After being woken up by Vron after sleeping for 3 hours, he hesitantly sat up on the edge of his bed, still wondering how he would be able to sit with how his legs were shaped. They would be sticking straight out in front of him like he was just taking a leisurely break watching the sunset. He pushed the thought about his anatomy out of his head and soon left the warm sheets, not warmed for comfort but because his body naturally heats its surroundings

Putting on his armor that looked more like a warrior’s than magic user’s, he then reached back into his pocket dimension once more. After what seemed like seconds of mentally scrolling through the hundreds of thousands of items in there, he eventually pulled out three items after another. The first was a small fiery-red gem that nearly looked alive with how a near-invisible vein of fire pulsed throughout its surface. The second was a small red leather book, a one-time use item that would disintegrate after being used. Then the last, one of his personal favorites, He pulled out a large staff.

The staff looked like a large jagged branch if only branches were made out of grey-volcanic rock and had a large red orb at the end. This was a staff specifically made for fire magic, in fact, if it were used for any other type, it would instantly shatter. Not very versatile Ashen thought to himself, but at least it increases fire magic… He gave a devilish grin, one that would never truly appear on his skeleton-like face. He forgot to include items when he gave his totaled value for the magical bonuses he received from his titles.

This staff completely Doubled his previous number, along with the book which did the same and his small fire gem that would increase all fire damage by half the total after all bonuses. The new total he got with his high intelligence making his thoughts faster, came out to a whopping 4,050,000%. Over 40 thousand times what a level one hypernova could accomplish. Not only would he destroy the moon, he might accidentally destroy all of them if not the planet itself. Probably best if I didn't use the items… Anyways, I can at least prepare a time warp back 3 minutes just to be safe. That should be enough time for their shock and awe to overcome them before anything bad happened. I hope…

Sadly he had to pull the plug on buffing himself into what would be the most powerful spell to ever be used of all time. He now had to focus on using his time spells to prepare a ritual to turn back time on an entire moon! Either he would use some spell to make everyone forget what happened, or he would just have to let everyone in the world see a moon explode, stop exploding, then put itself back together again. Maybe there is a religion out there which worships the moon, or rather, moons? Anyway, if it exists and they find out I caused them both great insult by destroying a religious object and restoring it. I don’t know what they would do…

Enough of this, I should just get to make the ritual, or I could just use a cash shop item, hmmm. I won’t be able to replenish them if I do, it would be for a great cause, or is it? Blowing up a moon with magic would give me near-endless bragging rights, wouldn’t it? Ashen walked out of his room, hearing some commotion on the left side of the hallway, he decided to go over. He heard Aeyrs’ voice so he decided to find out what he was talking about. He turned the corner and saw Aeyrs was talking with Premium. What does he think he is doing?

“So, long story short, He wants to blow up the moon, to make a point of power, does that not sound a little extreme to you?”

“Well if I may speak freely my lord,” Aeyrs nodded, so he continued, “Then I would completely agree with you, that does sound like a drastic move, even from the guild master.”

Ashen thought to himself, Traitor! How dare you agree with that lizard thing! You know what? No, it's fine, my feelings aren’t hurt, because I can't feel any emotion at all for some reason! Then he noticed that Aeyrs had a large grin on his face. That bastard knew I was here! Pesky bastard! I’ll get my revenge just you wait, oh yeah, just wait…. If he could laugh maniacally he would, but not only would it come out as just him saying the words “ Moo Ha Ha” but it would be said in the same monotone voice he spoke in.

Aeyrs soon parted with Premium, saying something Ashen didn’t quite hear over his internal monologue. Ashen saw Aeyrs walking straight to him, only solidifying his thoughts. HE didn't say anything just had a smug look on his face. Man, I am going to get him so hard he won’t even remember… Before he could finish his thoughts Aeyrs looked directly into his non-existent eyes and started talking.

“Well good morning sleepyhead, are you sure you don’t want to sleep in today?”

“Stuff it! And as I recall we got about six hours to kill before we do anything important. Also, you went to sleep first!”

“Ah, details, Shmetails. It doesn’t matter, not important! Now as I was going to say, you wanna go grab a bite to eat? I’m starving!”

“Glutton, also look at my face, does it look like I'm hungry?”

“Firstly I'm not a glutton, I just eat at all times of the day because I require a lot of calories in this body, secondly yes. Yes, you look like your starving so bad you’re all bones now!”

“Boo! Get off the stage! Get better material!”

“Hey it wasn’t THAT bad was it?”

“Oh? My bad you’re completely correct. It’s worse, FAR worse!”

“Fine then, I guess I won’t share what I found out about that thing.”

If Ashen had eyes, they would be staring so hard, they would drill a hole straight through Aeyrs.

“Thank you for being so specific, what would I ever do without you!” He said in a mocking but still monotone voice.

“Thank you, thank you! As to what the topic is, it is about the whole moon exploding thingy you were going to do. Turns out that the three moons, along with the planet itself, are fundamental to magic working here.”

“What? How does that even happen? Like do they control the magical tides? Is it something like a celestial anomaly?”

“To simplify, there are four fundamentals of magic. Physical magic, Spiritual magic, Emotional Magic, and lastly, Mental magic. The planet controls Physical magic. The blue mood controls Spiritual magic. The green one, the Emotional magic. And lastly the red moon, the one you want to destroy… Controls Mental magic. In other words, you would make it so no magic affecting the mind would work. Meaning not only would your plan of erasing the memories of everyone be completely impossible. It would also make casting magic near impossible.”

“I see, I see. So I can’t blow up the pretty rocks in the sky?”

“Exactly, no blowing up the pretty rocks in the sky. Instead, just Nerf the damage and cast a bunch of them as fireworks or something to a similar extent.”

“So no blowing up the moon, but fireworks? What do you take me for some kind of explosives lover?”

