n

n

nIt wasn't a surprise for the remaining forces of the enemy to get crushed in the next half an hour. My warriors coupled with my team just needed a chance to vent all their stress, and those enemies came at the perfect time for that.

nAs for me, I didn't have the desire to watch this fight anymore. A settled victory was already set in stone for my side this time, despite being an incomplete victory to be honest.

nBut it was still my win. Next time I'd do better, I promised myself that!

n

"Time to get you inactivated,

" despite the fact that my forces didn't need any help from the castle to win, I just wanted to prevent any unseen events.

nSo I went inside the three story building and stretched my arm towards the hovering emblem. Last time I was interrupted and stopped by that strong illusionist, but not anymore.

nDo you want to control the emblem?

nOnce I touched it, the system sent me this message. This was my first time coming in touch with an emblem, and this was an activated one as well.

n

"I want,

" once said these words, the emblem flashed in bright silver white light before it changed into black coloured rays of light. This swift change made me frown.

nI knew the colour of the illusionists' power was silver white. Was my energy coloured in black? Why was that?

nAs I didn't have any clue to an answer, I shrugged my shoulders and simply examined the next message of the system.

nYou control the advanced emblem

nThis emblem is now activated

nYou can control the emblem through an interface designed for emblems at your profile

n

"Open profile,

" I simply checked the new interface and turned the activated emblem into deactivated form.

nAfter doing all that, I finally had time to consider two things…

n

"Come,

" as the fight was going smoothly, I simply walked outside and shouted,

"come here my illusionists.

"

nThe ones I bound already were now fighting the enemies. But I didn't have time to even check on their numbers or their stats.

nMy order was a decree that they couldn't defy. The next few minutes I saw two hundred and fifty illusionists standing in front of me.

nThey had the same physique of humans, but their skin was milky white in colour with repeated circular patterns of heart beating-like silver shining colour.

nTheir eyes were big and rounded, but they lacked visible eyelids like humans. Unlike humans, they got a membrane-like fast moving layer that kept appearing and disappearing like water turning into frost before melting again.

nI watched them while feeling their hatred and anger towards me. Of course they were forced to become my lackeys, and I didn't find anything weird about their current feelings.

nWhat I needed from them was obedience and their strength; both were secured by the binding contract supervised over by the system.

n

"What are your current abilities?

" I asked in a demanding tone.

n

"Who are you first?

" one of them was courageous enough to speak in such arrogance.

nI could tolerate their silent enmity, but dude… I was never allowing for any rebellious act in front of me.

n

"You are going to die,

" I simply opened my profile page and looked for the contracts I had with others. There was a long list for me to search but I simply thought about that dude and instantly a small window of control appeared with his name.

nHe was called Allengar, and without any hesitation I chose to punish him with death.

nOf course there were many other options here to punish him, for example sealing up his powers and inflicting pain over his body. I also had the power to issue quests to any of them in exchange for paying a corresponding fee of blessing points.

n

"Not for now,

" without even batting an eye for the screaming Allengar, I closed that window which turned grey and looked at the rest.

"I'm not a democratic person, so spare your opinions or else…

"

nI motioned my head to the dead body of Allengar before adding,

"now, who is going to answer my question?

"

nThis time no one dared to say anything funny or useless anymore.

"We have the ability to stealth and move fast during such a state as our innate talent,

" one of them spoke and his tone came a bit shaky.

nIt seemed they saw me as a soft person to deal with before, but now? Humph! Despite having many people bound to me by contracts, dealing with other hostile races like these was a different thing.

nOnly power was respected, as I just did.

n

"What about your illusion abilities?

" This was something that didn't add up at all. What gave their race such a name wasn't just their ability to stealth, but to attack others using illusions.

nBut during all the fights back then, not a single time one of them used such an ability. And I wanted to know why.

n

"That's because it consumes a ton of coins,

" one of them said in a bitter tone.

n

"And?

" if it was a problem of coins, then this wouldn't be the case. At least that strong dude who appeared late would have used his ability on me.

n

"We also need intelligence stat points above three hundred,

" one of them added,

"and also need blessing points.

"

n

"I see,

" so it was a problem of a stat point at this stage. I didn't know any of that before! Just recalling how I was terrified when dealing with that shadow illusionist and the illusionists here, I couldn't help but bitterly smile.

nKnowledge was power, and the apocalypse proved this point clearer with each passing day.

nSo they couldn't use their deadliest weapon yet, and it seemed from the many conditions they had, not all of them would be able to do that.

nI wasn't only thinking about my enemies, but also considering my current force of these illusionists.

nCoins and stat points weren't an issue. Right now the higher limit of the stat points was fixed at one hundred mark. So it was safe to assume that the next quest would raise this limit to two hundred.

nSo even in the next quest I wouldn't be able to fulfil one of the main conditions for their abilities.

nAlso the blessing points were a pain.

