James was actually quite pissed. All those theatrics achieved absolutely nothing. He got chopped to bits and he still failed.

That’s why even though his new plan was a lot less refined, it was also a hell of a lot more satisfying.

It wasn’t something that he’d do without fully exhausting his other options. But he had no choice, he was tired of doubting his own sanity, and he had to protect his friends. Having mysterious stalkers was no way to live.

So he decided to do something very simple. He’d just destroy any living and non-living that was unlucky enough to exist near him. Luckily, there weren’t any animals in these dark lands, so he had no remorse about nuking the whole damn region.

As the leader was still slashing at his friends, James threw his head at Lunaris.

“Oh my God, at least give me a warning before you do stuff like this.” Lunaris cried out as she caught his head.

“I’m sorry, but I’d really like to regain the use of my limbs as quickly as possible. Would you be so kind as to regrow my body?”

“As long as you promise that none of your future plans will involve having your limbs and torso chopped off.” Lunaris sighed as she began healing the reckless maniac.

“You know I can’t promise that, Lun.” James chuckled. “Anyway, it’s time to end this charade. Can’t believe I went through all this for nothing.” He sighed. Nothing he did ever ended up quite the way he expected it to. “Gather up, everyone.”

The group immediately stopped their little dodging game with the leader and huddled next to James.

While Lunaris was regrowing his body, James was spitting out mana to cover the group in the strongest barrier he had ever created.

"I need you guys to add to this barrier as much as you possibly can. It’s gonna have to withstand one hell of a hit.” James announced as he was throwing out a tsunami of mana, turning the barrier into an opaque, glowing wall of mana.

Even though the leader was yelling, cursing and slashing at the barrier just a few feet away from them, they couldn’t even hear him anymore because of the sheer thickness of it.

“Why do we need such a strong barrier?” Denmac asked. His soothsayer senses were screaming at him, but with James around that was a daily occurrence, so he chose to calmly ask instead of panicking. “Do you think our enemies are that strong? This thing is downright suffocating, are you sure you should keep pumping mana into the barrier?”

“Oh, I’m sure. I’ll actually need to pour ten times this amount of mana, just to be sure we all survive.”

Every one of them went pale as soon as he said that. For the reckless madman to be this cautious, it must mean that he was expecting something really, really bad to happen.

“My god, what kind of enemy are we facing that we need that much protection?” Emilia asked, pale as a ghost.

“It’s not to protect us against the enemies. It’s to protect us from what I’m about to do to them.” James said with a blank stare.

While that did sound better than needing a barrier against some godly enemy that they couldn’t even see, the fact that the madman was going to do something that required this much protection still left the group quite worried.

“Would you be so kind as to explain what you’re going to do to them?” Ruppus, the shiest dwarf meekly requested.

“Nothing fancy, my friend. I’m pretty much just gonna blow them up.”

The seven looked at each other confused. They didn’t know what the hell he was talking about.

“You mean the stalkers?” Lunaris asked. “How are you going to blow them up if you don’t know where they are?”

“It’s simple, my dear.” James said with a kind smile. “I’m just going to blow everything up. Everything within many miles of this god forsaken place.” James grinned as he finally stopped fueling mana into the barrier, and instead began conjuring a crimson nuke within his newly regenerated hands.

Even Helios, who was smiling excitedly at everything James said, froze for a second.

“What do you mean, brother?” Helios whispered when he was finally able to muster the willpower to move again.

“Well, it’s as simple as it sounds, guys. Nothing fancy, I’ll just literally blow everything up.” What he was saying wasn’t matching his facial expressions at all. From the way he looked, you’d think he was taking them out for ice-cream. “You see, I figured that if they’re stalking us, then that means they must be relatively nearby, right? So if I just eradicate every single thing within a large radius, then I’ll get them too. Pretty simple, isn’t it? I got the idea after I detonated my saws. I barely broke a sweat back then, and yet I blew up most of the city. Now let’s see what happens when I really try.” James cackled again as he cast 50 sacrifices, buffing himself to the point his eyes were bloodshot, trying to put in as much firepower as he could into one attack.

“Won’t they just flee now that you announced your plan?” Eruditus asked, all too used to seeing talented mages fail after pontificating about their greatness.

“Hear my plan?” James laughed. “Can you hear anything outside this thick ass barrier? It’s impossible. No matter how good they are at stealth and espionage, nothing can get in or out of this barrier without my permission, not even sound.”

“But are you sure you can actually do it?” Bacchus asked. “From what I know, such an attack would require a mage of at least level 2000, if not much more. I mean, I’m not saying that it’s impossible. The universe is vast, and there are plenty of stories of great mages destroying entire planets. But those are basically Gods with levels in the millions, we’re still just normal people, even you. Do you think you can really do it?”

“Relax, guys. It’ll be a piece of cake. I’ll just cast a Chaos Flower, but instead of the usual tiny little particles that shred everything in sight, I’ll just pump a ton of mana into them, so much that that every single atom comprising them is split in half, and we have ourselves a nice little explosion. Easy-peasy, should probably kill anyone stalking us even if they’re watching us with magical binoculars from far away.”

[Skill unlocked: Chaos fission]

“Would you look at that, it even registered as a new skill! The system’s naming sense isn’t getting any more creative though.” James cackled one last time as a tiny, crimson flower materialized within his hands.

“And it’s finally ready. Would you look at that, it took the actual form of a flower this time. Isn’t that neat?”

But as soon as James showed them the flower, all seven of his friends fainted.