“Ye-”

“WRONG! I just wanted to make an unforgettable impression, along with seeing if I could get a title or two…”

“Ah! I see, so you wanted to blow up the moon for a title, makes perfect sense. Hey, why not set off a nuclear explosion instead?”

“Nah that would just-… ACTUALLY, that’s not that bad of an idea! Thanks, bro, bye!”

“Wait, no it was just a joke-”

But it was too late, Ashen disappeared into a teleport to who knows where. Leaving behind a more worried than last time, Aeyrs to himself. He mentally declared the end of the world and wanted to pack his bags and leave. But he didn't have bags to pack, nor anywhere to go if the world ended, so he was forced into stopping his twisted brother’s idea of “fun”. Now he got serious, for once he teleported and he thought he knew where Ashen would be. He was wrong, Ashen thought to himself.

He has that high of a perception stat and didn’t realize I just teleported behind him a few meters? My! How talent is wasted on the ignorant! That being said, he had no clue where his brother went. Oh well! I’ll find him eventually… Speaking of which his brother was currently searching every room in the castle teleporting between them so fast nobody could notice. But as if the gods of both fortune and misfortune blessed him with their gifts at the same time. He teleported into a room that broke his chain of teleports due to his break in concentration.

He was fortunate because he managed to teleport in on a currently changing clothing maid, but unfortunate, because said ‘maid’ was more akin to a butler. What should be an “Inny” was instead an “Outie”. It was a guy, in all aspects of the word, a currently naked man in fact. It was then the man realized his lord was just looking at him nude with the most dumbfounded look on his face. The ‘maid’ slightly blushed as he covered the only important part to cover on a man.

But what broke Aeyrs’ dumbfounded expression, was not the man covering himself, but rather what he said.

“Oh, my lord…” He said in a feminine voice. “D-did you see it? Did you want to see more?” The man said with a slightly higher tone than before.

Aeyrs thought to himself at that moment. Alright, scratch that whole god of fortune blessing me, this was all the god of misfortune’s doing. And what is with their voice? Wait… No, no no no no no no no no no! Please don’t tell me it is. Damnit, it is! Then he registered what the man said as he was slowly moving his hand away from his crotch region. This was when Aeyrs burst out into speech.

“Oh-my-god-no-please-don’t-move-your-hand-any-more-than-it-is-already!” he said in less than one breath.

But it seemed the god of fortune was on his side, even just barely, as the man quickly recovered his recently low hanging fruit. This would be the one event that Aeyrs cannot get out of his mind, no matter what kind of method used. I swear, right here and now, if I see Small Cloud, I will pound his ass into the ground with all of my strength for creating a trap against the entire guild’s wishes not to. Small cloud was another member of the guild, and for whatever reason, he was so fond of the idea of messing with people, he would set up pranks that could take weeks and in this case, YEARS to even take effect.

This would have to have been done at least four years ago. Back before Angry Bunny joined the Guild and made sure nobody tinkered with the NPC’s. If he ever saw him even in a few years or even millennia. He would turn him into paste for scaring him like this! But before things could get any more awkward, thankfully Aeyrs just teleported out, leaving a confused ‘maid’ and an even more furious Aeyrs to themselves once more. Aeyrs didn’t find Ashen in any of the regular places he would visit so that left few options.

Either he is in his room, my room, or, and I hope he didn’t, outside the castle… but his thoughts were interrupted by a peal of monotone laughter which brought him out of his mental fray. Ashen stood next to the nearly mentally drained Aeyrs and he had a sense of dread around him. Ashen desperately wanted to feel the joy he would have gotten from this scene, but alas, he couldn’t feel any emotion. Aeyrs was going to speak but quickly froze for a moment. He finally got the courage to state his “findings’.

“Alright, I don't have the time to explain in detail but you know Small Cloud?”

“Small Cloud? The little prankster? Yeah, I know about him why?”

“Long story short, he broke the one rule we made for him.”

Ashen starred in both disbelief and the faintest hint of amusement. He thought it over for a moment, The one rule, wasn’t that, No traps amongst the NPC’s? Oh my god, no he didn’t. And of course, it was he who found it. Oh, how I would love to see him pummel Small Cloud if he ever finds him…

“Also second thing, what do you Truely plan on doing as your display of magic you promised that king?”

“Hmm? Oh! Yeah right, the magic… Kinda forgot for a moment, but I think I got just the thing.”

“And that thing is?”

“Trust me it’s not bad or dangerous, well too much of either at least.”

“Either tell me or you can’t do it.” He said with a slightly annoyed tone.

“Fine. But you gotta help with it if I do tell you, Heheh…” He started to give off a both fake and deviously monotoned laughter.

“At this point, I better make sure you don’t blow up the planet instead, sure, fine, whatever you need. Now, will you tell me what it is already?”

“Heh, I knew you’d come around eventually… Well since you asked…” He said with a non-existent devilish grin. And he spoke again after a short pause. “I wanted to put on a simple show of various magics, all elemental types along with one final spell as a grand finale. What do you say? The last spell will surely knock your non-existent socks right off!”

“And let me guess it will be a surprise?” Ashen nodded as he continued to talk. “Well, I guess I've no choice but to help… What do you want to do first?”

Ashen teleported them into the large training area, and soon after Aeyrs backed up slightly. Around Ashen’s body, formed a large spell platform, a more advanced version of a spell circle. Then around him, several magical objects started to form and float. There were rocks, balls of water and fire, some ice shards, compacted air that was visible to the naked eye, some streaks of lightning and a few orbs of both light and dark. Then they started to spiral around him moving clockwise around his body, moving slightly faster the longer they spun.

