Everything sounded distant, muted, like waking up and hearing a TV show but all of your senses had been dulled. It was this haze where your mind wasn’t quite sure what was happening, where you were, and you didn’t even know your own name. Usually, everything would come rushing back within a few seconds.

But Alexander took much longer than that. More like ten seconds. More like a minute. He didn’t know. That was sort of the point with these sensations: your sense of time were fucked. It could be a minute or an hour, but he might die a second later regardless.

His vision was blurry, his eyes irritated—they’ve been irritated for a while, actually. His contacts were probably dirty beyond cleaning, needed to get new ones somehow.

His head hurt like a bad hangover, reminded him of the times when he’d gotten blacked out drunk once or twice. Gave him a good lesson about adulthood: do everything in moderation, like drinking. It was bad enough that Althea took after his combativeness (or was that generally a Shen thing?).

Althea…

Alexander shot wide open, coughing, hacking up dirt or whatever the hell was in his mouth. He keeled over, on his hands and knees, violently trying to vomit out his lungs. Blood came out, throat felt raw. He cursed; it came out broken and jumbled and weak.

Fucking Tewfik. First it had taken down an entire Pillar, now causing earthquakes. Just his fucking luck, nothing could be simple to kill. A literal god would be preferable. Did the earthquake hit everywhere else though? or was it just where they were? No matter how you’d cut it, the eastern front was completely devastated beyond the point of recovery. The roads were shit and nothing was going to plan.

“What the fuck…” he croaked. He must’ve said that about a hundred times at this point. This entire operation could be summed up in those three words: what the fuck.

Alexander attempted to stand, stumbled, the world felt dizzy, fell to his knees—one more time!—no, he fell again, coughing, only able to move halfway between limping and crawling. He didn’t know where he was going. Smoke was everywhere, the Sungrazers inflicted a permanent night over Ordo, so unless he had night vision, he was effectively blind.

Well, blinder. He rubbed his eyes.

Where were the others? Leona and Althea had protection; they were wearing the [True Protector’s Amulet] which will protect them from anything immediately fatal. Once it was broken, all bets were off. Or Vernon? Was he able to protect himself or stay calm? Shit, what about Damien? He lost an arm from stray shrapnel, but he acted like it was a Tuesday.

Alexander wished he had that kind of attitude towards life: so it goes.

He tripped on something hard, heavy, a thick block of concrete maybe? Either way, the end result was the same: he crashed, back banging against metal. A car. A civilian car that’d been hollowed out from the devastation lately. Alexander reached up, found the windowsill and hissed from accidentally stabbing his palm with several needle-like glass shards.

“Fuck…” he hissed, picking out the glass from his palm one-by-one, shedding a tear each time. Worse than picking out splinters.

As he reached up again—

Something red came down, somewhere near and something big.

The air ripped apart. A chunk of debris smacked him against the shoulder, and he folded forward, protecting his head as everything seemed to be out for his blood. The car tilted over, pelted with shards of rocks and concrete, but thankfully nothing slipped through.

The System dinged, automatically opening a blue screen that gave off little light. Wasn’t like Black Paladin Station where it was just darkness. The smoke obscured too much. Including the contents.

Alexander squinted but couldn’t read out any of the names. He hoped Alba wasn’t on the list.

Something had banged against the car, a muffled voice. Fear shot across Alexander and he instinctively reached for his [Steel Dagger], which’d been kept on his belt (that cost way too damn much). But a glimmer of logic came over: couldn’t be monsters, only allies. A dormant instinct from Hangzhou?

A familiar man looked over the car’s hood. “Alex? Shit, we gotta stop meeting like this, man.”

“Kinda hard not to,” he said with a pained chuckle.

Victor helped Alexander to his feet with an unflattering “C’mon, lazy bastard!”, hoisting him up relatively easily in part due to his Power. Then they walked through the unknown, as odd lights brightened between the smoke-cracks, and the ominous sound of warfare creaked. Alexander wasn’t quite sure that the noise was but none of it seemed good.

Suddenly, the smoke cleared abnormally fast, as though being sucked up by a vacuum. Glad to know that Slayers were still out there, fighting, working to remove burden after burden. Alexander could finally see again, albeit his vision was blurry. He couldn’t read signs across the street, but at least he could see Victor’s ugly face again.

