Those Who Break the Law

The carriage raced down the road so fast that it nearly left the ground altogether. At such a speed, with a carriage behind, a single misstep could result in death for both the horses and the wagon’s passengers. Still, Shannon pushed the animals harder.

“I can’t believe I got caught up with the Good Samaritan brigade,” Chris sighed to himself as he sat carelessly on the carriage roof.

“Shut up,” Shannon snapped, his gaze never leaving the road. “Nobody invited you.”

“I figured I’d do you a favor and let you know what was going on. Would you have preferred for me to let that monster eat all your friends?”

Shannon didn’t reply—he only urged the horses to run faster.

Without an answer, Chris continued. “Anyway, I wanted to see how you’d handle this. After that pompous speech you gave me the other day, if you’d turned tail and run I would’ve stabbed you in the back.’’ Chris looked toward the town, where flailing tentacles of flesh were plainly visible above the buildings. “More important, do you think you really have a chance of beating that thing?’’

“How can I know my chances when I don’t even know what’s going on?” Shannon curled his fingers over the reins. “If I can’t beat it, at least I can create a diversion so the townspeople have time to evacuate.”

“The townspeople who drove you out? Even if you save them, it’s not like they’ll appreciate it.”

“You don’t get it, do you? I’m not doing this to be thanked.”

“And you’re going to put your life—and your sisters’ lives—on the line for those ungrateful people?”

“If you’ve got a problem with it,” Shannon hissed through gritted teeth, “you can get off now.” He jerked his head toward the road flying beneath them.

Chris smirked. “I’m going to enjoy watching this.”

“Shut up,” Shannon ordered darkly.

A child was crying. The little boy shrieked at the top of his lungs, calling for his parents. His tiny body shook as the sound echoed down the empty street.

Yet it would never reach the ears of his parents, who, had been unwillingly dragged away by the citizen’s patrol.

A fleshy tentacle, which was attached to a mass of twisted flesh as large as a house, wrapped itself around the child’s leg. It squirmed like a slug, heading slowly toward the center of town. The countless tentacles protruding from its mass shot down side streets and into buildings in search of prey.

Once a living creature touched the monster, there was no hope for survival. The creature destroyed the physical structure of living things and transformed them into anything it wished.

“Dad! Mommy! Daaaaaooooorrrrgh!” The child’s cries turned into a terrible roar as his body split in two. Red liquid oozed and splashed onto the cobblestones.

Common sense dictated that the boy would die. But somehow, even with his face split apart, the child continued to cry. “D-D-Dad… Ma…”

From the wide gash in the boy’s face, things started to grow. Eyes, ears, fingers, and other body parts emerged grotesquely before withering away. The tentacles finally drew what was left of the child toward its main mass of flesh.

The last part to disappear was the child’s ruined face, crying until the very end.

Chris stood up once the carriage finally stopped.

He and the Casulls had reached the outskirts of Taurus in record time, but continuing forward was going to be far more difficult - a net of closely woven tentacles stretched across the entire perimeter of the town. There was no way in or out that wasn’t blocked by the monster.

“Chris.” Shannon dropped the reins and stood.

“Yeah?”

“We’re going to use a special technique to get through this barrier. Will you take the reins until we’re clear?”

“Sure.” Chris took Shannon’s place in the driver’s seat, and Shannon climbed to the top of the carriage and helped Raquel scramble up next to him.

Shannon met his sister’s eyes. “Are you ready?” he asked.

“I am,” she replied, looking around. “I don’t sense any people nearby, so as long as we’re careful with the range, full power should be fine.”

Raquel’s face locked into an expression of deep concentration as she started to cast a spell. “Though only temporarily,” she called, “I hereby grant you…”

Chris recognized the spell—it was used to activate an emulator. Raquel could cast it to temporarily make Shannon a sorcerer. So he wants to use magic? Chris wondered.

Once the spell was completed, Shannon began his own.

“Heaven, Earth, and all things in between, I now grant you your end…”

While Shannon spoke, Raquel began to cast another spell, their voices musically overlapping.

“My hope, my wish, incarnate here…”

Something dawned on Chris as he listened to the spells. He widened his eyes, impressed.

Pacifica took that moment to lean out the window. “What’s going on?” she asked him.

