"I always wanted to face you in one piece at least once," he said, satisfaction creeping into his voice.

Moving any closer might alert the leader, but that didn't matter. Enkrid wanted his presence known—not out of a sense of fair play or honorable battle. What honor was there in fighting a monster?

It was a test.

Just an opportunity to confirm what he had built up through countless repetitions of today.

The leader, flanked by two mutated gnolls acting as guards, snapped its head around at the sound of Enkrid's voice.

Not just its head—the leader raised two daggers in a defensive stance in the blink of an eye.

‘As fast as ever.’ Enkrid marveled at the speed.

"Guuk!" the leader growled, prompting the two mutated guards to react.

With a guttural roar resembling that of a ghoul, one of the guards lunged forward, swinging its spiked club downward in a heavy arc.

Enkrid tilted his blood-soaked sword diagonally, bracing himself.

With a whoosh, the club descended, aiming for his head. Enkrid’s eyes barely registered the movement—until the last second.

Then he moved.

His blade angled sharply, intercepting the club mid-shaft with a satisfying crack before he pushed it forward. The club’s surface splintered and peeled away like wood shaved by a chisel. Without breaking stride, Enkrid’s sword slashed upward, cleaving the gnoll’s neck.

The strike was a brutal display of precision and power, carving through muscle, bone, and tendons. Half of the gnoll’s neck was severed.

"Graah… ka… ghh."

The gnoll made a faint, airless sound as it crumpled to its knees, its yellow eyes dimming before it collapsed face-first onto the ground.

The second gnoll wasted no time, charging immediately. Enkrid pretended to ready his sword, only to sidestep at the last moment. The club swung down where he had been standing, missing completely. In a single fluid motion, Enkrid twisted his body and unleashed a horizontal slash.

The blade drew a perfect arc, slicing clean through the gnoll’s head at temple height. Its skull split open like a smashed gourd, black blood and gray brain matter spilling out.

The gnoll fell, the top half of its skull clattering to the ground beside it.

"Run, and you’ll die with this buried in the back of your skull," Enkrid warned.

He flicked his wrist, sending a whistling dagger flying through the air. It buried itself deeply into the head of a regular gnoll, which had hesitated on the edge of the fight. The gnoll fell backward, blood gushing from its skull, pooling beneath it.

A low, guttural growl spread through the remaining gnolls, sensing their leader's danger. Enkrid hoped the leader would take the bait and engage him directly.

This was uncharted territory for him—a path he had never walked before.

What would happen next, even he couldn’t predict. The leader might retreat, in which case he would simply chase it down and decorate its skull with throwing knives.

If it charged?

‘Can I survive today?’

He asked himself the question. The answer was unclear. He had prepared, assessed his opponent, and honed his skills, but combat was unpredictable by nature.

One thing was certain: this leader only showed itself when its prey was severely weakened—crippled with a gaping thigh wound, a deep slash across the stomach, or a pierced flank.

A coward’s strategy, but an effective one.

‘What a cunning bastard.’ Enkrid allowed himself a grudging nod of respect. A creature that only fought when victory was certain displayed an impressive level of intelligence.

Fortunately, the leader didn’t retreat. It moved exactly as Enkrid had hoped.

"Gruuuk!"

The leader leapt forward, so fast it seemed to stretch like a shadow under the midday sun. Enkrid had anticipated its speed but was still caught off guard by how quick it truly was.

The twin daggers gleamed in its hands, each coated with a deadly poison that ensured even the slightest scratch could end the battle.

‘Poison…’

The thought burned in his mind. Avoiding contact wasn’t optional—it was mandatory.

The first slash barely grazed his shoulder, leaving a shallow mark on the leather outer layer of his armor. The second dagger thrust forward, aiming for his ribs, but Enkrid twisted his body, evading it entirely.

His reaction speed was remarkable.

‘It works.’

The countless drills and training had paid off. He wasn’t merely dodging; he was predicting and countering in real time.

The leader growled, red bleeding into its yellow pupils, as it came at him again. This time, it crouched low, aiming its daggers at his thighs in a crisscross pattern—a trajectory designed to incapacitate.

Enkrid didn’t hesitate. His body moved faster than thought, driven by instinct honed through endless repetition.

The sword descended.

With a sharp hiss, his blade slashed vertically, splitting the leader from its head to halfway down its spine. The gnoll froze, its body caught in the shock of death. Even as its hands twitched feebly, it still tried to stab him.

Enkrid crouched, letting the dying gnoll’s dagger scrape harmlessly against his armor before it slipped from its lifeless grasp.

Finally, the leader’s body collapsed, splitting apart in two grotesque halves. Blood and entrails spilled onto the ground, pooling beneath its corpse.

Enkrid stood, exhaling deeply as a wave of exhilaration washed over him.

‘I’m improving.’