The world looked just as miserable when he last remembered. Smoke columns trickled to the clouds, vehicles were flipped over and had a dark bark to them, bodies and body parts (the same old, depressingly enough), and the buildings were picked hollow like a pack of hyenas had come through. It was a repeat of before the mass artillery strike: both the sight and people trying to retrieve casualties, albeit more dreary and depressing.

This wasn’t the Ordo that Alexander was fond of. No, the place where he’d made memories with those he loved.

The System had told him that his party suffered no deaths. Thank God.

“How’s the others?” Alexander asked. “Are they…” He gestured with his shoulders.

“A1’s alright,” Victor answered, yet there was a strange hollowness in his words. “Kaiya got incapictated though. Professor Saad too.”

“What about Deon?”

Victor didn’t answer.

Alexander stiffened and shut his eyes.

They made it to a corner-store where the shelves had been thrown out the already-broken windows to make room for the casualties inside. Near the freezers lining the wall, a healer had her hands pressed against a Slayer’s chest, who was missing a leg, chanting something and having a golden glow to her. On the opposite end, Kaiya and Chunhua were there—they were alive, thank God. But Kaiya had been injured, evident by how half her head was wrapped in gauze, and Chunhua was there, holding her hand and whispering comforting words to her.

You knew it was bad when Slayers needed practical medical treatment. It meant that the injuries were severe enough that [Healing Potions] couldn’t do the job in time, and there were too little healers and too many injured.

(Later, Alexander would find out that Victor was the one who’d found Deon, having been crushed by rubble and passed due to his injuries.)

“This way,” Victor urged, a slight pain in his voice, jerking his head towards the backroom where more people were at.

Going through the doorway (the door itself was nowhere to be seen), Alexander was simultaneously relieved and ashamed. His team was huddled together at the walls, disheveled, who came literally out of a war.

Althea was the first to notice him. Hair was frayed, blood stained her clothes, eyes dim but the light was still there. She stood, revealing a couple of empty [Healing Potions] rolling on the ground.

Damien was next. That one-armed bastard was in the same state as Althea’s. His robes had been torn in multiple places, revealing his casual clothes underneath, and for once he looked partly disturbed. Or maybe he was frustrated. But alive, relatively unscathed, and focused.

Vernon wasn’t so lucky. No clear injuries marked him but he was lying on the ground, mouth open, muttering nonsense words. Althea explained that he’d been thrown hard against a wall, and he didn’t get up since. Due to having a low Constitution, things like that were major concerns of injury.

For all of them.

Like Leona, who was also on the ground with bandages wrapped around her chest and part of her head. She was found partly buried underneath rubble, rescued by some of the juniors in Systemic Works and was brought here. The healers had gotten to her and said she’ll recover. Hope to God that they were telling the truth.

“Hey handsome…” Leona said weakly as Alexander approached her, taking her hand in his own.

Alexander didn’t see the [True Protector’s Amulet] around her neck and grimaced. “You need to stop getting hurt, you know.”

“Not my fault this time…”

“I know.” Alexander exhaled, carefully, to calm himself. “I know.”

Someone cleared his throat. Victor, he was still here.