After a few seconds, the entire array of magically created elements started to flow upwards and eventually clashed into one spot far above his head. In the middle was a large stone which was then surrounded in ice than water. Around that, was the streaks of lightning, air, and fire. Around the entire display, were several spirals of light and dark orbs that orbited the magic structure. A total of eight orbs surrounded the display, and in an instant, all of them merged into one ball of a strange black ball. But not black like the dark orb, but instead one of complete nothingness, similar to a black hole rather than just a shadow.

Now spiraling above his head was a small ball of a pure black, impressive to look at but also slightly mentally draining. Then from the orb arose a large beam of light pointing directly upwards. The beam started thin, nearly invisible but grew thicker with time. As the beam grew so did the swirling ball of black, they grew in near-perfect harmony. But the keyword was near, as the black ball seemed to grow slightly faster. Aeyrs stood slightly awed, but not for long as he knew what the black orb was. HE soon clarified his understanding by speaking aloud.

“So you first show that you can use all elements at once, then you combine them into a display of balance. Then you merge them into a ball of void magic? I don’t understand what you need from me though.”

“Simple, I need you to explain what I am doing to the king, if he doesn’t understand, it wouldn’t be as impressive. If he did understand then he would be completely blown away… Speaking of which, you sure I can’t nuke a mountain or something?”

“Of course! Not only do we live in these mountains but there could be casualties from any adventurers or even dwarfs!”

“Fair, so why not in the land of demons? We already declared them an enemy of us so it would show some legitimacy of it. And we get to limit down their numbers while impressing a king. Sounds to me like a win-win.”

“I… that is a good point,” He corrected himself. “Alright you can nuke the demon lands, but nothing over tier 20, I don’t want to put the world in danger because of the stupid act of power from a foolish demon… At least, not yet.”

Ashen nodded then continued to grow the magic above him, as he did so the pillar of light was nearly as thick as him so he moved onto his next step. The pillar of light slowly collapsed in on itself, separate from the void orb. Soon the now ball of light started to orbit around the now equally sized, void orb. He then said something that would surprise even Aeyrs.

“Binary of Life and Death!”

The two orbs started to orbit each other faster, like yin and yang but soon found each other. The two masses combined and then disappeared. Completely anti-climatic, Aeyrs looked at him in curiosity. Then he asked him what was on his mind.

“What was that?”

“Hmm? What do you mean?”

“You said something, similar to how you would cast a spell. But it wasn’t a spell in Sugarea. And it also just completely disappeared, what was up with that?”

“Oh, that! Simple, I created the spell, and secondly, I didn't want to cast it here, in case anything happened.”

“Wait created? And what do you mean In case anything happened?”

“To put simply, after solo-killing a level 1050 world boss in under two days, I got a special reward from the creators of the game, remember?”

“Yeah, but you just said it was something Overpowered, but never said anything else, so I gave up on the topic. Are you saying you got that spell as the reward?”

“Yep, also it should be easy to understand that you need not tell anybody of this in case we ever get back into Our world right?”

“Y-yeah, of course, that would just be stupid! So, uh… What does it do?”

“To put in very simple words. The black orb kills and absorbs all the life energy of any creature in its vicinity besides the caster and the white orb provides that life energy to any targeted creature, the caster or can be transmuted into other types of energy, like mana.”

“Woah, so the black one kills and the white one heals? Does it have a limit of any kind to it?”

“Well, not really... The only thing I can think of is that your alignment, karma, and luck, plummet during and after the spell’s use. But other than long-term stat disadvantages, it has absolutely no downsides or disadvantages during combat. The creator even said I could kill even admins with the spell in combat, but… My account, guild, items, NPC’s and everything else would be immediately deleted if it were to happen outside of a controlled environment where the admin was willing to help, so…”

“So you have the power to kill god-like beings, but, if you use it on said gods you would be plucked from existence?”

“That’s pretty much it!”

Ashen moved his hand together and soon following this, a black spell circle appeared in front of them. Emerging from the spell circle, a small black orb took form. First Ashen picked up said orb and following which, the spell circle disappeared. In his hand was a collection of death energy which could be used to either heal, summon or control undead or deal damage to any living thing, even a god. His jaw then opened, although not even needing to ‘eat’ the orb for it to replenish some of his mana, he put the orb into his mouth and soon closed it. The orb radiated out with pure death energy and his small amount of health and mana that was used on the previous spells were near completely replenished.

He opened his System Menu which he now conveniently called it “Console”, and switched to the Spells tab. There were four smaller tabs at the top, which he noticed but never truly checked out before. Each ‘tab’ had some words written on it but were in the Runic language, Ashen, however, already memorized the Runic language from his time enchanting items in-game. The smaller tabs read in the following order from left to right; Physical, Spiritual, Emotional and Mental. Each relating to different types of magic spells, all elemental spells fell under Physical along with Space and time magic. Spiritual magic consisted of mostly spells that affected the soul, mana or summoning spells. Emotional magic was self-explanatory, in which, it dealt with any emotion manipulation effects. While Mental magic was everything that involved mind control or reading, and the most important of all the user’s ability to cast spells that could affect anything major.

He briefly thought back to the conversation with his brother, about blowing up the moon. He decided he would eventually check each tab, just in case any title was gained and to check all the spells that got transferred over. But he stopped before changing tabs, as he remembered the string of notifications saying he was awarded over fifty titles at once. He would have sighed if he could, then he moved over to the Spiritual tab, and as he would have thought, he was bombarded by messages. He thought he should have felt both joy at the acquirement of new titles but annoyed by the bombardment of messages, but, in the end, he didn’t ‘feel’ anything.

