Weapons of Mass Destruction

“I think one of the points of this floor is to give people an opportunity to become a Champion candidate.” Tess states, as all eyes focus on her, drawn by the revelation of her new status.

Maya shamelessly smirks back at me when I look at her, and Min-Jae looks a bit guilty for not telling me sooner, but I figure Tess must have asked him not to tell. She probably chose this specific moment to cause the most impact.

It’s really such a silly thing to do.

I’d absolutely do the same.

Of course, there is always the chance that Tess was trying to see if she could hide it from me.

“My group located two containment cells with the team we put together. One was simple to reach, and the Champion was very different from the man we met in Mana Desert. The cell is hidden within a permanent storm on a floating island. Once inside we found a trapped vyssari woman.”

Maya snorts. “Just tell them already. The storm is powerful enough that the lightning has been known to kill people as high as level 200 in a single strike, and given its propensity for striking targets more than once it could easily take out stronger individuals.”

“It’s true we did have some trouble reaching it,” Tess admits, “but we’ve had plenty of time to prepare and plan, and we haven’t had a single death or severe wound. As for the storm, it’s made up of the excess primordial lightning energy being pulled from the prisoner and released into the area. So you can imagine why I wanted to take the risk to check things out when I sensed it.”

Tess’s eyes haze a bit as memories flash by, but she quickly returns to the room and smiles. “The vyssari Champion apparently wanted to be left alone and threatened to kill anyone who meant to free her.”

“Another nutcase, but she was definitely better than that guy in the hole.” Maya nods.

Min-Jae also joins in, “I kinda liked her. She seemed nice.”

“She said she was close to declaring Maya a candidate, but that she felt that there was still something missing and that she needed to try harder.” Tess quips, flashing a quick smile.

Maya doesn’t even seem hurt or disappointed, rather she shrugs it off, unbothered. “It’s fine. Just having the possibility confirmed is cool in and of itself.”

“So you want to visit her and have her declare the other Champion candidates?” I ask, already thinking about who might have a chance. The names that come to mind are Lily and Sophie. If Min-Jae didn’t make the cut then there’s a high chance the twins won’t either, I feel like they’re on the same level of talent. Even though I’m sure it’s possible they’ll reach that rank later; as we've seen, plenty of people aren’t declared candidates until they reach the higher levels.

“It would be a shame not to take the opportunity while we have a somewhat reasonable Champion nearby,” Tess confirms.

“Well, you guys can discuss it later,” I say, waving them off and focusing my attention on Tess. “As a Champion candidate, I challenge you, a fellow Champion candidate. My wager is 10 points from my Mana stat. If I lose, they’re yours. If I win, I want 10 points in Mana…”

These words stop in my throat, and I find myself unable to push them out.

So I try again. “As a Champion candidate, I challenge you, a fellow Champion candidate. My wager is 100 shards. If I lose, they’re yours. If I win, I…”

The same thing happens again.

“Nat, I think the system takes these challenges a bit more seriously than you do.” Tess shakes her head.

“I take them plenty seriously. As a Champion candidate, I challenge you, a fellow Champion candidate. My wager is one of the upper epic items I possess. If I lose, it’s yours. If I win, I want…”

And again I get stopped.

“Do you think the system would just let you abuse challenges that way? I have [Declaration], which seems to be a bit similar, so I can tell you it’s not how it works.”

Disappointed, I sit back and reply. “Explain.”

“The system probably thinks about challenges as something almost sacred. Something you can only call upon in specific situations with the right kind of ‘intent’, it needs to be ‘in the right spirit’ if you will. Can you imagine how it would look if they were that easy to abuse?”

“Tess, the system is an asshole.”

“I… it’s not wrong.”

“Sooner or later, I will find a way.”

“Got it, oh fellow Champion candidate,” she snarks, flashing me a smile.

As she turns to talk to the others, a single thought comes to mind.

This can’t go on. I have to get the cockroach to declare me an Absolute candidate somehow.

Walking through the city, I come to a stop in front of yet another tower. After checking the map, I confirm that this tower serves as the home of a mind mage.

