225-240

225 Selling Them My Point

As for the part regarding why I'd take eighty percent compensation from them despite my share being supposed to be equal to theirs, luckily no one of them asked anything about this.

Wryly might be too stupid to get this point, but Fang wasn't. That dude must have thought about this, and thought about the grand picture here. What was the loss about training more humans for him? He wouldn't pay or lose anything anyway.

Besides, I never left my human forces for too long at their camps. I always was in dire need for more troops, and the longest time for any human camp so far didn't exceed one week.

Anyway, as they didn't ask, I'd rather remain silent about this point. As for the problem of sharing the eighty percent between the two, I had an idea that would bring me more benefits for sure.

I would link the percentage each race would take in the end by nothing else but the number of human training camps each side had at the end.

This way I'd make sure they'd be more excited to have more training camps all the time, and also might act way above the contract we had and add more human camps without asking for anything else in return.

They wouldn't lose anything in return for training such human camps. After all, the area we were talking about was almost five fold larger than the area we currently were active at.

They would find a large number of captured humans in cages in any city or town they'd enter. They also might use humans from other cities and towns under their current control to make sure they'd gain the most at the end of this deal.

Perfect! Now that I got my idea, it was time to sell it to them.

[Dude, that Berserker asks for fifty percent of the entire loot for himself]

[What the f*ck?!!! Who does he think himself to be?]

Fang's reaction was expected to my little lie here. Of course Wryly didn't ask for anything, but if I had to sell my idea to these two, I had to first play Fang right.

[He says he has more fighters than you] this was indeed a fact, [Besides he says his forces are more brutal than yours]

[F*ck him! Since when Berserkers were stronger than Selvators?]

[Calm down dude, I just told him something but he replied with a challenge]

[A challenge?]

[He says the higher to gain castles will have the right to take more of the loot]

[Even if I can do it, I won't agree to this!] Fang was acting as I expected, [If he thinks he has more force, then let him wait until our next meeting. I swear I'll show him what the difference in numbers mean!]

Good! Now that passive Selvator was getting hyped over this. [I proposed something else by the way, something I believe it will solve this without causing any problems during our fight]

[Say it man!]

[As you two are going to exchange camps with me in return for cities, then why not use this as the main judging point in this little fight?]

[The one with more will have the right to choose more? That's not fair!]

[I'm not doing it his way but my way] I sent before adding, [See… We'll meet at the end of this war then we will run numbers. The final percent of the camps you two have will be the same percent the eighty percent land will be divided upon]

[You mean if at the end, we ran the numbers and ended up by eighty-twenty percent for me, then I'll get eighty percent?] Fang was from Selvators, a race that was obsessed with fairness and prestige.

Yet he showed for more than once his greedy nature. Of course I was playing on this point, and I just hit the mark here.

[That's my point] I sent over, [But I'm waiting for your answer before hearing his]

[I agree for sure] he sent, [Let's have a three party contract]

[Let me first hear his answer]

[If he refused, then forget about him man. I can bring enough forces to take down that area without the need of that arrogant berserker]

[Ok]

Of course I'd never agree to that. From the start, Fang wanted this loot all for himself. Of course he was envying Wryly for his promotion. Such an unexpected upgrade in ranks inspired Selvator to think about doing the same.

But to do so he needed to prove his worth. What was better than this fight to show off his calibre to his paragon? That was also why he instantly agreed over my proposition without even flinching.

As for Wryly, that dude agreed the moment he knew Fang had agreed. I also added little fuel between the two, making sure I didn't go overboard here.

After all, I wanted to ignite the fire of challenge between these two as much as I could. If they got the bait successfully, then I'd earn lots of human camps for free.

I received the contract during the next few minutes. Fang wrote down everything and stated clearly the conditions of this war, the familiar way of trading cities, towns, and castles with me, and lastly the way to divide the final piece of land at the end of this war.

He even went to the extent of providing examples with numbers. In all the examples he provided, he made sure he would get the higher amount each time.

[That Fang bro is really daring!] as Wryly got the contract he sent this back to me, [Does he really believe he will have a ninety to ten percent human camp equation at the end?]

[He truly believes so] I added more fuel again, [after all he plans to summon more fighters and use even the help of his paragon]

[Is this even allowed?]

[Nothing in the rules is against this]

[Then let's see who has the biggest pocket in the two of us] Wryly finally got the bait, [I'll do everything in my power to win this. I want to see his bitter face again after this war is over. His face back at the epic gate was epic!]

I didn't stand idle and after Wryly signed the contract, I delivered the words he said in the letter to Fang. The latter went berserk and swore this fight would be his win.

And by this, the mission of selling my condition to both ended up with great success… Bravo man!

226 Another Girls' Fight

Now I had five days till meeting with these two big boys. I was now very excited for this meeting, and more excited for the end of this war.

As I solved the problem of dealing with the conquered cities in the upcoming two quests, it was time for me to solve two more problems.

[Where are you?]

[What? Missed me already? I know you were just faking coldness in front of her to not hurt her feelings]

[Shut up and just come to my chariot]

[Where are you?]

[Just go to the central part of the city, you'll find a portal there. Just pass through it and you'll arrive at my chariot]

I sent this message to Hilary. As for that portal it was the staff of mine. I grew the habit of saving bookmarks of every place I visited since I got this awesome staff of mine.

[A space tool? Damn! My man rocks!]

[Just stop this and come]

[Coming, don't be this impatient… I'll make sure to make up to you in my own way]

I closed the chat while ignoring her sexual remark. As I told her, I also told Karoline and that jumper.

After all, I needed to hear more voices about this plan. After all, once I started, I wouldn't be able to change lots of things in it.

My forces would be scattered over a large stretch of land. I had to make sure I wouldn't need my forces and couldn't get them.

As the three were heading to my chariot, I decided to sit and relax my mind. The issue of cultivation had to be fixed, but not now.

I still had five days till our meeting. I intended to use this time to think thoroughly about what my cultivation should be like.

I would need my cultivation during the upcoming war, and the more quests waiting for me after quest four's end. It would be a waste to have such a power and not use it.

"You are really impatient!" Just as I was relaxing my mind, my peace was ruined with the arrival of this chick.

"Just wait at your pla…" before I could say anything, she sprinted and landed her body over mine. Without me doing anything, she was already lying on my legs with her head, looking at me with her mesmerising azure red eyes, while her hair covered my entire lower half.

Something was tickling at my thing down below. Damn chick, what did you plan to do here?

"Ahem," I cleared my throat, tried to push her head but my arm was grabbed with hers.

"Don't think you can get rid of me this easily," she said in a low tone that held its own charm within, "I know she is coming, so let the two of us enjoy this moment of peace together."

This chick… she knew Karoline was coming and still did this! Just looking at her eyes from this angle made my heart slightly race in its beats.

"You are playing with fire," I warned.

"Don't tell me you don't want a taste of this," she pointed at her body. Just seeing her hands moving across her chest, slightly pushing the two lumps up and giving them more contour made my saliva run.

"What are you two doing?" Just as I was lost in looking at her sexy fiery body, an uproar came from one direction.

"N… Nothing," I instantly was jolted up to my feet while the laughs of Hilary kept ranging in my ears.

"What? Didn't we already agree on what each can do?" this chick stood slowly, crossed up her arms while puffing her chest slightly up in an intentional way.

"I warned you," yet the one to speak was that bastard, the jumper, "Hye can't be trusted at all!"

"Humph, we'll see who will win in the end," Karoline said in challenge before stamping her feet over my chariot, heading towards me.

"Step aside," yet Hilary moved and blocked her path without saying anything.

"Or… What?" I couldn't see her face, all I could see was her back. She was acting confident, daring and not flinching back to get what she wanted; me.

But why did neither of these two girls ever ask about my opinion in this matter? I looked at Karoline and all I could see was the seeds of a fight.

"Stop you two from this childish act," I had to intervene before things would develop to a point of no return, "I didn't call you here to have a fight."

"Says the one who was having a feast just now," the jumper snorted and I simply snorted back.

"Why not go and find yourself a girl to flirt and feast on? You are a pathetic man! I have two and you have none, really pathetic."

"You…"

"Do you want to die?" I said in mockery while mimicking the way he used to say it. His eyes glared in a dangerous way, and I only laughed again in return.

"I know your secret, bud," I said in a mysterious tone, a warning and underlying threat that managed to stop that crazy dude from doing anything here.

"Anyway," I finally turned to the two girls before adding, "I gathered you here to put a plan about the future two quests."

"Why two quests?" Karoline asked.

"Are we going to have two quests at the same time?" Hilary raised an eyebrow, and I couldn't help but bring the bad news to them.

"Damn Hye! Why should I suffer from this?" The first reaction came from Hilary before the jumper laughed and Karoline didn't let this chance slip.

"If you are this bitter, then leave him and go back to whatever rock you were hiding under."

"Screw you," Hilary bellowed, "I will never leave his side, no matter what."

"Humph, says the girl who just complained about this," the jumper stepped in, supporting Karoline against Hilary.

