Tier 3+ - Accidental Champion (Book 6) - Chapter 57 - The Parameters Have Changed

The four suns above the Bright City and the cracked desert beyond illuminated a stunning sight. Dwarves and Phoexians were floating in the air, untethered from natural gravity. It wasn’t only these Denizens, either. Everything not bolted down gently made its way up. The pebbles and rocks along the desert floor. The chairs, boxes, and stone stacks around the battlements. A myriad of items from within the city, leaves and fruit and vegetables that had fallen from the plants among the gardens the dwarves kept within the city’s walls. Market stalls and their wares that had been left behind when the Phoexians had begun their siege.

In the midst of it all, a young dragonkin with large, black leathery wings lazily hovered, his aura projected outward, creating a wave of fear emanating from all it touched.

Though that fear was not as potent coming from two individuals.

The full-plate armoured leader of the dwarves now stood atop the battlements, her tall shield in one hand, her massive warhammer in the other, her chin raised, her gaze settled on the dragonkin.

And a short way from those battlements, the leader of the Phoenix Empire stared daggers into Xavier.

Xavier waited to see what would happen.

The dwarven leader was the first to speak. “If the System requires you to choose a side, why have you attacked us both?” The woman’s voice was surprisingly even. Though she felt fear, that fear wasn’t evident in her voice. If Xavier lacked the ability to sense fear in others, he wouldn’t know she was experiencing it at all.

The dwarf almost sounded as though she were bored.

Xavier gazed down at the full-plate armoured dwarf. His face blank. He didn’t really know what expression to wear in this situation, so it seemed the most appropriate. “I have not attacked either of you. If I had, you would all be dead.”

He was not trying to sound arrogant, though he knew that would be how it appeared. He was simply stating a fact.

“You dare threaten the Phoenix Empire?”

The leader of the Phoenix Empire had a voice Xavier wasn’t expecting. From the shrieks these creatures had produced, he’d thought he would sound shrill. Instead, he had a deep, resonating voice that would have sounded musical if it wasn’t so filled with rage. It was quite a contrast to that of the dwarf.

Xavier glanced at the Phoexian. “I have not come before you to deliver threats.” He took a silent breath, unsure of how this was going to go. “I have come to make peace.”

“Peace?” the dwarven leader said, and there was something different in her voice. Seeing her through his Farscope, he noticed a flicker of a smirk on her lips, though it had only been there a fraction of a second. Something he wasn’t sure anyone else would have been quick enough to catch. Her gaze turned to the Phoexian with the flaming robes and gnarled, ruby-topped staff. “Such a thing is impossible.”

“For once in a thousand years I am forced to agree with a dwarf. Such a thing is impossible. Choose a side, Champion. That is why you have been summoned.”

The dwarf inclined her head. “You court the System’s wrath if you do not choose.”

Xavier couldn’t help but smirk himself, then. Unlike the dwarven leader, his smirk lingered. “I’m not worried about the System’s wrath.”

His words sent a tremor through every Denizen there, dwarf and Phoexian alike.

“Blasphemy,” the dwarf whispered.

“Heresy,” the Phoexian intoned.

“Peace,” the dragonkin demanded, voice booming once more. “Or you will experience my wrath.” The words came unbidden, but he might not be able to swing this without posing the threat.

The Phoexian had said he hadn’t agreed with a dwarf in a thousand years. If that hadn’t been hyperbole, this war had been going for centuries.

Peace was not a simple thing after such a time. The animosity between these peoples would be ingrained in their very beings.

For a moment, he had second thoughts about what he was trying to do here. Force peace on two factions he didn’t truly care about. But once the idea had settled in his mind, he couldn’t help but try. It wasn’t just that there were innocents on the subterranean levels—he’d caused their deaths before, many times over now, even if he hadn’t remained to watch them die—it was that he couldn’t imagine any Champion before him ever trying to do such a thing.

The seeming rigidity of the tower floors had always irked him. It didn’t feel right that there was only one way to complete them. For the majority of floors, he hadn’t bothered to find other ways. He’d done things as straightforward as he could, using his ability to cause mass destruction on an epic scale to his benefit. Coupled with his ability to freeze time, he always achieved the highest record for the floors if a record was available.

But for some, he knew it was necessary to push himself, to find other ways—like with the hundredth floor, and the eightieth floor. And for others—like this one—well, sometimes he just couldn’t help himself.

Xavier couldn’t imagine anything like this had been done before, and because of that, there was a compulsion within him to try.

The System wanted conflict. Engineered it. It always had. That was how it forged Denizens into powerhouses.

But what if some of that conflict was actually holding people back? What if conflict wasn’t the only path to ultimate power—the power one needed to prevent the universe’s collapse, to defeat the ultimate threat at the end of time?

What if unity was what would get them there?

Xavier understood why the System made those who chose to become Champions fight each other to the death before giving them the privilege of entering the tower. It was to show them that the Greater Universe was an unforgiving place, and they needed to be unforgiving if they wished survive and protect their loved ones.

But what if there were other ways to get that point across?

If that Navy Seal, Julian Myers, who’d unknowingly sacrificed his life for Xavier when he’d forfeited the fight because he didn’t want to kill an unarmed civilian had survived, wouldn’t Earth have been stronger when the invasion forces had come calling? Wouldn’t they have been stronger if they’d had twice the number of Champions?

Or did that act push me into becoming what I am, into becoming someone worthy of the name Champion—wasn’t that something that drove me, in the beginning?

