Third chapter of the week...

 

...

 

[Sigh, what an anticlimactic end.] An enigmatic voice echoed in the laboratory. [I never expected these kids to defeat the girl. What a loss.]

The man did not reply. He just stared at the screen showing the result of the battle against Ley.

[Well, what are your plans now? This setback will delay our plan for a couple of months.]

“… I will think on something.” The man replied after a couple of seconds.

He then continued observing the screen, somehow trying to understand how his plan ended up this catastrophically.

He had invested several months of preparation and an enormous amount of resources to make this plan successful. It was supposed to be his first step toward greatness.

But the result was much worse than his worst expectations.

He only managed to spread the mental seed to a dozen of students, and even these seeds were sacrificed to strengthen Ley.

But in the end, Ley was defeated without managing to infect anyone.

[At least, the investors will be satisfied. The performance of the drug should be enough to entice them to continue investing.]

“That is the saving grace. Hey demon, I have a question.”

[Hmm?]

“Is the any chance of one of them being a host?”

[... It’s unlikely.]

“Why?”

[The boy of the sword should be a ‘Hero’, the girl of the threads must be related to some powerhouse, and the spear guy is too weak. Even the most untalented person should be at the peak of tier four after owning a fragment of me for this long.]

“Is it so?” The man sighed in disappointment.

When he saw their outstanding performance, he wondered if one of them had a ‘piece’ too, but it seemed that he was thinking too much.

[I could be mistaken though. You can keep an eye on them and investigate if you want. Be careful with the hero guy, though, nothing good will come from getting entangled with him.]

“The pawns on Sanctuary’s First will take care of it. I’ll also try to find a way to get the girl. She will be a good research material.”

Unbeknown to them, the man's guess was not off the mark.

There was a piece in Sanctuary’s First.

And now that someone had touched his reverse scale, he was burning with rage.

The curtains to the battle between the owners of the pieces were about to open.

And only one of them was destined to survive it.

 

…

 

Meanwhile, the group of celers was replaying the battles in the dungeon and observing every detail carefully.

“What do you think?” Their leader, Aulus 25, asked.

“According to my observations, our target should be at the level of an elite from the confederation. That is outrageous considering she comes from a backward planet.” Replied Duin. “Moreover, she has not shown the entirety of her abilities. She could be much stronger than our estimations.”

“I guess there is a reason we were sent to observe her.” Aulus 25 nodded with a thoughtful expression.

At that moment, he noticed that one of his companions was lost in thought while observing the battle against Ley.

“K’erta, did you discover anything?”

“I did.” K’erta nodded. She waved her hand, pointing to the scene where Andrew unleashed the finishing blow together with Jane. “Leader, don’t you think something about this guy seems strange.”

Aulus 25 was startled. He furrowed his brows and observed Andrew carefully.

He then manipulated the device projecting the images and replayed the video, this time, making sure to not miss any of Andrew’s movements.

The rest of the group was also curious and observed the footage. Soon, they discovered something unusual.

During the entire battle, not a piece of debris flew in his direction, and the wind was always in his favor.

That, coupled with his strangely powerful abilities, and his sudden growth during the battle, brought a certain information to their minds.

“Hero.” K’erta muttered.

Aulus 25’s expression became stern.

“How sure are you of your guess?”

“70%. I can’t rule out it being a coincidence.”

“70% is high enough. I will report this to the confederation immediately. This is not something we can deal with.”

The celers looked at each other with solemn expressions.

The existence of ‘Heroes’ was not unknown to the Celer Confederation. The beloved child of the world, a weapon chosen to exterminate the world's enemies when it feels endangered.

Across the history of the confederation, they had recorded over a dozen of heroes. Every one of them was a monster blessed with luck and talent, able to fight thousands of the finest warriors by themselves.

Thus, the five of them knew how dangerous a hero could be.

Even though they were much stronger than Andrew now, if they tried to kill him, they could be the ones ending up dead.

That was how unreasonable the existence of a hero was.

Among them, though, someone was looking at Andrew with an almost unnoticeable smile.

“It looks like the world’s consciousness is finally about to mature.” She giggled. “Just in time.”

The gears of fate were moving.