Outside the bar, six police cars came to a screeching halt. Twelve police officers jumped off their vehicles and used them as cover to secure the main entrance.

A woman in plain cloth ran to the leading officer. The man saluted.

“Detective Kirsten. What is the situation?”

“I’ve heard multiple gunshots, as well as screams, from inside the bar.” The woman tilted her head, glancing at the officers. Her ponytail swung from behind. “Are all the officers in place?”

“We’ve got two cars in the back and two in the ally. The place is under lock down. No one gets in or out. SWAT has been notified.”

Kirsten Kirsten reached inside her jacket and drew her sidearm. “Let’s go.”

The officers reached the door. One of the men took a deep breath and charged through the open door. The rest followed inside.

“CPD!” He shouted. His pistol was raised, ready to fire, but he immediately stopped himself when he saw what was inside. The rest of the officers entered as well, but they did a similar thing to their comrade.

Inside the bar, two girls were held up by two teenagers. The first teenager has a dagger next to the brunette’s neck. The second had a pistol next to the blonde’s temple. The two girls had tears on their face.

“Wait! Calm down! You don’t have to do this!” Kirsten held her left hand out in a comforting fashion. “Whatever you are dealing with, you can talk to us.”

“Get out!” The follower holding Katie demanded loudly. He just needed to buy time. “Get out of this bar now!”

“Drop your weapon!” One of the officers retaliated. Kirsten glanced at him and groaned inside. Amateurs. Using demands like these could only piss the hostage holders off.

Just like she imagined, the teenager holding Katie looked offended. He groaned and slid the dagger along the brunette’s right thigh. The girl screamed.

“I said get out! The next one will be inside her neck.” The follower returned his weapon to Katie’s neck.

“Fine!” Kirsten made a signal to the rest of the officers, and all of them slowly backed out of the bar. As they were gone, Caroline snapped at the man holding Katie.

“What the hell was that?”

“I actually suggested it.” Katie looked down on her thigh and touched the inside of the wound with her index finger. “It’s more realistic. No one working with the hostage takers would agree to be stabbed in a limb and potentially disabled.”

Caroline took a deep breath and evaded the question. “Where is Victor at?”

As they were busy with the role play, Victor has taken all the crystals on their duplicate blades and went to somewhere quiet. It would take both time and energy to restore the Blade of Kassak to its full power.

“He’s still working.”

“Then we need to keep this play going.” Katie forced out a few drops of tears and glanced at the blonde beside her. “God I never thought role play can be so fun. We should do this more when we’re done with this mess.”

Caroline could only do a mental face palm.

Outside, two carloads of SWAT operatives swarmed over the place. Ballistic shields were standard issue across the board. Every one of them had AR-15 automatic rifles with silencers on in their grip. Tactical goggles and face masks covered any expression by these men from the outside world.

“At least six suspects inside. They have taken two hostages.” Detective Kirsten turned to the leading officer. “Is the hostage negotiator in place?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“He’s stuck in traffic.”

“Oh…” Kirsten frowned. “Keep the place surrounded. Have we identified the hostage takers?“

“Surveillance cameras identify them as a group of high school students in Charleston Central High School.”

“Hmmm. High schoolers. Any idea why they want to barge into a bar and take hostages?”

“No idea. Mind I ask, sir, how did you realize something was wrong?”

“I have been staking out this bar for days. I’m certain it is the safehouse of a gang. A couple minutes ago I heard gunshots and screams, so I immediately called for reinforcement.” Kirsten explained. “I’ve got no idea it would turn out like this. I should’ve went in when I had the chance.”

“Actually, sir, that would be a bad idea.” The officer explained. “You said this bar is a safehouse for a gang. Then where is that gang? Someone went into their property and started wrecking things up, and they still sat back and did nothing? If it’s a bar, then where are the customers?”

Kirsten gulped as she realized what the officer meant.

A group of people strong enough to take out dozens of gang members was more than enough to overpower a single detective.

Inside a room, Victor silently rested the Blade of Kassak on the ground. He took out all the red crystals he gathered from the followers. They contained the essence of 44 human beings.

Supposedly, they were enough to revive a god.

Victor acted quietly and efficiently. Although he referred to the Blade of Kassak as a god, he merely treated him as an ally. In fact, none of the followers really thought Kassak was a god. It was a deal. That was it. Kassak gave these teenagers more power than they could ever gain in a normal life. He gave them the power to kill in ways they couldn’t even imagine. On the other hand, Kassak needed the followers to revive him.

The crystals were put into a circle around the blade. At this point Victor could simply sit back and let the blade do the rest.

Red energy streamed out of the crystals and entered the blade. As the process continued, the blade turned brighter and brighter. Finally, the Blade floated into the air by itself.

Victor took a step forward, showing no sign of respect. “We are trapped here by a squad of well armed enemies. We need you to get us out.”

The blade started vibrating.

“Didn’t you hear what I said? We’re trapped here! Enemy forces may charge in anytime. We need you to take them out!”

Victor’s tone was getting annoyed. The situation was desperate, and it wasn’t like he was truly faithful deep down.

The next second the blade stopped vibrating. Victor frowned, and his eyes widened when the blade accelerated toward him with lightning speed.

Its tip was ready for blood.

