Chapter 176: Omen – Chapter 162: Slaughterhouse

GamingWolf

Whoever had decided to attack the empire was obviously insane, but Tilka had to admit they did have a better chance than anyone else she could think of. They had somehow managed to disable all the slave collars and fake System notifications. The latter could not have been real; everyone knew that the System was an unthinking thing.

Still, some of her colleagues had listened to the fake messages they had received and had abandoned the empire, and nobody was able to do anything about it as they had vanished shortly after. That had led to a few more people deserting and disappearing, but it did not take long for command to get the troops back in order and stop any more people from letting themselves be teleported to certain doom. Cheap tricks…

Anyone with enough manpower and money could set up a teleportation formation that could target people like this. The bit earlier that had disrupted everything that had been powered by mana worried Tilka a little more, but she also knew that the researchers of the empire had been trying to figure this exact thing out for a few years now. Without a way to temporarily disrupt magic, they would never get past Lightfray, especially now that the cowards that had dared to call themselves Gods had disappeared.

For her part, Tilka was certain that they had just been waiting for an excuse to abandon them. They had promised that they would lead them to glory for generations, but nothing had ever come of that. Ridiculous.

Her musings were interrupted by a loud crash, quickly followed by shouts and then screams. Tilka grabbed her spear and helmet, putting the latter on before she stepped outside.

The sight that greeted her was not what she had expected.

Swords were flying, effortlessly piercing anyone that stood in their way while drawing a trail of fire behind them in the air. It lingered for a while, lashing out at anyone who dared to step close to it. She could not see the one controlling the swords, but neither did she need to. The other enemy that was rushing across the courtyard took all of Tilka's attention.

She could not follow the black and silver blur most of the time, only catching glimpses of the person when they slowed down briefly to drive their weapon into one of her colleagues; or sometimes simply moved through them. As best as she could tell, it was a winged woman wielding a staff of some sort. What that woman could do, however, did not fit into what Tilka knew anyone could accomplish. She could not feel any mana coming off of her, meaning that the stone that shattered beneath her feet whenever she kicked off it to reach her next target was not because she was enhancing her strength with magic, but simply through her own base abilities.

Nobody should be able to move like that. The Eternal Empire of Zeltar had the honour of calling the Sword Saint their own, and not even he would be able to move like that. Tilka had once seen the man dismantle a battalion on his own, yes, but he had done so in a much more… reasonable way. A loud bang called Tilka back to reality, and a moment later she was knocked to the ground by a gust of wind. One that was strong enough to shatter the windows of the building surrounding the courtyard as well as break the wooden gate.

Tilka tried to take a breath but only managed to cough again and again, trying to vacate her lungs of the blood that had gathered inside. She drew on her well, letting the healing mana that her Class granted her flow through her body. It only took a moment for the damage to her lungs to be healed and Tilka to be on her feet again.

As soon as she was, she saw what had caused the woman to dart across the courtyard even faster than before. Her captain had come outside and the attacker had obviously recognised his rank and wanted to dispose of him. Tilka had some hope that the captain would be able to pull something out of his hat to fend off the attacker, but the sickening sound of breaking bones and flesh tearing apart told her he did not. She only needed a glimpse of the attacker, spine of her captain in hand, to know that any hope she might have had was ill-placed.

They would die.

The empire would die.

Aperio closed her fist around the bloody spine she had ripped from the latest mortal who had tried to use magic on her mind, pulverising it. Whatever they tried to do never amounted to anything, of course, but the mere idea that they were trying to mess with her mind was enough to prioritise them. She had let the healers live so far, wanting them to heal their fallen comrades as best they could just so she could cut them down again. These mortals did not deserve any mercy. Only pain. Death.

She held up her hand, grabbing hold of one of her daughter's swords as it zipped by. With a sharp motion and a lot more force than she needed, Aperio threw the weapon through the building in front of her. It impaled a mortal and sent him flying, first through a wall and then a building, causing most of his body to spread itself across the surroundings.

An arrow fired from one of the mortals she had left alive bounced off of her, not even managing to leave a mark on her skin. To think Natio was able to make me bleed… Even if he were still a God, he would no longer be able to do that. Aperio adjusted the grip of her swordstaff before throwing it in a wide arc towards the one that had assumed a puny arrow would do anything to stop her. A moment later, the mortal was cut cleanly in half.

With a thought, her weapon returned to Aperio's hand, the blood that should have been on it nowhere to be seen. The same was true for the grime that should have been coating the All-Mother. She had dashed through more than a few mortals that had been in her way, their weak bodies not slowing her down in the slightest. After her first bloody altercation, she had spent hours in a bath trying to clean herself, and now, she simply did not want to get dirty and the world obliged.

Her will was law, and these pesky mortals saw it fit to question her. They would pay with their lives, but not before they felt at least a little bit of pain. Even the ones she had simply waltzed through got to live a little longer than they otherwise would have in order to experience pain; pain they would still feel in their next life.

She had no need to mar their Souls like Epemirial did. No, Aperio simply gifted everyone she killed a little title. They would not know they had it, but it would be there. Always reminding them of what pain their vile ways had caused them.

At the beginning she had not wanted to give them a title specifically, just something that would cause them to have a little voice in their next life that would stop them from repeating their vile mistakes. The System interpreted her wish and had gifted everyone she had killed so far with a title, one it had so helpfully called [Eternal Repentance]. In the end, Aperio hoped that it would stop them from doing something like that again.

Aperio lightly kicked off of the ground again, moving herself through yet another mortal before she wrapped her fingers around the head of another and squeezed. The skull offered no resistance and a moment later the weakling's brains scattered themselves over the surroundings.

