Like fragile glass, the entire barrier splintered into countless fragnts of golden energy before disintegrating into nothingness.
The protective glow that had shielded the city was gone.
Silence.
For a single, stretched-out second, no one moved.
No one spoke.
Then the realization hit.
The barrier was down.
The one thing keeping us safe, gone in an instant.
A low, heavy sound filled the air as the orc lord’s club, now back in his hand, settled onto the ground.
He hadn’t even moved to retrieve it.
It had simply returned to him.
Like it was his to command.
Like it was a re plaything.
The sa soldiers who had been laughing earlier now stood pale-faced, frozen in fear.
The mages who had sworn the barrier would hold stared at the empty sky where it once stood, their eyes wide with horror.
The orc lord rolled his shoulders, yawning, completely unbothered.
As if everything that just happened was nothing more than a minor inconvenience to him.
As if we were nothing.
A deep, guttural chuckle rumbled through the air, and my blood ran cold.
The orc lord grinned.
It wasn’t a smirk of amusent or even a cruel sneer, it was sothing far worse.
A slow, deliberate smile stretched across his monstrous face, revealing jagged, yellowed teeth that looked like they could tear through steel.
His crimson eyes glead with an unnatural hunger, watching us like prey that had just lost its only ans of escape.
That one expression sent an unmistakable ssage.
He knew.
He knew what we were feeling.
The fear.
The hopelessness.
The sheer disbelief that he had shattered the city’s strongest defense with nothing more than a casual throw.
And he was enjoying it.
It was as if he heard us...
And waited for us to be confident that the barrier would save us.
A sharp shiver ran down my spine as I forced my breathing to steady.
Around , the soldiers and awakened were frozen in place.
So instinctively stepped back, gripping their weapons tightly, while others simply stood there, wide-eyed, their confidence from before crumbling into dust.
I clenched my fists.
How?
How did he do that?
The barrier wasn’t sothing that should have broken so easily.
It had withstood countless attacks from those arrows, and are made from our strongest mage.
Yet this orc lord had obliterated it without even trying.
I quickly ran through everything I knew about orcs.
Regular orcs were dangerous, but predictable.
Strong, but killable.
Even their leaders, orc warriors, shamans, and berserkers, were powerful, but they had limits.
But this wasn’t just an orc.
This was sothing different...
An Orc Lord.
Sothing much higher in the hierarchy.
Sothing closer to a calamity than a re monster.
My mind raced as I analyzed the scene.
His armor, dark, reinforced, and worn like a second skin, was no ordinary tal.
It looked nearly indestructible, as if even the strongest attacks would barely leave a scratch.
His weapon, that club...
No, calling it a club was an understatent.
It was a slab of destruction, sothing that had already taken countless lives before this mont.
And then there was his aura.
That suffocating, all-consuming presence.
It didn’t feel like the pressure from a regular awakened or even a high-ranking monster.
No, this was sothing else entirely.
It felt absolute.
An existence so overwhelming that standing before it made every instinct scream run.
But running wasn’t an option.
Not when the barrier was gone.
Not when the city was now completely exposed.
I inhaled sharply, trying to suppress the growing dread in my chest.
Could he be defeated?
I didn’t know.
But I had to find an answer.
Fast.
Silence hung over the battlefield like a thick fog, choking the air as the orc lord stood motionless.
His presence alone felt like an unshakable weight pressing down on us, suffocating, inescapable.
No one moved.
No one spoke.
It was as if even the act of breathing too loudly might provoke him.
Then, bang!
A gunshot echoed through the tense air.
All eyes turned toward the source.
A male soldier, stood trembling, his hands gripping his rifle so tightly that his knuckles were bone white.
His face was pale, sweat trickling down his forehead, his body shaking.
He had fired.
Out of fear.
Out of desperation.
The bullet tore through the air toward the orc lord’s skull, only for sothing impossible to happen.
The bullet stopped.
Just inches from the orc lord’s face, it froze midair, as if ti itself had bent to his will.
It hung there, unmoving, caught in an invisible force.
I felt my stomach twist.
That was no skill I had ever seen before.
The orc lord’s crimson eyes flickered with sothing unreadable as he slowly turned his head, not toward the bullet, but toward the soldier.
The boy gasped, his breath catching in his throat.
And then, the bullet moved.
Not forward. backward.
Like a cruel joke, the sa bullet that was ant to kill the orc lord reversed its course, cutting through the air with unnatural precision.
Straight back toward the one who fired it.
There was no ti to react.
No ti to dodge.
The bullet punched through the soldier’s chest.
A choked gasp escaped his lips as he stumbled back, clutching the wound in shock.
Blood spilled between his fingers, warm and dark, soaking into his uniform.
His legs gave out beneath him, and he collapsed onto the ground.
For a mont, no one moved.
No one spoke.
We could only watch.
Watch as the life drained from his wide, horrified eyes.
Watch as the orc lord, still standing lazily in the sa spot, barely acknowledged what had just happened.
Watch as reality set in.
This wasn’t just so powerful monster.
This was sothing else entirely.
And we were not ready for it.
The ground trembled with each step the orc lord took, his towering form advancing toward us like an executioner approaching the condemned.
His presence alone sent shivers down my spine, a suffocating weight that pressed against my chest.
It wasn’t just his size or the thick, armored plating that covered his body like a fortress, it was the absolute certainty in his movents.
He was in no rush.
Because he knew there was nothing we could do.
"Open fire!" soone shouted, breaking the paralyzing silence.
A storm of gunfire erupted.
Bullets tore through the air, streaking toward the orc lord in a barrage of desperation.
So of the awakened joined in, launching elental attacks, flas, ice, lightning, all aid at bringing the monster down before he got any closer.
But none of it mattered.
The bullets and powers stopped.
Every single one of them, frozen midair.
It was as if ti itself had simply refused to let them pass.
A chill ran down my spine.
That was the second ti he had done this.
The firstrefused soldier had paid the price for his mistake, but now it was all of us making the sa foolish attempt.
The orc lord exhaled slowly, almost bored.
Then he raised his massive hand and, snapped his fingers.
A loud crack split the air, and before I could even process what had happened, the bullets moved.
Straight back at us.
I barely had ti to react.
My body moved on instinct, twisting as I ripped my sword from my side.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
I deflected one.
Then another.
Then another.
The force behind them rattled my arms, sending shockwaves through my muscles.
The speed, the power, they weren’t just coming back at us.
They were faster.
The first screams rang out as the bullets found their marks.
Many soldiers fell where they stood, blood splattering across the ground.
The awakened tried to shield themselves, but it was too fast, too overwhelming.
So managed to dodge, but most weren’t that lucky.
The air was filled with the sound of bodies hitting the dirt.
The orc lord hadn’t even lifted a weapon.
And yet, he had butchered us.
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