The sudden, violent detonation jolted Jeanne awake from her groggy slumber. Almost instantly, she noted that the personnel across the caravan were reacting with exceptional fluidity, shifting directly into a high-readiness combat formation. It was blindingly obvious they had maintained a massive layer of baseline vigilance regarding potential ambushes in this sector.
"Those damn bastards are at it again! Someone quickly verify if we're dealing with the Beggars or those localized Locusts!" the Lupo vanguard leader bellowed, his hands firmly gripping a massive war hammer.
Across the perimeter, the advancing transport vehicles rapidly maneuvered into a tight defensive phalanx. Every driver and guard dialed their psychological focus to the absolute maximum, scanning the barren wasteland to isolate the exact coordinates of the incoming threat.
By this point, Jeanne and Kal'tsit had stepped out of their respective cabins to evaluate the battlefield. To an untrained eye, neither of them looked like individuals who excelled at raw, unmitigated violence. However, if the hidden attackers chose to operate under that catastrophic miscalculation, they would find themselves clearing the bureaucratic paperwork for their next reincarnation cycles in short order!
After all, one of these individuals was an entity fully capable of matching an Emperor's Blade in a localized stalemate, while the other was a terrifying powerhouse capable of systematically beating an Emperor's Blade into a state of absolute, helpless submission. Strictly speaking, these two casual passengers represented the most horrifying, apocalyptic hidden raid bosses situated anywhere across this entire territory!
"Maintain your awareness," Kal'tsit advised, her voice a calm oasis amidst the mounting chaos. "This is a localized assault targeting the logistics column. The exact faction tracking our coordinates remains unverified for the moment, though the structural probability points heavily toward Sarkaz Drifters."
"Sarkaz Drifters"—this was the formal classification for the demographic the Lupo commander had just disparagingly labeled "Locusts." The term was fundamentally a derogatory slang placeholder utilized by veterans of the wasteland. These individuals were essentially dregs who lacked the raw psychological fortitude to enlist within professional mercenary regiments, leaving them with zero economic alternatives save for executing cowardly raids against small, defenseless merchant fleets.
Yet, despite their classification as low-tier dregs, they still possessed the brutally efficient physical templates inherent to the Sarkaz race. When coupled with the weaponized Originium Arts amplified by their Oripathy status, they represented an existential nightmare that an ordinary baseline merchant company could fundamentally never hope to repel. For a standard caravan, simply escaping a encounter with them with their lives intact qualified as a monumental stroke of luck.
Their entire socioeconomic survival strategy mimicked the behavioral patterns of a locust swarm; they would aggressively descend upon a supply column packed with rich rations, systematically strip the machinery clean of every tangible asset, and instantly vanish back into the wilderness to hunt down their subsequent target.
Furthermore, Jeanne vividly recalled a past briefing from Mudrock detailing how specific radicalized Drifter wouldn't even spare the physical lives of their captives. They would systematically execute their prisoners, dehydrating the remains to serve as a localized layer of emergency rations for their subsequent transits.
Evaluating their operational methodology, the derogatory moniker of "Demons" utilized by the wider global populaces felt entirely justified.
Filtering through these mental data files regarding the potential identity of the incoming hostiles, Jeanne summoned her signature blade into her palm, her body language shifting into a state of heightened combat readiness as she monitored the perimeter.
Even if the attackers ultimately proved to be a thoroughly weak batch of low-tier rabble, that reality would never serve as a valid justification for Jeanne to exhibit a single fraction of operational complacency.
Naturally, she made zero effort to conceal the manifestation of her weaponry from Kal'tsit. An anomalous phenomenon of that nature was impossible to camouflage anyway. Besides, given Kal'tsit's hyper-analytical intellect, the doctor had likely deduced Jeanne possessed a multitude of supernatural traits days ago, deliberately choosing to withhold direct questioning out of baseline diplomatic respect.
Sure enough, Kal'tsit merely watched the sudden materialization of the holy blade with a trace of clinical curiosity dancing behind her eyes. She could state with absolute diagnostic certainty that this phenomenon shared zero structural commonalities with any recognized school of Originium Arts; it was undoubtedly another localized anomaly tethered directly to Jeanne's unique personal template.
However, the current tactical window offered zero luxury to hyper-focus on esoteric anomalies. Suddenly, the flesh across Kal'tsit's upper back rippled as if a hidden, ancient entity had violently snapped awake beneath her skin, a grotesque, massive protrusion rapidly reshaping her silhouette.
