In Titanora,
If one ignored the state of such a warrior race now with their physical strength depleted to the point where they were mostly centered around a few towns and countries that lacked resources to even properly feed themselves due to a curse from the demon queen going on a rampage.
The whole of Titanora was drenched in a loop of destruction, yet it held on due to the strength of its race's capabilities to withstand hardships. However, the will to live cannot feed them.
"And anything else, Valhale?" Ryuk, after hearing the complete information from Valhale about the state of Titanora, nodded and deeply immersed himself in thinking of a solution.
A solution not exactly for the people's wellbeing, since doing charity only brings losses and he wasn't going to have one.
Halting in his path, he turned towards the woman with the same hued eyes as him, walking beside him with her hands tossing coins here and there for a dog—Mae, to be exact—to catch with her jaws. "Lady Drishti, what if we used Titanora as a place to manufacture our battleships? We're even getting free labor here."
'?!'
"YOU BASTARDS!!!" Suddenly hearing the words from beside him, Valhale found himself in anger, his hand clenched as he tried to swing it at Ryuk. But it felt as if his arm was held by someone tightly enough to not even budge.
"Kughh... Act like a man, kid, and fight me on equal grounds!" Valhale, seeing how the group followed behind Ryuk, calmly left him while his arm was held by a cloaked figure. Feeling humiliated, he cried out, knowing how far he had fallen.
"Don't disturb the Liege, old man." Holding the old man's punch with one hand was a cloaked figure wearing a black trench coat, his head count vered on the hoodie with a half-cloth covering the face, with eyes of a light shade of orange. Two other figures stood with odd stances at both corners of the road—One sat on his toes on a rock, while the other stood on a branch of a tree with folded hands.
Exactly, Ryuk, Esme, Regina, and Drishti, accompanied by eight cloaked figures, were heading towards the center of the forest. Valhale, who was also among them, was now stopped by one of the figures and two standing for backup.
Valhale's strength was suppressed by Drishti, and his age played a major role in making him weak enough to be stopped by LEGENDARY rankers. Otherwise...
'Shameless old man,' Ryuk thought, ignoring Valhale and continuing to move with his hand resting in his pocket. He was aware of how someone over a million years old was challenging a 17-year-old. To be exact, a 26 + 17 = 43-year-old man for a battle, and shamelessly referred to it as an equal-ground battle.
Ryuk had already seen how that old man cheated by nearly burning away half of his veins in the process of expansion.
In reality, whatever Ryuk was going to do on the mountain peak required some trustworthy individuals, not an old man who could slyly kill him while he underwent Body Reconstruction.
So, he had inevitably planned to stop Valhale here even if Valhale hadn't attacked him.
"Sayonara, old gramps." Walking behind the whole group of ten people, after three of the cloaked figures stopped with Valhale, Sam, who held a blade of grass between his teeth, used his two fingers to salute Valhale. His body was hunched forward like some goon following a gang, with his hands resting in his pockets.
He appeared the same as the weakest member of a gangster group who is most fearless and has half the control over the group—which definitely wasn't the case here.
Indeed, it was rightfully prepared by him.
----
[ Achoo~! >.< ]
[ Did someone steal my thing? O_o ]
『 Shut up, you evil system! You are the one who stole my thing! 』
In the space shrouded in complete white, a childish voice cried out, seeing an orange screen revolving around a statue chained down on its knees. That window had been doing so for several hours.
[ Aren't we friends? So, what is yours is mine, and what is mine is definitely mine too <( ̄) ̄)> ]
『 You are more evil than I thought. At least turn on the ability. 』
The voice, seeing how shameless this system was, told it to at least turn on the passive ability of Shunya, which made his father immune to poisons and any outside interference.
Meaning right now, Ryuk was simply in the most vulnerable state for any outside interference.
[ Nah, Host gave me a task to analyze this thing. Let me do my work. Shuuu, shuu >.< ]
『 You will put Daddy in harm's way! 』
The childish voice protested again, trying to clarify how this could be dangerous for its father's safety.
[ Tch, are you stupid? Do you really think I chose my Host because of some ability like you? Shut up. ]
The system's screen turned towards a white glowing figure of a small girl holding her frock while protesting, not understanding why its host needed to be protected by some ability.
[ Listen well, kid. He is my Host. He will be fine without you—CRUMBLE. ]
Before the system could complete its words, the whole space started to tremble vigorously as if struck by a 9-magnitude earthquake.
[ Or not (〒_〒) ]