He had a screen up, looking out the nearest window. “We got teleporters coming. C’mon, let’s get outta this shithole.”

~~~

Professor Baek Hei-ran experienced Hell within an hour, maybe a little more than that. She had watched her students be blown apart from Pereyra’s missiles, had watched as they were cut down by Tewfik, crushed by airborne debris caused by the following wind pressure—and had stood by when an earthquake took them. Crushed them. Buried them. She had personally seen Kastellanos’s, Ichiken’s, and Carvalho’s corpses, and…

“Is it…that terrible?” Saad asked, coughing out blood. His gemstones laid on the ground beside him, the hues flashing in and out like a dying bulb.

Hei-ran’s expression must’ve given it away. There was a hole in Saad’s stomach, an injury that would’ve killed any normal man on the spot. For a high-ranker, well, it’d still kill them without high-level healing magic. It’d simply kill them slower. Long enough where you could have a cigarette and think about where you went wrong.

So she said nothing.

“So I’m next…” Saad’s head tilted downwards, recognizing the wound he’d been dealt. He nodded, and nodded again, going through the steps until he finally accepted it. “In another world… I would live that life exactly as I have lived this one…”

“I’m sorry, Saad.” Hei-ran kneeled there as her friend shut his eyes and took his last breaths, passed on towards the next world, or whatever afterlife awaited the citizens of the meaningless multiverse.

[EXPEDITION STATUS]

DECEASED: Adjo

The earthquake had devastated nearly all sectors—not just the eastern side. At least a thousand were dead total throughout the conflict with the highest estimate being double that. Triple. More had been wounded, attempting to evacuate the battlefield but everything was smoke and nowhere seemed safe.

Pereyra and Tewfik had been moved to the west thanks to Archknell and other high-rankers, though that meant the general area was gravely at risk from collateral damage, where the only two options were retreating or seeking shelter, hoping you wouldn’t get hit.

Currently, just about the entire city was coming here: troops to aid the evacuation process and additional Slayers to maintain the perimeter and aid the high-rankers in combat. Even the Guild Masters, though Sage had said it'd take a long while for them to get here.

Hopefully, it’d mean the battle could be won.

Hei-ran exhaled, stood, and pushed down the despair that was growing inside her chest. She was going to grieve later, but not now. Not now, she had a job to do.

Accompanying her was Team Luster and Myriad, or Professor Mira Cloutier. They were the last two class administrators left of the Combative Program—how depressing was that?

Hidden suddenly appeared into view from above, descending down a vertical wall using friction. No doubt a skill’s work. She leapt off in a rather showboating fashion, sensed the dreary atmosphere and cleared her throat as though in respect. “I’ve marked out the path for us. I’m sending you the route now.”

Jury nodded, having a screen up that must’ve been the [Map]. The System automatically updated the [Map] if there were any changes, though infrequently. In times like these, you had to update them yourself. “I got it. Everyone ready to head off? Problem? Montana?”

Problem nodded, having his hood down revealing his youth, yet having striking maturity in his snake-like eyes. “Mhm.”

A heavy slam rocked pebbles, and armor clinked together. “Yeah,” began Montana, “let’s kill ‘em.”

“I’m ready too.” Cloutier glanced at Hei-ran, exchanged sympathy, and turned back to Jury.

Jury took a deep breath in, muttered something, maybe a personal prayer, and exhaled. “Alright then. On me.”

And so they went.

On the way to the battle location, Hei-ran had decided to move across the rooftops to gain a better visual. Although her vision was limited due to the pervasive smog, she could roughly make out the scene.

The high-rankers were pacing themselves, performing two objectives at once: deal damage to the Sungrazers while simultaneously pushing them to other locations, presumably where more Slayers were waiting or somewhere less densely populated, or both. It was a similar strategy to what they’d used in the demesne: using the area’s layout to place Slayers in strategic locations, inflicting a variety of attacks to keep the Comets on their toes.

Here, most if not all of the high-rankers were exhausted. Hei-ran certainly was. They had to pace themselves to avoid burning out. Like with Levin for example, distantly seen inside a building’s interior, resting against a counter heaving with several healers by her side. The only reason Hei-ran recognized it was her was from the lightning weakly sparking off her body.