In a matter of breaths, Kal'tsit's backless medical attire served its structural purpose as a hulking, pitch-black biomechanical monstrosity tore its way free from her spine. The entity's chassis gleamed with a deep, dark emerald-green tint, its armored plating aggressively reflecting the harsh rays of the afternoon sun.
This was Kal'tsit's primary summon, Mon3tr. Under standard operational conditions, the creature remained entirely dormant, slung directly inside the matrix of Kal'tsit's spinal column. This specific biological reality was the precise reason the doctor universally favored a wardrobe that completely exposed her upper back; it prevented the creature's high-velocity deployment from systematically obliterating her clothing.
The sheer martial pressure radiating from these two women instantly surpassed the collective combat presence of the entire logistics guard detail combined. Completely unbothered by the inherent danger of exposing her silhouette, Jeanne vaulted directly onto the reinforced roof of the lead transport vehicle, initiating a top-down scouting sweep of the surrounding terrain. She quickly noted that the hidden hostiles were utilizing the natural contours of the valley with exceptional precision; this was clearly a thoroughly premeditated ambush.
Whist—!
Right as Jeanne was standing tall on the roof analyzing the coordinates, a microscopic, high-velocity whistling sound—virtually imperceptible to standard biological ears—pierced the soundscape, locking directly onto her position. Jeanne's reactive instincts flared instantly.
Without a single trace of erratic motion, she merely extended her bare left hand and closed her fingers with casual elegance. A heavy, high-velocity crossbow bolt—engineered with enough raw kinetic energy to effortlessly punch a hole completely through her cranium—was suddenly brought to an absolute, grinding halt, pinned immovably within her palm. From the absolute initiation to the final completion of the catch, Jeanne's eyes never once drifted toward the physical coordinates where the projectile had been launched.
"What kind of unholy monster is that?!" the hidden sniper embedded within the jagged rocks hissed under his breath, a wave of profound terror seizing his nervous system. He possessed an intimate understanding of the raw lethality backing his weapon; a direct hit from that customized rig was structurally rated to punch cleanly through the reinforced helmets of elite Sarkaz shock troopers. Had he accidentally consumed an excessive volume of high-proof alcohol prior to deployment? Was he actively hallucinating?
"We have a hostile sniper embedded along that elevated ridge line! Everyone maintain your defensive angles!" Jeanne called out, lifting her hand high to showcase the trapped crossbow bolt to the defensive squads clustered below.
This tactical outcome was the precise reason she had deliberately chosen to plant her silhouette atop the highest point of the transport vehicle. She wanted to transform her own person into a massive, undeniable lightning rod, systematically drawing the hidden attackers' initial opening volleys directly onto her position. After all, when presented with a completely stationary, high-profile target like that, what sniper could possibly resist the urge to pull the trigger?
Unfortunately for the ambushers, an individual backed by the absolute clarity of Revelation and hyper-acute sensory perception was fundamentally immune to primitive assassination protocols. To be frank, these guys were standard highway thugs, not elite operators from the shadow factions; attempting to successfully catch her off-guard would require a few centuries of rigorous, consecutive training!
Down below, the caravan guards stared open-mouthed at the heavy bolt pinned between Jeanne's fingers, their eyes rapidly tracking toward the sector she was pointing out. A collective wave of cold sweat broke out across the crew; had her manual coordination drifted by even a millimeter, she would have been logging a direct departure ticket to the afterlife.
Or perhaps it was more accurate to state that this young lady possessed a level of martial prowess that completely justified her insane confidence? But seriously—how on earth did she physically catch that thing with her bare hands? If someone had told them she used a shield to deflect it, that would at least sit within the boundaries of objective reality!
Jeanne harbored zero intention of lounging around idle after issuing her warning. Her sensory grid had already mapped out the exact coordinates of the enemy's staging ground; the pocket they had selected was remarkably well-hidden beneath the natural terrain, making standard visual confirmation exceptionally difficult under normal parameters.
With a fluid flourish, Jeanne swung her blade downward, the tip of her steel pointing directly toward the hidden nest. A few guards watched her theatrical gesture with a trace of curiosity, entirely unable to comprehend what a girl standing on a roof hoped to accomplish by simply pointing a sword at a distant hill.
"AAAGHH! GOD, MY LEG! I'M HIT!"
Along the precise ridge line Jeanne's blade had targeted—a small earthen berm situated a modest distance away—the ambushers' hidden sanctuary instantly mutated into an absolute slaughterhouse.
