It was ironic, sad even, that a constant and imminent threat of apocalypse motivated the world to come together and establish world peace. No more wars. No more holding your finger over the nuclear button. They had superhumans now. Slayers, who practiced great forms of magic and integrated advanced technology into their warfare. Everyday meant another innovation made, another barrier against the end of times, and another sweet day.

The Hangzhou Disaster had awakened the world, then, that their world could be still snatched away in a blink of an eye, just like it almost had multiple times during the Slayer Emergence. Since then, every portal-bearing city built an Outbreak Barrier similarly to Ordo’s, and the domestic militaries and guilds updated their outbreak protocols. Yearly simulations were held in vacant worlds, where they underwent a mock outbreak, where Ordo’s were often cited to be “disturbingly realistic”. All to better prepare for the real thing, if it’d happen.

And it had.

Unfortunately for them, the Ordo Disaster was beyond their expectations. Typically, normal outbreaks were inherently chaotic. They had no order. At its core, it was nothing more than a stampede of different monsters from different worlds making a mess of things. Maybe you'd get leaders like goblin chieftains or liches, but no commanders. Many researchers said outbreaks were just “zoo handlers trying to wrangle escaped animals back to their cages”.

But no one could’ve expected that this outbreak was intentional, that they had distinct enemy commanders who purposefully targeted Ordo and led organized attacks against critical infrastructure, including the Five Pillars.

Ordo was simultaneously prepared and unprepared, having more than enough training and fourteen days worth of emergency outbreak provisions, yet fumbling when this resembled an old war.

However, if humanity was known for something, then it’d be adapting.

The enemy was clear, and they were hated.

Over ten thousand troops were participating in Operation Scorcher. Hailing from the Ordoian Army: units from the 6th Infantry Division, 2nd Armored Division, 1st Security Division, 1st Expedition Division, and 10th Artillery Brigade.

Units from the Otherguards (present at the time of disaster): Middle Eastern Division, Himalayan Division, Australian Outback Division, Sahara Division, Northern Territories Division, and Southeastern Asian Division.

Units from foreign militaries (present at the time of disaster): United States Armed Forces: 1st Battalion, 5th Marines; British Armed Forces: 4th Battalion, The Rifles; South African Army: 5 South African Infantry Battalion; and the National Army of Colombia: 41st Infantry Battalion, 2nd Division.

Over three thousand Slayers were participating in Operation Scorcher: Slayer Teams from the Big Four (Angels, Martials, Glory, Royals), including Vice Guild Master of Royals, Levin; Slayer Teams belonging to affiliate guilds and standalones, Ordo University’s Department of Systemic Works, and a single Pseudo-Slayer team, operating as licensed, battle-ready Slayers as dictated by World Defenses Order 22.

Slayer Teams from Otherguard units (present at the time of disaster): Mediterranean Division, North Pacific Ocean Division, Antarctic Division, and Caribbean Division.

Slayer Teams from foreign guilds (present at the time of disaster): United States of America: Legends and Aces Guild; Ghana: Anidaso Guild; Germany: Sonnenschwert Guild; Japan: Isshin Guild; Vatican City: the Vatican; India: Prakamya Guild; Indonesia: Kekuatan Guild; and Turkey: Aslan Guild.

Operation Scorcher was led by Guild Master Archknell of Glory Guild, assisted by the Head Artisan of Angels Guild, Sage.

In Gallery Street, over two hundred Slayers were present: Archknell, Levin, Team Luster, professors belonging to Ordo University, dozens of Slayer Teams both domestic and foreign. Most were B to A-Ranks, and seventeen were S-Ranks.

Archknell had left Ordo University after his speech, going to Black Paladin Station to retrieve the superweapon that could supposedly kill the Comets. Before he had even made the speech, the area had mostly been prepped; by the time he had arrived with his forces, everything was almost done.

Levin had began complaining about the Comets, swearing for revenge and generally being impatient as a whole. To her fortune, the stars of the hour had arrived, appearing above the massive group. Two figures robed in long, tattered black cloaks, limbs thin and sickly gray, each wielding their weapon: for the left, an ebony scepter with a ruby jewel; for the right, a thin spine-like sword that resembled a spear than a blade.

With a subtle twist of Archknell's hands, the air gained clarity, like a camera lens focusing. Thin lines manifested by the hundreds.

[Skill Activation: Silk of the Deathweaver - Siphoning Strings]

[Silk of the Deathweaver - Siphoning Strings] was a special skill (apart of a toolbox) that Archknell had woven into his threads; it had the natural property of sucking the strength out of anything caught in its traps. It affected even the Comets, who were quickly strung together as fast as they had arrived.