“Just watch,” Chris said. He wanted to see if Shannon and Raquel could pull off what they were attempting.

“O, thou with whom we have entered this pact, lend us thy great power now!”

Shannon’s spell, the combat support magic Rune, finally activated.

“God and devil, now both be destroyed!”

A moment later, Raquel finished her own magic— the military attack spell Ragnarok.

Two intertwined spirals of white light burst upward and pierced the sky. A wave of intense heat and sound hit Chris, and then Pacifica, a moment later.

The net of flesh, as well as the town wall and a large chunk of the ground, were all blown to pieces. The light faded to reveal nothing but scattered debris.

“Wow!” Pacifica exclaimed, scanning the damage. “That was… awesome!”

Chris brushed a few pebbles from his coat. “So that was the real Ragnarok?”

Shannon sent Chris a glare before climbing off the roof. “I’m surprised you knew what it was,” he said thinly.

Chris smiled. “After you beat me that first time, I did some research.”

Ragnarok was a spell designed for two or more sorcerers. It had two parts: the actual offensive blast known as Ragnarok, and the support spell, Rune, which stabilized the blast and increased its strength and aim. When Ragnarok was cast along with its support spell, it had ten times the destructive power of the attack spell alone. A powerful group of sorcerers could destroy an entire fortress down to its foundation.

Pacifica suddenly cried out and pointed toward the monster. “Look!” she shouted.

The tentacles within the spell’s blast had been destroyed, and the ones on either side had momentarily stilled. But once it was clear that the explosive light was gone, the destroyed parts of the monster began regenerating at an incredible rate.

Chris pushed the horses to start galloping again and headed toward the center of one of the larger gaps in the monster’s defenses.

“Keep that up,” Shannon said as he drew his sword, “and we’ll make it in time.”

Sure enough, the wagon sped through the gap before it closed off behind them. Chris blinked in surprise as he pulled the horses to a walk.

The town had been completely seized by tentacles—all the familiar storefronts, streets, and well-kept homes covered with the fleshy limbs. The tentacles felt their way down every road and alley in search of new prey.

A tentacle suddenly shot out for the carriage from around a corner. Raquel threw up a hand.

“Wall, defend!” Raquel’s voice rang out, activating the defense magic Midgard. The tentacle’s end fizzled as the power globe deflected it.

Chris turned back to Shannon. “Now what?” he asked. “Should I head for the Big Bear Inn?”

Shannon shook his head. “Go to the Wild Horse Inn. That’s where the citizen’s patrol hangs out, and it’s been designated as the evacuation area in case of an emergency. Everyone should be gathered there.”

Chris nodded and cracked the whip.

“What the hell is that thing?” a townswoman whispered, her eye pressed against a chink in the window defenses.

Not one of the people crowded in the Wild Horse Inn replied—it was the one question no one could answer. The heavy silence that smothered the room was only broken by the sound of someone quietly sobbing.

“There’s no way we can fight it. What are we going to do?”

Again, no one answered. There was no answer they could give.

After a few livestock had been absorbed by the monster, several members of the citizen’s patrol had attacked the tentacles. They had managed to harm it somewhat with blades and fire, but the damaged parts grew back almost immediately. A member of the attack group had been absorbed in the process.

The tentacles had covered the entire town. At that point, nothing the townspeople could do would hurt the monster. Their only option was to hide in their homes or in evacuation areas and pile up furniture in front of the doors and windows.

Nobody believed that such a flimsy method of defense would last long.

“If only we had some powerful… magic,” someone else whispered.

All at once, the townspeople suggested the same person.

“Raquel.”

“Yes, that girl! I saw her using attack magic.”

“She’s a powerful sorcerer, isn’t she?”

The speakers looked at each other, a faint glimmer of hope shining on their faces.

“Raquel and her siblings are gone,” a quiet voice interrupted them. Winia shook in the corner, her face strangely contorted. She wrapped her arms around her waist and took a step forward.

“We made them leave,” she said flatly. “Don’t you remember? We talked about them behind their backs, avoided them, and never gave them a chance to prove their innocence.”

Next to Winia was her grandmother, who grabbed her arm to try to quiet her. Winia just shook off the old woman’s hand.

