AN: Sorry for the late post! I'm finally back in the states and it took me a day to get over the jet lag. I'm good now though, so here's the chapter.
Hope you all have been liking the artwork too! For those that haven't seen, check out the previous artwork post for any updates that may have been made to it. I'll continue to add the minimalist art there as it comes through and will make sure to send out an update notification when I do. For some of the more substantial pieces that I'm finally getting responses on, I'll give them their own posts. Whichever way, you can find them all in the Map and Media Collection, just as you can find chapters in the American Isekai Collection.
Also another small glimpse into the future for those that may be concerned about it. While there might be some brief time skips, think week or month scales, I don't plan to do a major multi-year timeskip or anything like that. While this is definitely the end of an arc, there's still a lot of development I want to do. The style of the story changed with the creation of Iron Legion, moving away from the local scale with John's personal adventure through things like the Magisterium, and into the strategic and macro scale that comes with running a war. I can safely say that we're moving back to a more personal level, because obviously John isn't running Iron Legion anymore, which means I'm going to be able to give more screen time and development to the characters we've come to love and their future adventures as they grow into their cascading power.
We've still got plenty to go and a massive power scale to continue climbing, so I hope you all look forward to it. I'll continue doing my best to give this world the life and complexity it deserves.
Anyway, enjoy the chapter now. (and don't mind the typos)
Cheers!
“Shit shit shit!”
A man cursed and pulled the hood further down over his head, walking as fast as he could without outright running, anything to seem less suspicious on the city streets.
He wasn’t even walking by choice. It was impossible to get carriages or cars through the streets. All around him were rioting citizens, violent Nephilim, and reckless Magi. Spells and bodies were being slung across the air in equal measure. There were already dead bodies on some corners, and it didn’t help that the Royal Guard was either nowhere to be seen, or actively making things worse.
It didn’t help that now, all the Royal Guard were in fact Nephilim, not a single normal human among them. They exercised their authority with impunity and had a particular taste for escalation. They only made things worse by locking down the gates of the capital after martial law was declared, meaning that anyone who wanted to simply avoid the chaos was locked in the cage with rabid dogs.
There were few sanctuaries within the capital, but thankfully, the man was a part of one of them.
Seeing the Black Spider Hotel was a relieving sight, and jogging the rest of the distance, he made for the doors, being stopped by a pair of high Authority guards. The building was still spotless inside and out, and the nearby Nephilim corpses were plenty of evidence as to why that was.
The man flashed his golden key at them, and with a glance, one of the guards opened the door, allowing him in.
He stepped through and sighed as the door closed, noticing the armor the guards wore, sleek and higher tech than standard knight armor. The screams and chaos outside went muted, and pulling his hood back, he looked up at the receptionist.
The Key Master smiled and bowed a little.
“Welcome, Vatsy. Wonderful day, isn’t it?”
“You call a rioting city wonderful? I couldn’t even get my helicopter to take me to this place, having to walk on my own two feet because anybody who has one hightailed it out of here the second the decree was announced! Including my private pilot!”
“Indeed, the newspapers have done their job well.”
Vatsy grunted and leaned against the receptionist’s desk, the Key Master still smiling widely, earning Vatsy’s scrutinizing eye.
“You and John really were in cahoots. Did you help him do all this?”
“I’ve done nothing of the sort. I’m only the manager of my hotel and all its facilities. My exchanges with John Cooper were limited to providing him lodging and entry into the market.”
“Is that why the armor your guards are wearing looks suspiciously like Iron Legion armor?”
“Private transactions with Sawn Industries hardly indicate connection with John Cooper.”
“That’s an oxymoron.”
Vatsy rolled his eyes, depressing his head a bit, the Key Master eyeing him.
“So what brings a man such as yourself here, Vatsy? It seems this conflict doesn’t suit your tastes.”
“I’m here, Key Master, because I need your help. There are people here that I need to get out of the city, and obviously that can’t be done except by covert escape routes. Mine are compromised, so I need someone else’s.”
“Oh? And who might you need to help escape?”
“A handful of nobles, merchants, strong Magi, and their families.”
The Key Master’s face remained placid and silent, Vatsy glancing at him and sighing.
“I can pay whatever necessary, but these people are relatively important. More specifically, they are those who wish to aid in John Cooper’s cause. I intend to bring them to territories around the Talerrias and Ravens. They will do no good for anyone in this place.”
“John Cooper doesn’t have a cause. In fact, word from the Holy See says that after speaking to his Iron Legion, he disappeared. Nobody knows where he may have gone, not even the Pope.”