Or Archknell, sitting on a rooftop. His left arm was torn open, revealing the bone underneath; and a painfully large gash marked his chest. Netherstring hung in the air, floating like kelp in the sea, and threads weaved into his flesh, slowly stitching himself back together. Hei-ran didn’t know Archknell could do that but it looked awfully painful, even for an SS-Rank.

Why? He could simply call a healer or use a potion? No, actually. Hei-ran reminded herself: Archknell was too stubborn for his own good. He was the kind of man who’d deny immediate aid if it meant others could receive it sooner.

“I’m going on ahead!” Montana said over voice chat.

Something similar to a jet engine boomed. Montana rushed by Hei-ran with fire coming out of rents inside the back of his armor, propelling him forward as his slumbering axe was hefted over his shoulder, aflame. Problem and Jury shouted something, a word of advice, but their words were drowned out by his combustion.

Montana had flown directly towards Pereyra, as fast as trains, ramming the guillotine-like blade into one of its cracked, vulnerable plates. It got dented, the crack expanded, revealing a tiny hole that leaked cosmic ichor.

Pereyra howled, surprised to see its old friend from Black Paladin, and the plate gave off a nasty red concussive blast. Yet Montana anticipated this and fire came from his feet, sending him upwards. Then, once aptly high enough his back flared and he slammed down hard onto the Comet, the impact looking and sounding like an explosion, a wave of fire radiating outward.

It had enough force that just for a moment, Pereyra wavered, every one of its eyes blinking rapidly like sand had gotten into them. It dropped by a foot or two.

Montana stood perilously on its “head”, balancing similarly to a cowboy on a bull. Steam puffed through the holes in his helmet and he raised his axe again.

Until someone called, loudly, that the Cutter had made a full swing.

Hei-ran hissed, stopped her advance, sliding her feet against an ashy rooftop.

A pressure arc ripped through the street. No matter how many times Hei-ran had seen it, she was always surprised at how fast it moved. It made sense considering it was nothing more than pressurized wind, but not even she believed she could avoid it. Unscathed, at least. So for Montana, who was high-A, unless he had any maneuverability skills, he’d be caught. Pereyra too but surely it had some sort of defense.

Until something had erected in the middle of the road. It was an exact replica of a damaged building where the roof was caved in and so had the northern wall. Projection magic, Hei-ran recognized, and this one was pink in color. The pressure arc crashed into the projection, shattered it instantly but the projection gave enough resistance that the following wind had little effect on the immediate surroundings.

A woman fell to her knees, holding her chest.

“Cloutier, with me!” cried Hei-ran, diverting course towards Tewfik. The rest of Luster engaged Pereyra alongside a few Slayer Teams.

Rend, a Martials Head Officer and a powerful esper, was one of the high-rankers dealing with Tewfik. He bled from the eyes, ears, and nose. Psychic energy overuse was a gross sight to see; Hei-ran hated whenever Kaiya suffered from it.

Running on empty, Rend haphazardly hurled car after car as though they were baseballs, each sent fast enough that they disintegrated into scrap upon impact. A sedan, delivery truck, even an armored vehicle that’d been cleaved into two. He pushed Tewfik back, kept it on its pointed-toes while others attacked from afar, riddling it with bolts and magic and bullets.

With Cloutier behind, Hei-ran leapt onto a rooftop where the southern end had fallen in. A Slayer Team was there—correction, they were just an aggregate of shielders, finding safety up here, relatively far from the fight.

One shielder with an absurdly long red cape was firing green-projected arrows at people, giving them a shine upon impact. Another was furiously typing something on a blue screen with two strange levitating drones beside her.

A young man wearing a crescent moon mask noticed the two high-rankers and approached, bowing briefly in respect—must’ve been really young if he did that.

“Here.” He touched both women.

[You have been applied with a Minor Shield of Spirits!]

“It’s weak but it’ll still give you a single layer of protection. I—?!”

The ground rumbled, and the building shook.

Tewfik had its arc-blade embedded in the wall of a building, but it had just cleanly cut through the one before.

It was falling.

[Skill Activation: Psycho Motion Zero]

