Myra stared at Malik, as he looked between everyone that had shown up, all the while grinning. "To what do we owe the pleasure?" Myra asked and for the first time, Malik's attention was fully focused on her. A terrifying pressure came down on her shoulders and Malik let out a cheerful laugh. "You really didn't faint huh, well I guess I chose the right location then."

"What do you mean?" Peggy asked. Malik then turned his attention to her, but rather than being forced back by the pressure, Peggy just gave him a cold stare. " Ah, I guess you were probably trained by the World Father, no wonder my techniques didn't have any effect." Malik said, before releasing the pressure and turning back to Myra. "I need your guild moved away, or I need the guild itself. You choose, I will give you a single day to figure out what you're going to do."

Everyone stared for several seconds and Malik looked to each of them before he spoke in an exasperated voice. "Your guild location is on prime real estate for all types of gates to spawn, please don't think your group is what is special." He followed up, when everyone looked at him confused. "You have such an abundance of gates spawning, that I should be able to level up quite nicely around here, but I just can't have the competition, so leave or give me control and ownership over the guild and then I'll maybe share."

Myra could only stare as she desperately tried to recover from the insane pressure Malik had exuded. "You said you'd give us a day?" She asked, barely able to string the words together, without stuttering. "Yes, I'm going to go clear out all of the gates in the surrounding several miles, so I'll be back in about a day. Clear out before I'm back or be ready to give up the guild. And don't for a moment consider you have other options." Malik said, smiling sweetly.

Myra was about to ask another question, but Malik had disappeared. She kept her guard up for several seconds, before letting out a deep sigh. She had so much work to do and now she was going to need to figure out a way to keep the highest leveled person out of the city. "Hmm, what did I say? Didn't I say not to consider anything other than the options I gave you?" She heard a cheerful voice say from behind her. She tried to turn towards it, but she had already been grabbed. She felt an intense energy radiating off of Malik who now stood behind her, "Don't fuck with me, I will get what I want whether you like it or not. Don't make me do something you'll regret." He said in a whisper, before he disappeared.

"What the fuck are we going to do?" Myra wanted to ask, but she buried the thought as soon as she had it. Apparently the guy had the ability to read her mind and the last thing she wanted was to have him wreak havoc, before she could come up with a plan. Just in case she said out loud. "Come on, everyone, we have to go decide which one of the two options we are going to take. Peggy, you also are going to have to explain to me what just happened."

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Owen was finally on his own again and had been focused on clearing as many gates as possible. His plan to only clear tier eight and tier nine gates exclusively didn't work for too long. Several of the gates had spawned far enough apart that it made more sense to also clear gates on the way, since the goal was for credits regardless. The other reason he had started working on lower tiered gates was because he still needed to choose his new class skill.

Thankfully, as long as he used his resonance, most enemies in either gate were easy enough to kill, that he hardly needed to pay attention to them. The other reason, was that he wasn't sure if he would actually be able to clear a tier nine gate. The jump in power was supposedly almost double the difficulty of a tier eight gate, then he would most certainly die, especially if he was supposed to accomplish something while waves of monsters were attacking.

He wasn't even sure the first tier eight gate he had cleared would've been possible for him since it needed you to solve a puzzle. Regardless, he pulled his attention back to the waiting notification as a drop down menu appeared, listing all of the possible new skills. He took a quick second to burst through a zombie creature, before slowly slicing his way through a wall of enemies.

*Please select a new class skill

Polymath's Sight: This skill helps defend against illusions and allows the user to pierce through the veil of reality, this ability costs experience depending on the level of illusion or how far into fate you peer. This skill will combine with your current skill, Polymath's Keen Eye.*

*Polymath's Weapon Mastery: Allows the user to transfer their mastery of weapons to any type. Can imbue any weapon with mana to strike with increased power. At the cost of experience, you can see the weapon forms the Polymath has mastered and learn from them. This skills acts as an upgrade to Intermediate Weapon Mastery .*

*Polymath's Mobility: The user is able to shift and move their body in perfect coordination with their will. The effect of this skill scales off of Dexterity and Will. Grants the Will stat.*

Owen looked through each of the skills carefully, but the only one that stood out was the one he thought wouldn't work. The mobility skill was by far the most tempting offer, but the fact that it scaled off of the will stat worried him somewhat, since he had already filled both extra stat slots. He was fairly confident that their was a reason that it scaled off of both, so he was worried the skill wouldn't be worth the choice, since he would be missing some of its functionality.

Though that problem existed with both of the other skills as well. Polymath's sight allowed him to do exactly what the farseeing skill already did for him. Only at the cost of experience as well, the same with the weapons mastery skill, though the bonus of that skill upgrade was slightly tempting. Owen knew that he was by no means talented with weapons. While he had become proficient with some of them, there was a reason he had hardly used more than three out of the twelve options his bracers had the ability to change into.

He felt like he was experiencing decision paralysis and he wasn't a fan. He through the gate, mowing down monsters until he reached the exit. He still hadn't been able to make his choice, though he knew there was no rush. When he exited the gate, he was greeted with an uncomfortably familiar face, Malik.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

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"Malik has mental resonance, but something felt off about it, it felt oppressive. Normally it doesn't, but I haven't been part of the system for long enough that I know how he did it." Peggy said. Myra's face scrunched up, but she only let out a sigh as she let her face fall into her hands. There had been several occasions where Owen had complained about the the lacking defenses you could buy from the system and now she had to agree.

She hadn't been certain that Owen was capable of breaking through all of them, but she had learned about how achieving resonance in any form was almost like a super power under the system. While normally everyone was equalized due to stats not being able to range too far apart from person to person, but as the levels grew, the disparity did as well.

