Chapter 30: CH : 28 Leaving Everything Behind
Several hundred meters away from the
White Snow Castle and the City Freta was Maxwell practically crawling on the ground as far as possible from that castle.
He was not afraid of Julian's knights or if he wanted to exercise him since most likely the RAGNAROK had killed them all. But he was not at all sure that he had killed Julian, that old man was more resistant than he seemed.
After a few minutes he ran out of energy. He stayed on his back and looked at the sky with a lost look. His last attack was a desperate one that he did not distinguish between friends and enemies, most likely they were all dead, Ana, his sisters, Lucia Roger, Rosa, Penelope and others.
The only possible survivor was Julian.
Even Maxwell shit with fear seeing the power of his attack charged with all his magic, fortunately he was totally immune to his own element, but the shock wave did hurt him a lot.
Maxwell sighed looking up at the clear sky.
And now what do I do?
Maxwell inside in his thoughts but a giant shadow occupied his vision and drove him out of his mind.
What the hell?!!!!!
Maxwell stood up in fear regardless of his injuries and looked up at the sky in disbelief.
I know this is a fantastic world, but this is just ridiculous !!!
Just above Maxwell's view hundreds of miles above his head was a gigantic island floating against the laws of gravity.
An island in the sky !!
***
In the opposite direction to Maxwell, a badly wounded man with one of his arms missing ran with his teeth clenched and his eyes full of rage. Half of his body and face were badly burned and melted like candle wax.
"MAXWELL!!!!!" His voice sounded like the roar of a beast due to the amount of hatred contained in his voice.
***
Much further away from these two people was a small group galloping on horseback, regularly looking back at Whitesnow Castle. Their group was quite large and very diverse, ranging from men to very small children.
They were Roger and company who, thanks to a secret passage that he knew, were able to escape in time and even secure some horses.
***
In Whitesnow Castle itself, several rocks suddenly fell before an icy knight appeared from the large crater.
"Wow!!" Julian clutched his chest in fear. "I really almost died.
***
Maxwell relaxed atop the crudely finished wooden carriage, or so he wished he could say. The truth was that it was very uncomfortable to travel on the roads and the dilapidated carriage, his back felt as if he had carried a great weight and it never stopped hurting.
"Martha." Maxwell yelled.
"Sir?" the woman at the reins of the carriage replied.
"Remind me how much longer it is until we get there."
"If my calculations do not fail me, there is only one day left at most sir." Martha replied calmly as if it was not the first time she was asked this question.
"Okay." Maxwell sighed. He placed his hands behind his neck and let her fall. "Just one more day."
4 months had passed since that fateful day. After a day of waiting in the woods and regaining some of his strength, putting more than 5000 points in vitally to let his body heal faster and remaining ones were invested in other important stats.
Maxwell went to Freta City where he sought out a doctor who would settle his bones and heal his wounds. Since he did not want to be found, he did not reveal his identity and paid him with what he earned from his small commercial company in which he was currently operating.
It was not difficult to convince them to follow him on a journey that few would dare to cross half a continent. He first pressured them by telling them that without a lord now this city would be a small war zone that the other nobles will want to take over and then he revealed to them that all of Ashelan would be a war zone for the lack of a king to rule.
Maxwell always knew about Ashelan's situation but he never really cared because Rodmandia was located in the northernmost part of it, a place where the war would never come, but they didn't have to know that.
Other than that the king was not dead yet and as far as he knew he could live another 4 to 5 years.
Maxwell had manipulated them into following him half a continent but he didn't care, after all he was doing them a favor.
The decision to depart from Rodmandia and indeed all of Ashelan was not made on the spot or was rushed. His first idea was to stay and become the duke of rodmandia as there were no more descendants of magnus alive but this left him in a bad position as he inherited a very barren land in the cold north with a destroyed castle and no soldiers to defend his territory. He could ask for men from his banner but they would most likely betray him seeing him so weak. Adding to that the future war dissuaded Maxwell from abandoning that idea.
He and his trading caravan bought all the grain they could from the most prosperous city of Apron and on their way out of the kingdom he sold it all at a high price. All this strategy would not have worked if there was not a war in the making, but food rose in price in times of crisis and there were many great lords wanting to feed their armies.
