Protected by sufficient power of death, even the mountains beside Thorn Fortress had been flattened, yet that piece of land remained completely unharmed.
"Wh-what happened?"
As the dust gradually dispersed, the surviving soldiers within the other half of the fortress—the half fortunate enough not to have been flattened—finally began to recover their senses.
They first looked around blankly, toward where the fortress corridor should have been ahead of them.
But now, it had become a vast expanse of gray. Where was the corridor?
"Roar, roar, roar! For our lord, slaughter every living thing here! Kill!"
"For our lord, slaughter every last living thing!"
Just as the allied soldiers in the fortress stood at a loss, terrifying roars suddenly rang out from the gray haze ahead.
Hearing those roars, the allied soldiers strained their eyes even harder to peer forward.
Finally, in the next moment, they vaguely made out the scene beyond the gray mist.
That place had actually become a Land of Death.
The reason the area ahead had turned gray was that even the white dust could not conceal the dense deathly aura.
Yet what terrified everyone even more was naturally not the suddenly appearing Land of Death.
After all, without a replenishment of deathly aura, a Land of Death itself would gradually fade away. What they truly feared were the densely packed Dark Creatures filling the Land of Death.
"D-Dark Creatures! Enemy attack... enemy attack..."
After a moment of recovery, some defenders who possessed exceptional courage finally roared out the warning.
Faced with such a sudden upheaval, being able to muster the courage to shout and alert their comrades instead of turning around and wailing for their fathers and mothers already made them true warriors.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
"Enemy attack! Enemy attack!"
Soon afterward, urgent bell chimes rang