Tewfik chuckled, trying to tilt its head but its movement was too restricted to do so. “How intriguing… So this is the creativity that you humans demonstrated. Shame then, for destruction is our applause.”

Levin scowled. “You—!”

“Calm yourself, Levin,” said Archknell with a raised hand, telling everyone to ease. A conversation was to be had first. “I take it that you have accepted our challenge then? I never thought you Comets enjoy the concept of honor or fairness.”

“Neither,” corrected Pereyra, who had the same casualness as its partner. “You have deceived us, Archknell. For I am blind to your mysteries in those lightless places, especially this creation of your so-called ‘superweapon’.”

“It matters not,” Tewfik added. “We shall indulge in your inventions and your schemes and your anger. All of your inane machinations. Through the Pillar’s fall or yours, so this city and its collapse. Victory is assured.”

“Even when we have deduced your powers?” said a voice. Above, popping in the dark, had a short figure on the corner of a roof, dressed like the Comets were but their cloak was heavier, thicker, and concealed all but two snake-like eyes. Problem of Glory Guild.

“Yes.” Tewfik attempted to nod but couldn’t. “Even so.”

“Ha, regardless, we have prepared for your arrival since you poked your little heads out. To think we went through all this effort, all this secrecy and protocols just to find out that we could’ve asked you to come all this time. We even spread a rumor that we had a superweapon just to ensure you’d follow along to our song and dance. It doesn’t matter. None of this was a waste of time.”

“Oh, a falsehood all along?” asked Pereyra, attempting to turn its head towards Problem who snickered. “Have you the belief? That knowing our blessed powers would ensure your victory?”

“Of course. After all, your ally was easily deduced.” Problem saw past Pereyra and into Tewfik. “Tewfik, we have watched your attack on Pillar Vesper. Your power has astounded us all from its conception to its execution. How was it possible? You cut something that shouldn’t be cut. The only probable explanation was this: you possess a conceptual ability that converts ‘something that could be cut’ into ‘something that must be cut’. Combined with the natural ability to create wind pressure, you can cut anything and everything from a distance.”

But Problem didn’t mention its limitations, which was why Tewfik didn’t cut down the other four Pillars immediately after. That was one of the last mysteries they hadn't solved yet: what were its limitations? Other than an ambiguous answer of “needing star energy” or some trash like that.

So Problem intentionally omitted that part; however, it was an entirely different question if the Comet caught on.

Because right now, Tewfik was silent. Their deductions had been spot on. Good. That was one Comet down, one to go.

Pereyra seemed to scowl. It struggled to keep its head raised. “What a farce. What about I, the Watcher? If intelligence is your blessing.”

“So am I correct? Fantastic.” Problem glanced towards the Slayers present, on-guard and at the ready. “You were our largest concern. No doubt you have stripped us bare of every private detail we have. Fortunately, Slayers could communicate through the Slayer System, and we knew you couldn’t monitor our messages, but there’d be risks: accidental leaks, the power of deduction, and so on. We couldn’t move with certainty until we solved you. And we couldn’t.

“Until Alexander Shen discovered something fascinating.”

The two Comets stiffened hearing his name.

Problem continued, “During our first mission, he, out of everyone, measured the highest jin levels, barring those found in Gallery Street. Why was that? It’s simple. You were watching him. We haven’t figured out why and we’d love to know, but that’s neither here nor there.

“At some point, Hidden gave him a wonderful idea: we shouldn’t scrutinize the abnormal but rather the normal, things that are naturally embedded in this world that we overlook. Thus, Alexander turned himself into a compass and found that, only in the dark, the jin level went down. Your ability needs light.

“So let me pose you this riddle, Pereyra: What is normal in the presence of light?” Problem looked down at their allies, watching how their reflections in the blood-drowned street shimmered. “I won’t waste time and answer it for you: reflections. You were watching us through reflections.”

“Haha…” Pereyra slowly laughed. “How astute—!”

“And you are a foolish Comet. Both of you are. Surely you can see it now. We have deduced four of the five main abilities of the Kreutz Sungrazers.

“Pereyra, the Lesser Watcher, has the power to view the world through reflections.

“Tewfik, the Lesser Cutter, can cut any tangible object by altering the principle of certainty.

“And your leader, Kreutz, the Lesser Caller, can summon low-level cosmic entities.

“Either Wonder or Ikeya can allow magical phenomena for an environment. I wonder what the last ability is, Pereyra. What is it? Is it the very universe splitters you wield right now? Conduits to better channel your power? To allow you to cross worlds and control monsters at mass?

”Do the Space Beyond really look down on lowly astrals such as yourself—?!”

