Chapter 159: Another Massacre ; Sheffield

{WARNING: Multiple Binary Factors detected. Threat Level: 2}

Binary Factors? Is it going to be more of those disguised elves?

That's most likely the case, seeing that the threat level is the same as that time.

Turning my head, I look at Irene who's observing the flying ships and ask,

"Irene, are you capable of fighting against Binary Factors?"

"Yes, Father," she bluntly responds.

Then, there is nothing to worry about.

"Let's get going," I state.

---3rd POV---

As the ships continue flying forward, a woman with raven-black hair observes a crystalline orb in front of her.

Within the orb, there is the image of the earth below, however, the trees and leaves seem to have become invisible, revealing all life hiding under them.

The woman, Sheffield, continues to observe with intrigue all the happenings of the forest until she finally finds the target she came here for.

However, unexpectedly, there is a small child beside the target, leaving her a little baffled. Nevertheless, as per orders of the magistrate, she is to wipe out all those who are in the forest and bring back the Child of Nature.

Unfortunately, Sheffield is unable to locate the Child of Nature no matter how much she messes around with the orb.

"They must be close," she mutters as she shifts the orb's "sight" back to the man and the little girl beside him.

Suddenly, an idea appears in Sheffield's head as she observes the blonde-haired child.

"Could she be…" she mutters once more, as she checks the orb carefully, "But, she doesn't seem to be as old as how she was described."

Sheffield takes a few moments to deliberate on the matter before she concludes,

"The man must be using Illusory Magic to alter her appearance."

Then, she nods her once before saying in a loud voice,

"The enemy is capable of Illusory Magic! Activate the dark gems!"

As the men near her begin to hastily move around and shout orders, Sheffield looks back at the orb, just in time to see the man looking back at her.

"He can see me?" she asks no one in particular.

As if responding to her question, the man grins before abruptly disappearing along with the child beside him.

---1st POV---

Using Clairvoyance, I can see the contents of the orb, which to my surprise is displaying Irene and me, despite us being quite a distance away from the ships.

Could this orb work the same way my Clairvoyance does?

As this idea settles itself in my mind, a grin forms on my face before I leap into the sky.

Irene follows suit, which surprises me a little, as she displays no indications of slowing down.

Thus, the two of us fly toward the ships as I consider the best method of dealing with them.

There are two practical ways that this can be done. Either I kill every last human aboard the ships and keep the ships for myself, or completely annihilate them along with the ships.

Resource-wise, the former would be the better choice, as it would provide flying ships for engineers and researchers in my kingdom to study.

Simply put, destroying these ships would be an absolute waste.

With my plans set in mind, I increase my speed.

The moment I'm near the ships, I slow my pace down so that I can board the ship, however, before I can do that, a cannon directed at my body fires a shot.

Unexpectedly, instead of a cannon-ball, an inordinate amount of seeds are blasted my way.

This is as peculiar as it could get, so I promptly use Blink to get as far away from the area as I can.

Irene also appears to realize that something is amiss as she also speedily moves away.

The next instant, small radicles protrude from the seeds before abruptly growing and impelling toward us.

As my energy is already low, I make use of Pyrokinesis instead of Flames of Devastation to burn the plants down, while Irene directly slices through the plants using her bare hands.

Before our opponents can launch another attack, I swiftly descend on the ship that the black-haired woman is on and telekinetically lift any object I can find before hurling them at the men.

With most of the men down, I slowly walk over to the woman while keeping an eye on Irene who has boarded a different ship.

To my pleasant surprise, nothing seems to be effective against Irene as she easily diverts all attacks using her bare hands, and a single punch from her can easily kill a man.

Well, I shouldn't be all that startled, as she did say she is capable of fighting against Binary Factors, which says a lot about her strength.

In a matter of seconds, I find myself standing around a meter away from the black-haired woman who is currently scowling at me.

I open my mouth to demand her name, however, before I can speak a word, a barrage of magic attacks are sent my way from the ship that has been left out.

Using Vector Manipulation, I create a reflective barrier, sending all the attacks back to the senders.

Exhibiting signs of battle experience, the men swiftly move to dodge the reflected attacks before using some kind of extending mechanism to cross over to the ship I'm on, as more men appear from the interiors of both ships.

These new arrivals shortly surround me in an orderly manner.

Seeing them like this, I get a little perplexed.

Why haven't they sent out the Binary Factors? Do they think that they actually stand a chance against us if they outnumber us?

"No matter how powerful you are," a voice reverberates in my ears, "You won't last long against this many men."

Looking at the woman in the eyes, I say in a confident tone,

"These weaklings won't able to so much scratch me, let alone kill me."

Presumably sensing the confidence in my voice, the woman frowns as she says,

"Overconfidence often results in a loss."

The moment her voice fades out, dozens of men rush toward me, while the others begin casting either offensive or supportive magic.

Seeing the men nearing me, I let out a sigh before extracting Excalibur from the storage ring.

"An artifact?!" the woman exclaims as an expression of absolute shock appears on her face.

Then, just as I'm about to swing the sword in the men's direction, the woman shouts as hard as she can,

"Move away!"

However, before the men can act upon her instruction, I swing the sword, which results in a lethal force to escape from the blade and effectively strike the men down.

I take this moment to consider something before muttering,

"Tiamat, it's your time to shine."

As soon as I say that, a light shines in front of me as an enormous body appears on the ship.

Despite the added weight, the ship doesn't budge whatsoever, making all the more curious about the way it operates.

