The guardian turned over its giant shell, the power and speed behind its movement unimpeded by its gigantic mass as it threw everything off of its body. They sensed and braced for the impending action, but the violence behind it was too much to handle.

Rana and Taye were slammed to the side and fell from the sky, but the ground cracked with chasms below was not their only concern. The monsters that fell along with them did not forget their purpose. They thrashed about as they sped down, looking for something to latch onto, and that something was the human intruders.

The monsters lashed out. Their long limbs looked to grab onto the humans, and the shorter ones forced themselves out of their flesh bags and became longer. The bone plates and nails swiped out, slashing at them while trying to pull them forward.

It would have been futile, but that was only if Rana had no intention of going back. She could land safely if she just fell, but that would not do. She had to stay on the guardian monster.

Did she?

Why would the guardian monster swing them off? It showed them no disdain and if it wanted them off it could’ve done so the moment she and Taye latched onto it. The only explanation was that they were close to its heart.

Was that all? There was something more, but she couldn’t tell what it was.

Rana refocused her thoughts. Hesitation was the seed of defeat. She should just continue to fight the guardian, and the truth would come out sooner or later.

She fired off a ward and chains sprouted out. She grabbed onto it and fired off a Mana Blast before yelling at Taye to follow, who used Support Attack to get close.

They stopped their momentum to the side, but the monsters were not able to. They didn’t want to. A torrent of lashing beasts attacked them like ballistic projectiles. Rana called upon her blades of ash and tried to push the monsters aside and Taye raised her shield as they were slammed, but both of them tightened their grips on the chain as it swung them close to the guardian.

The two marked ones now dangled below the monster on the chain, but they were not alone.

The fleshy surface beneath the shell that peeled off screamed in silence. The pulsating veins and lumps began to wiggle as if something was bursting forth. An arm pushed against from below, then a head, then the entire body stretched the skin to its form. The abomination dropped down and dangled like a lump of meat swaying to the wind.

Multiple flesh bags dropped from the body of the guardian and hung like humans tied to a noose. Some had their necks snapped to the side, some had their limbs contorted, and some had their entire midriff squeezed to the spine.

The monsters thrashed about and swung and aimed their movement towards the two marked ones. Rana sent her one of her blades of ash to the nearest monster’s head. It screeched and went limp.

“You see that?” Rana asked Taye who nodded. “I think we know what we should do.”

Rana leaped off of the chain and grabbed onto one of the dangling bodies. It screamed and its limbs thrashed violently. She felt it scrape her skin, but it was not able to do much damage before being killed. She then climbed up the flesh and pulled violently when she reached near the top. The skin began to peel and revealed a deeper part of the guardian’s body.

She hopped onto another before the one she was on peeled off and fell. The process was simple enough, but the execution had to be precise. The problem was the need to find another one of those hanging bodies of monsters to hold onto when she finished cutting one off. It did not help that the marked ones below saw what they were doing and decided to help out.

Without coordination, it could very well break her rhythm and her planned route. She looked at Taye. The woman was far more daring than she thought. It seemed like her and her guildmates below were indeed veterans of battle together for a long time, as her route was easily maintained without the marked ones below messing it up. In fact, they were clearing a path for her.

Rana was never a group battle person, and that was why she was able to do it alone.

The monsters sprouted faster and their emergence much more violent. She was surrounded by three monsters who not only spawned close but were smart enough to pull and dislodge her hold while simultaneous lunging for her.

How helpful. They neglected to realize that the entire enemy's main body was also a monster.

Rana sent her blades of ash up and stuck them into the body. She activated Support Attack and had herself be near the top. She swung her crescent bladed staff in a circle and lopped off all of the hanging monsters. She then grabbed onto an arm that was beginning to emerge and pulled the monster out of the flesh body. She stabbed it in the neck and used its limped form as a point to find another path to attack.

The raid forces soon settled into a rhythm. They managed to stabilize the battle at the arena below and divert their attention to the battle upwards. With the lead of Rana and Taye and the support of the marked ones below, they were able to dig deeper into the guardian's flesh.

That was when they saw a layer of skin unlike that of the lumpy flesh from before. It was a thin veil that glowed and pulsated. It was the heart.

Rana changed her trajectory and went straight for the heart of the guardian. The platforms below were still descending and time was ticking, who knew when the monster would move its weak spot out of the way.

Why didn’t it?

There was something wrong, some that did not belong. It was almost as if the guardian was seeking death.

That was it! The entire time she believed that the raid was one of endurance, a battle to shave off the enemy health as the marked ones slowly inched towards victory. No. It was to delay something. The guardian did not show up out of a whim when the expedition first set out, it showed itself because it wanted to be found and it only did because whatever the core planned was coming into fruition.

The long battle of attrition was a delay tactic, and the reason the Chrysalis Abominations was an integration of many monsters was so that it could be killed off fast when it wanted to be dead.

What could it be planning? What benefit could a core gain from the death of its guardian?

No. It couldn't be, but that was the truth.

Rana stopped her advance below the heart of the monster, but before she was able to warn the marked ones below, a strong hostility was short forth from Taye towards her.

Why? Was she betraying Rana? No. It was a warning.

Rana shot out a ward of chains and pulled herself to the side as a blinding light soared upwards from below. It barely missed her and cut into the guardian’s heart. Hamilton launched a mysterious Skill, one without hostility or mana signature, and one that was able to ignore the enemy bulk and shoot straight into the heart. He wanted to kill her as collateral.

He missed, but he did not miss his primary objective.

The Chrysalis Abominations fell towards the arena. The burst into a torrent of blood and filled the chasms with a river of red. The marked ones were celebrating their victory, but she knew that one entity celebrated even harder.

When Rana fell, what she saw was not Hamilton’s smirk of mockery, but it was the grin of the guardian.

When a guardian monster fell, it opened the door to the core.

What had the Dungeon called Sunset Spears been doing the entire time of its existence? It expanded its territory, slowly with a strain of red that contaminated the earth.

Rana ran. She ignored the cheering marked ones or the jeers from some members of the Fire Shield guild. She ignored the subsiding blood that soaked into the abyss and the arena that returned to normal. She ran, knowing that the red below ran with her and towards both their destination.

Time stopped because the path towards Nye did not matter.

The City of Nye stood before her, but the earth below was a shade of red, and the night sky was even redder like blood. The earth cracked and gigantic spears of flame shot up like stake sand ignited the entire city in fire and screams and death. It was an offering to the rebirth of one who was robbed of their rightful heritage.

Was it hours? Days? She didn’t know. Then, the silence extinguished the flames.

A lone figure stood within the rubble and ashes, one she could not see fully but knew exactly their identity.

Rana stared into the gaze of a foe she once vanquished a century ago. In what form or state she didn’t know, but Diana of the Sunset Spear was revived.

Rana turned around and ran. The war for supremacy would drastically change for both humans and monsters, as a terror, a natural disaster, was unleashed onto the land.