“All of you! You were so eager to think the worst of them, you just believed whatever you heard! And now you want them to save us?”

For a moment, the room went completely silent. Most of the people present had never heard Winia raise her voice before. Being chided by Winia was like being savagely attacked by a kitten—they probably weren’t sure what to make of it.

“B-but, Winia,” one member of the citizen’s patrol stammered, “we all know Raquel used attack magic in the middle of town. And they fought with assassins!”

Several voices chimed in with agreements.

“Aren’t those attack spells illegal?”

“And you were kidnapped because you got involved with them!”

“We all wanted to go save you, but Shannon stopped us. That sounds like they were trying to cover something up to me.”

“Hey! Maybe they created that monster as revenge for being driven out of town!”

Winia couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Tears of frustration welled in her eyes.

Raquel had told her that the weaknesses in human nature made people humble enough to admit their mistakes. But the citizens of Taurus were still trying to spread the blame, even after everything they’d done.

Was such a sickness in the human spirit a fact she would have to accept?

Something heavy hit the front door with a thud. The townspeople immediately fell silent, every set of eyes locked on the door, in terror.

The door began to rattle, like someone or something had a grip on the handle and was trying to jiggle it open. When the door didn’t budge, it became still again.

“I think it’s gone,” a townsperson breathed at last.

“With this much stuff piled up, it would take an incredible force to get through—”

An incredible force ripped through the door and sent the pile of furniture flying into the far wall.

The people gripped whatever paltry weapons they had and prepared for the inevitable rush of tentacles. It never came. Instead, after the dust settled, a single stick poked in through the ruined doorway.

“Well, it’s certainly open now.” A wonderfully normal voice spoke from the other side of the ruined door. A moment later, two young men peeked their heads inside the room.

“Everyone okay in here?” one of them called out.

Winia squinted through the dust at the taller of the two figures. Her heart leapt when she realized who it was.

“Shannon?” she called out to him.

Shannon walked into the room with Chris in tow. Behind him, Winia could see that their carriage was parked so that it blocked the doorway, and a shimmering defensive spell surrounding it closed off all gaps a tentacle could pass through.

None of the townspeople moved. They still had weapons gripped in their hands, and their faces wore expressions of hate and fear one would expect to be reserved for the monster.

“You know what?” Chris commented as he looked around. “I don’t think they’re happy to see us.”

“Shut up.” Shannon took a sideways swing at his head, which the boy dodged easily.

Shannon turned to the people of Taurus. “We’ll secure your route of escape,” he said evenly. “You should get out of here as fast as you can.”

The townspeople stood in silence for a moment, then everyone began stammering all at once.

“What’s going on?”

“Why would you show up here all of a sudden?”

“Isn’t that boy the kidnapper?!”

Shannon brushed off the comments. “There’s no time for explanations. I don’t know what that monster wants or where it came from, but if you want to escape from here, we can get you out of town.”

The citizens quieted, but couldn’t stop muttering among themselves. None of them made a move to leave.

Shannon opened his mouth, but before he could say anything a voice chimed in from the back of the room.

“Okay—just tell us what to do. Everyone get your things ready.”

Safir Colt emerged holding an old long sword with a practiced grip.

Shannon studied him a moment. “I knew you weren’t an ordinary civilian,” he murmured.

Safir tapped his sheath lightly and gave a wry smile.

“I’m no fighter. I quit being a mercenary twenty years ago—I just lend my expertise to the citizen’s patrol now and then.”

“Safir…” A member of the patrol started to voice an objection, but Safir glared at him. The man trailed off into silence.

Safir transferred his glare to the rest of the townspeople. “You ought to be ashamed of yourselves,” he snapped. “I’ve never seen a bunch of adults act like such children. Wasting our time, trying to pass the blame around? If you want to stay here and argue, be my guest. I’m going with Shannon.”

Nobody seemed willing—or able—to argue with him. The people scurried to gather their belongings. Mothers held their children. An old man staggered and was caught by his son. The members of the citizen’s patrol ran back and forth, assisting anyone who needed it.

Suddenly, a low, loud roar shook the room. It was the unmistakable sound of many people speaking in unison, but it was so deep and thunderous that it was as if the world itself were rumbling.