“I’m always impressed by your intelligence network, but let’s not pretend as if it matters whether John Cooper has a formal cause or not. The Capital is burning because the King declared traitor the one man who was fighting properly for humanity. Now they’re doing their damndest to prevent news of this from leaking to the rest of the Kingdom by killing anyone who dissents and shutting down the NodeNet, but that certainly doesn’t help anybody, so I’m trying to work with some of the only people who can bring benefit to this husk of a Kingdom and its human citizens. I need your help to do that.”
The two stared at each other for a little longer before the Key Master nodded.
“Very well, Vatsy. I will give you your escape route. Simply bring everyone to this place, and they will leave all at once. If you’re doing so, however, you must go and find another person for me.”
One of Vatsy’s brows raised, thankful for the help, but curious who the Key Master thought so highly of.
“Who might that be?”
……
…
“Things aren’t looking good, Benedict.”
Vizen sighed as he gazed at the fires and chaos beyond the walls of the Magisterium. It seemed peaceful within the confines of this study, but he knew that the Magisterium was more akin to a rocking boat within a stormy sea. It was its own vessel, but not immune to the turbulent water beyond.
And it seemed its captain was getting ready to make his move. Vizen had already heard the call for an “administrative meeting.”
Glancing to the side, he saw Benedict sunken into his chair behind his desk. Most students had been evacuated with the decree, though that may have been a mistake in hindsight. The Magisterium was one of the safer places to be at the moment, but then again, it too contained plenty of Nephilim. Many of them had left so they could join the riots, and many of the humans had left to find their families. Still, there were some of both left, and the Nephilim had been infected with the violent atmosphere.
Benedict, the Puppet Master, sighed in defeat.
“It’s almost difficult to think the boy actually did it. Revolution.”
“Hm, to me, it's more unbelievable to think that he did everything besides that. I knew he was smart, but to do everything he’s done is just… ridiculous.”
“Well we did always know that he had a taste for recklessness. All he did was push it to an extreme, and now he got burned with a decree just as damning.”
“Yes, the King finally showed his hand. The only thing I care about though is what you’re going to do.”
Vizen turned back to the Puppet Master with a dark look in his eye.
The appearance of the Nephilim had already sparked a certain level of doubt in the population of humanity. Showing how violent they were sowed the seeds of dread. Then, the same papers that reported on Iron Legion’s campaign also exposed the evil currents that the Nephilim were propagating across the Kingdom.
Nobody was deluding themselves into thinking that the Nephilim were human anymore, not even the Nephilim themselves. Now that the King had come down with this decree, it was clear that a different type of war had been launched against humanity. Both Vizen and the Puppet Master were well aware of these things, as horrible as it felt to see it affect the institution that they had spent most of their lives pouring their hearts and efforts into.
Regardless, humanity’s place in the capital had been removed, and since they were still human, and powerful at that, their own lives weren’t so secure.
The rioting battlefield outside was testament to that. Question was, what would they do now?
The Puppet Master sighed, a dreary look on his aged face.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do. I don’t even think it’s possible to leave this city anymore. The President is probably calling us in to force our hand, or just outright kill us. He’s gotten brazen ever since he turned.”
“And he’s even more powerful than he was before. So let’s not walk into a beast’s den and figure something else out. I’d say call John Cooper, but since the NodeNet is down…”
“We’re on our own. Just like old times.”
Vizen’s face fell flat, not wishing to recall old memories.
Right then though, there was a knock that made both of them spin toward the door. On edge, they glanced at each other before Vizen moved to open it.
One man was beyond, one which both of them recognized. Their eyes turned incredulous.
Vatsy waved with a placid face.
“Good day, gentlemen. My name is Vatsy.”
“We know who you are.”
“Oh good, that saves me the trouble.”
“What brings a man like you all the way to a place like the Magisterium? Is the black market so crowded?”
The Puppet Master stood, walking around his desk cautiously. Tired and low on patience, Vatsy spoke plainly.
“No, I’m here on request. Someone close to John Cooper wants me to get the two of you out of the city, so I’m here to fetch. All you two need to do is follow me to the Black Spider Hotel, and your escape from the city will be secured. So please, right this way. We have only a small surplus of time.”
Vizen and the Puppet Master glanced at each other once more.
“It’s like our silent prayer was answered.”
“Yes, but we can’t just leave.”
“Sure we can.”
Both Vizen and Vatsy spoke simultaneously, making the Puppet Master roll his eyes.