A thought flashed into his mind, then. It wasn’t conflict that had driven him. He hadn’t fought the man. Hadn’t gotten that far. It was the man’s sacrifice. Julian Myers hadn’t taken the path set out in front of him. He’d taken a different one.

Is that what made all the difference?

Xavier sighed inwardly, pushing his thoughts away, ordering them in his mind. He didn’t know how they would help him.

He focused on the two leaders before him.

“You would force us to live in peace?” It was the dwarven leader who’d spoken, and with the most emotion she’d displayed yet. Though it wasn’t fear or anger that laced her voice, it was bafflement. “I do not know who—or frankly what—you are, but you, Champion, are clearly a powerful being.” Her gaze drifted to the state of the area around them. The floating dwarves and Phoexians. The myriads of different items that had become untethered along with them. “Yet you preach peace? Was peace how you came into your power? Is peace how you settle your debts? Claim your revenge?” A smirk whispered across her face, there and gone in a flash. “Is it how you solve your problems?” A cocked eyebrow.

Xavier glanced at the carnage. Remembered his threat.

Peace or death.

The woman had a point. He was acting like a tyrant. Barging into a foreign conflict and dictating the terms because he had the bigger guns. But the System had made this conflict his own by placing him here after he’d stepped onto the tower floor.

Xavier allowed himself to clear his throat this time.

Perhaps it could be seen as a sign of weakness. He didn’t care anymore. He didn’t need to paint some thin veneer over himself and act like a powerful being when he already was one.

His shoulders relaxed. He sighed audibly and crossed his arms. His wings flapped lazily at his back, even though the pattern of runes still had an effect on him. The fire-robed Phoexian leader with the burning wings still glared daggers at him with his rage-filled eyes. The dwarven leader’s single eyebrow remained cocked, waiting for his response.

“You’re right. I didn’t get where I am by playing nice. But in the past, I have spared a great many people because I didn’t think they deserved to die. Though that isn’t always the case.” The truth seemed the best option here, so he would present it to them, and see what they did. He locked eyes with the full-plate armoured dwarf. “You summoned a Champion; you know the ramifications of that choice. This is the fifteenth time I’ve been on this floor. I’ve been using your people to train a spell. In the process of that, I killed many, many dwarven defenders. Thirteen times, I tipped the balance toward the Phoexians before leaving the floor.”

As he spoke, the dwarven leader’s face became incredibly blank. Phoexian leader’s expression, however, changed from one of hatred, to one of glee. Though perhaps glee wasn’t quite the right word. It was more sinister than that—schadenfreude.

Xavier rotated in the air, using his active Untethered spell. “I didn’t do it for your benefit. The first time I came here I burned your flights alive, with their own spell. And…” A smile drifted onto his face. “I enjoyed it.”

There was a dissonance at work here, Xavier knew. He’d enjoyed all the combat on this floor. Enjoyed experiencing every single spell he’d stolen from these Denizens—and that enjoyment had only come when he’d tested those spells out. And yet here he was, trying to make them not fight.

I am the grandest hypocrite of all time, asking these people to agree to peace.

“Why are you telling us this?” the Phoexian spat, anger returned.

“So you understand I’m willing to follow through with all of your deaths.” Xaiver looked at each of the leaders. Sacrifice. He could kill them. Perhaps that would convince their people to do what he asked…

This is an interesting approach, Xavier.

He could feel the doubt in the soul bound weapon’s voice.

“Peace,” Xavier said. “Or I will start with the two of you.”

The dwarven leader’s expression shifted, then. A look of defiance slipping onto her usually blank face. The Phoexian had a similar expression, though his emotions were always obvious—bleeding out of him without control.

Fire is often hard to control.

The two leaders, as though they’d decided beforehand, locked eyes with one another. The dwarf cocked an eyebrow. The Phoexian gave a slight nod.

A System notification appeared.

Error.

The parameters of this floor have changed.

You have angered the leaders of the Phoenix Empire and the Bright City of Aethisa. Each have denounced you as their Champion, leaving you without the option to choose between the two factions.

This has never occurred before.

The goal of the hundred-and-twenty-first floor of the Tower of Champions has now changed.

To clear this floor, you must stop the hostilities between the Phoenix Empire and the Bright City of Aethisa. You can no longer stop the hostilities by eradicating only one side.

The exit to the Staging Room has been locked until this goal has been completed.

There can be no hostilities if everyone is dead.

Xavier blinked.

Several things happened at once.

Down on the battlements, one of the dwarven engineers who’d managed to remain, knuckles white as he gripped the massive ballistae bolted to the stone, fired a bolt. The bolt wasn’t aimed at Xavier. He paid it no mind.

When he realised where the bolt was aimed, his mistake became clear.

The bolt was electrified, and no doubt had all manner of other enchantments and runes he hadn’t examined.

That bolt sliced through the pattern of runes that glowed brightly at the centre of the battlements not far from the engineer. Xavier hadn’t given a second thought to the fact that the massive pattern might be seen by these people. Why would that matter? These people were weak—there was nothing they could do.

The bolt had an effect Xavier hadn’t experienced before. As it tore through the pattern, it electrified the runes. This cancelled them out, severing the whisper-thin strand of energy connecting him to it.

The runes flickered out of existence.

The dwarves and all the items that had been floating in the air around them fell.

The Phoexian flights caught themselves with their wings after only dropping a few feet when the effect of Untethered ceased.

Then both sides proceeded to attack Xavier.