Chapter 1190 (1/2)

That night, Heiffal hadn’t gotten much sleep. He had a dream that kept him twitching on the edge of consciousness. He had been called forward to a battle, one very like today’s battle, and he had been stationed at the front behind a powerful figure.

Yet as the battle went on, it rapidly became clear that the figure in front of them didn’t care at all for their lives. In fact, that figure allowed more and more of Heiffal’s soldiers to die in order to drink from their deaths and grow more powerful. Worst of all, Heiffal had died too, his stomach ripped out by the claws of a Nether Beast.

The cold darkness that greedily devoured him then was something that he would probably never forget. Which meant that he woke up very confused and disoriented from this dream, with the powerful image of his own death hanging over him as he prepared to march to battle.

Heiffal obviously didn’t want to die, but he was a professional soldier; he understood why he might need to die on this day. This area had only been recently captured by the Nexus from the terrible Nether savages. Without such a staging area, the Aether would forever be without useful thoroughfares to proactively destroy the Nether’s forces.

This was necessary.

Yet it had not been an easy go of it from the start. The grouped up reinforcements simply didn’t have enough time training together to form a cohesive unit. Even with the benefits of the fortifications, casualties began to mount. And that was before the Nether Gatekeeper had made its appearance.

Luckily, a young man stepped forward and stemmed the bleeding before the entire trope was slaughtered. From time to time as Heiffal rotated through being on watch, being support, then being on the front itself, back to a resting position, he glanced at the young man. He heard talk about the young man all around him.

When the claw of dense Nether had crashed to the ground toward the young man who had held off the Nether Gatekeeper, Heiffal had been close enough to be blasted backward but not close enough to have been simply snuffed out as some had been. In the wake of the blast, Heiffal found himself burning and face down in the dirt.

As Heiffal had blew out a mouthful of dirt and winced as Nether corroded his skin, he had struggled to his feet and witnessed the agonizing death-by-dissolution of some of his squad that he had probably missed by only a few meters.

Heiffal’s heart tightened as he looked around and saw the annihilated fortifications in the surrounding twenty meters. They had been so reliant on in the past. If necessary, Heiffal would gladly give his life to protect all the innocents who would remain safe as long as they established a base here. Yet Heiffal couldn’t get over the impression that what they did here wouldn’t be enough. The dream he had this morning weighed heavily on his mind. The figure defending them might be different, but the outcome seemed to be the same.

With this number of Nether Beasts, once more he would die-

It was at that moment that the smoke clear enough for Heiffal to see through to the figure standing between the forces of Aether and the forces of Nether. As reinforcements, Heiffal and his fellow soldiers didn’t know much about the chain of command here. They had been made aware that they were under Lady Iellaya, but for most of the average soldiers like Heiffal, they didn’t know much more than that. Likely the commanding officers were informed who could give them orders, but with the attack a short time away it wasn’t something that had been addressed in the lead up to the battle.

Even so, there were whispers about this man. Ghosthound, they called him. Although there were conflicting rumors about who exactly he was, while they were in the resting portion of the rotation a good friend had told Heiffal that the Ghosthound was Lady Iellaya’s left hand and the one in charge of mobilizing the common soldiers.

And he had certainly been the one here as the Nether Gatekeeper surged forward to slaughter them, but it was more than that. Even if the battlefield was extremely chaotic, it was impossible to miss the frequent interference of roots at very convenient times, vastly weakening the power of the Nether Beasts. And also that strange, chaotic aura that everyone carried, visibly empowering their attacks in small ways.

Just as Heiffal was reaching down toward a nearby soldier to help him to his feet, there were two loud cracks that made both of the soldiers jump. They looked into each other’s eyes in fear then looked forward. Beyond the Ghosthound, two more Nether Gatekeepers had crashed into the ground.

Even as Heiffal assisted his fellow in standing, his heart trembled once again. Even if it was possible to protect others by sacrificing themselves here, would their sacrifice really end up mattering…? With this number of Nether Gatekeepers-

That terrible darkness that Heiffal had felt when he died-

“Heh, seems like you don’t want this continuing for much longer,” The Ghosthound’s voice was so young. So much younger than Heiffal had expected. Yet it was bright and clear, even as the Great Rift hung above him like a headsman’s ax. “But did you think I was stalling just to bleed your footsoldiers? Hey Acri… have you been enjoying your meal?”

This time Heiffal’s shock was one of anticipation. For the first time since he had seen the sea of Nether Beasts that wanted to kill them, he felt the stirrings of hope. With this young man in front of them, they could accomplish anything.

As if to evidence the inexplicable capability of the Ghosthound, a Nether Beast was skewered through the chest as something erupted out of the approaching army. Mid-air, the slender spear grew to an incomparable size. Although it certainly grew longer, what was the most impressive was the way it widened to become a huge spike to rip out the heart of these tenacious Nether Beasts.