"I will stand by your side, no matter what," yet Hilary turned and faced me while saying this. I nodded, jumping over this clash that I had a feeling it would get repeated more frequently from now on.

227 Drawing A Map

"Now we need to talk about our plan," I seriously said before adding while looking at Hilary, "you came from a place far from here. I want you to draw a detailed map on the ground before explaining the situation in that area."

"You mean a map of Illinois?"

"Of course that's what he meant, genius!" the jumper rolled up his eyes, attracting the aggressiveness of Hilary.

"Says the loser," she shrugged and before the jumper would fall into this trap, I gave him a warning gaze.

Enough of wasting time kids, we have many things left to do.

"This is Illinois."

But after half an hour of waiting and watching Hilary work on the ground, I regretted asking her to do that.

If I asked a five years old girl to draw, her drawing wouldn't come as bad as what Hilary just did! Damn! Don't tell me she didn't know what Illinois state looked like.

"This is Illinois? Pft!" Karoline couldn't hold herself and pointed at these scratches and irregular lines on the ground while laughing in mockery.

"What do you think this is, pathetic girl?" Hilary didn't like the tone or the words of her rival, crossed up her arms and looked in challenge towards Karoline.

"I'd say an apple pie or something," the jumper laughed and joined Karoline. Hilary turned to me and all I could do to you, chick, was to raise both hands in the air, announcing my helplessness towards this.

"Screw you all! I dare to see how you'll draw my Illinois then."

"I'll teach you," Karoline moved, grabbed that white charcoal from Hilary's hand before scoffing, "just watch."

This time the drawing didn't take longer than five minutes. The map wasn't that detailed but it was good. Comparing this to Isabella's map from before, I knew Karoline lacked a lot.

But comparing this looking like a map drawing to whatever Hilary drew, this was obviously better in every way.

"Humph, you seem to know my Illinois very well," Hilary acted shamelessly and didn't show any sign of embarrassment or defeat at all.

This chick… She had her own strength after all.

"A daughter of the last president of the US will know the corners of her country very well," Karoline stood up and proudly said.

"You… What?" This was the first time for Hilary to know the true identity of Karoline. And the latter just raised her chin even further in pride and arrogance when she heard that comment.

"I'm the daughter of my father, the last president of the US before the apocalypse."

"Is she…" Hilary seemed to not believe what Karoline said. She turned to me to ask, and I simply nodded.

"You really know how to pick your girls, Hye," Hilary said in admiration, one that I could understand perfectly.

"I won't settle with anyone… After all, I'm not a normal person, right?" I also took the chance of this moment to feel pride, and Hilary simply smiled in a mysterious way.

"Scared now, rude girl?" the jumper said, yet Hilary responded only with a short laugh.

"This only will make things funnier," she said, "we aren't in the past glorious US reign. We are in the apocalypse."

She turned to Karoline, and all I could see was a far serious look over her face, "let's see how the beloved and deeply cherished girl of the white house will do in these times."

"I'll beat you," Karoline firmly responded, "just wait and see."

"I'm waiting then," Hilary lightly said, as if she didn't care about the history of Karoline.

Yet I felt a little change in her attitude. This knowledge differed in her vision towards Karoline.

"Anyway," I said to stop this meaningless talk, "I want you to explain the situation on this map."

"Well… I believe this is Springfield city," she pointed at the centre of the map before pointing to the Northern East, "and this is where Chicago lies, right?"

"It's your state, don't you recognise your big two cities?" Karoline responded in mockery, but I gave her a warning gaze as well as that jumper.

I didn't want to interrupt Hilary at this point.

"Keep talking," I also said, blocking the path over the sharp tongue of Hilary to step in.

"Fine," she shrugged, "I started from Springfield. Then I expanded my forces and territory towards Chicago. It's now under my control, yet the East from it lies the areas controlled by that dead dragon archlord."

She spoke while pointing at many places at the same time. This chick… She was messier in explaining the situation over the map.

But I got the general situation from her words alone. "So you still didn't take control over the entire state, right?" I asked just to make sure I was following the right track.

"I sent out my forces to take over the state," she said, "but to the West from here, there is a strong force that belonged to the Selvators."

"Is it another state?" I lost track of where she was pointing at. Was it inside Illinois borders or outside it? Was she speaking about Springfield city or the entire Illinois state?

"It's Missouri state," she said, "unluckily there is an archlord of the Selvators there with strong forces helping him. I had to spare half of my troops to stop his forces."

"He is that strong?" I started to think about the future foes in the upcoming war. And she nodded.

"Very strong."

"My man already has ties with an archlord of Selvators," Karoline said in pride, but I didn't agree with her words this time.

"The two are different," I simply said, "archlords in each race aren't as friendly as you might think."

"Oh, my man really knows his craft," Hilary responded to Karoline's comment, referring to me as her man. I only skipped this part and didn't comment or react to it.

"What about Illusionists?"

"These cowards?" Hilary asked almost instantly, "they are in the north but I won't bother with them."

It was weird that we two agreed on calling this race cowards. Of course they were! Compared even to humans!

228 Illinois Is Surrounded With Enemies

"What about Berserkers?" I asked.

"They are in Wisconsin."

"Didn't you say the illusionists were in the north?" Karoline asked, but I didn't get what she just said.

"What does that even mean?" I asked, and the answer I got was a simple stamp from Karoline's foot over the north of Illinois.

"Wisconsin lies to the north of Illinois," she said.

"The two archlords are up there indeed," Hilary nodded in confirmation, "but as the illusionists are a cowardly race, they feared the Berserkers and just kept their distance away from my borders."

"And the berserkers?" the jumper asked, "are they attacking the north?"

"Nah," she gave the answer I knew about. She waved her long strand hair with both hands before adding in strange pride, "someone high up in their race sat his eyes over me. So their archlord won't dare to set foot in my region."

"Oh, poor Hye, you got a competitor on that calibre," the jumper said in fake sympathy, in a way that gave me the desire to punch him in the face.

"Shut up," I rolled my eyes towards him, "I already am aware of that paragon's intentions."

"You know about him?!!" Hilary turned in surprise before jumping like a little girl, clapping her hands a couple times in weird happiness, "and still you dared to act at me and take me away… oh… That's so romantic of you, Hye."

"B*tch," the jumper snorted.

"Slut!" Karoline mocked.

"Shut the hell up all of you!" I shouted, putting an end to this seemingly endless quarrel, "let's focus on the important things we have here…"

I looked again at the map, trying to distract myself with the info Hilary just said.

"So the East is all empty and open for us to take," I said, and yet she shook her head in response.

"There is still another strong foe," she said and the last race popped up in my mind when she said that.

"Don't tell me those succubus girls are a hard nut to crack!" it was really impossible for me to believe such a thing.

Those girls… They were just like Hilary and Angelica. I even believed these two girls were reincarnations of twisted souls from that twisted sexy race.

"Of course not!" Hilary instantly said, "that race is just leaning over two other strong races in the apocalypse; the Dragons and the Selvators."

"Then…"

"There is another dragon archlord in Kentucky," she said, and I got an instant scare when I heard that.

"There is another dragon archlord there?" I instantly bellowed out, "where is that Kentucky from Illinois?"

"To the East," Karoline was the one to answer.

"The two archrold dragons worked together to secure the East side from my place," Hilary explained, "but as you just said, archlords from the same race aren't on the same page."

"So…" I paused and she nodded in return.

"That bastard let his race archlord fight with all his might against me and the Berserkers. He wanted to just watch the fights between tigers before descending to collect the loot from everyone after we got exhausted."

"Nice plan," the jumper said and I couldn't agree more.

"So that region is taken now by that dragon archlord?" Karoline asked.

"Weirdly enough, that bastard didn't move even against my territory so far," Hilary expressed her own doubts, "that's an unexpected move from him, right?"

It was indeed weird, but if they knew what I knew, then they wouldn't see this weird at all.

That dude wasn't simple to deal with. He even managed to hold back his greed towards all these open and weakened territories, setting his gaze over the further away and much bigger prize.

He wasn't easy to handle… Damn!

I knew dragons were strong and vicious. Adding to that their immense wealth and their habit to collect unique stuff from all over the universe, they were such a scary race to fight against.

But they had two weaknesses; greed and arrogance. Being an arrogant race meant they wouldn't close their eyes in front of any provocation.

One might consider them rash. Coupled with their greed for any good prize, they were vulnerable.

Yet that dude here seemed to know how to exert full control over his desires. That wasn't good news at all!

I previously thought that dragons would take their time to prepare their forces and march towards this empty region.

But I was wrong. They already got a strong foothold just south of that deceased dragon archlord's lands.

"So they are eyeing the entire region controlled by other races," I muttered to myself while my eyes flashed with realisation.

This was a risky big plan, but indeed the outcome was worth the risk.

"What do you mean?" Hilary asked and I looked at them while realising they still didn't get it.

"You'll know at the right time," I didn't explain further, "now I need you to tell me how your forces are spread and where they are currently at this moment."

"All of them?!" she gave me a surprised look, and I nodded.

Without knowing where your boys were, How was I supposed to arrange for the upcoming battle then?

