Kairos couldn’t help but think that Tiana’s temperament had rubbed off on him. As for whether or not that was a good or bad thing, he didn’t really know yet.
Nonetheless, he couldn’t help but admit being a bit overbearing felt nicer than he thought.
As he aimed his glowing blue hand towards the pile of rubble, the other people that were nearby began ducking and put their hands on their heads. The boy next to him ended up stumbling backwards and falling on his behind.
That was when Kairos let the spell loose.
For a split second, there was only a faint swish as the mana was expelled from his body.
Then, a thunderous explosion ensued.
Nasty cracks spread around the pavement that he had been walking on earlier. As for the rubble that was covering the farm, it was blown away and further shattered into smaller pieces.
The force was enough to send several of the smaller fragments twenty meters in the air, while the larger ones scattered to even move ten meters. Those fragments were still fairly large, and ended up slamming into the people that had taken cover earlier, ripping apart their skin and bruising their bodies.
They ended up letting out various cries of pain and ended up getting covered in dirt. The rubble smashed up large amounts of tilled farmland into the air, ruining it.
Kairos rubbed his chin with his thumb and forefinger while holding onto his elbow using his other hand.
“Hm. It seems I have caused quite a mess! Well, since it is your plot, then you shall be the one to work on it, alright?”
Those people didn’t end up responding. While covered in dirt, they continued to roll around and groan in pain. In fact, it seemed like one of them had broken their arm because of Kairos.
Seeing that broken arm, Kairos couldn’t help but let out a faint chuckle.
It reminded him of some things.
The boy from before was trembling slightly.
“This… this is too far!”
The rubble on his plot of land was cleared, and the aftereffects had already tilled some of the farm for him. However, the boy was still clearly against it.
“I… I don’t need this treatment.”
Kairos looked at him and narrowed his eyes. However, instead of displeasure, a smile ended up spreading across his face. He couldn’t help but think of more memories and look at the boy with a bit of unfairly placed disdain.
“Oh, really?”
Kairos walked over to the boy, lowered his face and brought himself closer. It was to the point where he could clearly make out the boy’s afraid face.
“Don’t worry, I am very impartial.”
Kairos spoke rather loudly, which made the boy grit his teeth in pain. All of the other farmers in the surroundings couldn’t help but stop what they were doing and look at him silently.
Kairos tilted his head to the side ever so slightly.
“No matter who, as long as they wish, then I am more than willing to help them.”
A few more gullible people seemed a little excited, not understanding his true meaning.
He then stood back up and gestured towards the people rolling around on the ground in pain.
“For example, can’t you see how much I’ve helped these people?”
Several people flinched. Some people couldn’t bring themselves to look at him any longer.
Kairos pointed towards a man who was crying out in pain, with his arm twisted the wrong way.
“Out of my own goodwill, I have broken this man’s arm. He is having difficulty thanking me through his tears of joy! Please come to me if you want similar treatment. Don’t worry, I’m very nice.”
Everyone had fallen very silent. All of the people working on farms were looking down, trying their best not to move as they didn’t want to attract attention. The only people looking at Kairos were those that were in his group.
Nicole in particular had her eyes widened all the way. She reached her hand out shakily, but was hesitating.
“K-Kairos?”
She called out as though she wasn’t even sure if the person in front of her was truly the person she had been with for so long.
Sydney had her mouth agape slightly, as though she was having difficulty understanding what he had done.
Tori seemed rather indifferent, as though this situation wasn’t anything strange. On the other hand Chase had a strange smile on his face.
Sam pressed his lips together and looked down.
Although he seemed displeased with Kairos’ actions, he also didn’t look surprised.
In the end, he just sighed.
“Come on, let’s get out of here.”
Kairos realized he had probably gone a tad bit too far, but he figured that this should be all he needed to do for a long while. He knew how fast rumors would spread, so even the people on the other side of the city, too far to see, should quickly know what happened.
It was important to establish a reputation.
Kairos walked on ahead nonchalantly, back with the normal expression on his face.
“Yes, we should leave. Waiting here any longer is just wasting time we could’ve needed.”
The group walked back towards the entrance, some more resolutely than others. Their walk was eerily silent, making the sounds of their footsteps rather noticeable.
It was quite strange when there were so many people, but hardly any sound was made.
The people working on the farms all tensed up and made sure not to look. Kairos thought about all of their envious glares from before and couldn’t help but marvel a little at the effectiveness of his intimidation.
Along the way, a child ended up crying when Kairos got near, but he didn’t even spare a glance. A mother hurriedly held onto the child and desperately tried to calm him down.
Kairos let out a soft sigh and thought to himself.
‘Seems like I’m the bad guy now, huh.’
By the time the group got close to the entrance of the city, they seemed to come to another realization. The wall was closed off, meaning that they couldn’t exactly leave.
