Chapter 525: ‘Enemy of Aramis’
The Einherjar was supposed to be a perfect Copy of Evan, and due to his Unique Disposition, ’Copies’ related to him could be even more convincing than the originals.
But Arthur had ignored the Einherjar and had spoken directly to the real him from the start.
"I have a Pseudo-Authority in the law of Time, and it’s capable of discerning how much ’Time’ an existence has experienced. I’ve told you this before, haven’t I?"
Indeed. Arthur had mentioned something like this on the day Evan first arrived on Aramis.
"Due to my left eye being constantly infused with Time Law energy, I can ’see’ how much time one has experienced without having to activate my Pseudo-Authority."
"Wow. You’re the first one besides Laurene who’s been able to tell my copies apart."
"Who the hell is Laurene?"
Arthur questioned Evan about this person he mentioned, but Evan just shrugged as he responded.
"Friend of mine from the future. She’s really good at ’Seeing through’ things."
While Evan and Arthur were having this casual conversation, Rael struggled to his feet, with heavy breaths as he struggled to remain conscious.
He wanted to make a run for it, but a single glance in Arthur’s direction was all he needed to know that Arthur had eyes on him.
The godslayer wasn’t physically looking at him, but his energy was.
’If I want to run, I need a distraction...’
Raising his hands, Rael put his fingers together and infused his magic power into the ground. The earth trembled and multiple swords erupted from below, forming a circle around Arthur and Evan.
"Bounded Fie-!"
The complete sound never left Rael’s throat.
*SWISH!
"You didn’t think I’d let you use that, did you?"
Arthur, now standing right beside Rael, spoke as he sheathed Celestia. Simultaneously, a thin silver line of light appeared on Rael’s neck and his head silently rolled off.
"Oof...you killed him anime style."
Evan chuckled as he watched the dragonslayer’s corpse fall to the ground, while Arthur turned around and responded.
"I always wanted to try that thing out once."
Just as Arthur said that, something crashed down a few metres beside him with meteoric force and the boy internally questioned how many things had crashed down from above.
However, when he turned around to see what it was, his expression behind his mask changed. Arthur was joking with Rael earlier since he could easily end them, however, this new entrant was not someone he could take that lightly.
"Oy! Why is this guy stronger than he was before?!"
Evan questioned with a loud voice as he locked gazes with the figure who descended, the same Hero who had tried to use mind control on him earlier.
This Hero was the youngest of the Aramisian Heroes and was a Level 710 Inferior Legendary—or at least, that’s what he was 30 minutes ago.
Right now, the young man before them exuded the same kind of power that Evan had sensed from Arthur when he appraised him some days ago...the power of a Peak Sovereign.
For Arthur, he cared not for the Hero’s sudden power surge, but the energy the Hero exuded.
’Cosmic Energy!’
Arthur was sure that the Hero did NOT possess any form of Cosmic Superiority earlier. He glanced down at the young man’s hands and saw he was holding the heads of two mid-rank Demons, Demons Arthur recognized to be Level 800 Brigadier Generals under Aravae.
Evan also noticed his and his brows furrowed.
"Even if he ’deals increased damage to Invaders’ and ’takes less damage from Invaders’ due to his Hero abilities, it should not have been enough for him to kill two Sovereigns..."
Unlike Arthur, Evan could not sense the cosmic energy so he did not know the source of the Hero’s sudden power surge, but Arthur could see it as clear as day.
The Hero who had been silent, tossed the two severed demon heads onto the floor, before looking straight at Arthur and asking.
"Just what are you?"
This was a question Arthur did not expect and did not plan to answer.
"I should be the one asking questions here. Why do you have access to Cosmic Energy?"
Hearing Arthur’s words, Evan’s eyes widened in surprise.
"You mean the invisible thing you always use?"
"Yes, that."
Arthur could see Cosmic energy flowing through the Hero’s body and therein laid the first problem. Cosmic energy should not be able to freely flow through the body of anyone who isn’t a Cosmic Being.
Even Arthur could only draw in ambient cosmic energy into his body for a few seconds before his existence rejected the higher power so as not to overload.
"You’re absorbing cosmic energy from the ground..."
When Arthur muttered this, an idea flashed in Evan’s mind and he quickly pulled up the interface of his personal system.
