"An insider?"

Muen’s gaze tightened. He immediately turned and looked toward the direction the explosion had come from beneath the wall.

Sure enough—amid the billowing smoke and dust, that massive gate, reinforced by dozens of powerful arrays and extremely difficult to breach from the outside, had already been blown open from the inside, leaving a gap.

The gap wasn’t large, but it was already enough for demonfolk to pass through. And the low-ranking demonmen who saw it were like they’d been injected with chicken blood, not caring at all about the lingering high heat after the alchemical bomb’s detonation, as they began to swarm into the fortress in a rush.

The gate guards hurried to meet them head-on. The two groups immediately began a frenzied slaughter centered on fighting over that gap in the gate, and the splashing blood quickly dyed the ground red.

"To strike at a time like this... was it because they sensed danger?"

From the very start of °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° this war, the other side had impatiently thrown out this trump card. This could no longer be described as coincidence.

There had clearly been better timing to play that card.

Muen frowned. After murmuring a few low words, he looked at Funal.

"Mr. Funal, have you caught the insider who blew the gate?"

"No."

Funal shook his head. "The explosion happened too suddenly. By the time the gate guards reacted, the gate was already blown open. From the situation back then, the one who blew it up probably also died."

"A suicide-style blast... so that insider never intended to live in the first place."

Muen rubbed his chin.

"Then can you confirm the identity of the one who blew the gate?"

"It’s too chaotic right now. We can’t confirm it."

As Funal spoke, the slaughter at the gate surged into a fever pitch in barely a minute. Every second, demonmen died under blades, and every second, Imperial soldiers were buried in this blood-soaked land.

In circumstances like this, trying to distinguish the identity of someone who had already died without leaving a trace was truly asking too much.

Or rather—in this battlefield, at every moment, people died without leaving a trace. What those people left behind was probably only a pale name on a soldier roster.

"They did it flawlessly."

Muen sighed.

"Yes. Looks like I have to take back what I said earlier."

Funal gave a self-mocking smile, but deep in his pupils, anger faintly burned. "This fortress is not entirely under my control. Heh. I was too confident. I didn’t expect those demonfolk to pull this on me. I really was caught completely off guard."

With the Duke injured, and him being responsible for this section, such a huge blunder—there was no way it wouldn’t make him feel ashamed.

"With just this gap, it shouldn’t be enough to truly break the wall, right?"

"Of course not. It’s just that because the response was rushed, manpower is temporarily stretched thin."

"I see."

Muen looked behind Funal. Those soldiers had clearly been gathered in a hurry. After all, if this hadn’t happened so suddenly, with Funal’s status, there would have been no need for him to come here in person.

"Then I’ll go help too."

"No!"

Funal immediately objected.

"We can’t put you, Young Master Muen, in such a dangerous position. Please first stay—"

"When I entered this fortress, I said it, didn’t I?"

Muen cut Funal off.

"Did you forget, Mr. Funal?"

"What?"

"I said... I came to take part in this battle, not to watch."

Staring into Funal’s eyes, Muen said each word clearly. "I will fight shoulder to shoulder with those soldiers."

"..."

Funal froze. Realizing the seriousness in Muen’s words—and that this was not merely a verbal promise made to soothe morale—his face once again showed that faint, gratified expression Muen had already seen who knew how many times since entering this fortress.

"Is that so... then once again I was discourteous. Sorry, Young Master Muen."

"This isn’t the time to apologize, is it?"

"You’re right."

Funal’s spirit lifted. He snapped into full mode and began directing soldiers to block that gap.

His command was extremely deft and meticulous. The guards, who had been panicked by the sudden explosion, quickly calmed down and began shifting from instinctive reactions into forming battle formations in an orderly way, coordinating with each other and pushing the demonmen who had poured in step by step back outward.

And even as the situation gradually improved, Funal’s allocation of soldiers never became chaotic. Under his command, every soldier knew exactly what they should do. This wasn’t a simple patching of one hole by tearing down another wall. With a turn of Funal’s hand, he re-compacted the entire wall defense.

"Mr. Funal has a lot of authority among these soldiers."

Muen suddenly said.

"No matter their rank, they don’t doubt your orders at all. Even if it costs their lives, they’ll still do their best to carry them out... as a commander, that’s impressive." 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

"Heh. What authority? I’m someone whose cultivation isn’t even at third rank. How could I have any great authority?"

Funal shook his head self-mockingly. "In a scene like this, I don’t even dare leave the protection of my personal guards, much less talk big like I did to you earlier, Young Master Muen."

"I only benefit from the Duke’s trust. I don’t hold any noble title, but inside this fortress, my authority... is only second to the Duke’s. To put it bluntly, it’s just borrowing the fox’s power to bully the tiger."

"Mr. Funal is being too modest. Being able to earn Father’s trust in the first place already proves your ability, doesn’t it? No wonder the demonfolk went to such lengths trying to kill you, too. I heard that in the last abnormal incident, they sent a full six waves of assassins just for you." Muen said.

"Yeah..."

Funal looked genuinely shaken as he spoke. "Even now, I still feel afraid afterward. If not for my good luck—if I hadn’t happened to be staying behind in the fortress—then I might’ve ended up like my former colleagues, buried in the Abyss desert."

"Yeah. Really good luck..."

Muen’s peripheral vision swept over Funal’s side profile.

In truth, this man—currently the fortress’s second-in-command on the surface—looked rather young, probably only a bit over thirty.

And his refined, scholarly appearance was the type that, walking through Belrand’s Upper City, would make neglected noblewomen toss handkerchiefs at him. Years of military life also seemed to have left almost no marks on his face.

Muen had naturally investigated him. He knew Mr. Funal held no title, and no officially granted Imperial military rank either. Mr. Funal was only valued by Father because of his outstanding ability.

More importantly, in all the intelligence Muen had obtained so far, there was absolutely no record of his past.

He was like someone who had appeared in this fortress out of thin air. Aside from the years he spent assisting Father, there was no record of him at all.

"Ah, look at me. I meant to go support them, and I ended up chatting with you again, Mr. Funal."

As if suddenly realizing it, Muen spoke with slight apology.

"It’s fine. I think right now, it might not yet require you to act, Young Master Muen."

Funal smiled faintly. His smile was very approachable, and it was also very easy to make people lower their guard.

"I think I’d better go support them anyway. I’ll treat it as a warm-up."

Muen turned and quickly walked toward that gap, which now seemed to be only in the cleanup stage.

But the moment he reached the lowest part of the wall, he raised a hand and summoned Ebul over, whispering a few low words into his ear.

"What... is that real?"

Ebul looked extremely shocked.

"Do as I said. Go."

"Yes!"

Ebul’s expression turned heavy. He cautiously swept a glance behind them, then led the squad away at speed.

And Muen continued toward the dangerous battlefield, tapping the hilt of Elizabeth as he went, and murmuring to himself in a low voice,

"Now... it’s basically confirmed."