From the people of Karragin, thousands of deserted soldiers and Demonic Beasts... He was the only one still standing.
And he could already tell that the vast majority of them would not get up again. Because their brains had...
Blown up!
Bits of brain, skull, blood, teeth and hair had splattered all over the jungle and the entire Karragin village. This was a scene straight out of a horror movie, and Ikaris was petrified with fright, unable to cope with the trauma.
Shaking like a leaf, he wandered around the village square, white as a sheet, walking by each headless corpse and wondering who it was. He was unfamiliar with most of the aborigines, but he froze grimly in front of a certain figure still holding his rusty bronze sword in his hand.
Krold.
The warrior had not been spared. Remembering the care the former Hadrakin soldier had given him since his arrival in this world, Ikaris experienced a pang of guilt. Not one of sadness, he guarded his heart too well for that, but yes, a sentiment of injustice.
Not for himself, but for Krold and the others. On Earth he was more gifted than most, and in this world too his Soul was much more powerful, giving him unfair advantages.
The boy had no doubt about it, it was not the shriek itself that had caused the death of all those people or he would have died too, but the devious energy contained within targeting their minds.
" Rest in peace Krold. I didn't know you well enough, but you were a good person." Ikaris stated with sincerity, while scavenging the corpse's pockets.
He respected the man, but now that he was dead his sword and money would be of no use to him where his soul was going. In addition to the bronze sword and his precious leather backpack filled with utensils, food and spare clothing, the boy was taken aback when he found a purse filled with bronze and silver coins.
It was a cruel reminder that before ending up in this godforsaken village, the barbarian had actually been a soldier in a civilized kingdom before becoming a deserter, and then a peasant of this backward tribe. Perhaps Krold had always intended to return home after laying low for a few years.
Ikaris then looked around for those who still had their heads on their shoulders and his face contorted as he realized there were only four of them. Malia, Ellie, Toby and Bree. Including him, that made five potential survivors.
Fearing the worst, he strode over to the blonde student and took her pulse.
'She's alive.' The teenager could hardly hold back his relief at discovering that he was not the only survivor.
However, she had lost a lot of blood. For the first time since he had this ability, Ikaris decided to scan her with his Appraisal Skill. The result confirmed his guess.
[Soul Strength: 5.06 points]
This was unexpected. It was way too much. Not compared to him, but to the other villagers. Krold for reference only had a Soul Strength of 1.02 after braving all kinds of danger and practicing magic all his life, doing his best despite his limited talent. It spoke volumes about how difficult it is to improve this stat.
Likewise, Ikaris had only gained one point after mutating into a Crawling-Thrall. Before that, he couldn't feel any difference.
Ascertaining that her life was not in danger, the teenager then went to Toby and used his Appraisal Spell again.
[Soul Strength: 4.89 points]
That was quite a number too. He had been unsure with Ellie because as a college student she could at least be labeled as smart and was used to stimulating her brain on a daily basis. She could also have been unusually gifted like him.
Now he knew that was not the case. The two of them had almost identical Soul Strengths. What the three of them had in common was that they were all Earthlings.
Had something different happened on Earth to make their Soul Strengths so different from those of the other natives, or had they been specifically chosen for this trait?
He couldn't answer that yet.
As he approached Bree, the only Healer with any experience as a Sorceress before coming to this world, he got another clue.
[Soul Strength: 2.16 points]
That was double the normal value, but it was actually rather low for an Otherworlder who had practiced magic for decades before arriving in this world.
It eliminated the assumption that all Otherworlders were gifted. Maybe there was something special about the Earthlings, but he would need a larger population sample to come to a definitive conclusion.
The young woman was on the verge of death, and it was unlikely that she would survive. Her eyes had burst, and a pool of blood far too large for her own good had spilled out beneath her head. She still had her head, but her brain was probably irreversibly damaged.
Not being a neurosurgeon, the boy sighed and lost interest in the sorceress.
