Flames battered his shield as he unleashed another volley of attacks. Between the rate of his energy use and the number of enemies he couldn't be sure how many monsters were dying any more. Spiritual energy surged into his feet as his shield shattered. He dodged the outstretched jaws of another salamander seconds before it would've taken his right leg. The battle had gone from bad to worse. The array on his robes was broken. Which meant he had to rely on his speed as there was no way he could stay still for Prismatic Barrier. He glanced at the largest salamander who watched like a roman emperor observing warriors in the coliseum. He wasn't sure if it wasn't joining the fight because it viewed Maximilian as a threat or if it was the opposite. For now, though it was a boon. Two salamanders shot out of the chaos of the battle and toward the wall where he landed. He blasted them both with imbued Severing Disc but another pair soon replaced them. He wanted no he needed to escape but the overgrown lizards were smarter than he gave them credit. They blocked the entrance he used with their bodies. Which meant he had to keep fighting. He released his aura and killing intent.

  Despite the situation his heart was calm. He didn't need to be a genius to figure out what he had to do. He wouldn't survive a prolonged battle which meant he had to strike at the head. He formed two new Severing Disc and imbued them with his Dao. He pushed off from the cave wall and rocketed toward the largest salamander. By the time the ugly beast reacted both attacks had already crossed the remaining distance. The first disc tore at its skull like a razor while the second attempted to tear out its throat. Neither succeeded. His instincts warned him mere moments before the boss salamander swung a claw big enough to split him in half. He had enough time to unleash a jet of water to soften the impact. It was of limited help. The claw slammed into him with enough force to shoot him across the chamber. He slammed into the wall hard enough to leave two-inch indent. Another scream of danger forced him to move as he took stock of the situation. He formed another set of Severing Discs and got to his feet. The rational part of him knew that he should be terrified but he wasn't. If anything he felt a strange sort of serenity about the situation. Once again, he was worried that the Network had changed something in his head. He stared at the arrays salamanders and cocked his head. He formed over a dozen darts of electricity and spread them out as far as he could. He doubled the total before the salamanders decided to attack.

  With his back against a literal and proverbial wall, he decided to activate Prismatic Barrier. The rainbow barrier sprung into existence as the last of his darts was expended. He paled as his spiritual energy expenditure tripled. He activated Severing Disc and went on the offensive. He burned through two thirds of his spiritual energy before the battle changed. Maximilian stumbled a step as his vision swam. He wasn't sure what determined the amount of mental energy he had, but he was running on empty. He wasn't able imbue any of his skills let alone form another shower of electric darts. The other side wasn't doing much better. He summoned a pair of crystals from his bag and drained them as fast as he could. The sudden surge of energy felt like a cooling rain over his scorched mind. The largest salamander wasn't willing to let him recover. Instead, it surged. Maximilian pushed spiritual energy into his feet and launched into the air. He only made half as far as he intended but that was enough. Once he had drained both crystals he resumed his attacks.

  Electricity and water rained down onto the boss lizard like an orbital bombardment. After the first few minutes Maximilian lost almost all visibility but he didn't stop. Not until he received a massive burst of spiritual energy. Spiritual energy that was like the first rain in a desert. Despite the kill confirmation he gave the area with the lizard a wide berth. He couldn't be sure there wasn't an unseen or unknown enemy, so he decided to play it safe. It took almost twenty minutes for the steam to lift. When it had he relaxed. The salamander was little more than a smoldering husk. One that had shrunk by more than fifty percent. He figured something would come to check on the battle soon, so he needed to recover as fast as possible. He summoned both a spirit stone and crystal to absorb. He sighed and for the first time today began to relax.