As I’ve done dozens of times before, I use [Ley Line] and fire it off at the tower where it “anchors” itself.

And a decent chunk of my mana disappears in response.

[Ley Line - lvl 39 > Ley Line - lvl 40]

Curious, I wait a minute to observe the coming reaction.

So far, they’ve fallen into three camps. Some towers didn’t notice. Others noticed, but after realizing I’m with Sophie, they stayed locked inside, trying to get rid of [Ley Line]. The third, and rarest, reaction was people coming out and trying to cause trouble.

If it were up to me, I’d likely teleport inside and at least purge the mind mages who were the worst at that dinner, but it seems like we might actually need them for the Framework. So I hold myself back, but I hope they come out and try to fight me.

That they’d give me an excuse I can use to justify my actions to Sophie, with all the work she’s done to get where she is within the city.

But this tower isn’t it, and they stay locked inside, so I leave, disappointed.

Since I started doing this, I’ve left twelve Ley Lines connecting me to twelve towers. But that’s not all. There are five more. Of a version that even Sophie can’t sense and she doesn’t know about them either.

And these connect to the Framework.

POV Maya Jones

“Sophie, are you sure it’s okay to let him do this?”

“Trust me this is better than letting him go around killing every mind mage that even tries to sense his mind. We need them for now.”

“Is this even good for something?”

Sophie laughs, almost incredulous, “Maya, that night after the dinner, he infiltrated the tower of one of the top 10 mind mages in the city. He just passed through their defenses as if they weren’t even there. That crazy skill, that [Ley Line], is still there, and not even Beatrice has been able to remove it. The mind mages, who would’ve fought tooth and nail to occupy such a high-grade tower under any other circumstances, refuse to move in. And now that he is going around the city and casually placing the same threads within their innermost protections, they’re scared shitless.”

“Doesn’t that mean they’ll band together to take us out?”

“They won’t. Maya, trust me, I’ve set up some truly nasty surprises to prevent that. After the Archon’s, my tower is the most secure in the city, so if they try anything, I’ll take them all down—and they know it very well.”

POV Nathaniel

On my way back to our tower, a crow lands on a bench next to me as I pass.

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

[Phantom Beak - lvl 241]

It’s the abomination I saw at the dinner in the garden.

It tries to connect to my mind and initiate telepathic communication, but I stonewall it and stare it down until it caws at me.

Then it flies a bit further away and lands on another bench, looking at me, clearly gesturing for me to follow.

I do just that, and for once, there isn’t a single mind mage trying to mess with my mind. That ever-present feeling of sharks circling in the water around me is gone. In this city, information spreads quickly.

Following the crow, I reach a small restaurant on the corner. This is strange in and of itself, after all, there aren’t many to be found in this city, but the ones that do exist seem to be worth visiting and are heavily regulated by the Archon himself. According to Sophie, there were just too many poisonings before he did.

The restaurant is empty, other than a table occupied by a man with two women standing at his side. The moment he’s within sight the crow immediately takes off and lands on the shoulder of a human woman with the same solid blue eyes as the crow.

[Spectral Sentinel - lvl 261]

But the more interesting one seems to be the second woman, this one’s a vyssari. Like the rest of her race, she looks almost human, though much shorter, with legs covered in gray scales with red highlights, and her eyes framed by the brown locks of her hair match the red gray sheen of her scales.

[Primordial Warden - lvl 291]

And finally come to the leader, who seems to be the man Sophie mentioned a while back, the leader of the third faction, the man known as Namior. He’s wearing the same luxurious clothes the mind mages around here tend to favor, and he has the same air of confidence around him.

[Mindsculptor - lvl 268]

Finally, I’m meeting him after trying to track him down for so long.

Without hesitation, I take a seat in the chair opposite him, under the watchful eyes of his woman protectors. The vyssari in particular seems dangerous, and the rumor that she’s capable of wielding two different primordial energies does interest me to a degree, given that I have yet to meet anyone else who could.

"I thank you for accepting my invitation," The man says with a smile.

"Are you Namior?" I ask, just to confirm my suspicion.

"Yes, I am. I see my reputation precedes me."

"Just a bit—I’ve been looking for you."

