Left alone on the roof, Glecy gasped as the horror unfolded below. Down in the ruined courtyard, the hunters stood completely frozen, paralyzed by the sudden realization that these monsters could actually evolve in real-time.
Kyla's mind went blank. The sheer weight of the body count, the drained mana, and now this horrifying mutation—it was all crashing down on her at once.
"Vice, snap out of it! Pull yourself together! I'm calling Captain!" Ryden bellowed, gliding down through the wind currents to land right beside her.
"The other two beasts are evolving too!" another hunter shrieked from the perimeter, his voice cracking in sheer terror.
Akiro stared at the shifting abominations, his knuckles white as he tried to cling to whatever fragile hope he had left. "Gods help us... How the hell do we deal with three evolved beasts? We haven't even figured out how to kill one!"
Having Solari drop into this meat grinder would be an absolute relief, but none of them had a damn clue where he actually was.
"I'm going to drain the rest of my mana to signal him. Cover my back, Verna," Ryden said, his tone deadly serious as he closed his eyes and began chanting, channeling every single drop of his remaining magic into the air around them.
A sharp, violent gust whipped up from his boots, swirling around his hands before shooting skyward—carrying his desperate message straight through the wind to wherever their Captain was hiding.
But before the wind message could shoot any higher into the sky, it slammed into an invisible barrier and snapped into complete nothingness.
"What?!" Ryden gasped, staring up in pure shock and confusion as his hard-earned mana vanished into thin air.
Meanwhile, up on the roof, Glecy nearly jumped out of her skin as a smooth, amused voice spoke directly behind her.
"Good spot to watch the whole chaos."
Glecy's foot slipped on the edge of the tiles, and she would have plummeted straight off the roof if a pair of slender hands hadn't caught her just in time. She wasn't going to die to the sharp teeth of some beast below, but from cracking her skull open on the hard cobblestones.
"You drained your mana," the voice noted softly.
Glecy's eyes went wide as she recognized the voice and looked up at the woman holding her. She froze instantly, overwhelmed by a mix of shock, awe, and utter confusion. The raw, heavy presence standing over her was so breathtakingly both terrifying and stunning that she completely forgot about the mutated beasts tearing up the courtyard below.
She only snapped back to reality when Cana pressed a precise spot on her back with her fingers. A sharp bolt of pain shot through her, making her hiss, but the agony was immediately washed over by an indescribable, surging relief. Her mana core suddenly felt as if it had been set ablaze, yet it didn't burn her. Instead, raw, liquid magic flooded through her veins, tripling her energy in a matter of seconds. The suffocating fatigue she had been dragging around all day vanished into thin air.
"I... I broke through?" she stammered, utterly bewildered.
How could her core possibly break through right now? She hadn't even done anything—yet her stagnant limit had just been shattered like fragile glass.
"W... what did you do?"
Instead of answering her directly, Cana pressed her index finger gently against Glecy's lips, sealing them shut while locking her gaze onto her. "Not a word about me being here or what I just did."
Glecy nodded frantically in complete obedience, bringing a satisfied smile to Cana's face. Even behind the delicate veil concealing her features, Glecy recognized her instantly—no one else possessed such unearthly beauty, and those breathtaking eyes alone felt powerful enough to melt her on the spot.
Cana turned her gaze back down to the battlefield, shaking her head lightly as she watched Ryden collapse onto the hard ground. Luckily, Verna was quick enough to dive in and catch him before he hit the dirt.
"Did Captain send you to help us?" Glecy asked softly.
"He's currently cooking, so he has no idea," Cana replied, casting a quick glance back at her with a mischievous wink.
The revelation hit Glecy like a physical shock. The infamous, terrifying Solari... cooking for someone? It confirmed her deepest suspicions that Cana was far more than some random stranger he had picked up off the road weeks ago. Solari had clearly known her for a very long time.
"There's another time for spacing out, Glecy. Go help your teammates now. Pour out whatever tricks you have—I'll have your back."
"Oh!" Staring at Cana had made her completely forget where she was. "Right! I almost forgot!"
Trying to figure out what to prioritize, Glecy's face suddenly lit up. An idea she had been harboring for ages—one she could never attempt before breaking through—suddenly felt entirely possible. Feeling the massive surge of energy roaring through her veins, she knew she had the power to pull it off.
She raised her palms in front of her, taking a breath to chant and cast the wide-scale spell, but Cana's smooth voice made her freeze mid-breath.
"Are you trying to heal the enemy, too?"
Glecy blinked, staring blankly at Cana. In an instant, the realization hit her—Cana had read her exact plan, and she was dead right. Casting a massive area heal on a battlefield packed with monsters would restore the dragon crawlers right alongside her dying allies.
