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Leo

Leo had left Allis, Glia, and Elaria behind, because none of them wanted to be anywhere near him when he said he would level about twenty acres of forestry with his magic.

Which was fair…

Thus, he only departed with Sciesch and Fel to his newly acquired lands, the flight taking only a few uneventful minutes. Fel tagged along to see him use more of his magic, while he used gravity magic for Sciesch to join them and help with zoning and such.

Unfortunately, the professional architect seemed to have joined the thirst club with how she now looked at him, causing no small amount of disappointment in him from the woman's occasional piercing gaze from behind.

‘Why do I get the feeling Elaria had something to do with this…?’

After flying above the overgrown trail for a bit, he stopped over the largest and most level terrain that was on the path to the mine. He flew a little higher and mentally pathed out how much he needed to clear, which equated to simply eyeballing it. When he was done, he casually ripped a tree out of the ground and floated it up to him.

‘While I don't like to be wasteful, I really don't have anywhere to store or properly process the wood… So this is a good time to test out atomizing magic.’ He thought while his first attempted cast went through on the tree, the matter seeming to bleed away into nothing.

Fel down flew next to him, and he noticed that the beats of her large wings were not quite lining up with accurately supporting her mass. “What the fuck was that?” She asked in a mixture of awe and horror.

“Well, that was essentially me deleting something using magic.” He responded guiltily while sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck, Fel and Sciesch staring at him with fully arched brows.

He winced at what the spell could do to a person, but it was better and more subtle than giving Smokey the bear a heart attack by torching the whole area. ‘Yeah, that's an appropriate response… And that didn't cost me much mana to do…. Strange that it felt like different parts of the tree used up different amounts of mana though. Might have to do with either density, or the strength of the molecular bonds?’ The thought genuinely interested him, but they were experiments for later.

“Welp, you two might want to brace yourselves for what I'm about to do.” He told them as he mentally visualized all the trees in his sight that needed to be cleared, and with a simple snap of his fingers, hundreds of them started to bleed away into nothing.

The process only took a few seconds, and what was left was a fully cleared area that was a little larger than the required space. The terrain was very rough, and was dotted with hundreds of holes from the deleted trees, some with a small pile of dust within them.

‘Gonna need to do some testing on denser objects, because that was like a nibble off my mana sandwich, and that's just all kinds of bullshit…’ He mentally noted to himself with a frown, not at all comfortable with the potential this spell could wrought.

Turning to his left, he saw Sciesch and Fel just gaping at the cleared land, and he really couldn't fault them for the reaction, because even he was taken aback at the site. It was one thing to say that you can casually cause widespread destruction, it was another to actually do it.

His gaze drew over the area, stuffing the frightening potential of his abilities into a mental box to be addressed later. ‘Hmm, gravity magic to flatten I guess…?’ He thought as he visualized a spell to use gravity to spread out, even, and compress the ground.

As he felt the cast go through, there was a massively deep thud that echoed from below, and all of the ground was instantly flattened perfectly. He smiled wide at his job being essentially done, but noticed that the edges of the flattened area looked like there was just a slice carved out of the ground.

‘God it's like a chunk error. Going to need to use the scalpel for that…’ He sighed while descending towards the ground, bringing Sciesch along with him.

When he got to the ground he noticed that Fel was still up in the sky, and seemed to be stuck in a permanent daze. He was about to call out to her, but noticed that Sciesch was also in a similar state.

The human's gaze shifted between his tagalongs and the nearly twenty acres of flattened land, the detached world-edit feeling eroding away as the scale of what he had done truly sunk in.

‘Yeah… I may have overdone it.’

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Fel

‘I've summoned a god…’ Was the lone thought in Fel's head while she stared out onto the clear and flattened area.

Though she knew that Leo wasn't actually a god, his ability to wield magic definitely was on the same level as one, and that would be very terrifying if he didn't make it abundantly clear that he hated having it in the first place.

As much of an insufferable ass as she believed he was, she also respected his pursuit of restraint, and seeing this level of power being used just deepened that feeling even more. He could, If he wanted to, go to the dragon capital and wipe out every one there, but that would go against everything he values.

That kind of moral obligation was something she needed back in her life after acting in the shadows for so long. ‘If I respect him any more, I might just move the bar up from irritation, to tolerable.’ She let out a small chuckle, continuing to take in the results of Leo's magic before she felt herself slightly yank downwards.

