“Scatter and attack,” Dallion said to a row of white-haired furies behind him.

Without delay, each conveyed the orders to the thousands that filled the skies. The area they covered was massive. There were countries that weren’t as large. Yet, it wasn’t them that would perform the attack. Their real task had been to protect the cloud forts from any surprise attacks.

Hundreds of mages cast their spells, launching aether projectiles and balls of fire. A hailstorm of purple and orange rained destruction on the ground. The intensity of the spells was such that in places it created clusters of glass in the soil itself.

Going a bit overkill, dear boy? Adzrog’s echo asked.

Dallion continued looking silently at the battlefield. It was extreme, but it was also the minimum needed to get the enemy to reveal himself.

“Tell Katka to keep an eye on the ground,” he told one of the furies, then turned to Diroh.

The ice fury was standing a short distance away. A sense of subdued fear emanated from her. Dallion would have been concerned if it hadn’t. No one in this world had seen destruction on such a massive scale since the fury wars, and even then, the intensity would have been less. The old battle mages, as powerful as they were, remained few in number. The same could be said about awakened furies. Right now, one witnessed the full might of the Academy focused on a single point.

“Diroh assumes command of this fort,” he added.

“Me?” The fury stared at him blankly.

Dallion allowed himself a smile. He could sense that the white-haired furies supported the idea. The crimson ones might create some issues, but they wouldn’t dare go against his orders, not yet in any event.

Taking another look at the former fields below, Dallion went to Diroh, continuing in a low voice so only she could hear.

“You’ll be fine. You just need to make sure that there are no problems in the air. Katka will handle the rest.”

The ice fury nodded.

“You’ll have to do it alone.” Dallion gave the mental order for his echo to disappear. The momentary shock in Diroh’s eyes told him that it had. “You’ve learned enough. You should be able to handle it.”

“I’ve seen crap.” The spark of rebellion shined through. Jiroh would have been proud. “You keep bouncing me from place to place, hoping I’d pick up enough!”

“I know.” He placed his hand on the fury’s cheek. “And you have each time.”

“I’m not an otherworlder, Dal. How many times must I tell you? Following your trail isn’t as easy as you think.”

You’re a lot stronger than you give yourself credit for, Dallion thought. She had to be. Win or lose, events such as today were likely going to become a reality, at least until Grym was taken down.

“Take care of the clouds,” he said loudly, pulling his hand away. “We’ll discuss things after I come back.”

“We better,” Diroh whispered.

With a nod, Dallion then cast a flight spell, then flew to the edge of the cloud fort.

“Have them keep casting until I reach the ground.” He burst into two hundred instances. It was the first time he had burst into so many. It didn’t seem effortless by any stretch of the imagination, though it wasn’t as difficult as he expected.

Are you sure it’s the right move? The armadil shield asked.

“I learned this trick from a memory fragment with grandfather,” Dallion said.

That’s not what I had in mind.

Flying beneath the layer of attack proved challenging. Even with all his skills, three quarters of his instances were easily hit. The remaining continued further down. The intensity of the spells showed no sign of decreasing. Some might even say that more than a few mages were deliberately aiming to hit their new commander. Dallion had little doubt that some did. At the same time, he was more than confident in his abilities to avoid similar clumsy attempts. Adzorg had even joked that this was a good way to get used to the life that awaited him.

The moment Dallion set foot on the ground, all spells ceased. There was no noise, no smoke, just a few pools of fire where the fire orbs had landed.

So far, so good. Dallion thought. There were several minutes until the vortexes were supposed to appear. The mages were very adamant regarding their prediction, as was Adzorg.

Glass crackled beneath Dallion’s feet. On several occasions, he entered the realm of his shoes to reinforce their soles. As far as the eye could see, there wasn’t a single other person. Some might even go as far as saying that the empire had wasted all that effort on a barren patch of land.

“Ruby, get ready,” Dallion said. The real form of the creature appeared on his left shoulder and flicked its wings. “Lux.”

The bladebow flew off Dallion’s back and pointed down. A ray of blue light shone from the kaleidervisto on it. For the most part, there was nothing—the wilderness held no realms or guardians, but after a few moments of flying around, the otherworlder’s suspicion was confirmed. A network of realms, each the size of an extremely long straw, crisscrossed the area. Unlike the empire, the Azures had been smart enough to prepare their advance beforehand. All the scouting parties, all the skirmishes, had one role: to create more and more awakened area realms. The realms were insignificant—not enough to increase the level of a single noble. However, linked together, they granted Grym the ability to transport his armies from one place to another instantly.

There was no need for any of them to be present. As long as there was a direct connection between this realm and wherever their forces were gathered, an army could spend years marching through the realms and still emerge the second the vortexes appeared. Unfortunately for them, there was an easy way to foil that plan.

AREA AWAKENING – REALM INVASION

Reality shifted, bringing Dallion into an enormous tunnel.

You are in the land of TUBE.

Defeat the guardian to change the land’s destiny.

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“Seriously?” Dallion laughed.

