The sun hadn't risen fully yet. The dew clung to the grass. Birds chirped in the distance.
And on a beaten dirt road slicing through the forested hills of northern L'solia, five weary adventurers trudged forward, heading toward the most dangerous destination they'd ever been voluntarily to reach the Northern Frontline Camp.
War was coming.
Demons were moving.
And their old priest thought, "Hey, let's send the idiots."
"Okay, but why are demons suddenly invading from the north?" Cael said for the seventh time in under ten minutes. "Why now? Why not during harvest season when everyone's distracted? Is this weather-related? Moon-cycle? Blood pact? Ancient prophecy?"
"Cael," said Alaric, who was now the designated leader simply because he walked slightly ahead, "maybe we just ask the commander when we get there."
Cael narrowed his eyes. "You mean if we get there. You've seen the reports. Demon army, massive casualties, weird claw-shaped scorch marks on the ground. That screams ritual summoning. I swear, if this turns out to be some cult nonsense—"
"You said it was moon-cycle related two minutes ago," Renna interrupted.
"Well, both can be true! Demons have layers!" Cael snapped. "Also, did you guys know the demon war in the third era ended because of salt shortages? Coincidence? I think not."
Thorne, dragging a large crate of spears on a floating wooden sled because he refused to carry anything that didn't look cool, let out a yawn. "Can we fight something yet? Or stab a prophecy? Something?"
Lys adjusted her glasses. "You can't stab a prophecy, Thorne."
"Bet," he muttered.
Cael took out a scroll and started scribbling. "Okay, okay. Let's recap. We've been assigned by the old priest—who, by the way, mysteriously knew we'd be needed—to reinforce a frontline camp that hasn't sent a letter in three days. THREE. That's a ghost protocol red flag. Also, I asked him if we were the only party going, and he said—quote—'You're the only ones who won't explode under pressure.' That's not comforting. That's not a compliment! That's a death sentence with frosting!"
Renna blinked. "Honestly, I think that was the nicest thing he ever said to us."
The group fell silent for a moment. The trees thinned. In the far distance, they could see the faint silhouette of watchtowers, banners of L'solia fluttering in the wind like dying birds.
The air smelled like smoke. Burned wood. Faint sulfur.
Lys glanced toward the skyline. "I see aerial shadows. Harpies, maybe. Or scouting demons."
"Great," Cael muttered. "It's gonna be an aerial assault arc. Those never go well. Has anyone seen the Demon Arc Chapter Thirty-Two Theory?"
"No one has read your theories, Cael," Alaric said flatly.
"They're 148 pages long, Cael," Lys added.
"Single-spaced!" Renna chimed in.
"AND YOU ALL MOCKED ME," Cael wailed, throwing his arms to the heavens. "BUT WHO'S GOING TO BE LAUGHING WHEN THE SKY BLEEDS FIRE?!"
Just then, a faint horn blew in the distance. A signal. A greeting… or a warning.
"Okay," Alaric said, cracking his knuckles. "Let's go make our heroic entrance."
"Preferably without setting anything on fire this time," Renna said, eyeing Thorne.
"No promises," Thorne grinned.
And as the group descended toward the front line, past barricades and smoke and hurried soldiers prepping for battle, they did not realize that this road—this cursed, demon-ridden road—was about to be the beginning of something far worse than cabbage ghosts or missing chickens.
Something was waiting. And it was watching.
Cael shivered. "...Did anyone else feel like we just walked into the next arc of pain?"
"Yes," everyone said.
Then a shrieking sound tore through the clouds—followed by a demonic harpy swooping low, its wings like razors, talons gleaming with something probably unholy and tax-evading.
Alaric didn't even blink.
"ENGAGE HERO MODE!" he yelled and blasted himself thirty meters into the air, light magic bursting from his boots like divine fireworks with a vendetta. His coat fluttered majestically. His eyes glowed with righteous fury. His sword? Summoned straight from his chest like it was a magical vending machine.
"LIGHT JUSTICE SLASHHHHHHHHHH!!!"
He spun in midair and cleaved a flying demon in half, the force of the slash vaporizing a few unfortunate clouds and several pants off the soldiers watching from below.
Thorne screamed, "ALREADY?! I HAVEN'T EVEN WARMED UP!"
Then proceeded to yeet every single lance on his back. And he had a lot of lances. Like, an unreasonable number.
WHOOSH! ZZZZZZAP! THWACK! THUNDERBOOM!
He was looping his summoned divine lance.
Desummon.
Summon.
THROW.
Repeat.
