Chapter 37: Last Stand

The first to notice Yanael's addition to the brawl was Violina. Since her Ice Spirit wasn't as strong upfront or as durable as Anerias' Hound, so she was in charge of dealing with the debris and broken branches coming their way. That meant she had to keep a wide perspective and watch the entire battlefield and not just the ape.

However, Yanael was far away, and Violina frowned at first since she couldn't tell what it was. But when two translucent wings unfolded and a bright halo appeared, Violina's eyes lit up.

She glanced around at her classmates. She grit her teeth.

"Split up! Half to the right! Other half to the left! Provide cover and irritate the bastard!" Violina's shout reached all the ears of her fellow students. Some listened, even if only to the part where she wanted them to split up.

Others stopped and turned to Violina with confused expression.

"Wha—" Someone tried to question her order.

"Shut up and listen if you don't want to die!" Violina barked at the person, scaring them into obedience.

Anerias wasn't sure what was going on, but he didn't have the room to hesitate. He knew better than anyone that they were only delaying the inevitable.

"Listen to Violina!" Anerias' support of Violina's orders caused the few remaining doubters to begrudgingly follow suit.

Anerias led one half of the class to the oversized ape's left, and Violina led the other half to the ape's right.

As quickly as they could, they set up a simple barricade with the defensive skills they had before starting to use whatever offense they had to attack the ape.

Most of the students were still confused since even if they put up their defenses, all the ape needed to do was sweep its arm or stomp its foot to wreck them. And their attacks were barely enough to trim its fur. The only ones doing damage beyond a much-needed haircut were Anerias and Violina.

But even those two and their familiars weren't leaving behind wounds that could ever take down the ape, even if it stood still and let them hit it without retaliating.

However, as the seconds passed, the students gradually realized that the bronze-toothed ape wasn't attacking them. It was attacking itself—No, it was swatting a figure that looked like a fly in comparison to the ape as it flew up the ape's body.

Even with her wings, Yanael technically wasn't flying. She took great strides and propelled herself upward with great speed. It looked like she was ascending.

Long after she had passed by the ape's shin, thigh, waist, mid-section, and chest, blood spurted out of long gashes across its body, both vertical and horizontal.

Yanael, as a proficient maid, excelled at multitasking. Climbing the ape and attacking at the same time wasn't a big deal for her. She wasn't even troubled by the stray attacks from the students that occasionally came a little too close to her.

The students were new to combat as a whole, considering they had their first real experience less than two weeks ago. They were tired, the ape was far away, and the ape was moving like surrounded by wasps. The students were having a hard enough time as it was getting their attacks to reach and hit the ape.

It was too much to ask of them to have any accuracy, regardless of whether they used their skills or familiars to attack.

Yanael didn't blame them. After all, more of the students' attacks were helpful than not.

She would have been fine even without any help or cover. But the attacks disoriented the ape and made it impossible for it to keep track of Yanael as she raced over and around its body, making great strokes with her sword, peeling the ape's skin.

After only a few minutes, Yanael had turned the previously fearsome great ape into a horrifying, blood-drenched monster with flaps of its skin hanging from its muscles and skeleton.

The ape had lost a lot of blood and strength, and its arms didn't move as often or with as much vigor as before.

The bronze-toothed ape stumbled and sank to a knee. It slammed a fist into the ground due to its fall and tried to hold itself up. But once it started falling, it was already too late to stop.

With a loud thud and blast of air, the giant ape crashed into the ground and shook it enough to make several students fall. It made a deep indentation in the ground with its body, regardless of whether there were trees or stumps in the way.

To secure the kill, Yanael raised her sword before plunging it into the base of the ape's skull, much like she had done to the fighter in the Underworld Locale. It was an effective method to kill large beings after bringing them to the ground.

Yanael let out a deep breath and sheathed her sword by transforming it into the bracelet again. She looked down.

"Tch."

She had gotten blood on her dress.

After barely being able to get it clean after they left the mountain, it was dirty again. It was at least fortunate the blood didn't soak in and stain the mysterious material of the dress, and she just needed to wash it.

But it was a disgrace for a maid to be dirty on the job, even if they were a battle maid. A proper battle maid could maintain perfect grace, elegance, and poise even in the midst of blood-boiling battle.

"Thank you, Miss Maid!" Violina called out cheerfully with a raised hand as she approached the fallen ape.

Yanael looked at Violina and nodded once before jumping down from the warm corpse and lining up behind Zach's shoulder.

Violina's gaze grew frosty as she looked at Zach with narrow eyes. Anerias glared at Zach, angry at how he up and left the class. Twice. But still thankful for the help Yanael had given them.

It was just that it was easy to separate Zach's betrayal and Yanael's help since they were clearly separate beings. Yanael was a beautiful woman, who, while she tried to have a composed demeanor, often showed expressions. And since she was so like a human, it was easier to read her expressions than it was to understand others' familiars.

Rather than thinking of her as another classmate's familiar, it was easy to think of her as Zach's maid.

As such, it was easy to think of Zach's rude behavior as Zach's rude behavior and of Yanael's help as Yanael's help, even if he ordered it.

"Hey, guys! Fancy meeting you here." Zach smiled and greeted his classmates, those who could get up and meet him at least. There was still a pile where they had made their last stand who were too injured or tired to confront Zach. Sёarch* The Nôvelƒire.net website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

"Sure. So, what made you come crawling back this time?" Anerias scowled.

"Funny story, actually." Zach scratched the back of his head. "I wasn't planning on leaving this time. I was just going to take a fat…"