It was a silver cliff face, towering so high you couldn’t see its end.

The upper edge of the cliff was swallowed by sand, dust, and mist so thick even sunlight couldn’t pierce it. Countless spatial turbulences churned there, sealing off this barren land completely. Any space-aspected magic was unable to use this “sky” above ordinary people’s feet to build a passage connecting the two sides.

And the lower edge of the cliff was smooth like it had been planed by a blade—so smooth that the endless vastness at the bottom of the Abyss could even be reflected on that wall.

The entire Abyss was like something cut out of a thick metal plate by the hydraulic machine tool from Muen’s previous life: sheer cliffs on both sides that couldn’t be climbed, and in the middle, a sunless, despairing valley floor.

And Muen, right now, probably counted as being in the deepest part of that cut crack... a bacterium, at most.

"Truly... terrifying," Muen said with feeling.

Only by seeing this scene with your own eyes could you understand what it meant to be... “a wound in the world.”

That war a thousand years ago against the Demon God had probably truly blasted through and tore apart the continent’s plates to create terrain this astonishing.

But even a “world wound” like this couldn’t be absolutely “perfect.”

Along the boundary running north to south across who knew how many miles of the Abyss, there were a total of five regions that were relatively gentle—regions where even the spatial turbulence had gaps.

No need to climb this sheer wall that was simply impossible to climb. No need to risk crossing those spatial storms overhead with a body tempered through a thousand hammerings. You only had to cross those gentler areas rising upward like steps, and the demonfolk could reach the surface they dreamed of—see, for the first time since birth... the sun.

Doronslei Fortress was built on the gap that belonged to the Empire’s border.

They called it a gap, but in truth, the vast fan-shaped region beyond it—though it rose in stages and still had places that were steep—was so enormously wide, measured in miles, that there was no longer any terrain that could serve as a barrier to the demonfolk.

You could say that Doronslei Fortress had now become the Empire’s... last line of defense against the demonfolk.

If they crossed this place, what lay behind it was the Campbell territory’s thousand-mile plains, countless civilians, and the fertile land the demonfolk dreamed of.

That was where the name “the land of the natural barrier” came from.

...

"Boom!"

Just as Muen and the others were about to observe the fortress more carefully from afar, they suddenly heard a dull drumbeat.

"Boom boom!"

First one beat, then ten, then countless—no one could tell how many drumbeats layered together, converging into a roar powerful enough to shake the world.

"R-report!"

Vick came sprinting over, panting hard. He snapped to attention and said,

"The demonfolk have started attacking the fortress!"

"Mhm."

Muen nodded, indicating he understood.

In truth, Vick didn’t even need to report it. The drumbeats shaking the ground were something even a deaf person could clearly sense.

Muen flicked his gaze to King Yintuo. King Yintuo gave a slight nod, indicating that their auras had already been hidden and the demonfolk wouldn’t detect them.

Muen let out a breath. The group stood on that small hill and continued watching.

With the drumbeats, dense as ants, the demonfolk army surged along the line where light was gradually carving its way across the world, charging toward the fortress not far away.

There, a ring-shaped outer wall—cast from some unknown material—stood at least a hundred meters tall, taller than any city wall ◆ Nоvеlіgһt ◆ (Only on Nоvеlіgһt) Muen had ever seen. Like a wedge hammered perfectly into that gap, it completely blocked the demonfolk’s route to the outside world.

And that was only the outer wall. According to the intelligence Muen knew, Doronslei Fortress had three layers of walls inside and out. Between the walls, the ground had been hollowed out and filled—at no regard for cost—with huge amounts of mercury, then sealed away. Mercury had the effect of absorbing magic power, and could weaken the impact of magical bombardment against the walls.

And within the walls, more than a hundred tall towers had been built. Mages skilled at long-range magic, military crossbows, and arcane cannons were all deployed atop those towers and battlements. Any demonfolk forces that approached would be blasted into slag under absolute firepower superiority.

This was a solid, vast fortress—so immense that merely standing there was enough to make any attacker suffocate.

A full hundred thousand Imperial elites were stationed within it. These elites had once pushed the defense line back into the depths of the Abyss by at least a hundred miles. If not for the sudden joint strike by five demonfolk grand dukes earlier, the battlefield right now wouldn’t even be here.

But amid the thunder of those drums, Muen understood: this time, the demonfolk would still attack this seemingly unbreakable fortress with a die-without-regret attitude.

Because in their eyes, compared to the sheer wall that couldn’t be climbed, compared to the sky that couldn’t be crossed, this fortress was like a little wooden door built between two mountains.

As long as it was a door, there would come a moment it could be broken.

As long as it wasn’t absolute despair, then for the demonfolk, it was absolute hope!

Boom!