“People of Taurus!” the voice boomed. “All of you, listen carefully!”

Something strange was happening to the creature.

All over the town, countless lumps of various sizes grew all over the tentacles. They swelled up like monstrous pimples, then burst to reveal a new face in each one.

The faces were identical—that of a beautiful man with chiseled features and a dignified air. Despite the grotesque monster from which it had been formed, the faces looked like exquisite works of art. No human face could reach such a level of perfection.

Shannon and Chris stared in utter astonishment. Identical faces of all different sizes stared back.

Pacifica and Raquel climbed off the carriage, their movements slowed by bewilderment. Several townspeople had followed Shannon outside, their mouths agape from shock.

Slowly, the main body of the creature appeared from behind a building. In the middle of the mangled mass of flesh was a much larger face.

Countless lips moved in unison, speaking in a single grave voice.

“In the name of the divine law, I order thee! Destroy the seed of disaster, Pacifica Casull!”

Pacifica’s blood went cold. She couldn’t believe what the monster had said.

He just told everyone I’m the Scrapped Princess! she thought in a panic.

After everything she and her siblings had done to hide her identity, a multifaceted mountain of flesh had gone and spilled the secret. She felt eyes boring into the back of her neck. She waited for the inevitable reaction— would they scream at her? Throw things? Attack her from behind?

Strangely, she heard nothing from the people of Taurus. She turned back to look at them.

The townspeople’s gazes were blank. Chris, Safir, and even Winia all bore the same empty expression.

What? The way the citizens stared sent a chill that ran down Pacifica’s spine. She looked to her brother and sister, hoping for an explanation, but she realized in horror that their faces wore the same terrible blankness.

Every pair of empty eyes focused on her.

“Shannon?” Pacifica whispered plaintively. “Raquel? What’s going on?”

Pacifica watched, her heart caught in her throat, as her sister’s hands reached out for her neck.

“R-Raquel?! Shannon?!”

Beside Raquel, Shannon drew his sword. Safir and Chris pointed their weapons at her. Even Winia reached out.

In an instant, everyone Pacifica cared about—the people who had been kind to her, her friends, and even her brother and sister—had turned into an enemy.

“This is some kind of sick joke,” Pacifica breathed. “Stop it, okay? Come on, this isn’t—”

Raquel’s fingers dug mercilessly into Pacifica’s neck, cutting off her words. Pacifica choked and gripped her sister’s wrists. Shannon raised his sword.

“W-why?” Pacifica gasped.

Pacifica tried to pry her sister’s fingers loose, but she couldn’t even weaken their grip. Raquel’s hands were abnormally strong. There was the chance that she could break Pacifica’s neck before she suffocated. Raquel’s face showed no sign of anger or hatred. She was about to murder her baby sister without having any particular emotion about it.

Pacifica’s eyes started to water.

I’m going to die.

It didn’t bother her that it would be by her siblings’ hands. She had been prepared for that all along—if, as the revelation had said, Pacifica really was going to destroy the world, she would accept her own death willingly. And she wanted the brother and sister who had protected her for so long to be the ones to end her life.

But this wasn’t a peaceful suicide after all other options had been exhausted. She couldn’t understand why Shannon and Raquel obeyed the words of a monster. Pacifica would die alone, in the dark, without saying goodbye.

I don’t want it to end like this!

Tears of frustration rolled down Pacifica’s cheeks as her vision began to fade.

No! I don’t want this! Shannon stared blankly at his sister. His feet moved forward on their own volition. He tried to walk away, tried to trip himself up or drop his sword, but it was no use. His body was no longer his own.

I won’t kill Pacifica! he thought.

But from within his mind, a voice from far deeper than his consciousness replied. You will. You will kill her because you’ve been ordered to. The thought smothered his resistance. You cannot disobey. That is the law. You are a human, and humans cannot rebel.

No! I won’t…

The tiny island of Shannon’s consciousness shrieked in defiance, trapped in a body that wouldn’t move.

Pacifica saw her brother raise his sword. She tried to scream, but no sound could escape while the hands squeezed her throat.

I don’t want to die like this!

Her brother slashed downward.

Not now!

Not here!

Her entire being screamed its denial.

NO!

There was no sound. There was no light.