  When he decided to stop, he had broken two more crystals, one of each type. He wanted to do more but this wasn't a cultivation time. He had defeated three of the four monsters, so he had no interest in stopping. It was like he had gotten a second wind. He decided to leave the salamander's remains behind. If he was lucky, he could come back and collect the materials later. He wasn't sure if they would be good for anything he needed but either way it wasn't a big enough deal. Not compared to what he could gain. He looked down at his robes and sighed. They weren't repairing themselves. He figured he would need a replacement. He wasn't sure if it was the damage or if they all had an insane damage mitigation. He added it to the mental list of things he had to replace or deal with. He would need to buy a shop when he got back. With everything else taken care of he got to his feet and set out in search of the final boss. It was time to finish. He had a pretty good idea where he could find the last enemy. So far he had gone in each of the other cardinal directions which meant it was time to head west.

  He decided to head up the outside of the mountain. He wished he could say that was due to some hidden knowledge, but the truth was that he didn't want to be underground anymore. Between the boars and the salamanders, he was tired of the rocks. He was pretty sure that some part of his settlement would be in the mountain, but the majority would be outside. He vaguely remembered fantasy cities and even a few real carved into the side of mountains. He would need to raid a library or two if he got the chance. His journey to the other side of the mountain took about three hours and what he found irritated him. Not only was there a desert in that direction but the monsters were scorpions. Part of him wanted to turn around and let the quest end. In honesty if it had been the kind of arachnid he would've. He had seen what spiritual energy did to creatures and had no interest in fighting those things. Still, he knew he couldn't. The Network hadn't clarified that he would be able to leave the mountain upon failing the quest. It was possible that he would find himself trapped here or that something would happen with the monsters that made it impossible. He briefly considered going back but he knew better. Outside of getting a new robe there was little reason to go and there was no guarantee that he could get something better. He took a deep breath and circulated his spiritual energy. When he was ready, he strode down the mountain ready to blow anything and everything away.

  Justinian spun his spear and just before he thrust in through the eye of the overgrown ant in front of him. Even without his skill the spear passed through the bug's bulbous eye and out the back of its head. It wasn't enough. He removed the spear and surveilled the battlefield. He had known the quest to become a recognized ruler would be hard, but this was ridiculous. The sound of machine guns was loud enough to drown out the clicking mandibles. At first, he had thought he had lucked out when he and the rest of his tutorial group appeared in a mostly intact town. They had been wrong. He avoided another ant and slammed the bit of his spear into yet another. No matter how fast he killed them it wasn't enough. It was like the world had conspired against them. Like it was cruel joke. Every time he looked up there was one less defender, one less warrior. One less person who trusted him. One less person who relied on him. One less person.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Even the military grade hardware wasn't enough. The bugs had only grown stronger over the last several days. He gritted his teeth and turned the fury in his heart into power. Spiritual energy surged into the tip of his spear as he activated Thrust. One spear point turned into five as the bugs in front of him were filled with wholes faster than he could see. Faster than anyone could. Almost as soon as the skill ended another ant charged toward him. The mindless creature crawled over its brethren as if they were little more than trash. Another explosion of gun fire told him that things were just as bad everywhere else. Spiritual energy surged into his arms and legs right before he charged into the ant in front of him. His spear passed through its body as if it were glass. He then pushed it into the ants behind it. Just like that he pushed through ten ants before he was forced to retreat. He jumped out of the horde and back onto the makeshift walls. Where he found someone waiting for him.

  "Status Report." Justinian asked the former soldier as soon as he stopped running.

  "We are running out of ammo. We can deal with the additional expenditure for another five days after that we will have to ration." Elijah replied.

  Justinian kept control of his expression as he stared at the endless horde beneath them. They didn't need to defeat the beasts. Rather the shimmering gate in the distance made that impossible. They needed to survive until the end of the week. "How are the people doing?" He asked with a hint of steel in his voice. At the beginning everyone was in high spirits. Their hope and faith that he would deal with the problem on his own gave birth to a confidence that had long faded. More than a few had been caught trying to steal food or escape the city. Something that he was forced to punish. Their subsequent executions increased the unrest which led to more bad behaviors. It rapidly descended into a spiral that he could do nothing to stop. The look on Elijah's face made it clear he wouldn't like the answer.

