battle.

So far so good. This battle is not that bad.

I shouldn't have said that.

A sudden ominous chill seized me and a truly malevolent presence loomed to my right.

By pure instinct, I jumped away from my spot just as a devastating strike obliterated the ground I was just standing on.

The destruction was so powerful that it blew me away. I crashed through a mound of bloody snow and into a pile of dead bodies.

My hands slipped on the blood as I picked myself up from the dismembered and mutilated corpses of Deathwalkeers.

Seriously? Who piles up bodies during a battle?

I shook out of my daze and looked at what crashed where I stood.

The dust and snow cleared and what I saw turned my blood to ice.

It was unlike any daemon I had seen so far.

It was small for a daemon, about six feet tall but I know instinctively that this is different.

It resembled a condensed, humanoid form, its solid, root-like body starkly different from the usual billowing darkness.

No. To be more accurate. It is as if the billowing darkness had condensed into a solid form.

As if the darkness of the daemons solidified into black roots that twisted and contorted into the shape of a human.

As I watched, the creature straightened its hunched back and turned its smooth head at me.

Like the daemons I fought, it had no eyes, no nose, no mouth, no ears. Just a blank surface of darkness swirling underneath.

What happened next... I couldn't even fathom.

One second, the Deathwalkers and daemons around the creature were fighting viciously.

The next second, the mutilated and crushed corpses of those very Deathwalkers lay in an extending sea of their blood, and multiple explosions of darkness closely followed that showed the violent deaths of the daemons.

In my transcendent state, I only saw a blur of sharp tentacles erupting out of its body, killing both Deathwalkers and daemons.

A sick feeling of dread knotted my stomach.

Utter disbelief consumed me.

In just a second, this thing killed hundreds of Deathwalkers.

There was no warning, no struggle, not even a scream.

Just... death.

My heart hammered against my ribs and my breathing quickened as a primal fear crept into my very being as I gazed on the terrifying abomination standing some distance from me.

The daemon kept its eyeless gaze on me, its exuding malevolence paralyzing me in my spot.

The faint smell of urine wafted into my nose and a warm, wet feeling spread in my pants.

I glanced down to see a rather big wet spot form around my crotch.

I raised my eyes to see the creature standing before me.

Its smooth head tilted down, its blank visage of darkness looking down on my trembling figure.

All sound seemed to fade away, leaving only the rapid beating of my heart.

My vision narrowed, locked on the faceless canvas of the daemon as I raised my head and looked at it.

My Omni contacts analyzed the creature and went absolutely berserk.

Immediately, warnings popped up in my vision. If it had an alarm system, that would've been blaring by now.

A name appeared in my vision, followed by a rank. I felt my soul leave my body as these words flashed in my hopeless eyes.

As the information of the daemon faded away from my vision, I bore witness to another terrifying sight that would haunt my very nightmares.

As I watched the daemon, a fissure appeared on its blank visage, widening to form a twisted, haunting smile.

The chilling sight petrified me.

My vision tunneled, fixated on that damned and nightmarish smile.