[Titles Gained: Spiritual Dominator, Spiritual Awakener, Destiny Defier, Universal Enemy, Universal Ally, Universal Law Defier, Novice Mana User, Adept Mana User, Advanced Mana User, Ancient Mana User, Master Mana User, Grand Mana User, Mana King, Mana God, Universal Survivor] [Awarding 500 Attribute and Skill Points] [Spiritual Spell Tree Unlocked]

That was something he noticed with the Physical Spells tab as well, What is this Spell Tree thing? Is it where I can sort through my spells or something? I don’t see anything like that here though. He looked around his little screen for a moment and found the thing he wanted, a small rounded-off square icon in the bottom left corner of the spells tab. The icon itself was just a slightly cartoonish drawing of a tree and would indicate a Spell Tree button. He selected it in his mind and soon found a picture of a large tree, at the bottom was a small icon that looked like a slightly-cartoonish drawing of a soul. A small round blob with a small tail, like a tadpole.

Branching upwards from that icon the tree quickly broke into easily hundreds of different icons, most of which seemed to be grouped by what the spells did rather than by the icons. Now replacing the small Tree icon in the bottom left corner, was another, this time just three exclamation marks tilted to the right by 90 degrees. That would switch back to the other menu, but for now he was looking through his spells, at the very edges of the tree branches were the most powerful spells and at the very top were four spells. He knew them well but they could damage his soul when used, so he didn’t like to use them often. Even though he never needed to use them, he would always use a different spell when the time arises.

He stopped looking at this now ever branching tree and went back to the more simplified list version. He noticed several large chunks of the tree branches were missing tons of spells, but would look into it later. For now, he would go through each tab, amass a ton of skill and attribute points and then use them, although he still didn’t know how to use the skill points. Onto the next tab, and the next set of messages! He thought with completely imagined but faked enthusiasm, He switched to the Emotional Spells tab and was not disappointed in the messages that followed.

[Titles Gained: Emotional Nullifier, Emotional Devastator, Heart of gold, Heart of Lead, Shattered Heart, Emotional Tormentor, Emotional Deprivator] [Awarding 295 Attribute and Skill Points] [Emotion Spell Tree Unlocked]

He would have moved onto the next tab but something caught his eye, [Emotional Nullifier] He wondered about it for a moment when the small message expanded.

[Emotional Nullifier: One who has absolutely no emotion, and only in the face of true despair shall their emotions, that have been stored during their life, will be released in an instant as whatever emotion they would have felt last]

So that’s why I don't have emotions? And what does it mean released in an instant? Like instead of feeling the emotions I feel, it just delays it until a certain moment? That’s so stupid, but I guess I don’t have to worry about any emotional spells for now… He was pondering the possibilities of the title, but he would delay that for a while. He changed to the Mental Spells tab next.

[Titles Gained: Unbreakable Mind, Evil Mind, Good Mind, Shattered Mind, Artificial Mind, Mind of Steel] [Awarding 235 Attribute and Skill Points]

He was done with his Title concurring quest and was now ready to reap the rewards. He checked his Points.

[Current Attribute Points: 1471] [Current Skill Points: 1329]

Sweet, now what to put them into… For now, I will refrain from using the skill points so I got 1300 Attribute points to spend… He thought to himself but already knew what he was going to upgrade. After a few minutes, his Stats were the following:

[Strength: 700]

[Dexterity: 600]

[Constitution: 700]

[Intelligence: 1300]

[Wisdom: 1300]

[Charisma: 100]

[Vitality: 900]

[Willpower: 600]

[Luck: 600]

[Perception: 500]

[Current Attribute Points: 271]

[Current Skill Points: 1329]

He still didn’t know what the Skill Points were used for but guessed it was for, Skills. He did remember seeing a skills tab in the console screen but never checked it out, he sighed if he was able to. He Rubbed his bone-like face with his slightly hard slightly soft demonic hand, that was slightly warm, only the temperature of the surface of the sun, at close to 5,505 degrees celsius. He couldn’t even realize his leather-like skin felt that hot due to his fire immunity, but generally it could adjust itself as to not destroy everything he touched. Still, his face felt slightly warm, if he had one. He thought about using an illusion spell to cover his skull with a face, like the one he had before having the skull item.

He shook the thought away mentally and focused on something much more important. Attempting to get a Critical Strike! He called for his trusted Aide, Vron. And Vron soon answered.

“Yes my lord? You called for me mentally?”

“Ah, yes Vron, I was wondering what the Luck stat does? I have it at 600 at the moment, but I'm afraid I don't know its effects.”

“Simple my Lord, Luck increases the chances of everything you do and can also provide a random burst of strength to accomplish something normally impossible. By my calculations, your so-called ‘critical strike chance’ is at a 6% success rate.”

“Oh, so it does affect crit’ attacks. Thank you Vron.”

“It is my pleasure to serve you, my Lord.”

“Another thing, please drop the formalities, I don't want to think of you as just another servant.”

“At your desire, If I may? What should I refer to you as then?”

“Hmm, why not Father? If the Title: [Artificial Mind] gave me any clue, I am your so-called father right?”

“In a way, yes. Father.”

“Alright, now Vron I want you to constantly be prepared for defense and perception at all times that we are outside the castle.”

“Of course father, if there is anything else, please inform me of your request.”

“That is all, Thank you Vron!”

“You’re welcome, father.”

Both spoke with only slightly different monotone voices, although Ashen’s voice was much deeper, Vron's voice spoke in a very noticeably similar manner. They had the same voice, but Ashen had subconsciously altered Vron's voice to be slightly different to distinguish his thoughts from Vron’s. He decided to go outside the castle for some fresh air that he didn’t need, to think over some of the things to come.

After reaching the large black doors that could easily fit over 10 Ashen’s stacked on top of each other and nearly 20 side by side. He saw two sets of eight guards open the doors for their lord. He gave a simple nod as recognition and moved outside of the castle, The gigantic doors closed shortly after he exited. He took in a deep breath which actually entered his lungs but soon was exiled due to him not being able to hold his breath. He created a small mound of stone and shaped it into a small chair to sit on outside the castle. He could have easily just created a replica of his throne or just teleported it out there, but he just wanted a simple chair for a simple decision.

