The exhausted pair of bodyguards nod and we quickly begin our sprint for the warp pad, all the while trying to remain as unnoticed as possible.

Unfortunately for us, it was hard for people to miss the giant golden cockroach that we were fighting, so the moment we begin moving in the direction of the warp pad, various soldier move in our way in an attempt to slow us down.

We try our best to move around as many as we can, but eventually our sprint for the finish line slows to a crawl. While the soldiers move to block us, the Kingdom agents take advantage of the decreased attention, and begin to slaughter any soldier that turns their back.

This causes the already dwindling number of soldiers to fall even further, until only about fifty or sixty remain.

Eventually the Kingdom agents join in the fight to impede our path to the warp pad too, causing everywhere around us to be a chaotic free for all where any semblance of order is tossed out the window.

We do our best to keep moving forward, but the sheer number of bodies in our way force us to stop. While Gael and Garut are doing most of the crowd control work, I still manage to hold my own, picking off weaker soldiers every now and then.

The agents are a different story, though, as they all seem to be of a much higher quality than the random Empiric foot soldiers. I’m lucky if I even manage to land a single attack on any of them. Thankfully Gael and Garut pick up the slack slightly in that department.

A soldier sporting two hatchets charges us from behind, I move in his way, while at the same time blocking one of the axes from above. The second axe swings straight for my stomach, clearly intending to disembowel me.

Surprisingly, I’m not in the mood to have my guts spilled on the floor, so I step back slightly and out of the range of the swing. The unexpected miss throws him off balance, allowing for a clean shot to his neck…. Or that would be the case had another soldier not intervened, by sending his longsword straight for my own neck.

I try to step back once more, only to bump into a furiously swinging Garut. Not wanting to leave him vulnerable from the back, I decide to take a risk and step forward. The moment I do, the axe man swings both axes at either of my sides.

Unable to take a step back I duck quickly, practically laying myself on the floor. Unfortunately this leaves me open for an attack by the other soldier’s longsword. I roll out of the way, and send my sword straight towards the outstretched arm of the sword wielder.

This does the trick as I send his arm flying through the air and he screams wildly. Seeing his fellow soldier’s distress, the axe man charges at me in hopes of avenging the lost arm.

Instead of blocking or dodging, this time I do something he doesn’t expect, I simply just thrust my sword forward towards his neck, banking that my attack will be the first one to land.

Not wanting to take that risk, he opts to instead pull back his attack and maneuver around me in hopes of reaching my side. In response, I stick out my leg and trip him, much to his dismay. The instant he falls onto the floor, I’m upon him, thrusting my sword straight through the back of his neck.

I look behind me to see the other two have made small but noticeable progress forward. Not wanting to get split up, I rush behind them, dodging stray attacks from the surrounding fights at the same time.

While I manage to avoid most of the stray swords and projectiles, A stray arrow manages to embed itself into my thigh. I roll clumsily onto the ground in surprise and pain, clutching my leg.

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At the same time as my fall, a Kingdom agent sees my misfortune and decides to take advantage, rushing me and bringing the full might of his flaming morningstar to bear.

Unable to react in time I cover my face with my arms in hopes of at least somewhat mitigating the damage. Luckily for me, Garut saves my ass, putting his axe in the way of the menacing morningstar.

While I may have avoided damage to myself, Garut has put himself in harms way from the various attackers he ignored to defend me. He takes a throwing knife and a small gash to the back, forcing him to turn his back on me to prevent any further damage to himself.

The morningstar soldier, hoping to take out the stronger opponent in Garut, swings quickly at his newly turned back.

Unable to accept this outcome, I throw my sword and myself into the way of the attack. Much to nobody’s surprise, I’m immediately flung to the side, crashing into several soldiers and agents.

‘Godamnit! This asshole a tier 6 at least!’ I groan to myself.

I try my best to get up and on my feet as soon as possible, but with an arrow still sticking out of my leg, it makes standing substantially more difficult, not to mention painful.

The soldiers around me still in shock at what could have possibly knocked them down so hard, all turn and stare at me.

‘Man we really got to work on our ‘not attracting attention’ skills.’ I sarcastically think to myself.

Gael and Garut instantly rush to my side, forming a perimeter around me. Thankfully about half of the soldier and agents that got knocked over go back to fighting with one another, but that still leaves about half of these asshole left.

At this point we are a short fifty or so feet away from the warp pad, a distance that, while short, is going to take all the effort our three exhausted bodies can muster to cross.

Gael shouts out,

“Don’t breath! I’m going to do something risky! Garut, you may have to carry me across the finish line!”

Garut nods and I’m left panicking at what he may do.

‘What the hell is he going to do?! It better not be some sacrificial bullshit! I’ve had enough of that for today.’

Gael seeing my face, says quickly,

“Relax, I’ll live, but I may be out of commission for a few days… or weeks.”

The next instant, he begins spewing some sort of red mist straight from his hands in large quantities. Within less than ten seconds, the entire area around us becomes covered in a thick smog.

Gaels continues with a strained look on his face. I watch as his face grows paler and paler by the second, sweat slowly begin to drip down from his forehead.

Once the smog surrounds about thirty feet around us, his eyes roll into the back of his head and he falls limply to the floor.

Garut then swiftly picks him up and we begin to make out way towards the warp pad while holding our breaths the best we can.

All around us, I watch as soldiers begin screaming in agony and pain, some holding their ears in distress, some of them even banging their heads on the floor begging for death.

‘Holy shit, thanks god I knew to hold my breath. I wouldn’t wish whatever the hell is going through their minds on anyone.’

We push and shove our way through the crowd, putting one foot in front of the other, taking each step more painful than the last, as the pain in my thigh only continues to worsen.

Finally, we reach the end of the thick mist, only ten feet away from the warp pad. We let out our held breaths, breathing in the comparatively fresh air.

We stare back at the quiet battlefield, the only noises being the screams and shouts from the soldier in the rapidly disappearing mist, and the few skirmishes and fights still happening.

Hundreds of bodies lay scattered on the stone floor, all dead from a series of events that were ultimately set off by me.

The weight of my actions begin to set in, the amount of people killed, all because of my selfish desire for ‘freedom’.

I look to where the two tier 9’s were fighting, to see the metallic red man, beaten and broken in several places, standing overtop the dead body of the military man.

Perhaps sensing my gaze, he looks over at me, and watches as Garut and I slowly limp towards the warp pad.

‘Fuck!’ I exclaim in my head while gritting my teeth, ‘One of those lazar beams I saw him use and we’re dead in an instant!’

To my surprise though, instead of charging up some sort of attack, he just nods at me and places his index finger where a person’s mouth would be.

In my shock, I nod back gratefully, as Garut and I finally reach the teleporter.

I look to Garut and ask,

“You know where the hell we should go?”

He nods and presses a button on the teleporter. As soon as he does, a notification pops in my status.

I click yes, and in a moment, I’m finally off the planet that I’ve spent almost twenty-one years on.