An overcast grey light, shimmering with light, blotted out both the sun and the sky. The ominous sight was more than enough to make Dia feel a touch of trepidation and fear, but she knew that indulging these emotions would simply worsen their current situation.

“Right now, we’re in deep trouble,” Nero muttered, his words punctured by his regular, firm steps.

“The fact that you, a tetra-folder, is saying that, just drives it home,” Risti replied. “Mind explaining?”

“We’re like fish in a barrel,” Nero replied. “The enemy is probably more than ready to wipe out the rest of this county, and we aren’t even at the starting line. Other than a trace of the culprit’s mana, which could be disguised, there’s nothing we can move on from.”

“Do you think the count has been compromised?” Risti asked."

“I hope not,” said Nero, “which is why we’re heading there to begin with. We’ll need to be very careful, though. Infiltration isn’t my strong suit, and I’m sure none of you guys are experts in sneaking around either.”

“I’m a fighter,” Dia replied. “I can’t sneak around for nuts.”

“And you can think of me as a means to scout from afar,” Risti added.

“Unfortunately, most of my skills deal with persuading people and tricking them.” Nero paused. “We’re all quite useless in this situation…well, I suppose Dia can at least cleave a way out for us if we’re ever surrounded by enemies. Uh, how good are you?”

“If need be, I can lay waste to a division of conventional infantry,” Dia replied, thinking about the shieldbearer phalanxes that the Grandis Empire used. “I have two skills that can wipe out an entire city and an entire army respectively too, even on the offensive.”

“No preparations needed, then.” Nero narrowed his eyes, a sign that he had picked up on the last three words. “I assume that they’re all level one or something, then.”

“You’re right there,” Dia replied. “They’re all level one…I don’t get the chance to use them much.”

“Any skillstrips or skillsticks?”

“I’ve made a few skillsticks, but not too many,” Dia replied. “These skills are designed to wipe out entire cities and armies. I can’t make too many in case they fall into the wrong hands.”

“…I hate to say this, but I think the two of us should carry one skillstick each, in case something happens to you,” said Nero. “Don’t worry, we’ll return them to you after we make it out of this damned place.”

Dia nodded and took out two skillsticks. “This one here contains the Sword Fall skillstick. When used, it summons a giant sword that will destroy everything and everyone that is not a tetra-folder upon impact. The radius is five hundred metres, but if you empower it with an entire mana circuit, you can increase the resulting radius to three-thousand and thirty-three metres.”

She handed it to Nero, and then passed the second skillstick to Risti. “This skillstick contains Domain of Swords. When used, thirty-three thousand illusory swords will appear high above the sky. Anyone not designated as an ally through your thoughts will be targeted by these swords, which carry the destructive power of a tri-folder using three mana circuits’ worth of mana.”

“…Just going to put this out here,” said Nero, “but these two aren’t normal skills, are they?”

“They’re ultimate skills of the Sword family,” Risti replied, using a term that rarely, if ever, was used in everyday conversation.

“Yeah.” Dia didn’t elaborate much. “Don’t use them randomly, and Risti, the control method for Domain of Swords is not that different from your Skyward Eye. You should be able to use it to its fullest potential, although you can also let it auto-target enemies.”

Risti looked at Dia. “Does the princess also have Domain of Swords?”

“Yes, her sixth skill that no one knows about is precisely Domain of Swords.” Dia smiled and told the truth.

“You really do have the same skills…” Risti grinned. “Now I’m pumped up. Incidentally, can I focus all the swords on the same target?”

“You can try, but…uh, you know. It’s probably hard to do that,” Dia replied.

“Hard?” Risti echoed. “What, you’ve never used it before?”

“Once. Never had a reason to after that. It’s one of those skills that you can’t dispel. Once it activates, you need to designate a target, or it’ll do the designating itself. Using this in a city is pretty much massacring them,” Dia replied. “And to make matters worse, the target zone is huge…you’ll understand if you ever got around to using it.”

She thought about Risti’s Skyward Eye. It was basically the same thing, except that every single lifeform highlighted by the skill would be shortly torn to pieces by an attack that carried three mana circuits’ worth of power. Since there was no way Nero could rehearse using the skill, Dia had opted to give the skillstick for Domain of Swords to Risti instead, since she was used to Skyward Eye.

“Risti,” said Nero, “do you have any trump cards for combat too? Skills that can do something other than looking at things from afar?”

“I’m a professional spy,” Risti replied. “So no. I am a reasonably good swordswoman, though.”

“The only thing going for me is the innate power of a tetra-folder, some complimentary training by a church knight, and my many skills designed to beguile the mind.” Nero clicked his teeth. “If it comes down to it and Count Daybreak is compromised or an enemy, I’ll forcibly retire his current consciousness and force one more friendly to us out.”

“That’s scary.”

“The Lord has powers beyond human imagination,” Nero replied. “His Gaze is the weakest skill in His repertoire; the others are more and more…reality-defying.”

Dia found herself at her loss, unsure of what to say. Telling him that she looked forward to his performance was implicitly hinting that she wanted to see some trouble; dismissing the whole thing by saying that it would be best if they didn’t need to bust those trump cards out might come off as a bit dismissively.

Fortunately, she didn’t need to answer.

“You should tell us more about them, then,” said Risti. “It’ll be best if we know what you can do and what you can’t do.”

“Hmm…” Nero folded his arms. “I suppose this is a good place to take a rest at anyway. Let’s get some meat broth going for lunch.”

The three of them had decided that returning with depleted mana circuits was a bad idea, so they had been walking back to the cities ever since. They hadn’t had a chance to eat something yet, so meat broth sounded good too.

“Alright, I suppose we should do that,” said Risti. “Dia, go make a pot with that rock over there.”

“Got it.” Dia unsheathed her sword and approached the rock Risti had pointed out. Cooking implements were large and unwieldly; other than the magical pot that Claud and Lily told her about, she had never come across something designed for outdoor cooking on a large scale before.

Therefore, they usually resorted to carving nearby rocks with Dia’s swordplay. By coating mana around her sword, Dia could easily carve through normal rock, but neither Risti nor Nero had the mana control needed to do such a thing.

Nero, in particular, had blown up a few rocks the first few times he tried.

Before long, Dia had finished carving out the pot, just as Nero got a fire going. Risti took a little while to return with a waterbag, and without much ceremony, she dumped it into the makeshift pot, which was already heating up above the fire, after scouring the insides clean with mana.

“Done. Let’s get cracking on the food, then.” Dia took out a slab of dried meat from her backpack and slid it into the pot, an action the others mirrored. A salting and spicing session followed as they tossed pepper, other spices and even more salt into the pot, and then waited for the mix to boil.

“While we’re waiting for this to boil, I suppose I should talk about my skills.” Nero looked at the pot, before licking his lips. “All of my skills are from the same family; they’re given by the Black God, and they specialise in affecting one’s emotions and reasons.”

He paused. “I want to highlight that they do not actually override someone’s free will, alright? The Church of the Black God respects the free will of others, something that some…people try to attack us on.”

“Got it.”

“Won’t pick on you for that one,” Dia added.

“Great. We’re on the same page, then. Okay, other than the customary Spirit Clone Descent, the first skill is Black God’s Gaze, which is pretty much an intimidation skill with extra effects. Like the Gazes of the other Coloured Gods, this has a suppressive effect on those in my vision, and then adds ramping fear to it,” said Nero. “The next one is Black God’s Words, which…”

Dia listened on intently, memorising these details and committing them to mind.