’I think I can find out what this is...’
While Evan was searching through his personal system Archives for information on this strange surge in power the Aramisian before them was experiencing, the Hero in question just silently stared at Arthur without moving an inch.
He had clear hostility towards Arthur given the godslayer was the ’Silver Summoner’ who wreaked havoc on Plomux’s Coastal bases, and he had the desire to attack him.
But he didn’t, because just like Rael earlier, he couldn’t find an opening.
A voice in his head was telling him that any move he made would result in an instant counter from Arthur and considering Arthur possessed destruction energy, that would be VERY bad.
Back to Evan who was looking at a diaphanous board with catalogues of data rapidly scrolling upwards. Finally, after half a minute of silence, he spoke up.
"Arthur...just what did you do?"
"Context. I’ve done a lot of things."
Evan dismissed his Archive and raised his gaze to look at the Hero before asking.
"Your sudden surge in power...it’s the Planet that’s giving you that power, isn’t it?"
"The Planet?"
When Arthur asked this, Evan nodded in affirmation and read out the information he had just discovered in his Archive, something he unlocked after reaching Level 700 last week.
"Basically, you’ve been marked as a ’World Enemy’ by the Planet Aramis and it is temporarily lending one of its Defence Mechanisms—its Hero—power to defeat you."
Arthur opened his status right after Evan spoke, and just like the Rogue Hero had said, he was indeed a ’World Enemy’.
The ’Enemy of Aramis’ title he now had was more than enough proof of this.
His action of using his Extreme Nothingness to damage the planet’s essence earlier had caused its consciousness to want to get rid of him at all costs.
At this moment, it considered Arthur to be the greatest Alien threat to it.
High-Rank Demons like Alvey and McEnda were threats, but they were more of threats to the people on Aramis and not the Planet itself as they did not possess the capability to deal True Damage to it.
But Arthur could due to his power of Null, which allowed him to turn things into Nothing.
Imagine the Planet Aramis as a supercomputer. The physical planet is the hardware, and its Consciousness is the operating system (OS) that controls it.
Arthur’s power was like a super tool that could completely erase the entire operating system, leaving no trace behind.
While Arthur always had this power, he previously lacked the energy to bypass the planet’s defences.
But now that he was pretty much a Semi-Transcendent, with energy levels approaching that of an entire continent, he had reached the minimum threshold to touch and potentially erase the Planet’s Consciousness.
Of course, it was all just potential until he became a Deity, but Arthur had come to this planet as a Superior Epic and in 7 months, he had climbed up to the Sovereign Level.
What if Arthur was going to remain here long enough to become a Deity? What if he suddenly decided to target the planet when he became one?
Possibilities like that were very real, and Aramis did not want such possibilities to become realities, hence, the current situation.
Arthur didn’t know all this as he still didn’t know he had injured the Planet’s Consciousness, but he now understood the source of the Hero’s extra power.
"Hey, Evan. Have you ever killed another Hero before?"
"Huh? No."
To Evan, now was NOT the time to ask such questions. Arthur, on the other hand, only smiled behind his mask and continued.
"I see...Would you like to try it?
I’m curious to see what’d happen if a Hero kills another one. ’Heroes’ are not a concept back in my Home World, you see...I have a desire to run a little experiment with this system."
Arthur’s home planet, Aeturn, was an Apex World with Deity Realms living on it. Even if the Hell Universe had a System like Valmone, there would be no need for Heroes as the planet would never feel any threat that’d require their presence in the first place.
"The Planet itself wants to get rid of me? Well, it’ll have to try harder than this."
He spoke while gesturing to the Hero and as if responding to his words, more cosmic energy surged into the young man’s body.
However, all Arthur did was laugh and snap his fingers, activating his Pseudo-Authority.
|¬Stop. ¬|
And Time obeyed.
The flow of time around the Aramisian Hero was halted, but a second later, a crack ran through the monochrome scene and the Hero was broken out.
His eyes widened in shock and he jumped back a few metres, trying to take distance from Arthur.
Meanwhile, Arthur was looking at him with wide eyes.
"Oh my, I never thought this was possible."
To any observer, it appeared as if the Hero had broken out of Arthur’s time stop with his own power, but any Time Authority wielder would be able to tell this was not the case.
It was the Planet that broke the Hero out.
