Time seemed to speed up after the statements Xavier had made to the Silver River sector. Earth was officially off-limits.

And while not everyone had listened, the vast majority of the invaders who’d come to Earth had left.

Those who remained regretted their actions, paying for them with their lives after they provided to Xavier what their home planet was. Most of the offenders he’d found had been free agents. Adventuring parties or guilds that weren’t affiliated to any one planet. He hadn’t killed these people, not right away. But he hadn’t treated them nicely. The word had travelled around the sector enough that these people must have been either incredibly brave or incredibly stupid to have stayed behind.

Or maybe they simply hadn’t believed what the information packets contained.

He felt no guilt in causing their deaths. Felt no guilt in sending the majority of them into the Deathly Dungeon to let Romalda Heralda and her army of undead minions deal with them. It wasn’t the steady trickle of Denizens he’d expected to be sending her way, but he felt that was a win more than anything.

The barriers around the Safe Zone cities had come down. Xavier had been there for when it happened at the city that Howard’s children—and fortunately his wife—had been inside. The reunion was nothing short of a tearjerker, and Xavier was man enough to admit his eyes had become more than a little watery as he watched it go down.

Howard’s wife had been with their children the entire time. Howard looked like a different man as he wrapped them all in his arms. First as a group, then one by one. He clung onto them as though afraid they would be taken from him again, but it was clear he was being careful not to hold onto them too tightly, given the fact that his stats would be far higher than any of theirs.

It turned out Justin’s mother had been within the Safe Zone city as well. She’d volunteered to look after those under System-integration age when she’d been given the choice. The woman had held her son so tight Xavier would have worried about her crushing him if they were pre-integration.

Justin, of course, was far tougher than that.

Siobhan’s sister was fourteen years old, two years below System-integration age. He should have known the girl would be here, in the Safe Zone, with the others.

It was nice to see them all, huddled together, holding each other close. Siobhan’s little sister was like a younger, shorter version of her. Same red hair. Same freckles. Though she had less of an accent, as she’d been younger when they’d come over.

It was strange to think that before the five year restriction was lifted, this girl would have been integrated into the System for three years.

By that point, Xavier still hadn’t gone after his mother. He’d been glad to find that she was still alive, something he’d figured out easily enough when he used one of the Blood Trackers on himself. The thing had zipped through the air, in the opposite direction of the city of Fronton.

As much as he wanted to ensure she was safe, he didn’t actually want to talk to the woman. It was hard to want to be around someone who’d stopped supporting you—who never really had, when he looked back honestly.

But he knew he was being petty. Foolish. She deserved to be saved, just as everyone else on this world did. Whatever problems he had with her, they weren’t enough that he would simply let her die. And he did care about her. She was his mother, however she’d treated him in the past few years.

In the grand scheme, with the fate of the world, the fate of the galaxy, on his shoulders, his problems with her were so insignificant as to be close to meaningless.

Watching the others reunion with their families didn’t make Xavier miss his mother more, rather it displayed the acute difference between them. Watching Justin’s mother hold him… he wondered if his own mother would hold him like that. The fact that he had to wonder was telling.

He couldn’t keep waiting. Right now, there were no more urgent matters that needed his attention.

The day the Safe Zones came down, Xavier followed the Blood Tracker and reunited with his mother.

It wasn’t a joyous occasion. The woman didn’t run into his arms. Hold him tight. Shed a tear. Not right away, anyhow. His mother had been hiding out somewhere in the middle of a city that looked a lot like the one he’d grown up in—and yet at the same time completely foreign—along with some other survivors.

The survivors, along with his mother, were… scavenging cans, as though prepping for an apocalypse that had already come. Every one of them was low level, between Level 1 and Level 5. Hard to imagine how that was possible in a world like this, with dangers around every corner.

But instead of fighting the beasts they encountered, they’d been hiding from them.

When Xavier found his mother, she didn’t even recognise him. Not at first. She stared up at him. Him, wearing black robes and carrying a vicious scythe-staff. Him, with a serious expression etched onto his face. She looked absolutely terrified, like death himself had come calling for her.

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He had waited perhaps one beat longer than he should have to speak.

“Hello, Mother.”

Recognition, realisation, followed by a strange kind of shock. Those were the emotions he saw in her before she fainted.

How someone integrated into the System could faint was a little beyond him. Perhaps it was because she was still only Level 1.

“You’re her son?” a man asked. One of the other survivors. He had grey hair at his temples and looked to be in his early fifties, around the same age as Xavier’s mother. He wore the basic armour of a warrior, with a sword at his hip that he didn’t look like he knew how to use. The man stood, posture hesitant, just behind his mother. He had a can of food in each of his hands.

Xavier looked around at the others here. A teenage girl, sixteen or seventeen. An old woman, maybe in her seventies. A man of around thirty, wearing the robes of a healer, and wondered why they were out doing this. “I am.”