At this point, I’m sure he’s already trying to break through my mind’s defenses. Despite the challenge presented by my passive, skills, and construct. And he’s pretty good, to be honest. I can tell because I can’t sense anything.

And Sophie hasn’t noticed anything either.

“So do you think you’re going to be able to break through my protections?” I ask.

The confident expression doesn’t disappear from his face. “Possibly, but it seems to be more difficult than I had expected.”

“You mean because Sophie doesn’t control me and you can’t exploit her link?”

This time, I do notice a moment of hesitation. [Focus] allows me to watch him, and kinetic energy emphasizes what I sense—a slight twitch of his eyebrow, and the shifting of his leg under the table.

He decides to keep his confident mask, buoyed by the support of his bodyguards, the dozen or so people outside the building waiting to rush in, and his connection to another place that may even allow him to escape.

“I’m honestly surprised she isn’t controlling you, but I’ve already split your group with Beatrice, and sooner or later, you’ll become one of mine. But please, tell me, how did you figure out that I’m influencing Sophie?”

“Her sister told me. Not long ago, Sophie started behaving oddly after meeting you at one of the dinners. And I think you’ve been working on it for a while, carefully and slowly, and now you can influence her without her even noticing.”

“So the princess locked in the tower noticed that,” he says, leaning back and scratching his chin, seeming to take it as feedback and thinking of ways to improve the process.

When he finally returns his attention to me, he’s just as overbearing as before. “It doesn’t change anything. What I did can’t be undone so easily, and each time I meet her, I’ll gradually strengthen it, influencing her more and more without her noticing until she becomes one of my vassals.”

“That may be true, even I can’t sense what you did to her,” I admit, standing up as I do and fixing my clothes. “Sophie kind of messed up here.”

The mood shifts as his guards, both those at his side and those waiting outside, prepare to burst in on his signal, and a preprepared array flairs into activity.

“I’m sorry, I can’t let you leave.” Namior chides, shaking his head.

That confuses me, and I tilt my head as I reply. “I wasn’t planning to leave.”

My entire right arm becomes a mess of torn flesh as I use kinetic energy to draw Fracture at incredible speed. In a single motion, I sever the connection between the man and his two bodyguards. Doing so won’t allow him to send orders, but it probably won’t change whatever he already did to their minds either.

In that same fraction of a second, I shove the sword back into its scabbard and activate two healing marks. Snapping my arm back into place, as the flesh regenerates.

The crow rushes to attack me, and its owner tries to move, but both are still standing, the crow frozen mid-air, held in place by my [Redistribution].

Golden flames explode around the Vyssari, surging toward me and effortlessly melting through my hastily formed barriers. I slide into [Focus] to push away the feeling of pain as my skin and flesh ignite and burn away in an instant. My bones are revealed, the fire attempting to burn even them, but unlike my flesh, my bones are durable.

Much more durable.

[Bone Knitting - lvl 20 > Bone Knitting - lvl 21]

[Bone Knitting - lvl 21 > Bone Knitting - lvl 22]

There are dozens of mana threads running through each bone, binding them together, filling them, covering them.

Part of my mind takes over that task, the skill keeping my bones from melting away, as [Redistribution] absorbs some of the heat. But the vyssari is better at thermal energy than me, and the flames seem impossible to stop even with the armor I’m forming around my body; it begins to sizzle and melt.

Now freed from the man’s control and acting reflexively in her confusion, she attacks me without giving it her all.

Wraith Dance brings me into her space, and up close, the flames are even deadlier, burning more of me away. The muscles, the tendons, some of the less important organs. My skeleton moves, powered by kinetic energy, as my skeletal arm crashes into her head at incredible speed, sending a burst of kinetic energy flooding through it.

And just like flipping a switch, she loses consciousness.

Three healing marks activate, and my flesh and body recover. Then as I turn to face Namior, he disappears, leaving a signature behind as he teleports away.

All of that happens within a short moment and soon dozens of guards finally rush in, skills swirling around them.

