Roland studied the tangled tracks on the ground, thinking through his options.

If he went back now and reported the commission failed, he would not receive the reward, but he would not have to pay a breach penalty either.

Money, however, was secondary.

His attention shifted to the occupation panel.

[Requirements: Strength 9, Agility 6, five max-level combat-related skills 4/5, kill 60/100 hostile creatures]

"Aside from the attribute requirements, I'm only missing one max-level combat skill and forty hostile creatures for the Warrior job change."

"Maxing out Lion Swordsmanship isn't a problem. At worst, I'll return and grind it with the [Combat Readiness] trait. Without the bonus from [Theory and Practice], the efficiency will be lower, but that only means spending more time."

"As for attributes, I can improve them through training. But forty hostile creatures..."

He recalled the Adventurer's Guild bulletin board.

There had been very few monster-related commissions. Of the three he saw, he had already taken two, and the last one was only an investigation into abnormal monster movements.

At this rate, similar monster-clearing commissions would be hard to find in the short term.

"Forget it..."

After weighing the matter, Roland made his decision.

"Since these kobolds haven't been gone long, I'll follow and take a look. If I catch up cleanly, I'll finish it fast. If the situation turns bad, with 7 Agility strengthened by [Adaptive Training], escaping shouldn't be a problem."

Decision made, Roland followed the kobold tracks through the dense forest, his attention sweeping over the surroundings.

Before long, he stopped at a fork in the path.

The original trail of kobold prints had been joined by several other sets of tracks.

Roland knelt and examined the overlapping marks. Beside the familiar kobold claw prints and human boot prints, he found three-toed goblin tracks, along with a strange set he had never seen before.

"More complicated than expected..."

His fingertips traced the marks in the mud.

"Not just goblins and kobolds. Humans too..."

He straightened and looked around.

The tracks converged from all directions, then scattered again. As he studied the churned ground, a guess formed in his mind.

"Could other monsters be migrating in groups too?"

His gaze followed the direction of the unfamiliar tracks, and his fingers brushed the hilt of his sword.

"And the mercenaries and adventurers who accepted clearing commissions followed them all the way here?"

With that question in mind, Roland continued along the trail.

The deeper he went, the denser the tracks became. The narrow forest path had been trampled into a broad dirt road.

Soon, the sunlight filtering through the canopy strengthened. The edge of the forest was close.

A deafening clamor reached him from the distance.

Human roars. Monster howls. Metal striking metal.

The sounds tangled together, signaling a fierce battle ahead.

Roland pushed aside the last cluster of bushes, and the battlefield opened before him.

Over a hundred mercenaries and adventurers were locked in a life-and-death struggle with a monster army in the forest clearing. The thick reek of blood pressed against his lungs.

"Those are..."

His attention fixed on the center of the battlefield.

Dozens of humanoid monsters moved among the kobolds and goblins. They were covered in coarse fur, with savage heads that clearly resembled hyenas.

Roland's face tightened. This was his first time seeing monsters other than kobolds and goblins.

"Gnolls?"

The fighting did not pause for his surprise.

Metal weapons caught the sunlight, then vanished into dark red sprays of blood. The ground had already been stained an eerie purple-black.

Even with monsters in front of them, the mercenaries and adventurers who should have been united against a common enemy had fallen into frenzied infighting.

A leather-armored mercenary had just cut down a gnoll and rushed greedily toward its head.

He had only drawn his dagger and crouched to claim the trophy when a sharp shortsword stabbed in from the side.

The attacker was an adventurer with a vicious stare, his eyes locked on the prey in the mercenary's hand.

"That's my trophy!"

"Bullshit! My arrow hit that gnoll in a vital spot!"

Similar disputes erupted across the battlefield.

Several well-equipped adventuring parties even ignored the goblin packs watching hungrily nearby and turned their blades on each other over bags of monster ears.

Roland watched with cold eyes and found that at least a third of the mercenaries and adventurers were facing other humans instead of fighting the monsters before them.

The monsters had clearly noticed the opportunity.

Cunning goblins hid behind trees and threw stones. Savage gnolls formed assault teams. Even the slower kobolds began organizing attacks against isolated adventurers.

Despite the gap in equipment and combat skill, this mixed monster army was holding its ground in what should have been a one-sided battle, all because the humans were killing one another.

Most ironic of all, several bulging spoil bags lay scattered in the fiercest part of the battlefield.

They were filled with ears, claws, and teeth.

Their owners had either become corpses or were fighting madly over new trophies.

"Fools who throw away their lives the moment profit appears."

A cool smile touched Roland's mouth, and his right hand reached back toward the two quivers on his back.

Before this trip, he had prepared a full fifty arrows just in case.

They were perfect for this situation.