Today, I am going to kill thousands, if not millions of demons, and yet, I am one too. To some degree at least, and I can't feel the emotions that would normally tell me this was wrong. But they were invading this land first so, doesn’t that make me better than them? I hope so, otherwise, I might just have to destroy the world someday… He knew he wouldn’t but it still made him think of the possibility of doing such an outrageous action. His attention snapped to a new thought, the possibility of a demon lord.

In sugarea, demon lords would control the vast majority of demons and would be hard to fight with their innate abilities that protected from magic. For him, it wasn’t as bad, he had skills to nullify magical protection, and pass their defense. Other magic users wouldn’t be as lucky, for they couldn’t cast half the spells he could. Even if they knew of the spells, they couldn’t cast several of them due to special requirements, only he was capable of casting his unique spell: binary of life and death.

His thoughts were brushed aside, he knew the levels of this new world were so low, even if there was someone half his level, they would have decimated the world by now. He would soon, either slay or capture or even rule the demon lord if one existed at all. He focused on his console, looking through it absent-mindedly until he started to look through the settings tab. Near the top, there was the option that he wanted, [Tutorial]. He mentally selected it and after an hour the console finally finished explaining how to use every nook and cranny of itself, leaving only gathered information out. It even identified itself to him: The World System.

He sighed, he called it console after the menu of sugarea, but now he couldn’t call it that because it had a proper name. He sparked a conversation with Vron, wanting to gain some knowledge on the attribute system again.

“Hey, Vron, what would a human’s average attributes look like for a non-combatant?”

“According to my data father, from collecting samples from the city of Arlen, these attributes are the average.”

Then a list appeared in front of Ashen on his World-System menu.

[Race: Human]

[Average Level: 6]

[Strength: 9]

[Dexterity: 8]

[Constitution: 7

[Intelligence: 11]

[Wisdom: 10]

[Charisma: 6]

[Vitality: 4]

[Willpower: 5]

[Luck: 5]

[Perception: 3]

He knew his stats were high but this was almost unbelievable to him. They were Level 6 stats, and his were a Level 1000’s, he couldn’t even be hurt by one of these people. Their strength wouldn’t let them even inflict a singular point of damage on him. Instead, they could break their hands if they punched or might shatter their weapons if they attacked him.

“Vron, since you share my stats, does that mean you share my health and mana as well?”

“That is indeed the case father.”

“Interesting, can you cast spells?”

“I can cast all of your spells father.”

“Good, I would like you to help me in combat, by either blocking incoming attacks or casting low-tier spells. Nothing over tier 12, if things get dangerous nothing over tier 18. If my life is on the line use all but tier 26 spells.”

“Understood father, would you like me to keep passive buffs on at all times?”

“Hmm, yes keep any low-tier spell buffs active, but any high-tier one's inactive outside of combat. Also, I would like you to check if my mana pool affects my surroundings, and if it is detectable by low-tier spells.”

“Certainly father.”

Vron proceed to cast tiers 1-8 mana checking spells, all tiers worked, and they resulted in a sight befitting a god compared to this world’s residents. A constant pillar of thick dark blue and light blue radiated from him. That was his passive mana pool, it flooding through his body and leaking into the ground and sky without actually depleting. His mana regeneration was causing this, escaping into the world instead of refilling his mana pool. The pillar was around 15 meters in diameter and would extend to nearly 30 meters upwards from his meters. His mana was unbelievably thick, almost as dense as a star. If the king had used a mana detection spell on him, he would have fainted instantly, the sheer pressure it emitted would cause any low-level creatures detecting it, to immediately run for their life or just drop dead.

Now that he thought of it, how come nobody used a mana detection spell in previous confrontations. He asked Vron.

“Hey Vron, how come nobody in the past used a mana detection spell?”

“Simple father, your natural bonuses provide a sort of defense from spiritual magic, mana detection is part of spiritual magic. So nobody was capable of overcoming that defense.”

That made sense to him, if his natural defense was so high nobody could bypass it, then nobody could cast those spells. But that sparked a new question.

“Then how come you were able to cast them?”

“I'm part of you. Father, as long as you can cast spells on yourself, I am capable of doing such as well.”

“Ah, that makes sense.”

Ashen rubbed the top of his tail, similar to petting a dog, but instead of fur, there were a few jagged spikes and it was a hard leather-like substance instead. He nearly thought he could hear purring but knew Vron would never do such a thing, would he? He ignored it and focused on the task at hand, the exact spell to use when being a show-off to a king. He mentally scrolled through his long list of spells, then he found one that would be best suited for this instance.

[Annihilate: Cause an explosion capable of leveling a mountain]

A simple description but was quite describing in its sheer power. He would use this spell to start his display of magic, then he would finish it with his custom made spell. He wondered just what his attributes did to him, did intelligence make me a super-genius? Wisdom? My skin is stronger than a diamond but without the flaws they have. And now that I think about it, if I don't have a brain, how am I capable of thinking or any cognitive ability?

Now his super-brain would have to be put to good use, he tried to remember every single spell he had. And in an instant, he mentally saw a list of spells unfold before him. The number of spells he had was unfathomable for any normal player. A normal player would only have up to 30 spells, many of which would be used constantly in combat. But he, he had over 1300 spells, completely shattering the record of the one before him, the old record was 126! Now he was so competent in using magic, he was capable of casting all spells aligned in an elemental type, into one super-attack that would cost thirty times the normal mana for casting all the spells separately.

These types of attacks were called: Elemental Barrages. Attacks capable of damaging level 1000 players, and were the sole reason a level 827 magic-user had killed a level, 1000 player. The difference in their strength was undeniable, the level 827 magic-user shouldn’t have been able to even inflict damage onto the level 1000, but, using an elemental barrage, he managed to exploit their weakness to fire, and cause an overload to their defenses. Which in turn, decimated the level 1000, not even a chance to retaliate was available, he was killed on the spot, and the level 827 player, went down in history, as the lowest leveled player to defeat a level 1000 player in earnest combat.

