A faint sound of something cutting through the air, so slight it was almost negligible, rang out. Then, between the despairing sisters and the ill-intentioned soldiers, the air seemed to distort slightly as a tall figure appeared out of nowhere.
The instant he appeared, an invisible, intangible, yet overwhelmingly tyrannical aura burst forth from him, spreading fiercely in all directions like a tsunami.
As the aura swept over them, the soldiers who had been leering or harboring malicious intentions seemed to be struck by invisible sledgehammers. Their eyes rolled back, foam spilled from their mouths, and they collapsed to the ground without a sound, losing consciousness.
Strangely, the sisters standing so close by, who should have borne the brunt of it, seemed to be in the eye of the storm. Aside from their hair stirring in the breeze, they were completely unaffected. They could only stare blankly at the blond man before them, as though a god had descended into the world.
Dawn slowly crouched down, reducing much of the pressure brought by his height.
He tried to bring his gaze level with the terrified sisters, and a gentle smile entirely at odds with his earlier domineering aura appeared on his face.
"Are you two all right?"
"...Y-Yes, we're fine. Thank you... thank you for saving us."
Monet, the older sister with long pale-green hair, was the first to recover from her immense shock. Instinctively shielding her younger sister Sugar behind her, she did her best to express her gratitude despite the tremor in her voice.
The man before them was unimaginably powerful, yet his smile strangely gave them a trace of reassurance.
Dawn carefully examined the sisters' features, and the last trace of uncertainty in his heart finally vanished. They were indeed the targets he had been searching for