"How many of you have support from gods?

" I just asked with little hope, hope that was instantly crushed the moment they all raised their hands.

nDamn! This was bad!

nThe bad thing here wasn't in their inability to gain further support from other gods, but it was also the nature of the gods they gained their sponsorship in the first place.

nThese gods were all illusionist race gods, all hostile to humans and human gods.

nSo thinking about the possibility of their gods giving them tasks and appointing blessing points for their deeds was a funny joke!

nSo I got a **load of those illusionists with their gods, and they couldn't accept the blessing from human gods now… What worse could happen?

nThere was only one way I knew how to solve this messy situation. Thanks to the angels, I knew that blessing points could be transported, just like what they did to attack me thrice with that deadly star weapon.

nMentioning the deadly star weapon, I now had a peace of mind about it. According to my chariot and its outstanding performance against that mighty illusionist god tear, I now had confidence in dealing with that scary weapon on my own.

nThat reminded me of those lazy gods in my channel. How come they didn't come up with their offers yet? And what about that mysterious high god who was thinking about coming forward as the jumper said before?

nAt this moment I felt that they lost their chance in convincing me to join any of their pantheons. Even that high god, I doubted he would be able to convince me as well.

n

"Alright, time to gather up intel,

" as I moved such thoughts aside for now, I turned to another hotpoint,

"what do you know about that world gate that just moved away from here?

"

nAs the mystery regarding their ability was cleared, now it was the time for another mystery to be unveiled.

nI knew world gates were rare, and extremely valuable. But from what I witnessed, that world gate seemed to be able to move freely between places.

nThat wasn't something I heard of before. And just considering such a possibility made me worried about controlling any world gate.

nWhat was the benefit of attacking one world gate and before controlling it, that gate would whoosh away? That was unacceptable and I needed to know more about such situation first.

n

"That's easy to explain, mighty one,

" one of them said before adding,

"this world gate wasn't the primary gate here. It was just a subsidiary gate created by paying a hefty price of coins and many blessing points as well.

"

n

"Call me lord,

" I corrected the way he addressed me. Just hearing that made me understand something.

"So you mean there is a primary world gate somewhere in the city and this was just a branch of it?

"

nAnd he nodded.

n

"Yes, my lord.

"

n

"Then why did you pay all this price just to create a subsidiary gate?

" I couldn't understand the reason behind this. As far as I knew, the world gate was something that needed heavy protection and much resources.

nJust opening one must have consumed a hell of their already scarce resources. Be it coins or blessing points, both weren't that abundant at such a stage of the apocalypse yet.

n

"We needed humans,

" one of them said in obvious hesitation,

"human slaves that we can use in labours and also to sacrifice them for our gods.

"

n

"Sacrifices? Blessing sacrifices?

" I couldn't help but feel anger when I heard these words. And it seemed my anger was so obvious that it made them all pause and fell into silence.

nBut their silence was enough evidence to confirm my guesses.

n

"Damn!

" I sucked in cold breath before adding,

"so that means other races are also doing the same thing, right?

"

nAnd this time they nodded.

n

"I heard that the Selvators and the dragons worked earlier than us to establish their outer gates around the city,

" one of them said before adding when I nodded in encouragement,

"I also heard that the dragons were slightly angry for unknown reasons. They got the support of some higher ups in their clans and opened two gates, not one.

"

nOnce I heard these words, I didn't know why that dragon archlord or something from the auction popped into my head. Yes, he might be the one behind such a rage, or perhaps that was the nature of the dragons.

nBut that meant I needed to change my tactics a bit.

nBlessing sacrifices was a very brutal concept, widely known and famous for all non-human races. In their eyes, humans were the lowest kind of race they ever met.

nSeeing us as slaves was something common. But in the eyes of their gods, and for unknown reason, these gods kept issuing blessing sacrifices to them, asking them to capture us and offer such captives as sacrifices to please the gods.

nIn return for such quests, those races would gain tons of blessing points and in such an easy way. Just seeing us as cattle and sheep herds worthy of nothing but slaughter on their sacrificing altars made my blood boil.

nAnd it also rang a very dangerous bell inside my mind. Wasting more time meant they would gain more blessing points and become more formidable than the way they were right now.

n

"Do you know where these subsidiary gates are?

" I couldn't help but ask in anticipation. But I was doomed to be disappointed when they all looked at each other while few shook their heads.

n

"We only know of our affairs,

" one of them said before adding when he noticed me frowning,

"but all the subsidiary gates are located in a wide circle around Jersey city that covers almost twenty miles radius.

"

n

"Twenty miles… That's not a small area to navigate,

" I thought deeply about that before I looked up and shouted,

"come down here!

"

n*Fwoosh!* *Fwoosh!* *Fwoosh!*

n