The air rippled, distorted. Caused by a shockwave that was almost imperceptible to the naked eye. Hei-ran flinched thinking it was a new trick devised by the Comets, like the paralyzing attack that Pereyra had or another bout of wind from the other one. No, not this time. This was caused by a Slayer.

Because the street had been frozen in time, or at least that was what it’d appeared at first. Papers floated in the air, vehicles were lifted off of their wheels, and most importantly the falling building was stuck, tilted over like a rollercoaster on the hill, caught in an endless, agonizing anticipation.

Everyone gawked at the sight. The shielder with the large cape was awestruck seeing his arrow hold itself in the air as though held by invisible puppet strings. He poked it. Didn’t move.

Rend. Hei-ran remembered now: this was one of his skills that he’d been practicing: [Psycho Motion Zero]. Using psionic energy, he could stop the motion of nearly all objects in a given area (barring exceptions that Hei-ran wasn’t so clear on, like for example herself, who could still move). But it had one drawback: it could only be actively maintained.

Rend was on his knees, teeth strained. Blood gushed from all visible ortifices.

He wasn’t going to last forever.

[EXPEDITION STATUS]

DECEASED: Hiro Hero

INCAPICTATED: Montana

Sounded like the other half was experiencing difficulties, but Hei-ran couldn’t focus on them.

Tewfik scoffed. “Middling trick!” it said and freed its arc-blade, debris popping out and immediately freezing.

Cloutier shouted, “Take cover—! Eh?”

A pressure arc was frozen in the air, towards Rend. It hadn’t moved more than a foot from Tewfik.

“Oh,” said Tewfik, sounding somewhat amused by this.

It craned its abstract head towards the Slayers here, stationed on rooftops and windows and on the street. The Slayers looked back, equally perplexed.

Tewfik began cutting at the air, solidifying wind.

“OPEN FIRE!” ordered a Slayer with quite an authoritative voice.

Every Slayer used whatever ranged attacks they had; some were even desperately throwing large chunks of concrete over the rooftops as if it’d achieve anything. It was the oddest sight seeing so many projectiles hang in the air like dumb birds, like time had actually frozen.

And when time resumes and physics return, everything, simultaneously, will be activated. Including Tewfik’s.

“Cloutier,” Hei-ran called to her, “pull Rend out as soon as the skill wears off! I’ll negate the attacks!”

Cloutier nodded and Hei-ran inhaled, drawing power from within her Krait. A soothing coolness washed over her like a gentle tide, and her body became water. But not the one found in the sea, but of a lake’s, having glittery jewels dazzling beneath the surface.

[Honor Exhibition: Fairy of Rushing Storms]

The transformation was possible due to her [Honor], [Fairy of Rushing Storms], where on an expedition about eight years ago she reckoned, she’d made a pact with a dying yet illustrious water fairy, who had a romantic ideal of adventure. In order to obtain water magic on the same level as divinity, Hei-ran had to find all that was beautiful in the world.

As a manipulator—someone who controlled pre-existing elements—the largest difficulty was finding the element itself. With [Fairy of Rushing Storms], it automatically provided water with little cost, thus making her superior to the average conjuror, who did create elements from thin air but had to expend large amounts of mana doing so.

Tewfik was on the move, skittering around the frozen area to stack pressure arcs at various locations and angles, thus inflicting the most amount of damage. For most places more than one arc was laid, which didn’t make much sense considering the absoluteness that the conceptual power had.

Slayers reacted, evacuating from the rooftops, hopping down, carried by their allies, preemptively lifting forcefields.

And Hei-ran chased after the Cutter.

[Skill Activation: Icelake of the Hunt]

[Icelake of the Hunt] was an enhancement skill that’d been mixed with fae magic, turning her manipulations into hard ice and having enough durability to mitigate the Cutter and hopefully dampen the wind.

Every individual pressure arc was encased in a block of frozen, glittering water. Hei-ran’s waterborne flight left a swimming trail like a tadpole’s tail, forming an interconnected web of ice spread out across the motionless expanse.

An indignant cry scratched her ears (or whatever she used to hear in this form). Tewfik had abandoned its assault and decided to cut the woman down, lunging off a building and leaving a crater in its wake, debris floating. After all, it could still move its own arc-blade. And even as a blob of water Hei-ran could still be killed.

