From the roof of the ten-story building, the city looked less like a city and more like a ruin, with broken walls, blood, and corpses scattered around.

  Roars and groans of the undead filled the sky while the masses filled the street, human figures running where they should have been hidden, most facing a gruesome death by the hand of the undead following them, but none of them had the courage to change their path.

  Or enter a building to hide.

  Sevran watched it all without leaning on the cracked ledge in front of him.

  Cold air moved through the broken concrete, carrying dust, and the faint metallic aftertaste of blood that had already dried somewhere below.

  None of it bothered him.

  Smell meant little.

  Behind him, many figures were watching coldly without the slightest emotion.

  But there were differences between them.

  Some are more confident, as if power radiated from their look.

  While those at the back, although they cared too little for the death happening below, felt more reserved, some whispered in low voices, and some kept looking at a tall building on the horizon.

  Far in the distance, a black line of vertical ruin split the night sky.

  Hollowlight Tower, or Nightworn 's domain.

  Even from here, it dominated the horizon.

  Nightworn.

  Rank one.

  Sevran’s eyes narrowed slightly in thought.

  A top strategist, the broadcasts had called him.

  A contender whose first day could already enter history.

  A man who moved through disaster as if he had rehearsed it countless times in advance.

  Sevran did not believe in miracles; luck existed, but only as an excuse used by people too dull to apply a measured system.

  What he had seen in the promotional footage and his followers’ information was troublesome, and he needed to get rid of this issue early on.

  Moreover, killing Nightworn would increase his rank and make him the top strategist; the help he would receive from his followers would increase countless times. He needs this win.

  A challenger near the back gave a low whistle as another stream of desperate survivors emerged from a half-collapsed road filled with cars and debris.

  What followed them wasn’t just undead but recruits of these challengers as well.

  They were as terrified as the survivors were, because they knew that if they failed their mission, only death awaited, either from the undead or from the summoners.

  “Another horde,” he muttered. “At this rate, all of the undead in the city will gather here.”

  “This was always the plan, can’t you see your recruit forcing these survivors to their death too?” Vorik said.

  His voice was flat, but the edge in it made the lesser challenger shut his mouth at once.

  Vorik stood to Sevran’s right, with broad shoulders and eyes that didn’t move from the street below.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  The man who had spoken shifted uncomfortably. “I didn’t mean to-”

  “You wanted to be useful,” Vorik said. “Now be quiet.”

  A few of the challengers stiffened.

  Sevran said nothing.

  It was not a problem.

  A small amount of contempt was healthy in structures like this. Too much respect would make men think their opinions matter.

  To Sevran’s left, an elven woman stepped toward the ledge, her gaze tracking the flow of undead below as she observed for any strategic movement.

  She was the one with the highest agility in the group, sharp in the way of the blade. “The bait and the undead to the east are pulling further away,” she said. “If they keep it like this, they would reach his domain too early; the attack wouldn’t be coordinated.”

  “Don’t worry, it won’t be of much importance, no need to obstruct them,” Sevran said.

  His tone was quiet.

  “We are not storming the tower,” Sevran continued. “If we try to break him with a single thrust and storm his domain, then he’ll probably kill us off easily inside the skyscraper. He is no fool; his defenses inside the skyscraper must already be up, and fighting him on his home ground is foolish.”

  “However, if we destroy his army outside of the skyscraper, then whatever defenses he has set up will be useless.”

  As Sevran's explanation hung in the air, someone from the back asked, “What if even after the undead reach his domain, he would still fortify himself and his army inside without coming out?”

  As he said that Vorik was a second away from flaring up insults but was stopped by Sevran's smile, “Don’t worry, if he cowers inside, it would be better for us, we could deal with him in countless ways, but don’t put your hopes up, he is smart enough not to make such a mistake.”

  Sevran didn’t mind answering their doubts. After all, they were good tools; as long as they remained useful, he wouldn’t mind indulging them.

  Silence answered him for a moment.

  “He is trapped within his own domain; he has around 5000 undead, but only around 120 useful ones.”

  “13 of them have E-grade status, but only three of them are to be concerned about, and even then, it is just a little trouble; after all, they have no intelligence.”

  “The only real threat is his recruit Lilith and his strategies.”

  “You all need to understand that he has destroyed one of the dungeons of the end after 12 hours of landing; you mustn’t underestimate him.”

  Sevran returned his eyes to the city below.

  Another bait line appeared. A group of natives, too weak or too terrified to resist the pressure around them, fled through a side street, their movement pulled fresh undead after them.

  Farther west, one challenger led a group, making noise across an intersection, urging the undead to follow.

  A second group stayed silent near them, camouflaging themselves, waiting as they used the first group as cover.

  Sevran had just begun recalculating the time for the early arrival of the undead from the east to Nightworn domain; however, that was when he realized that something was amiss.

  He and the people behind him are currently facing Nightworn’s domain to the north.

  He used survivors with recruits and some crossworlders to drive the undead toward Nightworn from the east, west, and his current location north of the domain.

  That only leaves the south; it was too far away to manage himself, so he decided to send three trustworthy crossworlders, among others, to lead and drive the undead to the domain, but now he is hearing sounds of battle.

  Sevran smiled lightly, ‘Good, Nightworn understood my intention very well.’

  ‘I wasn’t wrong about you; you could see through your situation with a glance.’

  The sound of fighting grew more intense by the second, and the people started to notice, so Sevran said calmly, “Nightworn has already noticed our move; he must have attacked to his south so he doesn’t get surrounded.”

  “We are too far away to help. Let’s hope they can handle themselves; quicken our pace. We need to reach his domain quickly.”

  After that, he gave orders to everyone, and they left one after another to do their job. On the rooftop, only Sevran and Vorik remained.

  Vorik said, “I saw that smile on your face, so are you planning on telling me the truth?”

  Sevran chuckled, “You can see through me easily, and that is why you are here.”

  “To answer your question, yes, I anticipated this. I gambled on Nightworn’s intelligence. Currently, no one has gifted him any information, so he must have noticed that someone is working against him. If nothing is being given to him, then someone must be taking these things.”

  “From the distribution of our members, he must have seen that the south is the strongest front and the north, west, and east are weak, so he attacked south, knowing that if he attacked from any other direction, his losses would be too great.”

  “He guessed that our location is north, and that group we sent south is just bait. Our goal was obvious: we wanted him to leave the north, west, and east so we could reach his domain, while giving him the south as a gift.”

  “His goal is also obvious; he wants to destroy the undead and the team to the south quickly and return to the domain for a final fight, knowing that our numbers have been reduced and that the south is clean, so he only needs one defensive line.”

  “Now I will try my best to hinder him, while he does the same to me.”

  Vorik frowned. “If you knew all of that, then why didn’t you set up an ambush in the south? We could reduce their top force this way?”

  Sevran shook his head. “Do you truly believe that he sent his main force southward without making sure that it was the best option? He must have investigated somehow.”

  Vorik nodded in realization, “I see.”

  Sevran smiled at him, but his smile held disguised contempt that nobody saw through.