He narrowed his eyes and swept the battlefield, estimating quickly.

Even after the earlier chaos, no fewer than a hundred monsters remained on the field.

Clearing them alone would take effort.

Right now, though, the mercenaries were saving him a great deal of trouble.

Reward money and bounties were only extra gains. His true goal was the one hundred kills required for the job change.

And now these monsters had delivered themselves to him.

Roland retreated several steps and hid among the tree shadows.

He drew his bow, nocked an arrow, and aimed at a kobold fighting a mercenary.

Whoosh!

The bowstring thrummed. The arrow punched cleanly through the kobold's throat.

The mercenary fighting it froze, then broke into a delighted grin. He drew his dagger and neatly cut off the prey's ear, giving no thought to where the sudden help had come from.

[Requirements: Strength 9, Agility 6, five max-level combat-related skills 4/5, kill 61/100 hostile creatures]

Roland ran his tongue over his dry lips when the number changed on the occupation panel.

He drew another arrow and set it to the string.

Sunlight slipped through the leaves and glinted on the arrowhead.

Sharp whistles cut through the air one after another. Each arrow took a monster's life.

The battle, however, remained deadlocked.

The mercenaries still argued over spoils with red faces. They shoved, cursed, and even drew blades against one another.

When his quiver was nearly empty, Roland breathed out and counted the arrows left beneath his fingertips.

"Seven left..."

"I didn't expect the monster-killing condition for changing occupation to Warrior to go this smoothly..."

At that brief moment of ease, he caught movement on the eastern side of the battlefield.

A figure draped in a pitch-black robe was approaching with an eerie gait.

It seemed to be walking at leisure, yet its speed was astonishing.

The drawn slender sword reflected a hard gleam beneath the sun, a venomous snake ready to strike.

The next moment, the black-robed figure swept into the battlefield. Wherever that slender sword passed, blood bloomed.

More chilling still, the blade did not distinguish between targets.

Human armor and monster hide alike split open under the slender sword, thin as paper before its edge.

The screams across the battlefield multiplied. The chaotic slaughter began to take on a strange order beneath this uninvited guest's massacre.

Every living thing fled in panic, and one after another, they fell in pools of blood.

"Damn it! It's the Executioner!"

"Why is that madman here?"

Several unwilling mercenaries and adventurers raised their swords to resist, only to become corpses in the next instant.

The already weakened monsters fared even worse. Under the black-robed figure's precise sword strikes, they fell like wheat before a scythe.

"It's him..."

Roland released the arrow in his hand and focused.

He finally remembered the black-robed person's identity.

It was the mysterious figure who had brushed past him earlier in the Adventurer's Guild.

"The Executioner..."

Roland studied that smooth, flowing swordsmanship, his expression growing severe.

He had undergone strict training from the estate guards, gained much more practical combat experience, and pushed Lion Swordsmanship close to max level.

But in pure swordsmanship, he was probably still no match for this killing god.

The thought did not linger.

Whether it was the mad Executioner, the mercenaries and adventurers in the melee, or the monsters, none of it had anything to do with him.

The only thing he cared about was reaching one hundred kills.

"Thirty-seventh!"

Another arrow tore through the air, and a distant goblin dropped.

"Only three left..."

Roland nocked another arrow, excitement tightening his grip.

Just as his fingertips touched the bowstring, a deafening buzz rose from far away.

He snapped his gaze toward the sound and saw the distant forest, still a moment ago, erupt into a sky-filling cloud of dust. A trail of smoke and earth rushed toward the battlefield like lightning.

"What's going on?"

Roland sensed trouble and drew the bowstring to its limit.

Before the arrow left the string, a black shadow burst from the forest and hovered above the battlefield.

"That is..."

Roland raised his head. His pupils contracted.

Sunlight pierced the dust, revealing the shadow's true form.

Its body was covered in blood-colored scales, strikingly similar to the Bloodscale Kobold he had encountered in the village. But its original dog head had stretched into something long and sharp, more like a lizard ready to strike, with a red tongue flicking from its mouth.

Most horrifying was the deformed fleshy wing growing from the left side of its back.

The wing looked tender as a larva just broken from its cocoon, horribly mismatched with the monster's massive body.

Yet that disproportionate little wing was supporting it in a low circle above the battlefield, casting a suffocating shadow.

"Roar!"

A deafening roar tore across the battlefield. The Winged Kobold raised its head and let out a long, chilling howl.

Before the mercenaries and adventurers could react, it swung the rusted greataxe in its hand. The blade caught the sun.

Whoosh!

The air screamed. The Winged Kobold beat its wing and dove like death itself, rushing straight toward the densest part of the crowd.

The greataxe swept across with crushing force.

Splurt! Splurt!

Blood fountained. Broken limbs flew.

