William wasn’t the type of person Jake thought much about. Not anymore. After he had turned his back on Eversmile and become a heretic, Jake didn’t really hear much about the young metal mage who had turned his Tutorial into a shitshow anymore. Sure, in the back of his mind, Jake probably knew he was doing stuff somewhere, but he hadn’t been someone worth dedicating much brain power to consider.
So it came as a genuine surprise when the mage wanted to meet Jake. His timing was also highly suspicious, being this close to the Prima Guardian event. Jake didn’t think he was there to sabotage them, though, as if he was, going through Miranda and wanting to meet Jake was perhaps the dumbest strategy.
Nevertheless, Jake was suspicious.
As promised, Miranda and William arrived not even ten minutes after he was informed they were coming over. Miranda had even deployed some kind of stealth field as she walked alongside the metal mage. When Jake saw them enter the valley fully, he instantly Identified William as there was one thing he wanted to confirm first and foremost.
[Human – lvl 276 – Heretic]
Still a heretic, Jake thought with a bit of relief while also noting the guy’s level was pretty good. Still behind Jake and the other top elites, but only by half a dozen levels. He also didn’t believe William could have spoofed the identification in any way. Besides, posing as a heretic tended not to end well, and Jake didn’t doubt quite a few people would outright attack William upon seeing the tag.
Jake also noted how William looked a lot calmer. Serene, almost. Or perhaps it was just because Jake was used to the guy having quite an intense and somewhat crazy look in his eyes, and now he appeared a lot more normal and put-together. In any case, it definitely looked like getting out from under Eversmile’s boot had done him good.
It wasn’t like Eversmile seemed to give a damn Jake had turned William to the dark side, either. Sure, he wasn’t friendly around Jake, but he hadn’t been outright hostile either. He genuinely didn’t seem like he cared much. Then again, maybe Eversmile just viewed it as another interesting development for his research. Yeah, that totally seemed like something Eversmile would do.
Sitting on the porch, Miranda and William approached, with Miranda being the first to speak. “Sorry for the lack of warning before the visit.”
“It’s my fault,” William spoke up, indeed seeming a lot more mellow than usual. “I just returned to Earth today from Nevermore, having entered the World Wonder quite late.”
“Speaking of Nevermore… you went there in D-grade, so how much time did you lose in C-grade?” Jake asked. Probably not the most pressing question, but he was curious.
“Just the time I was there in D-grade,” William shook his head. “Though it did disqualify me from competing on the Leaderboards, not that I ever planned on doing that in the first place. I didn’t have a party to go with, but I just found a group in Nevermore City. Ended up joining six different parties during my time there, and that isn’t even to mention the members swapped out while in each party.
“Sounds tough,” Jake commented, though to be honest, he didn’t really care overly much. He did care about the timing of this visit, though. “Quite a day you decide to return. Either you are extremely talented in timing when you would be done with Nevermore, or there’s something fishy going on here.”
“I didn’t finish… I had about a year and a half left, but I knew I couldn’t delay my return any longer. In truth, I already cut it a lot closer than I originally planned to, as I had a contact in Nevermore who was delayed,” William explained, Jake not detecting any clue he was lying. Still, he remained highly suspicious.
“Alright, fine. I also get that you probably want to participate in the Prima event, but needless to say, you aren’t going to be part of the strike team,” Jake wanted to clarify quickly. He simply wouldn’t trust his back to someone like William… well, alright, Jake wouldn’t care much about his own back, as he would definitely see the backstabbing coming, but he didn’t want people who didn’t have an overpowered Bloodline to trust William either.
“That’s fine,” William said. “That’s not why I’m here.”
“William disappeared from Earth around the same time you went to Nevermore, and I confirmed he was no longer on the planet,” Miranda chimed in. “This meeting is because of where he went during that time.”
This did catch Jake’s attention as he looked at William inquisitively.
“I went to Ell’Hakan’s homeworld,” William said, not beating around the bush. “I did this during the time Ell’Hakan and the majority of the other high-ranking individuals were gone to Nevermore. I spent over a year there, exploring the planet.”
“His planet, huh… how did you even find it?” Jake questioned. Truthfully, Jake had looked into Ell’Hakan’s homeworld before and found nothing. Even the Viper didn’t actually know where his homeworld was. The abilities of the gods to peer into the ninety-third universe remained limited, and while the Viper would easily see any area around Jake or others he had blessed, he couldn’t simply scout the entire universe.
Even in other universes, trying to find one particular planet could be extremely annoying. There was one pretty reliable way, though. One it appeared William had used.
“I met Ell’Hakan when he came to Earth. I formed a faint karmic connection with him, and I held onto that bond. Using it to find his planet was far easier than I expected. Far easier than it should have been, as his world is… wrong,” William explained.