The noble named the realm “tube”? Not that it particularly mattered. There never was any intention of keeping the realm after the vortexes were absorbed. In the best case, a new settlement would be created to serve as a border area. More likely the area would be abandoned while the troops marched onwards towards Priscord Province and the imperial capital.

Unused to the sudden change, the shardfly flew off Dallion’s shoulder.

“Not used to it yet?” Dallion asked. Finally, he had reached a point at which he could use his domain ruler ability and transport familiars between realms. Normally, it would be necessary for the realm to be his, but the Vermillion ring provided an exception he could abuse. “It’s only strange the first time.”

Emotions emerged within the body of the shardfly, expressing doubt.

Vihrogon emerged a few steps away from Dallion in his dryad form. Wearing the armor of a Sword Marshal, he took a few steps forward, looking in the distance.

“I’d say there’s a few thousand,” the guardian said. “A few mages, one minor noble… nothing special.”

So, Grym wasn’t there. Dallion felt more disappointment than relief.

“Any battle mages?”

“No,” Vihrogon replied. “Just a lot of cannon fodder.”

Dallion would have liked to believe that the recent attack had caused the enemy to change tactics, but it was most likely not true. The Azures weren’t stupid and accustomed to actual combat.

“Do you want to take care of them?” the Dyrad glanced at Dallion. “Or do you want me to handle it?”

“There’s no need.” Dallion drew both his aura sword and harpsisword. “Nox, do your thing.”

The crackling puma emerged on Dallion’s head, leaping off with a lazy yawn. For several seconds, it walked about the realm, looking at its paws at every step, as if it had stepped into something disgusting. By the looks of it, a familiar’s attitude also changed once its owner became a noble.

GUARDIAN CHALLENGE!

Nox had challenged the guardian of TUBE on your behalf!

The guardian has no choice but to respond to the challenge.

A red rectangle emerged. Shortly after, so did the creature of the realm.

TUBE GUARDIAN

Species: ROCKAPEDE

Class: EARTH

Health: 70%

Traits:

- BODY 20

- MIND 10

- PERCEPTION 10

- REACTION 10

Skills:

- ATTACK

- GUARD

- BURROW (Species Unique)

Weakness: SEGMENT LINKS

“You gotta be kidding.” Dallion stared at the massive centipede made of rock.

Each segment was the size of a small castle, made entirely of flawless granite. Legs the size of towers were attached to them, forming craters on the ground as it walked. The head—if it could be even called that—was an origami of sharpness, two caves of green light glaring at the otherworlder.

“It can’t be this weak.” Dallion turned to the dryad. Granted, it was a while since he fought common area guardians, but even so, there had to be something wrong.

Carefully, he examined the creature with his magic vision, seeking any trace of illusion spells, and yet it turned out there were none.

“Leave it to you to complain about anything,” Vihrogon shook his head, then turned around, walking away from the realm guardian. He was shortly followed by Nox, who wasn’t in the least interested in the fight.

COMBAT INITIATED

“I guess this is really happening…” Dallion split into sixty instances and waited.

…and waited. The strike seemed to take forever. At one point, he simply couldn’t take it anymore and performed a line attack aimed at the left row of the rockapede’s legs.

CRITICAL HIT

Dealt damage is increased by 200%

CRITICAL HIT

Dealt damage is increased by 200%

Rows of red rectangles emerged as dozens of stone legs were chopped off before the creature could even finish its initial attack. The ease with which it had been done made Dallion feel bad.

“We can stop here,” he said, filling his voice with the notion of surrender. “Just give up.”

The rockapede collapsed to the ground, twisting around with such ferocity that the entire tunnel shook. Still, it refused to give in.

“There’s no point,” Dallion tried again. “You know that one more strike will finish you off.”

“Can’t surrender,” the guardian’s voice boomed. “Must maintain the realm.”

So that was it. The Azures had taken safeguards, making sure that no one could invade their realms. If that were the case, it was also likely that upon Dallion’s victory, the realm would crumble altogether, vanishing from existence. There was no way to know for certain, but everything suggested it.

“I’m sorry,” Dallion said. That seemed to calm down the creature at least to the level of acceptance. “We don’t have to end the fight right away.”

In the far distance, Dallion was able to see the occupants of the realm bailing out by the hundreds. They had probably seen what was going on and now were eager to return to the real world as quickly as possible. That didn’t particularly matter. Once Dallion had finished here, he’d join them, appearing on the battlefield at precisely the same moment.

“Don’t,” Vihrogon said.

“Don’t what?”

“You’re thinking of leaving it alive, aren’t you? Reasoning that now that the gig is up, there’s no need to destroy it.”

Dallion shook his head.

“No.” He knew that he couldn’t afford to leave an active enemy realm this close to the vortex area. “I’m just sad about it.”

After he had purged the void within him, the sensations coming from his empathy trait had returned in full effect. They weren’t crippling, but were constantly present.

“Better luck with your next realm,” he whispered, then performed another line strike.

TERMINAL HIT

Dealt damage is increased by 1000%

The rockapede split in two, then disappeared in a cloud of gray dust that faded away.

REALM INVADED

REALM DESTROYED

Two more rectangles emerged, after which Dallion was returned to the real world.