“We need to get the kids, you idiots. Vizen, head to the women’s dorm, I’ll head to the men’s. Vatsy, keep our path secure. We’ll be back with our elites.”
“With all due respect sir, I don’t know if we have the room to grab a bunch of students.”
Vatsy stopped the Puppet Master on the way out, earning a glare.
“I don’t give a damn. If you want me to follow you out, then it’ll be with the kids. Otherwise you can be on your way and explain to our benefactor why you didn’t return with us.”
Vatsy’s face fell, a groan escaping.
“Fine, but make it quick! I’d rather not be anywhere near that damnable President Carrion longer than I have to be! I shouldn’t even be in this damned Capital!”
“You whine a lot for an Authority 10.”
“I only just recently advanced a year ago!”
The two walked off without response, leaving Vatsy behind and running to their destinations.
The Puppet Master unleashed his magic across the grounds, the dorms being infused with mana. As Vizen ran through his target, select students were simultaneously instructed on what to do.
With the two of them working in tandem, a small crowd of students was assembled outside the dorms. Nephilim followed as well, but with some choice spells from Vizen, they were either knocked out or put to sleep.
The Puppet Master looked between all of them. Most were elites, all of them were the future of the Kingdom. Perhaps it had been the growing threat of the Scourge triggering something in the latent potential of the population of Magi, but for possibly the first time, these particular classes of students contained commoners who were even more talented than the nobles. More and more noble families had opted to withold their children ever since the Calamity class, so more commoners had taken their places for Magisterium admittance.
Most of those before the Puppet Master were those commoners, and although they couldn’t bring much value to humanity at the moment, the Puppet Master knew his duty as an instructor was to raise and protect the future. Targeting schools like these where they could corrupt the future generation was at about the top of the priority list for those who ran those Nephilim corruption centers.
Having assembled them, the Puppet Master exercised his authority over them.
“I need all of you to follow us closely! We’re getting you all out of the city. Once we’re safe, we can worry about your families-”
“You will be taking them nowhere.”
A voice echoed across the courtyard, bringing everyone to a halt. The Puppet Master, Vizen, and Vatsy spun around to find Carrion standing across from them.
Beside him were a few of the more powerful Magisterium teachers and staff, all of which were Nephilim. Carrion himself, as opposed to some years ago, now had a large pair of silver horns coming out of his head, wrapping around like a grand crown. He was taller, stronger, and radiated power not insignificantly greater than his previous self.
The Puppet Master stepped between him and his students.
“Carrion, I sincerely hope you don’t plan on doing something unbefitting of your position as President of the Magisterium.”
“Like you are as the mentor of the Elites? These students are under my jurisdiction more than they are yours. In these turbulent times, they should remain within the confines of the school.”
“How convenient that you forgot those words earlier when the Nephilim and noble children were allowed to leave freely. Give me a good reason to withhold us, Carrion.”
The two stared at each other, Carrion looking bored for a few seconds before announcing.
“A new command from the Palace has come down. All students and staff who attend the Magisterium are to become Nephilim for the sake of the war with the Scourge. Given the circumstances, I’m not inclined to allow all of these students to leave before they undergo their transformation.”
“I see…”
The Puppet Master went quiet, glancing back at his students, then Vizen.
“Get them out.”
“Understood.”
There was a sigh, mana suddenly snapping through the air in a reverse shockwave, convering onto a newly appeared Foci in the Puppet Master’s hand.
The mana was directly manipulated to conjure a large dull blade, which appeared next to the curved sword that slashed at his neck.
The clash of metal screamed as Carrion pressed down on his blade, the sword biting through half of the conjured metal before stopping.
The Puppet Master scowled at him, his mana surging through the dull blade and shattering it into hundreds of find needles that shot toward Carrion.
With a wave of Vigor, however, all of them were either blocked or sliced, fragments falling to the floor as Carrion stepped back.
Then, he chuckled.
“You’ve lost your edge, Benedict.”
“As have you, Carrion. Neither of us have seen the battlefield in decades.”
“Yet time has been kinder to me. I’ve only become more powerful, at the pinnacle of a non-conceptual Authority Eleven. And here you stand, Authority 10, yet to have ever broken the Great Barrier despite so many years of trying.”
Carrion’s body suddenly blurred with those words, the Puppet Master spinning around and dumping half his mana into the atmosphere.
It shot toward his students, who were already running to the gates under Vizen’s command. A massive barrier manifested, woven with both magic and metal. Soon after, Carrion’s sword appeared, stabbing toward it and piercing through.
