Chapter 475: I Believe That’s Enough

The courtyard fell silent as the final three soldiers shifted their stance. They were getting ready.

The air grew heavier, not with killing intent, but with something cleaner, sharper.

Resolve.

The kind soldiers forged in battlefields where giving up meant dying.

Damien felt it immediately. ’They’ve changed.’ He thought with a small grin on his face.

Their feet planted more firmly. Their breath steadied. Their weapons lowered slightly, not in fear, but in preparation.

He narrowed his eyes, excitement stirring.

Then, one of the three kicked the ground.

The fight resumed.

The soldier dashed forward, blade slicing horizontally in a clean arc. Damien stepped to the side, only for the second soldier to appear suddenly at his left, thrusting with precise timing.

Damien leaned back, only for the third to sweep at his ankle.

A coordinated tri-strike.

It was both clean and efficient and by no means was it an accident.

They weren’t using a formation anymore—they were blending into each other’s rhythms, using each other’s movements to hide their own.

Damien grinned. “Good. Come at me then.”

He lifted a foot, spun lightly, and twisted past the ankle sweep, allowing the blade to pass harmlessly beneath him. Then he redirected the thrust with a gentle flick of his wrist.

But before he could counter, the first soldier rushed in again, faster than before.

They weren’t giving him space.

Not anymore.

Damien raised his hand, and another shout cut through the courtyard.

“Commander! Let us join!”

It was one of the nine soldiers Damien had already knocked down earlier. His eyes burned with the same determination as the trio.

“No,” one of the remaining three growled. “Stay back.”

But the others were already stepping in. One limped, one held his ribs, another gripped their shoulder, but all nine wore the same stubborn defiance.

“We’re not done,” a soldier muttered. “Not yet.”

Damien inhaled slowly. So this was their answer.

Twelve against one. Another round with this group of a dozen soldiers.

But this time… with something different.

Something wild and unorthodox.

Something unpredictable.

The commander crossed his arms, watching from the side.

“Now this,” he murmured under his breath, “should be interesting.”

Fenrir sat a few meters away, tail swishing, eyes glowing with interest. Luton jiggled atop a weapon rack, quivering in anticipation.

Damien rolled his shoulders and a cracking sound filled the space. It seemed like he was just getting warmed up too.

Since the commander had refused to approve the request of the other nine warriors because he wasn’t the one who had permitted them to join earlier, Damien had to approve their rejoining.

With a smirk and a hand gesture, he called them forth. “Come then.”

The twelve soldiers surged forward as if pulled by a single thread. But unlike the first time, there was no clear formation.

They had no uniform tactic. They came at him from every angle—high, low, from the front, from behind—each with a different style.

Swordsmanship, spearmanship, Axe techniques and even close-quarters brawling.

All clashing.

All overlapping.

They were stepping on each other’s ranges, interfering with each other’s attacks, crossing arcs of weapons in ways Damien had never seen before.

At first glance, it looked like chaos.

A mess.

A disaster of coordination.

But Damien quickly realized something much more dangerous. It wasn’t chaos!

It was rhythm. A broken rhythm.

A constantly shifting, ever-changing rhythm that made prediction impossible.

One soldier lunged with a spear and the next abruptly cut him off with a sword slash that forced Damien to dodge differently.

Another jumped in with a punch, only to retreat instantly, letting a taller soldier swing a heavy broadsword from behind.

There wasn’t a single pattern or cadence.

No flow to it.

Just twelve combatants improvising with the same goal. To touch Damien, even once. Just once.

The crowd roared.

“Look at them—!”

“They’re insane!”

“This isn’t training—this is madness!”

Seliah stared with wide eyes.

“They’re not fighting like soldiers anymore… They’re fighting like mercenaries.”

Damien’s eyes flickered with understanding.

“Yes,” he whispered to himself. “Two styles.”

Soldier discipline.

Mercenary chaos.

And these twelve had somehow fused both—poorly, but effectively—into something erratic and dangerous.

Damien sidestepped another strike, then ducked under a spear.

One soldier attempted to grab him in a chokehold; Damien elbowed him lightly in the chest, sending him stumbling back.

Another swung a hammer downward but Damien stepped sideways only to nearly get clipped by a dagger from behind.