It was a thunderstorm of stabbing. Several demons exploded mid-air. One unlucky harpy caught four lances and high-fived death on the way down.
Meanwhile, Cael was laughing but in a way that deeply worried everyone.
"I'VE BEEN HOLDING BACK FOR TOO LONG," he howled, his hands a blur.
Shadow bullets. Shadow arrows. Shadow spears. Shadow… ducks?!
Everything flew from him like a rapid-fire printer possessed by the spirits of vengeful pigeons.
The sky turned blacker than his soul.
And somehow, everything hit only demons.
"HOW IS HE SO ACCURATE?!" screamed a soldier from behind a barrel.
"I THINK HE'S JUST PANICKING REALLY HARD," yelled another.
"HE HIT THE ONE BEHIND THE TREE THAT I DIDN'T EVEN SEE," muttered a third.
Meanwhile, Lys was already in melee range, and no one knew how.
She summoned her magic bow, then used it like a baseball bat and batter'd up a demon's jaw into the stratosphere.
WHACK!
A follow-up wind spell sent three more flying like they were in a magical theme park ride gone wrong.
"ICE PILLAR—WIND SWEEP COMBOOO!" she yelled.
A tornado of icicles erupted behind her, turning a demon squad into snow cone confetti.
Renna? Renna was in full rainbow rage mode.
Her knife gleamed with all elements like it couldn't decide whether to burn, freeze, zap, poison, or just insult the enemy's fashion choices.
She stabbed a demon, and it turned into sparkles.
She stabbed another, and it exploded into fire and frogs.
She stabbed a third, and it disintegrated while playing an ominous flute sound that no one could explain.
"WHY DOES SHE HAVE THAT?!" a knight whispered, hiding behind a tent flap.
"SHHH, YOU'LL MAKE HER NOTICE YOU," someone hissed.
The camp was in chaos. But the enemy demons?
Even more chaotic.
They were being decimated.
Some tried to retreat. Some tried to explode. One literally curled up and cried.
The adventurers and soldiers of the frontline camp peeked from their bunkers, mouths hanging open, faces pale.
One grizzled captain dropped his sword and whispered, "So the rumors were true…"
"They're not a hero party," his lieutenant said solemnly.
"They're a natural disaster with matching outfits."
A loud, victorious shout came from Thorne as he lightning-slammed his lance into the ground and posed like a wrestler.
"IS THIS NOT THE MARK OF GLORY?!" he bellowed.
Then a random lance he'd thrown earlier landed next to him, almost taking his head off.
The group looked around at the battlefield.
Demons? Gone.
Harpies? Vapor.
Collateral damage? …Let's not talk about the tents.
"Cael," Renna said, her hair slightly on fire, "wasn't this just supposed to be a scouting mission?"
Cael looked down at his scroll, blinked, and said:
"…So apparently it was supposed to be a recon."
"WELL TOO LATE NOW!" Thorne roared, flexing.
The dust hadn't even settled yet when Lys, still brushing demon guts off her sleeves, adjusted her glasses and asked, "Okay—but seriously, how was this camp losing? Didn't you all have like... an army?"
The frontline commander, a weary man in his late forties with more scars than medals, sighed the kind of sigh only a man who hadn't slept since the last eclipse could manage.
"It's because," he said, voice hoarse, "we're out of mana."
The party collectively blinked.
"Come again?" Alaric asked, tilting his head like a confused puppy who could vaporize demons.
The commander waved a hand at the chaos behind them—tents torn, mages passed out in buckets, knights limping around with potion strapped to them like medieval caffeine drips.
"This battle's been going on for years, and demons don't exactly follow work shifts," he explained. "Our mages are drained. The knights are down to yelling threats. Even the adventurers are just here for rations at this point."
He pointed to a mage in the corner, face down in the dirt.
"That guy once summoned a meteor. Now he can barely summon a spark to light a campfire."
The mage raised a weak hand and wheezed, "I sneezed and passed out last week…"
"Oh gods," Lys muttered, "it's a mana drought."
Renna sat down on a crate, thoughtfully spinning her rainbow knife. "But you had backup, right? Gold-rank adventurers? Hero-class mages?"
The commander gave a laugh that was 70% bitterness, 30% caffeine withdrawal.
"They were here. Until the demon general popped up and they realized the pay didn't cover disintegration. We haven't had Gold-rank support in months."
The group exchanged glances.
"Wait, we're Gold rank now," Cael pointed out, blinking.
"Yeah, but we're different," Alaric added.
"Are we?" Renna asked.
