Xavier made a count of the slaves he could see. He didn’t know how many he expected to find, but he ended up counting twenty-two slaves. As for the invaders, there were more than his mini-map had shown. The tents that the invaders had brought with them blocked auras from being sensed.
That was an interesting detail. It made him wonder if his Seed Sanctuay would be able to do the same. It made sense that it would.
Focus, Xavier chided himself.
By his count, there were roughly a hundred invaders. Not a great many. He’d honestly been expecting more than that. His Soul Strikes were accurate enough that he should be able to use them to kill every enemy in the camp without hurting the slaves.
The soul apparitions have never harmed the members of my party… but what if the spell doesn’t recognise these slaves as allies?
Just as he had that thought, a System prompt appeared.
To select Denizens you wish to categorise as allies, focus on their auras or visually select their person.
Huh. Thanks, System.
He did as the System instructed. When he focused on the nearest slave, he thought ally. The change was instant. In his mini-map, the man appeared as a blue dot, whereas before he’d been a red one.
So everyone not categorised is assumed to be the enemy? Yeah, that tracks with my experiences so far…
Xavier did the same for every other slave that he could see in the camp. He’d seen a few of the invaders step in and out of their tents, but he couldn’t see inside them as the flaps obscured his view, or weren’t facing his way. If there were slaves inside of those tents, he risked injuring them.
Let’s go about this a different way.
Xavier cast Willpower Infusion. Purple energy shot forth out of him, turning into a mist, as though a massive cloud had descended upon the area. The invaders barely had time to notice the mist before it was already on them. He didn’t send it to control slaves—even though he sensed that he’d be able to if he wished.
The invaders’ minds were weak. Nothing he couldn’t easily handle. He took control of every one of them, but the mist—unfortunately—couldn’t penetrate the tents.
What are those things made of?
He’d get a chance to identify them later.
Kill each other, Xavier willed the command through the link he now had with each of the invaders. He would leave one alive—for now. Perhaps he should have felt a twinge of guilt or regret for dealing with the invaders so harshly—he often tried to spare lives where he could.
But the invaders didn’t deserve his mercy, just like the Endless Horde had not deserved his mercy. Especially these invaders, who had taken slaves, bound them in chains, and made them cook for them.
Hopefully they haven’t made them do anything else…
The carnage was disturbing to watch. One moment, the camp had been peaceful enough, the invaders chatting away with each other. The next, they stood, drew weapons or summoned staves. Swords were slashed and spears thrust. Spells were flung and arrows loosed. Bodies dropped everywhere. Xavier had activated his kill notifications, and saw them coming in, noticing the average level of the invaders was around fifteen.
Higher than I expected, but still weak enough. Though this many invaders would have given my party quite a bit of trouble if I wasn’t with them.
The slaves—no, captives, for he refused to think of his people as slaves—stumbled around and gasped in shock at the chaos that had befallen the camp. Some of them picked up fallen weapons, but found they had no one to fight.
Then something was thrown out of one of the tents. Xavier frowned. It had come from the big tent in the centre of the camp, exactly where the yellow dot had indicated the camp was on his mini-map. As he hadn’t seen a portal yet, and the quest clearly indicated there should be one here, he wondered if it was inside.
The item was spherical, like a ball. It rolled a few feet before it came to a stop. Xavier tilted his head to the side, staring at it. It glowed a harsh, bright blue.
What the hell is it doing?
Xavier had been about to push the sphere away with his telekinesis when the invader he’d decided to keep alive was suddenly free of his mental hold. Somehow, the line of Willpower Energy between them snapped in the same instant the blue light had flashed.
That’s a powerful little device.
The invader, a warrior, summoned a large halberd to her hands. She was faster than the captives, and slashed toward one—a strike that would no doubt take off the captive’s head.
The captive was only a teenage girl, around Justin’s age.
Xavier grabbed the invader with Heavy Telekinesis and crushed them in the air. Blood fountained around them as their body was squished. Xavier’s nose crinkled and he winced at the sight.
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Not near as clean as Soul Strike.
He felt a little bad for the captive who now had blood all over her clothes and face.
At least she’s alive.
Xavier stepped out of the trees, revealing himself for the first time. The device was still pulsing blue light. It was clear to him now what it did, though it had taken a moment for him to figure it out in the confusion.
Somehow, that device was able to sever my Willpower Energy. It halted my Willpower Infusion spell, stopping me from being able to control that last soldier. Or anyone else for that matter.
He’d had no idea such a device existed, and for an F Grade to possess a defensive item of that calibre was definitely impressive.
A man stepped out of the tent. He wore golden full-plate armour that gave off a bright glow, and had a red cape draped over his shoulder that flapped as he came to a standstill. The man drew a sword, a two-handed beast of a thing. His hair was blonde, his eyes… gold? Like his armour?
Golden eyes. That was new.
The man didn’t look afraid. He tilted his chin up and stared at Xavier as though he were a bug. The captives, chains around their necks, looked terrified at the sight of Xavier—with his dark robes and his massive scythe-staff, and the hint of beast his slightly grey skin revealed—but they were even more frightened by the sight of this man.
What has he done to them?
