The group in the van heard Delsie's call through her communicator and managed to protect themselves in time.
But they couldn't completely shake off the flashbang's effects.
Though… That slight disorientation wouldn't be too hard for seasoned fighters like themselves to work around.
As the van's driver and passengers made their way out, Lorie, Ginny, and Blaine approached Rick and Delsie while Cecelia and Lyn stood behind.
Since Cecelia couldn't protect herself, Lyn took on that duty herself.
While Blaine was also tasked with being her bodyguard, given the current situation, his prowess was needed on the frontlines.
If any stragglers made it past their group of five, disposing of them before they hurt the princess would be Lyn's job.
Cecelia did have the option of sitting in the car for protection, but it was far easier for Lyn to protect her if she was by her side.
Furthermore, if everything failed and they needed to run away, it would be far easier for Lyn to grab Cecelia and run if she was nearby.
Gripping a pair of razor-sharp daggers resembling a beast's claws, Lyn stood in front of the princess, calmly watching the scene before her.
Cecelia, however, did not share the middle-aged woman's remarkable calmness.
Instead, she was hastily fiddling with a Power Scanner she had brought.
However, as she was planning to turn it on, she decided against it.
There were far too many targets to analyze, so it wouldn't help the combatants to simply know the strength of one or two creatures amongst the group of over eighty.
Thinking to herself that she needed to improve the device's design, she could only powerlessly pray that those risking their lives would survive unharmed.
Not long after Blaine and the two others reached the area where Delsie and Rick stood, the five of them dashed towards the disoriented cluster of chitin.
While the Rock Crabs wouldn't stay dazed for long, the experienced group of human combatants wouldn't simply give them the time to recover.
They planned to utilize this window of opportunity to the fullest extent to take down as many of their targets as possible.
As the two groups met, the humans instantly started working, utilizing their weapons and mana arts to rapidly kill as many as they could.
Rick brought his war hammer down on the exposed chitinous carapace, gruesomely shattering both the exoskeleton and the creature underneath.
Ginny was wielding a spear that was longer than her, boasting a sharp tip that could easily cut through stone. She precisely thrust her spear into the creature's foamy mouths and pierced through their brains, swiftly killing her targets in a single strike.
Delsie was choosing a similar approach to Ginny, using her rapier to thrust directly into the vitals of the Magical Creatures. However, her rapier seemed to crackle with lightning, which caused the creatures she killed to violently twitch as the current passed through their bodies.
On the other hand, Lorie wielded a curved saber that she used to cut in between the gaps of the red chitin, cleanly cutting through the flesh and tendons of the Rock Crabs close to her. However, she seemed to unnaturally speed up during her attacks, turning her arms into a blur as they whizzed through the air.
Blaine was using a two-handed longsword similar to Lorie's, somehow managing to match the killing efficiency of his 2-Star companions despite being a full rank below them.
A big reason for this was his weapon.
While the Captains all possessed weapons made from the bodies of Rank-2 monsters, his sword was different.
His weapon was actually fastened from the corpse of a Rank-3 Giant!
This sword was entrusted to Blaine by his father when he passed the qualification test to enter the ranks of the Royal Guards after the latter had personally killed the magical creature used to make it.
As he channelled his mana from his core into the weapon, he felt himself grow slightly weak as the seemingly unassuming longsword slowly lit up with white light.
Blaine felt his partner's weapon ravenously consume the torrent of mana he flooded it with, like a parched man in a desert.
After being enhanced by the white light, his sword could even cleanly cut through the chitinous shell of the crab-like creatures.
Through their swift reaction, the group of five managed to dispatch the fifteen closest Rock Crabs before the others began to shake off their momentary confusion.
Now, the real battle was going to start.
As the first Rock Crab managed to reorient itself, it let out a series of angry clicking noises before it lunged at the nearest human, which so happened to be Ginny.
Lifting her spear to block a claw that came down, Ginny grimaced as she was sent flying back a few steps.
"Rick!"
Realizing what she wanted without asking for it, Rick lifted his war blood-and-guts-covered hammer and slung it over his back.
Even though the creatures had blue-coloured blood, it was still quite a stomach-churning sight.
Inhaling deeply, he shouted: "I'm on it! Everyone get back!"
Without turning around and revealing his back to the army of chitin, he quickly took a few steps back, putting some space between them.
The others around him did the same, and just as they did, the ground began to move under them as waves of earth rippled into large columns of earth that worked to narrow the circumference of a short expanse of the tunnel in front of them.
If the tunnel could be likened to an artery, Rick's actions were like filling a part of that artery with a plaque buildup, reducing the amount of blood that could flow through.
However, in this situation, instead of red blood cells, he was blocking red chitinous crabs.
With the tunnel's width being shortened, the group wouldn't need to fight against too many of the Magical Creatures at the same time.
The ones in front would act as a natural barrier, blocking the ones behind from approaching.
Watching this unfold from behind, Cecelia couldn't help but think that bringing the earth-rending Captain with them into the underground tunnel was one of the best decisions for the mission.