Miles away, in a chamber insulated from the slaughter, the core of the Naberius elite had been locked in tense negotiations with the Old Satan/king faction, debating the political changes of a looming Asgardian alliance. When the frantic, blood-choked distress signal broke through their wards, the debate died instantly. Pride and fury took its place. They were the ancient House of Naberius. They would descend upon this intruder, display the overwhelming might of their birthright, and execute him.
In the blood-slicked courtyard, a dozen teleportation circles flared to life, casting harsh violet light across the mutilated corpses of their foot soldiers. The elites materialized in perfect formation, weapons drawn, familiars snarling, ready to deliver judgment.
They never even got to speak.
Jin was already in the air before the light faded. He dropped into the center of the formation like a stone, driving his heels into the chest of Takeshi Chiba. The Pawn's ribs shattered with a wet crunch, his lungs collapsing as Jin used the dying man's chest as a springboard. Jin blurred forward, ripping his sword across the throat of a nearby Bishop before the Devil could even raise his staff.
Blood sprayed in a hot arc. The Bishop dropped, gurgling, clutching his ruined neck.
"Formation! Fall back and form up!" yelled Koushiro Sibaya, a Rook, his face pale with shock at the sudden, undignified butchery. "You coward! Stand and face us with hon—"
Jin didn't let him finish. He closed the twenty-foot gap in a single, explosive burst of speed. He sheathed his sword, his demeanor shifting instantly. Gone was the evasive assassin; in his place stood a juggernaut. Koushiro swung a massive war hammer in a desperate arc.
Jin didn't dodge. He hardened his forearm and pump it with concentrated Touki, his skin taking on a jaged pattern. The hammer slammed into Jin's guard with a deafening crack, but it was the weapon's haft that splintered. Jin stepped inside the Rook's guard, seized the back of Koushiro's head with a vice-like grip, and drove his elbow into the man's face.
Bone turned to powder. Koushiro's skull caved in with a sickening crunch, and Jin carelessly discarded the limp, twitching body.
"Kill him! Tear him apart!" screeched a Knight, rage overtaking him.
Three Devils rushed him simultaneously. Jin welcomed the violence. He ducked a sweeping blade, driving a hardened fist straight through a Knight's armored sternum. Without pausing to retract his arm, Jin pivoted, using the impaled Devil as a meat shield to block a spear thrust from behind. He snapped his leg out, shattering the spearman's knee, then grabbed the screaming man by the jaw and wrenched his neck until it snapped.
The brutality was suffocating. Panic infected the remaining. This wasn't how it was suppose to go. Two Pawns broke rank, trying to sprint toward the estate gates, tears of terror streaking their faces.
From the shadows of the courtyard pillars, three identical Jins stepped out.
The clones didn't charge. They moved with terrifying, unhurried grace, their hands weaving through seals in a blur. The crimson eyes of the clones spun, casting a wide-area Genjutsu directly into the path of the fleeing Devils.
The Pawns skidded to a halt, their eyes dilating in horror. To them, the iron gates twisted into massive, writhing serpents, and their own allies morphed into demonic, shadow-drenched versions of the intruder.
"Get away from me!" one screamed, wildly swinging his broadsword, cleaving into the shoulder of his fellow Pawn.
"It's me! Stop, it's me!" the other shrieked, bleeding out as they hacked each other to pieces in the dirt, completely oblivious to the real world. The clones simply watched, tossing a volley of kunai tied with explosive tags into the center of the remaining elites, blasting their formations apart before seamlessly weaving wind jutsu to fan the resulting flames.
From a high balcony obscured by a perception filter, the Ace and the Heir of the Naberius clan watched the massacre unfold. The Heir was trembling, but the Ace's eyes were narrowed, tracking the chaos with cold, analytical precision.
She watched Jin—the real Jin, the one coated in blood—take a point-blank blast of demonic fire from the Djinn Knight, Ignus Danhash. The main body simply walked through the inferno, his skin hardened by Touki, completely ignoring the heat. Jin grabbed Ignus by the throat, lifted him off the ground, and slammed him repeatedly into a stone pillar until the Djinn stopped twitching.
He's not casting, the Ace realized, her mind racing. The main body... it's pure physical force. Brute strength, momentum, and hardening. But the ones casting the illusions and the fire...
She looked at the edges of the battlefield. A clone was weaving a water dragon, perfectly countering a counter-attack from Scylla. Scylla's water whip lashed out, catching the clone in the chest. Instead of bleeding, the clone erupted in a puff of white smoke.
The contradiction was glaring. The main body was an unstoppable, brawling tank that used no magic. The clones were fragile, evasive spellcasters pulling the strings.
The Ace tapped her temple, linking her mind to the surviving elites via a telepathic network.
"Listen to me! Stop fighting the phantoms! The clones will shatter with a single solid hit! The main body is only using physical reinforcement—he has no magical defense! Box him in! Force him to a standstill!"
The revelation sparked a surge of coordinated desperation among the survivors. Alasdair Ruthven, a Dhampir Rook, roared an order, rallying the remaining Knights and Bishops.
They changed tactics instantly. Wide-area, sweeping elemental blasts cleared the courtyard edges, popping Jin's shadow clones in rapid succession. Clouds of white smoke hissed across the stones. Before Jin could weave signs to create more, Alasdair and two heavily armored Knights crashed into him.
Jin's momentum stalled but he took out a moment and weave the jutsu to try to hold other , the clone spread to stop weakling to also join the fight. He caught a sweeping greatsword with his bare, hardened palms, the friction sparking wildly, but a second blade slashed across his thigh, drawing a thin line of blood. For the first time, he was forced back. He delivered a crushing kick to a Knight's chest, sending him flying, but Alasdair immediately stepped into the gap, thrusting a spear that Jin had to deflect with his forearm.
The fluid, relentless chain of Jin's attacks broke down into a grinding, brutal deadlock. He was trapped in a meat grinder of flashing steel and coordinated strikes, his hardened body tanking glancing blows while he systematically broke bones to survive. He was holding his own, but he was pinned.
It was exactly the opening the Ace had engineered.
Without a sound, she dropped from the balcony. As she fell, mana surged through her veins, condensing around her arm into a blinding, highly compressed blade of swirling fire and jagged, crackling lightning. She aimed perfectly for the blind spot at the back of Jin's neck, striking precisely at the moment his hands were occupied parrying Alasdair's heavy strike.
She descended like a meteor, her elemental blade screaming through the air, aimed directly at the unarmored flesh meant to sever his head from his shoulders.
"Did it work?" -Yes.