The gray arc-blade swiped across the air and Hei-ran bounded back, crashed and scattered as she hit a floating concrete block, inches away from touching the static pressure arc. She bucked around to the left, swam over another swipe, weaved under the third, fast and slippery like eels.

She emerged a fair bit above its head, solidifying herself where her upper half regained her human form with a bluish, sparkling tint. Slamming both hands together, a white flood of fae-water drenched Tewfik for a moment, then hardened. Turned into the [Icelake of the Hunt].

Its head and shoulders were trapped inside, immobile; a normal human would quickly die from the lack of oxygen. Obviously this was no human.

Before the Comet thought about breaking free, the rest of its body was encased in the same ice, trapped motionless alongside any pressure arcs it’d manifested during this time.

[EXPEDITION STATUS]

INCAPICTATED: Rend

[Psycho Motion Zero] ended.

Hei-ran tried for a gasp but she couldn’t even take a whole breath. A cacophony of puzzling, terrifying sensations were thrown at her as though men had taken cattle prods to poke at her brain. She got slammed into a building, crashed through every floor, down through concrete and dirt until hitting the basement.

[Minor Shield of Spirits has been broken!]

It was a weak shield. Did little to help.

She groaned, pain cracking through every part of her body, forced out of her water form. Above her, the moonlight shone through the hole she’d made; more importantly, the chaotic chorus of lights.

[EXPEDITION STATUS]

DECEASED: Regal

DECEASED: Long Shot

DECEASED: Franklin

INCAPICTATED: Koala Bear

INCAPICTATED: Jarl King

DECEASED: Grandeur

INCAPICTATED: Killer Humor

DECEASED: Gibbons

DECEASED: Ecstasy

Hei-ran hissed. The [Icelakes] couldn’t protect everyone.

She allowed herself the bitter indulgence of a freeing scream, knowing no one would hear her above the pandemonium outside. And that was where her vulnerability ended, and she returned to the Hei-ran that was a Slayer—Gul.

Hei-ran rose, back aching from the fall but as an S-Rank, these incidents were inconvenient at most. (At lower ranks, getting launched into walls and buildings meant severe injury or even death.)

Her lower half turned into water, she flung herself through the hole and felt the warm smoke prickling at her exposed skin. Below, the block had been obliterated from everything really. Pieces of ice were scattered across the streets, evidence that the [Icelakes] mitigated the damage somewhat. But not enough. Not good enough.

Tewfik had been pushed to the west, further from Pereyra.

Hei-ran checked the other front: Problem’s ritual magic was seen blasting black beams at the Watcher, and a member from Legends Guild (given how a gaudy L was stamped onto his shoulder-plate) had an enlarged, plasma sword in his hands several times taller than his height, waving it around effortlessly as though it was weightless. Jury joined him, with her clones, imbuing aether into her [Arbiter].

She muttered a soft prayer for them and rushed towards her battle, where more had joined the fray. Tewfik was on the move, jumping from roof to roof, creating holes with every leap. An Arabian man with glasses made some gestures with his hands. A black wall appeared in front of the Comet, and Tewfik slammed against it. The wall cracked, warped backwards slightly, and another wall came in from above.

Tewfik lifted its arms as the wall came down fast. It got flattened, crushed against the roof. Now it was a matter of who would break first: the roof itself or Tewfik?

The answer was obvious.

The roof gave. Tewfik disappeared into the building’s interior but Hei-ran was able to catch glimpses through the open windows. Or the dust blowing out of them floor-by-floor, until reaching the bottom level and pushing into the basement below. Just like she had.

A shout came from the Arabian Slayer, towards two: one was lobbing purple fireballs into the building, their trajectories controlled somehow, and the other had two shoulder-mounted machine guns firing white-colored bullets.

Whatever coordination they had, it didn’t come fast enough. A pressure arc tore through the building’s front like an ugly scar and crashed into a building across the street, where at least five were nearby.

Surprisingly the arc didn’t cut straight though—was it getting weaker?—but it had done enough structural damage for the upper half to slant over. The last pillars lasted for all but a few seconds, then collapse.

[EXPEDITION STATUS]

DECEASED: Terrorize

DECEASED: Lion

INCAPICTATED: Stein

Tewfik leapt onto the street triumphantly despite its condition. For God-knows-how-long, it’d endured at least an hour of straight combat from a couple hundred different Slayers at minimum where many were capable of hurt. Tewfik was bleeding so much that it was impossible to have this much fluids in its body let alone act his energetic, but nothing about this bastard made sense. Nothing did.

