I returned to outside the City Shield and waited. It went down and I raced for the city. Female soldiers tried to stop me, but it was useless as I melted them and entered. I hunted down every single person. If I could Sense them, I killed them.
They had tried to put up a resistance at the wall, but they had been easily crushed. I didn’t spot any more of those Council Members. They had probably fled out another gate. It would be impossible to track them down in the wilderness.
It was a bit frustrating, but I didn’t mind. I was entering a building to kill another person when my foot caught on a wire I had missed. Aqua Sphere. The blast dug into the skill and my armor was slightly scorched.
A trap, but not strong enough. Still, it was impressive and made me more wary of entering buildings. I got to the plaza and cleared the buildings. I ended up carrying a corpse around and would chuck it at the wires to set off the traps. I would then grab a new corpse and use it as a trap activator.
I considered it good practice for the tower. I would need to make sure I stocked up on a lot of logs. They were cheap and had weight. I would then toss them forward to check for traps. That did raise an issue of traps created by the Almighty System might have different trigger mechanisms. I would have to be careful not to get complacent and to manage my supplies.
Once this city was wiped out, it would be time to upgrade my skills. On the way to the boulder hill, I could claim some of the nearby dungeons. Hopefully the women hadn’t used them up since the time interval for them had just happened yesterday.
Then I could make my way around Normandy checking for people, scouting the terrain and clearing out the level 3 dungeons to upgrade my skills even more. I needed power not silent or gestureless if I was going to fight level 5 monsters.
I would take the level 3 zones near Normandy since no one would look up here. After that I would make my way to a city for a lot of supplies and then a tower. Heaven was the closest, so I would stock up there. Get one pack stuffed to the brim and an entire cart. Every piece of gear I would buy multiple of. Torches, lanterns, oil, swords, clothing, chunks of wood, lighters, and gear. That was in addition to all the food and water I would pack away as well.
I figured forty nine floors, I should plan for fifty days. One floor a day. I tossed another corpse through a doorway and another explosion happened. I noted that while annihilation explosions cut through anything, they slowed down against physical material and other skills.
Still, that cutting through anything part was the most useful aspect about these types of bombs. Even if something had a super high amount of defense, you were going to do some damage at point blank range.
That was why I had confidence in the beam cannons Doctor Katz was working on, unlike that golden energy wave. Even if we managed to remove a foot or hand from the Divine Empress, I felt that would even the odds if we fought.
Probably a foot at the very least to hinder her movements. Then I would keep pressuring her and wear her down in a battle of attrition.
My danger sense activation. Air Burst. I moved out of the way as an assassin appeared and stabbed where I had been standing. Too predictable. Acid Shot x20 x20. Their stats weren’t that high. The woman screamed as she melted.
Yeah, a city of female assassins needed to be wiped out for sure. It was just too much of a risk long term. I couldn’t let the Astrologer get such a city under his control no matter what. The assassins would decimate my forces long term.
They weren’t good in a straight up fight, but their ability to hide from the Sense stat was incredibly overpowered. I would have to do a couple sweeps through this city, but I had let Commander Abdullah know to tell Clarissa to send a follow up force to take this area over.
The more territory we controlled, the harder it would be for the Divine Empress and any other force to really hurt our side. That was the advantage of not having your powerbase be in a city and we could quickly raise up new soldiers through hybridization and consumption.
Thank you Ritualist for allowing my Empire to grow off your accomplishments and research. Using hybrids to sweep large swaths of land and clear out the Dragon Empire’s grinders would give our side a huge advantage.
“Die!” Four women came out from surroundings rooms with swords aimed at me. Acid Shot x20 x20. They all died screaming as they melted. Not even to land a blow on me, but with their stats it didn’t really matter.
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I was looking for documents I could steal or other information they left behind. But any place that might have had something was booby trapped. I wasn’t that careful either, trigger the traps left and right. It was honestly kind of amusing everything these women were trying.
They weren’t going down without a fight either. Every so often more would leap out and try to kill me. It was honestly getting quite repetitive. I mean send someone strong or use some powerful skills or something.
I needed to get more experience before I fought the Divine Empress. I could easily see her surviving the super weapon but injured and I would have to go in and finish her in a high stakes battle with everything on the line.