Before the eyes of the horrified crowd, I point at the ship that is a nuisance and state,

"Destroy that ship, while making sure to avoid damaging the ships Irene and I are on."

"Understood, Master," a loud and imposing voice resounds all over the place as Tiamat 'leaps' into the air and flaps her magnificent wings.

Tiamat flies up for a few dozen meters before turning mid-air and diving toward the ship.

Discerning what's about to transpire, the men aboard the ship all run toward the extending mechanisms, while some of them directly jump off in hopes of surviving the imminent attack.

One moment later, fiery flames escape from Tiamat's mouth as she flies close to the ship, incinerating everything in its way to ashes.

Seeing all this, the men on the ship that I am on all begin to shiver as they anxiously look over at me with terror and awe in their eyes.

Ignoring them, I look over at the baffled woman with a grin on my face and mock,

"You were saying?"

Responding to my words, a flared look appears on the woman's face as she pulls out a golden wand and points it at me.

The next thing I know, a beam has escaped from the wand and has horizontally split my body in half.

Huh? Not only was I not able to react to it, but it easily broke through my body despite my endurance.

I ignore the pain in my arms and chest as I examine the wand in the woman's hand.

A small smile appears on her face as she sees my arms fall off to the ground and my shirt getting bloody.

However, her joy doesn't last for long, as before her eyes, new arms begin to grow from flames as my upper half reconnects with my lower half.

"You…" the woman cries while pointing at me, "What are you?"

Shrugging my shoulders, I say,

"Just your everyday prince."

Hearing this, the woman's brows twitch as she says in a sharp tone,

"Don't joke with me"

"I do whatever I want to," I say as I raise my arm and use telekinesis to levitate Excalibur.

Then, I propel it in the direction of whoever is left while whirling it around.

This ultimately results in waves of destruction to be sent out, killing and destroying everything in its path.

Naturally, this damages the ship more than a little, however, that doesn't matter all that much, as long as it's repairable.

Seeing my actions, the woman seems to lose all hope as she looks down and mutters to no one,

"I'm sorry."

Looks like she was following someone's orders and now feels like she has failed them.

"What's your name?" I ask her as three men are thrown off the other ship by Irene, while Tiamat returns for another round of live roasting on the ship that's barely holding up.

Seemingly having given up on all hope, the women dejectedly replies,

"Sheffield."

Looking at her, I notice something that I'm surprised I had not perceived before.

On her forehead, there are strange runes that I'm unable to make out.

Hold on… Don't tell me, she's a familiar?

Normally, such a thought wouldn't have passed through my mind, but then I remembered Irene's words when I formed a contract with Louise.

AI, can you make the rune I received from the contract with Louise visible?

{Affirmative.}

Do it.

Immediately after I say so, several shining lines begin appearing on my right one after another, before forming something quite similar to what's on Sheffield's forehead.

Sheffield's eyes widen as she observes the runes on my hand before she looks up and says,

"You're Gandalfr?"

Oh, it seems like she's familiar with the term. I wonder if she knows about the powers that come along with it.

"Yes, I am indeed Gandalfr. And you? What are you?"

She takes a moment to think about my inquiry, however, I use Eye of Judgement to pressure her into giving me an acceptable answer.

"Myozunitonirun," she finally says.

What the heck.

"What's it supposed to be and mean?" I ask.

"It means 'Mind of God'," she explains.

"That's quite the fancy name for an ability," I say mockingly, "What's it supposed to grant you, omniscience?"

"Huh?"

"Never mind. You belong to me from now on. Make sure to not screw around with me, as I can literally kill you and bring you back to life as much as I want."

As any normal individual would, a doubtful expression appears on Sheffield's face.

"Would you like me to prove it to you?" I say with a grin as I raise my right arm and point my finger at her face.

The reason I threaten her is to let her know that committing suicide will not bring her salvation. Once something belongs to me, it will always stay as such.

As a response to my blatant threat, Sheffield raises her arms before she simply says,

"I understand."

"Good," I say before turning my head to look over at the ship Irene is on.

What meets my eyes is the sight of several men whose bones have been shattered lying all over the deck, while some men are hanging onto the side of the ship.

Letting out a sigh, I reach my arm out and lock hands with Sheffield before walking over to the edge of the ship while pulling her along.

Once we're near the edge, I pull her toward myself and carry her as I jump over to the other ship.

Mid-air, I use Holy Slash to finish off the men hanging on the sides before I land on the deck.

Irene, who just threw the last man down, notices me as she turns to face before hastily trotting over with a smile on her face.

She then stands in front of me and looks me in the eye with an expression practically shouting "praise me".

So, I extend my right arm and begin patting her small head while saying,

"You were much stronger and faster than I expected."

After a few seconds, I focus my senses on the reason I came over to this ship: The Binary Factors inside it.

And thus, I guide Sheffield and Irene along as we head down.

Soon, I find myself standing in front of three Binary Factors whose limbs and bodies have been chained up.

What's strange is that there is some kind of tube that's connected to their arms which is extracting a green liquid.

Observing the tubes, I find them moving toward two more of the cannon that was used to shoot the strange seeds toward us.

"Truly, monstrous," I say.

It's much more preferable to have those under me freely make use of their powers than use them however I wish before throwing them away once they've been deemed useless.

Whoever is the one behind all this, he has successfully managed to irritate me.

In return, I will make sure that he or she experiences some pain.

For now, I should get these guys down.

"Irene," I say, "Go and check if there are any survivors on the other ships. If you find any, you know what to do."

"Yes, Father!" she responds before heading back to the deck.

Now then,

"Sheffield, do you mind explaining what's being done to them?"