With a start, she realized that her summon and Sciesch were already on the ground, beyond impressed at his ease of control and precision of whatever magic this was to grab her attention.

The dragoness flew down to them with amazement still plastered across her face. “I would ask how, but I don't think I'd want to know…” She remarked in a slight awe, trying to imagine how a dragon might accomplish this just as quickly without burning everything for miles around.

The human let out a nervous chuckle that unnerved her a bit. “Yeah, this is definitely going on my most dangerous spells list.”

“Exactly how many spells are on that list?” She asked cautiously while eyeing him with a fair amount of concern.

The frankly frightening archmage coughed uncomfortably, looking all the while like a hatchling discovering their own strength after accidentally injuring the family pet. “At least a few dozen, but some of them I've put hard limits on. Remember when I refused to tell you what a nuke was? Well the byproduct of using it is high levels of ray-dee-ation, which is something that I am never going to fuck with.”

Once again, Fel looked over the area. “What does it do to be worse than this?” She questioned skeptically.

Leo grimaced. “Without explaining the concept, because no one should ever know how to do this, it's essentially poison that can kill pretty much anything, can linger in the air for hundreds if not thousands of years, and is near impossible to safely clean up after a certain point.”

“That's fucking horrifying! Wait, you said a byproduct. What is its main use? Wait, no, I don't want to know.” She did, however, wonder just how they managed to create something like that without the use of magic of any kind.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

A slightly dark expression fell over the man's visage. “Yeah, it's a horrible way to die…”

‘How could his world seem like a paradise, but also have weapons that do that…?’

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Sciesch

Sciesch had been experiencing quite the thrill from flying over to the construction site, while also being partially distracted by less than professional fantasies. She had been backed up and so far from home for a few months now, that getting in bed with a human might actually be worth it to destress and loosen up.

It was fairly obvious that she would be staying in Telnar for at least a year to oversee the construction, a circumstance that would have wound her up if she was working for the usual noble, but a human? Fanatics were truly, well, fanatical, and she didn't even want to think about what would happen to her, her family, her homeland, or the whole world when the news got out.

On the flip side, things being the way they are, she was pretty much guaranteed a lot of profitable work. She had initially hoped to be sticking around for a few more weeks after the initial contract for minor additions anyway, but having a human as a client would definitely guarantee her work back home.

So she was at least happy about that, because coin was coin after all.

Those thoughts were currently on the backburner as she continued to process what she witnessed, almost missing the fact that she was suddenly standing on the ground.

Sciesch looked over at Leo, who was staring up at Fel. ‘That was not something that a simple arch mage would be capable of, that seemed closer to what a god could do…’

The skeptical tiefling had always been critical of the zealots who equated the second summon to a god. Because if he was, then how could he die? No, he was as mortal as everyone else, even dragons, as powerful as they are, were subject to mortality.

Consequently, she always thought that the zealots went too far in deifying the summon. But after witnessing what he could do, and an admission from a dragon of their defeat by him, she may have to rethink some of her long held beliefs on the subject.

She furrowed her brow as she bit her lip in irritation. ‘I really don't want to admit that those crazy bastards are right, but…’ The thought trailed off as she looked between the cleared land and Leo.

The answer was probably no, and that it was a stupid thing to even ask, but she stiffly walked over to ask him anyway. “Um, Leo, are you and your people gods?” She questioned nervously, while not at all mentally prepared for a yes, as it would mean that she had been wrong her entire life.

Leo opened his mouth to speak, paused, frowned, and went silent for a bit until realization seemed to cross his face. “No to both. My world doesn't have magic, and I'm just like everyone else without it. In fact if you catch me with my guard down, then an arrow to the face is just as deadly as anything else. Just think of me as wielding the power, not being said power. So please don't start treating me like a god, or be constantly on edge around me, because I just want to be treated like everyone else.” He paused to look over the area.

“Even though I can do this…” He trailed off with an exhausted sigh, and she physically relaxed at his explanation, because it turned her worldview back upright again.

The tiefling cocked her head as an almost nagging thought repeated at the back of her mind. “So just to be sure, you want to be treated without regard to your magical ability?”

The man smiled warmly. “Exactly.”

