Chapter 53 – Pressure builds
The gap between waves was shorter than before.
Not enough time to reset.
Just enough to notice.
Jack stood at the line, breathing steady, watching the treeline again as the last of the first wave thinned out.
Bodies lay scattered across the outer ground, uneven and uncollected. The Sisters had pulled back slightly, adjusting positions, rotating out where needed, but no one had fully stepped away from the line.
They were waiting.
“Drink,” Adelaide said from behind, passing out small amounts of water without slowing down. “Not too much.”
One of them took it, nodded, and moved back into position without speaking.
Hanna stepped along the line again, checking spacing.
“Stay where you are,” she said. “Don’t tighten up just because you’re tired.”
“I’m not tired,” someone muttered.
Hanna glanced at her.
“You will be.”
That ended it.
Jack’s attention shifted forward.
Movement returned.
Faster this time.
The shapes that broke through the trees didn’t spread out the same way as before. They moved tighter, more direct, not pausing at the edge of the open ground.
“Second wave,” Jack said.
Hanna nodded once.
“Hold the line.”
They came in harder.
The first beast hit with more force than the previous wave, its movement sharper, its angle tighter. One of the Sisters intercepted it, but the impact pushed her back a full step before she could stabilize.
“Brace,” Hanna said.
Too late for that one.
But the next adjusted.
The line held.
Jack stepped in immediately as two more pushed through the center.
Sanguine Grasp.
The tendril snapped forward, catching one and dragging it off its path, but the second adjusted mid-lunge, slipping past the disruption.
Faster.
Jack reacted.
Blood Shield.
The barrier formed just in time, the impact hitting solid instead of flesh. The force drove him back half a step, more than before.
Stronger.
He pivoted and finished it.
[You have defeated: Forest Beast (Lv.9)]
[Experience Gained]
Higher level.
Jack stepped back.
The line shifted again.
Left side dipped.
Two beasts pressed together, forcing one of the Sisters into a retreat she hadn’t planned.
“Left—hold,” Hanna said, already moving.
She didn’t wait for them to recover.
She stepped in, forcing space back into the line with a direct strike that broke their momentum long enough for the others to stabilize.
“Don’t give ground unless you have to,” she said.
“I had to,” the woman replied.
“Then take it back faster.”
She did.
Jack tracked the rest.
More pressure now.
Less space between engagements.
He stepped forward again.
Sanguine Surge activated.
The shift hit heavier this time.
Not harder.
Just more present.
He moved along the line, not cutting through enemies directly, but breaking their rhythm—stepping in where two came too close together, pulling one out of position, forcing another to slow just enough for someone else to land the hit.
Control.
Not speed.
The Sisters adapted around it.
Not cleanly.
But effectively.
A beast broke through too far right.
Jack didn’t reach it in time.
One of the newer fighters hesitated.
Just long enough.
The beast lunged.
Hanna intercepted it.
Not clean.
But fast.
She drove it back and finished it before it could follow through.
“Don’t wait,” she said, not raising her voice. “You already know what to do.”
The woman nodded quickly.
“…Yeah.”
Then stepped forward again.
Better this time.
Behind them, the mid-zone was no longer calm.
Two injured rotated back at the same time.
Adelaide didn’t slow.
“Sit. You—pressure here. You—don’t touch that, you’ll make it worse.”
“I’m not—”
“You are.”
The woman stopped.
Jack could feel it now.
Strain.
Not breaking.
But building.
The pace didn’t drop.
More came through.
Still not overwhelming.
But constant.
Jack felt Blood Shield take another hit, the impact heavier than before. He held it for a second longer than necessary, then let it collapse before it drained more than it needed to.
Efficiency mattered now.
He stepped back, letting the line recover for half a second.
Then moved again.
The pattern held.
Barely.
Hanna stepped back beside him for a moment.
“They’re faster,” she said.
Jack nodded.
“Yeah.”
“Still manageable?”
He looked over the line.
At the spacing.
At the way they adjusted.
At the mistakes that were happening less often than before.
“For now.”
That was enough.
The second wave continued to press, steady and controlled, forcing them to keep pace without letting them reset fully.