Several balls of fire danced in the air before turning towards the defenders of Buri City.

The attack wasn’t aimed at the riders on the frontline, the target was their horses.

The animals neighed loudly as the fireballs hit them, most were burned on the head and eyes, causing them to rear dangerously and making the riders fall off.

Feneh quickly dashed among their ranks, casting fireballs around him in quick succession.

The knights and adventurers reacted swiftly, but Feneh was too strong for the average fighter to handle. He was not only a Hobgoblin, a naturally stronger version of Goblins, he was also experienced in combat, and there were 2 factors that made him significantly more dangerous than a normal Hobgoblin:

One, he was a Chieftain, which meant he not only commanded Goblins, he gained strength from the members of his tribe, and his tribe had over a thousand Goblins in it.

Two, he possessed a Gift of Fire, which gave him the ability to produce and manipulate flames to a certain degree, along with resistance to fire and heat, a vast and strong aura, and a large mana pool.

The combination of these two characteristics made him a formidable foe to anyone, he was Category A monster to the Adventurers’ Guild, an A rank adventuring party would be required to hunt him down.

Ordinary knights and adventurers below B rank were helpless prey in front of him.

Feneh’s fist connected on the helmet of a bulky knight, producing a sickening crack, the knight was dead instantly; Feneh dodged swords and deflected spears as he continued his barrage of flames and punches.

His fists clashed fearlessly with the blades of the knights pushing them back, his flames burned the adventurers on the face, torso, and arms, each of his strikes had enough strength to break bones, and he moved at high speed.

Over 20 people had been killed before Feneh’s assault was brought to a halt. Simon Bickherd’s great axe clashed with the Goblin Chieftain’s fist, sending shivers down Simon’s arms.

“Guh!”

The monster was too strong; Simon was pushed back while Feneh only stopped running, but that was enough for other adventurers to start the counterattack.

Arrows flew from 3 different directions, charged with different Skills to produce various effects.

Feneh jumped forwards and rolled on the ground, dodging the incoming arrows, he rose from the ground in a swift motion, casting a moving wall of fire to his left, while he ran towards the right.

He was confronted by a man of spiky blue hair, the feline ears on his head and sharp fangs on his mouth showing he was a beastkin from the tiger clans.

Huin, leader of the A rank adventuring party Saber Tooth.

Huin swung his sword in a flash, clashing three times with Feneh’s fists, so fast that they even produced sparks as Huin’s blade moved along the surface of the black bandages that covered Feneh’s hands and arms.

The sparks grew in an instant, turning into fireballs that attacked Huin. He managed to avoid the flames but was hit in the abdomen by a kick from his Hobgoblin opponent sending him flying over 3 meters away but not causing any real harm, Huin quickly steadied himself and slashed again at the Goblin Chieftain.

His sword flashed with a bluish light as it moved at high speed in a descending swing, it was met by a flaming uppercut.

Sword and punch collided fueled by the auras from both fighters, the resounding clang made everyone’s eardrum vibrate.

That sound was more akin to two heavy metal plates hitting each other.

The red Hobgoblin opened his mouth like shouting, but what came from his mouth was not a yell but a flashing flare.

Huin reacted immediately jumping back but was still covered by the blazing fire. He rolled on the floor and took out a bottle from his belt, shattering it on the ground, a huge rain cloud emerged from the broken bottle and covered his body, extinguishing the flames immediately.

Feneh turned to his left while crossing his arms in front of him and covering them in fire, just as two magic arrows with freezing effect hit him.

The collision of ice and fire made him back away, but he remained standing, snarling at an elven archer many meters away.

Ilura, an A rank adventurer and archer from Saber Tooth, nocked another arrow, drew the bowstring and loosened the arrow, all in one second.

The [Piercing Shot] was unfortunately dodged by the Goblin Chieftain, who immediately made the motion of throwing a punch to Ilura, shooting a potent and fast fireball from his hand.