“Silence!”

“Heh. Any mage worth their salt knows of your homeland.” If the situation had an ounce of lightheartedness, then Problem would have allowed themselves a grin. “You may have other auxiliary abilities, but we have your aces. Deducing your abilities was the first step; with what you know now, I’m certain that even a makeshift entity such as yourself can pull together the threads.”

Let’s start at the beginning then, of Operation Scorcher. Archknell and Seraph had discussed the objectives.

The main objective was this: the protection of Pillar Dawns, and if possible, the subjugation of the Lesser Watcher and Caller.

The first step was figuring out their powers. Due to Tewfik’s appearance in Pillar Vesper and Pereyra’s in Black Paladin Station, Ordo had roughly estimated their power level to be at least an S-Rank, perhaps higher. For their abilities themselves, it was exactly what Problem described so there was no need to go over them again.

Next was figuring out how to do it given the circumstances. Initially, the plan was to subjugate Pereyra by finding its hideout, but that fell through after the Tormented Flesh had emerged and Tewfik had destroyed Pillar Vesper. The former clogged the roads, and the latter struck fear, making Ordo's commanders nervous.

As Sage described: Pereyra was merely the scout. Tewfik was the warrior.

Seraph suggested to shore up Pillar Dawns’s defense as much as they possibly could without jeopardizing the defenses of other critical infrastructure. However, Archknell and Sage thought otherwise. These were two Comets from the Space Beyond, and multiple S-Ranks (plus an SS-Rank, Archknell himself) would be present. The possibility of collateral damage was so absurdly high that the battle may end up destroying the Pillar anyway. Not to mention possible civilian casualties.

Thus, the battle needed to be taken elsewhere. Meaning, they had to subjugate the Comets. Or at the very least, force them to retreat.

That was when Problem suggested an idea: Gallery Street. Due to the fact that it’d been altered into an ‘environment that allowed magical phenomena’, no civilians would be present, and it’d be far enough from Pillar Dawns. Most importantly, the street reeked with mana.

Problem assured them that they could create a ritual that’d use the mana inside Gallery Street and create an arena, allowing the high-rankers to fight the Comets with little impediments. To conceal the ritual, it’d be written in blood, which would be hidden underneath the gore that the street already had.

So Problem had drawn a blueprint of the ritual and sent it to a clean-up crew comprised of trusted soldiers and Slayers, where they’d use ritual blood, a special type of blood specifically used for ritualism, to draw it.

To ensure the ritual would last, mana conduction rods were ordered to be constructed, which could better funnel mana, thus better mana efficiency, thus longer duration. Fearing that Pereyra may catch on, Archknell suggested this: they could take engineers from Ordo University and send them to Black Paladin Station alongside crates of night vision potions.

In a conversation with Alexander shortly after Pereyra’s attack there, he had mentioned that he looked into using the tunnels to transport supplies underground. However, the tunnels could also be used as a place to construct the mana conduction rods because it was pitch black inside (and how the Incogs got the drop on everyone).

There was one glaring problem though: How could they force the Comets to fight there? Why wouldn’t they fly off to Pillar Dawns immediately? Or worse yet, attack the mobilization efforts? To solve this, they defined two additional objectives: give themselves time and draw the Comets to Gallery.

Archknell had already solved the first problem when he suggested sending the engineers to Black Paladin Station. It was simple: spread rumors. Specifically about a vague and all-powerful superweapon. Then, abruptly pull the magic engineers out of Ordo University, forbade all communications, all to draw questions.

Once Pereyra caught on, it’d want to investigate further regardless of the rumor’s soundness. This, coupled with Tewfik’s power limitations (currently unknown), would give Ordo a reasonable amount of time and space, considering thirteen thousand people were being mobilized.

Next was actually attracting them. No one had any good ideas other than challenging them directly. So that was what they did: Archknell revealed the “true” operation to Systemic Works, simultaneously egging Pereyra to act. He appealed to their pride; if that didn’t work, the superweapon (hopefully) pressured them to come anyway. All done with little time between the revelation and the engagement to apply pressure.

No one was sure that this was going to work but thankfully it had. Tewfik’s confession had unsettling implications however. The initial shock of Vesper’s collapse had jolted Ordo awake. Since the Comet had expended a great amount of its energy (or whatever its power source was), it most likely couldn’t do the same for the other Pillars in such a small time-frame.

Thus, knowing that Ordo was preparing to defend Dawns, knowing that they were expecting two of the five Sungrazers, knowing that all the important leaders and powerful Slayers and expensive equipment and everything else would be confined into a single place… It was irresistible.

