After the incident where three hundred elite guards were instantly wiped out, the threatened Silvermane Guards finally woke up completely.
They were no longer slaves for the big shots to order around at will. Now, they had a Galactic Battleship they could rely on.
The Emiya family was different from Gepard.
Righteous and devoted to his country and people, Gepard was certainly the kind of leader you could safely entrust your back to in battle.
But in the end, he would never raise his blade against his family. Standing with him meant you would inevitably be stabbed in the back by the Landau family, turning your loved ones into weaknesses.
But the Emiya family was different. They had already made their stance clear, whoever dared to touch them, they would dare to kill, whether it was the Landaus or the Architects. And they had the ability and means to make it happen.
Through days of being together, the Silvermane Guards had deeply felt the kindness of the Emiya family, something even Gepard had never given them, a true sense of safety.
So, was it better to obey the big shots' foolish orders and go die, or to firmly stand with the Galactic Battleship, who would at least avenge their families? Anyone whose brain hadn't been sucked dry by rift creatures could see the answer clearly.
"Miss Acheron already said it very clearly. On the dueling ground, blades and swords have no eyes, if you die, it's only your own fault!"
No one knew whether it was a single Iron Guard shouting loudly, or all of them speaking in unison. But the moment the words fell, they all stood neatly behind Emiya.
"You, you actually want to betray Belobog? You traitors! Cough cough cough!" Overwhelmed by too many shocks, the Landau patriarch's eyes rolled white, and he coughed nonstop, looking like he was about to keel over dead from a chill.
'Die! Die! Die already!'
Most of the people present were chanting the same thing in their hearts, hoping this old thing would just keel over right now. But heaven never follows human wishes, in the end, the Landau patriarch managed to hold on.
"Yo, old man, your life is really tough, huh? You didn't even die from that!"
A shocking, world-shaking voice drifted faintly with the snow and wind, making everyone's hearts jolt. They subconsciously thought they had wished too hard for the Landau patriarch to die and accidentally let their inner thoughts slip out.
"Zoe, if you keep talking nonsense, you're not eating dinner tonight." Vera scolded, pinching Zoe's soft cheeks.
"If it's your inner thoughts, you need to keep them in your heart. Say it out loud and everyone hears it!"
"Uh…" Not to mention the others, even Emiya himself couldn't help but get a forehead full of black lines.
"Why are these two girls back? I had six hundred elite guards that big, where the hell did they go?!"
The sudden appearance of Zoe and her sister struck the Landau family's leaders like a heavy blow to the head. They couldn't hold on any longer and collapsed onto the ground, just like their patriarch and his wife.
Heaven knew how much effort had gone into training those elite guards. And yet, on their first shining debut, they had turned into nothing but clowns.
"Oh, you mean those flashy idiots wearing armor in the dead of winter? On the road, they were, uh… what was it again?" Zoe couldn't remember the word and looked to Vera for help.
"They were mutated creatures of the Silvermane Guards inside the rift. I remember it's called the Eternal Winter Wraith."
Vera gently set Zoe down. Even her always-calm lips curved into a faint smile as she looked at the powerful big shots who had come to show off their might.
"What a coincidence, there was a massive outbreak of rift monsters, and they were all eaten."
"This… this… damn it!" The Landau patriarch's eyes rolled back, and he fainted.
As for whether the old man was actually dead or not, no one cared anymore, because even more explosive news came right after.
"Bad news! The outpost reports at least… huff… at least over one hundred thousand rift monsters are rushing toward us!"
Intelligence officer Pela, normally famous for her composure, was clutching her shattered glasses so tightly that the shards cut her fingers and blood flowed freely, yet she didn't even feel it.
Faced with the most severe rift monster horde in history, she couldn't think of a single way to deal with it.
"Give me your glasses." Emiya walked to Pela's side and took them from her, though she didn't even notice. Her mind was so overwhelmed with panic that her sharp brain had gone completely blank.
With projection magecraft, he restored Pela's glasses to perfect condition and placed them on her delicate nose. Then, he carefully bandaged her calloused hands. Only then did Emiya use his mana to stimulate Pela's brain, helping her regain clarity.
"You... you are…?" Pela adjusted her glasses, trying to look up at him. But her head spun so badly she almost collapsed, if not for his quick reaction, catching her shoulders firmly with both hands.
'Such big hands… it felt like he could almost cover me completely. Such a broad chest…'
Pela instinctively leaned her head toward him, wanting to rest for just a moment. But then she suddenly snapped awake, this was a place with countless eyes watching. What on earth was she doing? The battle was the priority.
"Don't worry. Just take this as my gift to you all for our first meeting." Emiya lightly patted her shoulder, made sure she could stand steadily, then summoned his Holy Sword and walked toward the frontline.
"Wait, don't! It's too dangerous over there!" Pela tried to grab him, but Emiya, though he looked like he was walking slowly, crossed ten meters in a single step, and in the blink of an eye he had disappeared at the edge of her vision.
"Little Glasses, with my Emiya on the field, you don't need to panic." Zoe hopped up and grabbed Pela's hand.
"You look exhausted. Come to our tent and sit down, we just caught a super soft, super cute bunny!"
"Let me go! I still have urgent work to do!"
Pela instinctively tried to resist, but Zoe, who looked so small and weak, had astonishing strength. Even with all her effort, Pela couldn't pull her hand free. She could only shoot a pleading look at Gepard, who was readying the troops.
"Pela, since Zoe kindly invited you, go and take a good rest. With me here, don't worry about the frontlines." Gepard glanced down at the armguard on his arm. That man was finally stepping in, but could he really turn the tide?
This time, the enemy was the most terrifying Belobog had ever faced.
Since the blizzards swept across Jarilo, Belobog had never faced more than seventy thousand rift monsters at once, and that was during the northern campaign, when both Gepard and the Supreme Guardian Cocolia fought together.
In that battle, nearly all of the elite Silvermane Guards were lost. That was what left the later Iron Guards so uneven in quality, giving the Landau family the chance to seize full control over them.
But this time, the reported number alone was already over one hundred thousand. And surely, many intelligent rift monsters were lurking in the dark. Without a miracle, Belobog would almost certainly be broken by monsters this time.
The Architects and the Landau family, though aloof from worldly affairs, still knew the general situation of each war. The moment they heard the enemy numbered a hundred thousand, they immediately ran back to Belobog and shut the gates tight.
Judging by their stance, until the Iron Guards wiped out the rift monsters, even if every single one of them died, those gates would never open again.
Only the Supreme Guardian and Bronya still stood calmly at Gepard's side, showing no intention of leaving.
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