Ank

News travel fast, apparently.

It hadn’t been a full day since my twin sister and I ended the entire cult of the [Emerald Goddess], and there were already multiple lines of people trying to run away from the country that extended for kilometers, most of them going to the capital; all the ships in the city were departing, quickly, and the price to board in was skyrocketing.

And that was just the beginning. I doubted that it would take more than a week for the neighboring [Gods] to advance into that territory, slashing everyone, and burning everything.

“Do you regret anything?”, Hunah asked, as we stared at a long and hurried caravan of despaired people traveling to the capital.

“No”, I replied immediately. Looking sideways at Hunah, noticing how she frowned just slightly; just enough that only her twin brother who shared the same permanently disinterested face would know it was there; I added, patting her head: “It’s not our fault that [Gods] are evil, sister. If we hadn’t done anything, the whore would keep killing people forever, probably even more than will die in this chaos.”

My twin sister smiled, pressing her head further against my hand.

The moment didn’t last long, however, as a crying child stumbled out of the jungle beside the road which the caravan was taking. She was alone and covered in scratches.

I frowned, and, with Hunah, approached the kid.

“Hey~ don’t cry, don’t cry”, Hunah crouched before the little girl, patting the kid not differently from how I was patting her a second ago. “What’s your name?”

“M- Mia”, the little girl replied cleaning her face on her sleeves.

“Mia, where are your parents?”

“M- My parents… BUAAAH!”, the kid started to cry again, this time even louder. Between sobs, however, the little girl explained: “Mom and dad! They stood behind! They’re still in the village, the bad monster will hurt them!”

“Where’s your village?”, I asked, and go the little girl attention. “Big sister here, and I, are adventurers, we can deal with this evil monster if you tell us where’s your village.”

“T- That way.”

The little girl didn’t look starved nor in a really bad shape, apart from all the dirt and small scratches caused by low branches, so, as expected, her village wasn’t located too far way; Hunah and I got to it in just about half an hour with our superior [Attributes].

I wished we had shown up sooner.

The first thing we saw were the body piles. Just outside the village itself, about fifty corpses had been pilled up; clearly the oldest, and the youngest inhabitants of the place, their faces frozen in terror and pain, their bodies mutilated.

Frowning, tightening my hands into fists, alone, I bypassed the clouds of flies that infested the immediate surroundings of the body pile, stepping into the dirt street turned muddy from all the spilled blood; hundreds of the insects died from the gushes of enraged aura that leaked even between my grasp. Even if I was hiding my [Level] (so Hunah and I would not get identified as those who ended that kingdom, what could put the people against us) it wasn’t like my true strength was suppressed at all.

Speaking of aura, I could very well feel the energy coming from the culprits of that massacre, just ahead, after the few one hundred or so empty houses that made up the village, the arrogant stench emanating from the square at the center of the settlement.

I heard them before I could see their faces:

“…Are you sure?”

“Yeah, man, of course! There are hundreds of thousands of people in this country, they wouldn’t notice if we snatched a few hundred, or even a few thousands for us!”

“Well, if you put things that way, sacrifice everyone in this village for ourselves makes more sense. But, dude, we can’t just show up to the new boss, whoever they end up being, without sacrifices for them.”

“Well, yeah, but we are the closest [Gods] to the capital city, and every mortal must be heading that way, to the ports, right now: we kill everyone here, take the city, snatch a few sacrifices for ourselves, and keep hoarding mortals until the first Intermediate [God] shows up, and then we give them as offerings!”

“Hmm! You sound more convincing by the minute! …But I’m not the one you should be trying to argue with, you know i-”

“I will give you one chance to kill yourselves. Else, I will make sure you suffer”, I promised, as I stepped into the square, face inexpressive.

And the two [Zemis], already covered in masses of thorns that took a vaguely humanoid shape, looked at each other. Before bursting into laughs, and even rolling on their backs on the ground, even slapping the dirt and holding onto their bellies, so much they found the situation funny.

“L- Look at the mortal! I told you, man, the Intermediate [Gods] wouldn’t even find it weird if a few thousands were missing: these mortals are so stupid they just walk into danger!”, the first [Zemi] said.

“Well, well, you’re right, you finally convinced me; we should talk with little boss, convince him to take over the capital. But, you know what? I’ll give you the honor: sacrifice this mortal to yourself first”, the second [Zemi] said, and gesticulated towards me.