A tremendous explosion drowned out the drums. Firelight began flashing atop the fortress’s towers. Terrifying torrents and shells fell from the sky, bursting open among the dense demonfolk ranks. Countless sprays of blood and severed limbs rapidly birthed one death-omen flower after another.

Yet these dazzling flowers of death—scaled up to the entire battlefield—were nothing more than tiny ripples stirred within the vast demonfolk sea.

Relying on long-range firepower alone, in truth, couldn’t suppress the demonfolk army’s pace of advance.

Muen had still underestimated the scale of this war. 𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

Yes, a hundred thousand Imperial elites were stationed in the fortress—but how many demonfolk were charging at it right now?

Impossible to count.

All he could see was: from one end of his vision to the other, a thick ink-dark painting formed by black dots massed together. Those ragged low-ranking demonfolk, huge demonic beasts with ferocious faces, and some monsters he couldn’t even identify, surged like a tide, wave after wave, slamming into the fortress walls.

They climbed toward the walls, and were constantly knocked down. Those behind trampled their companions’ corpses to charge again—using crude ladders, siege platforms, or simply being hurled upward by those towering beasts.

Occasionally, one or two squads managed to get onto the wall, and what awaited them was even more brutal close-quarters slaughter.

These low-ranking demonfolk were far more vicious than humans. They didn’t care about their companions’ deaths at all. They would even treat their companions’ corpses as an attack method, as weapons, and even as food to replenish their strength.

Muen’s gaze flickered. He had originally thought there was no moat outside the fortress, but at this moment he suddenly realized: it wasn’t that there was no moat. It was that the wide river that had been opened up as the first layer of barrier had long since been filled level by corpses.

Yet this scene didn’t make the demonfolk hesitate. Instead, it further ignited their savagery.

"A-are you... alright, Young Master Campbell?"

Ebul asked worriedly. He was concerned that a pampered noble young master like the duke’s son wouldn’t be able to adapt to such a bloody, horrifying scene. After all, even a countryside kid like Vick—who’d been hunting since childhood—had been so scared the first time he faced the battlefield that he nearly pissed his pants.

But to Ebul’s surprise, Muen was far calmer than he’d expected.

"I’m fine."

Muen’s face was a little pale, but he still waved his hand casually.

"It’s true this is my first time seeing a real battlefield, but it’s not enough to scare me."

Muen took a deep breath, inhaling air thick with the stench of blood.

He said that, but this scene still shook him deeply.

Because compared to those lofty Evil Gods, this was a different kind of terror.

One kind was the ultimate in power and weirdness.

And this kind was the most real death and wailing.

"This should just be a probing siege, right?" Muen asked.

"Yes. Even though it looks frightening, what the demonfolk lack least are these low-ranking demonfolk. So as long as there’s no movement from demonfolk powerhouses, then it’s probably just them throwing these things out as cannon fodder, while also wearing us down."

The one speaking was Gree. The wound on his face had already healed by now, making it even easier to see the numbness of someone who was long since used to such scenes.

"Is that so?"

Muen stroked his chin.

To be honest, he hadn’t expected to run into a demonfolk siege right as he arrived.

But from another angle, this kind of scene probably played out every day in front of this fortress.

Every day, every day—like a gigantic meat grinder, harvesting countless lives.

No wonder even Celicia couldn’t stay calm. Because judging from the current situation, if something happened to Father, the Imperial defense line really would have a hard time holding back the demonfolk’s mad assault.

But...

Before rescuing the fortress from crisis, there was an even more important question in front of Muen right now.

"That said, how are we supposed to get in?"

Muen looked at King Yintuo.

To take the shortcut, he had directly had King Yintuo bring him down into the Abyss. The shortcut had indeed been taken—but it also landed them right in front of the fortress.

But they couldn’t exactly charge the fortress like those demonfolk, either.

His own side would be yelling, “Young Master, I’ll avenge you,” while crying and blasting him into slag.

"If it were only you alone, I could directly carry you and fly over," King Yintuo said expressionlessly.

"That won’t do. If I do something like that, when we go back, Father will kick my ass."

Muen’s gaze swept once more over the dense demonfolk army at their feet, falling into thought.

The more he thought, the more his head started to ache, and he couldn’t help rubbing his temples.

Damn it. Earlier, after swallowing those arcane-conducting materials, I ate too much. All my mental power is being used to suppress that thing in my head right now. Thinking this hard really is a bit...

Huh?

Wait.

Ate too much?

"Got it."

Muen suddenly snapped his fingers and proposed,

"Since we just happened to eat our fill, how about we give our dear demonfolk friends an impromptu performance?"

"A performance? What kind of performance?" King Yintuo looked confused.

"It’s not anything too mystical."

Muen smiled. In his ice-lake-blue pupils, thick darkness gradually began to flow.

"We’ll give these bumpkins who’ve never seen the world... a magic trick!"