If Iron Flesh is the shield, Demon Sinew has to be the sword. It's the offensive counterpart. You can't tank damage forever. Eventually, you have to hit harder than the other guy to survive.


Liam had never been the turtle type. He preferred to strike first.


He made his choice.


I choose Demon Sinew.


Instantly, a new stream of data flooded his brain.


Ether Art Acquired: Demon Sinew. Mastery Initiated.


It felt like a lightning bolt hitting his nervous system. Information on muscle density, explosive torque, and kinetic energy force-fed itself into his memory, his body already beginning to rewrite its own limits.


A fresh surge of power boiled within him. Liam had finally nailed it—he had fully mastered the Ether Art Demon Sinew.


It was exactly as he'd suspected. If Iron Flesh was his shield, an art built for defense, then Demon Sinew was his sword—pure, unadulterated offense.


Every muscle in his body felt supercharged, injected with a strange, high-octane fuel. Liam didn't just run; he accelerated, his speed climbing with every step. The force behind his machete swings grew heavier, deadlier.


Drake, Gwen, and Harris froze. They stared, jaw-dropped, at Liam in the center of the roof. The look on their faces was somewhere between terror and awe.


To them, Liam had ceased to be a solid object. He was a blur, a wisp of smoke dancing across the battlefield. Everywhere that smoke drifted, heads rolled. Rows of Greater Carrion Beasts collapsed, severed from their necks before they even knew they were dead.


In the span of a heartbeat or two, the rooftop was cleared. Not a single Carrion Beast was left standing; they were nothing but a carpet of corpses.


"What... what kind of ability is that?" Drake gasped, the air hissing through his teeth.


Gwen managed to keep her cool, though her sharp, cat-like eyes glimmered with intensity. "Liam must have broken through. He's hit Tier 5."


Harris, who had been silent the whole time, finally spoke up, his voice dripping with admiration. "That has to be a Tier 5 Ether Art. It's insane..."


Liam finally skidded to a halt. By the time Drake and the others focused on his back, he was already standing at the very edge of the roof, peering down into the water below. Something down there had caught his attention.


"Liam!" Drake shouted, sprinting over. "What was that? That was terrifying, man. We couldn't even track you."


Liam barely glanced back. "It's the Ether Art I unlocked," he said quietly. "You guys will get it too, once you hit Tier 5."


Below the building, the dark water was clogged with corpses. Dozens of fresh bodies had just been tossed down, yet oddly, not a single scavenger had surfaced to feed. It was quiet. Too quiet.


Liam studied the water, his expression darkening.


Gwen and Harris joined them at the edge.


"Something's wrong," Drake said, frowning. "We dumped all those bodies, and—"


BOOM.


A massive explosion of water cut him off. It sounded like a depth charge going off beneath the surface. The floating corpses were blasted outward by a shockwave of force as something colossal erupted from the depths.


The monster's vertical leap was impossible. It rocketed seven, maybe eight meters into the air, clearing the distance from the water to the roof in a single bound. Riding a tsunami of spray, it crashed down toward the edge where Liam and his team stood.


The sheer pressure of the creature was suffocating. Nobody tried to be a hero; they scrambled to the sides, diving for cover.


BANG. The behemoth slammed onto the concrete, flattening several Carrion Beast corpses into a gruesome paste of blood and bone.


Drake and the others went pale, sucking in sharp breaths. But Liam didn't scatter. He held his ground, stepping back just enough to position himself directly in front of the creature, drawing its aggro.


It was a fish—if a fish was the size of a yacht and built like a tank. It lay on the roof, over six meters from nose to tail, covered in dark yellow scales that shimmered with a faint, oily light. Four muscular, scaled legs sprouted from its belly, each ending in a five-clawed foot that dug into the concrete, cracking the surface. A single horn, over a meter long, jutted from its head, glowing with a menacing yellow pulse.


This was the apex predator. Its presence explained why the other monsters were hiding. It hadn't come for the dead scraps in the water; it wanted fresh meat. It opened its maw and let out a roar—not a gurgle, but a majestic, thundering sound that echoed like a dragon's cry.


The team stared in horror. This was no ordinary spawn.


Between Liam's eyebrows, the Insight Rune flared to life, scanning the beast.


Name: Draco-Rhino Fish.


Level: 6.


Type: Rare Class Ether Beast.


Description: Extremely rare. Possesses infinite strength. Scales are indestructible. The horn is a treasure, sharp enough to sever anything (vorpal property). Weakness: The unprotected abdomen. Other data unavailable.


"Draco-Rhino Fish... Rare Class?" Liam stared at the monster, his eyes widening slightly.


He knew the hierarchy of Ether Beasts. At the bottom was Common Class, then Elite, then Boss-tier, and the terrifying Arcane Class, like the Corpse Matriarch. That made four types.


But this was a fifth type. Rare Class.


The Draco-Rhino Fish unleashed another dragon-roar. The surrounding buildings fell deathly silent; every other monster had vanished, terrified of this thing. Bracing its four scaled limbs against the roof, the massive creature launched itself into the air again, charging straight for Liam like a living battering ram.


Liam had evolved to Tier 5. He packed over two thousand pounds of force behind his muscles. But looking at this thing, he knew one thing for sure: he wasn't going to try and tank this hit.


The Draco-Rhino Fish moved with blur-inducing speed. Its feet scrambled, alternating in a rapid-fire rhythm as it swept across five meters in a heartbeat, slamming violently into the stairwell wall behind them.


Crunch.


The unicorn-like horn jutting from its forehead sliced into the concrete like a hot knife through butter.


Liam took a sharp breath. He'd seen the stats on this thing, but seeing it in real life was a whole different ball game. That horn was a treasure, sure, but it was also vorpal-grade sharp. It could slice gold and shatter jade. If that thing even grazed him, it wouldn't matter how tough his muscles were—he'd be sliced deli meat in a nanosecond.


Despite its massive bulk, the Draco-Rhino Fish was terrifyingly agile. When its initial pounce missed, it whipped its body around, dragging that lethal horn through the wall in a horizontal arc before lashing out with a front claw, aiming straight for Liam.


Drake, Gwen, and Harris watched the horn carve through solid concrete like it was wet cardboard. Their faces went pale. There was no way they were getting anywhere near that thing. They scrambled backward, putting as much distance between them and the beast as possible.