“What do you hope to achieve by bringing me here?”When he heard Zeke’s question, Viator’s beady eyes stopped their incessant movement and focused on the young man.“Instead of staying on your doomed planet, we want you to come with us. With your cooperation, we might be able to study the Paths of Extinction System. We are ready to accommodate you and anyone you want to bring along. We have no destination in mind and what little fuel we currently have is only enough to run away from the Dead Ends. Eventually, we will run out of fuel and be stranded in space, withering away with the passing of time. You store enough Aether in your body to fully power our Mother Starship and allow us to travel longer distances.”“If you know about the Systems, then you surely know that mine will interfere and force me to stay.”“Yes, we are aware of that. Our efforts for the past decades weren’t completely fruitless. We know how the Night Goddess resisted the System and emerged victorious. If you agree,

Now that he had been freed, Frederic stood up and channelled his Aether. A sparkling white light coated around his body and healed some of the minor injuries.“Alright. First and foremost, I’m going to need you to unlock a new path.”“That’s your plan?”“It’s part of it. You can’t deny that, during our time together, I didn’t give you good advice on growing stronger and making perfect use of the System’s functionalities. It’s a shame that we turned into enemies, though.”“Spare me your pointless commentary.”Frederic let out a soft laugh and nodded. He raised his left hand and let out small bits of Aether.“Even though you only have one eye right now, I’m sure that your Aether sensitivity and Aether Control should be high enough to allow you to perceive Aether and even see it.”Zeke nodded as he stared at the somewhat disjointed flow of Aether that emanated from the Vagabond’s hand.“The path you’re going to unlock is a time-gated one, so you need to use your PE to quickly unlock it.

“How’s this going to help us?”Zeke stared at the 2 meter-long metal rod in Frederic’s hand. It looked like an unremarkable rod rather than an actual artifact.“Technically, it is an artifact. A conductor and storage for Aether. There are several of these inside the Mother Starship and it facilitates the flow of Aether.”He sighed and tested the rod, “Unlike you, I can store and use only a limited quantity of Aether. I require somesort of a boost, so to speak. Okay… the ship is going down so he’s what we’re going to do…”…The Mother Starship, which was the size of a small mountain, fell down from the sky and brought with it explosions and flames.The sight was horrifying, especially from a spectator’s point of view.There was a deafening rumbling and a bright flash of light as it was about to crash on the coast.The Special Agents sent by the Minister had kept their distances and raised layers upon layers of small barriers.There was even a magical wall that surrounded the entire cap

As she witnessed the slaughter, the young Layla turned around and puked. Even though she was a mercenary, she wasn’t used to such brutal sights. Admittedly, Zeke’s voltage had burned almost all the bodies, but some were blown to pieces or filled with bloody and gaping holes.Even Vins looked disturbed as he tried to not look at the gore and blood. In contrast, Kiam Hells and George Mill weren’t the least bit affected. The former hailed from a tribe of warriors and the latter had been a veteran soldier for more than a decade before joining the Lightning Flame.It was a horrifying sight to see a young man kill so many people so fast and with ease. Any doubts any of them had harboured toward his strength was not replaced by fear and awe.When Layla saw Zeke stare at her and the other three and then approach them, she got a little bit tense.“I remember seeing you. You’re one of the mercenaries?”“They’re our finest, actually.”Young Jeremy, whose handcuffs were broken by the voltage, sto

“Hate me and resent me all you want, but the truth remains: I gain nothing by backstabbing you right now. Even if I manage to get your System, which isn’t possible due to how strong you’ve become, I’ll still have to start from scratch. I wouldn’t be able to resist the Dead Ends. I might survive, but what use is that when everyone is dead?”Frederic stared back at Zeke, his voice and expression both serious. “If you succeed in destroying the Dead Ends and want to get rid of your System, then I can relieve you of it. How does that work?”There was a hint of desperation in the Vagabond’s words. He genuinely didn’t know if Zeke would accept or would just kill him there and now.After an inordinate silence, Zeke spoke,“First, tell me what you know of the Dead Ends.”“Do I have your words that you won’t kill me?”“Prove yourself useful and make me change my mind. I’m disinclined to let someone like you free, especially after all the shit you did.”Frederic Whitefort let out a heavy sigh i