He laughed quietly.

“Good.”

This was the kind of fight that sharpened reflexes.

That trained instinct. The kind of fight that forced one into adaptation.

He let the fight continue.

Predicting their movements was nearly impossible.

Tracking each fighter individually was pointless.

So Damien changed his approach.

He ignored everything they were doing. Technique, weapon arcs, and even footwork.

He focused instead on the momentum of the group itself and on the flow of their combined presence rather than the attacks they threw.

Twelve presences would equal twelve intentions. Twelve wills.

If he read them as one…

The chaos became coherent.

The broken rhythm became a beat.

The unpredictable movements became predictable.

Damien smirked as the realization hit him. ’Ah. So that’s how it’s going to be.’

The next time a soldier charged from behind, Damien didn’t move away. He just grinned and stepped forward, letting the man’s timing miss entirely.

A spear thrust from his right and Damien caught the spear lightly with two fingers and twisted, redirecting it as if the soldier had meant to attack his own teammate.

“Shit!” The teammate whom the redirected attack was aimed out, yelped as he moved to dodge before it became too late. The spear was aimed at his heart after all.

But Damien didn’t care, he was still locked between eleven more soldiers. A heavy punch arrived from the left and Damien pulled the striker forward by the wrist, letting him crash harmlessly into the dirt.

Now Damien was the one moving among them like water.

Each attack that should have cornered him became useless.

Each weapon that should have grazed him passed through air.

And each mistake they made… he happily exploited like a gold digger that had seen a pit of gold.

Not killing or crippling blows.

But soft taps and precise hits that struck nerves, tendons, joints.

One by one, soldiers fell.

The first collapsed with a grunt after Damien flicked his fingers against a pressure point near the shoulder.

Pa!

The second dropped as Damien struck the side of his neck with the back of his knuckles.

The third stumbled when Damien tapped the back of his knee, making him unable to even stand which in turn made him unable to continue the fight.

The fourth fell face-first after Damien stepped aside and let his own momentum betray him. Then Damien kicked him toward the far end of the courtyard.

Four down.

But two more soon followed and the number rose to six.

Damien moved faster now—not frantic, not rushed. Simply efficient. He was no longer dodging at the last second. He was reading them. Anticipating them.

Adapting.

A soldier with a staff jabbed toward him—Damien fired a quick palm strike into his sternum, sending him crashing into another teammate.

They weren’t done recovering when Damien added another two, bringing the total number of knocked out soldiers to eight.

Only four remained.

But even those four were panting, sweat pouring down their faces, arms trembling.

One of them charged anyway, shouting through clenched teeth, “I’m not—done—!”

Damien side-stepped and pressed two fingers to the base of the man’s skull.

The soldier collapsed instantly.

Three left.

One swung his blade at Damien’s waist. Damien kicked the man’s foot, twisting his stance, then landed a solid blow on his ribs.

He fell without a sound.

Two left.

The both of them exchanged a desperate glance.

They were exhausted.

Covered in bruises.

Nearly out of breath.

But they gritted their teeth and held their weapons.

Damien admired them. He liked their tenacity and their pride.

Their refusal to bow even when the fight was over.

They rushed him but Damien didn’t even counter.

He simply weaved between their blows and landed one blow on each of them once on the chest.

They dropped.

And now, only four of the twelve soldiers remained conscious in the entire courtyard.

Damien stood at the center of the arena, breathing evenly.

Uninjured and untouched.

The ground around him was littered with bodies—none gravely wounded, but most unconscious or unable to stand after his precise strikes.

Eight knocked out cold. Four barely conscious.

The courtyard was stunned.

Silence rippled through the watching soldiers.

Then, a roar exploded from the barracks.

“DAMN!”

“WHAT KIND OF MONSTER—”

“TWELVE OF US—TWELVE—!!”

“We didn’t even scratch him!”

“It wasn’t even a real fight!”

Haldric stared, jaw tight, eyes unreadable.

The commander slowly exhaled through his nose.

Seliah whispered under her breath, “He really is… inhuman.”

Fenrir hummed, almost proudly while luton made a pleased bubbling sound.

Damien lowered his hand.

“I believe,” he said calmly, “that’s enough.”

And with eight soldiers unconscious on the ground around him, the fight ended

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