Visitors Arrive

"Mhmm… You're the third person to ask me," Elizabeth sighed, before loudly announcing, "Anyone who's met the requirements to form their Magic Connection or breakthrough to the Pawn Stage can do so without asking for permission." It was around half-past two in the afternoon of the fourth day and several of her apprentice Mages had been pestering her about the issue conflicting with their meditation regimens.

On one hand, she felt accomplished seeing so many talented students of hers outpace her when it came to cultivation; objectively they were faster than her when she was in the Mortal Stage. However, it was also a source of indignation seeing so many "freeloaders" get such special treatment when she had to suffer and work for her resources and chances. With Pills from Sun, Formations from Jane along with her own personal insights on cultivating extreme path cultivation bases, it almost felt like they were being gifted their power.

Still, she sighed, 'There's no use in bothering to compare between us… I'm too abnormal to be compared with.' With a look of acceptance and a quick shout, Elizabeth left her beach resort-masked training boot camp, to fly around Japan and help clear out any dense areas of Vymling Devils.

Since they had spawned, she had taken it upon herself to endure the "hardship" of harvesting the clusters of free death energies that spawned as a result of the Second Stage of the Cataclysm. Throughout the night she spent the hours when her apprentices had their free-time on clearing out Devils, and during the day, she would leave whenever things seemed stable and a period of training had recently begun. By now, hundreds of thousands of Opal Vymlings had perished by her hands, most of which were destroyed by the pull of her triggers; she'd begun repeatedly experimenting with her new Bullet Hell Codex Skill.

By Elizabeth's own admission, the Bullet Hell Codex was much more perverse than she had originally taken it to be. Now using it for what it was best at — crowd controlling tactics — she finally understood how absurd just the first two skills in the method of gunfire were. Target Homing had never been a skill she could truly understand until it was cast in an area of several hundred enemies as only when she attempted the skill against a horde of Level 1 Devils was its potency revealed.

Imagine a small army of invaders running around in several directions arbitrarily. Even if Elizabeth overwhelmingly outpowered and outsped all of them it would still take a couple of seconds to dispatch the threat by hand. However, by casting a grand scale incantation of Target Homing and pulling the trigger just nine, maybe ten, times, the entire army was taken care of; it wouldn't even take a second… Now let it sink in that she had recently gotten herself the Skill, Energy Bullet. She had infinite ammo and no need to reload, considering the vast difference in strength between them!

It was almost a religious experience, taking cover within your house or any other building and having your nerves taut to the limit by the impending threat that was a horde of Devils waiting outside, only for a flying goddess-like young girl to appear from the sky, issue out a couple loud bangs and flashes of lights, and seeing the threat to you and your family's lives end without contest.

In Japan alone, there was no telling how many people came to see Elizabeth's appearance as that of a real Saint; not that Stage in cultivation. Only she and a couple other high ranking Spirit Realm experts were so mystical in their method of managing the apocalypse, yet none were as graceful as the only King Mage on the planet.

Thus, time passed with more and more areas cleared and Elizabeth becoming increasingly full of death energies. Those areas that were cleared were like her beachfront resort, in that more Devils would spawn from small rifts ever once in a while, but they could be easily managed by the others at a later time. The true threat was the initial invasion, where rifts all over the world were seen at their prime. Truth be told, the largest tear Elizabeth saw first hand — the one that spanned between one to two kilometers in length — couldn't even be considered that big compared to other recorded incidents across the world.

Luckily, however, the largest recorded rift had spawned in Tokyo, where Kurt was still stationed. Though that monstrous 89 square kilometer large tear brought with it an estimated 57 million invaders, Kurt's standing as the strongest expert on Earth was brought to the forefront. Even now, as Elizabeth flew around and swiftly exterminated areas congested with Vymling Devils, she couldn't help but shudder at the thought of her father's strength.

In the video captured by a lucky bystander, who probably would have been killed had Kurt not been there when the Second Stage of the Cataclysm descended, Elizabeth clearly recognized Kurt using Temporal Pulse from the Forsaken Continuum Baptism that he had gifted her. His mastery of the technique was leagues ahead of her, in not only the thickness of his Pulse, but also the potency. Evident by the sight of the several-dozen-large army of Devils almost completely coming to a halt mid-air upon coming into contact with his Temporal Pulse, Kurt then used a series of Fire and Lightning Qi attacks, each more devastating than the last; more frightening was the fact that Elizabeth felt his first offensive move trumped her Cold Flames.