'Maybe she would no longer want to live if she learned that her lover Jacob is dead. Maybe it's a blessing in disguise.' He mused unconvinced.
Ikaris then walked over to Malia and found that she was unexpectedly much more severely injured than Ellie and Toby, but less so than Bree. Her blood loss was somewhere in between.
The blood vessels in her eyes had almost all burst, her sclera turning blood red, but at least she still had her eyeballs. The blood loss was a concern, but survival was not beyond the realm of possibility.
Still, as the puddle of blood slowly receded, the boy realized he was worrying for nothing. Malia was not a normal human. The most direct proof was that he still couldn't use his Appraisal Skill on her.
"Mooo..."
Ikaris gasped as he heard the Alpha Bison moo weakly behind him. The heavy bovine was lying on its side in its own blood, but it was conscious. Its injuries were even more severe than Bree and Malia's, but it hadn't fainted.
"Let me never doubt your tenacity again." The teen chuckled as he patted the bison's head.
"Moooo! Moo..."
The vengeful beast snorted for a moment, then fell back to sleep. His heart skipping a beat, Ikaris hastily checked its pulse, but relaxed as he realized that the bison was really sleeping.
"Truly an Alpha Demonic Beast." He laughed wrily as he left his new animal buddy slumbering.
He ended his walk by returning to the cottage and found the shaman's cold corpse. The monster's second wail had been her undoing.
BADUM! BADUM!
The earth shook again and Ikaris finally felt despair as he saw the massive monstrosity draw a deep breath from afar.
"No, no, no! Please don't do that..." The boy repeated in panic.
If another cry like the last one hit the village, everyone would die this time except him. That included the handful of soldiers and Demonic Beasts still alive that he had spotted.
SWIIIISH!
PHHHWWWOO!
ROOOARRR!
At that moment, the blue sky covered itself with thunderstorm clouds and huge blinding purple lightning bolts smote the gigantic behemoth nearing the Great Wall. The lightning glare reflected off the clouds and the silhouette of a huge western dragon flashed within.
Simultaneously, Ikaris spotted two human figures flying overhead like shooting stars. One looked like a red light speck, the other like a silver one. The two specks of light collided hundreds of times in a matter of seconds, but they were ultimately traveling in the same direction.
" Hey, watch where you're fucking going, you mangy dog!" The red speck yelled scornfully as it got ahead of the white speck.
"Wuf! Give me back what you stole from me instead, Magnus!" The white speck swelled abruptly, morphing into a hideous gray wolf as wide as an ocean liner.
The creature stomped through the air and with one stride crossed several kilometers to the south, catching up with the red speck that had outrun it.
As they clashed over the village, a devastating shockwave blasted Karragin. The thatched cottage, the only building still standing, was instantly flattened. Aghast, Ikaris watched helplessly as the shockwave slammed into the wounded and Bree, who was already in terrible condition, died instantly.
Displaying his Demonic Beast instincts, the Alpha Bison woke up just in time and protected Ellie with his body, mistakenly assuming that she was the boy's sweetheart.
Toby took the full brunt of the impact, but with his muscular body, he survived at the cost of many broken bones. Malia was also hit hard, but like Ikaris, her bones cracked but did not break. Still, it must hurt like hell!
The teenager would have been happy to curse those two bright specks, call them names and give them a good thrashing, but in the end he collapsed helplessly. Leaning against the Elsisn Stele, the only undamaged object in the village, he stared at the Great Wall in the distance and saw dozens of other light dots converging from all directions towards the titanic monster standing before the Great Wall.
Even with his Crawling eyesight he could barely make out anything, but the recurring explosions, the earth quaking and the rabid wailing of the behemoth warned him that a battle of titanic proportions was raging there.
BOOOOOOOM!
Suddenly, a flash of light more blinding than any previous one burned into his retina. The brightness was on par with that of a nuclear explosion.
Ikaris had just enough time to witness the Great Wall explode into tiny pieces before he lost his sight.
