On a inconspicuous day, on a farm of Texas, the farmers are getting in the works that are needed to be done before summer comes around.
They plow the fields using oxen driven plow, while some just do it by hand using a shovel. There is a particularly strange pair, they are very far away from any other farmers.
“Hey bastard Li, I think that after today I'll go find me a girl and make a family…” A farmer who is driving the plow, tell the person who is throwing seeds behind him. They're moving about casually, the two are plowing and seeding while humming.
“Bah...have you ever looked at yourself monster Han? Even a monster from the depth of the underworld will not wants you, much less marry you.” The seeder sneered while still seeding.
Snorting annoyed, Farmer Han turned to looked at Farmer Li and confidently declared, “What do you know? Don't you know that the village girls are swooning over me, whenever I swagger through town?” Seemingly proud of himself, Farmer Han stuck out his chest and crack a smile at his best friend.
“Oh please, I don't want to pop your bubble but those girls are cursing out your entire family for giving birth to the monster you.” Farmer Li also seemingly proud of himself, looked towards Farmer Han and loudly sneer.
“You are just jealous bastard Li, no girls ever want a bastard like you…” Trying to make a comeback, Farmer Han voice trail off into the distance because he knows...just how popular the bastard friend of his is.
“Whatever, hey do you think that maybe we could get a tractor for this field work?” Farmer Li eyes shines with stars, as if the tractor was a sport car in his mind.
“Oh please, those old geezer back at home don't even spend extra money on ox. You think that you'll get to touch the expensive tractor?” Having pointed out the problem, Farmer Han did not feel good at all, instead they just silently get back to work...wallowing in the despair of no machinery.
“Rumble, rumble, rumble.”
The two farmers who are nonchalantly farming suddenly felt a tremor, it is like the earth itself was shaking. Vibrations that caused even the oxen to be rooted in place, also rooted the farmer in place.
“Earthquake…? No this sounds more like...a stampede?” The seeder put his ears to the ground, and listened to the shaking rumbling sound.
“A stampede? No way bastard Li, no stampede can make that amount of noise and shaking of the earth even if you let every cows on earth run rampant.” Closing his eyes, Farmer Han spoke like a teacher pointing out the flaws in his student judgement.
“Hmm? Look there, does that not looked like dust clouds from stampede?” Farmer Li pointed towards the horizon, where clouds of dust rise above even the tallest of trees.
“You're right bastard Li it is a stampede!!!...but why is the earth shaking so much from a bunch of cows?”
Confused both farmers looked towards the dust cloud that, slowly reveals a collage of beast of all kinds. One looked like a cross between a bear and a snake, while another is a dog the size of a tractor, a flying beast that are plane size. The towering bloodlust that these beast release was thick enough to be cut.
“Monster Han...I believe that...the stampede is not an ordinary one...and they looked quite angry too.” Sheepishly smirking, Farmer Li starts to count how many of such creatures there are, but he stopped after a few.
“Yea, you're right! I've never seen a bear that looked like that and those red eyes are so bloody,” Farmer Han smack a hand on a open palm like he have suddenly find an answer, “hey you think that they came from a lab?”
“No you stupid, have you seen any weird experiments that takes place around here?” Farmer Li who is still contemplating over where these monsters came from, looked at Farmer Han like he was an idiot, “I say, you are dumber than that haystack down back.”
Farmer Han cocked his head suddenly as if realizing something and asked, “Hey bastard Li, shouldn't we be running from the stampede?”
“Ah yea you're right.”
After taking a good looked at the crazily charging stampede, the two have finally started to run. They unhooked the plow from the two ox and ride on them, however it is easier said than done.
The two have to hang on for dear life, as there are no saddle to keep them from falling off. The oxen madly dash forward without care as they try to get away from the hordes of creatures.
“Monster Han...why did we not run earlier?!”
“Because...we're idiots?”
“Good point…”
Silently nodding the two farmers try their hardest to hold on to the oxen that they are currently on. However, the widely dashing oxen that did not care about their terrains, ram into two hay stacks that was leave to dry on a uncultivated area. However both of the oxen ran into each other instead one per haystack, like they are trying to stay away from something.
