Chapter 509: When Corpses Touched the Sky (3)

— Day Nineteen —

“Frey… why do you wear that mask?”

Ghost asked me this during the next battle against the Ultras.

He fought through my shadow, so he was always very close to me on the battlefield.

“It helps me suppress my emotions.”

That was my answer.

I don’t know when exactly it started, but the Nameless mask I once feared… had somehow become like a sedative—one that numbed all the unnecessary thoughts that had been plaguing my mind lately.

It helped me… a lot.

When I said that, I noticed a hint of pain flash across Ghost’s face.

But he didn’t say a word.

He simply kept supporting me from the shadows, as we slaughtered more and more enemies.

The battle flowed smoothly.

All eight of the remaining soldiers .. except for Celine ..had surpassed the S+ rank, which made them capable of surviving on their own.

Since Sansa and I always handled the strongest foes, the survival of the others was almost guaranteed, so long as they knew how to maneuver the fight.

But even they began to suffer injuries once the enemy swarmed them with overwhelming numbers.

It seemed… they had finally reached their limit.

…

— Day Twenty —

Between mountains of corpses and walls made of the dead…

I stood with the remaining survivors of my unit, watching as waves of enemies marched toward us.

It seemed the Ultras had finally decided to focus all their forces on us.

“Lord Starlight… thank you. Thank you for preparing the perfect stage of death for this old woman.”

Standing beside me, Zenith smiled at death as she spoke.

The rest of the squad looked just as ready.

Seeing their final resolve, I gave a nod and placed the Nameless mask over my face.

“At the very least… kill as many of them as you can before you die.”

Harsh as my words might’ve sounded, every single one of them shouted in unison…

“Understood!”

They were a true group of madmen.

Uriel pulled the trembling Celine close to her side, while I ..as always—took the front.

Today… we would unleash another massacre.

With a dented shield, a torn cloak, and a mask stained with blood…

With cursed black swords that brought only death and ruin…

I charged again, letting this dead land of the Ultras soak up even more of its people’s fresh blood.

But this time, the battle was on a completely different scale.

It felt like the entire Ultras vanguard had been summoned here… even the candidates for the rank of Emperion had arrived.

I fought with everything I had, unleashing Ignition alongside Nameless Judgement multiple times…

Sansa, too, extended her shadows and drained all her energy…

I saw Uriel push her sacred power to its limit, manifesting a strange angel behind her .. any who approached her were burned alive by the mysterious light it radiated…

The rest of my squad fought like monsters, delivering a breathtaking display of brutality.

This was without a doubt… our longest battle. A painful, merciless war.

…

Falling to my knees, I stabbed my swords deep into the ground…

I fought the violent trembling in my body, panting nonstop, desperate to breathe in even a sliver of air…

But all that filled my lungs was the thick, bloody mist .. more fog than air.

The battle… had finally ended.

It had lasted until morning.

We held our ground for yet another day.

But once again, our numbers had dwindled.

When I turned around to check what was left behind me, I found myself surrounded by so many Ultras corpses that locating the surviving members of my squad took a great deal of time.

The only ones near me were Sansa and Ghost. So I struggled to find the rest.

Through the slits of the Nameless mask, I checked them one by one…

Just as she wished… Zenith had died on the battlefield, lying there in a pool of her own blood, a massive crater tearing through her chest.

Of the eight who had chosen to join me, five were dead, and three had survived.

I found Grim sitting alone, whispering prayers.

His body was covered in countless wounds .. one so severe it had split his face and destroyed his right eye.

And yet, despite everything, he sat peacefully among the dead… praying in silence.

Morval had also survived, but had collapsed from blood loss. He had lost an arm and a leg…

Grim and Morval were the strongest among the eight .. so their survival didn’t surprise me.

But what did surprise me… was Celine still being alive, protected by Uriel.

The latter had managed to fend off every attacker thanks to that strange angel she summoned from nothingness.

Her power exceeded my expectations by far… but I was genuinely relieved she survived.

Taking a deep breath, I spoke, my voice heavy with exhaustion ..

“Get ready. I doubt the Ultras will launch any more attacks. So we’ll be moving out again soon.”

After launching such a massive assault, it was unlikely they would continue attacking.

This was the perfect chance to advance after being stuck in this cursed place for far too long…

So long that the mountains of corpses seemed to threaten the sky itself…

But then, I felt Ghost’s hand on my shoulder.

“We won’t be able to go any farther, Frey… the main forces have already caught up to us.”

His words snapped me out of my daze, and that’s when I realized they had arrived.

“The Imperial Forces…”

“We killed so many of them, Frey, that the Ultras were forced to focus all their vanguard on us… which meant there was no one left to stop the Empire from advancing.”

While we held them off here for days… the Empire pushed forward without needing to fight.

“We’ve carried the weight of this war alone.”

Ghost said, just as the Imperial troops drew closer and closer…

That night…

A new legend spread across the world.

The tale of a single squad… that held off the Ultras’ vanguard for twenty full days.