Confusion, anxiety, chaos.
Everything mixed together. Some residents saw hallucinations.
"I shall come find you myself."
It was the Demon-Lord's summons.
Some had to cry, some had to despair. It was that kind of time.
However, these people were still human. That's why they were swept up in the atmosphere.
Throughout history, exceptional individuals were said to change the mood of entire groups. Heroes who drew out fighting spirit at the front of battlefields did so, and eloquent orators who persuaded everyone did so.
Now, the madman's attitude did just that. The atmosphere wasn't despairing. Though the approaching future was truly bleak, it seemed like such things wouldn't happen.
Why? Because the residents' eyes were filled with those people's composure.
The residents couldn't step forward, becoming spectators with dumbfounded expressions.
Among them, a few children muttered a song.
It was a long orally-transmitted song with lyrics about apocalypse and the end of war.
[ * * * ]
"I need training. Training."
Pel muttered while swinging his sword. The madman who'd been asleep for a while, who'd always cried out about training, woke from his comatose state.
"Uoooh."
He even let out battle cries alone. He hardly looked normal, but he was composed.
Pel's psychological state was simple and clear. Monsters were enemies, and these people were subjects to protect. That was satisfying enough.
With strength in his eyes, Pel took Idol Slayer and began dancing on one side.
"How noisy. You're Roman, right? Come here for a moment."
Lawford's confidence had wavered briefly after seeing Enkrid's sword and the crazy feat he'd just shown. Objectively confirming and observing his own state was his forte.
Lawford, facing his own state head-on, found an answer.
'What I need now is experience winning.'
Immediately hunting nearby monsters would be one method, and giving Roman the sparring he needed would be a similar way to gain experience.
In truth, what he desired more desperately than experience winning was the sense of accomplishment from being helpful to someone.
"How will you achieve the process for putting force into a single strike?"
Lawford said, smoothly coaxing Roman. Roman blinked and approached him.
Having a leisurely sword session here?
Though his expression was full of such questions, he too was swept up in the atmosphere.
Lawford simplified his thoughts. What Enkrid had done would bring answers on its own. So he planned to do what he could right now.
'Let's maintain optimal condition.'
It was to do so in both body and mind.
Lawford narrowed his thoughts and concentrated with Roman before him.
Having faced Pel countless times, he knew his strengths and weaknesses. Also the commonalities of those who had the tendency to stake everything on a single strike.
Moreover, he had many secrets and methods accumulated from training the unit called Enkrid's Honor Guard.
He could utilize all of that.
To stake victory on one strike, you had to know how to build up the corresponding process.
Enkrid had said what Roman needed was an arduous process, hadn't he?
'Put more simply, he needs to suffer enough that his life hangs in the balance.'
Lawford fully intended to give him such an experience.
There were residents who'd been shocked seeing Enkrid cut the symbol, but no one fainted in shock. Those among them whose heads were working accepted the changed situation. That attitude shift was extremely fast.
In reality, they had no choice. What could they do if they didn't bow their heads right here?
The Demon-Lord's Janitor was dead and the demon's hand was far away, but this swordsman was right before their noses. Just a movement of his hand and they'd all be slaughtered.
Those who realized this simple fact awakened their survival instincts, bowed their heads, and revered Enkrid.
"Ooh."
Of course, there might be their own reasons besides that.
Rem saw it and chuckled.
"They're changing their attitude like a starving Belopter snatching rat meat."
Belopters were mad for rat meat, so they said rats were hard to find in the west.
It was also because of monsters called Copycats that easily appeared in the western region. Cats easily caught and ate rats—no, should he say they couldn't eat them because there were none?
"Sparring?"
Ragna approached Enkrid, who'd just finished fighting. Seeing that, Rem frowned.
What was this crazy lazy bastard saying?
"Have you gone mad?"
This was truly an uncommon level of anger. Wasn't it like hearing criticism directed at parents or children?
Westerners were especially vulnerable to insults about their kin.
Rem unhesitatingly drew his axe and recited the reason for his anger.
Enkrid thought Ragna had insulted Rem somehow as he approached, but that wasn't it.
"I'm first for sparring."
...Was that something to get this angry about?
"Brother, the Lord didn't say to endure unreasonableness. Why do you always step forward first?"
Audin heard that and interrupted.
"He's my fiancé. Naturally I'm first."
Even Shinar added her words.
But couldn't Shinar fully exert her power here? Fairies couldn't properly use their strength in places lacking spirit energy. That's why since coming here, Shinar had constantly thrown jokes at Enkrid's side about feeling dizzy and how she'd feel better if he held her for one night.
The basis for those jokes was her state, more vulnerable than usual.
"You know how to imbue, right?"
Ragna asked them all. Can you imbue Will in your weapon? Can you make a sword that shines? If you can't do that, would it be proper sparring?
In other words, what Ragna was saying was that from now on they'd have high-level sparring, so weaklings should step back.
"Hey, you just insulted Western shamanism."
Rem maintained his anger. The expressed anger took form. It was using Intimidation in his own way.
Rem's shadow grew, ignoring the moonlight. Then it tried to stand up completely.
If they fought now, that shadow would swing an axe too.
"The Lord said nothing cannot be achieved through divinity."
While Audin kept interrupting, Enkrid detected an ambush stabbing his back.
If he described what he felt now in words, it was about the level of someone waving a willow branch from five steps away, yet his sixth sense caught it.
All his senses were sharpened from the fight moments ago. Enkrid's body reacted automatically.
Clang!
When he turned and raised Dawnforge, the blade of an extended dagger touched it. It was Jaxen's thrust.
As soon as sparks flew, Jaxen retreated more than three steps and stared at Enkrid.
