All My Summons Become Divine Girls

Chapter 301: The Commander’s Limit

Dreth pushed his fingers beneath the opened core plate, driving ash through every cord stretched across the command ridge.

Ninety-five Flint soldiers jerked backward as the cords tightened under their armor, pulling mana from their cores toward his central socket. Several clawed at the fitted lines, finding nothing their hands could reach.

"Commander, release the reserve," Corven said, shifting the circulation bank farther north while its outer frame shook, "their cores will fail before the transfer settles."

"They were given power to hold my ground," Dreth replied, crushing his palm against the exposed core, "I am taking back what they failed to use."

The first company dropped together, filling Divine Eye with collapsing pathways before Hajin could cross the broken siege screen. Thirty-four cores emptied at once, sending their final mana beneath the ridge as the bodies stopped moving.

Sixty-one soldiers survived the first draw, but their circulation kept folding around the cords still buried inside them.

[ Zone reserve consumed: 95 combatants ]

[ Immediate deaths: 34 ]

[ Core failure: 61 ]

Hajin drove the Chain between two empty elite sockets, cutting through the last ground panel protecting Dreth’s chest.

"Nineteen treatment windows are closing," she said, marking bodies scattered beside the northern sockets, "the other forty-two have already passed what you can stabilize here."

Nineteen marked pathways narrowed before him while Dreth stood exposed inside the open strike line.

Hajin turned his wrist away from Dreth, sending the weapon beneath the nineteen soldiers instead.

Aegis followed its links across the ridge, breaking their fitted sockets apart before lifting every marked body from the ash. Dreth’s exposed chest disappeared behind a new ground panel as soon as the Chain abandoned that route.

"You had the opening," Dreth said, sealing the panel through his spear while stolen mana entered his core, "those bodies cannot repay what you just lost."

"They are not paying me," Hajin replied, spreading his left hand across the barrier, "that seems to be the part you never understood."

Three blades rose from the Zone beneath his exposed side while one Ring remained committed to the rescue. Hajin caught two against the rotating halos, but the third entered beside the wound Vella had stabilized.

The blade tore through his coat before a Chain link stopped it, reopening flesh around the same damaged pathways.

Assimilation answered through Vella’s Spirit Ring as Hajin pulled her touch-range gold into his left palm. The connection carried her power without restoring the violet reserve she had spent behind the line.

He pushed that healing into Aegis, turning the barrier beneath the nineteen soldiers into a direct treatment medium. Gold entered each failing pathway in measured portions, stopping the collapse without repairing any emptied core.

[ Emergency stabilization through Assimilation ]

[ Hostile soldiers stabilized: 19 ]

[ Combat condition: unable to continue ]

The other forty-two remained beyond his present reach, leaving all sixty-one unable to stand while their sockets fed Dreth.

Farther along the ridge, Flint soldiers watched ash leave men wearing their own unit paint. A captain near the third standard caught his cord with both hands, sawing it against the edge of his sword.

"Release the reserve companies," he said, pulling until blood covered his grip, "we cannot defend your Zone while it is eating us."

"Your position remains assigned," Dreth ordered, turning his spear toward the third standard, "cut that cord again and I will open it myself."

The captain stopped pulling, but he did not raise his weapon when Hans’s militia moved beyond the broken screen. Two nearby standards lowered with his, spreading the hesitation across companies Dreth had not drained yet.

Corven moved the bank away from them, keeping seven Shards on the command route while ignoring every fallen soldier.

The Zone answered the hesitation by opening another fitted section beneath Hans’s forward shields.

Mila changed the route flag before the first spike rose, sending the shield row toward Mara’s withdrawal lane. A second line followed beneath them, adjusting through the ground after Dreth read the movement.

Tovan took the rear handle of the final treatment frame, shoving it past the white stake before the spike reached them. The point entered his back during the push, killing him while seven defenders fell beneath separate ash cuts.

Mara’s crews loaded every living casualty as the section closed, forcing Hajin to widen Aegis before it trapped them.

The divided barrier forced all three Rings to accelerate around his right forearm, tearing mana through the injured pathways.

"Our frames crossed the stake," Hans said, holding his remaining shields beyond the Zone section, "drop the rear barrier before it takes your arm."

"Move them past the next sockets first," Hajin replied, keeping Aegis over Mara’s crews, "Dreth can still follow your route underneath it."

Hans gave one signal with his board, sending Mila plus the remaining shield row farther back. Mara dragged Tovan’s marked frame beside the seven living patients, preserving his name inside the same withdrawal column.

{Sixth campaign update: Tovan deceased / 7 new serious injuries.}

[ Sixth campaign ledger: 31 deceased / 109 serious injuries ]

Hajin released the rear barrier after the final frame cleared Dreth’s reach, but the nineteen Flint victims still needed support. Their gold panels stayed beneath them while ash pressed upward from the sockets they had escaped.

Three ground sections closed the approach to Dreth, while the rescue cost Hajin position plus enough reserve to slow every Ring.

[ Hajin mana reserve: critical decline ]

[ Mana pathways: injured ]

Dreth stood straighter inside the rebuilt command socket, though ash leaked around the fingers covering his burned core. His Zone had recovered its shape, but the soldiers behind it kept their standards lowered.

"Look at what your mercy purchased," Dreth said, pointing his spear toward the barriers, "you spent your strength and changed nothing."

"Thirty-four of your soldiers are dead," Hajin replied, drawing the Chain across the treatment line, "nineteen you discarded are still breathing, so count again."

The nearest Flint company stepped away from Hans’s militia instead of advancing under Dreth’s next order. Nobody threw down a weapon yet, but the forward line stopped pretending its commander meant to bring them home.

Aria opened the campaign ledger across Hajin’s sight, separating Dreth’s self-inflicted deaths from every valid reward already earned during the counteroffensive.

[ Legitimate rewards, Chapters 295-300: 670,000 EXP ]

[ Dreth’s self-inflicted casualties: 0 EXP ]

[ Hajin Ring Progress: 24,380,000 / 25,000,000 EXP ]

[ Active Flint siege force: 705 ]

The same three halos remained around Hajin’s right forearm, giving him nothing new for people his enemy had killed. Dreth answered by pushing more stolen power into the fitted panels between them.

Corven looked past those panels toward the nineteen soldiers resting upon Hajin’s Aegis. Their survival had become the reason nearby companies refused to move, making the exposed treatment line more valuable than another attack on Hajin.

"The reserve is watching them breathe," Corven said, turning the circulation bank toward the wounded, "remove the reason they think refusal protects them."

Seven-Shard mana entered the bank’s outer frame, opening a mobile attack branch through the Zone before Hajin could recover his position.

"Corven will reach the treatment panels first," Aria warned, marking the deputy’s route across his sight, "your current strike can still reach Dreth instead."

Hajin pulled the Chain away from the commander without waiting for the route to finish forming, placing its dark-gold edge between Corven and the wounded.