Kairos’ eyebrow twitched, but before he could think of going back to Tiana a pathway began to reveal itself automatically. He was a bit confused, but decided to continue through it anyway, and the rest followed.
By the time they came out the other end, Nicole couldn’t keep her thoughts silent anymore.
“W-Why did you do that?”
Kairos sighed.
“I was given a rather nice position out of luck. However, most of the people are likely against my new position or jealous because of it. Considering that it is the only reason we are even allowed to stay, it is important to maintain that position.”
He looked over his shoulder and into Nicole’s eyes.
“Wouldn’t you prefer having this as a place to stay? Without my identity as the logistics guy, then we would all be kicked out.”
Nicole looked down.
“But did you have to…”
Chase shrugged his shoulders.
“What else do you think he could’ve done? If he tried being nice, then countless shameless people would try to take advantage of that. And taking into consideration how many there were…”
Nicole clenched her fists tightly.
“I… I guess.”
Sydney lightly brushed Nicole’s hair, but did not say anything. Tori obliviously blinked, not really understanding the dreary atmosphere, and decided it would probably be better to be silent.
Kairos looked towards Sam and spoke as though none of this had ever happened.
“Could you check what recently happened here? Maybe we can get a lead on where to go afterwards.”
Sam had a long look at his son before nodding.
“Alright.”
He got down on one knee and placed his palm on a relatively clean spot on the ground. He closed his eyes and remained very still for roughly five minutes.
Then, he opened his eyes.
“…I saw the walls being constructed.”
Kairos nodded.
“What else did you see?”
Sam closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He spoke gently.
“It passed by in a flash, but I could see a rather large group of survivors coming from the left.”
Kairos put a finger on his chin.
“Since the survivors came from the left, I propose going to the right.”
Tori raised an eyebrow.
“Eh? Why?”
Chase shrugged his shoulders.
“If the survivors came from the left, then there’s probably nothing useful in that direction. There were no threats, and anything relatively valuable they had gotten their hands on is probably gone.”
Tori slowly nodded.
“Ah, makes sense.”
Sam sighed.
“Then right it is, I suppose.”
The group proceeded to traverse towards the right, walking over all the dead corpses. The street was as silent as it was before. It seemed like there was still a strong sense of dread having over the place.
However, in just an hour or so of walking, they were able to see active monsters.
It was still the city streets, but there were a multitude of monsters feasting on various corpses they had found.
Chase clicked his tongue.
“Finally, I thought none of these damn things would show up.”
He pulled the bow off of his back and drew a mana arrow.
Most of the monsters noticed their presence, and raised their heads to roar. Some of them took a step forward as though proving their aggression, but soon took another step back.
Chase let an arrow loose, smashing through a few skulls and diverting the trajectory of his arrow to get a few more.
“Damn. Thought I would get a few more.”
Sydney’s breathing had become a little heavy as she held on the bone with both hands.
Kairos raised his hand.
“Wait, wait.”
Most of the group turned to look at him strangely.
Kairos cleared his throat.
“I don’t plan on killing any of these, but I want to test something before we get rid of them all.”
Sam raised an eyebrow.
“And what is that?”
Kairos walked forth, until he was just a meter away from the monsters.
“Just… something.”
The monsters roared at him aggressively, lunging forth occasionally, but always pulling back right after. Nicole called out with concern.
“Be careful!”
Kairos waved his hand dismissively.
“I’ll be alright.”
He ended up walking a bit closer, but the monsters still didn’t attack him, seemingly unwilling to step any closer.
Kairos waited for one of them to lunge forth with their claws, then he grabbed onto its claws, pulling on it with all of his strength. The monster didn’t seem to expect that as it was thrown onto the pavement.
It immediately let out rather high-pitched roars and scrambled up to its feet, completely ignoring Kairos. The monster rushed back towards the other side.
Kairos decided to be a little willful and stuck out his leg, causing the monster to trip.
It didn’t even look at him before scrambling away on all fours. Only when it had reached the other side, did it turn around to roar at Kairos resentfully.
Chase couldn’t help but laugh.
“They are so damn afraid…”
Kairos backed off while thinking to himself.
“It really seems like there is something scaring them away, with a clear boundary too.”
Sam looked over his shoulder and muttered.
“…Ananta.”
Kairos let out a soft sigh.
“Anyways, you guys can continue.”
Chase was in the process of drawing back another mana arrow, but decided to walk up to the monsters and take advantage of this opportunity.
Other than him, both Sydney and Tori walked up too.
Nicole simply stood in place, not going up. However, Kairos didn’t say anything as he would’ve preferred more points going towards Chase and Sydney.
That was because Chase naturally had a hard time gathering points, and would probably need some for his evolution while Sydney’s points could basically be converted into health.
As for Tori, he just shrugged it off.
But there was something he couldn’t shrug off.
A strange, yet familiar brushing sound.