"Ok, give me a minute," it seemed she didn't track the exact movements of her forces at the moment. It was expected. I didn't even know exactly where my forces were at this moment.

"Are we going to fight there?"

Just as Hilary went to one side while getting busy contacting her scattered forces, the jumper came as he said in a serious tone.

"You have any problem with that?" I answered with the same seriousness as well.

"We won't have any help from the system during these two quests… It's not possible for us to control any city no matter how many castles and emblems we have. Not to mention we are speaking about more than double our current stat limit difference!"

I knew what he said was true. In each new quest, the higher limit of the stats would be elevated.

229 This War Is Massive!

We started by ten at the system start up, elevated to forty when the first part of the first quest came. At the second part of quest one, this limit was raised to one hundred. At the second quest, this limit was raised by one hundred stat points at one go.

But that limit would be raised by one hundred and fifty points at quest three, by an entire two hundred stat points.

So in these two quests, the lost stat points for me and my forces would be three hundred and fifty points. In return, our stats would freeze only at two hundred stat points.

That was really a big gulf.

"I have a way to make our people make up for this difference," I said without delving into any details for now.

"Is this real?" the jumper asked in a dead serious tone, and I simply nodded.

"What are you two talking about?" Karoline, who was standing on my side, couldn't help but ask.

And the jumper just volunteered to explain everything for her. Just as he finished, Karoline's face turned ashen white.

"This is bad…" her lips trembled as her body. Of course she had to be scared. And at this moment she realised why Hilary was shocked when she heard about this punishment we got.

"Don't panic, your valiant man here said he has a way to help," the jumper just flipped the switch and again spoke in his old self tone filled with mockery.

That annoying bastard… yet at least he believed me. Or else he would instead be complaining and whining like a girl instead of just fooling around like that.

"Stop harassing my man," she poked him with her elbow, making me smile regardless of anything else.

"Ouch, I'm not the one who snapped him off you girl!" The jumper had such unnatural talent in ruining anything great for me.

And as he said it, the face of Karoline who was filled with a bright smile dimmed again.

Screw you man!

"I got to know their locations," to make things worse, Hilary returned at this moment, "what? Why are you three looking like this?"

"Nothing," Karoline pushed her aside and went towards another side of the chariot.

"Show us their locations," I noticed Hilary's eyes following Karoline's movement.

"Alright, they are here, here, here…" she shrugged, before pointing at the map while speaking.

Her forces scattered in six different directions. According to her explanation, thirty thousands of her forces were just left near the southern west side of Illinois, protecting against that Selvator archlord.

As for the other seventy thousands, twenty were stationed at southern east, protecting against any potential attack from that dragon archlord.

The rest were scattered in four armies, each having from ten to fifteen thousand strong fighters. Half were working on unifying Illinois, while the rest went to the east side where that deceased dragon archlord's territory was.

"Interesting," I muttered when she told me that her two armies, which were working to expand her reign over that empty area, had fought many battles already with Illusionists and Selvators.

Succubus armies were also with these two, seemingly trying to get a good piece of this cake.

"We have to go there now," the jumper was rash in his decision this time, "or else we'll have nothing left once we reach there."

"I agree," Hilary nodded, but I shook my head.

"It's not time yet," I said before turning to Hilary, "are you ready to move your boys near us?"

"By boys you mean… all my armies?!!" her eyes showed a great deal of doubt towards my words.

"They are isolated from us," I nodded in confirmation while explaining, "I believe we are still separated from them by two states, right?"

"Three," Karoline returned after calming herself down a little bit, "There are Indiana, Ohio, and Pennsylvania states."

"Indiana is the one where that deceased dragon legacy is left," I said, but Hilary shook her head.

"His legacy is way broader than just Indiana," she paused for a second, seemingly thinking about what she knew about that before adding, "he had Michigan and Ohio in addition to Indiana."

"Three states?!!" I was surprised to hear that, "can you roughly draw these states and also the states between us and them?"

I directed my last question to Karoline who rolled her eyes, showing her dissatisfaction from doing this.

"If you don't want to, I'll gladly accept doing that. At least I'll be doing something useful to my man rather than just telling useless tales," yet when Hilary said this, Karoline's face changed slightly before sticking out her tongue and starting to draw.

But something told me Hilary intervened to make fun of Karoline. Just a mere look at Hilary's expression made me sure of that.

That chick… she wasn't easy foe at all!

"This is it," Karoline finished before noticing the weird look over her enemy, "f*ck you!" she threw the charcoal on the ground, smashing it into pieces before walking away in an angry way.

"She has such a childish mind," Hilary shrugged as if this wasn't related to her at all, "aside from her good body, she isn't that good for you at all."

I ignored her sly looking eyes and simply examined that map.

Putting Illinois as the centre of this map, it was surrounded by Wisconsin state at the north, Iota at west, Missouri taking the southern west side and south, Kentucky at southern east and east side, plus Indiana at east.

Indiana had Illinois at west, Michigan at north, Kentucky at south, and Ohio at east. Pennsylvania lied in between New York and Ohio.

The entire map was finally clear with all borders and states in this upcoming battle. "It's going to be an epic battle indeed," my eyes flashed with greed and excitement.

I never expected this battle would involve all this area. To be honest, if I managed to play it smart and ended up winning this fight for me and my coalition army, then the end results of this would be massive.

230 The War Gains Are Huge

For sure Fang would be promoted. It wasn't even impossible for Wryly to have the same treatment. Aside from that, the sheer number of humans I'd get from these states would be numbered in millions or even tens of millions.

I looked at this map not at its current state. I started to draw lines in my mind, separating the territories of the three of us partaking in this coalition army.

The east side… I had to get my hand on the east side of this entire region. If I could get my hands over Michigan, Indiana, and Kentucky, drawing a line from there all the way up to the ocean, then I'd be satisfied.

By this, my territory would be connected, grouped in one mass, and easily protected. I'd also end up having various lands with different resources.

Besides, I'd get my access to Canada up North, the new lands which would appear instead of the Atlantic ocean in the East, and also still had access to the rest of the continent from Indiana.

Illinois would be a state that I'd have to give up for now. Later on this one would work as my own path towards the west of this continent.

As for Selvators, I'd try my best to place Fang against that dude at Missouri. I'd help Fang to switch his forces down to the south, acting as an insulator layer, protecting the southern borders of my entire land.

As for Wryly, I'd also try to replace that archlord at Wisconsin with him, letting him expand his territory further to the west.

Well, to be frank, playing Wryly wasn't that hard. Yet that Fang was a pain in the as*. I'd figure something out when the entire battle would heat up.

But for now, it was a priority to start training and preparing for this battle. After all, the biggest fight wouldn't occur by our arrival, but at the last days of the third quest and even at the early days of the fourth one.

Those dragon archlords coming to get this region would prove to be hard to contend against. Besides, I now knew the foothold of one of them. But from where the second archlord would come from?

I had to ask Fang about this.

"Does our courageous leader have a plan or something?"

That jumper interrupted my line of thoughts. "I'll tell you once I make everything ready," I said before turning to the map, "from now on, we need to focus to exert our total control over the side of New York. we have to do it in less than five days."

"But our forces are scattered to chase and hunt down those dragons," Karoline said and of course I knew that.

"I'll give you all one day," I said seriously, "you have to completely repair the walls before then."

"And then what?" Hilary asked.

"You will get your army by then," I said, telling her that I didn't forget about what I promised her before, "then you'll work together to control everything towards the ocean."

"What about you?" The jumper left everything and as usual, was focused on me, "what are you going to do during all this time?"

"I have something to work upon," I said without delving into details, "once you control Massachusetts, I'll come and have another important meeting with all of you."

"A war meeting?" Hilary asked in excitement, but I shook my head to disappoint her.

"It's a meeting for the future," I was the only one knowing everything about how important this meeting would be.

After all, it would be about how to turn the useless human firearm into something that could be used in this apocalypse.

"Ah, please spread the word among your forces," thinking about that reminded me of another task that I almost forgot, "select a few to go and record the details of each of our forces. Make sure they would also use compasses to detect the traitors and help cleansing our forces from these parasites."

"What do you want this info for?" The jumper's keen eyes spotted the most important thing in what I said.

"I need certain people from them," I said, "but first make sure to record and organise everything. I'll later tell you about whom I'm looking for."

"Ok mysterious man," Hilary said before leaning in a tempting way over my shoulder, "if you think acting mysterious is sexy then I'm here to tell you that… It's hellishly sexy indeed!"

"Slut!" from the side I could see Karoline's eyes rolling up while a look of disdain appeared over her face. Hilary scoffed back at her before she stretched her neck, reached to my cheek and left a soft imprint from her lips there.

"This is just a pay front before we conquer everyone," she freshly jumped away, walking like she was strolling or something, "after our win, I promise to let you have a decent feast that you never tasted before."

"Slut!" Karoline said with the jumper in the same moment, and I simply decided to ignore all of this.

If I was forced between two girls, then why wouldn't I enjoy myself in the process? As for which girl I'd choose, I'd leave this task for my heart to decide.

