Chapter 26: The strength of a soldier

Narrator's Pov

The fight started quickly...

Svarog quickly pointed at the group of guards making quite a lot of missiles to come out from his back flying directly at them, Gepard rose up his shield protecting various guards, the missiles impacted causing various explosions and covering them in a cloud of smoke.

From the smoke, 3 projectiles came out flying towards the group, Ryan reacted quickly enough to back away and create a magical circle in front of them blocking the attacks that exploded, 4 guards with halberds came out running from the cloud of smoke, with 2 bigger guards with grenade launchers behind them.

Ryan dissipated the magic circle in front of them and clapped his hands, creating a magic circle under his companions that made their bodies glow slightly green.

"Everyone's faster now!"

Dan Heng quickly dashed towards the guards, his body moving weirdly faster than usual due to Ryan's buff spell, he turned into a green blur that quickly striked three guards, Dan Heng slid his feet across the ground and turned around sweeping his spear at the fourth guard knocking him out alongside the other three.

One of the guards with a grenade launcher tried to shoot at Dan Heng but an ice arrow hit the cannon of the weapon, blocking the projectile and therefore making the weapon internally explode throwing the guard backwards, Stelle appeared and in a quick movement she slammed her bat against that same guard's head knocking him out.

Another guard with an halberd tried to attack Stelle from behind but a lighting fell in him electrifying him and leaving it unconscious, Gepard grunted a bit and ran towards the fight throwing a punch directly towards Dan Heng that got ready to dodge but Svarog got in the middle also throwing a punch.

The punches of Gepard and Svarog clashed making a small shockwave, Dan Heng was pushed back slightly and quickly dashed away dodging a sweep from another guard with halberd.

"You...what is your purpose?" Gepard asked as he struggled in the clash of attacks.

"Save Jarilo-VI, that is my priority...to create a safe world"

Svarog opened his hand, grabbing Gepard's punch and then shooting his repulsor blast, the force on his arm made the blonde Captain back away but then quickly covered himself with his shield to block another punch from the robot that made him slide backwards slightly.

"Ryan, can you use a big magic attack or something?" March asked as she shoot an arrow freezing a guard's legs.

"Magic doesn't see the difference between friend or foe, if I throw a meteorite all of you will receive damage"

"You can throw meteorites?!" She asked a bit excited.

"No, that's too advanced"

"Owwww..."

Ryan decided to join the fight and ran towards his companions, he dashed across Serval and Stelle, punching in the gut a guard that attempted to flank Dan Heng, he then quickly kicked one of his legs to force him to kneel followed up by him kicking his head knocking him out.

He quickly ducked barely dodging a sweep from another guard and sweeped his legs with a kick making him fall on the ground, he stood up and stomped on the Silvermane Guard's head knocking it out, he looked slightly away seeing how Gepard and Svarog continued fighting.

The robot jumped backwards dodging a slam from Gepard's shield, the blonde Captain grunted and rose said shield to block a blast from Svarog's repulsor, he then advanced with his shield high trying to tackle the robot that quickly grabbed the shield with both hands, he rose up the shield also lifting up Gepard, he shook the shield to the side forcing Gepard to let go of it and fall to the ground rolling a bit.

Svarog threw the shield away and ran towards the Silvermane Captain that quickly stood up and lifted up his arms in front of him, he leaned slightly back to dodge a punch from Svarog and he responded with 2 quick punches to tbe robot's stomach, his punches were already slightly cracking his outer carcass, he seemed to have great strength on his own.

Gepard ducked dodging a right hook and gave a quick uppercut to Svarog's torso, followed by various direct and stronger punches that made the robot stumble backwards, Svarog's eye glowed a bit.

"Pattern Recognized, initiating counter attack..."

Svarog dashed towards Gepard and got ready to throw a right hook making Gepard rise up his guard, instead, the robot turned around and gave a roundhouse kick to the Captain's torso making him fly backwards Rolling a bit on the ground.

Gepard quickie got up and seeing Svarog already in front of him, he threw a punch to the robot's torso but was stopped by Svarog that grabbed his wrist and lifted him up punching him on the gut making him stay airborne as he let the blonde's wrist go and joined both hands hitting Gepard's head with them slamming him against the ground.

Gepard's barrier flashed lightly and he rolled to the side dodging a stomp from Svarog, the captain started to run towards his shield while the robot shot various blasts towards him but was distracted when 2 guards shoot their grenades launchers at him from behind making him turn around and take both of them down with his repulsor blast, when he turned around, Geoard hit him with the shield with incredibly strength lifting him up from the ground and forcing him backwards.

Gepard grunted softly and grabbed his shield with both hands he spun it over him a bit before jumping and slamming it against the ground sending a shockwave towards Svarog and also towards the rest of the group, making all of them stumble.

Gepard was about to order his comrades to regroup, but an alarm started to go off making him curse mentally.

"Captain! There's a wave of Fragmentum Monsters coming!"

"Damnit..." He grunted and looked at the group of intruders.

"I'll take care of the Fragmentum monsters, you guys continue fighting Gepard" Ryan spoke.

"Wait, what?" Seele asked a bit confused.

The trailblazers and their companions look at Ryan that immediately after he was done speaking, jumped high onto the air using magic circles to impulse himself higher until he was high enough to jump and fall on the other side of the gate.

"And he ditched us..." Stelle groaned.

"What the hell?" Gepard looked weirdly at the gate but then growled and pointed towards the intruders. "Guards! Continue the attack!"

On the other side of the gate, Ryan fell on the snow sliding a bit, he looked forwards seeing a huge group of Fragmentum monsters, he let out a content sigh and stretched his arms upwards followed by him slowly unclipping the ornament he used to tie his high ponytail, he took it off letting his hair fall loose on his back, some of his hair fell on his face covering his right eye, he grunted a bit trying to uncover his eye with no effort so he eventually gave up.

