"Wait!" Caelum scread. "You would kill billions for our cri!? They're innocents!"
Atticus didn't look away. "I will slaughter the entire world for my people."
The leaders paled.
"Wait! Wait! Don't do this!" Neresa scread. "They did nothing wrong! I'm the one who wants revenge on you! I alone went after your mother!"
"Then face the consequences. Their blood is on your hands."
"No!"
The teor crashed down, and the Surnix world was consud in an endless sea of fire.
Neresa stared at the sheer destruction with a trembling eyes.
"Y-you actually did it." Rehn gripped his hair in disbelief. Even the other leaders were equally horrified.
"You're evil," Neresa murmured, pointing a shaking finger at Atticus.
"They were innocents! Innocents, and you killed them! You're evil! You shouldn't exist! You should be purged from the face of this—"
Atticus calmly blinked, and sound vanished from her mouth.
"So," he turned to the remaining leaders, "what about you?"
Multiple screens appeared before them, each showing a teor descending toward their respective worlds.
"What will you choose?"
As they stared at him, they gulped. There was no bluff there. He would destroy their worlds if they refused.
"I-I'll talk!"
"Rehn!" Mae snapped, glaring at the Velmiralth leader.
"What?! He's going to destroy our world! Do you really want that!?"
"I—"
The Somnera leader's words were cut off as Atticus waved his hand.
"Speak."
Rehn gulped, then nodded. Atticus' eyes bored into him.
"We call them the Three…"
Seconds later, Atticus stopped the teors from crashing into each world. Then he stripped the four leaders of their paragon powers. Though he hadn't tried it before, this had been the perfect opportunity.
A paragon beca one with theur power. All he did was order the world to reverse the process. They beca grandmasters, in both body and mind.
Then he teleported them beneath the Vein Root Tree, where the temperature was boiling and gravity intense.
They squird across the ground, screaming in pain and clutching their heads.
Next, he visited the hill, where he embraced Anastasia tightly.
"I'm sorry about this, mom."
"It's alright, baby. It's not your fault." Anastasia gripped her son like she never wanted to let go.
"I just inford Dad and Grandpa. They'll be here soon."
Atticus noticed the odd look in her eyes. He knew why but said nothing.
Even Lyanna, Sirius, and Nathan could only silently stare at him. They had seen the teor crash from the hill. They knew what had happened, and it had made them gulp.
Ozeroth and Whisker appeared by him next. Though the forr had seen everything that occurred and was currently fuming, the latter was still clueless.
Atticus had Ozeroth and the others explain to him while he vanished into the skies to think.
Rehn explained everything they knew to him, and Atticus had even gone the extra mile to enforce his will on him and read his mind.
Though he could have easily done this earlier, doing so without his permission would've driven him mad. It was rcy, considering the torture he had in mind for them.
'The three.'
This was the title they had given to the people responsible. According to his words and mories, the three single handedly planned everything that occurred today. They got rid of their mana contract and gave them information pertaining to their operations.
They knew of his and the Eldorians' absence, and knew his will had been retracted from the world.
A dangerous enemy.
'Who?'
Atticus scanned the world. The first thing he did was hunt.
He vanished and appeared all over the world, visiting everyone he knew should be under mana contract but were sohow free of it.
Shockingly, there was a small army of them, from paragons to people as weak as interdiates. After torturing each of them and extracting information, Atticus killed them all.
Afterwards, he appeared in the skies once more, pondering.
'No one has seen them before.'
He'd gone through each of their mories but couldn't make out a face. Only that there were three.
'No body structure to compare, or even voice. Just a black mass.'
His eyes sharpened. He was dealing with a very careful enemy.
'It's soone close.'
Atticus was sure of this. They knew information only people who'd been to the hill knew, about his seclusion, his movents.
He could feel the intent of every single person in the world, hear their whispers, yet he couldn't identify the one responsible.
'Three…'
Atticus narrowed his eyes. He sohow felt that information was very relevant. They could hide their appearance and mask their voice, but they couldn't hide their numbers.
'The three stars.'
Lyanna. Sirius. Nathan. His first suspects. They were like family to him, but Atticus wasn't leaving any stones unturned.
'There's no motive.'
Atticus couldn't think of any reason why they would do this. The Ravenstein were their family, and they had been with him since the beginning. Plus, they had been fighting the leaders before he arrived.
'It could be a trick to make them appear innocent…' Atticus shook his head.
'It's unlikely.' He searched his mory once more.
'The triplets of ruin.'
They were three elders of the Ravenstein family. Atticus had t them a while back when the Stellaris attacked sector three.
'Unlikely.'
He shook his head once more and closed his eyes.
'What am I missing?'
What if it wasn't so joint force? What if the three weren't classified together by the world but were sohow related…
Atticus' eyes snapped open.
'Three apex.'
They had the motives. They had the information.
'Likely.'
Atticus vanished from the skies and appeared in the middle of a training room where a spar was ongoing.
Lirae and Maera clashed with blurring speed, unleashing waves that shook the room.
They stopped the mont Atticus arrived, with Lirae's eyes lighting up.
"Atticus! Are you finally going to fulfil your promise?"
"Kneel."
A weight slamd onto them, forcing them to their knees. Atticus waved a hand, and the startled Ae'ark appeared kneeling beside them.
"W-what's going on!"
As Atticus approached them with heavy steps, the apexes couldn't help but fix their horrified eyes on him.
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