Yet I had to give credit to Karoline. After all, she held a special place deep in there. But her foe wasn't someone to be taken lightly. Well… I'd wait and watch from the side while enjoying myself at the same time.

Just as I watched the three of them walking away from the top of my chariot, a message popped up in front of my eyes.

[The gods from your Ultras have finished their admission spree]

[They sent you a message requesting a meeting with their representative]

[Another god says he was the one who sent you a message before. He is also asking for a meeting as well]

I looked up at the sky before asking in calm tone:

"Can the system help me in determining if he was the one to send me this message or not?"

[He says the content of the talk you two had was encrypted. So no one else knows about what you two talked about from other gods]

"Then let him give me a reminder of what he said."

231 Earthling Hye

[He reminds you that he was the one who told you how to kill a god]

Once I read this message, I knew he was the one. Without his timely intervention back then, I'd be dead since then.

That fight… It was simply something way beyond my current capabilities.

"I'll first meet with him."

In fact I held deep curiosity about his identity. He didn't tell me which shrine he belonged to.

If he didn't tell me that the war shrine was annihilated, I'd take him to be one of them. He might be one of the other human big shrine names. As for the death shrine, he wouldn't be one of them for sure.

The reason was simple… That shrine was so close to being destroyed in my opinion. It was already festered with internal struggle, so fierce that I doubted their ability to spare time to observe me.

The death god, Sith, was already at war with Hades. The two great gods of death were standing against each other. I didn't dream of joining such a disastrous shrine, hopefully my thoughts would come true and they would be so busy to bother someone like me.

[You have three free god blessing slots available]

[You are eligible to have a conversation with three gods with the intention of gaining their blessing and support]

[A meeting location is being prepared at the moment]

[Preparations are complete]

[You can pass through the portal now and reach the meeting location]

[Warning: the initial time allocated for you for free is one hour. To add more hours, you'll need to pay one thousand blessing points per hour]

I looked at my profile again. I had thirteen thousand blessing points after all this time. It was enough to buy me thirteen extra hours.

But I doubted I'd need any of that. After all, I'd just meet up with him, discuss a few things before accepting his support.

I already promised him to accept his blessing back then. This visit was just for me to better understand the shrine I was joining and its internal situation.

Hopefully it wouldn't be this bad.

*Fwoosh!*

Just as I was lost in my thoughts, a bright silver-white portal appeared in front of me. "It's not the death shrine, luckily!" The first thing I did was to heave a deep sigh of relief.

After all the death shrine's energy was all black, not silver, definitely not white!

As I passed through the portal, I felt a strange weight over my entire body like a damn mountain. Luckily this feeling didn't last longer than a few breaths, or else I'd end up crashing on the ground, sweating profusely with racing breaths.

But the moment I arrived at the meeting location, my breath was halted by what I saw.

"It's… You!!!" I shockingly rubbed my eyes twice, trying to make sure I wasn't dreaming.

"What? Don't tell me you were expecting someone else," that god with a jackal head and giant shining black body said in a calm yet domineering tone.

His aura was seeping out of his body in torrents, yet limited and confined to a certain area around him with an invisible barrier.

He was sitting over a big red seat, one that suited his body perfectly. In front of him, a much smaller seat was there, seemingly prepared for me.

"Come, earthling Hye, we have a lot to talk about," he motioned with his staff with the head of jackal towards the smaller seat.

It was him… It was Sith himself!

He was the last god I wanted to see here.

"Were you the one to speak with me before?" as I already came here, and already promised to join his pantheon, I had no other choice but to sit on that seat.

"It wasn't me," Sith was acting in weird calmness, giving me the impression that even if the entire universe was shattered to pieces, he wouldn't even blink in response. "I just sent one of my trusted subordinates to help you back then."

"Thanks for that by the way," I honestly said, "if not for your help, I wouldn't have been able to sit with you now."

"You are a nice earthling, Hye. You have already caught my attention since your remarkable start in this apocalypse."

Despite his calm and normal looking tone and selection of words, there was something that kept bothering me.

"Why are you referring to me as an earthling?" Earthling was a word that was given to those living on earth. What? Wasn't he also a god from earth or what?

"You already know about the presence of our human race in many worlds, right?" he didn't directly answer my question, yet threw another question back to me.

And I simply nodded without saying anything.

"You may know me as a god of humans, serving the ancient Egyptian civilization. But that isn't totally true," he slowly shook his head, while that silver-gold cap over his head shook slightly with him.

"I prefer to call myself a special being, a Nether is my rightful name. Other known gods to earthlings prefer to call themselves other names as well."

"So you aren't a real god?" I asked in doubt.

"I'm a special being selected by a higher form of power to serve my race," he slowly said before adding another secret, "after all I was, a long long time ago, a human just like you. But I didn't come from Earth. As you know, humans are scattered across the universe."

I already had my own guesses about the origin of these gods. Nero, the god I once met before, was already a famed roman emperor, a human.

So it wasn't surprising at all to know this god, or nether, in front of me was also a human one day in the past.

"So you came from another human civilization in the universe to serve us on earth?" I asked, trying to understand further about this point.

"Special beings like myself aren't that easy to find," he sighed, in a tiring way that made me question what happened to make him feel like that, "so once being selected and honoured with such privilege, you are asked to care for all your race in any corner in the universe."

232 A Talk With A God

He paused for a moment before his two jade red like eyes shone brightly as he added, "just like the gods of other races you are fighting. They are also selected from various worlds, yet are ready to serve their races in any apocalypse regardless of their origins."

"That's interesting," I commented, "but why are you, special beings, trying to help us? Are you having such fun doing that? Or are you looking for worship?"

"Worship is an overstated term, earthling Hye," he calmly said before adding, "it's as simple as this… like any army, we are acting like generals and you are acting like soldiers."

"You mean… That multiverse war?!"

"It's a war for existence, don't take it lightly like that," his eyes shone up again before dimming and returning to their calm state, "it's still too early for you to learn about this stuff. Yet from the records I received, you already accepted that chain quest to fight in this war."

"I need some help in establishing a communication system for humans on earth," I didn't hide my intentions or felt any regret about doing this, "without this, we stood no chance at all in this apocalypse."

"True," unlike what I thought, and instead of reprimanding me or giving me a long lecture, he simply nodded in agreement, "intelligence is the deadliest weapon in any war."

"Thanks for understanding."

"But you need to know that such a quest is really harsh. Even if you joined my shrine coalition forces, death still awaits you at any moment."

I never expected such a quest to be a walk in the park. "Thanks for your consideration, but I won't renege on this path no matter what."

"Bravery is good thing, but you shouldn't be foolish as well," he slowly said, but I didn't get his point before he elaborated further:

"You know nothing, absolutely nothing about the nature of this war, the strength of your enemies… I even doubt you know anything at all about your enemies waiting for you there."

He was right. "Can you help me with this?"

"As a part of my forces, indeed I can help. But you have to realise that I nurture lots and lots of great talents just like yourself."

His calm tone and carefully selected words held a deeper meaning behind. I got what he wanted to say. "I'll do my best to shine among all of them," I simply said, "but may I know on what basis you'll judge our worth?"

"Other special beings may be interested in your personal strength, your achievements at the apocalypse, or even establishing something grand like a kingdom…"

He paused and I had to ask:

"What about you?"

"I only care about one thing… Are you this useful to our human race or not?"

It was a good and also such a vague answer at the same time.

"Like what?" I asked, demanding more explanation of this important point.

I needed to know how he would assess and evaluate all of us. Or else I might be wasting my time and effort on something that wouldn't make any difference at all.

"I care about how you help other humans in your apocalypse," he finally started to reveal more about his own ideals, "for example, some might focus on training more humans, others might focus on helping humans be stronger by opening cultivation paths for them… You for example are helping humans with that nice dealings with other races, rescuing those who are sold as slaves and even giving them a chance through training camps."

Hearing his own ideals made me heave a silent sigh of relief. At least I was walking in the same direction with his ideals.

"But…" just before I could lower my guard, he added, "you have to know humans are blessed with intelligence and unheard of ideas. This is the true power of our race, true genuinity. So even if what you were doing looked amazing, you are still lacking compared to many other humans."

"But I'm planning to help them in other aspects as well," I defended myself and he responded with a gentle nod.

"I know all about your plans, earthling Hye. Your upcoming move to revolutionise the human arsenal into something apocalyptic friendly is good. But the best plan you got is that communication system. I have to admit, it's way higher than most of the humans I have."

"Most?!" His assessment came as a surprise for me. I thought with my plan to arm humans with weapons they were familiar with, I'd secure my spot in top elites of his forces. As for my grander plan of communication system, it was enough to secure the top spot for me.

"This plan is enough to put you in the top one hundred list of my people," he threw such a bomb in front of my face.

"May I ask why?" I couldn't accept this. I couldn't imagine there were other humans able to pull feats even more remarkable than mine.

"Let me give you one hint… The scale!"

"Scale?" his hint was vague like hell! Come on dude nether, give me something I could properly understand.

"To simplify it, your actions are really remarkable but they are limited by the few numbers of humans serving you. In other words, your actions will only help a smaller number of people compared with other competitors you have."

