Sylas took a deep breath in as he appeared before the gate in what looked like a flashstep. His Aether whirled around him with a great sharpness, and suddenly black scales erupted across his skin.

<Psychedelic Punch>.

Basic Aetherflow rolled and rumbled.

BOOM!

The sudden attack rocked the night. The heavy gates trembled before they were suddenly blown off their hinges. Without the protection of a formation, the doors were just normal thick wood. Although it was impossible for Sylas to destroy them with his current strength, if it was just a matter of forcing their mechanisms to snap and fail…

He could do that ten times over.

The black scales vanished from Sylas, and the Basilisk King suddenly appeared by his side. They rushed forward together and unleashed a slaughter, killing five guards before they even knew what happened. Three more died simply due to the weight of the door falling on them from above.

In what felt like a few blinks, the entire city was thrown into a state of absolute turmoil.

'Time to go,' Sylas thought.

He took the Basilisk King away and rushed out into the night. But he didn't forget to store away the two large doors he had flung from their hinges. If he just left them here, it would be too easy for the Hobgoblins to put them back up. By then, what would have been the point of all of this?

'They don't have as many sieging weapons as the pig demons had. As expected, Archibald and Azrael were two anomalies. Normal villages at this level won't have so many defenses. That makes things far easier.'

He had come here alone first to make the next assault easier, and second to double-check if they would have to deal with rapid-fire ballista units. Since they didn't have to, the rest would be far more straightforward.

...

[Kargan (FFF-)]

[Level: 17]

[Physical: 297]

[Mental: 323]

[Will: 288]

—

Kargan woke up with a start and was immediately infuriated when he learned what happened. Who dared to attack his village like this?!

However, after having such thoughts, he calmed down. This person had attacked so swiftly, and they came from the front gate before retreating even more swiftly.

Something was fishy about this. They were likely to be preparing for another attack.

"Gather up the army! Prepare for an enemy attack!"

Kargan did the opposite of what the enemy likely thought he would do. He didn't chase. Instead, he gathered up his men and prepared them for battle.

The hobgoblins were about 5'7" to 5'9" in height. They had fierce red skin that looked as though they had just been boiled alive, and their ears stood tall and sharp. When they were gathered together, wearing matching leather armor, it looked as though they were an army of demons that had just marched out from the gates of hell…

But it was all useless.

They waited for hours, but the army Kargan was expecting didn't come.

The hobgoblin leader could only feel more and more humiliated as the time ticked on.

'Was it a one-time attack, or?'

No, that was impossible. Kargan didn't believe that this was the end of it. That meant that, more likely than not, this person was going to use hit-and-run tactics.

'If they're using hit-and-run tactics, then their next attack should come at an optimal time and there'll be no more optimal time than…'

Kargan's eyes landed on the broken gates, and he realized something. No wonder. This mysterious enemy wanted to attack again likely when they were focused on fixing their gates.

'In that case, I'll leave a little trap for them.'

Kargan sneered, feeling that he understood what the real plan was now.

The hobgoblins began to fix the gates, but from the outside, no one could tell that it was actually the elite guards of Kargan who were doing this manual labor. Not only that… but that was only just the first layer of traps that Kargan had laid.

...

Sylas approached the village again. As expected, they were focused on rebuilding the gate now after wasting an entire night. There was a cold indifference in his eyes as things continued to go to plan.

As the sun began to set, he prepared to attack again. When the first light of the moon shone, he bolted forward.

However, while Kargan was expecting an attack on the workers fixing the gates, Sylas approached from the river. He dove down below and laid eyes on three protector beasts.

—

[Megapiranha (FFF-)]

[Level: 15]

[Physical: 341]

[Mental: 299]

[Will: 273]

—

It was an extinct breed of piranha. They were almost a meter long, and their ferociousness seemed to have been dialed up to an extreme.

The moment they sensed Sylas, they went rabid, and the water began to churn.

'Three of them…' Sylas' eyes couldn't help but narrow. Still, he was prepared.

The Megapiranha were fast and their teeth were powerful, but their Constitution was definitely their weakest stat.

The moment they appeared around Sylas, he moved. He took out three Ice-Poison pouches and threw them into the open maws of the fish.

The change wasn't instantaneous, so they had already appeared before him. They bit down, looking to shred him apart from three different regions.

Sylas' gaze flashed and he unleashed a prepared Skill. <Astral Bound> collided with the piranha that gave him the most pressure, then he easily slipped out of the way of the last two.

He moved and dodged smoothly, not attacking directly so that the commotion in the water would be the weakest possible.

As expected, by the third exchange, the piranhas began to move with far less speed. By the sixth, a chilling cold had begun to come from them, and by the tenth, ice was already crackling over their scales.

Blue runes drilled through their bodies and eventually froze them all the way through.

They stopped moving, falling to the bottom of the ocean silently.

After double-checking that they were dead and storing them away, Sylas' eyes slowly peeked out of the water.