It was a moment of growth, validated by results—a rare sensation in his eternal cycle of repetition.

But the battle wasn’t over.

The gnolls still surrounded him, growling and closing in from all sides.

"Haah!"

With a sharp cry, Enkrid swung his sword with brutal efficiency, cleaving through two gnolls blocking his path.

Northern-style swordsmanship—perfected for slaying beasts in the harshest of environments.

Enkrid’s blade cut through muscle, bone, and sinew in a single centrifugal motion, bisecting his foes cleanly.

He dashed forward.

‘Can I escape?’

Fleeing all day was possible. Fighting while exhausting his stamina? That was a different matter entirely.

That would be difficult. Through countless battles, Enkrid had come to understand the importance of conserving stamina during prolonged fights.

But now, after crawling through dirt and enduring a short yet intense skirmish to take down the gnoll leader, he faced another problem—carving a path back to the village. This wasn’t the same as simply dodging and holding out in one spot.

"Can't we call it a day and try again tomorrow?" Enkrid muttered as he dodged another attack, knowing full well it was pointless to say such a thing. The gnolls, of course, didn’t answer.

Instead, the reply came in the form of a hyena beastman leaping at his back, jaws wide open.

Reacting instantly, Enkrid drove his elbow into the beastman’s skull.

Thud.

The creature slammed into the ground. Without wasting a second, Enkrid fluidly plunged his sword into its head.

In the same motion, he swung his blade horizontally to slash at two more charging beastmen and a gnoll.

The gnoll, clad in something resembling leather armor, stumbled back a few paces, its chest cut open but not deeply enough to be fatal.

The lack of force in the swing wasn’t due to hesitation—it was exhaustion. His stance was off, his breathing labored, and the lingering effects of activating the Heart of Might earlier had taken a toll on his body.

‘Damn it.’

His hands trembled from fatigue, a warning sign he knew all too well. He needed a brief moment to recover.

For now, he danced between attacks, relying on the finely honed reflexes of his Sense of Evasion.

"Guwooog!"

The gnolls’ collective growls seemed to translate to, "Kill him! Kill that human!"

Enkrid ignored the noise, retrieving his sword as he moved. Dodge what he could, parry what he couldn’t. His movements were almost too precise, the mark of a true master in the art of combat.

Anyone watching from afar might have been awestruck by his skill, but the truth was less glamorous—he was simply staying alive.

The satisfaction of killing the leader still lingered, a heady mix of exhilaration and vindication. It felt like overturning a table set by fate itself.

But what was that table? What was the wall he had just shattered?

For Enkrid, the "wall" had been the gnoll leader itself—a foe he was expected to confront while riddled with injuries and poisoned. To fight it without getting scratched or poisoned was, by all accounts, impossible.

But Enkrid had defied expectations.

It wasn’t that he couldn’t take the injuries and win the fight. He could. He just didn’t want to. Why should he follow the script written for him?

‘I hated that smirk.’

The leader’s smug laughter lingered in his mind. He could admire the creature's cunning, but it still didn’t sit right with him. Waiting for an opponent to be critically injured before showing up—it was clever but infuriating.

And so, he changed the rules.

He killed the leader without sustaining any grievous wounds. As a result, none of the villagers had died, at least not from what he could see. Perhaps some might have been unlucky enough to be hit by stray rocks, but that was beyond his control.

Not that he cared deeply about the villagers’ safety—it just so happened to work out that way. If he had to give a reason, it was simply because he couldn’t stand the leader’s laughter.

Above all, it was more efficient this way.

Still, efficiency wouldn’t mean much if he didn’t make it out alive. He needed to finish this properly. To survive.

He conserved his energy, kept his breathing steady, and avoided unnecessary flourishes in his movements. He tried opening a path with a few precise strikes of his northern-style swordsmanship but failed to break through.

At this point, the options weren’t great. Should he hold out and hope for an unexpected opportunity? Or should he burn through his remaining stamina and unleash the Heart of Might to force an escape?

Neither choice seemed particularly viable, and instinctively, Enkrid knew that.

Just as he was about to make a decision, something unexpected happened.

"Make way!"

A shout rang out from the village entrance.

Thud, thud, thud!

The heavy wooden gates creaked open, revealing a gap in the thick log barricade.

Thanks to the chaos caused by Enkrid and Esther’s antics, the gnolls had been forced to turn their attention away from the gate. Taking advantage of this, Deutsch Pullman, the village militia leader, made his move.

"Anyone brave enough to follow me, come on out! If you’re staying behind, pack up your things and get lost!" Deutsch bellowed, his voice full of the authority only a seasoned mercenary could command.

Several of his subordinates spilled out from the gate, weapons at the ready.

Deutsch himself stepped forward, wielding his massive glaive with practiced ease. Behind him, ten battle-hardened militia members—veterans from his mercenary days—followed closely.