Some began to flee, others were frozen in fear, while a few of the braver ones picked up fallen weapons, holding them with such little skill that it was clear they hadn’t raised their levels or ranks—or maybe had no weapon skills at all.
The red-cloaked man pointed his sword toward Xavier. “Mental sorcerer, your control has been thwarted! You shall not gain access to my mind with this device active!” The man smirked. “Let’s see how strong you are without your despicable tricks.”
Xavier grinned. There was a corpse right beside the man. He Soul Stepped his way to it, swinging Charon’s Scythe in the same instant. As he materialised, his weapon was mid-swing.
The blade severed the golden-armoured, golden-eyed, red-cloaked bastard’s head clean off. The man’s head went one way, his body the other. Armour clanked loudly on the ground. Xavier tipped his chin up.
This action did not, apparently, calm down the captives in the area. If anything, they became more frightened. All of them were running now.
Xavier sighed. “Stop! I’m on your side!” How could he show them? He glanced around, wondering if there were any more invaders hiding in their tents. From the looks of it, it had only been their leader.
Then he spotted one captive who hadn’t fled. They couldn’t flee. The end of their chain was attached to a post, and they weren’t strong enough to remove it.
“Will they come back for you?” Xavier asked.
The man was shivering. Not from cold. His eyes were wide. “I-I d-don’t know.”
Xavier brought up his mini-map. He could still sense the auras of all the former captives as they ran through the forest, so their red dots were visible on the map as well. Some in small clumps, others alone, but all were running. None looked like they were coming back for this man.
He supposed he didn’t blame them. They surely would have tried to scan him, and when that hadn’t worked, they would have known that he was way, way out of their league—assuming they hadn’t gotten that hint from what he’d done to their now-dead captors.
Xavier shrugged and stepped into the large tent. He’d been right. There was a portal in here. Protecting the people of Earth was his first priority, but the captives were safe now. He would release the one chained to the post, but first he had to make sure there weren’t any other threats coming.
The tent was huge. Larger on the inside than it had been on the outside, like the Tardis from Doctor Who, or the tents used in Harry Potter during the Quidditch World Cup. He smiled.
“God, I love magic,” he muttered. Or science—whatever the hell it was that managed to do this. He supposed the tent must be made by some sort of similar spatial technology to that of Storage Rings.
His hunch had been right. At the far end of the leader’s tent, a purple portal stood. Beneath it was a red carpet the same shade as the dead leader’s cloak.
“A red carpet? Really? Talk about full of themselves.” Xavier shook his head. Though what should he have expected, considering the man’s glowing golden armour? Xavier had far stronger gear—E Grade gear—than that man could have possessed, and yet his robes didn’t glow.
The tent was… well, kind of beautiful. He had to admit, he was a little jealous of it. These invaders were clearly horrible people, but their leader knew how to travel in style. Expensive-looking, finely crafted furniture adorned the entire place. Plush couches and armchairs, a bookshelf with old, leather-bound tomes, even a writing desk.
Part of him just wanted to look at everything, but he had something more important to do, so he strode straight over to the open portal. “So, how do I close this thing?”
Congratulations! You have defeated all of the enemy invaders, and the first part of your quest! The enemy invaders portal will soon close now that it is no longer being maintained.
Quest Log Updated
Xavier blinked, feeling a little… disappointed?
That was a bit anticlimactic.
Then again, he could imagine the relief that someone much weaker than himself might feel after taking down these invaders and being rewarded with their portal shrinking down into nothing.
Just as it was doing now before his eyes.
He tilted his head, staring at it. He reached out to touch it but fell short, not wanting to lose a finger. He couldn’t help but wonder what kind of world lay on the other side. Would he survive if he stepped through? Would he be able to fight whoever—whatever—was in this other world?
Xavier had defeated a D Grade Denizen before, a man who was well on his way to becoming the ruler of an entire sector. But that man… he’d been from a very weak sector, at least comparatively. He’d only just reached the beginning of D Grade and fighting him hadn’t exactly been the easiest thing Xavier had ever done.
I’m stronger now than I was back then. Much stronger.
He bit his lip. It was foolish—very foolish—but he couldn’t help but want to step through that portal and teach whoever was on the other side a valuable lesson about attacking Earth—that it was very, very bad for one’s health, and the health of their planet.
But he didn’t have a good lay of the land yet—both on his own world, and that of the sector at large. The strongest Denizen in the sector was a C Grade empress. Did that mean that she was the only C Grade in the sector, or just that she was the strongest among them?
Besides, the Silver River sector was a relatively new sector in the grand scheme of things, which meant it would have plenty of powerful Progenitors. The Lord of the Endless Horde had been powerful, but he hadn’t—as far as Xavier knew—had any special advantages or titles. Certainly nothing like Xavier possessed.
Xavier might be incredibly strong for his level, but that didn’t mean there weren’t others out there strong for their own levels, levels much higher than his.
Not to mention there’s a big difference between facing a single D Grade, and a whole army worth of them.
He pulled his hand away from the portal as it shrunk and took a step back for good measure.
Xavier stepped out of the tent. When he did, the man chained to the post flinched.
It was time to corral the former captives and show them that he was a friend.