Something burst forth from Pacifica in an unstoppable wave, an invisible color painting over everyone and everything. It changed everything it touched.

Just before Shannon’s blade reached her forehead, it froze. The sword slid out of her brother’s hand and clattered to the ground in front of her.

“P-Pacifica…?” Shannon breathed, his sword arm falling limp to his side.

At the same time, Raquel hurriedly pulled her hands from her sister’s neck. She stepped back and stared at her fingers as if she’d never seen them before.

The people of Taurus blinked and wiped their eyes. They looked at Pacifica, then the monster, and then each other. It was obvious that they were clearly confused over what had just happened.

Pacifica touched her bruised neck. Swallowing hard, she hoped that the nightmare was over.

“Are you… back?” Pacifica whispered. “Are you back to normal?”

Shannon barely nodded, his hands shaking. His face contorted in anger. He glared at the monster so violently that it was a wonder the creature didn’t die on the spot.

“Is-is it true?” one of the townspeople managed to stammer. Pacifica saw that everyone’s eyes were trained on her again, although this time they were alive with curiosity, fear, and anger.

“Pacifica Casull, are you really…?” asked the voice.

The human-faced lumps on the monster also turned to her as countless tentacles shot in her direction.

There was nothing to shield everyone with—when Raquel had fallen under the monster’s control, Midgard had been deactivated. Shannon and Safir leapt into action, slashing at every tentacle they could reach, but there were just too many of them. One of the tentacles shot past Shannon’s blade and headed directly for Pacifica’s face.

“Pacifica!” Winia screamed.

There was no time for Pacifica to dodge. She hopelessly covered her head.

Just before the monstrous limb should have slammed into her flesh, the tentacle stopped in midair. The voice spoke again, sounding strangely unsure.

“So it’s true… after all.”

The tentacles actually started to tremble, as though the monster were afraid.

Chris stared in disbelief. “Did it just stop itself?” he whispered to Shannon.

Shannon swallowed. “I don’t think so,” he answered. “For some reason, I don’t think it can harm her.”

Pacifica just stared at the halted tentacle, confusion and fear etched on her face.

“Amazing,” came a voice.

From high in the air, a girl gazed down at Taurus. Her sky-colored hair—long enough to reach her feet and tied back with a purple ribbon—waved in the breeze.

She hovered far over the ground. Even with magic, the height dictated that the air was too thin to breathe. The girl should have been suffocating.

She, too, was only human in appearance.

“Impressive for a human to defeat a Peacemaker,” she intoned, “even if it was only an intermediary entity. Impressive that they could disobey divine law.”

If what she had told Shannon was true, the girl’s name was Arfi. Her cold, stiff expression remained unchanged.

“That’s only to be expected from the poison that will destroy the world. She is the last hope our master left behind.”

Arfi nodded in satisfaction. “Still,” she said to no one, “you must destroy the intermediary yourself. Since I have assumed a human form, I cannot lend a hand.”

The monster’s countless faces all stared at Pacifica.

“If we cannot end you directly,” the voices said in unison, “we will destroy those who take your side. Without anyone to protect you, you will not survive.”

Tentacles shot out at Pacifica’s companions. Shannon, Raquel, Chris, and Safir were all trained in combat and could get out of the way, but Winia was frozen in fear. She recognized the tiny human faces at the tips of the tentacles.

The Purgers. The faces showed no pain or sadness, only radiant joy. They seemed to call out to her, promising an end to her own suffering.

Winia screamed and backed away.

That’s not happiness! she thought, her heart racing in her chest. She knew better now. Pain was what drove people to do better, sadness reminded them to be kind. The end of those feelings would be the end of humanity.

The tentacles fused into each other, becoming one thick pillar of flesh. It shot directly for her, but a flash of brown cut across her vision and left half of the tentacle to flop on the ground.

It was a fighting stick, gripped in Chris’ hand. He sliced with incredible speed and grace at another incoming tentacle. His exceptional technique clearly allowed the wooden stick to cut like a blade.

“Huh?” Winia breathed. She stared at Chris, more surprised that he had protected her than by his fighting skill.

“Stay inside the building,” he told her. “You’ll get hurt if you stay out here.” Chris crushed the fallen pieces of tentacle with his stick and prepared for the next attack.