The two farmer was thrown off and face planted into the watery mud, that was used for planting later. The two turned around and looked towards the incoming hordes of monsters, looked at the knocked out oxen and then towards each other.
“Hey bastard Li, are we going to die today? I still haven't find a beautiful wife yet…aye ya...what is love…” Farmer Han looked at farmer Li with misty eyes, he sigh in a voice full of grief.
“It’s ok monster Han, you still have me with you here...even though we are going to die, at least we still have each other right?” Farmer Li spoke optimistically, but he is also crying while looking at his best friend.
“Who would want to spend their last moment with you ya bastard...but it is ok in this situation.”
They hold each other and cried, while looking at the incoming horde of monsters. The rumbling wave of monster is only a mere step away, from turning the two into mash meatloaf.
At that moment in front of the two farmer, a figure jumped down from the haystack.“Aye ya, has it already been a year? This is ridiculous, this is why I really hate cultivating…”
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When the two farmers are sobbing, they suddenly saw a small figure jumped down from the haystack and spoke in a differently language. It was a boy, no more than 10 years of age, raven black hair, wearing rags, and the striking oversized weapons on his back leave a big impression.
The two farmer who is a sobbing mess try to scream towards to the boy to run...but their voice was drown out as the creatures are closer than ever to their location.
Seemingly unaware of his surroundings, the boy yawned and turned towards the monster horde. The next scene caused the farmers to stopped their crying and observe at what the boy is doing.
The boy without saying anything, waved his hands in the air like he was drawing something and suddenly yelled.
“HAH!”
Then as the farmers who were confused by the gesture, a light envelope the three of them. When the spell just finish, the monsters rushing forwards was close enough to feel their breath.
However a scene like that of Moses opening the sea happened, the monster horde split apart and leaving the three people enveloped in light alone.
The monsters continuously madly dash pass the light that surround the trio, but after about a few minutes of passing monsters...
“£¥£€£€¥£€£€£€€£¥¥€££€££€££€¥¥€” A booming voice resound throughout the surrounding, it instilled fear to all who hear it. Surrounding monsters shuddered in fear and dash even faster towards civilization.
The monster that roared is an creature that tower at 4 meters. It looks like a frankenstein that had gone wrong. It have a goat head, torso bigger than its own body many time made completely of random parts stitched together, left arm of a tiger while the right is a talon. The last of all is a miniscule pair of legs, it look like chopsticks compare to the rest of the body, it is a wonder how those sticks hold up its body weight.
The monster spoke in a strange tongue, of random gurgles and grunt. It stopped just before the barrier of light, laugh and it slowly fly off as if the three people before it is nothing but air.
“Phew. Oh man, keeping up that illusion barrier up is such a chore, got to work on my Huala reserves. I think that should be the last of them…” Maha mentality sucked in a breath of relief as he falled back and sat down, sweat and fatigue covered his body. He is quite embarrass as well because before that he was posing like an almighty lord, but after just a few minutes he is sweating bricks.
He have expended a large amount of his powers to powered the illusion barrier, that created a space to avoid all detection. In Maha’s case, he could not create such a perfect barrier due to his lack of power, but it can blocked out detections from monsters to a certain level of powers.
“H...hello?” Farmer Han, who recover faster than his friend came up to Maha and gave a greeting. “Sire are you...perhaps…a Formica that belonged to the Collis Peak?”
Farmer have a look of jealousy on his face while asking that, but in his eyes there is nothing but admiration. It was like he saw his favorite idol up close, jealous of the idol’s fame but never the less looked up to them.
Still on the floor sweating and breathing hard, Maha turned around confused. He have never heard of such thing back before he went into enlightenment meditation about a godly text from the Eternal Library.
“Formica? Collis Peak? What's that?” Instead of Maha being confuse the farmer looked even more confused than him.
Farmer Han was perplexed as to why the kid before him did not know of the famous Collis Peak, have he been living under a rock? Just as he was about to say something Farmer Li suddenly speak.
“Sire, could it be that you're not from around here?” Farmer Li questioned as he got over his shock from the monster wave. Him and Farmer Han are not such weak willed people to be scare witless from just the horde.
