Tier 3+ - Accidental Champion (Book 8) - Chapter 15 - I Hope Your Journey to the Afterlife Is a Smooth One

Danil Thald gazed down at the spectacle before him.

The strange patterns of runes shimmered in the air, each one of them glowing when this Xavier Collins, or when of his drones, finished working on them.

Danil had never seen anything like this before. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat, the movement so imperceptible he was sure the man below wouldn’t notice he was unaffected by his time dilation field.

Danil had remained watching not because he’d cared about what happened to the Ventorin sector, or because the fights had been interesting, but because this strange Denizen had come from nowhere. Danil always kept abreast of the different up-and-coming Denizens on this side of the Greater Universe. He especially turned his gaze toward the frontier—where the System was still integrating planets. Though newly integrated Denizens were usually conquered quite swiftly, the survivors tended to come up with interesting innovations. Though it was difficult for many to admit, there was a benefit from living without the System in your formative years. A benefit from seeing things from an outside perspective—one difficult, if not impossible, to replicate.

But he had never heard of Xavier Collins until now. Danil checked at least once a decade for new developments, using all the best Information Traders he could, which was frequently enough to see if anyone was becoming powerful.

Such a thing tended to take hundreds of years, after all.

In fact, his wife often told him he checked too often. Once a century would likely be enough.

And yet, he’d never heard of this Xavier Collins. Never heard of a dragonkin on this side of the Greater Universe at all. There was something very strange about the man.

Where have you been hiding?

That was the only reason he’d remained in his seat when so many other sector rulers had disappeared. Sheer curiosity. It was nice to hear The Collector was dead, too. Though Danil didn’t pay much attention to the specific politics of these sectors, he’d heard terrible things about that man. Not to mention the fact that The Collector had snagged more than a few up-and-coming Denizens that Danil had had his eyes on—that or snuffed them out before they could truly get their start.

On more than one occasion, Danil had considered having The Collector killed. But he’d kept putting it off. There were always more important things to get done…

At least I don’t have to worry about that anymore.

When Xavier had started manipulating time, that had truly gotten Danil interested. There weren’t a great many time mages out there who were also good fighters. The path of the time mage was a powerful one, but it didn’t lend itself well to one-on-one fights.

Danil knew that better than most.

Maybe he didn’t kill The Collector on his own. Maybe he fought within a large group who defeated him, and he’s only their leader. He may not have been more powerful than The Collector at all…

The drones Xavier summoned surprised Danil, but more than that the expert use of runes was what shocked him the most. He’d seen a lot of things in his many years. He’d even dabbled with runes in his youth.

But he’d never seen this.

He was eager to watch how this would play out. Though he felt bad for Xavier. All this planning. All this time. He clearly thought he could actually defeat his opponent. Though Danil hadn’t been able to scan the man, he was sure there was no way he could defeat Rewke Fouran. He may rule over a lesser sector, but he was the strongest B Grade in the surrounding fifty sectors.

Defeating The Collector was one thing. Defeating Rewke Fouran? That wasn’t going to happen.

I wish I’d heard of you before this fight, Xavier Collins. I hope your journey to the afterlife is a smooth one.

Danil had the urge to lean back. Crack his neck. He’d been sitting in the same spot for a long time, barely moving a muscle. Though he didn’t wish to see Xavier die, there was a part of him looking forward to when this would all be over.

And he was also looking forward to seeing what these strange runes did.

Time manipulation and rune craft… what an odd combination. But you’ll have to let him out of that Time Prison if you want to do any actual damage to your enemy.

That was the moment Danil was anticipating. If anything, at least this might be an interesting fight to watch.

Xavier Collins walked past all the strangely glowing patterns of intricate runes until he was at the edge of his time dilation field. He tilted his head, peering over at the man across from him—Sovereign Rewke Fouran. Danil wondered what this young Denizen was thinking.

Stand back, you fool. Put your drones in front when you let out that mage.

Xavier raised his stylus. It shifted, turning into a long sword. A melee weapon. An odd thing for a mage, but not too rare.

Come on then. Let’s get on with this, lad.

Danil had been holding his breath for as long as Xavier’s time dilation field had been active—so several days had passed without him letting it out.

