If Zeke was honest, he would have said that he expected what had ended up happening. However, the reasons behind it were surprising. Walking through Moreth, he’d been suitably impressed by the architecture. To date, he’d had few chances to see truly awe-inspiring settlements, so the city was a nice change of pace.

It almost felt like a date – or a vacation – as he and Adara gawked like tourists. For a while, it became difficult to remember that he was behind enemy lines. With its sweeping bridges, tall towers, and gleaming white stone, the city was beautiful, and in a way Zeke had never encountered.

So, it was inevitable that it would be interrupted by bigotry.

“We don’t serve her kind here,” spat a doughy baker as he crossed his arms over his prodigious gut. He wore a white apron, and his hands were white with flour. “So go on, now. Get out of here, or I’ll be forced to call the guards.”

Zeke’s knuckles whitened as his every muscle tensed. “What did you just say?” he demanded.

“You heard me. Half-breeds aren’t welcome here. And don’t try to convince me she’s not one. I can tell.”

As Zeke tried to restrain his fury, Adara put a hand on his shoulder and said, “Don’t. It’s not worth it.”

As she spoke, he heard a chorus of voices from behind him, each one whispering the same word. “Half-breed,” they gasped, which only served to push his anger to a new level.

“It kind of feels like it would be worth it,” he said, resisting the urge to summon his hammer. The time for real violence might soon come, but for now, he could make do with his bare hands. After all, the baker was only level forty-three, which meant that Zeke could rip him apart with both hands tied behind his back.

So could Adara, come to that. Which probably should have steered him toward restraint.

But some people just didn’t have much in the way of self-preservation instincts.

“Listen to your master, freak,” the baker spat. “I’m not –”

Adara’s hand snapped out in a backhand that sent the rotund man flying backward. He hit the wall, and the shockwave rattled the shelves, knocking cooking implements and containers crashing to the ground. A pot even fell directly on the baker’s head, though he was in no condition to notice it. He was too busy trying to hold his broken and dislocated jaw in place.

He tried to say something, but all that came out of his mouth was a warbling mewling sound that Zeke couldn’t quite interpret.

For her part, Adara turned to a woman who was standing behind the counter, then said, “I think we’ll take two of those lemon pastries.”

“Uh…”

“You two are so compatible it’s disgusting,” Eveline said in Zeke’s mind, giving the impression that she’d rolled her eyes.

Zeke ignored her, glancing back as the other customers inside the bakery fled the scene. That probably should have been his first hint that things were about to go wrong. He’d hoped to spend a couple of days scouting the city unnoticed, but it seemed that was out of the question.

Not that he blamed Adara for her reaction. If she hadn’t done it, he would have.

“I think we’re going to have to cut this short,” he said. “I expect the guards will be here soon.”

“I was hoping to visit that boutique across the street,” she said with an exaggerated pout.

“That is a weapon’s shop, not a boutique.”

She shrugged. “Same difference. The weapons the kobolds make are nice, but they lack a certain artistry,” she said. “They get the job done and all, but…well, sometimes, I want something that looks nice, too.”

Zeke shook his head. He could certainly understand Adara’s point, especially considering how long he’d spent helping to build his armor back in Jariq. He’d fussed over every detail, most of which were completely inconsequential to the efficacy of the final product. But he’d wanted it to look a certain way, and he’d been unwilling to compromise on his vision. Clearly, Adara was similarly motivated.

“How about this – I’ll find some raw materials, and we’ll get with the best blacksmiths in the tower,” he suggested. “Then, we’ll both lend our help. You can oversee every detail until they get it perfect. We can make a project out of it.”

To Zeke, it sounded a little like the time when his father had asked him to help restore an old pickup truck. At the time, he’d been thrilled to accept the offer, but as was usually the case, his father had lost interest before the project even began. Still, the idea of creating something as a bonding experience loomed large in his mind.

“That sounds nice,” she said, grinning. The expression exposed her slightly sharp teeth, which was one of the only features that marked her diverse parentage.

“It’s a date, then. I’ll –”

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Before Zeke could complete the statement, someone flung the door open and strode in. The man was obviously strong – probably early seventies – though when Zeke tried to use [Inspect], he found nothing but question marks. Still, he was experienced enough to estimate someone’s power level just by the way they moved.

The man wore a blue tabard over lacquered white armor, with a longsword at his waist and a shield across his back. The effect would have been intimidating, but Zeke had long since passed the point where someone in his seventies could scare him.

“Be still,” the man said, holding out a hand. “We have the area surrounded with a suppression ring. If you go quietly, you can get through this with a simple fine for letting your half-breed run amok. Your property will be confiscated, but you will be reimbursed for its value.”

Zeke blinked.

“Property? You mean the clothes on my back?” he asked. Because of his spatial storage, Zeke never carried anything on his person.

“The half-breed battle slave.”

“Oh. Well, you’ve got it all wrong,” Zeke said, stepping forward. He didn’t do so with any urgency. “Adara…I think we’re going to have to take a rain check on shopping for materials. I hope you can forgive me.”

“I like this better,” she said. Zeke didn’t need to look back to see the murderous gleam in her eye. He heard the rasp of a sword leaving its scabbard. Unlike Zeke, Adara didn’t have a spatial storage, so she had to keep her weapons on her.