"But my grand plan will serve the entire human race on Earth!" I didn't give up just like that! His words might be logical considering my other plans but this one.

"Let me tell you, can you do it soon?" Despite my sharp tone, he answered with a much calmer tone.

"I need a lot of time to do it," I admitted.

"Tell me then, do you think how many humans will still be breathing when you finish this risky plan of yours?"

When he said it in such a way, my eyes popped out of shock and realisation. Damn! I totally overlooked the time factor in my calculations.

"If you can do it now, or even in the next five quests, I guarantee you the first spot in my forces. Delaying it for twenty quests will guarantee a spot in the top ten. Delaying it for fifty quests will secure you a place in the top hundred… Do you get it now?"

"I got it," I firmly nodded, "I'll think about a way then to help more people during this time."

"Good lad."

"Now may I ask about something that kept bothering me all this time?" As I finished speaking about this point, it was time to speak about something as important as this.

"You mean the current state of the entire death shrine, right?" and as if he could read through my thoughts, he perfectly hit the mark.

233 I'm Not That Kind Of A Loser

"Well… I won't hide it from you," he calmly shrugged as if he was speaking about someone else's problem, "things don't look that good in the shrine right now."

"A war between you and Hades?" I asked.

"It's not just about that, we aren't the only two fighting," he shook his head before adding with his calm tone and attitude, "it all started with a new special being that joined our shrine a few decades before."

I kept my silence while listening to his interesting tale.

"First each shrine should have a boss. The first act to destroy a shrine is to take such a mighty figure down. Of course doing such a thing isn't feasible or easy, but it's not that impossible either."

"The head of the shrine was taken down?!!" I asked with surprise and he nodded.

"Don't be surprised, he fell at one of the big wars between the two universes," his words painted a darker picture about the reality of that war, "after all supreme beings aren't only limited to our universe."

"I see," I simply responded and he didn't delve too much about what happened.

"Take the shrine of war as an example, you already know it's gone, right?"

"Your man told me this," I wasn't that informative to know such deep secrets or facts. All I got was that intel from the lower god he sent.

And he nodded in response.

"They first lost their leader a couple hundred years ago, or perhaps over a thousand years ago. Anyway, during the three hundred years that followed, the special beings there fought among themselves to claim such a prestigious seat."

"And they killed themselves?"

"The right question should be how to ascend from a rank to a higher rank as a special being, or what the likes of you would call gods," his words were on the mark again before adding:

"There are two different ways with no other shortcuts, one is to do exceptional services at the ongoing onslaught in that war. That's the path I selected for myself."

"And the other one?" I didn't show any reaction to what he just said. I had to know the second option to determine if what he chose was right or wrong.

"The second is to devour other special beings on the same rank as you, ending up with additional energy gained from them, enough to make you cross the insurmountable gap from ranks like myself and Hades and the head of the shrine rank."

"And that's the path Hades selected, right?" my eyes shone in realisation.

"It's not a wrong path to take to be honest, especially when putting into consideration it's much easier and a lot safer than the other path."

I nodded and this time I felt more admiration towards him.

Indeed setting the goal of making great things at such chaotic and realistically dangerous war even for such a formidable god wasn't an easy path to venture.

But it also held another meaning, another small point that told me this god in front of me was putting the greater good of the shrine above his own interests at least.

"This is the way the war shrine fell?"

"Yes," he nodded, "back then most of the strongest special beings there got killed by others. I didn't get the whole truth but from what I know so far I can say for sure these killings had many suspicious actions."

"The hostile universe?"

"Who else?" he shrugged, "even if another shrine belonging to another race tried to meddle in, they wouldn't be able to destroy such a formidable and ancient shrine like a war shrine. After all, shrines have existed since the early moments of our universe."

"If they had such power, they could have killed that shrine a long time ago."

"Indeed," he nodded in agreement to my statement, "I also can't put my fellow Hades in fault. After all, such a path I selected had a very low success rate and very terrifying death rate to whoever selected it."

I nodded in understanding. He was right in his evaluation for sure.

Such a place where even the head of such a mighty shrine fell must be a real hell in this life.

"So, we are fighting, and not only the two of us. Hades selected me once he knew about my real intentions."

"Don't tell me I joined the losing side," I laughed while my words carried a far more serious meaning.

"I'm not that kind of a loser," Sith laughed back, "selecting that path doesn't mean I'm weak or that passive. If he wants to come to me, he is most welcome to do so."

He said it in a light tone amidst his laugh, yet his words carried their own weight. This god… he wasn't really that weak or even fazed by this challenge from Hades.

"Anyway," he returned to his calm demeanor, "I'm here to accept you to the shrine and take you under my wing. I initially thought to let you serve first under one of my underlings. Yet putting into consideration your grand plan and your guaranteed spot amongst the top hundred humans, it makes more sense to let you serve directly under me."

"Thanks for such honour," I slightly bowed my head in respect.

"Don't celebrate too soon," yet what he said next made me pause and look up at him in question. "I'm not that free like other special beings, so I won't even be present to watch your play on your channel."

I could understand this point so I remained silent while he added:

"Also you aren't the only promising human I have. In fact the other hundred humans all share the same value like yourself. So you won't be able to get as much support from me as other sponsors will do."

"That…" I knew he was busy, but leaving me behind like this was too much. How would I gain anything back from his support then?

234 The Angelic Tribe

Gods were supposed to support races in the apocalypse in many ways. For example they will solve the problem of coins, give many blessing points in the form of quests and other things as rewards for special quests and stuff.

Not to mention their presence would solve many issues against other contenders with lower grade gods.

"Don't panic, it's not that bad either for you," he laughed, "I'm a fair being. So let me tell you this: I'll give you quests with handsome rewards. But my quests would be so hard to fulfil, I'm warning you from the start."

Damn! Why was he giving me hope and then crashing it down like this?

"Don't give me that look, I know you'll gain another special being's blessing soon."

"But you should at least help me here," I helplessly said.

"I help those who show their value to me," he firmly blocked this path to get more from him, "besides the quests I'll assign to you will generally be in the direction of your main goals. Also you'll get something from me as a welcoming gift to the shrine."

"A gift?" seeing this stingy god was willing to give me something made me feel more helpless. Dude, you should act better than that. Do you think I would do well if you stayed away from my side? Even if I was doing great so far, others would have a wider gap with me thanks to their gods' support.

"It's something that won't disappoint you," he vaguely said, "but I'll give it to you once you return. Also I'll assign one of my loyal subordinates to follow your steps, giving you some guidance every now and then."

Well… anything from you, stingy lazy god, would be a gain that I wouldn't say no towards.

"Now do you have anything else to ask me about?"

Just as I was going to say no, something flashed in my mind.

"My jumper…" I suddenly said in a loud tone as I recalled that issue.

"That masked person with you?"

I nodded before seriously adding:

"He has a god, and that god cursed my channel before. As I learnt, such a curse won't come from any friendly god at all. I know that god belongs to the other side, but I want to know more about him."

"About her," Sith corrected me before adding, "and your guess is absolutely correct. She is an agent for the hostile universe fighting with us."

"And?" I wasn't satisfied with what he said. I already was convinced that the jumper's god was working with the enemies.

"Didn't I explain to you what happened to the war shrine in detail?" Instead of answering me directly, he asked me back.

"Don't tell me she was the one to bring its downfall!"

"It's not like this," he shook his head before adding, "but she was behind the destruction of another shrine in the same way. It's not one of human shrines to be honest, but that doesn't mean she is easy to handle."

My next question was about why not doing something against such traitors as long as they were known. But his answer in this way explained everything to me. And also placed more questions in front of my eyes.

"Can other race gods be sponsors to our race?" I asked and he firmly shook his head in firm denial. "Then how come… Don't tell me that a bastard isn't a human to begin with!"

You are getting all wrong," he shook his head again, "your person is a human indeed. But ask yourself this, how come he got his power? From a human source? Or another source?"

Suddenly everything flashed in front of my eyes. I recalled the long and bitter story of that jumper. He was looking for someone he met at quest fifteen, an angel, a true angel, someone who wasn't a human or even part of our apocalypse.

"He got it from another race called angels," I said, before hurriedly adding, "but not those dirty angels working as guides at my apocalypse."

"I've watched that video of the two of you speaking about that history," Sith calmly said. That dude wasn't as busy as he claimed to be then.

"And?"

"Let me tell you this," he paused before adding in warning, "it's a big piece of news, so you must be prepared to hear it…"

"Hit me."

"Some traitors might work to destroy shrines, but special traitors might even work to destroy races."

"Races…" I suddenly paused while a threatening thought flashed through my mind, "don't tell me…"

"She was the one behind the downfall of the entire angelic race," Sith said before adding, "of course this is something that happened a long time ago."

"But…"

"Your person met someone from that race, also you met someone from it, right?" he said and his words explained perfectly the puzzlement I was feeling right now, "that race was one of the most exceptional races in the entire universe. Do you know why?"

"They were… angels, right? So they must have been so pure and kind hearted."

He laughed over my answer, shaking his head in a helpless way it seemed.