“Yes, I came from North America, I was traveling see...so I was traveling and stumble upon an enlightenment, and I just got out from my cave.” Maha had a gut feeling that even if he tell these gullible looking farmers, there will be no harm's done.
“Wow. Hey bastard Li, he said he gained enlightenment… so you think he reached Silver Warrior yet?” Now Farmer Hans is full of admiration instead of jealousy.
“Obviously you doofus, the only way to get to Silver Warrior is to gain enlightenment on something.”
Maha is now extremely confused, he remember that there is no such thing as silver warrior. The ranking that he left in the manual are Egg, Larvae, Pupae, Adult, Worker, and Queen. Using clues from the farmers he guessed that the humans that changed the names of the ranking. However, he have only been in meditation only after 3 months of traveling, how could that have happened in only 9 months?
“Say can you tell me, why is it that it is called Silver Warrior? Is it perhaps a ranking?”
Both farmers stared at Maha at the same time while in the middle of their bickering. It was like they really did saw an alien from another planet...how could he not know such basic knowledge if he have been living on earth?
Even though they found it odd, Farmer Li still step forward to inform the kid in front who, even if uninformed, is still their savior.
“Ahem, well you see about 120 years ago people used a ranking very similar to an insect’s growth. Further down the line however, an almighty person named John Wick change the ranking system. It is now, Bronze Student, Silver Warriors, Gold King, Platinum Master, Palladium Overlord, and Titanium God. As for the reason why he changed the name is because he find that ranking people like comparing them to insect, is a humiliation almost. However, even though everything skills or technique now don't have insect like names, the first 9 Godly Manual still retains their odd names, each manual of ant in the name. Weird right?”
Farmer is surprisingly well informed even though he is a farmer out in the middle of nowhere, for he spend most of his time researching about the Formica and topics related to them. Everyone in the world know who they are but apparently the kid in front of him don't.
“Hmm, 120 years? What the hell?” Maha is obviously stunned, he have predicted that his meditation won't last any longer than a year, give or take 2 years top. But 120 years? But that is only a matter of course, the enlightenment that he gained is from the Text of Wuldu, an ancient text on the mystery of the time before creation, a time even before nothingness. If it was anyone else rather than Maha, he would have exploded or gone insane in less than a second of being exposed to such knowledge.
Maha sat up and starts to contemplate about what to do now that he knows that 120 years have passed.
At the side, the two farmers starts talking to each other seeing that Maha is in a trance of sort. “Yo bastard Li, what will happen to our town now that the monster horde came again?”(Farmer Han)
“Bah, what are you worrying about, the Collis Peak probably already send its students to our town to kill the horde for experience.”(Farmer Li)
“Oh yea...man I'm so jealous of those Formica, they gets to wield so much power...and get so much ladies.”(Farmer Han)
“You monster, is that all you think about? Women? Do you know how hard it is to join Collis Peak?”(Farmer Li)
“Yea, it sucks so bad, man only those who can please an ant gets to join...last time I try giving it honey for like 2 hours straight during the exam, but nothing man.”(Farmer Han)
“Hayse, I know I try giving it sugar for the exam as well but that didn't work either...you know that kid Ling Ling Lu who passed in only one hour?”(Farmer Li)
“Oh yea, that little girl lived down the street from me, how did she do it man?”(Farmer Han)
“I heard this from the girls at school who was taking the exam with her, you know what she did? She touch the ant so much and so gently that it got pleased with her…”(Farmer Li)
Farmer Han didn't know how to replied, I mean who would sit and gently touch an ant for one whole hour straight? It is extremely weird and tiring.
Maha who been sitting and questioning himself finally nodded and breath out a defeated breath.
“No point in crying over spilt milk now...let's just go with the waves and see where it'll take me.”
Finally decided on his path, Maha was about to say something to the two farmers, but now that he is feeling well and not fatigue, he can see deeper into their beings to find that they both have pretty good potential. Its nothing world shocking, but enough to let them reach the apex of the human race. As for the others worlds that he scattered around...they are merely bottom scrubbers with their potential.
Seeing that he could take advantage of them...I mean he can teach and guide them, Maha made up his mind and ask the two a question that will shake the heavens above and flood the hell below.
“Hey you two, want to become my apprentice?”