He held the ornament in his hand and looking at it he smiled a bit before putting it inside of his Kimono, he then turned around slightly looking at the closed gate behind him.

"Don't worry Mr.Teo...nobody is watching"

He looked again towards the approaching wave of monsters and he let out a soft sigh, the mark under his left eye started to glow while he created an ethereal katana in his left hand, he gripped the weapon tightly and then ran against the wave.

On the other side.

Stelle bonked a guard making it stumble backwards and fall unconscious, she let out a short breath while she looked towards her friends, Dan Heng kept his distance making sure the guards didn't went to swarm March because of her ranged attacks, Seele was holding her own against three guards, Serval was electrifying a few guards and Svarog continued fighting against Gepard.

Only a few guards were left standing, most of them unconscious while others were just out of the battle due to their injuries, while all of them had already lost the speed spell Ryan had used on them.

Gepard blocked one of Svarog's punches With his shield, backing away a bit because of the force behind the robot's attack, he pushed Svarog and backed away from him with a jump dodging Stelle that had tried to attack him from the side with her bat.

Gepard rose up his shield blocking an Ice arrow from March, he then turned around blocked Seele's scythe with the wrist around his armor he grabbed the girl's arm and turned around throwing her against Stelle that quickly catched the girl.

Dan Heng dashed to Gepard's back and threw a stab against him but the blonde quickly put his shield in the middle stopping the spear and deflecting it, he hit the boy with his shield pushing him away but then a lighting fell on him, Geoard let out a grunt before the lighting faded and he fell on one knee.

"That's enough Gepard!...look around you, you're the last one standing" Serval spoke as she approached her brother.

Gepard looked around the place and indeed, he was the lash one still fighting, great amount of the soldiers that were with him were unconscious, while others simply rested away from the conflict because of their injuries, he let out a short grunt and slowly stood up.

"Even if I am, I won't yield..."

"Fine, then we'll knock you out too" Stelle grabbed her bat approaching him.

"Stelle, Wait" March stopped the girl grabbing her by the shoulder. "Look Gepard, we want the same thing, we want to preserve this world and stop it from being completely destroyed"

"Brother...even if you don't believe the outsiders, you should believe me...ugh, maybe I wasted all your trust in me" she sighed and pulled Bronya's letter out of her pocket. "If you don't believe me, then believe Bronya..."

"Lady Bronya?" He groaned a bit and slowly grabbed the letter opening it and reading it. "..."

"There's nothing more to say Gepard...the decision is yours" Serval backed away slightly with some anxiety.

After he finishes reading the letter he looked at the group. "As a captain of the Silvermane Guards, I have to carry out the orders of the Supreme Guardian...."

"Are you sure that's your final answer?" Stelle asked.

"But...Lady Bronya is the commanding officer of the frontlines, according to protocol, if the commanding official directives clash with those of an Architect, a soldier must stay on his post and await further directives." He returned Bronya's letter to his sister that smiled lightly accepting it.

"So we win because of a law interpretation? That's some Saul Goodman stuff" Stelle let out a short sigh.

"I don't have any information on 'Saul Goodman' "Svarog spoke and Stelle patted the robot's arm lightly

"We need to upgrade your culture"

"Thank you, Gepard" Serval smiled lightly towards her brother.

"Don't thank me...I should be apologizing" he grunted a bit and grabbed his head. "If I had let you explain yourself before..."

"Don't sweat it bro, I'll give you some spanks later, rest for now, we were quite rough with you"

"Oh! Oh! I know" March smiled and pulled out the healing glyph that Ryan had given to her and put it close to Gepard. "Uhhh....leijis!"

...

"Nothing...happened?" Gepard looked weirdly at the group.

"Didn't we have to say that?" March asked a bit confused.

"Leighis" Dan Heng spoke this time.

The glyph glowed a bit and let out a small shockwave, a golden aura covered Gepard's body completely fading away after a few seconds...

"I feel...much better" Gepard looked at his hands a bit surprised.

"We could've asked Ryan to heal him..." Seele spoke softly.

"Oh shoot I forgot about Ryan!" Stelle raised her voice a bit alarmed.

"How can you just forget about your 'brother'?" Dan Heng asked.

"That's the most sibling thing to do!" Stelle replied quickly.

"I'll open the gate" Gepard quickly walked to the gate and used a terminal to the side to open it. "Everyone get ready"

The gate slowly opened and the group got ready to go through it, as soon the gate opened, the group ran through it setting foot outside of the fortress.

"Uhhhhh...I don't see anything" March looked around with her bow in her hands.

"Did Ryan kill all of them?" Dan Heng asked also looking around.

"I have the signal of Ryan's unknown energy type" Svarog spoke.

"Let's go, Svarog, lead the way." Seele spoke this time an the robot started to run.

The group quickly followed Svarog, they arrived at a patch with no snow, they were able to see the stone under the small amount of snow that had already started to cover the place, in between the snow they saw a silhouette in a black cloak, apparently ripping off the throat of a Shadewalker with his bare hands.

"Is that Ryan?" Gepard asked a bit confused.

"I'm not sure, let's approach with caut-"

"Hey Ryan, take off the edgy cloak!" Stelle screamed.

The cloak slowly disappeared as he let the Shadewalker go, the body of the Fragmentum monster disintegrating in black smoke, the cloak also started to disappear in black smoke, showing Ryan's long hair, the boy turned around looking at the group, the mark under his left eye slowly stopped glowing.

"You guys finished too?"

★ ★ ★

A/N: This one came out fast, it's also a bit shorter than I expected but meh, who cares? It's over 2000K words and that's acceptable for me.

Anyways! Hope you enjoyed