She smiled impishly, because with most of his magical abilities checked out, she really wanted to confirm Elaria's claim on his physical. “Great, so want to fuck?” She offered bluntly while her tail swayed expectantly, almost giddy at the prospect.

Leo blinked. “Yeah, sure… What else did I expect?” His disappointed tone caused her unusual forwardness to slip, unaware that the man's internal thoughts were more or less. ‘Like I'm going to say no to a sexy demoness.’ The casualness of sex was mearly hitting him from left field, again.

Sciesch became crestfallen, her tail drooping sadly. “It's fine if you don't want to, you could have just said no…” She pouted as she timidly twirled a strand of her hair.

Fel crossed her arms disapprovingly at Leo. “Paper dragon wants to make others feel bad? That's rich.”

The barb made him wince. “I'm sorry Sciesch, I didn't mean it like that. It's just that being constantly leered at is starting to get to me. You're a gorgeous woman and I'd be happy to have a good time with you.” He turned to Fel. “And as for you. After I've had my time with her, I'm going to finally fuck paper dragon out of your vocabulary.” He finished with a hard certainty, and both women's skin color deepened in shade considerably.

…

Sciesch had been left to her own thoughts after that encouraging conversation, wondering what her sisters would think about her potentially fucking a human, and how seethinglly jealous the more religious family members would be. Although, she did wonder why she had been so quick to throw caution to the wind, a large part of her hoping that her people's darker aspects weren't affecting her.

‘I might need to watch myself afterwards…’ The concerning mental note was placed at the forefront of her mind, but any intimate encounters usually did help to curb her people's troubling condition anyway.

For the most part though, she spent the better half of two hours walking around the flattened land and casually zoning out construction areas in her head. Fel and Leo on the other hand, had spent that time smoothing out the terrain around the edges of the flattened land, an understandable task considering how unseemly it looked.

He was nearly done after a little over two hours in, when Sciesch heard a muffled voice in her bag. It was from the communication orb the branch lent her, and when she pulled it out she could hear someone frantically calling in a hushed tone.

The orb pulsed dimly. “Hello, architect?! Are you there?! Gods please answer?! Hello?!” The woman called desperately from the other end.

Sciesch became visibly worried. “Hello, this is Sciesch. Is som-” She was cut off by the woman.

The orb brightened. “Get Leo!”

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Rak

-FOUR HOURS AGO-

Rak was patiently waiting outside the academy, leaning against a massive floating metal box. The box was an ancient artifact that was excavated from a ruin found in Selaria, and dated back to the era of progress. The box could carry a limitless amount of weight, and glide over terrain with ease. But since the runes that made it work were a complete mystery to the academy, they just used it to transport many supplies, or other heavy objects.

Rak couldn't care less about the floating magical mystery, as his mind was on what he would do when he got to Telnar. “It has been a while, so I should take my time and enjoy it. There probably won't be another opportunity like this for decades…” He muttered with a small and eager smile.

The headmaster approached with a smile on her face. “All the mages and supplies are loaded, so we are set to head off. We should probably get there around midday.” She told him.

Rak smiled happily, one of the few occasions that he was actually in such a mood to regard the pathetic little thing. “Oh I'm much too impatient for that, so why don't I just teleport you all there.”

The headmaster arched a brow, and looked between him and the artifact. “Are you sure? I mean no disrespect, but this is quite a lot.” She questioned meekly.

Rak barked a laugh at the insect, and how small they actually were compared to him. “This is nothing for me little bug! I have the ability to move twice this size, and my mana pool is even bigger than most other dragons.” He huffed proudly.

The headmaster nodded, and boarded the artifact with some hesitation, much to Rak's amusement.

Placing both his hands on the box, Rak visualized the area he scouted yesterday that was just outside Telnar. The sounds of cracks and tears could be heard, as the space around him and the artifact began to shift and warp.

And after one loud and thunderous snap, they were both at their destination.

Rak banged on the box. “We're here!” He shouted while looking out over the town with a manic expression.

The headmaster exited the artifact, and started giving orders to take the gates and patrol the walls, to make sure no one escapes.

The headmaster then thanked Rak for the teleport, and hoped that it didn't cost him too much mana.

The dragon snorted at being worried over by an insect. “Nothing I couldn't do twice over.” Internally he had to admit that he spent a decent chunk.

‘But it's not like there's anything here that could even scratch me.’

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