Level twenty five was the first checkpoint, titles were both a great equalizer and yet, were one of the biggest contributors to someone pulling ahead of another. Next was the quality of secondary class you chose, while the last was dependent on how you chose to upgrade you main class. She had known Owen stood out among most normal people, he had been the first person she was aware of that was, according to Ivar, cultivating his soul.

Myra paced back and forth, while considering if it was even possible for them to fight back against someone like Malik, but she couldn't come up with anything. Peggy stood off to the side, also looking lost in thought, both of them slowly growing more worried as Owen had yet to respond to the messages they had sent. "I think we need a second to calm down, dealing with someone who has mental resonance for the first time can be straining, but you should already be able to combat the feeling." Peggy said as she grasped Myra's hands to keep her from pacing.

Several minutes passed as Peggy helped Myra feel like she had some control, as Peggy helped her train against mental pressure. It would make achieving true mental resonance harder for her, but at the same time, they couldn't think in the long term for the moment, especially since they only had one day. "Have you been able to think of anything?" Myra asked after she felt slightly calmer and Peggy seemed deep in thought again.

"He somehow knew I had been trained by the World Father, without me mentioning it to him. The biggest problem with that, none of my magic will probably work against him. I can definitely try, but in order to kill him or make him flee, we will need something either far more erratic than the magic I was taught or Owen to use his chaos to create another explosion. I'm going to try and come up with something else, but we don't have much time and we need the credits Owen can bring back." Peggy said thoughtfully.

They both already knew that Owen blowing himself up wasn't an option, neither of them wanted him to make sacrifices for them, especially when it was so clear how unstable chaos was. The biggest problem Myra saw with their issue, was that if they moved, they would become vulnerable to more than just the strongest and could get hunted down, while trying to find a new location. The other option wasn't great either, seeding control to Malik, an unknown variable, was just as risky. They didn't know the type of person he was yet and while he probably wouldn't kill them, being kept as slaves was a real possibility.

The last problem, Myra wasn't sure whether she was overreacting or not the the dangers. She knew for certain Malik was a danger, but she had no real grasp on just how much a danger he could be.

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"You're Malik," Owen said as he stared at the man standing in front of him. Malik only grinned and gave Owen an interested look. "I think you might be stronger than me when I was your level." Malik said, a friendly tone to his voice. Despite the friendly demeanor, Owen could feel the hairs across the back of his neck rise. "I've been working hard," Owen said, still on high alert.

"I can't tell who trained you, the aura seems absent." Malik said in a questioning tone as he slowly walked around him. "Oh, interesting! You have two inheritances and one of them in inherent to you. Interesting interesting." Malik continued, still sounding like he was meeting a friend for the first time in years. "Wow, one of them is a god's inheritance as well, you must be like me." Malik said, clapping Owen on the back.

Owen was surprised that for the first time it felt like Malik was genuine, but he still kept his guard up. It didn't matter what he did or how hard he could try, the gap between the two of them made Malik an impossible target to fight. So if he needed to act buddy-buddy with him for a while, then he would. "I might be," Owen said hesitantly and Malik nodded in agreement. "Well, let's see who is stronger, you are too far behind me in levels, but your foundation is decent, so let's race through a tier nine gate. The first one to finish gets to keep this territory and that city nearby." Malik said, before grinning and clapping Owen on the back again.

"We can start in an hour, don't worry, I'll know if you enter the gate early." He smiled innocently. Then he was gone. Owen spent several seconds staring into nothingness as his brain tried to catch up with what just happened. "He wants Rochester, or maybe our guild?" Owen asked himself, but he couldn't make heads or tails of the situation. He started running at a full sprint towards the closest tier nine gate, while trying to contact Myra.

"Oh thank god you're okay," Myra said as soon as she answered. "What's going on?" Owen asked and Myra quickly explained the situation they were all in and Owen shuddered. "I don't think we really have the option to fight him. I suppose we could try moving everything over towards the military base." Owen offered. There was a pause over the messaging device, but Myra's voice came through quietly. "I think the military base is included, apparently he was over there just before he visited us." Owen cursed, not really sure what to do.

"Well, he just challenged me for ownership of the city, so I think either way we are going to have to flee." Owen said, feeling powerless for the first time since the system had arrived. Malik was just too strong and Owen wasn't even sure how it was possible. He had talked with Xerxes about it several times, but so far it seemed like Xerxes was wrong. Unless Malik had killed thousands of monsters for every level, it shouldn't be possible to reach levels close to reaching 200. Yet regardless, he had stood in front of both Owen and Myra, with the level 176.

Owen reached the gate as he and Myra tried to come up with any other plans, but each plan slowly turned into how they were going to pack things up and leave. There was an upside to the situation, which Peggy had pointed out when she had joined the call. If they needed to leave or disband the guild, they would no longer be in the top three and the bounty for their guild would disappear. It seemed like the best option as they thought about it, none of them had been particularly enthusiastic about the guild, they hadn't even bothered to name it.

"You can race him and if you win, awesome. But if you lose, message us as soon as possible and we will start giving everyone the option of leaving or staying." Peggy said. "I'll try my best, but I would start preparing anyways. I don't even know if I am strong enough to clear one of these gates in a reasonable time, so expect me to lose." Both of them gave him some extra encouragement as he stood facing the gate and they gave their goodbyes shortly after.

Owen wasn't exactly sure what time he and Malik had parted ways, but it had to be close to an hour since then. Just as he was about to enter the gate, he got another message and quickly checked. Owen immediately felt sweat start to run down his back as he looked at the message.

"I suppose since we both arrived at the same time, we can just enter in ten seconds, instead of the full hour." - Malik

Owen stared for several seconds, as he wondered how Malik had managed to message him, but forced himself to jump into the gate right as ten seconds had passed.