…

Eventually, Elizabeth came back from her slaughter-fest to check up on her class as time was fast approaching eight o'clock, but when she returned to her beach resort, she was in for a mild surprise.

"Mhmm… Amy? What are you doing here?" With a brow raised and a slight smile on her face, Elizabeth once more met with the little girl she had healed as her chosen for the Final Stage of the Medicinal Event of the Wushi Tournament.

Instead of hearing a verbal response, she was tackled by the waist as the five-year-old's inclination was to first hug her benefactor. "Big Sister Elizabeth!" was all Amy said before crashing onto Elizabeth's body. After squeezing Elizabeth with wanton abandon, she continued saying, "We finally found you!"

Elizabeth raised her head from eyeing the child that stuck to her like glue to said child's companion and presumed guardian. Taking note of the woman before her, Elizabeth noticed she and Amy looked similar; probably relatives. Both having curly brown hair and freckles and brown eyes, if she wasn't her mother, she was probably a cousin. "You are?" She asked.

"Emma Dewington, her… sister," she almost seemed bummed out by the fact that they were siblings. "Anyway," she continued, "We've been looking for you for quite some time. Amy over there's just glad to come visit you, while I've come with a gift from my family. You know… as a sign of goodwill for resolving her problem."

Emma then produced and handed over a couple of stacks of talismans; there had to be at least a couple hundred in total. "Thanks," Elizabeth took the talismans without much thought and place them in her spatial ring's storage before continuing, "Say, why don't you come and have some snacks." While it was against her nature to act so chummily with a stranger, it was even worse to not reciprocate goodwill; especially to the relative of one of her acquaintances.

Smiling and nodding at her invitation, Emma made Amy separate from Elizabeth, before the two followed her from the entrance of the beach resort to the lounge, where most of the apprentice Mages were still meditating; their training time for the day had already expired.

After accepting a cup of tea from Elizabeth, Emma said, "Actually, I came here for one more reason." Having successfully garnered Elizabeth's attention, she continued, "Our folks over at the Cerulean Guild have heard talks of people not being… 'welcoming' to the advent of Mages. I think it's safe to say you've scared the world itself with the result of the Wushi Tournament and many Martial Practitioners are reproachful."

Taking a sip of her tea, Emma's face turned solemn as she said, "I want you to be prepared to face the scrutiny and mistreatment of such Martial Practitioners. There are probably already several groups gearing up to challenge you or your students…"

"Heh, I wish they would test me," Elizabeth smirked, clearly unphased by the prospect of a challenge. "They'd be digging their own graves and donating their wallets," she said with derision so blatant it was suffocating the room.

Seeing her unshakable confidence, Emma dropped the subject; feeling satisfied with getting her message across. She felt less and less worried as she continued conversing with Elizabeth; the topic at hand being her apprentices. Witnessing first-hand the outrageous progress of the group before her, after finding out they've only been practitioner Mages for less than a week, she had to admit that Elizabeth had a reason for being so confident.

Elizabeth's visitors stuck around for a short while longer, imparting a spark of competitiveness within her. Knowing that people were going to antagonize her without prompt again — the first time being in the Shadow Realm — Elizabeth left to clear away hordes of Opal Vymlings after her guests left, in an even more brutal and efficient way than before.

No longer even deigning to use her guns after realizing that her solidification of space alone could crush Level 1 Vymlings to meat paste, Elizabeth left behind horrifying patches of flattened corpses as she flew around Japan. As the Vymlings that spawned almost always came in groups, her devastating crushing attacks would create giant pancakes of ground together meat; with blood pooling, bones crushed, and organs mixed. Even scarier for the people out of the know, were the craters left behind by her attacks; craters which always held what was left of the Devils.

By sunrise, Elizabeth had killed so much, she was on the brink of entering a high from all the death energies that her Mark of the Godslayer had absorbed. However, before that high could manifest, a Quest prompt quickly sobered her up to the terrifying reality of what she had done.

[Cataclysm Chain Quest 1: Vymling Slayer

Difficulty: D*

Objective 1) Kill 100,000 Vymlings (✔)

Objective 2) Kill 500,000 Vymlings, ???

Description: Kill, Kill, Kill your way to victory! By the way the (*) that's next to this Quest's D* rating is due to the fact that theoretically Pawn Stage practitioners are able to complete this mission as Vymlings can only spawn up to level 10~

Deadline: Expires in conjunction with Cataclysm Quest 1]