Unlike when they pushed their way through to the compound, making their way back was done at a slower pace. This wasn’t necessarily a bad thing as it made for a more relaxed atmosphere amount the group. The pressure on everyone’s shoulders had lifted and now that there was nothing to truly lose, they were mostly hungry for a proper fight.
It didn’t take too long for them to get one either. They passed the same bridge they had claimed previously, not bothering with moving to any of the others as the amount of people there wouldn’t be worth the extra time it took to divert their course. Eventually they reached the inner fortress and met back with the small group that had been left there in case they needed a distraction.
This was when they learnt that The Pantheon had not been sitting idle over the last few days. All of the people from the remaining inner fortresses had been moved together into this single one. It had happened gradually but now, rather than a small group inhabiting the fortress there was over 5 times the amount they expected which numbered over a million people compared to their own few thousand.
Although this was more than they had expected to face so early on in the trek back they were not disappointed. All that they had left to do was fight each other, the fact they had been so kind enough to group together was only a boon in his eyes.
The only thing that was slightly annoying was that he only had two skills in which he could level up in the fight, his new metamorphosis skill and his Titan’s Body. Seeing as how he didn’t want to expose his Titan’s body skill just yet and he needed to make an impression using his metamorphosis skill the decision on how he would fight was made for him.
Given how many people had gathered for him as well he would also help the others out by thinning the numbers with his summons skill, but even then he expected to have casualties in this fight, especially given that every single person in the group wanted to join the fighting rather than sit out.
When they got close enough to the fortress he laid out his plan which was rather simple and to the point. He would go in first, cause utter mayhem, clear a way into the fortress for everyone else to be able to enter unimpeded, then it was up to them not to die.
No one argued with him or came up with a different plan. There was a small amount of grumbling that he caught from a group of humans about him just wanting to show off and kill everyone before they got a chance. He didn’t react to hearing it though as these were the same people that didn’t join them in the attack on the compound and they were still very much bitter about how everything went down.
He didn’t waste any time after tha”, he’summoned his eagles and hounds and then he himself transformed. Using the metamorphosis skill was still a weird feeling, one he would have to get used to. Growing a tail and horns as well as bringing out his wings made him feel even less human than he was. The strength he gained in this form though was epic though.
He left the group not long after this, flying off with his eagles as his hounds rushed forth on the ground, leaving the rest of the group chasing after them. It took less than a minute for him to bridge the gap between where he had been and the fortress and he made sure that he made enough of a spectacle of himself that everyone in the fortress knew he had arrived.
He had approached in a way that lightning cracked through the air with every flap of his wings, and the moment that he was seen, shouts had echoed through the compound. He started high enough in the air that he could be seen by all who looked his way, but as he drew closer he dived down straight at the entrance of the fortress, planning on clearing a line through the soldiers gathered there and guarding this particular entrance.
As he drew closer he was attacked by everyone that had a ranged weapon or skill, but none made it close enough to him to even graze his skin. He gathered lightning around him, powering up for a devastating attack. It was even easier to control lightning in this form but he also had to be very careful to not let any death energy bleed into it which was something he had spent many months training to do.
Diving down towards the fortress, he didn’t slow his decent until the last moment, spreading his wings he pushed through the opening of the fortress walls and with a large amount of his mana he sent down all of the gathered lightning in a continuous blast of power that devastated anyone who happened to be close to him.
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He didn’t stop releasing his attacks until he had made a line of destruction from the fortress wall all the way into the centre of the fortress. He had left nothing but destruction in his wake and no one had survived his initial sweep into the fortress. When he had reached the centre of the fortress he pulled up, using his wings to push him back into the air, each flap causing more destruction to the area around him.
It was a powerful attack, when he looked at his mana usage though he had barely used 10% of his total. He hadn’t killed everyone in the compound, but if he was to guess he did manage to kill off at least 5 to 10% of the occupants in one go.
Rather than go around for another sweep he perched himself on the roof of the tallest building in the fortress and had his eagles, who had followed him during his attack, go our and kill the occupants. From his own perch atop the building he utilised his echo to track down any large groups in the fortress, when he managed to find people gathered together he didn’t hesitate to send out bolts of lightning and kill off large groups at a time.
Most of his focus was towards the opposite side of the fortress that his own group would enter. He had already caused enough destruction closest to them that they should have no issue moving in and attacking. If he didn’t thin the numbers on the opposite side though they would eventually be overwhelmed by pure numbers.
When his own group entered the fortress he kept his echo on them to make sure that if he was needed that he would be able to assist. He would only do this though if he was truly needed, knowing that they needed to be able to fight and die on their own to a certain extent.
He did however become bored quickly. Sitting on top of a building and just launching lightning bolts at people was not his idea of enjoyable. It was effective at thinning out the numbers but he felt like he was just abusing his power on those weaker than him than actually fighting anyone.
He didn’t stop though until he was certain that the numbers had been thinned enough that his own group would be relatively safe from being overwhelmed any time soon, and with that done he set off from the roof in search of his own fight.
It didn’t take long for him to find a group of a few thousand Pantheon members running towards the fighting. Rather than attack from above he made sure to dive down to the ground and land right in front of them, cutting them off from the direction they had bene running and causing them to stop dead in their tracks.
He took both of his swords out and stared them down, challenging them to fight him here and now. He was disappointed when some of them tried to run away, he didn’t let them though. Using a flame strike he killed everyone who dared not face him in combat.
That message came across loud and clear, and although they looked terrified of him, they did eventually charge. He was, disappointed. Even before all of the upgrades he had received due to his heritage he had been overpowered compared to the average human. Now though, it was as if they were moving in slow motion.
With a sigh, he did what he wanted to do, he got no joy from it though. He cut through them all, using nothing but his swords. There was no challenge in doing it though, he killed them all before any one of them had managed to even release their own attack. It took seconds for him to move through them and kill every single one of them, they died before they realised what was even happening to them.
When he was done he tried to find a bigger group, when he did the same ending occurred. It wasn’t until he had cleared out several groups and easily over 200,000 people were dead did he just give up on finding any worthy fight here. He had hopes that when he met Jason in a fight he would get some enjoyment from it, but he doubted it. He was now way to overpowered for anything in the E grade. He doubted that the D grade dungeon would be a challenge for him, but he planned to test that theory when this was done. Hopefully at its highest difficulty he would be able to truly test out his new skills and stats.
He didn’t bother joining In the fight after that unless he found his own team In any danger of being killed, even then though he didn’t act as some god and save everyone, rather he just controlled the flow of people coming at them.
This meant that it took much longer for them to clear the fortress and when it got to a point that his group had hit their limit of being able to fight any longer he cleared the rest of the fortress quickly. This was good experience for them, knowing their limits and skills and learning to pace themselves in drawn out fights.
They weren’t gaining experience but they were gaining skill levels which was even more valuable in the long run. When the last of The Pantheon numbers died he started to claim the fortress. They would need to rest for a while before moving on and repeating the same process all over again and he had no desire to leave the fortress unclaimed.
His group found somewhere relatively stable to stay for the night so that they could eat and celebrate their victory. It was when he joined back up with the group and heard excited exclamations from more than one of the group that he froze. They were talking about affinity, more specifically, there were a number of people that had acquired one during the fight.