Hei-ran raised her hands only for a flash of white to stumble onto the field.

[Skill Activation: Myriad Summons - Loup du Nord]

The spectral head of a white wolf phased through several buildings as large as a roaming giant, with every dancing lock of fur about the size of a fully grown man. Compared to Tewfik? Even for the Cutter's enormous size compared to the average human, it was like an ant compared to the [Loup du Nord], one of Cloutier’s summons.

Tewfik was swallowed whole before it could even react. The [Loup du Nord] thrashed, keeping the Cutter dazed so it didn’t have time to perform a full swing. The summon rammed himself against adjacent buildings, “hopped” up and down, crashed against the street over and over, making his way down the block.

Reaching a collapsed building, the [Loup du Nord] simply plowed through and kept going.

“Hei-ran!” cried Cloutier, who stood on the roof to her left. “We need to take Tewfik further down!”

Hei-ran looked down the street and knew exactly what her colleague was planning. “Alright!” She took a deep breath. “EVERYONE! EVACUATE FROM THE STREET!”

And she floated down onto the road. Ahead of her, the [Loup du Nord] was rampaging through, but it’d be a matter of time before Tewfik broke out. Here I go.

[Skill Activation]

In front of her was the same divine water, blessed by that gorgeous fairy.

Divine Water

[Shinsoo]

[Shinsoo] was simply a skill to manipulate water. Using [Fairy of Rushing Storms] to generate the water, this was the perfect synergy for her.

“Break,” she said, and the water rushed out.

Like the time when a portal had opened and flooded several blocks, killing and wounding many. This too was a flood but one she had complete control over. It didn’t leak into any of the alleyways or through torn interiors, but straight ahead, forward, pushed by her guiding hands faster than any jet could fly.

It collected any debris, quickly becoming a hazardous river that you’d find in any typhoons or flash floods.

A pressure arc shot out of the [Loup du Nord]’s skull and destroyed the summon instantly, but by then it was too late. Tewfik was struck, swept up by the flood and caught in the chaotic tides, buried underneath the detritus.

All the way to the point of interest, where Cloutier wanted.

It was a sinkhole, one that Tewfik had created when it struck at the earth and caused seismic earthquakes to rattle Ordo for kilometers beyond, killing so many here and most likely causing more deaths outside of the battle itself.

Now, with any luck, the sinkhole will be its grave.

With Cloutier there to shut the casket.

Mira Cloutier was an Ordoian-French woman, having lived in Ordo for most of her life. Her [Honor] was [La Femme Nantaise], or The Woman of Nantes, The Nantes Woman. Years ago in Nantes, a breakthrough had occurred with Cloutier present. She single-handedly fought against the invading monsters and prevented the breakthrough from escalating into an outbreak.

The System rewarded her with this [Honor], granting her increased potency from any of her summons. It was an [Honor] that’d been gained simply and had a simple effect; oftentimes, in Hei-ran’s experience, the skills with the most mundane powers were the most devastating, as long as they were in the right hands with the right mind.

[Skill Activation: Myriad Summons - Guivre]

From the sinkhole a gargantuan serpent rose bearing a draconic head. A wingless dragon, and it breathed a condensed, sickly green breath that killed any foliage.

The [Guivre] opened his maws, spotted the Comet struggling in the rampaging river. The summon hissed. In one graceful motion he dove and swallowed Tewfik just like the [Loup du Nord] had, taking it into the sinkhole.

And the rest of the water came, creating a waterfall and filling the hole.

Cloutier pressed her hands together and summoned several more [Guivres] from the sinkhole’s edges. And they dove into the chasm, into the murky, polluted waters, to end Tewfik.

[Skill Activation: Myriad Summons - Combustion]

Hei-ran didn’t know what exactly happened in the sinkhole. She stopped when she felt her job was adequately done—controlling this much water was intensive.

But she knew that Cloutier had used [Combustion]. It wasn’t a summon but rather an ability that affected summons: whenever she desired, Cloutier could dispel her minions in a grand explosion.

The sinkhole had a white glow, and a geyser of dark water spewed into the air.

Hei-ran smiled. Maybe this would be it—

[EXPEDITION STATUS]

DECEASED: Hidden

INCAPICTATED: King of Clubs

Hidden?!

Hei-ran spun around and her jaw dropped.

