Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
The sound of massive cannon fire echoed from all directions.
Kali shouted to the Atlas soldiers.
"Magical beasts are swarming from the front again! Load the shells!"
The powerful magic defensive circle installed on the outskirts of Atlas had been shattered long ago.
Because of that, they had to hold off the charging magical beasts with conventional weapons while the mages recovered their mana.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
The shells fired from atop the ramparts fell toward the black horde of approaching magical beasts.
Whoooosh!
The flying shells detonated in mid-air, splitting into smaller orbs that scattered in all directions and rained down over the magical beasts' heads.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
The impact proved tremendous. These weren't ordinary shells; they were special munitions crafted with mana stones to strike a wide area.
They had been provided to Atlas's defense forces by Nemesis, who had been refining weapons against magical beasts alongside Hades.
Nemesis had deployed not just these special shells but a variety of weapons in the field, preventing the magical beasts from breaching Atlas.
Without Nemesis's armaments, Atlas would have fallen long ago.
At that moment, a long-armed magical beast dodged the shells and began scaling the ramparts.
Graaaargh!
Unlike typical magical beasts, outsider-species magical beasts had varied wildly in appearance and type, which made weak points hard to pinpoint. For regular soldiers who could not use aura, they proved a grueling foe.
Kali drew her sword and charged straight at the magical beast clambering up the ramparts.
"Haaah!"
A vivid Aura Blade surged from her sword.
The Aura Blade on her sword severed the arm gripping the ramparts.
Slaaash!
The maimed magical beast plummeted from the ramparts.
Thud!
Its body burst upon hitting the ground, splattering violet fluids everywhere.
But soon, the magical beast's corpse began to twitch.
Screeech—
The shattered fragments of its body squirmed and, astonishingly, fused together, reforming into a new shape different from before and starting to move.
That wasn't all.
Some pieces even merged with debris from other dead magical beasts below the ramparts, rebirthing as entirely new ones.
Grroowl!
The newly formed magical beasts soon attempted to scale the ramparts again.
Seeing this, Kali gritted her teeth and yelled.
"They're climbing the ramparts! Bring water!"
At Kali's command, soldiers hauled large pots of water and poured them over the ramparts.
Sploosh!
The magical beasts were drenched by the cascading water.
Then the soldiers brought long iron rods and pressed their tips against the wet ramparts.
Zzzzt! Zzzzt! Zzzzt!
Plasma currents flowed from the ends of the rods held by the soldiers.
The electricity conducted through the poured water, reaching the magical beasts at the base.
Zzzzt! Zzzzt! Zzzzt!
Electrocuted, the magical beasts went rigid and fell from the ramparts, paralyzed.
Thud!
The scattered fragments lay still, as if dead.
But once the paralysis wore off, they would merge with the debris again to form new magical beasts, just like before.
At that moment, something enormous appeared from behind.
"Help!"
It was barbarians carrying baskets filled with liquid-laden balloons on their backs.
Riding on King's Fist's shoulders, the mischievous genius alchemist twins Al and Jeff shouted.
"Splash 'em! Splash 'em!"
"Throw! Throw!"
Following Al and Jeff's words, the barbarians began hurling the balloons toward the magical beasts below the ramparts.
Sizzle!
The balloons burst, scattering their contents everywhere.
The debris hit by the solution stopped moving entirely and melted away.
Seeing this, Al and Jeff burst into satisfied laughter.
"Kahaha! Success!"
"We're geniuses, after all!"
While staying in Atlas and working with Feynen to develop various potions, Al and Jeff had urgently researched a venom effective against outsider-species magical beasts and produced test batches.
The soldiers, confirming the solution's effect nearby, rushed to the baskets the barbarians had brought, grabbed balloons, and flung them at the magical beast remnants.
Sizzle—
The magical beasts that had been resurrecting and climbing the ramparts melted away, finally quelling the immediate crisis.
Having verified the test product's success, Al and Jeff shouted excitedly.
"It's a success, so mass production!"
"No! Make it even more potent and mass produce!"
The two, grinning with excitement, spoke to King's Fist in the barbarians' tongue.
"King's Fist! Help!"
"Again carry!"
King's Fist, who got along well with the twin troublemakers, leaped down from the ramparts with them on his shoulders and dashed straight toward the laboratory.
With Al and Jeff's help stabilizing the front temporarily, Kali could finally exhale and lean against the wall.
That's when someone approached her.
"Family Head."
It was Boris, the head of Nemesis.
Boris, facing Kali, remained expressionless, but his eyes betrayed deep fatigue.
While Kali and the Draker knights held the ramparts against the onslaught from outside, Nemesis guarded invisible routes like the city's underground waterways.
Shadia's assassins from Nemesis waged a fierce daily war in the city's shadows.
Thanks to the weapons Hades, Feynen, and Gelion had created together, they had held out this long, but it seemed they were reaching their limit.
Boris looked at Kali and said.
"Our supplies are running critically low. Without external aid... Atlas won't last the week."
Atlas was Midland's premier metropolis.