A Sarkaz thug stared with unadulterated horror as the comrade collapsed beside him, his entire lower limb suddenly skewered and pinned to the earth by a cluster of massive, pitch-black iron thorns that had erupted violently out of the barren soil without a single trace of warning. The wounded man shrieked in absolute agony, but zero personnel within his squad made a move to assist; the entire unit was scrambling backward in a state of primitive panic, desperate to distance themselves from the anomaly.
It wasn't that these Drifters had never witnessed anomalous Originium Arts before, but an execution methodology capable of dealing catastrophic, lethal damage across this structural distance—packaged in such a visually terrifying, abrupt manifestation—shattered their psychological resolve completely.
The collective drive to abandon the operation instantly seized their hearts. At the end of the day, these men were cowards who explicitly lacked the internal fortitude to engage in symmetric military warfare; had they possessed even a single shred of authentic martial courage, they would have signed on with a professional mercenary company instead of executing gutter raids.
Before they could even coordinate a retreat vector, a secondary wave of black thorns erupted from the earth with an even more horrifying density. The sheer saturation of the spike field left these massive, hulking Sarkaz bodies with literally zero physical space to execute a evasion maneuver; every single combatant within the pocket found their torso or limbs forcefully impaled by multiple iron shafts.
In an instant, a chorus of agonizing, blood-curdling shrieks resonated across the desolate canyon. This specific batch of thugs was remarkably unlucky; due to the structural distance separating their ridge from the transport vehicle, Jeanne lacked the precise visual resolution required to execute targeted, pinpoint executions.
Consequently, she had opted for a standard saturation-bombardment protocol. Since she couldn't guarantee that every single black thorn would score a direct hit on a vital organ, a substantial portion of the raiding party found themselves brutally pinned through their extremities or torso, trapped in a agonizing state of suspended animation without dying instantly.
The sheer, spectral horror of those collective screams caused a cold shiver to run down the spines of the logistics caravan guards below. Exactly what kind of unmitigated torment was unfolding up on that ridge to force a hardened demographic like the Sarkaz to manifest such thoroughly wretched, pathetic wails?
A sea of eyes slowly shifted upward, locking directly onto Jeanne's serene silhouette on the roof. Every single veteran present had already deduced that this cataclysmic intervention was entirely her handiwork, yet their minds remained completely incapable of parsing the underlying methodology behind her power.
"Do we require a couple of living assets to conduct a formal battlefield interrogation?" Jeanne called down from her perch, her tone casual. It was entirely ambiguous whether her query was directed toward the Lupo vanguard leader or explicitly intended for Kal'tsit's ears.
Jeanne figured that Kal'tsit or the logistics commanders might desire to verify exactly which localized warlord or syndicate had authorized the strike. As for the concept of actively sparing these thugs' lives out of baseline mercy? During her extended operational deployment across the northern frozen tundras, Patriot had hammered that specific lesson into her consciousness on a dozen separate occasions: Never harbor naive illusions of mercy toward the predators of the wastelands.
An enemy of that nature would never experience a surge of profound gratitude for your restraint; they would merely mock your primitive stupidity the moment they slipped their chains. When dealing with thugs who actively choose to block a highway to execute a lethal raid, mercy was a luxury that carried zero practical value.
For a brief interval, a heavy silence dominated the caravan below as the guards processed her prompt. Under standard doctrine, it was certainly wise to verify the identity of an attacking force, but evaluating the sheer lethality of the current situation, prioritizing absolute security by leaving zero loose ends felt vastly superior.
"There is zero structural necessity to retain living assets. These entities represent nothing more than opportunistic scavengers waiting in ambush. Cleanse the sector completely," Kal'tsit declared, her voice slicing cleanly through the hesitation of the crowd.
Hearing the doctor's absolute verdict, the remaining guards offered zero objections.
"Understood!"
With a final, sweep of her sword, Jeanne triggered a secondary protocol. The entire targeted ridge line instantly dissolved into a raging, apocalyptic inferno, the specialized holy fire incinerating the entire batch of wounded hostiles into absolute ash in a matter of fractions.
The rapid thermal surge simultaneously triggered a sequence of sharp, secondary detonations across the target zone—clearly cooking off a cache of crude Originium explosives the raiders had stockpiled for the ambush. Fortunately, before they ever possessed the operational window to launch those volatile payloads into the logistics column, their entire unit had been systematically wiped from the face of the earth.