A set of arrows bounced off her wings, not even managing to ruffle her feathers. This time, she ignored the fools that still tried to fight her and jumped up into the air, her wings spreading to their full length behind her back. She did not rise into the air for a better aim for a mana-based attack, but to see with her own eyes what she had already done while drawing neither on the raging flood of mana that was flowing through her body nor the endless wellspring she could access at her whim. These mortals would die by her hand. Literally.

Aperio stopped beating her wings and let herself fall downward again, ignoring the desperate screams that filled every bit of her surroundings. A moment later she landed, and a wet crunch confirmed that she had hit her target. The gaudier the mortal's armour, the more unusual the way Aperio would kill them.

A small whimper caused Aperio to look down at the mortal that had just been talking to the one she had squished. She was covered head to toe in the remains of her slaving friend, trying to use her pitiful magic to heal his remains. The All-Mother simply grabbed the woman by her neck and threw her with a liberal application of more strength.

Using more than a tiny fraction of her strength resulted in the mortal's body falling apart, the air itself changing as the pile of flesh and blood pushed through it. Behind the body, Aperio noticed a surprising absence of anything, one that tried — and failed — to pull her in. All of that meant nothing in comparison to the dome of fire that began to rise around the corpse just after it left her hand.

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There was a brief moment of silence, short enough that only the All-Mother herself would notice before the surroundings simply ceased to exist, replaced by a crater and smoke.

"I thought you did not want to use magic," Ferio said as she brushed a bit of ash off of her shoulder. She waved her hand, causing the smoke that still lingered to clear. "Could have warned me."

"I didn't," Aperio replied, blinking as she tried to understand how throwing a mortal as hard as she could would lead to a result like this. "I just let loose and threw a mortal."

"You threw a mortal? Hard enough to cause... this?" her daughter asked, gesturing at their charred surroundings.

"Apparently," Aperio replied as she looked at her hand. She balled it into a fist, watching the muscles move below her skin. She would be lying if she said she did not enjoy what she had done, but a part of her was also scared; reminded of how easy it was to let loose and potentially hurt those she cherished. Just a little too much strength and she could end up hurting Caethya, something she would never forgive herself for if she did.

"I guess?" Ferio said. "If you threw them hard enough…" Her daughter's voice trailed off as she mumbled to herself. Aperio was sure she could hear the words 'fusion,' 'plasma,' and 'relativistic, ' but she did not know what exactly they meant.

The All-Mother reached out to her daughter, gently touching her shoulder. "Ferio?" she asked, tilting her head. "You okay?"

"Yes, yes," she replied with a small laugh. "I simply forgot that you are who you are, and are not really bound by the same rules as anyone else."

Aperio ignored her daughter's words and let a bit of her mana flow through her, just to make sure she really did not injure her. She had not expected this to happen and, while Ferio was strong, Aperio did not know how strong. Just because she herself went unscathed did not mean anyone else would.

"It's fine, Mother," Ferio replied with a small smile. "Goddess of the Sun, remember? That is not just an allegory to life and light; I used to actually live in the sun. This wasn't much different from that."

Aperio took her hand off Ferio's shoulder, giving her daughter a last once over before she offered a hesitant nod. "If you say so."

The All-Mother was still not quite comfortable with what had happened. She had let loose, and could have hurt her daughter. No matter how strong Ferio was, it was nothing compared to what Aperio could muster if she actually tried. Still, besides the remorse she felt at being reckless, she could not help but smile. She had liked the moment of being less than careful; liked to use the strength she always had to keep in check in order to not break everything.

Aperio balled her hands into fists again and again, tensing her muscles as she did. She was itching for more. Wanted to find out what else she could do with her body alone. Her weapon disappeared back into her Void as she looked at her daughter. "Do you wish to join me?" she asked as she pointed towards the next military base she had found. "There are more."

Ferio, of all things, smiled at the words. "Sure," she replied. "But do you even want me to help? You seem to be finally enjoying yourself."

The All-Mother tilted her head ever-so-slightly to the side. "Is that wrong?" she asked. "These mortals deserve no mercy, and I have not given anything my all since I returned." I need to fight.

She had felt the itch before, but now that she had had a taste of her own abilities, Aperio wanted to experience it again. She wanted to fight; to give an outlet to the rage that had bubbled up inside her ever since her return. Talking did not help, and Caethya could only calm her anger, not erase it.

The thought of her love caused the All-Mother to pause. Would Caethya even approve of what she was doing? Or would the knowledge of what she was truly capable of scare the Demigoddess so much that she would run away?

Aperio began to reach out to her love but stopped. Then she reached out again, only to reconsider again. With a deep breath, she finally made contact with Caethya, letting her love feel the fear, the uncertainty that filled her mind. If Caethya did not want her to let the slaving mortals be the outlet for her anger, she would find something else.

Much to Aperio's surprise, Caethya offered the mental equivalent of shrug to her question. She did not care for them, and if Aperio thought that is what they deserved, she would be all for it.

"It's not wrong," Ferio replied with a smile, taking Aperio from her thoughts. "It's simply not what I expected from you as you are now. You had this weird love for mortals when you came back and I had thought that extended to all of them."

"I care for a few mortals," the All-Mother replied as she mentally said her goodbyes to Caethya. "I do not have any love for slavers."

With those words, Aperio kicked off of the ground, spread her wings and, with a mighty beat, propelled herself towards the next base. The wind rushing past her, the small resistance she had to push past to go ever faster; it all made her feel alive. Like she was actually in the real world and not some weird dream.

It only took a few seconds for her to reach her goal. Aperio folded her wings behind her back and closed her eyes. The mortals would not see or hear her coming, but they would most certainly feel it when she crashed through all the buildings that separated her from the one she assumed to be the leader of this fort.

GamingWolf

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