Killing thirteen thousand troops was, horrifically-speaking, an easier task than destroying a Pillar in their eyes. It’d collapse either way, through swordfall or anarchy. To the Comets, this wasn’t a battle at all. Rather a feast, like a predator seeing thousands of its prey huddled against a corner.

That wasn’t a comforting thought.

Regardless, to execute this operation, the roads needed to be cleared and thirteen thousand troops had to be moved, organized. Units present in Dawns already took care of the latter. Hour-by-hour, they worked tirelessly, knee-deep in their own dead, transporting truckloads of rotting corpses to their temporary funeral homes. They deserved the most praise as they made this operation possible.

And Sage as well. With her team, they ran hundreds, thousands of simulations, calculating the most optimal positions for everyone. As best as they could anyway, considering they had less than a day's worth of time. It was good enough though. Something like this was possible due to today's technology and Ordo's preparedness.

Sage informed the Slayers through the [Private Channel] about everything: positions, contingencies, protocols. Everyone knew where they were going; even the most inexperienced of the bunch, the first-years, could tell their left and right. For the military, they were informed through various communication networks, forced to follow certain protocols to avoid leakage and Pereyra’s watchful eyes.

The arena was set. Only high-rankers were to fight the Comets. The rest? Well, they’d receive waves of monsters. So a special defense had to be considered.

So an elaborate, multi-layered square was created if one viewed it directly from the sky. Gallery Street was the center, in the intersection where the Tormented Flesh was first spotted by Jury and her team during the initial scouting mission. Fifty meters out, an invisible line was drawn in the bloodied streets. Everything inside was space occupied by high-ranking Slayers. Five blocks out, a massive perimeter was erected, formed with manasteel barriers and armored vehicles, protected by rifles and swords.

At every odd interval beyond had smaller perimeters made, until they reached the outermost perimeter where its defenses were on par to the one closest to Gallery Street. Slayer Team Alba was stationed on the eastern side with the Department of Systemic Works, Venus Street, one street away from Rama Avenue, the outermost wall.

They had anticipated endless assaults. They were correct. The outermost perimeter was tasked with defending the structure from outside threats; the inner layers acted as buffers, additional defenses, and reference points to better locate spatial distortions—or better known: portals.

The space between the walls were for the Slayers to contend with.

After all, why would the portals appear just outside the structure? The Slayers were mainly tasked with eliminate any disturbances that went on inside the formation. Unfortunately, this wasn't an open area. Which made it several times harder for them to track and shut down the portals, if said portals appeared in the buildings themselves.

While it was preferable to have done this in a park or something, Gallery Street was non-negotiable.

The fastest solution was to brute force it: more manpower. And they thought to use the environment to their advantage. By taking over the rooftops, they had effectively claimed the airspace from any aerial monsters, immediately shooting anything down. Some buildings were designated as supply points, medical, the like, chosen by their location and ease of access.

Overall, the structure had a diameter of roughly four-and-a-half to five miles in all directions with some deviations.

Problem smiled, happy with this outcome. If only that old rag saw me now.

Humanity had to win. Kreutz Sungrazers, Sirius Aethfell, they all had to be killed.

I’ll reveal to you our secret, filthy Comets. The true mystery—I might even call this our ‘superweapon’! Problem raised their right arm. Suddenly from the rooftops, Slayers withdrew lengthy blue steel rods, topped off with a mana crystal surrounded by a manasteel cage, and stuck them into the concrete. The mana conduction rods.

“Ignite,” beckoned Problem, and they snapped their fingers. Crisp. From the inch-deep bloodwaters, black flames illuminated, beginning at the center where an image was shown: a fetus thinking about the Earth. The ritual spanned out in geometric lines, connecting to diagrams and other sub-circles. Until finally, the outermost circle was formed, connected.

“You,” Problem began, “will be trapped here with us.”

A black, opaque cube erected from the ritual circle about fifty meter in diameter and in height. The borders tore through any passing buildings, leaving the walls burnt and charred. Anyone who touched these walls would be burned just the same.

The ritual was something simple yet mana-extensive: a demesne implementation, a magic system that allowed users to create their own world with their own "laws". With a high-level demesne being raised, nothing could get in and nothing could get out. Even with Tewfik’s attacks, as long as the demesne was being fed mana, it would self-regenerate. Additionally, it came with an anti-spatial property—they couldn’t teleport out.

Here, the high-rankers had the space and the freedom to fight.

Thirty minutes. That was how long the demesne would last. More than enough time.

As the Comets were trapped in the demesne, the forces outside dealt with their own battles. This was why the structure was established in the first place: to defend the demesne from outside threats.

Let the battle begin.