In that moment, Vatsy acted himself. Manifesting his own barrier in front of the sword, he managed to kill the rest of the momentum, making Carrion frown.
“Vatsy, you must be working with the Black Spider Market. I didn’t think you had interests here.”
“It was a special request.”
Vatsy’s reply was succinct, Carrion backing away and facing the Puppet Master once more.
Carrion motioned with his head.
“The rest of you, grab the students while I handle Benedict.”
“Damn you, Carrion.”
The Puppet Master wielded the mana in the atmosphere as the other teachers and staff started moving. He knew all of them, knew that many of them were newly hired since other teachers had been leaving in recent years after the Calamity Class.
He was angry, though more than anything, disappointed and indignant. That the Magisterium had fallen so far was a thought that created a hole in his heart.
And that he may not be able to save his students might be something he’d have to pay for with his life.
“Vatsy, get them out of here now!”
“...”
“Vatsy?!”
The Puppet Master glanced back while preparing a dozen spells, the staff closing in almost leisurely, knowing that their lives were hardly threatened when they had the numbers, as well as Carrion.
Yet, Vatsy simply stood there, an inquisitive look on his face. It caused the Pupet Master to nearly seethe in sudden rage.
“Vatsy, what are you doing?!”
“...I’m just confused.”
Not knowing how to respond, the Puppet Master decided to act first and think later. He launched his spells, creating lances of metal and subsequently superheating them with fire magic. Then, making them slightly malleable with water magic, he shaped the lances with cone heads and fired them forward.
The teachers he attacked all raised their barriers, and yet when they made contact with with the cones, they crumbled as if they were tangible.
The collapse of the cones against those hard surfaces only amplified their performance, the nearly molten metal slamming forward and sending a jet stream through the barrier. While mostly dampened, those who failed to completely block the projectile faced a sharpened bead of metal, which tended to win against flesh.
The Puppet Master moved to his next target as half of the teachers outright died due to his attack. Setting his eyes on Carrion, he readied another spell, emptying most of his reserves in order to generate something that might incapacitate Carrion enough for the others to continue running.
That’s when he saw Vatsy, Carrion slicing toward him with the intention to bisect him in one go. Despite the imminent death though, Vatsy continued to watch Carrion with a weird gaze.
And then he generated a spell, the formation flashing with enough complexity to beffudle the Puppet Master and activating before he could even comprehend what kind of runes he was looking at.
That’s when He noticed an arc of lightning snap over Vatsy’s arm, his limb moving just as fast as Carrion toward the incoming sword. Mana wrapped over his hand simultaneously, creating a tangible film of what initially looked like white-blue fire.
That film was all that was necessary, the sword stopping dead in its tracks upon nearing Vatsy’s outstretched fingers. More than that, it was uncannily silent, the expected shockwave of power nowhere to be found.
That’s when the Puppet Master noticed that the film surrounding Vatsy’s hand wasn’t fire, but a layer of pure lightning so dense that it looked almost solid.
Vatsy’s face cringed after the contact, his other hand coming around and punching the sword, sending it flying in the other direction and forcing Carrion to handle the recoil.
“That fucking hurt, mate. You cut my bloody finger.”
The film of lightning over his hand disappeared with those words, revealing a small bleeding cut where the blade seemed to kiss the tip of his finger.
Taking out a handkerchief, Vatsy wiped the beading blood away and sighed, tucking it back in before taking off his suit coat and sending it to his storage. Then he rolled up the sleeves of his button down shirt.
“Fine, it’s a fight. Puppet Master, you handle the teachers. I’ll hold back Carrion. He’s weaker than I thought he was. Maybe John had a point in hindsight…”
“Excuse me?”
Carrion questioned, the offense palpable in his voice, not that the Puppet Master blamed him. He, too, was a bit shocked at the audacity.
Vatsy shot him a look, taking two items out of his storage once his sleeves were proper.
“Don’t expect me to kill the guy. Just handle the teachers and get yourself and the students to the rendezvous. And hurry up, because I certainly am not getting paid to get hurt!”
The Puppet Master was silent as he watched Vatsy start walking over to Carrion, slipping those two items over his fingers. They looked like tiny gauntlets, his fingers slipping through holes, his knuckles now augmented with horribly enchanted metal.
Lightning snapped audibly over the metal and runes, especially when he knocked them together, the arcs seemingly igniting the very atmosphere with fire.