She was protected by one of the knights, a female knight who raised her shield shining with a light barrier.

Feneh’s attack exploded on the knight’s barrier, shattering it, but unable to pass it, so both the adventurer and knight were unharmed.

The Chieftain looked around him, his assault on the troops had been fast and deadly, even when fighting a strong opponent, he still found the chances to attack other people around, his fireballs continuously dealing damage and breaking their morale.

But there was a limit to how much he could do alone.

Many wounded and dozens of dead were lying on the ground, but the ones still standing had taken distance from Feneh, and were surrounding him.

Unfortunately for them, Feneh was not alone.

From both East and West sides of the formation of troops surrounding the Chieftain, the ground caved in, and many roars and growls could be heard coming from underground.

From the 2 openings on the land, hundreds of goblins poured forth, shooting stones and arrows at the surprised defenders of Buri City.

Hobgoblins led the charge, spearheading into the Knights’ formation and aiming to reunite with their Chieftain,

At the same time, groups of goblins from both sides rushed to the city gates.

Watch Captain Teresa hesitated. It was her responsibility to protect the city and prevent the goblins from entering, but if she ordered to close the gates, the people outside would be in great danger of being overrun by the goblins.

She couldn’t just abandon them but couldn’t let the goblins cross the gates either.

Hesitation wouldn’t help with anything and inaction could be even worse, so she made her decision, traced a rune on the City Ward Bracelet and stomped her foot.

The city gates went down in an instant, forcing their descent with magic. Teresa would see that the troops outside received back-up immediately, but closing the gates was first.

Tracing another rune, she rained down hundreds of magically constructed arrows on the goblins, their large numbers only made them a bigger target for the wide area of effect from the city’s magic wards.

“Protect the troops outside, prepare another group to reinforce them!”

Teresa shouted commands at the guardsmen and they immediately carried them out.

She activated the Lightning Rain again, this time killing dozens of the goblins in an instant, the Goblin with the barrier skill was too far away to do anything.

The guardsmen shot arrows and spells to the goblins, but the situation didn’t look good for the troops outside, the goblin horde had abandoned any attempt to enter the city and instead focused on attacking the troops outside, only shooting arrows at the guardsmen on the wall to delay their attacks.

The knights and adventurers were surrounded, individually most of the Goblins were weaker than them but there were over 600 Goblins here right now, vastly outnumbering them.

The Goblin Chieftain smirked wickedly at them, clearly enjoying their predicament and anticipating their deaths. Flames covered his body with renewed intensity, probably in preparation for another attack.

He started to dash at the troops again and suddenly stopped, looking to the sky with a surprised expression.

Over 20 meters above the wall, one figure stood, disdainfully looking down on the goblins on the ground, the figure’s gaze focused on Feneh, making him feel like needles were traveling down his spine.

Feneh felt the air around him was charging with electricity, he was certain of it, the man floating in the air above, was like a force of nature, he was a storm given human form, full of the power of thunder and lightning.

This sensation in the air was the omen of a storm, promising the advent of lightning.

He roared, igniting the flames on his body to their utmost, unleashing his full strength for the first time in this battle. A whirlwind of flames surrounded him and he roared orders in the Goblin language.

The Hobgoblins reacted immediately, obeying their Chieftain’s command. They pulled black spheres out of their pouches and bags, throwing them into the air while the Goblins started to run back to the subterranean passages whence they had come.

The black spheres exploded, releasing black smoke that covered the area, enabling the Goblins to hide from the sight of everyone.

In the sky, Artorius Lei raised one hand above his head, making a magic circle appear over it for an instant before lightning surged and the crack of thunder could be heard by everyone around.

3 seconds was all it took for a sphere of lightning even bigger than the one used by the City Wards to be formed.

