Chapter 32: Making his Move

Julius found himself staring over the troll encampment. It was night, and he could only make out the details because of the fires that were scattered around the camp. He wasn’t going to lie, he was really nervous. Taking down individual groups was fine, but taking on an entire horde of self-regenerating monsters was terrifying. Part of him still wanted to rain bombs from a safe distance, but he knew that it would most likely be a waste of mana. Even if he used half of his core for a single blast, he didn’t think he would kill more than a couple of dozen, and worse, it would alert them against any future attacks.

But Julius steeled his nerves and quietly made his way down to the camp. He had taken a couple of hours to prepare. He had observed the camp and watched as the trolls returned to their tents. There were no guards posted around the camp, which was expected, considering they were probably the strongest monsters in the rift.

His core was full, and his body was completely charged with kinetic energy. He originally planned on having many constructs surround him like an arsenal, but he realized that having a dozen shining red disks of mana would kind of defeat the purpose of stealth.

He approached the first tent, activating [Savage Dance] to settle some of his anxiety. He could hear loud snoring coming from the inside, and based on what he had observed, there were usually four to six trolls per tent. The same amount that was typically in a team.

He quickly prepared several sharp wedges of hardened fire mana. Julius had tested them earlier on some rocks, and while they weren’t as effective as the saw blades, they didn’t require any spinning, meaning they didn’t whistle. Which would be important if he wanted to do this quietly.

He sensed five trolls within this tent, but no leader. According to what he could sense with [Spatial Perception], the groups with leaders had their tents more toward the center of the camp. The ones around the edges were apparently lower in the troll’s social hierarchy.

He opened the tent, which was made of the same plant-based material as their clothes. It made a slight crinkling noise as it parted, but thankfully, the trolls didn’t awake. Then five wedges of sharpened floated over the heads of the sleeping trolls. Once they were all directly over the necks of the snoring trolls, he slammed them down and added a boost of kinetic energy to make sure they went all the way through.

It was anti-climactic, all the wedges pierced through the monster’s necks, killing them swiftly. Honestly, Julius felt a little nauseous for the first time since he’d been in this rift. It was the only time he had felt genuinely bad for killing a monster. Killing an opponent that was actively trying to kill you was different than slaughtering his opponents in their sleep. It just didn’t sit well with Julius.

However, he still had many other tents to visit, and he couldn’t back out now. So Julius quietly made his way out of the tent and went to the next closest one, keeping the constructs as low to the ground so that their glowing wouldn’t alert any trolls still awake.

The next tent had only four trolls, and he just decided to send the wedges in alone. The constructs parted the tent and silently hovered above the trolls. He could sense every movement inside with his skill and, with a pulse of kinetic energy, killed all the trolls.

The same happened with the next dozen or so tents. By this point, Julius was racking up quite a lot of kills. It was going very smoothly. At this rate, he could take out the entire camp in less than an hour. It was extremely disturbing, assassinating trolls by the dozens like it was nothing.

He even got a notification for his actions.

Would you like to learn to learn the skill [Assassination] (Uncommon)?

Julius hadn’t received any notifications for new skills in a while, even though he had been hoping for certain ones, like some sort of burst step or movement skill. The fact that he was offered such a skill at this moment made his heart drop. He felt like his insides were curdling like sour milk.

He didn’t like it. The depths of his soul were vehemently opposing what he was doing. He didn’t like being forced to do this.

So why the hell am I? Julius asked himself.

Was it because he had no other choice? Because he had other plans that he decided against. Or was it because it was the easiest choice?

His mouth opened as if he wanted to refute that thought.

But that’s exactly what it was. It was the easiest choice.

He had to be brutally honest with himself. This particular solution was just the easiest way to clear the rift with the least amount of risk and using the least amount of mana.

Julius gazed up into the fractured night sky as if it held the answers to his problems. I got so tunnel-visioned on clearing the rift that I was willing to do anything to achieve it, even if it meant doing what was easy versus what was right, he realized.

Julius didn’t consider himself a good guy. He wasn’t a hero. If it came down to choosing a single person he cared about or the entire world, he would let the world burn to ash. However, he still had morals, and cutting the throats of his opponents in their beds might very well be one of them. He was aiming for the pinnacle of this world, but if he turned into a broken shadow of himself while doing it, was that really considered a success?

Was silently killing them when they were asleep any better than bombarding them from a mountaintop?

No, either way, I would be killing them. But killing them in the same manner as the Genshen Clan bothers me in a way I cannot describe.

Julius knew he shouldn’t have a problem with it. He had already killed dozens of trolls by ambushing them. His style of fighting wasn’t exactly “honorable”.

Maybe there is something about slitting someone’s throat when they are sleeping in their beds that doesn’t sit right with me.

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It was like he had said before, power without ideals was empty, and maybe this would be one of his. He had no problem killing his opponents in their homes, but he would at least give them the common courtesy and knock on their front door before he did so.