  "We had another group attempt to escape while you were out there. They were non-cultivators." The sadness in his voice was like a lance driven into Justinian's heart. He closed his eyes and wanted nothing more than to blast the ants in front of him to nothing. Destroy the Network, those dwarves and everyone else responsible for this insanity. He had become Icarus. He soared through the air like a phoenix during the tutorial only to be slapped down as soon as they left. Part of him wondered if it was all a trick. If the Network had done it to them on purpose. Gave them hope that they were heroes only to crush them later.

  "Are they being held in the cells?" He sighed and opened his eyes. Being a leader was never glamorous. The history books never included the hardships you faced. The pain you would cause. The non-cultivators or mortals as others had taken to calling them had no business on the battlefield. Even with guns it was like throwing peasants against the roman empire. Yet what was he supposed to do? There weren't enough cultivators to make up an army. They were outnumbered four to one as it was. He was already dealing with irritation between the two groups. What would happen if he let one leave the battlefield and not the other? As much as he didn't like it the thing that kept the settlement together was his power. Well, that and his reputation.

  "They are. We have a couple of injured guards keeping watch." Elijah replied. "Are you ready to activate the array?" Justinian held out a hand. Elijah placed the weird array in his hands. The device was size of baseball and was made out of some kind of glass. The array was translucent with what looked like a small bouncing ball of fire inside. It was the Scorching Ember array, and it was one of the few arrays he could buy. Thanks to his performance during the tutorial. The best comparison he could make was that of a grenade. It promised the ability to cause widespread devastation. It was hard to believe that it would make a difference where actual grenades had failed.

  "Have everyone return to the wall. I activate the array in thirty seconds." Elijah nodded and darted off to rely on the warning. He wouldn't activate the array if there were innocents in the way. Not if he could avoid it but it would be best that they didn't know that. Kill energy had made everything unreliable. The few who wanted to do battle wanted to squeeze every ounce of benefit from everything. Which the ants were great for. It just also made organizing them difficult. When the time came, he sent a thread of spiritual energy into the array. When the small ball began to warm in his hand he launched it into the wave of enemies. The ball disappeared beneath the surge of bodies and nothing happened. Just as he began to wonder if he had made a mistake, he received a premonition of danger. He had learned long ago to trust his gut especially now that he had a luck attribute. "Down!" He barely had enough time to hit the ground before a blazing inferno blasted out. Even at this distance the flames were intense enough to make him feel like he was in an oven.

  He resisted the urge to activate his defensive skill. Not wanting to waste it if he was needed to rejoin the fighting. The intense heat lasted for less than five minutes. When it was finally over, he dragged himself up only to find nothing. The ground had been reduced to a barren landscape of burned-out dirt and trees. The gate was still standing but it wasn't releasing anymore ants. As if even, that was cowed by the display. It only took Justinian a moment to snap himself out of the stupor. "Repair the walls! The battle isn't over." He sent a small amount of spiritual energy into his vocal cords to make sure everyone could hear him. Even doing so he had to give out a second order to get everyone moving. He couldn't blame them. That explosion was insane for something so small. When you took into account how much stronger everything was. If he had to guess, he would put it somewhere in missile range. Just much more contained. He doubted even the best old-world weapons would've managed to do that level of damage. While leaving him unharmed. Once again, he was awed and terrified by what was possible. He shook off the distraction and took a seat. He needed regain his spiritual energy. The ants would return, and he wasn't ready the death toll would only increase.

  When the gate pulsed and a fresh stream of ants streamed out, he was ready. He launched himself from the wall. He landed at the forefront of the next wave. These ants were the colors of the dying embers of a fire. He assumed that meant they were resistant to fire. Not that it mattered. They didn't have another fire array and even if they did. There was no way he would use it so soon. They weren't sure what the future waves would be. Therefore, they had to be cautious. There was also something about getting into the fight. Pushing himself and crushing the horrid bugs. The spiritual energy was a nice bonus.