Red blood sprayed upon the white snow that was beginning to cover the eastern territory. The Fourth Division’s forces were far from sufficient to block the large-scale looting and invasion that had simultaneously begun at the eastern front line. Countless refugees were flooding into Beldeve, but the Fourth Division had yet to fully recover and there was no one who was able to fill Hela’s vacant seat.

Juan fiddled with Talter’s short sword. In the meantime, Horhell brought a tactical map and noticed Juan staring at his short sword.

“Is there a problem?” Horhell asked.

“It seems like I didn’t take good enough care of this short sword.”

Horhell approached Juan and closely examined the condition of the short sword. To Horhell, the short sword still looked fine and balanced, with a sharp blade.

“I don’t know. It still looks good to me,” Horhell said.

Juan smiled. It was only natural that Horhell couldn’t notice the difference; the strength of Talter’s short sword depended on how much blood it consumed. The short sword had been useful until now since it had consumed enormous amounts of blood at the colosseum in Tantil, but it hadn’t been able to consume enough blood to maintain itself after Juan took possession of it—this was especially true in recent times. Juan had been feeling that the condition of the short sword was getting worse and worse each day.

Juan decided to place these thoughts to the back of his mind and turned his attention to the tactical map brought by Horhell.

“How many enemies do we have?” Juan asked.

“According to the report we got from the scouts, the...