"That's really amusing, hearing the obsolete and unreal theories of humans about other races," he said before stopping his laughs and added, "they were kind hearted indeed, but they weren't special thanks to that."

"Then…"

"They enjoyed special powers," he said, "special to even rival the powers our shrine special beings have. For example, the one that met your jumper had the power to travel through dimensions. As for the one you met, he has the power to travel through sealed spaces."

"Sealed spaces?" I still couldn't get what he wanted to explain here.

"A tribe of them had the power to seal a certain space against the cruel passage of time," he explained in such simple words, "and the two angels related to you and your jumper came from this specific space."

235 The Power To Crash Sealed Spaces

I thought for a few seconds before I realised something common between all these powers. "They have the power of time and space, right?"

"Again you are right," he nodded.

"So they aren't extinct, yet not technically alive, right?" I tried to get a better understanding of such a complicated situation.

"That's why their special beings can't die," Sith said, "if a race was annihilated, then all the special beings related to them would be punished by death in return."

"That's why those gods are trying their best to help their races," I said in realisation and he nodded.

"For many other reasons of course, but this is also one of them," he said, "and that's why even after the extinction of the angelic race, that female is still roaming the universe."

"But why the jumper?" I couldn't yet get the point of this, "why me?"

"The jumper is a logical result," he shrugged, "after all he didn't only gain the power from that dead angel, but also part of his soul."

Ok, I could understand that. "But what about me?" I pointed at myself, "why did she target me and my channel?"

"Because she felt danger coming from you," his eyes shone again in red ruby-like light.

"Me?!!" I never expected such an answer, "didn't you just say they were extinct?"

"I told you they were sealed in a space that defies time," he lightly shrugged, "and that action wasn't done just out of desperation. They are waiting for a saviour, someone who can crush that space and safely carry them out."

"And that's me?! No way!!!" I pointed again at myself and he calmly smiled.

"You missed the point again," he slowly said before throwing a bomb over my head, "as your jumper ended up absorbing part of that angel's soul and his power, you also ended up in the same spot."

"M… Me?!!!" I was too shocked to even speak normally. I didn't feel myself but standing while adding in disbelief:

"Do you mean I got part of that old man's power?"

"He didn't just send you back using that chick's power… He sacrificed himself, giving you also part of his soul and also his power. Tell me, earthling Hye, do you remember what was the power of that old angelic dude you met before?"

"The power to travel through sealed spaces?" I asked and he nodded before hurriedly shaking off his head.

"You have two powers, Hye. one that belongs to that old angel, and the other belonged to that chick of yours. And the two are about to combine together, using the dark energy of my shrine and your cultivation to give birth to a totally new and very terrifying power."

"Which is?" my body landed weakly over the seat while my mind was all frozen up, waiting to listen to his next words.

"The power to crash sealed spaces, spaces made even to stand against the cruelty of time."

My entire body shook while my mind regained its vitality and activity again. I wasn't in need to listen to his next words, as I already guessed them.

"So that traitor sensed the two powers inside your body, realised what threat you were posing to him. When you visited my death shrine, the merge between all these powers and energies became much clearer than ever. So she acted against you, trying to push the brakes against your accelerating ascension."

Damn! Damn! Damn! I never expected things to be this deeply connected! I never imagined that an old man would die and sacrifice himself to give me all this.

Was it a blessing? Was it a curse? I frankly couldn't tell. Yet the only thing that popped up in my mind right now was that last request he asked me for.

"I trust you as my mentor trusted me back in the days… Don't forget, you need to help and save my angel clan, the real angels who are facing a great calamity when the apocalypse happens. Find us, help us… Just follow the golden quests whenever they appear and you'll have your chance to repay me this lifetime debt…"

His voice kept ringing in my mind while that moment kept replaying for a long time.

"You don't need to panic," I didn't know how long I was lost in my thoughts. Of course that old man's actions became much heavier than before after knowing what he did.

I wasn't afraid, I was just feeling the extreme weight of the responsibility he entrusted me with. It never crossed up my mind that what he lightly said before sending me here held such importance!

"She can't touch you, at least not now." he said in such a light tone that made everything look a little different in my eyes.

"I'm not afraid, but I realised how big my responsibility is."

"Good, a man should always know the magnitude of responsibility over his shoulders," he said in praise before adding, "you just need to focus on merging your powers and gaining that new space crashing power. Luckily you got that chick by your side."

"Hilary?" I asked in doubt and he laughed out of the blue.

"If I wanted to watch your channel then it would be for the current fun going on between you and these two girls."

"That's not funny," I complained, "that chick crashed into my life without any invitation."

"A sexy girl is a daring girl," he said, "and such a chick is always seeking a strong man to make her feel satisfied."

"I just hope she won't end up sticking to me," I honestly said but my words made him laugh again.

That god… he was really enjoying my current disaster!

"If I were you, I wouldn't be this shy and act at the two girls at the same time," he said, "but don't tell those beauties from the love shrine or else I will miss a lot of fun."

He laughed on what he said as if this was some kind of a joke. "But to be honest, her presence beside you will hasten the merging process of your powers. Not to mention the other girl isn't that good either."

236 Paying One Thousand Blessing Points

"But I like her," I defended and he shook his head in response.

"Liking is different from loving, you should know that as a man."

"I can't relate to that."

"You will," he paused before breaking out in laughter again, "soon enough you'll have enough experience to fill my shrine to the brim in that matter."

"It's your words."

"It's what I know," he said amidst his laughs, really enjoying my current dilemma, "you can't get away from fate. Since day one here, you were fated to be with this fiery chick. Just show more appreciation that you ended up with such a chick and not with some ugly and cold lady."

"Humph," I didn't agree with his words, and weirdly enough my rude response made him laugh again.

"ِAnyway, my advice to you is to have fun and enjoy. Don't have a meal served and be such a coward to deny it."

I didn't know why but at this point, I imagined this god dude sitting with ladies covering the entire floor of his palace.

"Do you have any more questions?" he asked and I shook my head.

[One hour has passed]

[Do you want to extend one more?]

[You'll pay one thousand blessing points for this hour]

"Pay the price and stay," just as I was this close to selecting to leave, he suddenly said, "I have something important you'll need to hear."

"Alright," despite feeling a little annoyed by his timing, I had no other choice but to accept the loss. It didn't seem coincidental at all. He timed it perfectly to match my one hour limit here.

"What do you want to talk about?" I was still feeling bitter about the one thousand blessing points I paid.

"You do have a deal with that winged nymph girl, right?" What he said was unexpected for me.

"Which deal exactly are we talking about?" I already had more than one ongoing deal with her.

"The one that will deliver lots of other races to you."

"They are hostile races," I thought he'd ask for me to retreat from such a deal, "they are hurting our people, so it's fair to hurt theirs."

"I'm not against such actions," he shrugged, "what you did was really remarkable."

"So?" I still didn't get his point.

"First I'll have to remind you that the winged nymph race is a friendly race to us. So don't be rude to this chick."

That lustful god! Was he setting his eyes over her or what?

"I'm giving her a special treatment already," I ignored his sexual desire and added, "she is kind and honest with me. So I'm not acting rude at all with her."

"Good lad," he nodded in praise, "now let's talk about the real deal. From the races she is working to bring for you, three are exceptionally important."

"I'm going to kill them all," I instantly said, "do you want me to torture them first or what?"

I didn't find any fate worse than death to be honest. If he had another opinion, then I was open to listen to his suggestions.

"I don't want you to kill them," unlike what I expected, he said, "don't give me that look. First listen to what I have to say."

"Go on," I said in doubt. Why would he, a mighty god of humans, ask me to spare some races who worked in such brutality against humans?

"You have a punishment that will hinder lots of your progress in the upcoming two quests, right?"

"That's a pain in the as*," I didn't hide my true feelings about this punishment.

"Then did you know that such a punishment is a single apocalypse limited one?"

"Sorry, what does this even mean?" I didn't get his point, so I had to ask.

"These races brought to you by this winged nymph will come from other ongoing apocalypses. For the record, these apocalypses are all in the same twenty apocalypse group yours in."

"They are with me?" I raised an eyebrow while recalling the previous words Hilary told me about.

"They are indeed," he slowly nodded, "after all that winged nymph would pay more price if she tried to bring them from apocalypses outside this group of yours."

"I see," what I really thought about right now was a chance. It was indeed a golden chance for me to get a glimpse over the situations at other apocalypses that I might face one day.

"So from the races she planned to bring for you, there are three who stood exceptionally above the rest. They are strong, vicious, and deadly in any battle. Besides, an foremost important reason to spare these three, they won't be limited by your punishment."

My eyes went all wide open from the shocking realisation I got. "Do you mean… I can give them stat points, let them fight and get materials and other stuff from the monsters and other races there?"

"And you can also let them conquer castles, emblems, and acquire cities and towns under your name."

This was the most pleasant news I'd ever heard since coming here! Damn! This was like a game changer to me!

I was already burdened by this punishment. I knew even with all my preparations, things wouldn't look that easy or promising for me and my forces in the upcoming two quests.

