Chapter 94- The arrival of Saintess.
The shield wall screamed under the strain. It felt like it could collapse at any second.
The devil avatar’s fist came down like a hammer — once, twice, three times. Each blow slammed into the interlocking shields and drove the knights back, step by step.
Iron scraped against iron as the shields ground together, and the devil’s claws raked across their faces. The barrage finally cracked one knight’s shield clean in half, and just as he was about to be smashed into pulp where he stood, another knight hauled him back by the collar to safety.
[Knight Shield Wall: Combined HP → 1,880 → 1,410]
"Close the gap! Close it!"
The registrar’s voice was rough and cracking as he shouted from the center of the line, shield raised high, blade braced, both arms trembling with the effort of holding.
"Ironhaven shall not fall today! Hold!!!!!!"
The devil slammed a two-handed fist into the line, bending the straight wall of shields into a crescent.
Two more knights went down.
But the wall held. Barely.
Then — the bells rang again.
Deep. Resonant....
Coming from the west.
Through the ash and gray smoke, a column of white light tore down from the sky and struck the square’s western edge like a lance.
[Corruption HALTED, Zones Purified]
Church reinforcements had arrived.
The light didn’t scatter.
Figures stepped out of it — clerics in white robes, staves ringing against the flagstones, golden circles blooming beneath their feet.
A wave of purification rolled outward, and the crimson roots that had poisoned the ground shrank back like worms recoiling from salt.
Healers moved in behind them, hands already glowing.
And at the center of the light walked a woman with no weapon at all.
The saintess.
She didn’t so much as glance at the devil. She walked straight toward the knights’ line, unhurried, and the corrupted ground beneath her feet went still with every step.
[Purified Area: Expanding — 12m radius]
Behind the knights, the church moved like a machine that had run this drill a hundred times before. Healers darted the other way, dragging the wounded clear of the line, and one by one the knights steadied as their wounds closed. The devil watched all of it with something like disgust curling in its eyes — the holy light clearly turned its stomach.
A healer knelt beside Hugh, hands lit with holy power, mending the unconscious blacksmith’s chest. He hadn’t moved since the barrier broke; his ashen flame had burned through every drop of mana in his body.
Leo let out a breath of relief at the sight and turned back to the fight.
The avatar had stopped hammering the shield wall and returned to the dragon skull, feeding the last thread of energy into the gate.
[Avatar HP: 140,300/150,000]
Its health was climbing again as Leo watched.
Everything they’d bled for in the last hour felt like it was slipping through their fingers.
The third anchor line — the crack running through it — was knitting itself shut. The avatar was pouring the dragon skull’s energy straight into healing it.
Leo watched the gap narrow and felt his stomach drop.
Minutes. At this rate, the seam would be sealed in minutes.
As he racked his brain for a way to stop it, the saintess walked past him — straight through the wall of devil energy shielding the seam, as if it were nothing more than a curtain.
Unarmed. Unbothered. Her white robes stayed spotless, and the light around her burned so bright the crimson roots flinched away from her like they’d been burned.
She reached the seam, knelt at the exact point the fracture was closing, and pressed her palm to the ground.
Golden light burst from her hand and sank into the earth like roots of its own.
The seam stopped closing.
The avatar’s head snapped toward her. It snarled — a sound like metal tearing.
"Interesting," the Saintess mused, tilting her head the way someone might examine a crack in a teacup. Simple as that. No gravity of the situation.
"It’s learned to feed this wound directly," she said, "to finish the last line and make the gate self-sustaining. My light is the only thing holding that fracture open right now." She glanced at Leo. "But it doesn’t look like it’ll let me hold it forever." She stuck out her tongue, wry. "I can keep it open for a while. But the second I let go, the crack seals, the anchor completes, and the gate becomes permanent — open for good. Hell walks into this city whenever it likes."
Leo watched the devil as he listened. It kept repeating the same process — hammer the shield wall to keep everyone back, then feed the seam. Like an agent finishing a job. Driving the anchor home before anyone in the city could stop it.
Leo spread his senses wide, Forge Sight and qi sense both stretched to their limit. Beneath the stone he found it — the point where all three lines met the foundation of Ironhaven itself, the single joint holding the gate open.
The instant his senses touched it, the mark on his armor flared again.
It had done this once before, the moment the gate first opened. Somehow the gate could feel the mark. Leo felt like something on the other side was looking back at him.
or.... Is that thing alive?