I move the mana in my [Mana Crown], spinning it, faster and faster, until it reaches an incredible speed. The massive amount of mana quickly begins to move so quickly that it reaches critical speed, and with a little help from skill, a burst of disruptive energy explodes from me. Just as powerful as it would have been if I had directed it at a single target, but this one creates an area of effect that disables the skills of everyone here.

My Mana Wavelength Iris activates, and I look at the remains of his teleportation. I watch the mana track, using [Focus] to rebuild the structure of the portal, and then use [Resonance] to use the remains to teleport along the same route.

The moment I appear on the other side, dozens of attacks crash into me, stripping me down to the bone, but my mana spins in the crown again, reaching that critical limit and releasing another disruptive wave before slowing and coming to a stop.

My flesh grows back under the influence of the healing marks, and tracking Namior’s presence, I use Wraith Dance to move over to the massive door dominating the room. There, I switch to Breaker Style, and a single powerful burst causes the metal door to buckle inward, as the second sends it flying through the room and embedding it in the wall of the tower.

[Mana Domain] encompasses me as I tear through all the defenses within, spinning the mana inside my crown and sending disruptive waves throughout, causing the entire tower to flicker as I make my way to the highest floor.

The guards freeze in place, only to be pinned to the walls or thrown out of the tower, while Namior keeps moving higher and higher, throwing everything he has against me.

Before I can reach him, he’s gone again, and I repeat the process, resonating with his teleport, appearing in a different tower, likely belonging to one of his vassals’.

As I’m getting my bearings, rocks explode from the ground as two huge monsters burrow their way onto the surface, reminiscent of gorillas, coated in white fur with four eyes each and no mouth.

Mana seeps from my body, spinning itself into threads that weave themselves into a suit of armor that surrounds me and grows bigger and bigger until I match the size of the monsters. My heart thumps wildly, generating kinetic energy to boost my movements in this massive, heavy mana armor.

The first gorilla crashes into me, but my elbow hits the side of its head; as it wavers, I grab it and bury its head into the ground, tearing up trees and small buildings in the process.

A huge spear of mana forms in my hand, and I pierce the monster’s body, boosting the spear with kinetic energy, creating a hook at the end, and pinning the gorilla to the ground.

The other one jumps at me, but I sidestep and, with a burst of kinetic energy, tackle it into the tower, which shakes at its foundations but endures nonetheless. Two of my arms hold the gorilla, and two more arms form at my shoulders, their fingers interlocking before I bring the hands down, slamming them into the monster’s head.

A massive mouth opens in the monster's chest, stretching as wide as its torso, and a deafening screech erupts, assaulting my eardrums. Tattoos flare across its skin, its strength surging. But I repeat the process, striking again until its eyes cloud over. Using all four arms, I rip the monster's limbs apart and hurl them—and the creature itself—far away.

My armor disappears, the mana flooding back into my crown in a blink. I quickly realize that the first gorilla is about to break free and form a huge nail in the air, launching it at the monster to pin it once more while being careful to avoid killing it.

I land on the ground, Wraith Dance bringing me to the next door, which I destroy, finding guards and the remains of another teleport inside.

A tricolored shield blocks the incoming barrage of attacks, and I teleport myself again.

This time, I appear before the city’s second-tallest tower, owned by Beatrice, the pink-skinned, pink-haired daughter of the Archon.

“Beatrice! Beatrice! Fucking help me, you can have my mind if you want, just get that man off me! Beatrice!” Namior screams, shouting at the woman standing on top of the wall surrounding her tower, her bodyguard standing next to her with his transparent crown floating over his head.

Namior shuts up and turns back, to see me standing there, and shouts, “Get the fuck away from me!”—followed by the most powerful mental attack I’ve felt so far.

But it’s all for nothing. It simply slides off my mental defenses.

And when he opens his mouth to shout again, I’m there standing by his side.

“I can be more useful alive, I can…” Before he can finish, a concentrated blast of kinetic energy detonates his head.

[You have defeated Mindsculptor - lvl 268]

Beatrice says nothing, watching as I tear the rest of his body apart with subsequent bursts of kinetic energy, then burn the remains.

Before I leave I throw one last [Ley Line] toward the inside of her tower, and when I finally teleport away, no one tries to stop me.