Arthur had just finished dealing with his dragonslayer opponent and was wiping the blood off his hands when something streaked down from the sky and crashed into the ground beside his half-dead opponent, forming a neighbouring crater beside the dragonslayer.
Turning his gaze to his right, he saw a green flame immolated Evan walking over while dragging something on the ground.
"Evan…his leg has been disconnected from the rest of his body."
"Huh?"
Arthur's words stopped Evan in his tracks and he turned around to see that all he was holding was Tyn's severed leg, while Tyn himself was lying a few feet away with blood spilling from the stump.
"Oh, no wonder it got lighter."
Such was Evan's comment as he tossed the leg away, then walked back to grab the poor Tyn by his other leg.
"So, you're gonna tell me what that is?"
Arthur asked as he pointed at Evan's Einherjar who was piercing the Unforged Vale through Tyvi's stomach—the 'something' that had crashed down from above earlier.
"It's a 'World Magic' Spell I was testing out.
World Magic: Spell Number 9: Einherjar.
It's basically a second 'me'. A Golem Construct that although lacks my ability to use Spells and Unique Skills, has all my normal skills and has its Physical and Elemental Damage buffed for every Skill it cannot use.
It also possesses none of my weaknesses."
Evan explained the Einherjar's effects as he extended his right hand in its direction and snapped his fingers. The Einherjar dissolved into golden mist which was quickly absorbed into his body, after which he was questioned by Arthur.
"None of your weaknesses? Meaning dragonslayer powers are useless against it?"
"Exactly. Sadly, since most of my skills are a result of one of my Unique Skills which it cannot use, it only has 21 skills."
The way Evan said 'Only 21 Skills', one would think it was a small number. But it was not. Far from it.
Most people at Evan's level barely had 10 skills, and even transcendents topped out at 15-20.
But that wasn't even up to half of Evan's skill number.
"The Duration is also a bit shor-!"
Evan suddenly paused mid-explanation as a realisation hit him like a freight train.
"Wait a sec…how were you able to tell my Einherjar apart from me?"
The Einherjar was a perfect copy of Evan, from appearance to aura. Due to Evan's disposition as the wielder of the Mystic Eyes of Mimicry, 'Copies' related to him tended to be more convincing than the originals.
But Arthur had ignored the Einherjar and had spoken directly to the real Evan from the get-go.
"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?"
Evan took a moment to recall Arthur having said something similar on his first day on Aramis. Seeing the remembrance in Evan's eyes, Arthur continued speaking.
"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 had imaginary question marks floating above his head as he asked about 'Laurene' but Evan didn't give much of an explanation.
"Friend of mine from the future. She's really good at 'Seeing through' things."
That was the forte of Laurene's 'Mystic Eyes of Truth'. If she were here, she would have been able to instantly tell Evan and his Einherjar apart as well.
As the two boys were discussing, Arthur's dragonslayer opponent struggled to his feet with heavy breaths as he forced himself to stay conscious.
Having received the beating of his life from Arthur, the man had every intention to run, but a single glance at Arthur was enough to know that though the godslayer was conversing with Evan, he still had eyes on him.
Arthur wasn't physically looking at him, but his energy was.
'If I want to run, I need a distraction…'
Putting his fingers together, he channelled the last of his magic power into the ground. The earth quaked as Sword Law energy surged through it, and sharp swords erupted in a perfect circle around Arthur and Evan.
"Bounded Fie—!"
The complete sound never left the dragonslayer's throat.
*SWISH!
"You didn't think I'd let you use that, did you?"
Arthur, now standing right beside the man, spoke as he sheathed his sword. Simultaneously, a thin silver line shimmered across the dragonslayer's neck, and his head quietly detached, falling to the ground.
"Oof…you killed him anime style."
Evan let out a low chuckle as the dragonslayer's lifeless body crumpled to the ground, while Arthur turned back toward him with a faint laugh of his own.
"I always wanted to try that thing out once."
Just as the words left his mouth, the ground shook violently. Something crashed into the earth a few meters away with the force of a meteor, kicking up a cloud of dust and debris.
'How many things are going to fall from the sky today?'
Arthur asked this question internally as he turned around, but when he saw what had fallen, the expression behind his mask changed.
Unlike his dragonslayer opponent that he had toyed with, this new entrant was radiating a level of power that he didn't think would be easy to handle.
But what shocked Arthur and Evan more, was their identity.
"Oy! Why is this guy stronger than he was before?!"
Evan's loud exclamation filled the air as he locked eyes with the new entrant—the Aramisian Hero who had tried to use mind control on him earlier.
