Chaos' Heir

Chapter 1410: Deception

It was quite the no-brainer. As long as someone didn’t fixate on pride, glory, or other superficial stuff, victory was indeed achievable, at least a partial version of it.

Luckily, Rodney had none of those pointless feelings hindering his reasoning. He had made a point not to develop any. After all, humankind didn’t need an ego-driven leader. It required someone who could look at the big picture, even accepting working in the shadows and dirtying his own hands to drive it forward.

Rodney couldn’t win, so he wouldn’t. Yet, humankind could still achieve victory, so he would work toward that goal, doing his best not to die or lose too much of himself in the process.

The problem before Rodney was three-faced now.

First, Rodney couldn’t give away his new strategy. The long-haired alien couldn’t notice it. The plan would fail otherwise.

Second, the new strategy didn’t change Rodney’s state. He was exhausted, only having enough fuel to perform one or two more miracles.

Rodney needed at least one miracle to complete his plan, meaning he couldn’t waste those powerful spells to survive the following exchanges.

Third, the timing wasn’t for Rodney to decide. It depended on the alien-lover’s best fan and his bald opponent fighting on the other side of that melted, broken battlefield.

To make matters worse, Rodney had to use at least one miracle against the long-haired alien to avoid arousing suspicion. In theory, that spell had no real counters, but Rodney couldn’t leave anything to chance.

Moreover, the alien-lover’s fan and his opponent were constantly moving at a speed Rodney could barely follow. He had to time himself with their exchanges while dealing with the attacks flying at him, making everything more challenging.

For all intents and purposes, Rodney was the wrong man to pull off that nigh-impossible plan. Yet, humankind didn’t have anyone else. He wouldn’t have had to be in a rush to lead it otherwise, so he had to do.

Luckily, Rodney had one advantage there. His opponent had turned out to be rather talkative.

"I won’t last long," Rodney announced, using the Nak’s way of speaking. "In a few exchanges, we’ll see if I can properly envision your death or will die in the process."

"[Son of the mana]," The long-haired alien called, almost sounding disappointed. "[Your desperation is showing if you are resorting to words]."

Nine of the ten worm-like creatures shot forward, enlarging or shrinking to surround Rodney from different directions and deploy a nigh-unreadable offensive.

Meanwhile, the tenth, denser, and more dangerous worm-like creature remained behind, hovering above the long-haired evolved warrior, seemingly watching the offensive unfold.

Rodney held back a curse since he recognized that attack pattern. Still, he could only play by its rules once more, doing his best to steer it in an intended direction that would inflict as little damage as possible.

A series of ringing noises resounded both inside and outside Rodney’s mind, applying effects to his body and the black smoke.

The worm-like creatures’ True Chaos was something Rodney had already learned to affect, and his mastery over that process had only improved throughout the battle.

Yet, the long-haired alien had also made adjustments to his creatures’ composition, starting a game of corrections against Rodney.

So, despite all the improvements, the nine worm-like creatures only flickered for a second, threatening to lose their structural integrity before restoring it and resuming their advance.

Nevertheless, Rodney made full use of that second. His body almost moved on its own, propelled by internal and external forces that pushed it past its physical limits to follow planned gestures and evasive maneuvers.

Rodney danced at a tune of his own through the nine converging creatures, narrowly dodging each one of them, only leaving them his already torn military uniform as food.

Still, Rodney knew that was the easy part. After dodging the nine gaseous creatures, their denser leader appeared on his escape path, its vast, fuming mouth already closing on his right shoulder.

The stars and uniform on Rodney’s right shoulder instantly vanished, devoured by that intense, invasive energy inside the fuming mouth. His skin there was even following the same trend, wounds opening as pieces of it directly disappeared.

The fuming mouth was about to devour Rodney’s shoulder whole, but a donging noise resounded in his mind, and reality bent. His figure stopped existing in that location, instantly appearing before the long-haired alien while pointing his right elbow at his face.

Rodney’s elbow was already on the alien’s nose, but the latter somehow remained faster than that completed attack. Smoke came out of the evolved warrior’s mouth, creating a gaseous extension of it, threatening to devour Rodney’s entire right limb.

That development wasn’t new for Rodney. He had already witnessed similar iterations of that and had even planned an escape route. His momentum suddenly vanished, and his figure flew sideways, exposing itself to the ten worm-like creatures that had begun to chase after him.

Rodney had initially planned another escape route for that predictable follow-up, but his brain felt on the verge of blacking out. The last miracle had almost drained him completely, temporarily preventing him from using any spells, forcing him to accelerate his plans.

"The mana has a new God," Rodney exclaimed, hiding any positive reaction when the ten gaseous creatures stopped their advance.

"[You can’t comprehend what a God is]," The leaner alien exclaimed through his strange way of speaking.

"Maybe," Rodney admitted, "But he has already killed two scouts of the True Chaos. I bet he is also hurrying here, bringing all his annoying alien awesomeness."

"[He shall find nothing but True Chaos]," The long-haired evolved warrior said, still holding back on continuing his assault to gather more information.

"That wouldn’t go well with him," Rodney explained. "He is quite the emotional, ungrateful leader. Well, not mine. Half of what I’m saying is just to wait until his biggest fan over there gets close enough."

The long-haired alien didn’t understand that line. Rodney had even stopped using the Nak’s language mid-way, making his statement even more confusing.

Reality bent again, and Rodney began existing elsewhere. The long-haired alien initially checked his surroundings, expecting an attack, only to find his opponent in the middle of the other fight, delaying the blade that was about to kill the silver swordsman, watching as he cut through his companion.