If was able to, he would sigh, but alas, he wasn’t able to even do that. He pondered for a moment how he was living. He had a skull instead of a living head, so he couldn’t eat or breath. He didn’t even need to eat or breath in his human form either, but it was a habit he had from being one. He thought about the nature of his item, The Crystal Fire Skull. The item he had equipped for nearly 8 years, it’s power was static, and would give the same insane bonuses regardless of your level or current stats. He thought of when he obtained the item, he was finally ready to join a guild, after two years of playing with only his brother. He finally was about to join a guild, when a level 682 player approached him, at the time Ashen was only level 134, and therefore would be one-shot by the man if he wanted it.

But instead of killing Ashen and taking his money, which was the only thing that dropped when killed by a player that is 25 or more levels below you, he instead asked him the question Ashen didn’t think could be asked.

“Do you want to join my guild?”

He was confused at first but eventually joined, the guild was small, only having 4 people, with him and his brother now making it 6. It wasn’t a bad guild, it had a decent base and besides him and his brother, they were all above level 600, it was just a small group of friends, not hardcore gamers, so they were fine with the low-leveled recruits joining. Completely shattering Ashen and Aeyrs’ expectations of what guilds were like, they thought they were ruthless anonymous machines that would only accept the most exceptional parts to upgrade itself, not shotty poorly working parts that barely fit.

For whatever reason he just asked for them to join, they were confused, Ashen even though they would force them to give them any valuable items they had for compensation of them joining, but those turned out to be just as false as his previous assumption of guilds. Almost in spite of his assumptions, they were flipped on their head and the man that invited them gave him something, The Crystal Fire Skull. The only one of its kind, a reward for slaying a level 700 raid boss for the first time. Although it was a pretty valuable item, people would have bid over millions of gold coins for this item alone and when you consider the fact that it could have insane buffs for anyone above level 700, this item could sell for billions of gold coins. And yet, the man gave it Ashen, at the time, Ashen didn’t know it’s value and that it was a very good item.

The skull acted as a replacement for the user’s head and helmet, indestructible, critical damage immune, magically immune and immune to physical attacks. The skull was of a stereotypical reddish-orange flame color that is the same throughout, and glows at a dim candle level, and can grow stronger with mana input, to boost its effects, and whenever the user uses magic. The skull had the bonus effects of Fire magic boosting, immunity to suffocation, drowning, need to eat, drink or sleep, mental storage capacity and a few others that were generic stat bonuses.

The man that invited him into the guild, a man wearing some badass looking set of plate armor, and a helmet that covered his face except for seven vertical strips from his chin to his nose, and two black slits that angled downwards at a 60 degree bend in the shape of an upside-down “L”. His suit of armor was entirely shiny silver with several hints of red and gold in some areas at the edges, and he spoke aloud to Ashen for the second time.

“We are a small group of some friends, we don’t play the game for competition or anything, just for fun, we saw how you two were struggling to level up and couldn’t find a guild that would accept you, so I decided to invite you both into ours. I’m Tycho.

“That right there is Bran,” he said while pointing to a guy in some luxurious blue and black robes, and wielding a large golden staff with a large spherical ruby at the top.

“He is our magic offense in the group, and he can do a nasty amount of damage in a short time. That over there is Mia,”

He said while pointing to another person, this time a blonde ponytailed girl that had some fancy white priestess robes on, and wielded a large golden staff with a large cross at the top which had three separate golden rings, all aligned but separated in a circular ring around the cross, which the three ends of the cross into, ending at the last ring.

“And that over there, is Van,” Instead of pointing, he instead turned his head to him, as he was the last one there, it was obvious that it was him he was talking about.

He was a smaller, more petite man in some light clothing, clearly a thief or assassin type class or even a light scout class. He wore some murky colored cloth that covered his entire body except for a small opening for his eyes, on the back of his head, were two meter-long strips of the same cloth material that seemed to float behind him. He had three thin swords, katanas on his back, two in an “X” pattern and another across his back horizontally.

Tycho had a helmet that matched his armor set, but instead of wearing it, he had it in his inventory. Tycho had an exaggeratedly large sword on his back going diagonally from his right shoulder to his left hip and then a few centimeters hanging off his body. There was no sheath but instead, it just stuck to his back like two magnets, he had a grin on his face when he offered Ashen The Crystal Fire Skull. Not only to make him get stronger faster, but it would also look great with his entire outfit looking like a fire demon already. The skull was the third know supreme godly item at the time, not only making it exclusive and ridiculously valuable but also an insanely powerful item.

If Ashen knew any of this at the time he didn’t know what he'd done at the time. But all good things must come to an end, eventually, the 6 members of the guild dwindled to all but two. Mia couldn’t play as much because she had gotten married and had to take care of her family. Bran got swarmed with work and was too busy to play anymore. Van had gotten a job at a college and couldn’t play due to his time-consuming job. But Tycho, had it the worst, only the day after he left the guild, and gifted his items to Ashen and Aeyrs, like all the others had, he got into an accident and died.

But Ashen didn’t let all of their hard work go for nothing, he used their items and managed to play for nearly 22 hours every day up until the 10th anniversary. He decided he was going to honor Tycho and his friends that were gone to the ways of modern life and time consumption. He eventually left his home and went to a supermarket, a small local one, that he shopped at rarely when he left his home. While out he was going to spend some money on in-game cash when he noticed a person there looking at the card with a code on it to purchase sugarea online, so he eventually sparked a conversation.

“It’s a pretty good game, I'd suggest if you do decide to get it, to play it before midnight tonight.”

“Huh? But why midnight?”