“Wall, defend!”

Raquel reinstated the shining geometric pattern of Midgard around the Wild Horse Inn. Satisfied, she peered up at the huge mass of flesh in the hopes that its horror would inspire a plan.

The most difficult thing, she thought, is its rapid powers of regeneration. If both cutting and burning the creature didn’t work, she knew a long battle lay ahead.

However, Raquel could see two ways to potentially defeat the monster. The first was to batter it beyond its powers of healing. There had to be some end to its ability to regenerate, so, hypothetically, too many wounds would eventually wear out the monster’s powers. The problem with that plan was that it required the town to wait for “eventually.”

The second, better option was to quickly destroy all of the creature’s body tissue so that it didn’t have time to use its healing powers. Luckily for everyone, Raquel knew a spell that would do just that.

“I just need another sorcerer,” she thought out loud with a sigh.

The complete annihilation attack magic Fenrir, like Ragnarok, was so advanced that it took more than one sorcerer to activate. Teaming up with Shannon would work, but there was no way she could cast Fenrir and keep her Midgard defenses in place. In addition, the range of Fenrir needed to be set before the spell was cast—it targeted a large area rather than an individual opponent. She needed something to hold the monster in place long enough for her to complete the spell.

That meant she needed Shannon, someone to defend the townspeople in place of Midgard, and a plan to keep the creature still.

“You need another sorcerer?” Chris asked from nearby. “Why don’t you ask them?” He gestured at several men who stepped out of the inn.

The men wore ordinary clothes, but Raquel could see their strong builds beneath the outfits. They seemed too fit to be average townspeople.

“This wasn’t part of our mission,” one of them admitted, “but we don’t particularly want to die here. We’ll help you with what you need.”

Shannon bared his teeth. “You!” he hissed. “You’re the ones who-—”

Shannon would have leapt forward to attack if Raquel hadn’t pulled him back. He turned to her in frustration, but she simply shook her head.

Regardless of whether or not those men had been the ones to start the rumors or were allied with the soldiers from the road, it wasn’t the time for a feud. “We appreciate it,” Raquel said with a smile.

The fourth Peacemaker, Galil, looked out of the many eyes of the monster.

He had created the mass of flesh to be his intermediary by giving some of his powers to the bodies of the Purgers. He could control the monster like it was his own body, directing its movements and borrowing its senses, or he could cut off all ties with it and dispose of it if he wished.

“Hmm…” Through the creature’s countless eyes, Galil saw Midgard flicker for a moment. Another sorcerer had taken over protecting the inn.

Galil assumed that the Guardian siblings were preparing a different spell; considering the situation, it was most likely an attack spell with severe destructive power. But Galil knew the disadvantages of such spells well.

All he had to do was keep moving. No matter how powerful the spell was, it couldn’t do any harm if it didn’t hit him.

Dark lines suddenly whipped out above the monster. Galil could feel cold metal as the lines touched its skin.

“What is this…?”

They were chains. Men had tossed them back and forth from the rooftops to wrap them around the monster. The men held the ends of the chains and braced themselves, obviously intending to immobilize the creature.

From their movements, Galil could tell that the men were skilled fighters. They were most likely members of the military’s intelligence division.

“Do you think you can restrain me with these?” Galil mocked, although he didn’t speak through the creature. He laughed silently as the humans frantically tried to delay the inevitable.

If they had obeyed the divine law, Galil would have granted them an easy death. Even in terms of simple physical strength, he could defeat any human easily. He could destroy entire cities. The men’s pathetic struggles only prolonged their suffering.

The tentacles wrapped around the chains, preparing to snap them apart. But before it could do so, white-hot lightning passed through the chains and into the monster.

“What?!’’cried Galil.

The attack magic Thunder Hammer hit the creature full force. Had it been an ordinary creature, blood would have boiled from its ears. The intermediary had once been a living organism, so while its Peacemaker power kept it alive, it still sustained significant injury.

Tentacles charred and fell to the ground.

Galil narrowed his eyes. Moments later, the burned flesh began to grow back. The monster’s healing abilities allowed it to reconstruct itself as long as its central core remained intact. Even if it didn’t have organic material to replace its ruined parts, it could create new tissue from air, soil, or water.

