Reincarnated in the game world ~ A gamer's beginning to [Dungeon job hunting recommendation]
Vol. 11 - Ch. 576 - What went beyond Rina’ Calculation & Fate of Machos!

While the situation turned more and more dicey for the 4th fortress, their allies weren't unaware of the situation. 

—Jumping on the time wheel to trace the movement of Class-51.

At the 2nd fortress, Rina was constantly observing «Dragon's Miniature Garden», and naturally, she took notice of the Class-1's attack. 

"Enemies are approaching from the south! «Guild Connect»! Please immediately bring Lamda-san on-line!"

Rina promptly invoked her skill and contacted her classmate who should be around Lamada, their main firepower. 

«Guild Connect» allows the user to contact their guild members, or party members, like telepathy. And in these matches, the Class-51 in itself was registered as party members for Rina. Since she couldn't bring Lamada to contact directly, she had one of their class members accompany him for any emergency relay. 

The skill usually needed to be higher skill to allow two-way communication, though Rina had already upgraded it to Lv10. 

"«This is the main force. Your voice is loud and clear.»"

"We have enemies, presumably Class-1, breaching the path via southwest. Their number is 16. Please inform him to prepare for a charge attack."

"«Copy that!»"

Swiftly, the classmate in-charge of communication had passed the details to Lamda as the main squad could be seen passing through the 3rd fortress and appear in the south, two squares of it. (Coordinate J-10)

The location was in blind spot from the direction of Class-1's base. Plus, the distance allowed them to promptly help out any nearby fortress that was under attack by Class-1. 

Using «Dragon's Miniature Garden» to capture enemie's movement, and then putting their own force for ambush—this was the general to-do Rina had done in the inter-class battles to arrive at the finale. 

In the meantime, Rina also contacted the commanders of each fortress and informed them of the possible Class-1's raid. 

She had guessed Zephyr would definitely launch a raid on the fortress once he found out about them. And needless to say, she was right. Albeit, the question was, what tactic would he use to target the fortress? 

The fortress was kind of failsafe for that situation. Since nothing was known about the opponent's strategy, the fortresses were the temporary obstacles to slow down their opponent. After all, there's no way even Zephyr's class could bring them down in such a short time, right? 

And beside that, she was also busy formulating another strategy, since she couldn't have enough measures against Class-1. They'd put so much effort for the same cause. 

This was also why they'd dwarves with «Construction» skill pre-assembled the parts required for fortress, and brought them over in the «Item Bag (small)»—they'd also used «Compact Arrangement» skill in tandem, allowing them to store the materials as much as possible—thus saving themselves from spending too much time on their creation on the spot. 

They'd also utilised the Item Bags of their alliance class for that use. Out of 30 Item Bags—each class was permissible to bring «Item Bag (small)»—22 were solely used to bring over fortress materials. The rest were used to store recovery items, traps etc.

It was a struggle, but they somehow managed to build up the fortress while the «Count» category students protected them. 

The fortress right now could endure Zephyr—or well, «Eden» members «Synchronised Onslaught» twice. Thus she had some assurity in her plan.

However everything converges on this point; how much advantage she could fish out in this one battle. 

So at an immediate notice, she conveyed the news of a possible raid to all the members of the alliance. Now, if they could push Class-1 back to shut themselves in their base, Rina's strategy would be a success. 

With «Dragon's Miniature Garden» was at verge of completion, and victory pieces at their place, all that was to see the situation unfold.

Rina was awaiting that moment, but what she heard completely dumbfounded her. 

"«R-report! We have sighted s-super long range attacks! And despite the range, they appear to be at full power, and are striking down the 4th fortress!» —Comment from Lamda-san. '4th Fortress wouldn't last long if this continues, so we should split out force and send the reinforcement!'"

The only thing «Dragon's Miniature Garden» could display was monsters, team members, guardian monsters, or buildings, while skills or spells were excluded. 

So, despite keeping track of the situation in the «Dragon's Miniature Garden», she could have never imagined Class-1's force stationed nearby southwest point weren't for further reinforcement to the raid. Plus, what they'd used was probably a super unconventional tactic available for advanced jobs, something that she had yet to learn about. 

She knew Zephyr was planning something, but with little to no knowledge, she couldn't draw out what it was. With the sudden turnaround, it appeared like their preparation might not even provide them the solace for a moment. 

The members of 4th fortress had already fallen in panic as she captured the changes from «Dragon's Miniature Garden». 

Either way, 4th fortress now needed their assistance, and that meant tackling Zephyr's force.

