Chapter 175

Lykan

Ending the Siege

Lykan, Pentra, and Brenna all left the dungeon buried under the ground floors of the Sidherthan Academy. In the past the building had originally been built to seal in the great evil that was the Titans.

Of course, the original builders had no idea how childish the idea of using a few feet of stone to stop a Titan would be. This was of course the equivalent of burying someone in an inch of sand and hoping it would do more than protect them from sun poisoning.

Still the trio ascended.

Lykan of course expected some form of resistance. He had in fact invaded a major stronghold within the inner perimeter of the mighty kingdom of Sidhertha. That act alone was enough to constitute a war crime. The fact that he entered the city under less than favorable circumstances also served to heighten the fact that he was little more than a war criminal.

He had half expected guards to be positioned by the exit, waiting for him to leave. He half expected a lot of things. What he had not expected to see was the Academy nearly deserted.

Instead, the halls of learning that were once filled with many tomes and inquisitive students was now left bare and destitute.

It was clear that most major works were packed in a hurry. That the professors sensed that their valuable tomes would come under conflict soon.

This was what Lykan came to.

He came to a city that had gone mad. That was it, there was no other way to describe the utter self-destruction the city was exerting upon itself. It literally was the hydra, having grown so many heads that it was now battling with itself for how it would divvy up the few remaining resources that the school had to offer.

Just one look around showed Lykan the reason the use of the Third old world law went out of fashion. In the end, it took a beautiful country and brought it down to its knees.

At this moment, Lykan realized this utter collapse of a city and death of a great nation was his own fault. He had been too proud now, thinking that just because he could wield great power, that he should wield great power.

Lykan had loved Sidhertha. It was the home that took him in after he left the Elven stronghold. Sidhertha taught him how to fly, how to lay the groundwork for the person he was today. While there were a lot of bad days, there were many good ones as well.

No, this was not what Lykan thought would be the final outcome of enacting the third old world law on a human. Someone who was by their very nature prone to mistakes. Yes, Lykan had broken the bond of the law of the land to the man, but that did little to stop the continued suffering that the people were now going through.

Swoosh.

Lykan took off flying, up into the air.

Once in the air, he felt a familiar presence. A fly on his otherwise perfect wind currents.

In an instant Lykan recognized the form as being that of Ajimal, the man had apparently followed him from the remains of the elven stronghold.

Lykan looked on with anger to see that the man wielded lighting indiscriminately. At least that is what Lykan assumed at first, but then the wind told him a different story.

The wind told Lykan a story of a man who only struck down men who were cornering women. Seeing this, Lykan paused, as he reevaluated the man before him. Here he was, the conqueror of the north, able to easily wipe out the main enemy force. A force that was in the process of ripping itself apart. But rather than wiping out the forces, he instead chose to play the role of moral overwatch. Stopping men from forcing their way onto women. With so much going on, it was clear that there were many activities that had gone beyond the scope of what people had originally intended.

At one-point Ajimal noticed that Lykan had returned.

As their gazes met, Lykan gave a nod of gratitude to the foreign dictator who seemed content with the idea of having a role of moral enforcer.

Then moving over top of the city, Lykan began to cycle his qi. Going so far as to seemingly rip the threads of qi from the very air itself. Anyone in possession of qi, felt the foreign energy being forcefully ripped from their bodies and pulled towards Lykan.

Lykan let this sensation of power build for a moment.

At first many people stared up.

“Wha?”

“Huh?”

Fighting directly below Lykan ended as people began to look up towards the source of the disturbance to the natural balance of the world.

Pentra watched as something truly remarkable happened. She had of course read about such events, even heard the theories of such events described to her in detail. But this was the first time she had in fact gotten a chance to see power cultivation, the type of cultivation that one could use to exert force and pressure over others.

As the Qi began to cycle out of everyone, the wind itself also began to blow and increase pressure. Soon people felt the unmistakable need to kneel. Not out of deference, but out of balance.

Here they were, having the native energy of their bodies being ripped away. While at the same time feeling the unrelenting force of the universe bearing down on them. Then to add even more confusion to everything, the wind began blowing fiercely, causing everyone to instinctively get low. This of course meant that rather than fighting like they once were, everyone huddled into themselves as they felt like their very souls were being pulled form their bodies.

The invading warriors who had shown flashes of power so inspirational that they were able to overcome magic, suddenly looked human. No, they looked less than human. As their bodies began to tremble from the strain of someone performing this powerful of a cultivation right over top of them.

Within seconds the battle had ended. Within minutes, all were brought to their knees. Even Ajimal felt the unmistakable majesty as he too was forced to descend to the ground. Rather than collapsing as the others, Ajimal found a building that he could rest against.

The only two people that could manage to stand were Pentra and Brenna. Both of whom had to cultivate themselves to maintain standing.