When Xavier’s mother had fainted, he hadn’t just stood there and let her fall. He’d moved faster than any of the survivors could perceive and caught her before she’d hit the ground.

He lowered her gently to the floor. She’d wake up in a moment. If not, he’d get out a health potion, though he didn’t think she was actually injured, just surprised.

“Xavier.” The man nodded. “She never stops talking about you.” He looked Xavier up and down. “You don’t look like a writer.”

“Things change.”

“You look strong.”

Xavier glanced at the man. “I am,” he said, thinking, because I’ve been out there fighting, not spending my time scavenging for food.

Food was important, but it should be the least of their worries right now.

Looking at the state of these people made him realise just how much help the world needed. There must be thousands of different pockets of people in the area focusing on the wrongs things in their bid to try and survive. He supposed he shouldn’t look down on them or be too harsh to them. They were only a couple of weeks out from the integration. People were bound to still be getting their bearings.

The problem was, people didn’t have time to gain their bearings. By the time they did it would be too late, and they’d already be dead.

“I have a base. Somewhere safe.” Xavier paused. “There’s plenty of food. You’re all welcome to come along with me.”

Xavier knew it was unsustainable to invite anyone and everyone to his base. There simply wasn’t enough room or organisation to suddenly have thousands of people there, but he did need more citizens, and he knew the Sanctuary Seed would grow as it needed to grow. Its general strength was supposed to grow with its owner, but Guardian had recently been telling him the size of the base was more dependent on how many people were in it.

There was a part of him that wondered if he should only be inviting a select few there. If he should use his base to harbour and train only the elites of Earth. But that was thinking too small. Besides, he was confident that right now, he could turn anyone into an elite by Earth’s standards within a couple of days if he really wanted to.

Considering the state the man and those he was with were in, Xavier had expected him to jump at the chance to come with him. What he hadn’t expected was for the man to violently shake his head and take a swift step forward, raising his hands—hands which still held cans of food.

“No, no, no! We can’t go with you! Please, don’t make us!”

Xavier frowned. Tilted his head to the side. “Why not?”

“He has my daughter,” the man said.

“And my husband,” the seventy-year-old woman said.

“My mother,” the teenage girl piped up.

Xavier’s jaw tightened. Was there an invasion force still here? Someone who hadn’t left when they were supposed to? It wouldn’t surprise him. He’d already come upon some. “Who? Where? What world are they from?”

The older man blinked. “What world? They? It’s one man. He’s from Earth. When this all started, he said he would protect us, but… he’s just been using us.”

His mother opened her eyes, then. “Xavier?” She blinked up at him. “What am I doing on the floor?”

It turned out his mother and the other survivors she’d been with had been held captive by their “protector.” A man called Willian who’d pretended to be their friend until he’d quickly gained enough power to control them.

Relative to the others, he’d levelled up fast. The man whose daughter was being held captive by him was named Michael.

And apparently he was Xavier’s mother’s boyfriend. That was news to him. He didn’t think she’d been seeing anyone. Then again, he knew very little about his mother’s life these days.

Xavier couldn’t help but find it incredibly disappointing that someone from Earth would exploit the integration in this way. He also wasn’t surprised in the least. Honestly, he’d expected more things like this to be happening, all around the world, that he’d simply yet to encounter before.

He sent his mother, along with everyone else but Michael, through a portal to the base. At first, they’d not wanted to go, arguing with him that if they didn’t return, their loved ones would be killed.

Xavier had made it very clear that he wasn’t going to let anything like that happen.

The extraction was quick. Brutal. Michael showed him where the others were being held. Xavier asked him questions. What contracts they’d signed. How many people this William had. What level he was. The answers shocked him.

Michael didn’t know anything at all about System contracts. William had no soldiers. He simply ruled these few with threats and power alone. He’d killed a couple of them early on, to prove that he wouldn’t blink before doing it, and never let people leave unless they left someone behind.

And he was only Level 21.

Xavier seethed when he heard all this. Not only was he angry at William, but he was angry at the people under his thumb. Angry at his mother for letting this happen. He knew he shouldn’t be, but he couldn’t help but wonder if there was something they could have done to prevent this before it had gotten to this point—before the man had gotten that many levels ahead of them.

It’s not their fault. There will always be people who fight for those who can’t fight for themselves.

The others were being held at the top of an apartment building. He couldn’t help but be reminded of Famarial’s headquarters.

“He’s in the apartment up the top,” Michael had said.

Xavier hadn’t even bothered entering the building. He could see the aura of all those inside easily enough. None of them were strong enough to be hiding their auras, after all. He cast Willpower Infusion on the lot of them, and mentally commanded them all to come outside.

Then he killed William.