"Inform Lamda-san that his suggestion is accepted! Please defend the 4th fortress, and deal with the ranged attacks! Also, 4th fortress, do not engage with Zephyr's team in an all out attack! They're strong, so your first priority is to earn the time!"

Rina promptly made her decision, and allowed the split of their forces. 

Given the situation, Lamda was just the precise person to defend against the ranged attacks. With his skills, he should be able to tank the attacks. Though, there's no doubt this would put his HP into jeopardy, so Rina reminded him to absolutely bring a healer with himself. 

Following that, she directed the dwarves squad, they're in charge of construction, to move to 4th fortress from the backdoor. The fortress would definitely need repair in-between the confrontation to keep up with the situation.

◇◇◇

Back to the 4th fortress.

Alan unlinked their Muscle Union, and declared in a striking tone. 

"Haa! Between muscles and construction, it appears there's no second to muscles!!"

"H-how dare you!! Everyone, prepare for onslaught! Launch your magic, we need to hold down until help arrives!

Riyana propped back her fallen comrades. Rina had already informed the reinforcement was on their way, then they at least had to hold until then.

"Tsk, the muscles are really strong! «Mega Flare»!"

"Get away from the fort!  «Ice Spear»!"

"Grr, this is quite a heated reception huh! But, there's nothing that our muscles can't handle!! Haaa!!"

"The heck, he's punching the spells!?"

A befuddled shriek escaped from the dumbfounded magicians as they saw Machos literally smashing their spells. 

The spells were second order, so certainly, the reception was marginally hot, but they're by no means something meant to be received with punches. Or well, *normally*, no one would think of it. However Machos pulled that, and it actually worked too.

There was some damage, but that was promptly covered by continuous healing. 

The fear against the Machos rises up in their hearts. It was like they're facing the undead legion; seeing opponents against whom attacks weren't working as effectively as they should, perhaps it wasn't as much of an irrational thought.

Plus, Machos weren't the only danger they'd. The intermittent drop of those shining swords was another threat. 

The swirl of many elements eventually—well, not that it wasn't before, but at least it was somehow holding together—broke down the cooperation. It opened a gap in their defense which ended in the loss of four «Ballista», and one of their members being eliminated. 

Perhaps, there was no more saving them. Such bitter thoughts passed in Riyana's mind. 

Albeit, just before all hope was lost, she glimpsed the long-awaited light at the end of the tunnel.

"—At last, we're here, Riyana! The reinforcement shall now take command of the situation here! As for Class-1, another square is already on their way to confront them!"

"!! F-finally!!"

At the sudden voice, Riyana hurriedly leaned outward from the guardrail and let our an euphoric shout when she saw her beacon of hope; clad in full-bodied silver armor and carrying a huge giant on one hand, and a magnificent one-handed sword on other, Lamada had arrived at the scene with ten of their member in tow.

"Lamda!"

"Sorry for the delay! —Haa! «Saber Strike»!"

"Geh! Hmph!"

"—! Hmm, I gotta give you for the toughness!"

"You're not bad either! I'm surprised my muscles get pushed back!"

Arriving at the scene, Lamda immediately jumped in the battle, and delivered a strong attack toward Alan. 

It was a fourth order skill from «Caliburn Paladin», an high ranking mid-tier advanced job, and imbued with holy attribute, the force of the attack easily knockback'd Alan, while also dealing damage to the muscles. But since it was still a physical attack, the damage was barely comparable, which, too, was healed by the grace of continuous healing.

"Lamda! You're facing the guildmaster of «Machos», a «Brawny Warrior»! Physical attack wouldn't work as effectively, and he even have continuous healing support!"

"I know. But the first priority is to sweep them away from the premise first—«Judgment Sword Chain»!"

"Grrr!! What formidable power, you're quite an adversary!"

With dexterity too quick to be perceived by naked eyes, Lamda performed chains of sword strikes, and continued to push back Alan. «Judgement Sword Chain» was a holy attribute magic attack that shot out a series of arc shaped slashes. With the double whammy of being a magic attack, and longer reach, Alan could barely fight back.

"Damn you, muscles! Go down for me! «Curse Bind»!"

"We're your opponents! «Flare Burst»!"

"Rgh, another troop?!"

"The reinforcement is here! It's payback time, everyone!"

In mere moments, the reinforcement also joined the rest of the team, increasing the morale of 4th fortress at once. The gloomy clouds had been hanging under the onslaught of Machos finally parted away from the fortress side. Without wasting another moment, they continued to push back the other members of «Machos» too, and finally gained a thorough advantage for the first time. 