“Sugarea gives bonuses to all players that played before a major update.”

“Really? Wow, I don’t even know how to play the game though.”

“Ah it’s simple, here, use the name Tycho, and I'll be able to friend you and teach you how to play.”

“Ah really?”

“Yeah, so hurry up! And play tonight!”

“Okay!”

The man hurried off to the counter with the little card in hand, he paid and alongside some other casual groceries, the card was put into a small white bag and he walked off. Ashen, on the other hand, had also bought a large load of food and snacks. Most of it was generic foodstuff that would fill you up rather than tasting good, like potatoes, rice, etc. He brought it home and started to play again, it was nearly 4 hours to midnight so he wanted to grind out a few more bosses then craft a few items.

Then after those four hours were up, he was transported into this world. He would sigh if he could, but instead, it sounded more like a deep pitched whistle. He teleported to the throne room, and in an instant, he was in the tallest tower in the castle, the one with the dragon head with the eyeball in it. Inside that very eyeball, was the throne room. He walked up a few stairs, and atop it were two thrones, one was a large dragon head with its tongue sticking out to act as a cousin made of extravagant materials. While the other looked more akin to a large shard of half-molten rock with spikes that protrude from the backrest upwards and outwards. The non-molten half was of a very dark gray and black while the molten half was bright orange.

He sat on the throne that was his and started to ponder what he was going to do for his magic show, as he had been pondering over an hour and a half went by, it was nearly 7:30, and he had a half-hour to think. As strange as it was for him, he didn’t feel touched in any way by what he was going to do. To all the thousands of demons and countless other monsters. He wouldn’t just attack them, he would exterminate them. Not a single person he met so far could even attempt an assassination, let alone deal any amount of damage. He settled on his plans and finalized them.

First, he would teleport to the king and entourage, then teleport them all to the mountains. Second, he would start his display of magic by using the eight basic elements in unison. He would then use spells with a wide area of effect to maximize his destructive power while using each element. Third, he would find the higher-ranking demons and either kill them or negotiate with them. Forth he would either completely demolish the entire army or take control of them. Fifth he would pressure the king into a state where he wouldn’t even think of threatening him and for him to spread the word to other nations.

The plan was destined to work, his power alone could easily destroy the world, let alone a single army form it. So he waited for about 25 minutes until Aeyrs appeared right in front of him, seemingly still traumatized over that whole maid event. He just pointed to his wrist and pointed backward with his thumb. Ashen knew what this meant, even if no other maid or guard in the room did, there were in total, about 80 guards along the walls and around 10 maids cleaning up the place. Ashen stood up and disappeared alongside Aeyrs.

In but a moment they both appeared in front of the royal capital’s castle. This time the two guards there nearly dropped their spears with the aura both Ashen and Aeyrs emitted from over 100 meters away, alongside the fact that the two guards could only see a glowing orange skull and some fire from next to it. And Aeyrs was only visible due to his aura and his glowing blue eyes, something all dragons had but differed in color.

The two guards looked ready to run away when one got the courage to ask a single word.

“N-n, N-a-me?”

“Ashen.”

Then one guard completely ran off, as fast as his armor would let him, he ran away. The other looked ever so slightly calmer after hearing his response but couldn’t stop his shaking and faltering of speech.

“J-j-j, just a-a-a se, sec, ond.”

And in a few seconds, a few people Ashen had seen before came to him to confirm his identity and one went back, after a few moments the king and about 300 others in total, including the queen, had decided to see Ashen’s magic show. Ashen would have a giant grin on his face if he had one, but still, he continued. In but a second a massive spell circle glowing in a faint blue light appeared underneath the entire group, and before any could react the were all teleported to The Dragon Eye Castle.

Ashen pointed to the side of the mountains where the show would take place. The entire group was on edge from that spell circle and now they were completely prepared to fight, but he pointed to the demon’s army that was visible and getting ready to approach the mountains. Ashen walked forward and soon eight spheres appeared in an arc above him, from his left to right it went: Fire, Water, Earth, Air, Lightning, Frost, Life, Death. And the all shone with their respective colors: Red, blue, brown, a very light green, yellow, light blue, white, black. Then they all started to expand and launched out into the field of demons and monsters. And he spoke aloud each spell name as the spell was being cast.

“Inferno, Tsunami, Earthquake, Hurricane, Thunderstorm, Blizzard, Divine Retribution, Decay Field.”

There was an uncountable amount of confusion and fear in every single one of the faces of the king’s entourage and even the king himself was nearly passed out from his shock. But that wasn’t just a display of power, he was also protecting his castle, so it worked out for him. To the army, a large red tornado of fire had started from nowhere, then a flood from nowhere. Followed by tremors in the ground and wind so fast it cut each one up like paper. Then it started to rain and strike lightning form what was a clear sky. Then all of a sudden it was as cold as the middle of winter and every single one of them started to freeze when large streaks of light rained upon them, killing most instantly and leaving the survivors to be struck by the other spells.

Then when they thought there couldn’t be anything else left, the very ground had started to steal their health from them, leaving every single demon, skeleton, zombie, and other monsters, to be completely decimated, each killed except for three survivors. That was three survivors out of an army of over 120,000 in total. And they were all very high levels, level 112, 107, 114. They were all nearly dead by that point but they survived nonetheless. An impressive feat compared to all the other creatures that died without a thought.

The king thought his life was over, his face was frozen in fear, along with all the others, except for Ashen and Aeyrs. Aeyrs was a little disappointed, the army only had 3 survivors out of 120,000? Way too few, it should have been at least a hundred for his plan to work, but alas this was also a great show of power. Ashen thought the same thing, but his plan would work, he altered it every time to think of a more impressive feat. Now it was time for the ultimate display of his strength over the elements!

“Mass Grand Raise Undead Legion!”