In a single exchange, a pile of mangled corpses appeared on the ground.

From above, the Winged Kobold looked like a farmer harvesting wheat, while the mercenaries and adventurers were only stalks waiting to be cut.

A few reacted quickly and raised their weapons to block. Several others ducked aside and tried to counterattack.

However...

Clang! Clang! Clang!

Their weapons struck the Winged Kobold's scale-covered body and produced only sparks. Not a single scratch appeared.

Despair spread through the crowd.

"This... this isn't something we can handle!"

"Its scales are harder than steel! Our attacks aren't doing anything!"

"Retreat! If this keeps going, we'll all die here!"

"Damn it, did this thing crawl out of hell?"

After witnessing the Winged Kobold's brutal slaughter, the mercenaries and adventurers broke.

They abandoned the spoils they had nearly claimed and fled in terror, throwing the battlefield into chaos.

The Winged Kobold hovered low, its lone wing beating at its back, scarlet eyes burning with bloodlust.

It toyed with the fleeing humans like a bird of prey. Every dive brought fresh screams.

The monster army surged forward as well.

They howled, waved crude weapons, and joined the one-sided massacre.

Roland had already made his choice.

The instant he saw the Winged Kobold's true appearance, he put away the shortbow and withdrew.

His steps were light and quick. In only a few breaths, he had moved far from the center of the battlefield.

He ignored the screams behind him.

He had saved Darco in the jungle because Darco was a noble young master, Baron Forsling's only son.

Darco's life and death were directly tied to Roland's own life.

But these mercenaries and adventurers?

They were greedy profit-seekers. Their lives and deaths had nothing to do with him.

With Roland's current strength, if he used Cleave, he did have a chance to kill the Winged Kobold in one strike.

But afterward?

Once he fell into a weakened state, could he truly count on outlaws who lived by the blade to feel grateful?

The answer was obvious.

Staying away from this trouble was the wisest choice.

"What a pity. I'm only three kills short of the Warrior job-change requirement..."

Roland kept moving, his thoughts racing.

He kept the sound of dead branches beneath his boots to the smallest possible range, each step landing on the safest foothold.

"But it doesn't matter..."

"Master Hawk approved a long leave. At worst, I'll stay in Pinewood Town a few more days. With that kobold around, the nearby monsters definitely won't stay quiet."

His pace quickened as he calculated.

Then the ringing clash of metal cut through the wailing.

Roland frowned.

Someone could hold their own against that Winged Kobold?

Judging from the frequency of the exchange, they did not seem to be at a disadvantage.

It was not that he looked down on those mercenaries.

After fighting the Bloodscale Kobold, he understood all too well how terrifying this type of monster was.

Scales impervious to blades and spears. Monstrous strength far beyond ordinary people. And now, mobility from that wing.

Back when they faced the Bloodscale Kobold, even John and the others, as standing soldiers, had struggled to withstand it. How could this hastily gathered mob possibly...

The clash of metal grew denser, mixed with the monster's pained roars.

Roland did not stop out of curiosity.

Whoever was holding that monster back was buying him precious time to withdraw.

Boom!

A deafening explosion burst behind him, and Roland turned by reflex.

A black shadow came whistling toward him like a cannonball, so fast it left afterimages in the air.

Roland dodged aside on instinct.

The shadow brushed past the hem of his robe and slammed into a tree ahead.

The thick trunk groaned under the impact, and shattered bark sprayed outward.

"The Executioner?"

He recognized the figure in that instant.

The other party's signature black robe had been torn in many places, revealing a slender body in leather armor beneath. Pale fingers still gripped that iconic slender sword.

Before Roland could steady himself, a bone-deep chill crawled over the back of his neck.

His battle instincts drove him into a crouch and roll without hesitation.

Crack!

The rusted greataxe swept over his hair and cut through an oak tree as thick as a man's embrace.

Wood chips burst through the air. Roland rolled to his feet, iron sword already drawn, its edge cutting a pale line beneath the sun.

The next moment, the Winged Kobold changed targets.

The Executioner, who had been sliding down the tree trunk a heartbeat earlier, had already risen and rushed toward the lone wing on the monster's back.

Clang!

The Winged Kobold spun and swept horizontally, its greataxe tearing through the air.

The Executioner's slender figure bent backward like a falling leaf.

The axe blade passed the tip of his nose, then altered course halfway and collided with the slender sword.

"Cough!"

A muffled grunt came from beneath the black robe.

The Executioner dropped to one knee. The slender sword stabbed into the ground and carved a long trench before stopping his retreat.

When he raised his head, the Winged Kobold was already charging again.

Swish, swish, swish!

The slender sword became a storm of silver cuts.

Its blade stabbed precisely toward weak points such as the eyelids, ear holes, and wing membrane, yet every attack was blocked by scales.