The young dragonkin did something Danil wasn’t expecting. He glanced straight up at Danil, pointedly looking straight at him, then he gave the sector ruler a small grin and a wink.

Danil’s eyes widened and he let out a long breath.

He knows…

Danil couldn’t help but let out a chuckle. He sunk back into his chair with a shake of the head. “How long have you known?” Danil’s voice boomed.

Xavier Collins raised his chin. “Long enough. I’d thought to hide that I knew until the end, but… Well, I could see how uncomfortable you were getting. Figured I might as well let the charade slip.”

Danil shook his head again. “You’ve got a good eye then, lad.” He pursed his lips. “You know, I try not to give unsolicited advice, especially in the middle of a fight, but lad… I think you should have taken this man’s offer of surrender when he gave it to you.”

The young dragonkin blinked. “You really think he was genuine about that?”

“Sovereign Fouran is known to be many things. One of those things is a man of his word.”

Xavier chuckled. “I’ve only spoken to the man once before today, and I already know that isn’t true.” He inclined his head. “I don’t know who you are, but you don’t need to worry about me. I hope you enjoy the show.”

Danil sighed. Ah. An arrogant one. Well, perhaps the loss won’t be all that bad after all. Danil cracked his neck, took a few deep breaths just because he finally could, and properly relaxed into his chair, feeling all his stiff muscles ease, waiting for this man’s end and contemplating what he might have the chefs whip up for dinner when he returned.

Xavier Collins turned his full attention back to the true B Grade in front of him. His gaze was intense. Frighteningly so. Danil could almost believe he would win, just from seeing that look in his eyes.

Almost.

As Danil relaxed into his seat, that was the moment the fight truly began. Xavier Collins released his enemy from the Time Prison spell. The sovereign didn’t move, of course. He was still trapped outside of the young dragonkin’s time dilation field, but Danil could sense a shift from him. A shift in his energies. A subtle one he wasn’t sure the young denizen that was his opponent would be able to notice.

This all happened very quickly. In a fraction of a fraction of a second—from Danil’s perspective. His gaze turned from the released sovereign to the strange runes that had been drawn straight into the air. They’d started glowing far more intensely than before.

Whatever they were, they had finally been activated.

Danil leant forward in wonder as energies flowed from the runes. Powerful energies. More power than he’d expected the young dragonkin to be able to wield.

What is the time mage up to?

Danil was one of very few Denizens he knew of who was able to read the energies in the air that spells produced. It was an old and forgotten art, or so his late master often told him, one that wasn’t much used these days. But it was of great benefit to the time mage, for they could stop and study energies from within their time dilation fields quite easily.

It had been a hobby of his for many years, and he had the ability to identify a great many spell this way.

Which was why he leant even farther forward in his seat. The energies that came from those runes weren’t time magic, nor were they the normal rune magic he’d seen in the past…

They were something else. Something he’d never known any time mage or rune crafter to be able to wield.

Spirit magic… more, reaper magic. Who is this man?

The magic, something he wasn’t terribly familiar with, shot straight for Sovereign Fouran. Outside the time dilation field, he wasn’t affected by it—the spells didn’t reach him. Couldn’t reach him. Not yet. But the energies of two hundred spells gathered at the very edge of the time dilation field. Waiting and ready.

Some of the patterns the energies weaved in the air were hauntingly familiar to him. Though he was far less versed in the energies of the Spirit attribute and the many spells connected to it, he’d fought his fair share of Denizens in the Reaper line of classes, not to mention those Denizens who could wield the art of Otherworldly summoning.

He’d studied their spells. And these energies, from runes, looked an awful lot like spells. It baffled him.

What the hell am I watching right now?

There were at least three distinct patterns he was able to sense. Most of them were one pattern, however. He looked at the energies and compared them inside his mind to every memory of different energies he’d felt before.

It did not take long for him to find a match.

Soul Shatter…

Danil blinked in silence, his mouth having fallen open, and stared at the spectacle before him. This man, this young denizen, had… created spells from runes? Such a thing wasn’t—shouldn’t be—possible!

Though he had been staring at these strange patterns of runes for many hours now as Xavier had drawn them, he finally looked at them anew.

Each one of these is a spell…

“What the hell have you managed to do, lad?” Danil shouted out from his seat.