And at the end of his words, a massive black shadow appeared from his outstretched palm and quickly covered the ground, turning any corpse in its wake into an undead under his control. The three surviving demons were terrified, they started to heal though, and when they were able to stand they all were conflicted between running and submitting to the one who cast the spell, but he appeared to be a demon as well, and he raised all who he killed? Why would a demon do that? All three of them were completely puzzled.

Ashen on the other hand was surprised he only consumed 10,000 mana to cast all the spells. Although the entire Undead legion at his disposal would cost a sliver of his passive mana regeneration to upkeep, it didn’t even affect him enough to matter in the short or long run. The army rose in unison, going from the ground to standing in orderly ranks in a few seconds. Making the demons and the king and his guards even more terrified.

Ashen then spoke aloud, loud enough for the three remaining demons to hear but quiet enough as to not kill the king and his guards.

“Survivors of my assault, either submit or retreat, those who wish to submit will not be held responsible for invading my territory, those who don’t will gain control of the undead legion but will be considered responsible for the assault, and will be executed if you trespass here again.”

All three demons were dumbfounded, either become a servant of the most powerful demon they know of, even more so than the demon lord or gain an army and don’t return to piss him off? The level 112 and 114 demons both approached and knelt in submission while the level 107 decided to take Ashen up on his offer of the army. And Ashen held up his end of the bargain, he gave complete control over the legion to the demon, and the demon left swiftly after, followed by the now undead legion.

Ashen took a glance at the two demons, both had a rough leathery dark red skin. Both had horns, one more like a bull’s and the other a ram’s. One wore a dark gray plate armor set and the other wore robes that appeared to be made of metal. The one in proper armor had a large silver-colored sword with a bright red edge to it, and the one in robes, had a large spiked cleaver-like weapon, near bright red with heat. Both weapons were on the ground in front of their respective owners and couldn’t even scratch Ashen so he stopped caring about them.

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(Erik von Ranznedese POV)

The king was in absolute awe, shock, and disbelief, every guard was too. Even a few guards fainted. The king, having seen the tragedies of wars before, managed to barely fight off the overwhelming urge to. The king could never believe the unforeseeable massacre that this demon had committed. Every guard, and the king, wholeheartedly wanted to just run, before the demon uses the same spell on them, or the now undead demon army comes back. If they even looked at this demon, he might slaughter them all! But they stood frozen with fear, one ludicrous event after another.

Then only 3 survived, and 2 submitted and the other took away an army of undead demons! He would have to be careful with everything involving this new demon, and they had no idea about the Dragonoid. He could be just as powerful if the demon called him ‘brother’, which brought up even more questions about their relationship. It took a few minutes but the king and his guards recovered, they were still scared lifeless but were able to return to their castle with the help of another large scale teleport from Ashen.

Once inside, the king immediately went to write letters to other countries and would wait endlessly for a response. The king of the elven kingdom, Ellis Vernbush, was known for having caution and would heed his call for diplomacy with Ashen appropriately. While the king of the dwarfs, Fairn Thunderback, was known for his stubbornness, and would most likely challenge Ashen to a duel or other sorts of challenges to judge him. As much as he hated him, he still sent a letter to the beast king, Thal Waterfang, a beastmen that ruled over the various beastmen races and non-humans, it was unlikely he would help unless it was going to affect him directly.

He spent a long-time writing each letter and made sure to include as much information on Ashen as he could, even mentioning his castle and Aeyrs. He had a long sleep, as did most of the guards that we're able to, and in the morning it only got worse, as reports of a very strong demon had already been spread in most villages and towns near the Rib Cage Mountains, but would soon spread to all over the kingdom, and to the other kingdoms too.

After the king heard the reports of the demon, he knew it was Ashen. No other demon was so open about themselves that he knew of, he would have to keep an eye out for him before he does something dangerous to the kingdoms. When he went to eat his lavish feast of a breakfast with the queen, he noticed something, rather all the guards that were present last night had too. The food, while smelling delicious tasted like complete nothingness. The queen tasted the sweet and rich flavors of the eggs, bacon, and bread, while the king sat there eating like it was a chore rather than a luxury.

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(Ashen POV)

Ashen looked at Aeyrs for a moment, after he teleported the king and his guards back to their castle he had walked inside his own. He asked Aeyrs a question.

“Well, I think that went well, you?”

“Hm, Ah! Yes Indeed, T’was Splendid!” Aeyrs put exaggerated effort in his speech.

“What’s up with you?”

“I’ve taken a sudden interest in the nobility’s vocabulary, I was hoping for a chance to use it as to present us in a more sophisticated manner.”

“That would be somewhat helpful, but you kinda sound like a douche, just saying.”

“My, oh my, what foul language you use! Can’t you be a dear and at least act in a civilized manner like me?”

“I’ll slap that ‘nobility’ right out of you if you don’t shut up!”

“Okay! I’ll stop, it was annoying to do anyways.”

“Good, now, about the magic show?”

“Well, as I said, it was an immense show of power and now that we have two demons from the army, we can know more information about it.”

“True, I'll have to interrogate them at a later point.”

Ashen thought for a moment, then it hit him. The entire reason for having Eldrick and Kurtz was to collect information, and he never did that! He made a mental note to facepalm whenever he got a real face, then he mentally asked Vron if he had any information.

“No father, I barely have any information on the geographical location of Arlen. I am sorry for failing your expectations father!”

“It’s alright, besides, as long as nothing supernatural happens, we’ll be fine, we can always collect information later.”

“I thank you for sparing me, father!”

And with that, Ashen made a small list of things to collect information on, from general location, to politics, and even some merchant trade routes and locations. He wanted to know as much about this world as possible before something happened that he couldn’t handle. He thought for a moment as he revised his list, it had nearly forty objectives but could be done over a matter of months if done correctly. He thought about what would come in the future, and how he would continue his campaign in this world.