Carrion frowned, Vigor flooding his blade before he launched forward. It was a direct slice, no flair or deception, just pure power.
Vatsy’s eyes sparked with magic, his body moving forward to meet the clash. One of his fists shot toward the blade, wrapping with dense lightning once more as his body moved faster than any Warlock’s should have any right to.
This time, the clash wasn’t silent. The lightning connected with the blade and exploded with released power, blowing the blade away. As Carrion handled the recoil, Vatsy followed up with another punch, his fist meeting Carrion’s arm, raised to block.
Another explosion between tangible Vigor and lightning, and Carrion was launched a hundred feet away, the fabric of his sleeve now smoking and burnt to crispiness.
But that was the extent of the damage, Carrion recovering easily and facing Vatsy properly.
“I didn’t think a rich auction house owner could fight like that.
“Well what kind of man hasn’t been in a few bar fights? You think I staked my claim on my auction houses in those black markets by asking nicely? You know how many gangsters I had to fend off in my early days? How many disgusting, drugged up assholes I had to punch? I commissioned my first pair of gauntlets purely because touching their skin made me want to cleanse my hands with fire!”
“It seems you ended up doing that anyway.”
Carrion glanced down at Vatsy’s fists, still covered in films of lightning.
Vatsy scoffed.
“You think this is mere fire? Plasma might be similar, but my plasma sits on a realm of its own. Don’t insult me by comparing this beautiful spell to fire magic, you ignorant neanderthal.”
“...What did you just call me?”
“You heard me, you primitive cunt. You have literal magic at your disposal, you sit near the top of the hierarchy, you’ve dipped into demonism for more power, and you’re still this weak? I knew I wasn’t the most talented, but compared to you? I’m a bloody savant!”
Vatsy attacked first as Carrion glared. Instead of using his fists, lightning arced across his forearm. He raised his finger, pointed at Carrion, and then let it loose.
The lightning found its target, snapping from the tip of his finger to Carrion’s chest. The bolt of lightning was as thick as the arm it came from, and the sheer amount of power it transferred caused a pressure wave that released an explosion of sound through the entire Magisterium.
Carrion defended using the Vigor through his body, yet felt it, somehow, vaporize under the power of the lightning. The instantaneous attack not only burned through his defense, but slammed through his body, stunning him for nearly a second.
That was enough time for Vatsy to follow up by dashing forward, slamming his fist into Carrion’s ribcage and unleashing another wave of lightning and a mysterious repulsive force which made his fist feel like a heavy warhammer.
Carrion was launched across the courtyard once more, everyone else watching, few able to believe it.
The Puppet Master was fast to recover though, using the rest of his mana to launch more attacks at the other teachers. With Carrion occupied, Vizen herded the students and finally left the Magisterium.
Lightning continued to blast across Vatsy’s attacks, and although Carrion was suppressed, the Puppet Master could tell that he wasn’t being beat. Vasty’s attacks looked difficult to deal with, but the actual damage being done to Carrion was small. Not only that, but so much lightning definitely took copious amounts of mana to generate. Vatsy wouldn’t outlast Carrion.
So the Puppet Master made his battles quick, using overwhelming force and spells from his days as a soldier to annihilate the teachers. Although they may have been comparable in their mana reserves, being both younger and Nephilim, they relied too much on their power instead of experience and skill.
There was a reason the Puppet Master was responsible for teaching the most talented and skilled noble children in the entire Kingdom. Power did not always equal skill, and the Puppet Master was good at teaching skill to those with incredible latent power.
That meant he was simultaneously baffled at how Vatsy was pulling off what he was. By his guesses, Vatsy was using lightning to artificially stimulate and control his body, allowing him to pull off feats of instantaneous movement surpassing even Carrion’s. The burden that should place on the body of a warlock should’ve killed him instantly, yet he used it like a normal combat spell.
The Puppet Master couldn’t imagine what kind of finesse went into such a spell. Whether its formation or its utilization, both were a display of incredible skill, intelligence, and talent.
Spurred by the sight of it, the Puppet Master ended his battles quickly, all of the Nephilim teachers and staff either killed or incapacitated. Then, he turned to Vatsy’s battle.
“Vatsy-!”
“Just get going so I can leave too! I can’t escape if you’re still here!”
“You think I’m going to let you escape?!”
Carrion seethed at the very notion of it, pouring more power into his attacks, yet being dodged by deft movements.
The Puppet Master took in the sight of it for a few more moments before nodding and leaving, rushing out of the Magisterium and in the direction of the Black Spider Hotel.