"Selective healing," Cana instructed calmly. "Focus your mana exclusively on mortals, and it won't touch anything else."
Glecy stood there in sheer awe. How could this woman possess such deep, expert knowledge of high-tier support magic? Despite her lingering questions, she followed Cana's instructions without a second thought. She had an overwhelming gut feeling that so long as she was around Cana, nothing could possibly go wrong.
"Don't hold back. I'll control your mana," Cana commanded softly.
Glecy nodded without hesitation once more, completely past the point of questioning this woman's absurd abilities. At this point, pure excitement overshadowed any lingering doubt.
A gentle warmth spread through Glecy the moment Cana rested her palm against her back. The touch was unexpectedly heartwarming—reminiscent of a mother's gentle, protective embrace. A deep sense of comfort and absolute safety washed over her, completely dissolving her hesitation, fatigue, and hopelessness. In their place bloomed an unshakeable confidence that, with Cana at her back, failure was entirely impossible.
Cana smiled softly. Glecy was one of the very few individuals she had met whose heart possessed true, untainted innocence. It was no wonder the girl could adapt so rapidly to her power despite the immense gap in their levels. Cana's flame did not repel Glecy—a sign that her soul was pure, and that she could be trusted, at least for now.
Starting the enchantment, a scepter tailored for support abilities materialized in Glecy's hands. Crafting itself from fine, pristine white glass, it hummed with latent power. She poured her energy into the artifact while chanting, raising it high above her head as she uttered the precise words to target only those she wished to heal.
At the tip of the scepter, swirling green energy began to interweave with subtle streaks of radiant gold. The divine coloration was odd to Glecy, but she chose to ignore it for now, focusing entirely on the spell.
The moment she unleashed the magic, an immense rush of mana surged into her body directly from Cana's palms. The sensation was so intoxicatingly warm that she felt as though she were melting on the spot. Her knees buckled, threatening to send her crashing to the roof once more, but Cana remained steady behind her, holding her up.
It was, without a doubt, the most satisfying feeling Glecy had ever experienced in her life—completely oblivious to the sheer scale of divine force Cana had just channeled into her system.
"Are you okay?" Cana asked, a rare flicker of confusion and genuine concern crossing her face. She wondered if she had accidentally overdone the energy transfer while trying to replenish whatever Glecy would lose during the spell.
"That... felt so good," Glecy murmured in a daze, still floating in the lingering warmth flushing through her chest.
"Oh," Cana replied, her voice dropping into a rare, awkward beat. She hadn't anticipated that a tiny, negligible fraction of her energy would affect a mortal quite like this.
Meanwhile, the squad of the Grand Abyss and the surviving hunters stood frozen in utter shock, confusion, and awe as glistening green light rained down from the sky. The moment the droplets grazed their skin, their bodies absorbed the magic instantly, sending a roaring surge of energy straight through their veins. Their depleted mana pools weren't just restored—they flooded far past their normal capacity.
"What just happened?" Kyla asked, her brows knitting as she watched the luminous shower. As the green light made contact with her skin, it flared into brilliant gold before sinking into her body. It wasn't just their wounds and drained reserves being knit back together—the divine light completely cleansed and mended their torn armor and bloody clothes.
She recognized a support-type ability when she saw one, but what rank could possibly cast high-tier magic of this magnitude? Was someone at the peak level intervening?
"Did Glecy break through just now?" Verna asked, her eyes locked on the edge of the roof where Glecy stood alongside an unfamiliar woman.
The stranger wore a translucent white gown, her face veiled by a shroud of pure white that rendered her features completely unidentifiable. The way she supported the dazed healer made it clear she was no enemy, yet her aura screamed absolute danger. Her sheer presence radiated a suffocating pressure unnervingly similar to having their Captain nearby.
Akiro followed Verna's gaze, but the sight only doubled the storm of confusion on his face. How, what, and who collided violently in his mind, yet he uttered not a single word—he couldn't even figure out which question to voice first.
"Who is that?" Kyla asked, sparing Akiro from the endless questions running through his head.
The suffocating weight of that aura was no stranger to them, but the mortal woman casting it was an absolute mystery. They couldn't even tell if she was a secluded elder or a high-ranking hunter like themselves.
On the other hand, Ryden was silently losing his mind, wondering why she was standing on that roof when it was Solari he had tried to call for backup. He knew beyond a doubt that it was Cana who had snuffed out his wind magic earlier. While he hadn't fully unraveled her secrets during her stay, living in such close proximity to her for days had left her deadly aura permanently etched into his instincts. Even blindfolded, he could sense that predatory threat lurking in the air. Being Solari's go-to choice for dangerous missions had honed his senses to instinctively pinpoint the Captain's presence anywhere on the battlefield—and Cana carried that exact same terrifying weight.