“I warn you – this is a minor matter, but it will escalate if you allow your slave to –”

Zeke finally came within arm’s reach of the man, who was clutching the hilt of his sword as he backed away. Without skipping a beat, he slammed his hand into the guard’s throat, smashing him against the wall. “First of all, she’s not a slave. I don’t believe in that kind of thing,” he said. “Second, I don’t allow her to do anything. She does what she wants. And right now, I think she wants to ram her sword up your –”

“No need to be crass,” Eveline interrupted.

“Backside,” he finished. “And third, I think you got the wrong impression of why I’m here. I was going to just walk around, enjoy the sights, and maybe buy some things. But the last I checked, I was at war with the Imperium. So, this was always going to end with people like you dead. This little encounter just pushes that matter to the front. Suppose I’ll just have to teach kobolds how to bake pastries.”

With that, he ripped the guard’s throat out – much to the horror of the bakery’s workers, who let out a collective shout. Zeke let the man fall, but before the body hit the floor, a wave of mana swept through the store.

Everyone in the bakery – including Adara – fell. Only Zeke managed to catch himself as he was beset by a wave of weakness.

“That looks like the suppression circle,” Eveline said.

“Ring. He said ring,” Zeke pointed out, gritting his teeth. “You know how this thing works?”

“Should be a rune formation,” she answered. “You just need to find the runes. If it was me, I would put them on flags that could be deployed on all around the target. You just need to…oh, you’re doing that. I guess that’ll work too.”

Zeke wasn’t listening. Instead, he embraced his Will, letting it flow through him. In the past, he wouldn’t have been capable of withstanding so much of his own destructive power. However, as he’d leveled, he’d gained an incredible degree of durability. On top of that, he’d learned to control his Will quite well. And finally, he’d spent countless hours inoculating himself against its effects.

The end result was that he could wield it almost as well as he could use his skills. The big difference was that it was a lot more versatile. Skills were meant to do one specific thing, and while someone could vary the power of those effects, they couldn’t change its nature. Will was different. More and less limited at the same time.

With his Path of Arcane Destruction, he could infuse his skills with increased destructive power, destroy foreign power if it invaded his body, and pick apart runes like it was nothing. And that was only the tip of the iceberg. So long as he perceived it to be under the purview of runecrafting or destruction, Zeke could leverage his Will to affect it.

One of the advantages of his path was that, because it had originally formed partially from his knowledge of runecrafting, it also came with the ability to sense nearby runes. And unfortunately for the guards intending to attack him, that included the suppression ring.

Zeke found it, and just like Eveline had predicted, it had been created via a circle of flags, each one bearing a dense collection of glyphs and symbols. Functionally, they were the building blocks of the overall rune, and Zeke knew from experience just how easily such complex formations could be broken.

So, with a flick of his mind, Zeke destroyed a single glyph, and the entire structure came toppling down. Outside, he heard a series of tiny explosions followed by panicked screams.

But he didn’t move.

“Hmm,” he hummed to himself.

“What?” asked Adara, who looked like she was itching for a fight.

“Just thinking. How big was the garrison in this town?” he asked. They’d passed it earlier in the day, but he’d forgotten how many warriors Adara had estimated it could support. For all his power, Zeke was not trained in the more tedious aspects of war. He could fight, and he would overcome any enemy before him. But guessing how many soldiers an enemy could field? That was beyond him. Thankfully, he had people like Adara who could pick up that slack.

“Approximately five thousand. Seven if they really packed them in there, which is unlikely, given the location,” she said.

That made sense. The Imperium was isolated, and any potential invader would have to bring an entire army across those mountains. Zeke had bypassed that by doing it on his own, but it would have been an impossible journey for an army of any size. So, Moreth wasn’t considered to be in danger of invasion. Thus, the small size of its defending force.

“You think the kobolds want a fight?” he asked. “I could probably beat them all by myself, but I was thinking the army needs a little work. What do you think?”

“I think that’s a great idea,” she said. “So long as I get to fight, too. Without your rampaging, there’ll be plenty to go around.”

“I don’t rampage.”

“Sure you don’t,” she said. “It’s obviously tactical.”

“Whatever. Stand back,” he said. “I’m going to summon the gate.”

Once Adara was out of the way, he did just that. A few moments after he’d summoned his gate, Silik stepped out.

“Situation?”

“We’re in the middle of a city called Moreth,” Zeke said. “Five to seven thousand enemy combatants. Many times that in civilians.”

“Orders?”

“Kill the enemy warriors. Engage civilians in self-defense only. Otherwise, we’re moving toward the palace,” Zeke said. “Adara can show you.”

“What are you going to do?” the half-orc woman asked.

“I told you – I wanted some of those pastries,” he said, stepping behind the counter. He squatted to retrieve a couple of the flakey treats. “I’m sure you’ll be fine out there without me rampaging, right? Just shout if you need my help.”

She grinned. “This is a much better gift than pastries.”

Zeke just shook his head and bit into the pastry. It was just as tasty as he’d hoped. Meanwhile, a veritable flood of kobolds flowed out of the gate, and a few moments later, the sound of battle echoed in Zeke’s ears.