The Winged Kobold grinned and endured the strikes head-on, forcing its weapon through.

Boom!

The axe smashed into the ground, sending spiderweb cracks across the earth.

The Executioner rolled aside in haste, but the force wave tore away half of the black robe, revealing a pale jaw and several loose strands of silver hair.

Before he could steady himself, the Winged Kobold raised its battleaxe again. The second downward chop fell with an air-tearing shriek.

There was nowhere to dodge.

The Executioner's deep blue pupils tightened, reflecting the descending axe.

"Move!"

Roland's roar exploded through the critical moment.

He darted out like a cheetah. The iron sword in his hand tore through the air, stabbing straight toward the unscaled wing on the kobold's back.

The Winged Kobold reacted with startling speed. Its wrist twisted, and the greataxe that had been chopping downward shifted into a fierce horizontal sweep.

Bang!

Axe and sword collided, sparks spraying.

A tremendous force traveled along Roland's blade. His entire arm went numb, and the impact drove him several steps back.

"Stronger than the Bloodscale Kobold, and faster too..."

He gritted his teeth, shocked despite himself.

"Fortunately, [Adaptive Training] raised my Agility to 7. Otherwise, I might not be able to keep up with its movements!"

On the other side, the Executioner rose with the slender sword as support.

Caught between enemies at front and back, the Winged Kobold did not continue its attack. Instead, it flapped its wing and retreated.

Its scarlet eyes moved between the two of them until both were within its field of view. Only then did it stop and take a guarded stance.

"That is..."

Roland's gaze locked onto the white object clutched under the Winged Kobold's left arm, and a strange familiarity stirred in him.

He pushed the thought aside at once. This unusually cautious enemy made the situation troublesome.

When the Executioner had been fighting the Winged Kobold earlier, Roland had indeed had a chance to escape.

But the Executioner was clearly not this monster's match.

If Roland had not acted in time, the Executioner's head would probably already be on the ground.

And if the Executioner died, then even if Roland fled, the Winged Kobold's flight speed and mobility meant he would not get far.

After weighing the matter, joining forces with the Executioner was better than fighting alone.

The problem was...

The Executioner had just slaughtered mercenaries, adventurers, and monsters without distinction.

Roland had to confirm that this temporary ally would not turn on him.

"If we deal with this monster together, you won't attack me too, will you?"

Roland kept his eyes on the kobold and spoke in a low voice.

The Executioner's silver hair lifted slightly. He shook his head.

The next second, the slender sword was out, and his figure rushed toward the enemy like lightning, leaving his back completely exposed to Roland.

Roland followed with his sword.

"Attack the wing on its back and create an opening for me!"

The confident command made the Executioner's movements pause for a fraction of a second. Then he adjusted his steps, nimbly avoided the greataxe's horizontal sweep, and slipped behind the monster.

Roland seized the fleeting battle opportunity. His iron sword became a silver rainbow.

In an instant, metal rang through the forest in a continuous series of impacts.

Perhaps because both were seasoned fighters, Roland and the Executioner showed astonishing coordination despite being strangers.

But the Executioner had already been injured. As time passed, his steps began to break out of rhythm.

The Winged Kobold noticed the flaw at once. Because of Roland's perfectly timed restraining attacks, however, it missed several chances to kill him. The fury in its scarlet eyes burned hotter.

Then the monster ignored everything and swung its axe into a head-on clash with the Executioner.

"Opportunity!"

Roland's eyes sharpened, and the [Focus] trait activated instantly.

He stepped forward and leaped into the air, gripping the longsword with both hands. The blade drew a fierce silver gleam under the sunlight.

Mockery appeared in the Winged Kobold's scarlet pupils.

It struck with force, colliding with the Executioner's slender sword.

After seeing the Executioner spit blood and collapse to the ground, it turned swiftly and held the rusted greataxe horizontally before its chest.

In its eyes, the human who had leaped into the air was already a lamb waiting for slaughter.

One small twist of the axe blade would cut him down.

Clang!

But the instant axe and sword collided, the contempt in the monster's eyes froze.

A terrifying force traveled through the axe handle, numbing its claws and tearing a panicked screech from its throat.

Power surged into Roland's arms like a tide.

He gritted his teeth and forced the sword down with both hands.

"Cleave!"

The roar sounded in his heart.

The blood-colored scales that had resisted blades and spears were suddenly no stronger than thin paper.

The longsword chopped down without obstruction, slanting from the axe handle straight toward the Winged Kobold's left abdomen.

Bang!

Roland landed heavily.

The Winged Kobold stood stiffly in place, seemingly unharmed.

Then a scarlet line opened across its body.

Splurt!

Blood gushed out like a fountain.