“Explain,” Jake frowned.
William took a moment before he spoke. “On Earth right now, karma is an endless web. It’s a confusing mess of different connections between people, and it’s what most would call natural. The karmic connections have been formed through genuine emotion. The bond between friends looks like friends, lovers like lovers, and so on. It isn’t like that on Ell’Hakan’s planet. Not at all.”
Jake kept quiet as the young-looking man continued.
“I think a bit of background is in order. Karma is a powerful aspect of Yip of Yore’s powers, yes, but Ell’Hakan has specialized further. His Bloodline is almost tailor-made to create powerful karmic connections between himself and others, and it’s through this karma he exploits them. As the Chosen of Yip of Yore, they both gain power based on others’ belief in their legends, and the more strongly others believe their legends, the more real these legends become. The more power they get,” William continued his explanation.
“I told you that here on Earth, the karmic web looks like expected, but on Ell’Hakans homeworld, it’s just fucked up. Effectively, the entire population shares one singular karmic bond, more powerful than any other. A singular stronger connection than their parents, partners, and children. Above everyone else, there is Ell’Hakan, the Celestial Child.”
“What exactly does this mean?” Jake questioned.
“Rather than a mortal or a mere leader, they view him more as a god… no, a being even higher than a god. They genuinely love and revere him. His word is truth, his actions just. They even believe he is unbeatable and that even if an actual god tried to slay him, they wouldn’t stand a chance. Honestly, Yip of Yore’s Path fits him so damn well it’s disgusting, as this powerful belief gives him actual tangible power.”
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Jake’s frown only deepened the more William spoke. For a long time, Jake’s theory had been that Ell’Hakan had a skill not that dissimilar to Jake’s Big Game Hunter, except rather than being triggered by higher-leveled opponents, it was triggered by the belief in his legend. If that was the case… did that mean he had a powerful passive boosting skill active at all times due to the belief from his homeworld?
There was one pretty damn simple potential method to overcome this kind of skill, though. Especially as a boosting skill like this could very well come with some form of backlash should Ell’Hakan lose belief in his legend.
“His legend is built on a lie. If we reveal the truth, it-“
“Won’t matter,” William sighed as he shook his head. “I tried. Caught a few people and showed them the truth, including some things he said to me that directly contradicted his own doctrine. It had absolutely no effect. Truth isn’t anything they care about anymore; it’s pure fanaticism.”
“Even if the majority of the population is brainwashed, there must be some people to disagree with his rule or people who managed to break out of this delusion,” Jake tried to argue.
“I didn’t detect a single one,” William said before he was silent for a bit, before asking a question Jake had never considered. “Do you know when he took over his planet?”
“I would say shortly after the system arrived… but I have the feeling that isn’t right,” Jake said.
“Twenty years before the integration. For twenty years, Ell’Hakan had already ruled his planet. Unified all the factions and countries under his own banner as the Celestial Child while doing a purge of anyone who dared not view him as a being above any other. To them, he is the literal son of the twin moons and the sun of his planet. No, not a metaphor or anything… legend has it that on the day of a twin eclipse, he was born, gifted to their world by the stars themselves to rule and bring peace,” William explained.
“Pretty sure only Starborn are born from literal stars,” Jake joked as he found the notion utterly idiotic.
“To make things even worse, I did also find his actual parents, though they seemed to believe they had only been the ones to raise him, despite the biological connection,” William continued. “I want to reiterate. Everything I’ve said is something every single person on the planet believes with utter unswayable conviction. They are completely fanatical. If he told them all to kill themselves, they wouldn’t even ask the reason before doing it.”
“So they’re like the fanatics of the Holy Church,” Jake said, really not needing more people like that in his life.
“They are far worse. Followers of the Holy Church at least know they can go to the Holyland if they die or they get some other benefits. In the end, they still act somewhat selfishly and logically, believing their deaths either serve a greater goal or help their family and friends,” William disagreed. “What is happening on Ell’Hakan’s planet isn’t that at all… it’s something the Holy Church could only dream of achieving.”
Jake was in thought for a bit before asking the big question: “I appreciate this information, but I’m still not sure why you needed this urgent meeting or exactly what you want me to do with this knowledge. You don’t sound like you’re offering any solutions here.”
“I’m not,” William sighed. “But let me get to the crux of it. Ell’Hakan’s Bloodline allows him to manipulate emotions, something I’m sure you’ve already experienced, right?”
“Right,” Jake nodded. He really fucking hated that Bloodline. His own was way better and way less insidious.