The only disadvantage was that this reconstructive ability took a tremendous amount of energy.

“Why, you little…”

The lightning strikes continued, one after another. Thunder Hammer was a powerful attack spell, but it only lasted for an instant. Several sorcerers likely took turns activating it.

The healing power was set as the highest priority of the intermediary’s abilities, and it activated whenever the creature sustained an injury. The constant attacks meant that the monster was forced to use almost all of its energy on healing and therefore didn’t have enough strength left to move.

The way things were going, the monster was likely to die from whatever was cast.

Galil suddenly realized he was panicking.

The Peacemakers were assigned to reign over the Dustovin Continent by Lord Mauser. Even though he was the lowest-ranking Peacemaker, he was still far superior to any human. That was divine law.

Losing a battle to humans could not be tolerated.

“Pacifica Casull… this is all your fault!” Galil screamed.

Humiliated and ashamed, he had no choice but to resort to underhanded tactics.

Shannon began reciting the words to activate his spell. As he looked out at the monster, however, something made him choke on his words.

A new face emerged in the mass of flesh: that of a young child.

“H-help!” the child cried out weakly, “It… it hurts!”

Shannon’s lips ceased the incantation. He could do nothing but stare at the child’s face.

It’s too late, he tried to remind himself. You can’t save him now. But as he watched that young face, its tiny features twisting in pain, Shannon felt his heart drop to his stomach.

It was his family’s fault. The child hadn’t done anything… and yet the presence of the Casull family had killed him anyway. Shannon couldn’t bring himself to hurt that child again.

“Sorry, kid.”

A short sword flew through the air and right into the child’s face. Shocked, Shannon whipped around.

Chris still had his arm extended from his throw. “We can’t save you,” he said to the looming monster above.

The child’s face looked surprised for a moment, but then it collapsed and sank back into the mass of flesh.

Shannon’s black eyes turned impossibly darker. “Chris,” he hissed dangerously.

“You need to cast your spell,” Chris said without batting an eye. “You know he’s past saving. The only way to end this is by killing that thing.”

Shannon remained silent, his gaze frozen at the younger warrior.

Chris suddenly scowled. “Shannon Casull!” he snapped. “You swore you’d protect her, didn’t you? You swore to protect your sister no matter what! You can’t afford to hesitate!”

Shannon clenched his fist. Chris kept his gaze level with Shannon’s, then looked away and sighed.

“Just do it,” Chris said, his voice suddenly tired. “You can’t hesitate.”

Shannon noticed Raquel watching him from behind. He closed his eyes once, then sent her a small nod.

Shannon evenly recited the end of his spell.

“Release, you are the cane of destruction!”

The complete annihilation attack magic Fenrir activated from Raquel’s hands, its power strengthened by amplification spells.

A sound like an enormous whip cracking shook the air as a giant grid pattern appeared on the ground below the flesh-covered monster. A moment later, countless rays of light shot skyward from the grid. They bent in complicated, overlapping shapes and created a net that completely engulfed the creature.

The chains and tentacles that extended beyond the net were severed; they chinked and splattered to the cobblestones. The beast swung its tentacles at the net of light, but it wouldn’t budge.

A piece of the monster suddenly vanished. It hadn’t been cut or blown off; it simply existed one moment and didn’t the next.

Another moment passed, and another piece of the creature disappeared. It almost looked as if some invisible beast had taken bloodless bites from the monster. The creature tried to escape, swinging its tentacles wildly, but it was no use. With every moment that passed, the monster became smaller and smaller.

It was the force of a molecular disintegration chain reaction, which meant that any matter that was subject to it, disintegrated into particles finer than dust. Growth, healing, and reconstruction were no match for it.

Faces emerged from the dying monster. The Purgers, the Blackhawk soldiers, people from town, and the crying child all burst from the rapidly shrinking mass.

The faces of the dead. They cried out, begging for mercy or shrieking curses.

Shannon bit his lip so hard that a trickle of blood dripped down his chin. Still, he wouldn’t look away.

Look at them, he ordered himself. It’s your duty to look at them, Shannon.

The monster writhed in pain while the faces screamed. Finally, the glowing cage of light folded in on itself.

A bright light flashed.

The next moment, nothing remained…