Whatever waited behind the gate or the gate itself had turned its attention on him, and the pressure of him nearly buckled his knees.
[Devil Energy: 58]
[Status: Mark Compromised — Gateway Attention Locked On]
[Status: Corruption Resistance — Diminishing]
The mark urged him to let it in. To close the fracture. To open the gate.
Leo shoved the thought down hard, fist clenched at his side.
He dropped to one knee in the middle of the square, palm flat against the stone, and let his Forge Sight and qi sense settle on the convergence point he’d felt before — the exact joint where the three crimson veins met the city’s foundation.
[Anchor Convergence Identified]
He looked up at the Saintess. "Can you hold the seam from closing — and can you hold my life right at the edge?"
The Saintess blinked. "...I’m sorry?"
"I mean — can you heal me just enough that I don’t die, but keep my HP under five percent."
She studied him, surprised. "You catch on fast. My ability do works that way..."
"Can you do it?"
"At the very edge, yes. My light will catch the killing blow before it lands." She paused. "But if something goes wrong with the seam, I won’t be able to watch you too. You’ll die."
Leo nodded, already running the numbers. Blood Frenzy needed his health low before its damage multiplier kicked in. Stack Devilization and Primordial Trinity on top of that, then Gungnir’s Descent to land the killing blow on the anchor —
An hour ago he’d ruled both skills out. Devilization was too dangerous this close to the gate. Gungnir’s Descent in the middle of a city was a hammer that broke far more than it needed to.
But he was out of options. The people were already evacuated.
And the seam was still closing. Once it sealed, the anchor became permanent — the gate open forever, right here, over this city.
Buildings could be rebuilt. Lives couldn’t.
If that gate opened and whatever was behind it got loose, it wouldn’t just cost the city. It could cost the whole empire.
Rook had already tried severing the third line, but this one wasn’t spiritual like the first two — it was physical, and his soul attacks barely touched it.
Leo took a deep breath. The mark on his chest kept flaring, whispering for him to open the door. He forced it back down again.
He looked at the Saintess. "Keep me alive."
"What exactly are you trying to do?" Rook asked.
Leo said nothing.
Caelum watched him with a grim, steady expression.
The registrar drove his shield into the ground. "Knights! Hold the wall until that boy finishes whatever he’s doing! Buy him time!"
[Knight Shield Wall: Combined HP → 1,410 → 1,205]
Leo stepped forward — straight into the devil’s range, sword hanging loose in his grip, point dragging toward the ground.
He’d given up on defending himself entirely.
The Saintess raised her hands.
[You have received the saintess’s blessing]
[Strength +50% for 2 minutes]
[You have received the saintess’s blessing]
[Dexterity +50% for 2 minutes]
[You have received the saintess’s blessing]
[Mana Regeneration +150% for 2 minutes]
[You have received the saintess’s blessing]
[All skill cooldowns reduced by 70% for 5 minutes]
The boosts hit him all at once, and for a second it nearly took his breath away.
The devil’s first blow came in the same backhand sweep as always. Leo saw it coming and didn’t dodge. He let it hit him square across the chest.
[Damage Received: 1,412]
[Leo HP: 3,400 → 1,988/3,400]
"What in the hell is that kid doing?" the registrar shouted.
"Fall back! Kid, fall back!" the knights echoed.
The crowd gasped as Leo dragged himself upright again, blood running from his mouth, and walked straight back toward the devil.
The avatar tilted its head, almost curious, and struck again — a full palm strike to the chest this time.
[Damage Received: 983]
[Leo HP: 1,988 → 1,005/3,400]
The third blow was a clawed swipe that caught him across the hip and tore him clean out of his boots. He hit the stones rolling, came up on one knee spitting blood, the entire square screaming for him to get back.
[Damage Received: 493]
[Leo HP: 1,005 → 512/3,400]
The avatar seemed almost pleased, hammering at him again and again. It hated when its strikes didn’t land — and now it had found a stubborn little ant that refused to run.
It raised its claws for the finishing blow, aiming straight for Leo’s throat.
But that was exactly what Leo had been waiting for.... His HP to be near death. He had placed all his hopes on the Saintess to keep him alive.
Every step into the devil’s range had been building toward this — charging Gungnir’s Descent, driving his own health down low enough that Blood Frenzy’s multiplier would hit like a freight train.
Rook and Caelum saw the strike coming and knew, this time, it looked lethal.
They moved.
...