“What you’ve experienced is only a mere fleeting moment of it. I want you to imagine what continued exposure can result in, especially when the feelings they foster are never contradicted or argued against. It makes the emotions utterly engrained in your being and something you don’t question. But it’s more than that… because these emotions weren’t born naturally but forcefully empowered through the influence of a Bloodline. Empowered to a whole new level of emotions – a new conceptual stage - I don’t even think we can imagine, and that’s coming from someone who’s been introduced to quite a few entirely new emotions throughout his life,” William explained in-depth.
“People already let emotions rule them more than logic, and this takes that to an extreme. These emotions become so strong there is no way to sway them. They embedded themselves in the soul, becoming core parts of a person. I’m not saying disillusioning someone from Ell’Hakan’s manipulation is impossible, but you will need far more than merely showing them the truth. You will need something magical in nature to break this illusion they live under.”
“You still haven’t gotten to why this is so urgent,” Jake pointed out, as he felt like William was rambling quite a bit. He knew the guy liked to talk from way back in the Tutorial, but this was getting a bit much for what was effectively just the guy telling Jake Ell’Hakan’s Bloodline was dangerous.
“During the Prima Guardian event, Ell’Hakan has chosen to assist the other planets and not do the event alone. He leads this alliance and will get all other World Leaders in a room with him and access to hundreds of planets. He will spread his legend and create powerful diplomatic connections. People will go to his planet, he will go to theirs, and that’s where things get really dangerous…”
William raised a hand as a bit of mana gathered. “You control the nearby Pylon of Civilization. That means all of the territory the Pylon covers is infused with a bit of Records and energy at all times, correct?”
Jake nodded, as he suddenly had a realization. Wait, he can’t mean-
“The same is true for Ell’Hakan. Your Records have resulted in this Pylon being quite scary to all beasts, and as I’m sure Ms. Wells can attest to, it passively has helped everyone increase their resistance to auras merely living here. Now imagine if this same concept is applied to Ell’Hakan controlling a Pylon,” William said.
“He plans on gaining control of other Planetary Pylons by swaying the local World Leaders,” Jake had already realized. If a Pylon of Civilization covered a city in the Records and partial aura of a person, a Planetary Pylon definitely covered the whole planet... which would mean...
“That’s what I believe he is planning,” William nodded. “He wants to make other worlds like his own by making his Bloodline passively affect everyone living on these planets, turning them into fanatics. To make worlds where absolute reverence toward him is the baseline. While I’m sure there is a cap to his boosting ability, it’s still undisputable that he gains more power the more people believe in his legend. I’m sure he has other ways to use this energy that’s effectively faith, so if he gains control of more planets, his power will only grow to new heights. So that’s why this is urgent. If Ell’Hakan runs wild, he may just lay claim to the entire Milky Way galaxy before Earth even makes meaningful contact with other planets.”
“Well… fuck,” Jake could only say as he still wondered. “How do you even know all this? I just want to make sure this isn’t pure speculation on your part, even if it does sound pretty damn possible.”
“I had it confirmed and explained by the person who is effectively the Prime Minister of Ell’Hakan’s empire,” William answered with a smile. “He was more than happy to tell me everything.”
Jake narrowed his eyes as William just flashed a small smile. “Ell’Hakan is not the only innately manipulative person. It wasn’t hard to convince the guy I served Ell’Hakan and Yip of Yore by acting as the contact person between Eversmile and them. That my job was to assist in their quest. It didn’t take long before we were the best of friends and he told me all their plans as I only nodded along in excitement.”
“What are the chances this is all false information planted by Ell’Hakan to throw us off some other real goal?” Miranda asked after a few seconds.
“I doubt it is,” William shook his head. “Everything lined up too well, and I doubt he believed anyone would or even could go to his planet. It isn’t somewhere that’s easy to find at all, and he’s even done a lot to keep it hidden. While I don’t have much to thank Eversmile for and far more reasons for grief, he did teach me some valuable things that allowed me to find it.”
The three of them were silent for a moment as Jake considered everything they had talked about. After a bit, Miranda spoke up.
“When the Prima Guardian dies, this alliance system will also open up to us… we should take this chance to compete openly with Ell’Hakan. Ell’Hakan has recently tried to act more amicable toward Jake, so he can’t outright try and shut us out without it looking like he’s going back on his word,” Miranda said.
Jake considered her words and could only nod. In truth, this had also kind of been the plan… though more so because it looked like a chance to do some fun exploration while even fighting more bosses.
“The most important thing is for others not to hand over their planetary cores to Ell’Hakan,” William nodded. “Because if they do… I’m not sure what the solution would be.”
“To kill Ell’Hakan,” Jake shrugged. Seemed pretty easy.
“That won’t make these emotions go away,” William sighed. “The level of fanaticism exists independent of him. My guess is that they will assume he didn’t truly die but just ascended or will be revived in the future or some shit.”
… Jake really hated dealing with goddamn fanatics.