He never believed that traveling across the continent was so complicated and difficult. He was constantly attacked by bandits and armies of Lords, but they all fled in terror upon receiving the full RAGNAROK from him.
Four months later he was in the center and most fertile place of the continent, only one day away from reaching the great city Brenor of the Lester empire. In these four months he and his caravan had earned a nickname.
Maxwell: The Walking Disaster.
The caravan on the other hand was called: the Lightning Caravan.
As a preventive measure and taking advantage of his growing fame, Maxwell had a large lightning bolt painted on the carriages. From that day on, the attacks on his caravan were practically non-existent and they were able to travel with peace of mind.
On his long journey, Maxwell had managed to understand many things that had previously been confusing to him. For example, the continent: it was simply called that, because it was the only one in existence and there was no need to name it to differentiate it from another. On the other hand, he was researching in all the cities and kingdoms about the existence of the island in the sky, but he only received ridicule about how naive he was to believe in that old legend. Apparently since the beginning of time on this continent there had been a legend of a floating island where God watched the mere mortals. There were many reports of sightings but they were always taken as delusions of a madman since multiple investigations had been carried out on the matter by great kingdoms without a single result so far.
The night came so fast that Maxwell didn't even notice, he gathered a few blocks of wood and with a little of his magic he lit it up although he almost turned it into complete charcoal. His control over his magic had never been good and now that he had increased it so precipitously it was even less so. His control was so bad that he took a full 5 years to create his lightning speed ability.
Creating a skill of that caliber was not easy at all. First he had to send a very small amount of magic to his brain and control it to stimulate him in such a way as to speed up his thought process. This in itself was very dangerous because of the risk of damaging his brain but he was able to overcome it because of his immunity to the lightning. After that he had to stimulate the muscles of his body to burst with immense force that allowed him to move at great speeds, but this very process also damaged them.
Come to think of it, Maxwell was very good at only taking 5 years for this long and onerous process. Now what he had to do was strengthen his body so that it could be further stimulated and explode with insane force.
Maxwell looked at his stat panel
[Maxwell Magnar]
Age: 12 Years
Strength: 9
Agility: 23
Resistance: 28
Vitality: 34
Intelligence: 50
Mana: 4180
Arcane Tempest Mastery: 93
Element: Lightning
Achievements: 17…
Sexual Points: 17
In order to heal faster and without hidden injuries, Maxwell invested all the points he collected along the way into Vitality. Each point after 20 cost him 100 sexual points and after crossing 30 marks when I increased it by even one point he needed 1000 sexual points, an astronomical figure for me. As even when a woman gets pregnant he only gets 5000 points.
Something he also inevitably discovered during his travels was that having sex with a simple commoner gave him much fewer points than sleeping with a noblewoman.
Maybe his Tampa was too classist or maybe it was because of the magic that ran through every noble. Maxwell didn't know it yet but he couldn't benefit as he wanted from this trip.
Another thing to keep in mind in this world was that there were also sexually transmitted diseases and these were very different from his world, that's why he couldn't sleep with any woman he found along the way.
'I already seem to be gaining a reputation as an usurper in the lands I passed by,' I thought.
[Sexual Points: 17]
'7000 points sounds like a lot, but in reality, it's not that much,' I thought, since if I distributed all the points among my 7 different attributes, that would only make about a few points per attribute.
It took me many years to understand that 10 represented the limit for normal humans in this world.
'But it's not an insurmountable limit.'
There are strength monsters who can surpass this boundary, like my late father's brute who stands over 6 feet tall, or Julian, who, with proper weight distribution, can now bench-press over 500 kilos.
I doubt it has anything to do with magical lineages like mine, but I can't be certain since I can't view other people's attributes.
There are numerous giants in this world with strength that, in my old world, would be considered superhuman on the level of having super powers, but the norm remains relatively similar to Earth's.
'Meaning, for an injury that should heal in a month or two, When I put all my attribute points into Vitality, I'd have a constitution that lets me recover 15.8 times faster than usual.'
'In short, everything would be fine within 4 to 8 days, but is this really the best solution?' I wondered.