Yet, Ryden kept his mouth shut, offering not a word to the squad. Up on the roof, Cana was staring directly down at him. Just like Solari's sharp glares, her eyes carried an unmistakable, silent warning, and his gut was far too sharp to misunderstand what she meant by that look.
Even with their fully replenished mana, a swell of genuine hope rose in Ryden's chest simply because Cana was here. She was a wielder of the blue flame—and to the mutated beasts lurking in the courtyard, she was nothing short of a living harbinger of hell.
"I want to watch the results of Erus' leadership in your squad," Cana whispered softly, her voice carrying a chillingly casual edge. "If you guys can't kill even a single beast crawling on that ground, I'll have him train you ten times harder."
Glecy nearly jumped out of her skin, completely spooked by the casual malice in Cana's tone. She swallowed hard, acutely aware that this masked woman was actually capable of saying those exact words straight to their Captain—and there was zero doubt in her mind that Solari would blindly listen to whatever Cana demanded.
"J... just one of those beasts, right? What about the rest?" Glecy managed to ask, summoning a sliver of courage despite her overwhelming situation.
"After killing one beast, then you have to kill the next beast," Cana replied smoothly. "Unless you wanted to watch them wreck the entire city."
Glecy's face turned deathly pale. Could Cana perhaps be Solari's twin sister? Their minds were frighteningly alike. This was the exact brand of psychological torture their Captain always used to break them.
How badly she wanted to cry right now.
"I'll be the official cook for your squad once this is done. I hope you know—"
"You mean it?"
Cana was taken aback when Glecy cut her off, her pale face suddenly lighting up with overwhelming excitement.
"Of course. I don't go back on my words," Cana assured her.
Glecy grinned widely like an absolute lunatic, completely forgetting all her worries from just a moment ago.
"We'll definitely kill all those beasts! Just watch us from up here!" Glecy declared, practically bursting with sudden, manic energy.
"Don't slip your tongue," Cana reminded her sternly, her eyes narrowing beneath the veil.
"Absolutely! You have my word!" Glecy said before throwing herself off the roof, completely recharged.
Cana was left standing in sheer confusion, her hand frozen mid-air after attempting to help guide the healer down safely. She stared down at the leaping girl, seriously wondering if Glecy suffered from some sort of bipolar disorder. Her emotional switch flipped faster than a dying lightbulb.
She honestly began to wonder if Erus had been starving his team on their past missions. Given his short temper and massive ego, it wasn't impossible at all.
Below, on the shattered, bloody cobblestones, Glecy sprinted toward her team. But midway across the courtyard, a mutated dragon crawler lunged into her path, its two heads looming over her like giant serpents. Luckily, this beast wasn't an elemental type that channeled complex magic—unfortunately, it spat a lethal, hyper-acidic venom. Whatever the liquid touched melted instantly like iron exposed to blistering heat.
The Grand Abyss team panicked at the sight. Akiro nearly bolted forward to throw himself between them, but Ryden grabbed him, holding him back with a vice-like grip. Seeing Glecy deliberately walk right into the beast's line of attack, Ryden knew she wasn't panicking—she had a plan.
"What are you guys watching?! Help me!" Glecy screamed at the top of her lungs.
She hadn't planned on dying today, but in her sheer excitement, she had carelessly dropped her guard while trying to sprint straight to her team. Now this freaking beast was blocking her path, about to send her straight to doom, and the Grand Abyss squad was just standing there watching her while she was practically shaking in her boots!
What the hell was wrong with them? Were they trying to get rid of her now?
"What?" Ryden reacted in sheer confusion.
In a matter of seconds, he closed the distance to Glecy's spot and snatched her out of the path of incoming death. The sudden lightness of his own body startled him—he had moved so fast it was almost like watching Solari, though still nowhere near their Captain's insane speed.
"Oh gods! I thought I was going to die right there!" Glecy gasped, panting heavily.
"We thought you had given up on life!" Verna called out, staring at her in disbelief.
"What the hell were you even thinking, running straight out into the open like that?!" Ryden barked, utterly disappointed in her.
"Were you jinxed by that woman?" Kyla asked doubtfully, her eyes narrowing as she glanced up toward where Cana was standing.
"What?" Glecy looked back and forth between the roof and Kyla. "No! She would be the last person to harm me."
The Grand Abyss team stared at her suspiciously.
"You know her?" Verna and Akiro asked in unison.
"I—she's my ancestor!" Glecy blurted out, her mind completely drawing a blank as she frantically searched for any excuse to keep them from figuring out Cana was up there secretly judging their squad.
"Ancestor?" they all chimed in unison, looking at her with total confusion and deep doubt.