Cael answered by pointing at himself. "My mana pool is so deep, it makes the ocean feel self-conscious."
"I haven't run out once," Lys admitted. "Even when I tried."
"I THINK MINE REFILLS WHEN I YELL," Thorne shouted, unnecessarily, sparks dancing around him.
Alaric raised his hand. "I breathe and I regenerate magic. Pretty sure light magic is just sunshine and hope, and I'm full of both."
The commander stared at them.
"You… what."
Cael gestured at them like a very cursed game show host. "None of us run out of mana. We're basically broken."
The commander blinked. Twice.
"That explains so much," he mumbled. "No wonder HQ just sent you lunatics instead of reinforcements."
One of the soldiers limped by, eyeing the hero party with reverent terror. "Sir, they vaporized the air itself."
"No we didn't," Alaric protested.
"Yes you did," Cael muttered. "You light-blasted a demon so hard the grass grew back wrong."
"Oh. Cool."
Lys rubbed her temples. "Okay, so the enemy has constant reinforcements, your forces are drained, morale is lower than Cael's blood sugar during a nightmare, and the only reason this camp still exists is probably because we showed up like a cosmic punchline."
The commander nodded grimly. "Correct."
"WELL THEN," Thorne said, slamming his fist into his open palm, lightning crackling around him. "Let's give these demons a reason to regret their life choices."
Renna stood up, cracking her neck. "Let's turn this place from a graveyard into a highlight reel."
Lys summoned her bow again with a whoosh of wind and frost. "We'll handle the front lines."
Alaric unsheathed his sword and beamed. "We're about to give this war the most heroic—and absolutely unhinged—support it's ever seen."
Cael leaned in toward the commander and whispered, "You might want to build more tents. For safety. From us."
"…I'm going to start praying again," the commander muttered.
Cael patted his shoulder. "Smart man."
The hero party gathered around a very makeshift war table, a crate with a badly drawn map and a crushed sandwich on it, while the sun dipped behind gray clouds like it didn't even want to see what was about to happen.
Lys was first to speak. "Okay. So. Demon army. Big. Angry. Heading straight here. What do we do?"
"Negotiate?" Renna offered.
Thorne crossed his arms. "I only negotiate with punches."
Alaric rubbed his chin dramatically. "What if we challenge the Demon General to a duel?"
"That's assuming they care about honor duels," Lys pointed out. "They're demons, not fencing club presidents."
Cael, crouched dramatically on a barrel, whispered, "What if… we're already too late? What if they're watching us now?" He looked around wildly. "IS THAT TREE BREATHING?!"
"Cael," Alaric said gently, "that's a very normal tree."
"THAT'S WHAT IT WANTS US TO THINK!"
Lys put her face in her hands. "Okay, we need to think strategically."
Renna glanced at the map. "It says here there are roughly ten thousand demons in the army."
Thorne's brow furrowed. "Is that a lot?"
Cael turned slowly. "Thorne. If you lined them up end to end, they'd blot out the sun."
Thorne cracked his knuckles. "Then we fight in the shade."
"NO," Cael barked, "THAT'S NOT—ugh, you know what, fine."
Alaric shrugged. "If they're gonna attack anyway, we should just go first."
Lys blinked. "What do you mean, go first?"
"You know. Pre-attack them."
Cael's mouth twitched. "You want us to… what? Ambush the literal hellspawn army with five people?"
Alaric grinned. "Yup."
"…I'm listening," Thorne said.
Renna raised her hand. "Wait, wait. Why don't we wait for reinforcements? Or better terrain? Or maybe not die?"
Alaric shrugged. "Well, we don't know if we'll die."
Lys sighed. "We also don't know how to wage war."
"We've played war games," Thorne said proudly.
Cael threw up his hands. "We're not generals!"
"But we are dangerously overpowered lunatics," Renna pointed out.
"True," Cael admitted.
A long silence followed. They all looked at each other, minds completely empty except for sparkles, chaos, and the distant sound of boss battle music warming up.
Then Lys sighed.
"…We're going to attack the demon army, aren't we?"
Everyone else nodded solemnly.
Cael pinched the bridge of his nose. "Fine. FINE. But if we all die in the most preventable way possible, I'm haunting all of you."
Meanwhile, behind a tree that was indeed not breathing...
A scout from the demon army peered through his spyglass. His eyes widened in horror.
"They're… they're planning to charge us?!"
Another demon scout leaned over. "That's stupid. They're only five people."
"I know! It's the stupidity that makes it terrifying!!"