'I could have put some points into my Strength or my Agility, or perhaps…'
I stopped thinking and shook my head, realizing there was no point in hesitating. Vitality was the most useful attribute because it allowed me to accelerate the healing speed of my physical injuries.
It significantly accelerated my recovery from illnesses and bolstered my immunity to extraordinary levels, rendering me far more resilient—even against potential sexually transmitted diseases, should I ever encounter them. Given that earning sexual points relies solely on intimate encounters, this enhancement was vital.
Over the years, this enhanced immunity made sickness an increasingly rare occurrence for me, while simultaneously unlocking and fully harnessing the dormant genetic potential hidden deep within my genes.
'My height keeps increasing even though I can't change that factor just by increasing my strength or endurance.'
'It's been a 12-year journey, but today I have a better understanding of my system,' I thought as I closed my eyes but I couldn't get any sleep.
Maxwell sighed and looked west.
Lester Empire huh?
The place where the greatest nobles and knights of the continent met. The center of commerce and politics.
I'm already looking forward to it.
***
Sometimes fate could be very capricious and had fun making people meet who couldn't possibly be together.
Other times it was so fair that it hurt.
The darkness of the night covered everything like a hungry beast that swallowed up every last glimmer of light. Maxwell looked out the window of the old castle to observe the stars and the moon. The night was so dark that it was impossible for him to see anything, with a sigh under his head in disappointment, however, when he looked down, what he saw was an entire army of undead walking slowly to the castle doors.
Frightened and a little disoriented, Maxwell ran through the long, luxurious corridors of the castle that slowly seemed to become smaller and smaller. He couldn't believe what he saw.
"Is it feasible to achieve that within the constraints of a magic system such as this one?"
The whole place began to move illogically and the walls became the floor and vice versa. Maxwell stopped confused and scared to death but his world did not stop changing until he was at the end of the hallway with a thick wall blocking his way.
His first instinct was to turn and run, but he could only see about two meters ahead of him, the only thing that could be seen beyond that was a cold and terrifying darkness. Maxwell didn't know what was there, but his body began to shake as if something was approaching.
Maxwell tried to use his magic to break the wall behind him but not a single spark came out of it. Slowly but surely panic and terror took hold of him so that he began to use his fists to madly hit the wall until his knuckles bled. But he stopped his actions when he heard footsteps behind him.
Maxwell turned his head and looked back where the darkness seemed to have come even closer. The footsteps became clearer and clearer and the closer they came, the faster his heart beat.
When a figure became visible from the shadows Maxwell's heart stopped completely.
A completely malnourished and putrid body with maggots sticking out of various parts, a dirty and patched dress. Nails sticking out of her hands while her hair covered half of her face, but it was clearly visible that she had nothing to call eyes, only darkness. Her neck was horribly cut in such a way that it was only held on by a bit of skin still uncut.
This scared him, but it wasn't what surprised him the most, because that terrified monster was... Olivia.
"Mom?" Maxwell asked in a whisper and the creature twisted strangely.
"M-Maxwellllllll" the being growled upon seeing him. "Why?..." He walked slowly towards him. "Why did you abandon us? Why couldn't you protect us?"
Maxwell's face paled as he saw the being approaching him, because only now could he see how the being was dragging the body of a little girl along the ground. Her face could not be seen because it was completely destroyed by the constant dragging but Maxwell could be completely sure that it was his little sister, his little angel, he was supposed to be strongest for her.
"Maxwell"
Maxwell slowly turned his head in horror as he heard another voice, one he couldn't forget even if he wanted to. The voice of his first time.
"Ma-maria." His voice trembled slightly as he watched a blood-stained woman with a large belly appear from the darkness. Like Olivia, her eyes were pitch black but aside from that, her face had a large smile that took up half of it in a sinister manner.
The form of Mary hit her bulging belly very hard while smiling at her.
"Max, it's time for you to meet your beloved child." After her statement and before Maxwell's shocked and horrified eyes, Maria with her two bare hands and in a very crude way began to open her own belly from which fell a pile of guts along with a small being that was a mix of a human girl and a goat with one of her eyes hanging from its sockets and looked at him with the same sinister smile as Maria.
"Hello Daddy..."