~~~

Systemic Works was finally leaving. Alexander didn’t know the final tally. Really, he didn’t want to know. This operation was a disaster; they’d underestimated the Sungrazers’ power and that was when they assumed the worst.

Jokes on them for being too unimaginative.

Because the Comets were pushed westward, tons of soldiers came into the area to begin the recovery process, trying to get as many people out of here as fast as they could. There was no telling if or when the fuckers could come back.

Then, the teleporters popped into existence.

With some help, Systemic Works was taken outside alongside hundreds of others, where they wouldn't be endangered by unstable buildings around them.

The teleporters couldn’t teleport everybody immediately due to natural energy restraints. Thus they had to prioritize: wounded first, then the rest. Some teleporters were innovative, Alexander saw, where they made portable teleport markers (like the ones you’d see in a game) hooked up to some sort of battery. Others had a reusable ritual set up or other fancy means.

Leona, Damien, and Vernon were put into the “need help right fucking away” crowd alongside several members of Systemic Works, like Kaiya.

It was a slow process. The teleporters allocated here were too little, about seven. Sounded like a lot until you realized that there were hundreds here and hundreds more coming in. They had to deal with the recent arrivals as well, where some required immediate aid and thus immediate teleportation (if their body could handle it).

Alexander sighed. “We might have to take a truck or something.”

Chunhua nodded. “There are too many hurt and too less teleporters.”

“Ugh.” Victor kicked the ground and crouched. Deon’s death was burned into his eyes, Alexander could tell.

Althea tugged her brother’s sleeve. “Hey uh… Did we… Did we do okay?“

As okay as we were able. “Yeah. You did great. Shit... God, shit like this happens.” Like losing an arm. “Don’t worry about it, alright? Don’t worry.” You did more than I ever could. You’re a better person than I am.

She didn’t say anything else.

Alexander stared at the sky, the false night, counting smoke stacks and stars. He felt small again. Insignificant. Weak. He couldn't change anything, couldn't turn the tide. He didn't have a masterplan that'd ensured Ordo's flawless victory, didn't have the strength to kill the Comets outright. Nothing. He had nothing.

Damien lost an arm. It wasn’t anyone’s fault. It happened, an effect to a cause completely outside of everyone’s actions. Vernon got hurt, Leona too. This was apart of the job—didn’t make it less heart-wrenching.

But had he been stronger, having progressed far into the ranks and becoming exactly who Seraph imagined—a Slayer who had underwent a Second Emergence—then his team wouldn’t be hurt no matter what happened. They wouldn’t lose a limb or feel pain. They wouldn’t be trapped in a warzone fearing for their lives, flinching every time artillery came and they’d be forced to contemplate their uselessness against such power.

Like him.

Right now.

And before, in Hangzhou, where Mom and Dad died to protect their innocent children.

Alexander promised them that he’d be strong to protect everyone he loves. Where the fuck was that strength now?

Maybe…

Maybe if he had chosen to enroll in Systemic Works from the very beginning… Or pursue a life as a Slayer… He’d be useful.

[EXPEDITION STATUS]

DECEASED: Hidden

INCAPICTATED: King of Clubs

Alexander’s eyes widened. Hidden…?

Soldiers were shouting, clamoring. Some yelled for everyone to get back inside, seek shelter; others disagreed and told to stay put; and there were those who screamed at the teleporters to hurry the hell up.

Victor shook Alexander’s shoulder, shouting at him, pointed towards the direction of Gallery Street, where the demesne had been located. And something appeared west too.

A giant red mass emerged from those two exact locations, but they weren't a single solid object. No, even with Alexander's bad eyes, he could make out individual red rays. Hundreds of them, soaring upwards into the sky like fireworks and blossoming outwards. They resembled a mighty tree stretching into countless, sprawling branches.

Falling upon Dawns.

Alexander’s breath hitched.

Pereyra.

If Tewfik had the earthquake, then this was Pereyra’s.

Why did it sprout from Gallery Street? The answer came to him immediately: reflections, the same answer that had resolved the initial mystery. Blood had covered the streets in order to conceal the initial ritual, and blood in itself could reflect your own image. The other location must’ve had a large reflective area too.

Ordo had already known that Pereyra had spatial abilities to some extent…

So this was a combination of those powers. A mass artillery strike shortly after an earthquake.

Nearby Slayers erected a dome-shaped forcefield of many colors and geometric shapes, just as one missile was falling towards their location.

Like a meteorite.