"Nochtar, do you understand the mess you are about to cause by doing this?" Malrik spoke, trying to look calm while raising his fists; the heat over them started to intensify again, charging for another attack.

With the corner of his eye, he tracked the 3 women as dozens of royal knights tightened around them and steered them toward the carriage.

They brought shields together and set their spears to a shared angle as their boots carried them in close ranks, giving the escort a solid face.

Yet the Rank 1 Umbraens weren't fragile and were still far stronger than ordinary mortals, so that brief sense of order broke almost at once.

Skills flared and blades flashed, and steel met flesh between one heartbeat and the next. Each passing second, their skills melted limbs, decomposed bodies, while weapons opened throats, and broke skulls, mowing the knights like wheat so the formation thinned row by row.

Even the Rank 2 Frost Wyvern wasn't enough to stop them. It spread its cold-bright wings and folded them over the women, the membranes frost-rimed and straining, but all it could do was shield them and take the punishment on its own body, each impact thudding through scale and sinew.

The most depressing moment came when one of the Umbraens slipped from the formations with a fluid sidestep that barely touched the ground, took the lives of 2 guards in a single, efficient pass, and then killed the dark blue horses that were preparing to pull the carriage, eliminating the women's only means of escape.

Malrik clenched his teeth, anger written across his face, while he let the words out in a heated breath. "Your Lord, the Dragon Rider Sevrak, not long ago came here with the intention to kill and had to retreat with the warning of the Revered Wanderer Merchant. Are you not informed of that?"

He now tried to break the attackers' morale, shaping his tone to sound like certainty in order to plant doubt, hoping they might retreat as well.

But it made no dent. The Umbraens moved with the same steady footwork, their eyes as cold as before.

"Our Lord is as wise as he is strong. Why do you think he sent us here to do the job?" Nochtar laughed in a pleased and mocking way, the sound riding lightly over the clash of metal.

Meanwhile, the other 2 started to move to trap Malrik in a three-way pincer, their angles tightening with each step until escape vectors pinched down to nothing.

"So you thought everything through, huh?" Malrik finally understood he could not avoid a fight. The heat still charging on his fists deepened shade by shade until it started to turn magma red, a molten glow that licked over his knuckles and traced faint, wavering lines along his forearms.

He was fully aware that if the attacker had been Sevrak himself, the overlord of the Region, that surely would have drawn the Rank 5 Adept's attention again and could have given him enough reason to move and stop the fight. The political weight of an overlord was a lever that moved even the proud.

But when it came to low Rank 1 and Rank 2 attackers, even if the Wanderer Merchant had noticed the sneak attack, there was a low chance he would move himself to stop this once again.

It wasn't about laziness or unwillingness; it was a matter of honor to protect the image of someone at that level. No adult would want to be seen beating a child in the end.

"Enough chat. Go kill him. We need to end this before Liora Virell returns." Nochtar gave the command, and after he swung the spear in his hand once to test his balance and stance, feeling the shaft settle against his palm, he lunged forward with a clean, straight burst of speed.

Malrik gave a quick glance to all 3 sides, reading foot placement and shoulder tilt as he saw their attacks coming in synchronized fashion, each step designed to close his space.

He did not let that affect his judgment of the situation. He quickly decided it wasn't a move he could dodge. With his hands—where the heat was still rising and now fully charged, glowing completely crimson—he suddenly struck the ground with a great explosive sound, putting his whole weight behind the downward drive.

WHOOMPH!

With the sudden impact, the ground split under Malrik, a jagged seam racing outward while sand and dust rose in a rolling sheet and spread rapidly, making the 3 attackers stop their dash and cover their eyes against the blast.

They tried to look through the rising dust cloud, but there was no way to see or sense without appropriate investigative-type Spark skills. The world in their eyes became outlines and coughs while shapes smudged into moving shadows.

Then another big impact sound was heard. This time, it was as if the fists had hit something softer than the ground, a heavy, meaty thud that carried through the haze, and a humanoid voice followed, punched out of a gut.

"Blughrhh…" The sound of air suddenly emptying from a stomach came from one of the Umbraens. At the same time, his body was hurled out of the dust cloud.

He pinwheeled, struck a nearby sand pile, and only then stopped, half-buried and twisted at an awkward angle.

"Raw strength against defense, let's see which one comes out the victor." Malrik's voice was heard inside the dust cloud, this time more pleased, steady in a way that said he had found his rhythm.

He started to charge his fists with the skill once again, heat blooming back through his knuckles, and used his vision skill to find his enemy inside the dust cloud, moving once again for his next target.

But this time, while he tried to rush, he felt the ground turning soft like mud and his feet sinking. The next moment, a deep pain started to come from his feet as the surface bit like acid through leather and skin.

His momentum bled away with each step.

Damn… he understood instantly it was a skill the Umbraens used to turn the ground acidic and muddy to slow his movements, a terrain trap that punished forward pressure and fed on haste.

In that moment and situation, he then saw a figure attacking him from the side with a long spear, the tip cutting a clean line through the dust like a dark needle.

The attacker was Nochtar, and apparently, he was also using a skill to see inside the dust cloud, his aim too sure to be guesswork.

Malrik, feeling he could not avoid this attack easily, quickly deactivated his attack skill; his fists rapidly lost heat and returned to normal as the glow peeled away.

Then he activated another skill, and his left arm suddenly began to transform, the change starting at the shoulder and rolling down like a living wave.

His whole arm suddenly swelled and began to lengthen and grow, tearing the cloth around it stitch by stitch, becoming like a huge, hairy, muscular gorilla arm.

Veins ridged the surface, the wrist thickened, and the fingers broadened into heavy knuckles meant for crushing.

The change completed in a heartbeat, and he brought the arm around, using its length to cut across the thrust at the last instant before the spear tip reached his throat, turning the spearhead aside with a sharp, jarring smack.

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