This Hero, Tanyth, was the youngest and weakest of Aramis' remaining Heroes, and his level was 710.
At least, it was 710 around 30 minutes ago.
Now, the young man standing before Arthur and Evan radiated the same kind of power Evan had sensed from Arthur after their escapades in Iklaque.
The power of a Peak Sovereign, Level 899.
Arthur wasn't bothered about Tanyth's sudden power surge, but the energy the Hero now exuded.
'Cosmic Energy!'
He was 110% sure that earlier, Tanyth did NOT possess any form of Cosmic Superiority.
Looking down at Tanyth's hands, he saw the severed heads of two Mid-Rank Demons at Level 800, and Evan, noticing this as well, furrowed his brows.
"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…"
Evan couldn't sense the Cosmic Energy Arthur did, so he couldn't tell the source of Tanyth's sudden power surge.
However, he was already searching through his system archives for any information that could explain what he was seeing.
It was then that Tanyth who had been silent, tossed the two severed demon heads onto the floor before looking straight at Arthur and asking.
"Just what are you?"
A sudden question Arthur wasn't expecting and wasn't planning to answer.
"I should be the one asking questions here. Why do you have access to Cosmic Energy?"
The contents of Arthur's return question made Evan's eyes widen in surprise.
"You mean the invisible thing you always use?"
"Yes, that."
Arthur's eyes traced the unmistakable flow of Cosmic energy coursing through the Tanyth's body.
That, in itself, was an anomaly.
Cosmic energy wasn't supposed to move freely within the body of anyone who hadn't attained a form of Cosmic Superiority.
Even Arthur himself could only draw in ambient cosmic energy for a few seconds before his existence rejected the higher power to avoid overload.
"You're absorbing cosmic energy from the ground…"
Arthur's words sparked a sudden idea in Evan's mind. He quickly pulled up the RHS interface and moved to a specific section.
'I think I can find out what this is…'
While Evan was scouring the Archives for information on the Tanyth's surge in power, the Hero in question just silently stared at Arthur.
He was hostile towards Arthur; an unsurprising outcome considering Arthur was the 'Silver Summoner' who wreaked havoc on Plomux's Coastal bases.
Tanyth also desired to attack Arthur, but he didn't, because just like the dragonslayer Arthur just killed, the Hero couldn't find an opening.
A voice in his head warned that any action he took would be met with an immediate counter from Arthur—a prospect made all the more terrifying by Arthur's command over destruction energy. That would end disastrously.
Silence reigned supreme in the area until Evan finally broke it with a question.
"Arthur…just what did you do?"
"Context. I've done a lot of things."
Evan dismissed the diaphanous board that was the system interface and raised his gaze to face the Aramisian before them as he asked another question.
"Your sudden surge in power…it's the Planet that's giving you that power, isn't it?"
"The Planet?"
Arthur echoed Evan's words and the Rogue Hero nodded in affirmation before reading out the information he had just discovered in the Archive. It was in one of the new sections of the system that had been unlocked after he reached 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."
Right after Evan spoke, Arthur opened his status and just like Evan had said, he now had a title called 'Enemy of Aramis'.
Evan didn't know what Arthur had done earlier, but at this point, 'Aramis' considered Arthur to be the greatest Alien threat to 'it'.
The current Semi-Transcendent Arthur, plus his unique power of Null that enabled him to turn things into Nothing, was capable of dealing 'True Damage' to the planet.
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 his current level of power had reached the minimum threshold to touch and potentially erase the Planet's Consciousness.
Of course, it was all just potential until Arthur became a Deity. However, in just seven months on this planet, Arthur had risen from the Epic Level to the Sovereign Level.
What if he stayed long enough to become a Deity? What if, once he achieved that power, he turned his sights on the planet itself?
Such possibilities were far from hypothetical, and 'Aramis' had no intention of letting them become reality.
Hence, the present confrontation.
The funniest part of all this was that Arthur didn't even know that he had injured the Planet's Consciousness when he was dealing with the dragonslayer earlier.
But now, he understood the source of Tanyth's extra power. Following this, a mischievous smile appeared on his face.
"Hey, Evan. Have you ever killed another Hero before?"
"Huh? No."
For Evan, now was definitely NOT the moment to entertain such questions. Arthur, however, simply smiled behind his mask and asked.
"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 was an Apex World with Deity Realm Existences living on it. Even if his home universe had a System like this one, 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."
[IMPORTANT NOTE IN THE COMMENTS]