Ch. 14: War

"Kinda figured it'd come to this. Let's get serious." I walked right out of the cathedral the same way I came, through the hole in the wall and down a few hundred feet.

My landing ripped the stone plaza outside to shreds, but my body absorbed the entire shock with no visible effort. For show, I raised a hand into the sky before activating my first spell.

Instantly, the sky went black, plunging the entire city into darkness, before a single light blasted the very darkness away in the form of a huge lightning bolt that engulfed the entire cathedral, transforming the entire gorgeous, gigantic tower into a hole so deep that the bottom couldn't be seen.

"Now. [Summon Weak Enemy]."

[Summon Weak Enemy] at max level summoned something from another world within certain parameters. These parameters gave the monster fairly weak skills, and average stats of half whatever amount of MP you put into it.

I also had [Summon Strong] from both [Ally], and [Hero] skill lines, but you couldn't summon something that didn't exist, so none of my [Summon Strong] skills technically worked correctly.

I once used [Summon Strong Ally] with all my MP, and it gave me a tiny insect god, with the [My Universe] skill, which was a localized skill of similar magnitude to [Omnipotence].

Unfortunately, he was totally powerless here, and spent a few hours screaming at me about my 'impertinence' before I created a [Return to Home World] skill and used it on him to send him back.

This time, I used about 150,000 MP to summon something with slightly higher stats than Ravana, but vastly inferior skills, so that nothing but Ravana and I'd be able to kill it.

"WHO DARES SUMMON-"

"Nope." The difference between [Summon Enemy] and [Summon Ally] was in the fact that an [Enemy] summon would immediately attack their summoner and hunt them to the ends of the planet to kill them if they were able. An [Ally] summon would generally be pretty grateful that they were taken from whatever situation they were in.

Like with that insect god, there were a few exceptions, but this was clearly not the case.

The dude was a huge puff of red smoke billowing over the entire city, so I used my power to forcibly slam him into a single form, kneeling at my feet. Despite his incredible strength that had probably subjugated most of his home planet, he trembled, feeling the vast gulf in power between us.

"What do you wish, my lord?" He caught on fast, but I knew he still wanted to kill me.

"Sense anything unusual here?" I asked him.

Obediently, he looked around with his meager skills. It clearly wasn't enough, "You can release some of your body to assist you." I allowed.

"The people here… Their souls are strange." More specifically, every single human body in the city was basically an empty shell. There were fragments of the original soul inside the body, leftovers to allow Kid to control them easier, but you'd definitely get more autonomy from a video game character than you would from these people.

He was basically just playing house with thousands of families at once, and every time they'd have a baby, they'd suck the soul out of it before it even left the womb.

Saying I wouldn't allow them to live anymore would be a misnomer, but I was going to slaughter every single one of them.

Of course, I wanted Kid to struggle to keep up his game for as long as possible, so I didn't kill them myself.

"Find every single person on the planet with this affliction, and slaughter them one by one if necessary." Eventually, I'd search the entire planet for bodies that Kid's killed the soul before taking over, but I wasn't gonna kill each one myself, because that'd just make him give up on that game.

I'd just give them to my new subordinate, who was likely just as immortal as Ravana and me (I had created the [Immortality] skill as soon as I was able. I could get around [Immortality] with my skills, but I would never age or die naturally anymore.)

As soon as he was done, I'd send him home (Likely not to the benefit of anyone but him, but that wasn't my problem to interfere with).

"Allow me to start immediately?" He asked. I nodded, and he transformed back into smoke.

"I Am the Demon Lord Iridonias! Hear my name and DIE!" Didn't we already have a demon lord in this world? Oh well, this guy was probably way stronger anyways. Sorry, current demon lord.

"Remember, Irri. Only kill the people being controlled. You're too strong to need to bother killing small fry that don't have to do with your mission." I reminded him. I'd keep an eye on him.

"Understood, lord."

"I'll be watching. See you." I spent the rest of the day looking at things with [Lingering Perception] while I took my time filling in the space around what used to be Uriah with it… At least, most of the rest of the day.

...

"What do you know about the dragon parts?" Parker was in a bar in the capitol city of Perseus, using light magic to disguise her form.

"Dragon parts? You ain't from around these parts."

"What makes you say that?"

"Nobody from around these parts' gonna know too much about Lord Arc." The guy Parker was talking to took a huge swig from his drink.

"So the one killing dragons is a noble?"

"Lord Arc ain't no noble!" The guy on the other side of Parker yelled, drunk as a skunk, "Lord Arc's some sorta god, I tell ya!"

"He's just an elite adventurer. Lord Arc's no god." The first guy argued.

"Have you ever met Lord Arc? I'm telling ya, he's in a league so far above that Hero that Amale's got. I've seen both with my own eyes, and there's no contest. It's some sort of aura he's got."

"You think he's really strong as a god?" Parker asked. She already knew that this guy was probably stronger than her, but having it confirmed like that was still a big hit to her pride.

"Strong as one, sure, but Lord Arc's flesh and blood, just like you and me. Heard him telling the king himself."

"Heard from an innkeep I know. Terribly cheap inn. He checked in, entered the room, and disappeared. Did it every night for five days straight before switching inns. Said the only thing that needed cleaning was the dust on the floor."

The barkeep stepped in, having heard the conversation, "I heard from this one guy about a month ago, encountered a pack of wyverns during a job in the mountains. Lord Arc came out of nowhere, warned the wyverns, then instantly obliterated five when they didn't back off. By the time the guy picked his jaw up enough to thank him, dude was gone without a trace."

"You mean [Teleportation]?" [Spatial Magic] was incredibly powerful. Unless you had a resistance to it, use of it would instantly destroy anything in its path.

[Spatial Magic] users were incredibly rare, and known for their nomadic lifestyles. They rarely followed rules, because they were incredibly difficult to catch if they didn't want to be caught. [Spatial Magic] could be sealed with certain magic tools, though. There were certain materials that also affected [Spatial Magic].

"He's definitely got [Spatial Magic], but he's nothing like the spatial mages I've heard about. Lord Arc's just on another level."

"Thanks for the information. This Lord Arc sounds like an interesting guy." A spatial mage just might be able to take out a dragon, so long as the dragon doesn't have the [Spatial Resistance] skill.

Parker decided that this Arc guy probably had [Spatial Magic] and some sort of [Examine] skill. He wasn't too strong, he was just on a different paradigm than the rest of the world.

Parker herself had [Spatial Resistance], so she could probably take him down with a little preparation, but keeping him in Amale would be impossible.

Luckily for her, her orders were just to bring him to Amale, so it'd just be a temporary difficulty for him. He didn't have any need to stay in Amale after she brought him there.

"Why're you asking about me?" A voice came out of an alley as Parker passed it by. She stopped. Something about that voice made her blood freeze.

"You're Arc, right?" She didn't turn around, but she could feel his presence with her [Perception] skill. He felt like a veritable monster.

"Didn't answer my question, Parker. What does Amale's dog want with me?" There was an implication behind that, but Parker didn't quite understand what it was.

The air temperature seemed to drop for a moment upon the words 'Amale's dog', but it was so fleeting that Parker was almost convinced that she had imagined it.

"Amale needs strong fighters. The queen is willing to pay you to join her faction."

"Just as obedient as ever, I see. Looks like a trip back to Amale's in order." He said it in a casual tone, but the words somehow sent shivers down Parker's spine.