As the first lower [God] started to move towards me, I sighed.

Then I quickly conjured me an armor, jumped straight against the chest of the humanoid mass of thorns, breaking through the structure with ease, and grabbed the small wooden-man in the center by the neck. I didn’t even need to use my secret, neither my unique [Spell], just my immensely superior [Attributes] being enough to deal with the small fry.

“I made you a question”, I said, as I pulled the first and trembling scared [Zemi] off the chest of its magical construction. “Answer me.”

“D- Don’t fuck with us, mortal!”, the second [Zemi] attacked, throwing its massive fist against me.

I answered by using the body of the [God] I had in my hands to swap away the other deity’s attack, destroying a huge chunk of the last remaining magical construct of thorns, and making the wooden man I used as a “meat” shield scream, as its [HP] was greatly reduced, and its body cracked, and its skin chipped away in many places.

Then I threw the [God] I had in hands against the chest of the second magical construct, and the “projectile” came off the other side of the vaguely humanoid form, bringing the second [Zemi] with itself.

Before the two little wooden-men could get up, I was already beside them, looking down at their figures.

“W- Wait, we will do anything! J- Just don’t kill us, please!”, the first [Zemi] got on its knees and begged.

“Y- You’re a [High Priest] of some Intermediate [God], right? So- Sorry, we’re so sorry for not recognizing you! Look, we were planning to join your side anyways, so, please!”, the second deity copied its friend.

“…Hu? I’m no [High Priest], or associated with anything sacred in particular. I’m just an adventurer who really hates [Gods]. Now, I promised you, hadn’t I? I’d make you suffer.”, I said. And pair of little wooden-man went quiet, eyes losing their shine, their bodies frozen in place.

“BOOM!”, the doors of the largest building of the village, and the only one made of stone, blew up.

Dust from the explosion was hiding whatever was inside the building, but this didn’t stop the [Zemis] from getting up and laughing at my face:

“Ahaha, you’re absolutely fucked now!”, the first deity screamed, pointing his index finger towards me.

“Little boss is gonna make YOU beg the chance to commit suicide! Ahaha!”, the second deity bent backward, holding his stomach as he laughed.

I didn’t bother looking over my shoulders, and the figure coming off the dust curtain, but simply conjured me a blade, and sliced off all the eight limbs of the pair of small wooden-man in an instant: they shouldn’t have blood circulation, and as far as I knew they only lived through magic-bulshit, so this shouldn’t be enough to kill them.

“G- GAAAAH! H- HELP, SMALL BOOS!”, The [Zemis] screamed in unison, as they trashed on the ground. Thankfully, even made completely out of wood, they still felt pain. Hu. weird universal rules.

“S… Stop…”, A hoarse voice wheezed out. Another [God], the one who the [Zemis] took for their leader, an [Apacheta].

Hunah dragged its broken and cracked body by the stone that served as the thing’s head; a few dozen of survivors (all in really bad shape), following her closely, the villagers not seeming to believe their own eyes.

“Ah…”, The first [Zemi] started blankly at its defeated leader, who was asking for forgiveness itself. “[FIRE GRENADE!]”, the weakest deity finally realized the situation it was in, and tried to blow itself away.

“Too late, buddy”, I said, swapping the explosive away from the little [God] a thousand years before it exploded; the power gap between us simply too great. As the shacking [Zemi] stared at its spell demolishing a house nearby, as it stared its own powerlessness, a position it had never been before, I concluded: “I said I’d give you one chance, right? You missed it when you decided to attack me.”

We left the villagers decided the destiny of the captured deities. As a result, we ended up making the most powerful and expansive toilet in history: the stone body of the [Apacheta] lining up the walls of the septic well, while the wood from the [Zemis] made up the seat itself. They were all completely conscious, and were, of course, immortals, but we beat and broke them down so badly, that unless someone as strong as Taffy healed them, they would never be able to regenerate to their original forms, or use any [Spells] or [Skills].

Speaking of Taffy, she showed up with the little girl soon after we finished our job; while the parents of the little girl had been killed, the village elder swore to take care of her. Then, as we were about to leave the place, I finally finished planting the seeds my sister and I had started to plant when we turned the punishment of the three [Gods] into a public display of absolute strength instead of simply whipping them off the map with one move:

“Oh, yeah”, I turned around, at the edge of the village |, as the few survivors looked at my back. “The Adventurer’s Guild is taking [God] killing quests now.”