Just looking at his stabbing and withdrawing skill, his feet were faster than Rem's.
"You feral cat bastard!"
Rem's anger exploded, but Jaxen ignored it and said.
"I'm done."
With that single strike, he'd grasped Enkrid's reaction and heightened sensitivity. That was enough for Jaxen.
'It'll be difficult to catch him from behind now.'
Simple ambushes wouldn't work. That was certain.
'Then?'
Whoosh.
Jaxen organized his thoughts while dodging the flying hand axe.
'I need to pull out everything I have too.'
Only then could he face him. And he'd have to do so after securing advantageous ground.
Otherwise, he couldn't kill him.
This was the assessment from none other than Geor's Dagger—the head of an assassination guild passed down as legend on the continent. It meant killing through assassination was now impossible.
"Enough."
Enkrid, for the first time in a long while, soothed them and called Rem out first. Just to match hands and feet briefly. In other words, sparring.
"As expected."
Rem nodded and drew his axe. That axe appeared to have strangely dense black smoke gathered on it.
Though he'd consumed Will from killing the bull-headed sword master earlier, his Will spring hadn't dried up, and his body trained through the Isolation Technique didn't make such feeble sounds at this level.
"Muscles are beautiful things."
Those were Audin's words, having seen through it.
Teresa quietly took in all this scene with her eyes. And those standing beside her too.
'Should I call this exhilarating?'
Or should she call it unrestrained?
The moment she saw those worthy of being called Eroded, veins stood out on Teresa's hand. Strength naturally entered her hand.
She wanted to swing her greatsword right away to split and smash them.
Ominous and unpleasant. It was the kind of unpleasantness like thousands of ants crawling over her body.
She should tear them to death and purify this land.
Teresa heard her whole body's call. A hand gripped Teresa's arm. A large, warm hand that would emit white light if desired.
"If the Lord says to kill, will you kill them all? The Lord's will is right, but we who receive it are imperfect."
Audin taught what he usually taught even now. The Half-Giant took three shallow, long breaths in and out, then nodded.
Sending them to God's side would give them a resting place too, but they had their own wishes.
Regardless, Teresa reached a conclusion inside. No, she had reached it.
'They cannot be saved.'
There was no salvation. There was no method, so she saw it that way.
"Admiration, only admiration comes out!"
It was Luagarne constantly exclaiming beside her.
Indeed, the madman of a different caliber had a different perspective. His train of thought was different.
Teresa saw Enkrid cut the symbol and Audin burst the relic buried in the ground with divine power.
'He protects somehow.'
And somehow saves them too.
'Perhaps the epithet Salvation suits him better than Iron Wall.'
Until moments ago, leaving them seemed to go against the Lord's teachings, but now it was different again.
The War god she served gave peace to her heart.
'O Lord.'
Teresa bowed her head while praying. In reality, how to protect this place wasn't her concern.
That was for the one who started this to handle.
Would he summon Krais here?
But would that giant-eyed man come if called?
No matter how much it was Enkrid, that guy wouldn't come to the Demonic Realm.
Then how?
Such questions briefly crossed her mind, but again, it wasn't Teresa's concern.
Teresa wasn't the only one aware of the realistic problem.
Rem also recognized and was aware of the problem, and though he knew realistically solving this problem was difficult, he ignored it.
Even now, after cutting the symbol, didn't he sense the presence of nearby monsters and Demon Beasts?
Thinking about it, it was natural.
'How appetizing must this place have been all this time?'
It was like throwing freshly caught rats to a Belopter and telling it not to eat. Of course, a well-trained Belopter would endure. It would resist without eating.
But what if the master said it could eat now?
'It wouldn't be a Belopter if it didn't rush in.'
It was what instinct commanded.
Rem thought while withdrawing his axe. They'd been sparring. If they got a bit more serious than now, one of them would be badly injured.
The black soot on his axe blurred, then rose like smoke and disappeared.
"What's that?"
Enkrid asked. It was a technique similar to yet different from Will. A different path from gathering Will to imbue in a sword.
It was also something achieved purely through talent for handling shamanism, not the realm of techniques or skills.
"Spirit Possession."
It was a technique he wouldn't dare use unless with a Spirit Weapon. It meant making shamanic power stay on the axe and manifest outwardly.
It wasn't something easily used. There were dozens of hurdles to overcome to reach this level.
Rem stared at Enkrid. He had nothing to ask. That method of gathering Will like before? He didn't need it. Also, besides that, he'd already learned everything by watching, so there was nothing to ask.
'Weapon techniques and handling shamanism are separate.'
To reach the concept called Knight here or Champion in the west, you had to do both. Training the body and training shamanism were separate but connected.
The probability of excelling at both?
'Low. Too low.'
That's why without talent, you couldn't even dare to reach this level.
'I know how to teach it, though.'
This was close to purely following and imitating the system Enkrid had built.
"Well, I learned well."
So he said reluctantly.
Enkrid blinked a couple times and said.
"Where did Rem go? Are you some evil spirit?"
"...Damn it."
Why was this bastard doing this when he was thanking him?
"Shall I purify you?"
Audin also reacted. It must be a moment his divine power was needed.
"Were you possessed by an evil spirit?"
Teresa added her words too. Jaxen had already drawn his dagger, ready to throw it.
"Sunrise burns anything."
At Ragna's added words, Rem laughed.
"You son of a..."
The curse wasn't completed.
"Time to work, Rem."
Enkrid cut off those words. He'd teased enough.
The fence-protected, high-quality food storage door had opened. It was time for monsters and Demon Beasts to swarm from all directions, and now they were visible too. Audible as well.