It wasn’t something I was looking forward to, but I knew I would have to do it. Kind of like laundry. No one wanted to do laundry, but it needed to get done. I felt the same way about the Divine Empress now that everything was falling into place. I would get it done, but it would be annoying and take up time.
Air Burst. Aqua Sphere. The entire building I was in exploded as I shot up through the roof, my arms braced over my head. Air Burst. I landed gently on the ground as the building collapsed. That was a good try, but the traps triggered my danger sense an instant before they detonated.
They were too slow for someone of my caliber. Now I knew why assassination attempts on the Divine Empress had failed. Even if they put a bomb under her chair, she would sense the threat long enough to dodge out of the way as the bomb took a moment to activate.
If anything it was a bit annoying, but I was treating this entire thing as a training exercise.
“How could you!” A woman screamed while clutching a baby in her arms who was screaming. Acid Shot. Not going to let any of these kids grow up to cause me future drama. That was my new focus, no more future drama. Kill everyone who stood against me.
I could do this since I knew it was necessary. If you are going to kill people, don’t take half measures. Another thing I had learned from the Ritualist. He had taught me a lot of life lessons I had needed to learn. I might have known them, but there was knowing and then there was really knowing.
One of the women might even grind her way up and confront me in the future. It would be amusing to have that happen, since I was confident my speed would eclipse everyone else’s speed once I had cities under my control.
That was a big reason why I was doing this as well. Each city, each zone, each dungeon under my control, would represent an increase in my passive income. This city would make seven and then the nine from the Dragon Empire would make sixteen total.
Even at just a million points a day, that would be sixteen million points. In a hundred days, that would be one point six billion points. Grinding by myself was no longer a long term option for growth. While I would still do it to keep my combat skills sharp, fighting monsters for me was less about points now. It would be more about getting better at fighting and combat skills.
It was a weird transition to think about. I had been so focused for so long on getting more points by fighting and killing monsters, it was hard to change mindsets. The heist had been the eye opener I had needed.
That was something I learned from the Divine Empress. You don’t need a team if you are strong enough. And it is better to be stronger yourself than rely on useless people to do your fighting for you. I had to give her respect for coming out to Purgatory herself.
It was opposite the mindset most leaders would have had. She might be the most evil person to ever be born or exist, sorry Hitler, but she didn’t mind getting her hands dirty. I could respect that. That was one thing I had hated about the Ritualist, always slithering away like a snake or a rat to come back later and bother me.
It felt odd to give the Divine Empress any credit for fighting honor, but she had it. People were more than just good or evil, they had nuance. “AHHH!” Except these women. Acid Shot. Honestly this place had to be cult with how brainwashed they all were and rushing to their deaths like lemmings off a cliff.
It was a mindset that I just didn’t understand. But I also didn’t care enough to capture one of these women and question them. A cult of female assassins. Well, they were absolutely useless. I mean, even after their leaders had fled they were still rushing to their deaths and trying to kill me.
Whatever techniques they were using, they were effective. Perhaps some combination of skills, torture, and starvation to condition these women. I noticed none of them were plump or plus size. Oh, perhaps the Astrologer gave the technique of brainwashing to the leaders, which is why they liked him and wanted to find him.
That would be amusing, but it would make sense in a twisted sort of way. He had portrayed himself as an expert on energy and everything I had heard and seen so far had confirmed that. Which meant he might have developed some sort of conditioning program.
Heck, he didn’t even need to give it away. He could start with a couple of women and then they would keep the process going. Building up an army for him. His stand-in that I had dealt with probably wanted the women to stay away so he could have a power base he could return to without the Divine Empress interfering with it.
Plots within plots. It was impressive how everyone was maneuvering to have the best strategic position once the Divine Empress was killed. The Avatar, the Astrologer, and myself were all jockeying for a piece of the pie once it came out of the oven.
The fanatical nature of these women only confirmed in my mind that they needed to die even more. The Avatar was already enough of a headache to deal with. One war at a time. We crush the Dragon Empire, then move onto the Fifth Caliphate.
I could nip this war with the Astrologer in the bud before it even happened, but I couldn’t afford to take any chances. I began melting the city buildings as I ran into them one after another. This city would be left a ruin once I was done with it.