I Aggressively Stack Steel of the Heart in the Knight Order

Carnivorous Hunting Dog Carlos.

Although he hadn’t been a Fear Knight for long, he had become the champion of the Slaughter Death Arena and received the blessing of Avernus. His immense strength and insatiable thirst for battle and slaughter were undeniable.

He was nothing like the Dark Mage Iskander, a schemer who preferred to hide and manipulate everything from behind the scenes.

Even when crushing an ant, Carlos would use his full strength. He savored the battle, savored the fear, and used his enemies’ wails and deaths to please his master, all to receive the blessing of even greater Mighty Power.

When he sensed the Knightly Aura of Matthias attempting another sneak attack, Carlos grew increasingly impatient, his temper flaring into a furious rage.

He had planned to save this cowardly ant, who loved to hide and launch sneak attacks, for last. But this was the first time he had seen someone so eager to die.

After all, compared to Matthias, he was far more interested in Manon, whose strength was immense and whose will to fight burned like a raging fire.

While pinning down Manon, Carlos fixed his brownish-yellow, slitted pupils on Matthias. His cruel gaze was that of a man looking at a corpse.

’Such a pathetic tactic is meant to kill someone?’

’When this Imperial Knight first tried to ambush me, I already took note of his Special Ability. And now, this laughable ant dares to try the same trick again?’

’Utterly reckless.’

Carlos’s long tail was his second weapon, its strength and destructive power rivaling that of his Evil Bone Slaughter Knife. It was covered in bone spurs that detached easily. If even one of them pierced an enemy, he could channel the Mighty Power of Evil Bone to corrode and kill them.

However, just as he expected Matthias to be sent flying by his tail once more, the Imperial Knight—the ant in his eyes—suddenly unleashed a massive torrent of azure electric arcs from between his hands!

The high-temperature, high-pressure arcs resembled a plasma torch.

The aura of Mighty Power radiating from it made even the Fear Knight Carlos’s pupils shrink in shock! The humiliation of being played by an ant was like gasoline poured onto the fire of his rage.

’This despicable insect...’

For an Official Knight of Carlos’s level, the speed of thought was far beyond what an ordinary person could imagine. Though a flurry of thoughts crossed his mind, it all happened in a single instant in the Real Cosmos.

And his tail, having been lashed out, was now less than twenty centimeters from Matthias, with no room to be pulled back.

He could only watch helplessly as his tail slammed into the high-temperature electric arcs radiating terrifying power. Nearly a third of its length was severed clean off!

In that instant, Matthias’s and Carlos’s gazes collided in mid-air.

Facing the Fear Knight’s fury, Matthias felt no fear. There was only the brilliant blue light erupting from the electric arcs in his hands.

Special Ability·Arc Thermal Melting Cutter.

And in that same moment, his Knightly Aura surged, abruptly reaching the level of a Seven-star Military Rank!

Matthias had been stuck at the six-star Official Military Rank for twenty years. Even though he had once been a genius Knight serving in the Ash Guard, he was keenly aware that his talent and strength had always made him the weakest link in the Vengeance Angel Squad.

Outside of combat, he spent nearly all his time meditating and tempering his Knightly Physique.

The Arc Thermal Melting Cutter was originally a prototype Combat Technique he had begun developing after joining the Vengeance Angel Squad, basing it on Agate’s Thermite Beam. However, he had never finished it.

And now, after experiencing one life-or-death battle after another, his Extraordinary Armament·Arc Manufacturing Machine had used his Combat Technique as a blueprint to forcibly awaken a seventh Special Ability, helping him break through to the Seven-star Earth Military Rank!

If this breakthrough had happened during training, Matthias would have been ecstatic. Only he knew the sheer hardship and effort he had poured in to reach this point!

He had never been one to be content with falling behind.

When Manon was promoted to the Seven-star Military Rank, Matthias celebrated with him, but it was only when he was alone in the training room that he felt that deep, inner sting of disappointment.

But now, his heart was filled only with a desire to embrace the fires of combat and the resolve to prove his Loyalty to the Empire!

At the same time, Manon, who had been pinned down by Carlos’s slaughter knife, launched his own counterattack.

Manon gripped the traitor’s slaughter knife with all his might, preventing him from escaping. He then lunged forward, trying to use the combined weight of his body and Power Armor to topple his foe.

Bested for the first time in a battle against an equal, and even having his tail severed, Carnivorous Hunting Dog Carlos’s face twisted into a mask of ultimate ferocity!

He let out a low, bestial roar, devoid of any human quality. He deliberately snapped his Evil Bone Slaughter Knife, which Manon still gripped, putting the full power of a Fear Knight on display!

”ROAR—!”

A mass of bone grew to encase his left hand, which he used to meet Matthias’s arc thermal cutter head-on. He seized Matthias’s wrist in a death grip and flung him to the side.

At the same time, he used the momentum from twisting his body. Just as Manon pounced, Carlos’s body, like that of an Abyssal Hound, sprang up. He delivered a straight, vicious kick that slammed into Manon’s Chest Armor!

In the instant the three of them clashed, Carlos, despite being at a disadvantage, had instantly turned the tables.

However, even though Carnivorous Hunting Dog Carlos was a Fear Knight—a being so dreaded by the myriad races of the Cosmos that his existence was synonymous with disaster and destruction, and whose name alone could strike fear into an entire Thousand-Man Battle Group—he had no idea that the two Imperial Knights he now faced were anything but weak!

Matthias, who had been thrown aside by Carlos, dissolved into a current of azure electricity and vanished.

The golden light around Manon flared even brighter as he, in a powerful show of direct confrontation, caught Carlos’s flying kick with a single hand!

Then, like a phantom, Matthias reappeared to Carlos’s left and launched a feint.

Manon counter-attacked in the same instant. Roaring like a golden-armored war god, his right fist became a heavy cannon, letting out a sharp boom as it shot through the air, aimed straight for Carlos’s canine face!

The Fear Knight, Carnivorous Hunting Dog Carlos.

Facing the pincer attack of two powerful Imperial Knights, his Demon eyes showed no fear or hesitation. On the contrary, the humiliation of having his tail severed by Matthias had transformed into a monstrous rage. His soaring will to fight, wrapped in his foul Knight Power, raged and roared!

In fact, at this moment, an irrepressible, frenzied excitement showed on Carlos’s enraged face as he hissed, ”Your power... it brings me pleasure! Imperial Knights!

Come on! Fight!

”Your blood and death will surely please my master! ROAR—!”

...

「Meanwhile.」

At the upper-level Barge Port.

Reinhardt stood amidst a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood—the remains of Demons and Void Knights. His right foot rested on the chest of a Combat Gang leader as he pulled his blood-soaked Black War Axe free.

At the same time, Raphael’s voice, filled with grief and indignation, rang in Reinhardt’s ear after he contacted Bach and Hymes and learned of the situation at the lower port.

’Sir, Manon and Matthias... they might be...’