“Be ready for the clean up once it ends and inform me afterward,” Revensol ordered once the siren rang throughout the settlement, piercing through the wall of the sub-sectors.

“As ordered.”

There were two reasons Revensol had decided to start his bloody journey of revenge from this sector, and it had nothing to do with Vissbl’s dead son acting as he had. No, it was not because of two simple but important reasons. First being that with Knrama being the Lord Representative of this settlement, he could easily deal with any external problem that propped up while the operation was ongoing and the other reason was the Flooding. These two reasons combined made sure Revensol would not choose any other settlement as his first target. After all, he had to provide Knrama with such a result seeing which he would have no choice but to work with him.

Revensol watched the rapidly changing data on the holograms, watched the sudden change brought about by the alarm. Almost no one, aside from the few still fighting, remained outside the sub-sectors, and unfortunately for them, they could no longer enter. Unlike the people of the nobility faction, after distancing from them, his men prepared to drown. Though it was still up to luck, Revensol was fairly confident that the device he had prepared for this would at the very least save their lives.

The Qi came in flooding and the only word he could use to describe it was heavy, refined to a state far beyond his current level. Despite just looking at the video, he could almost feel the level of refinement it had undergone, and how much restricted it was in scope.

He just watched as most of the people, a few of his included simply disappeared the moment. Some were unable to gain distance from the attackers and just disappeared forever in the flood of Qi, others were attacked by their enemies while deploying the device.

He watched as everything was drowned in the quickly increasing level of Qi that almost instantly reached the ceiling. No matter the Layer, similar scenes were playing out there. With this, the playing field was leveled, at least in the numbers. The Flooding was almost like a force of nature, uncontrollable, and destructive, but he had successfully utilized it to his advantage.

The settlement boasted a population of a million souls and to keep them under their grip, the noble families had massive forces spread through the settlement. The only reason his men had kept fighting successfully was the hatred burning within them and the technologically superior equipment they used. It was the equipment that had been refined over and over during the tens of cycles they had spent outside, filled with constant combat.

“Sir, it is done.” A voice informed him not long after all of the Qi released by the Central Tower was used up.

“Good. If Harlev needs any reinforcement send him, otherwise half of you are to guard the settlement while the other half is to start the tasks you had been briefed before the operation.”

“As ordered,” A quick salute and the hologram closed off Revensol was once again left alone amongst the sea of constantly moving data. It had been quickly a while since the operation had started by he still could not find any thread using which he could unravel all of this mess.

Though the nobility never had access to the system, they had over the many cycles learned and became experts at cleaning their tracks. It was a testament to their ability that he still had been unable to remove the trace of their auctions to such an extent.

As he once again dived into the sea of data, looking and praying to find just a thread, a point from which he could start. His mind was now numb, as he kept searching for something, anything, he found it and then slapped on his forehead. An incident that had resulted in the deaths of many, almost a sub-sector wiped clean of all its inhabitants. What was more glaring was the death of two almost on the verge of attaining the title of Seeker and a Seeker from the capital. These two things had put them in Knrama’s attention. It was not this that attracted his attention though, that was his final goal, “Orphanage,” Revensol uttered.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

He quickly started searching for anything related to it but was met with the same result but he was not discouraged, the orphanage needed a supplier to provide it with food and other utilities and thought the sub-sector it was located in was almost abandoned now, after digging for a few hours he started finding some clues.

“Go to the coordinates I just sent and bring me the people there. Be as quick as possible,” after issuing the orders, Revensol started searching for anyone who had even the slightest bit of connection with the orphanage. He wanted to use these people to find out even one person who had worked within the orphanage when it was operational.

***

The first time she had thought something bad had happened to him. The next time he came back, his condition had been even worse and the following return had seen him being brought back on the verge of death. If not for a team of harvesters who were nearby noticing his condition, he would have died long ago, torn and eaten by the monsters whom he had been fighting against. That was a time when he was still undergoing his mandatory service and had just proved himself capable enough to set off on solo expeditions. It was a time when he did not have enough to use the luxury that was healing pods.

Seeing that if nothing changed, he would kill himself, Fria-al had, with the assistance of Doctor Shedil created a device similar to a healing pod, but much more efficient and powerful, specially designed for Inero-ie, something that would make sure no matter how grievous his wounds may be, he would be nursed back to full health. She had hoped that it would heal him not just physically but mend his mental wounds too, something she had never known how to help with when she could not overcome her own.

Though it had never been able to help him recover mentally, and physically it made sure he would be nourished back to full health with no effect on his potential despite the abuse he put himself through. And though as time passed, Inero-ie came back in a worse state each time, Fri-al and Shedil kept working on it, optimizing its capabilities to the extent that even if he was on the verge of death, the device could bring him back to life, fully healed.

In a dark room, on a bed-like device laid Inero-ie, submerged in a liquid that did not overflow due to a transparent barrier that was difficult to see even in light. Accessing that Inero-ie had fully healed, once again snatched back from the jaws of death, the level of liquid started coming down, eventually, as the last bits of the liquid disappeared, the barrier came down. The room reverted to its previous state, still fully dark but with Inero-ie sleeping.

Only the sounds of inhale and exhale could be heard inside the space.

A few moments passed and his eyes blinked open. Blinked again, once then twice, and despite waking up in pitch black darkness that few could stand, he felt nothing. He had long since lost the fear of this absolute darkness. Why would he even? Why when it had long since become his constant companion as he wandered the desolate world? It was his companion, just like the constant cold was his companion.

Threads rushed out of his body, instantly filling this whole space owned by Fria-al and his attention was on the kidnapped woman who still showed no signs of waking up. After checking the amount of time that had passed, he picked up the woman and for a moment stood still, thinking about what he would do now.

As he exited the sub-sector he immediately noticed the change. The usual flow of people was no longer there. Before there were still many who physically traversed these pathways to move between the sub-sectors but at this moment there were barely any. He spread his Threads all around, listening and becoming aware of what had happened. He still did not stop, instead ran even faster allowing him to quickly approach the Lifting Sation.

It was a stark contrast to what he remembered, having used it many times because Fria-al lived here. Just like before, there was almost no one here and of those present, most were the members of Revensol’s group. Becoming even more careful, he eventually dropped the woman in the supervisory staff building and quickly left, heading for the top. He still had to take his revenge.