I never cared about quests. I knew quests were just stepping stones on the long ladder of strength prepared by the system. What I cared and deeply regretted was the long time I'd lose during this.

Only the waiting period for the third quest lasted for a week! That meant the third quest might even reach two weeks' time! Only one quest and its waiting period was almost one month.

That meant the time I might lose in these two quests would range between two and three months. That wasn't something I could compensate for.

Even if I held a great advantage for now, this advantage was doomed to be threatened. I also was in such a tough position that I needed to take part in the upcoming war, reaping part of the big cake in the central zone of this continent.

237 [Bonus chapter] A Game Changer Chance

I deserved this. But I also knew my safety would be jeopardised. I hoped I'd emerge unscathed and with the least losses and most gains from this clash.

Then at the fifth and later quests, I'd try my hardest and make a comeback.

But now? If what Sith said was true, then I didn't need all of this!

I just had to wait for the delivery from that nymph girl. Sparing the lives of three races? Damn! At this moment I was seriously considering sparing the lives of all the races delivered to me!

"Other races are useless and trash," as if he could read through my thoughts, he said, "just these three are worth nourishing. Besides, you'll need tons of souls to summon your deadly fallen gods."

"They can help?" I asked in great doubt and he simply nodded.

"They are in a whole different realm than everyone else," he said, "at least for the first ten quests."

"Hmm…" I never expected my boys would play such a great role in the upcoming dark times. If what he said was true, then I had to summon tons of them.

And that would require tons of souls. So it wouldn't be feasible to just abandon all these souls.

"Alright," I said in a decisive tone, "I'll spare only these three. But what are their names?"

"The giants," he started with such an awesome race, "they don't need any introduction. They enjoy insane natural body strength that will leave any other race behind in the dust."

"Indeed," I nodded with a big smile over my face. Such the first race was enough to make me quite eager to add to my forces.

"The shaders," he brought a weird name, "they work like your soulers. Yet they travel through shadows and darkness. I believe when that war you are preparing for will start, the suns will dim and the world will be all in darkness. They are vicious assassins, deadly against any present race, even dragons and Selvators."

His words painted a picture of a scary race. I wasn't just thinking about the gains I'd have from this, but also about the later to come fights between worlds.

Damn! Such a race would be really hard to deal with. I had to thoroughly study this race and try to find their weaknesses.

"The last would be the grounders," he also gave a weird name, "they are like your Gollams, yet with nimble movements through anything related to earth. They can move fast, do surprise attacks, or even prepare deadly traps."

Damn! Another troublesome race popped up. What the hell? Don't tell me other worlds were brimming with such scary races.

"You wanted knowledge about other worlds competing with your Earth in this, right?" again he gave me another sign of his ability to read my mind, "instead of doing that, why not use that winged nymph chick and let her grab races from each apocalypse?"

It was an interesting idea indeed. I already was considering ways to study these three races as a start. "Can she get me races from other apocalypses?"

"As long as you can pay the suitable price, she can do anything for you," he said, "you have twenty apocalypses in your group, each had six competing races as a fixed rule. There are no repeated races in any apocalypse in any group. So you have a lot of races to study."

"Yet not all of them will survive to the next round."

"Failing to survive doesn't mean there aren't good races worthy to nurture from these fallen worlds," he said something brilliant before adding, "for example the angels are a fallen race, yet they are worthy to be supported and nurtured, right?"

I understood what he wanted to say here. I firmly nodded, deciding to take his advice by the letter.

"Thanks for letting me know all of this," I honestly thanked him while slightly bowing my head in respect. In fact if he didn't tell me that, I wouldn't have known any of this until it was too late.

"It's nothing," he waved his hand holding that staff at me. A portal appeared next while his last words echoed in my mind before leaving here:

"This isn't the gift I prepared for you. I just want to remind you of this; you aren't the only special human I'm supporting. Prove your worth, and you'll gain more of my support. This is just a small taste of what my support looks like."

In a flash I left this place, and in the next I found myself standing again over my chariot. It looked like I didn't take much time at all, just a span of breaths.

"Thank you," even if I left his place, I also bowed in respect and appreciation. Indeed he showed how worthy his support was.

One hundred contenders? Humph! I'd show you all how a human from Earth would crush you all and secure the first spot.

Despite me feeling I didn't last that much, I had tons of messages coming from my teammates, telling me I lasted more than one hour.

"Hmm… So that bastard already spread the news…"

From what I read, all my scattered teammates were speaking about two things; the punishment I got and Hilary's presence.

All of them were scared. They showed their doubt and panic towards the upcoming two quests, even asking me to retreat from any plans to fight against any race during this period.

As for Hilary, it was weird to have divided opinions about her.

The spearhead and Leo were supporting me in ruling over the two girls. The ladies were protesting against her presence. Yet the most shocking message came from Angelica.

[I say this chick is better, way better than that plain looking cold girl called Karoline. You must seize that fiery chick and claim all her forts man!]

I didn't know if I should laugh or cry! That jumper bastard! Why couldn't he simply shut up his mouth and let me handle these matters on my own?

238 Sith God Gift

Anyway, as they all knew, I simply decided to ignore the things related to Hilary. After all this was my personal sh*t, not theirs!

[Just keep killing the dragon forces and claim their inventories. Don't forget to bring back all the dead bodies of any elite dragon back with you. Leave that upcoming quests to me to handle]

Of course this answer didn't satisfy or reassure them. They hurriedly sent back messages pleading for mercy, asking for me to rethink about the upcoming plans.

Of course that bastard didn't shut up and must have told them also about my plans! F*cking bastard! Just wait, next time we'd meet I'd punch you on your ugly mask and crush it to pieces, revealing your secret.

Yet I closed all these messages and only left two. One was from Hilary. She sent me a message about receiving a grand army already.

"That Wryly knows his stuff," I smiled in contentment. Now as she had her forces, I ordered her to start moving East. I put Massachusetts as a top priority for now.

[I won't leave you with that girl alone!] yet she protested.

[What? Do you think she can seduce me with your absence? We are already dating and sleeping together!]

[That's why I won't leave without her!] she sent again, [I won't miss another bang bang party without my presence]

I decided to ignore her sexual remark. Having two girls at the same time in one bed? That seemed really intriguing but I'd prefer to have my fun with one girl at a time.

The words of that god repeated themselves in my mind again while I was sending orders for her to move out before sending the same order to Karoline.

As for that bastard, I left the duty to fix walls for him. Yes, work as my labour man and do such a tiring job as your fair punishment.

Closing all these messages and ignoring the expected responses from the three, I finally had time to the last one.

It was a system message, and it was related to my gift from Sith.

[You've gained a gift from a higher god]

[You have an offer of blessing from that god]

[You'll need to accept the offer first before receiving the gift]

"I accept," I simply said before a long row of messages popped up in front of my face.

[Congratulations! You accepted the first blessing god]

[Your sponsor god is a high ranked god]

[You'll gain double blessing points from any quests you'll fulfil from him for the next five quests]

[You gained fifty percent increase in your stat points permanently]

[You have opened the sponsorship interface. You can access it through your profile]

[You have a list of quests waiting for you there. Make sure to always select one quest at any time, and complete one per month at least or else the sponsorship will be cancelled]

[You gained a gift from your sponsor]

[The gift is added to your memory beads]

"Memory beads?!!" I muttered in shock, "my memory beads?!!!"

What was the relation between this gift and my memory beads?

[You will gain ten blessing points per day as passive income from your god support]

I ignored the last message. What could ten blessings do to me anyway? I closed all these notifications and went directly to my profile.

There I found the sponsorship interface. Yet what I chose was nothing else but my memory beads. I wanted to know what that god gave me as a gift, and why it was stored in my memory beads.

My memory beads were the place where my old man stored all his teachings for me.

"Oh… What a gift!" Just as I opened the memory beads, I found the regular list stored by my old man. But on the top, there was a newly added recording.

It was a group recording under one simple title: The gift from Sith god.

When I opened this group, I found seven recordings, each holding a serial number besides a common name: How to establish your cultivation.

I was curious about this gift even more now. But when I tried to open the first one, I realised it was at least one day in length.

It cost fifty million coins and one thousand blessing points to open this first recording. As for the next recordings, this price went higher the higher the number next to the title was.

The seventh recording was almost an entire week in length, costing five hundred million coins and one hundred thousand blessing points.

Damn! The coins have never been a problem to me since ages ago. But the blessing points were. So if I had to open these recordings after the first one, I had to first complete quests from this god.

"I can open the first one now," as I had nothing major to do here, so I decided to check this gift first. I had to decide whether it was worth the trouble or not.

As for the entire day I'd waste here, well… my forces were spreading and doing what I asked for. I didn't need to do anything until Hilary and Karoline would take control over the Massachusetts state.

As for my meeting with Fang and Wryly, I still had five days left. As I decided, I accepted the payment and started listening to what that god recorded there.

Just as the recording worked, I was totally absorbed into it. Before this, I made sure to call forth my entire private army here. Even if things looked peaceful on the surface, I shouldn't let down my guard at all.