Finally, when everyone looked up to the source of their sudden weakness. When everyone looked up to find one man floating high over the remains of the city. The man spoke.

Then he spoke the three words that officially ended the invasion of Sidhertha by its own people.

“This is enough.” There was pain in those words.

Pain that seemed to reverberate within everyone.

Pentra herself, felt one of her cores shatter from the resonant pressure of that one painful sentence.

“This is enough.” Someone shouted back to Lykan.

With that, he stopped his cultivation. Well not truly stopped his cultivation. At Lykan’s level of advancement such a process would be impossible. Instead, he just limited his range of cultivation to be just the immediate area around him.

With that Lykan ended the battle.

There was a calmness to the air. Many felt this was the same sensation one might feel when they were in the eye of a storm. That one spot where nothing happened. The one spot where nothing could touch you. Everyone breathed out a sigh of relief, but half wondered when the rest of the storm would hit, or if they were about to experience another round of storms.

“Leaders from both sides come forward.” Lykan said, calmly. His words were friendly, the tone one would use to speak to honored guests. But there was a hidden power to those words. A power of intent that lay dormant for the briefest of moments.

There was a pause, as everyone began stirring.

Finally, a few faces began to show themselves.

There were the people that Lykan recognized from the hill, back before he entered the city. Back then he thought that there would not be much to conquer, as he had relinquished control of the country from King Philipon.

Looking back, Lykan realized that such an act only served to stem more confusion amongst the masses.

Finally, over time, people from both sides arrived.

At this point Lykan slowly lowered himself so that he was eye level with the warriors.

It had been a long trip for Lykan himself. He had lost his own staff but was in the final stages of weaving different components of tri, penta, and septa-weave qi strands into a natural body armor. One that would protect vital areas, while allowing for rapid movement.

This personal project of course was but one of many things that Lykan wished to work on and use to improve himself. The more Lykan looked the more, he realized there were always places he could improve up.

His recent lack of attention to people and places was but one of them.

“This city, a city I love with all my heart is broken.” Lykan began, as he spoke a gentle breeze carried his words to every corner of the city and beyond.

“I realize this is my fault. I used powers and set in motion events that I had no frame of reference for. I created a world where I forced a grieving king to forget about their own personal pain for the prosperity of their kingdom. I forced the people of this nation to turn against a good man. The best king this country has ever seen, and for what? So, people could eat.”

Lykan said all this, as he looked at the commanders of the different groups.

“If you wish to blame anyone, blame me. For I am the one who played with powers far out of my understanding. While I thought I knew the full ramifications of the powers, I failed to consider why such laws were ultimately abandoned for the natural order of things. For that, I apologize.”

Lykan paused.

He had originally left the dungeon with the expectation that the three of them would be off. Going straight from here to the burnt down ruins of Abberty Village, his birth village.

That of course would only exacerbate the problem here.

He could leave Brenna and Pentra, but that would only cause more confusion. Mainly because no one, save for him could understand Pentra.

He could leave Brenna, but there seemed to be something disheartening about leaving his wife so soon after his relationship to her had been acknowledged by the gods.

No, looking at the people gathered before him, Lykan realized this was his mess. This was all his mess. A mess he created when he granted the powers and then walked away. Then he exacerbated those same problems by coming back, relinquishing those powers at the same time the capital was being invaded.

No, if Lykan was going to solve a problem he knew he needed to do so himself.

That was why he decided to do the next part of his plan right away.

“Seeing as this is my fault. The broken walls, the unhappy villagers. The mistrusting guards who raised weapons against the very people they were sworn to protect.” At that, quite a few soldiers looked down in disgust.

“This is all my fault. As such, my apprentices and I will stay here. We will not only rebuild this city to be back at its former state of grandeur, but we will heal the lands that have suffered from my inattentiveness.”

There was a hush for a moment as everyone tried to take in what was happening.

“Brenna, if you would please.” Lykan said, gesturing at a few broken walls.

Brenna just nodded, then moving closer to the damaged walls, she summoned forth waves of earth to fill in the gaps made. Then she applied pressure, intense pressure to the spots she filled. The pressure of course caused the stone to shrink. At which point Brenna would once again fill the holes with even more stone and repeat the process.

While Brenna was working on the walls, Lykan had Pentra begin cultivating in a way that caused the stagnant water of the city to flow. It wasn’t instantaneous, but slowly over time the once beautiful river that Sidhertha had been built over began to flow cleanly.

With his two apprentices working, Lykan himself began going around and fixing buildings. Helping people who were now stuck, or otherwise pinned from battle. The entire process was long, but seeing the three powerful cultivators working, others soon found their own place to help.

The entire time Ajimal looked on in shock and awe as he wondered for perhaps the hundredth time, what would have happened if that man became part of the family. Then, taking a page from Lykan’s book decided he should do now, what he should have done so long ago. If he wanted to recruit the man, he should do so himself, and that is just what he was going to do.