“Don’t you dare…” Victor subconsciously reached out, summoning his blade, but immediately an excruciating wave of pain struck his arm where the follower mark was. It was as if someone just pushed a piece of iron on his skin. He screamed and collapsed.

The next second the Blade of Kassak gently tapped on his skull. The man’s eyes turned completely red as his mind was transformed. Two minutes later, Victor’s eyes turned normal again, but he was no longer who he used to be. He used to be an independent human being, but now he is no more than a puppet. The Blade of Kassak returned to his sheath.

Victor’s supplicant blade transformed into a surge of black essence and returned to the Blade of Kassak, making it slightly larger and darker.

From the moment he met Victor, the Blade of Kassak has never intended on truly working with him. In fact, if he wasn’t gravely wounded and lost most of his power, he would have killed the man and taken his life energy in a heartbeat.

But he was wounded beyond anything he has experienced before, and he knew there was no way he could save himself. Even if it was possible, it would take decades. Some life energy would be great, but it wasn’t safe enough.

So when he first met the wondering teenager, he did his best to convince him. In fact, he exhausted almost all of his power to create the first duplicate blade that he gave to Victor. If that failed and the blade didn’t take a single life, Kassak’s only choice would be lying around and hope he could live long enough to be restored to his former glory.

But that didn’t happen. Under his trick, Victor took a life. It was just a homeless man, but that man’s life force brought the Blade of Kassak back to his feet.

Things only went better and better. Victor had ambitions, and he didn’t settle with being a teenager with a magical sword. He wanted to be a god.

The number of followers grew more and more, and more and more lives were taken by the duplicate blades. A small portion of these live energies were passed on to the users and another portion was stored in the blades themselves, but most of these energy was actually returned to the Blade of Kassak himself. His power grew stronger by the days.

Eventually, inside this bar, his followers has finally found enough sacrificial lambs to revive him.

He was still not at his full power. If he wanted to become the monster he once was, it would take much more than 44 lives. However, it did give him the power to do a lot more things than he could right now, including killing someone and controlling his body.

The followers have been useful, but starting from this moment they were doing more harm than good. The duplicate blades they possessed were copies of the Blade of Kassak’s own body. They were created from his very essence. They could directly pass energy to him, but their presence was weakening him as well. He needed to take them back.

The followers would never agree to this, so they had to go.

Puppet Victor turned around and walked out of the room. There were still 14 followers on this planet, and all of them needed to die.

Inside the front of the bar, Katie ran her fingers across Caroline’s legs in boredom. A normal person would be wetting her pants in a situation like this, but Katie was so bored a part of her wanted the police outside to charge inside and shoot her.

It has been over twenty minutes since the police first came in. They tried asking for what the hostage takers wanted, but they were trying to negotiate with someone who only wanted to stall. The result was obvious.

“We should get a room when it’s done.” Katie suddenly said. The wound on her leg was no more than a scar, and this made her bored. Usually in a situation like this she would just stab herself again, but this wasn’t exactly the right time.

Caroline coughed. “I’m sorry?”

“I said we should have sex when we’re done. Need me to repeat again?”

Caroline rose her eyebrows. “But you’re a girl.”

“So?”

“So…” Caroline held her hands out. “so how can we…”

Katie smiled. “You really don’t know anything about sex, do you?”

“I know the basics.” Caroline rebutted.

“Well, trust me, there’s so much more than the basics.” Katie smiled. This was going to be fun.

Just when she was about to get into the more detailed information, she heard footsteps from behind. She turned around and found Victor walking up. Caroline turned away. Deep down, she was slightly disappointed.

“Victor? What are you doing here?” One of the followers walked up. Her blade was in her sleeve.

The next moment the girl screamed and collapsed. Her knees hit the floor, and her throat was just at the height of Victor’s hand.

Victor reached out and slit her throat.

“What the…” A follower grasped in confusion.

“Take him out! Shoot first, talk later!” Caroline declared decisively. All thirteen followers, including Katie, held out their arms. Thirteen duplicate blades were in the air, yearning for blood.

Facing the forest of swords, Victor tilted his head, and all thirteen followers collapsed in pain. Screams covered the field as the blades fell onto the ground.

When the Blade of Kassak gave the followers their marks, he installed a backdoor to make sure no follower could ever challenge him. With a single thought, he could send all the followers to their knees.

Katie bit her lips and tasted something salty. It took every cell in her body to keep herself from screaming like every other follower beside her. Her entire body shook violently and she was struggling to keep standing. Beside her, Caroline clutched to her head like it was on fire. Tears came out of her eyes. She wasn’t crying because she was scared. It just hurt too much.

Victor smirked and walked to one of the followers on the ground and stabbed him in the chest. That follower has killed half a dozen gang hitmen, but now he was absolutely defenseless.

Then the second.

Then the third.

Finally, when there were only six followers left, Victor reached Katie. Just like all the followers in front of her, she was shaking.

Victor grabbed onto Katie’s hair with one hand and raised his blade and aimed at the girl’s heart, but the next second the girl’s eyes snapped open.

Victor, or rather the Blade of Kassak, frowned.

He didn’t saw pain. Instead, he saw an infinite amount of excitement.

“That...is...AWESOME!”