"Hi earthling Hye, this is Sith and this is my gift to you. As I studied the new cultivation path you are about to take, I put into my consideration the higher goal of merging up your energy.

So I devised this cultivation for you, putting in mind all your energies and also the dark energy gained from my blessing. In this seven recording, you'll have a detailed path of seven steps into your cultivation.

Of course you have the right to ditch all this, but I strongly recommend against that.

You have to listen more than once to my words here, try to think deeply about them before deciding what to do. Hopefully my effort won't go in vain."

239 Cultivation Grand Manuscript

For an entire day I listened to a detailed explanation for what Sith prepared for my cultivation.

In fact what I listened to was a real eye opener for me.

"Wow! I never imagined such a thing could be done!"

What he proposed here was a different way to cultivate other than I initially thought. I didn't think deeply about this before, but I already had a few ideas that I planned to consider.

One of them was to try and use the classic pyramid stepped way approach of other races' cultivation. The classic cultivation of the races I knew about would consist of nine main steps, with each step having around five to seven smaller stages.

Another idea was to just treat it as building another body of mine. The idea came to me when I first opened my shadow world. Having a clone, a real clone that could let me survive if my real body died was tempting.

But what Sith proposed was something different. He spoke about my shadow, giving me new insights about this.

According to him, my shadow wasn't just a dark clone to me, but it was an entire world. He said that shadows had their own rules, connected together, and even considering shadows living in a universe of their own wasn't an exaggeration.

What he proposed was that I work towards gaining control over this neglected shadow universe. That would work by working towards expanding my shadow using my cultivation.

He said that my two energies I gained from the old man and Hilary didn't have any significant attribute towards any specific direction. They weren't considered light or dark energy, so it wasn't bad to use my dark cultivation energy to complete this merge.

He said that my cultivation energy was destined to be a black or dark energy. First of all I got my cultivation opened from that dark realm monster.

Also I had a dark side class. In addition to the blessing I got from his death shrine… everything I had belonged to the dark side.

So it was logic to merge all this and use all this to expand my dark shadow world. According to his words, this wouldn't be the first attempt from someone to do this feat.

Yet all the previous attempts failed. He didn't tell me exactly what caused such failures, but he promised to tell me at some point in later records.

Sith spent a lot of time studying these attempts before my arrival. So he was the best one in the entire universe to guide me here, or that was according to his words.

Anyway, according to what he explained later I could say this god dude had really deep insights into this issue.

The cultivation process would be aiming towards expanding my shadow to become a mighty shadow. According to his words, the dark universe was a cruel place where power wasn't the only thing to determine your rank there.

Dark energy was! So according to his plans, I should first work towards establishing a strong foundation of my dark energy as the first cultivation step.

As for the other six steps, they would be directed towards expanding and refining this energy, aiming to form something unheard of before.

Of course he didn't forget to warn me that this process would take a long time, hard effort, and lots of sacrifices. It wasn't just a tourist tour inside that universe, as I'd be faced with many challenges.

These things wouldn't stop me or even make me hesitate. I overlooked this point and started to study what he talked about later in deep concentration.

"So he is asking me to seek such dark realm monsters… That's insane!"

The first step was divided into thirteen steps. Each step required three things to be completed. The first would be absorbing one bone from a dark realm monster with no grade lower than the grade of the bone I used in opening my cultivation.

I already had many bones from that dude, but they were all grades weaker than the red graded bone I used at first.

According to his words, if I tried to use any grade lower than this, then I'd need more bones and much more time and effort. Of course that wouldn't be the perfect plan for me, but at this moment I couldn't find any dark realm monsters around here.

Besides, the fight against that bastard was something I didn't want to voluntarily seek. Not while my personal strength wasn't that good yet.

So for this point, I could just resort to the current stockpile of bones from that dark realm monster. It wouldn't get me so far ahead, and would only help to secure the energy needed to open the first two small stages in my cultivation, but at least I'd start cultivating.

The second step needed was spiritual energy. According to Sith, my current energy was silver white, a low grade form of energy.

I had to work to absorb and refine all the energy I could from the world. That process would take a long time indeed, but he advised me to start doing this any moment I was free at.

The third step would be a mind task. He thought about stages and steps for my cultivation. But as he described it, breaking through a step would require me to think about the shape of the next step.

It was like building a city. I had to prepare a blueprint for its buildings, streets, districts, and even important facilities.

This was also the case in my cultivation. For each process I had to fully understand the purpose from it, try to imagine how my energy would gather inside my shadow, how it would expand and in what form.

Sith gave me his advice, to try and consider the honeycomb structure of beehives as a base. I got his general idea but this step would take time for me to complete.

So three steps each cultivation small stage, thirteen stages in each one major stage, and totally seven stages… This was what my cultivation path would look like.

240 Sith God Quests

This was a step that I needed some time to prepare for. Sith was kind enough to give me a detailed description about how to absorb the energy from the world.

He didn't need to. I knew such info already from the recordings of my old man. As I closed the beads, I had time to explore the sponsorship interface.

I found a separate market where anyone with blessing could access. There were many items related to increasing the amount of blessing gained from gods after doing any quest for them.

I also found many quests offered for sale as those who had these couldn't complete them or didn't have time to.

The price of such quests were all in blessing points, just like anything else in this market. In addition to that, I even found gods making offers to sponsor anyone, stating their advantages over other gods in this matter.

Some promised more blessing income than others, others promised more quests, while many promised easy quests to gain blessing points fast.

I also found many gears sold, many scrolls, potions, and even special items with astronomical prices in blessing point currency.

It was another world, but I didn't feel attached to it. I got three blessing spots, one was taken already and the second would be taken soon enough.

The third was a must to leave free to be able to gain more slots in the future quests.

Damn! Would I also miss another spot during the two upcoming quests? I never thought about this at all!

Anyway there was nothing I could do about that. Just as I closed the market interface, I instantly went towards the quest section.

Sith did me a big favour here. That gift of his was really worthy to be called a mighty gift. He saved me tons of time and research, and gave me a new perspective about something I never knew.

The list of quests appeared in front of my eyes and when I read them, I couldn't help but frown.

[Quest 1: Start your cultivation by completing your first cultivation step]

[Quest 2: Take revenge from those who punished you. Make sure to make the two races suffer and you'll be greatly rewarded]

[Quest 3: Establish your own kingdom]

[Quest 4: Obtain fighters in your force from all the other nineteen apocalypses in your group]

[Quest 5: End up being the first in the upcoming six quests]

[Quest 6: Arm humans with modified firearm weapons]

[Quest 7: kill any race higher up than archlord and get rewarded]

Damn! This wasn't a list of quests but a roadmap for my strength. I looked at all these quests, opened them one by one and read through their instructions.

The good thing was the reward sections. Rewards from Sith weren't limited only to big numbers of blessing points, but also lots of things as well.

Coins. Stat points, potions, scrolls, gears, and even warriors were there as rewards. The only thing it missed would be souls. Anyway he couldn't reward me with that, right?

But I was touched by his care. He wasn't blindly issuing useless quests like other gods. At least every single quest was related to something I truly wanted.

"Thanks Sith," I raised my head and said in honesty. I closed the entire interface to be met with tons of messages.

After all, I was lost in listening to my beads for a long day. The message mostly came from all my teammates. They kept updating me about their current progress, speaking nonsense about my complicated relationship with Hilary and Karoline, and finally expressing their doubts towards the upcoming two quests.

I didn't find any need to repeat my words. I already told them that Karoline-Hilary-I relation was something they shouldn't meddle in. As for the upcoming quests, I also reassured them once.

If they didn't trust me, then that was their problem not mine.

Of course I knew this wasn't a problem of trust, but fear. They knew how dangerous the upcoming quests would be.

If I got fifty percent confidence before going to meet Sith, then now I had over one thousand percent confidence to crush any enemy in these quests.

Bypassing these useless messages, I found messages from Wryly and Fang. It seemed the two talked and argued together, ending up being very hostile to each other.

They each sent their complaints to me, complaining from the other party and asking for my justice.

Of course it was good they missed my little play from before. Or else I'd end up being the sole focus of their anger and hatred.

Hating each other? Why would I meddle and solve this misunderstanding? Come on! I wasn't part of any of your races to begin with!

Let them be… after all I might need to use someone to limit the other one's activity at some point. None of them ever worked honestly with me. Fang hid the fact of human trafficking from me, and Wryly hid the location of Hilary from me when I needed it.

Anyway, it was best to leave these two raising their weapons at each other's throat. This way I'd end up being the more secure, and with the most benefits for sure.

Aside from all this, I found a message that I was waiting for.

[What you asked before is ready] the first message said so, [Do you want to proceed with our deal about these races now?]

These two short messages came from none but the green nymph lady. Just seeing her name on top of each message made my heart dance.

[Send them now] I sent over, [Also I want to establish another deal with you]

[One more deal?] she had the right to be surprised. After all, we still have two other ongoing deals between each other.

Aside from this ongoing deal of races, we still have the fallen gods deal and the soulers deal. In addition to that, she still was looking for weapons just like the big machine guns I got from the dragons.