“[Spear of the Storm]”

The spell condensed into a massive spear, over 4 meters long and 50 cm wide. It floated in the air above Artorious, and he hurled it down towards the blazing Hobgoblin on the ground, like a deity passing judgment on the mortals.

The Goblin Chieftain let out a savage roar, propelling the whirling of fire around him to his hands and punched towards the incoming lightning spear.

“[Plaited Flares]!!”

He snarled in the Goblin tongue, activating a Skill at full strength.

Feneh’s attack was a blazing tornado full of destructive power, clashing with Artorius’s spear over 20 meters in the air.

A blinding flash of light, the heat of the flame and the sound of thunder covered the area. The smoke from the explosion hid Feneh from their view.

“Hahahahahahahahahahahaha.”

The Goblin’s laughter echoed in the area.

He couldn’t be seen because of all the smoke around, but his voice resounded loudly, mocking and arrogant.

Artorious put both of his hands in front of himself, one above the other with the palms facing each other.

“[Frost Lightning]”

Bluish white electricity surged from his palms, connected with each other and spread around him. As the Magus separated his hands giving more space for the spell, the Ice-attribute lightning became denser and denser, making the temperature around drop at a fast rate.

Artorius spread his hands and aimed his attack, he never lost track of the red Hobgoblin’s presence, even with all this smoke, he could sense his location.

As if feeling the imminent danger, a flash of red appeared among the smoke, about 200 meters away from the wall. Feneh prepared to face Artorius’ spell by igniting his fire around his body then gathered all in one place, compressing the flames over and over.

He wasn’t good at controlling this type of attack, he simply gathered his mana and aura to fuel his flames, further strengthening them, and centered them between his hands.

The fire around him extinguished, now all focused on a single ball of condensed red flame.

“[Meteor Blaze]”

Feneh made a move similar to Artorius, thrusting both hands forwards, almost like pushing the ball of fire away from him, in the direction of the Magus’ spell, an explosive blast propelled the fireball to fly at high speed.

The Frost Lightning crossed the air freezing everything in its wake.

The Meteor Blaze carried with extreme heat and explosive force to destroy anything on its path.

The two opposing forces collided, and for a second the world seemed to stand still and silent as red and blue colors bathed the two sides of the clashing point.

And then sound returned, loud as a thunderclap, making even the guardsmen on the wall feel the vibrations, they could even swear they felt the wall shake a bit.

The next second, blue overcame red, and Artorious spell pierced through Feneh’s flame, albeit with difficulty and vastly weakened.

The remains of Frost Lightning disappeared inside the clouds of smoke that covered the area, but Artorius knew that it struck the Goblin Chieftain head-on.

The Hobgoblin’s mana signal disappeared and everything fell silent, but Artorius didn’t think he was dead.

“Heh, hehehe… hahahahahahahaha!!”

Sure enough, the Chieftain’s laughter could be heard again, but this time Artorius couldn’t pinpoint his position.

“Hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.”

The troops of the ground were silent, the guards on the wall trembled, some from fury, others out of fear.

The laughter continued on, growing more distant with every passing second.

Buri City had repelled the attack, but this didn’t feel like a victory at all.

As the smoke cleared, only some corpses of horses were left on the ground, the Goblins had taken the dead as loot for their equipment; weapons, armors, and anything valuable on their bags would be taken, then who knew what the Goblins would do with the corpses.

The tunnels had been closed by earth magic from the shamans, it would be impossible to follow them, and only a madman would go underground to fight hundreds of Goblins.

The Goblin’s laughter finally stopped, silence returned to the land, the City Gates opened again, the adventurers and knights walked inside.

There was no clamor, no celebration.

The Hobgoblin’s laughter no longer sounded in their ears, but it still echoed in their minds, and it would take a long time before they could get it out of there and get rid of the emotion clutching their hearts.

Fear.

For the Goblins might have left, but they would surely return, and that laughter promised a greater fight in the future.

And the Magus of Lightning still hovering above the walls would not be here next time.