Xavier didn’t so much as glance up at Danil.

Danil tried to stand from his seat, but he couldn’t. An invisible power stopped him. There was nothing he could do to interfere with this fight.

Xavier Collins… Whoever this Denizen truly was, wherever the hell he’d come from, he was a damned genius.

Sovereign Rewke Fouran’s whole body twitched.

And that genius was about to die.

There was a part of Danil that wanted to shut his eyes. He hated to see potential snuffed out so young. This boy mustn’t be more than a few centuries old. Maybe a thousand. Any older than that and surely he wouldn’t have been able to hide for as long as he had.

The sovereign twitched a second time. Then the exact thing Danil had been expecting to happen when that Time Prison was lifted happened—though it happened much earlier than he’d thought it would.

The time dilation field Xavier had summoned around him and his drones shattered.

Several things happened all at once as Danil watched in horror at what was about to unfold.

The first thing was that Sovereign Rewke Fouran disappeared from view. He teleported to the other side of the mountain’s peak in a flash of flames, leaving nothing behind but a small pile of ashes. Fire teleportation spells always left a strange scent in the air—one that smelled an awful lot like a crematorium.

Not that Danil often spent time in a crematorium. Still, that smell was very distinct and left a strong memory. Danil crinkled his nose even though he couldn’t smell it from where he sat.

The second thing to happen was that the build-up of energies at the end of the sovereign’s staff exploded. The sovereign had teleported away incredibly fast. Fast enough that he managed to avoid being hit by the explosion entirely. That time dilation field the young dragonkin had conjured had been powerful. But all spells had weaknesses, and from what Danil had heard, the sovereign was a master at finding his enemies’ weaknesses. And he wouldn’t have come into the fight without a way to counter that time dilation field.

Xavier’s going to get hit by the explosion…

Danil, his own time dilation field unharmed, was able to watch the entire fight play out in slow motion. He watched it all happen, from each fraction of a second to the next, but wasn’t able to do a damned thing to intervene.

His mind started to wander back to what he’d be having for dinner. He didn’t need to eat, of course. But the foods his chefs could conjure up—

Danil’s eyes widened. He’d thought for sure that the explosion would take Xavier Collins out. That this fight would end in its infancy, before any of the young dragonkin’s plans could come to pass.

But what happened next shocked him more than anything he’d seen in the fight so far.

The time mage that could create intricate runes that somehow made the use of spirit spells possible cast another spell that a time mage shouldn’t be in possession of—a portal spell.

The lad created several portals at once. The explosion coming toward him was diverted before it could reach him, causing him no harm whatsoever as it was completely pacified.

And every one of those attacks that came from the rune patterns? They didn’t miss their target after all. They were redirected through another portal.

The time dilation field failing, though it must have surprised the young dragonkin, didn’t seem to faze him at all.

Every single one of those two hundred attacks slammed straight into Sovereign Rewke Fouran. The true B Grade sector ruler’s eyes became as wide as saucers as the attacks came for him.

From examining the energies, Danil did a little quick math, trying to ascertain just how much damage something like that was likely to do. These kinds of spells, as far as he could tell, would cut to the very core of the sovereign and past every one of his physical, mental, and magical defences, causing immense damage.

Soul damage.

Soul damage was something very few Denizens had a strong defence against. And with the number of those strange rune patterns Xavier had drawn…

Did I read this fight wrong? Is Rewke Fouran’s soul about to be ripped about?

A bit of excitement bubbled up inside Danil. Not because he had anything against the sovereign of the Orin Sector. Honestly, he didn’t care about the Orin sector at all. But because this was very unexpected. A new, up-and-coming Denizen defeating a true B Grade like Rewke?

That was unprecedented.

Seeing Xavier’s quick reactions to his time dilation field being broken made Danil wonder, for the first time, if the lad actually had a chance of winning this.

Then something rather shocking happened. Danil would have leapt from his seat if the System hadn’t chained him to it. As he realised how it had happened, Danil’s eyes widened.

“Gods. What in the world did you do to yourself, Rewke?” he said under his breath.

The energies ripped straight through the sovereign and caused him… no damage whatsoever. And Danil knew exactly why.

The sovereign stood, staring at his opponent, entirely unscathed with a grin on his face.