The situation had Alan grimacing.

"Well, this is truly a situation, no?!"

"I never knew you Machos are strong enough to take your eyes off of an opponent, eh! Got you, «Holy Slash»!"

"Aaarghh!"

The situation finally made the no skill disadvantage of «Brawny Warrior» apparent. Even a defensive skill would have helped them holding their ground, but there was no use crying over something non-existent. 

The confrontation between Alan and Lamda expanded, and to no one's surprise, Lamda was too much for Alan to handle. The wall of advanced jobs topped with magic attacks proved hard to conquer. 

However Machos didn't cave-in. In a situation where normal jobs would have long collapsed, «Brawny Warriors» continued to tightly hold their ground.

"That toughness isn't all. You're... healing too?"

"It appeared to be some sort of buff! They've had this for a long while, and it is still ongoing!"

Lamda realised there was more reason to why Machos managed to trouble the fortress, and expressed his doubt. Riyana immediately informed him from the top of the fortress.

"«Brawny Warriors» are tough, no doubt. But I was doubtful how they could raid a fortress by themselves. Sure enough, you have—"

"Right back at you, you've got the guts to focus on chatting with others while facing me, huh!"

"Hmph!"

Alan targeted the opening in Lamda's defense who was exchanging details with Riyana while swinging his sword. 

The fist was easily blocked by the huge shield, however this allowed Alan to distance himself. 

"Let's retreat, Alan-san. We're few against many. And Zephyr-sama had already assumed reinforcement would interrupt our charge. So we should act on as the plan says."

"Celestine..."

Celestine was supporting Machos from the background, and confirming the tide was turning against them, he instructed Alan for retreat. 

Alan nodded in affirmation and backstepped, distancing himself from Lamda while also giving his signal to others.

"Machos, gather!"

" " " "Yes, sir!!" " " "

Reflecting the intense training they'd been doing everyday, Machos's members showed an unbelievable fluidity in their action and gathered around Alan within a blink of an eye like perfectly mashing cogs.

They're planning to use the «Muscle Roller», however Lamda and his squad were one step faster, and showered them with their magic attack.

"Do not let them come together! Bring them down with magic!"

"Kuh, they're strong! The attack just now depleted half of my HP!?"

"My, my muscles are screaming in pain!"

With the onslaught of spells, the damage accumulated to the threshold continuous healing couldn't catch up to. But hellbent on not giving them any second chance, «Caliburn Paladin» dashed in Machos direction, his sword glowing in radiance.

"Good grief, «Brawny Warriors» was it? I admit, you're so comically strong. But, this is as far as you can go."

Lamda assertively declared, his entire body caught up in an amber glow. It was like an omen to the ultimate ability.

"Tsk, a serious blow huh!?"

"Sheesh, you could've used that as the first thing in a fight!"

Lamda faced the entirety of Machos as he pulled in the trigger on his strongest move, perhaps intending to wipe all of them out. Celestine was tackling the crowd and securing their path to retreat so he was out of the range. 

Confined in the amber cocoon of light, Lamda discarded the shield, and grabbed the sword with his two hands. The sword was as if it had noticed the resolve of his owner, and released the same, if not even beyond dazzling glow. 

"A reminder though, not that it matters, this is beyond your ability to defend. As strong you're, «Brawny Warrior» can never forsake the low RES stats, and lack of armaments. Furthermore, given your already chipped off HP, this one attack shall decide your fate"

"You dare say our muscles would lose?!"

"Unforgivable! Behold, we shall teach you the heights training can take you to!"

"Stop, we have a plan, you know!?"

Triggered by the provocation of Lamda, and feeling an attack on their muscles, two of the Machos lunged at Lamda, ignoring Alan's attempt to stop them. 

It was a foolish move, but in hindsight, it became the lifeline for Alan and others. What should have been the fatal attack for five instead was turned to the two respective impatient members.

The brilliance of Lamda's sword reached the zenith, and it appeared like the light in itself was forged into a sword. Slowly, but with a strong motion, Lamda swung it down. 

"Unique Skill «Excalibur»!!"

" "——" "

*BOOOOM*

The muscles, burning in enthusiasm to prove themselves, clashed against the torrent of light released by the sword.

The spectacle became that singularity in the entire battlefield that everyone unconsciously stopped in their motion, and gazed upon the spectacle. 

Soon, the torrent of light had stopped, however—the two machos were nowhere to be seen.