Chapter 010: Stunning Performance

Oldas let out a groan and swept across the battlefield, immediately spotting several eerie black shadows. Ignoring the dangers surrounding him, he moved swiftly, swinging his long sword repeatedly as he unleashed several crescent-shaped bursts of combat energy, shattering the shadows to pieces.
Though powerful and highly skilled, Oldas wasn’t invincible—he had only two arms. Despite exerting all his strength, he managed to cut down only half of the arrows; the rest flew toward the students of Roland Academy.
The students noticed this immediately. Though they tried to avoid them, even after forming a makeshift defense line, there were still over a dozen tentacles. Even if they managed to escape, death was inevitable.
In that hesitation, several more were struck by crossbow arrows, turning into pools of blood. Their crumbling defense line vanished entirely, leaving only three students alive—aside from Kris, two others were lucky enough not to be killed by Du Fan on the spot.
The strange arrows finally disappeared from the battlefield. It seemed Du Fan had run out of arrows and stopped attacking.
Yet despite the absence of crossbow threats, the octopus’s tentacles remained a formidable danger. Oldas felt slightly relieved but was now worried about Kris. His earlier ambition had vanished, replaced by the sole desire to rush to her side and take her away from this cursed place.
Unfortunately, just as he thought this, the octopus didn’t give him a chance. While he was saving others, over a dozen tentacles launched an attack from all directions.
Oldas sneered, thinking, “Even you, beast, dare to ignore your limits?”
By now, most of his combat energy had recovered. With a few swift swings of his sword—though not as powerful as before—the sword, empowered by his energy, sliced through the tentacles like butter. In moments, he severed several of them.
But before Oldas could continue his onslaught, muffled groans came from behind him. Turning around, his eyes turned red.

Without his rescue and without a proper battle formation, although Kris still had some strength, facing such a large number of tentacles, she was overwhelmed and unable to focus. In less than a moment, the defense line formed by Kris and the two other trainees was broken. Fortunately, the octopus monster seemed affected by the Mist of Weakness as well, so although it wrapped around the three of them, it couldn’t kill them right away. The combat energy around Kris and the others barely formed a shield, putting them in a desperate situation.

Oldas was deeply worried about Kris. Ever since he realized his feelings for her, half of his heart had been with her. How could he let his first love, his beloved, leave him like this? With a roar, Oldas unleashed all his combat energy. Tan and silver colors merged to form a vortex of combat energy. His figure moved like lightning, passing through most of the tentacles around him in an instant. The remaining tentacles shattered into pieces as they brushed past him.

It only took a few seconds for him to reach Kris, but the octopus seemed extremely enraged at its inability to disrupt the combat energy surrounding the three of them. Kris was thrown lightly, seemingly on her way straight into the octopus’s gaping maw. When she opened her eyes and realized her situation, tears welled up, but her strong character prevented her from crying like an ordinary girl. Instead, she let out a long sigh and closed her eyes, ready to die.

Furious, Oldas swung his swords twice, severing the tentacles still wrapped around the other two trainees. His figure moved like lightning, breaking through all obstacles, and in the last moment, he wrapped his left arm around Kris’s waist. Kris suddenly opened her eyes and whispered, “Why…”

Oldas sighed deeply and said, “Kris, I’m here… So… you don’t have to be afraid…” Before his words faded, both of them fell into the octopus monster’s gaping maw. The octopus closed its mouth and let out a roar of apparent pleasure. Its huge eyes turned to focus on the two trainees who had barely escaped on the shore, with the remaining tentacles already stirring.

But those two trainees were stunned by what they saw. Without Oldas and Kris, even if they survived, what could they do next? Even Ferre, hiding nearby, couldn’t help but take a deep breath.

Although rationally speaking, resolving Ordas in this way was undeniably beneficial for the Holy See’s objectives, emotionally, Feray still hoped Ordas would not die. After all, a figure like him might not appear again in the Gavin Empire for decades. His death would be a tremendous loss in every sense.

Du Fan glanced at Feray lightly, as if able to see through his thoughts, and even smiled faintly. That smile terrified Feray, who dared not ask anything.

Du Fan closed his eyes and sensed for a moment. His mental strength was astonishing. Though the natural pressure from the Octopus Monster made people’s souls tremble, his mastery of various techniques had made his mental strength, along with his combat energy and magic power, incredibly peculiar. In an indescribable way, he managed to bypass those layers of mental pressure and sense everything that was happening.

After a while, he slowly opened his eyes, exhaled softly, and smiled at Feray, saying, “Don’t worry. Ordas isn’t dead.”

Hearing this, Feray was so shocked that his heart almost leaped out of his chest. He was too stunned to say a word.

After speaking, Du Fan no longer looked at Feray. Instead, he gazed in the direction of the Octopus Monster and sighed softly, murmuring, “Ordas… Ordas. It seems I can no longer comprehend your strength. Chenchen once said that one cannot understand such power without reaching a certain level—there’s truth to that… When will I be able to face you openly, without relying on these schemes?”

Though he said this, Du Fan had no intention of repenting. His mindset differed from most people on the Roland Continent. In his view, martial skills, magic, fame, power, status, identity, schemes… everything was part of a person’s strength. Even a master of the Sacred rank might not stand a chance against an emperor who could command an army of a hundred thousand.

Human strength was limited after all. True strength lay in making rational use of everything around one to achieve one’s goals.

Under such circumstances, individual strength was still necessary—otherwise, Du Fan wouldn’t have uttered such sighs.

But as for the sighs, the situation before them was becoming increasingly strange.

The octopus monster, which had originally intended to deal with the two Roland Academy students by the shore, somehow stopped moving for no apparent reason. Everyone else looked at each other in confusion, utterly unaware of what was happening. Du Fan, however, possessed extraordinary mental strength and faintly sensed what was about to occur, which only made him sigh even more.

Suddenly, a deafening roar erupted, and the entire valley seemed to turn blood red in an instant. Streams of crimson blood sprayed out from above the octopus monster’s head. As the blood gushed forth, a huge cross-shaped wound appeared on its head, from which all its blood and vitality seemed to be flowing out.

With a quick sense, Du Fan was shocked to discover that the monster’s internal organs had already been shattered—this massive beast was clearly doomed.

Amidst the blood shower, a figure soared into the air, surrounded by combat energy that protected him completely, preventing even a trace of the blood rain from touching him.

Aldas held a sword in one hand and cradled the unconscious Kris in the other. His floating body emitted intense combat energy, so dazzling that almost no one could bear to look directly at it.

Finally, the spraying of blood stopped. But by now, the picturesque lake had turned blood red, and not a trace of the spiritual energy from when they first arrived remained anywhere around.

If one had to describe the atmosphere, it could only be described as one of killing intent and death.

Aldas slowly descended. His combat energy had long been exhausted. If it weren’t for his willpower holding him together, he would have lost consciousness long ago.

He landed in a relatively clean area and placed Kris down. As his combat energy dissipated, he nearly fainted.

Two students who had barely escaped struggled to reach Aldas and handed him various medicines with trembling hands.

Aldas shook his head slightly. He knew Kris was only in a coma due to extreme shock and depleted combat energy. If handled properly, this situation could greatly benefit her future strength.

After putting a secret medicine from Roland Academy into Kris’s mouth, Aldas finally smiled in relief. He slowly turned to look at the corpses everywhere, his heart aching as he didn’t know what to do for a moment.