As such, it had a massive population and was filled more with consumption facilities than production ones.
Isolated and cut off from the outside, resources depleted at an alarming rate.
The production facilities in the surrounding outskirts had been destroyed by magical beasts, and the rail lines for transporting goods were all blocked, leaving no way to receive supplies.
Kali furrowed her brow at Boris's words and spoke slowly.
"If we release the military supplies stored in the Four Seasons Star, we can hold out a bit longer."
She had decided to commit all of Draker's resources to defending Atlas.
A choice the former Family Head, Arthur Draker, would never have made.
Boris respected Kali's decision but pointed out the lack of alternatives.
"The black knights of Midland have been killed or gone missing, and Battle King Rex Thurn is injured and unable to move. Even releasing Draker's stockpiles, holding out more than three days will be difficult."
When Midland came under attack from magical beasts, Rex Thurn, head of the Thurn family and Draker's blood oath ally, had led his knights to enter Atlas.
But during the entry, they were ambushed by a mysterious group.
Thanks to the sacrifice of the Thurn knights, Rex Thurn barely made it into Atlas and had been transported to the central headquarters 'Tera,' deemed the safest location.
There, Feynen and the naga healers were doing everything to treat him, but no one knew how long full recovery would take.
After a moment of silence, Kali asked Boris.
"The portals to the outside still aren't functioning?"
The only way out of isolated Atlas was through portals.
But for some reason, the portals in Atlas weren't working at all.
As a major hub city in Midland and the central continent, Atlas had been connected by portals to locations across the continent, but with the devices inoperable, neither entry nor exit was possible.
Boris shook his head at Kali's question.
"There's still no sign of recovery. Feynen has been checking continuously, but... based on the situation so far, it's not a device malfunction. It seems an external mana field is isolating Atlas and interfering with the portals."
The portals enabling large-scale spatial movement were ancient relics that had been excavated and refined for use.
As such, activating them had required a tremendous amount of mana.
To deploy a mana field strong enough to disrupt the portals from outside, an even greater, continuous supply of mana would have been needed. Yet how that was possible remained a mystery. For now, with the source, location, and method unknown, countermeasures proved impossible.
Kali bit her lip hard.
"There's no way?"
"Not at present."
Boris looked at Kali and spoke in a subdued voice.
"Family Head, before it's too late, we must break an escape route and evacuate at least the key forces from the city."
Even minimizing casualties and holding on like this, food would eventually run out, rendering knights and soldiers unable to fight.
Holding out without external help wasn't viable long-term.
Strategically, Boris judged that Kali and the Draker knights should escape Atlas and join the continental allied forces.
Kali hardened her expression and shook her head at his words.
"We can't do that."
"I understand your feelings. But if we stay, not just the Draker Knight Order but all of
Atlas's citizens will be massacred by the magical beasts." Better to take the risk than face total annihilation.
Even if it failed, preserving the main forces would be preferable in the long run—that was Boris's view.
Under Arthur Draker's leadership, Draker would have acted on Boris's judgment.
But Kali had ascended to Family Head to reform such inhumane practices.
Thus, she intended to uphold the responsibility of her words.
She told Boris.
"Atlas will be defended by me and Draker to the end. Boris, take Nemesis's personnel and leave to inform the outside of the situation here."
Conversely, Kali believed Boris and Nemesis escaping would be better. As the war dragged on, the role of intelligence units grew more crucial.
Moreover, she recalled that even if she fell here, someone capable of succeeding as Draker's Family Head existed.
'Zeke.'
The knight of knights, most fitting for the Draker name.
She saw her role as defending Atlas to the last, elevating the Draker family's honor.
That way, Zeke, the next Family Head, could claim the justification to lead the continental allied forces as Draker's head.
Boris instantly grasped the intent hidden in Kali's words.
He realized she hoped, in this dire situation, to sacrifice herself so all continental knights would rally around Zeke.
"Family Head..."
At that moment, a drumbeat resounded from the watchtower.
"Magical beasts! More magical beasts incoming!" Kali gripped her sword again and rose.
Turning toward the ramparts, she said to Boris.
"My place is here. Before it's too late, leave quickly and report the situation. To save
Atlas's citizens, we must act as fast as possible."
Boris fell silent at Kali's words, then bowed his head and turned away.
It was a gesture of respect for the noble knight willing to sacrifice herself to see her will through.
Boris resolved to lead Nemesis's key members out of Atlas and relay the crisis to the continental allied forces as swiftly as possible.
But then.
Tzzzzzt—
Suddenly, a black hole appeared in the sky over Atlas.
Everyone in Atlas stared at the black hole in the sky.
"W-What's that?"
"A hole just...?"
The black hole expanded, soon large enough to engulf all of Atlas.
Then, an eerie sound emanated from within.
Ooooooo!
An ominous rumble, as if from deep in a vast cavern, echoed across the entire city.
Moments later, something began to emerge from the hole.
Screeeeech!
Grotesque winged outsider-species magical beasts poured out in a black swarm from the void.