The Doctor blinked, and the figure was already gone.
Was that just her imagination?
But she had no time left to dwell on it, because the moment she turned back around, she found herself locking eyes with the Sarkaz standing behind her.
Looking at the horned, hulking man — especially the war hammer in his hand, easily bigger than her whole head — she gave up on the idea of fighting back.
The image of a pink-haired Sarkaz flashed through her mind, and she decided to gamble:
“Wait a second — I came from Babel.
I’ve met your Her Highness Theresa.”
Sure enough, the man froze in place for a moment.
“Looks like I made a mistake.”
The Sarkaz nodded.
The Doctor nodded back, over and over.
But in the next instant, the Sarkaz’s face darkened, and he raised his free hand.
“Here I thought you were just some Aegirian — turns out you’re the Aegirian who bewitched Her Highness, no less.
That’s no ordinary foreigner.
Take her — we’ll kill her slow!”
“Damn it, Her Highness has doomed me!”
The Doctor threw her hands up to guard, but the blow never came.
Turns out, without anyone noticing, Leon had already dropped down from high above, right behind the Sarkaz.
Having already checked on his rescue target’s condition, he pressed his left hand against the Sarkaz’s lower spine.
The man flinched at first, but once he actually felt the touch, a mocking grin spread across his face:
“Who’s this lunatic?
Playing hero without so much as a weapon on you?
You’re not actually thinking your bare hand can—”
The Sarkaz lost the ability to speak, right about then.
First he felt a wave of warmth in his spine, and then he realized, to his horror, that the hand had actually slid through his muscle like it was cutting through butter.
Amid the flesh’s silent scream, Leon closed his fingers around the man’s spine and squeezed —
“Aaaaaargh—”
Even as the Sarkaz screamed, Leon’s right hand had already blurred into a chopping blade.
“Noisy.”
An almost transparent white afterimage sliced across the man’s neck.
A thin line of blood slowly welled up, and his head began to teeter.
Watching this, Leon’s brow furrowed.
If that thing dropped like this, it’d probably roll right over to where Amiya was…
In the interest of protecting the poor kid’s mental well-being, he caught the Sarkaz’s head and turned to face the rest of the attackers.
His sudden appearance, and the violence that followed it, did a fine job of getting the situation under control.
Except, he seemed to have completely forgotten about the Doctor standing right there.
The white-haired woman locked eyes with a Sarkaz for the second time — except this one was down to just a head now.
Sarkaz bodies weren’t exactly fragile, and yet he’d done that with just his bare hand…
Maybe it was some kind of Originium Arts she didn’t know about?
She’d only just woken up, after all — it was only natural she didn’t understand this world yet.
That was how the Doctor explained it to herself.
And the attackers came to much the same conclusion.
They prayed that Leon was actually some Wendigo without a skull, or some Blood Fiend with its ears carved off.
Oh, he must be one of the noble Royal Court, that explains why he’s this terrifying!
And in the middle of that grim, heavy silence, Leon finally spoke.
He looked toward the Sarkaz leader at the head of the group, his eyes turning cold:
“Looks like you don’t get it.
The kids in our group chat aren’t yours to push around.”
Without even giving the man a chance to talk tough, he flickered forward in an instant, right up to the heavily armored enemy at the front.
He raised the severed head in his hand and rammed it straight into the man’s helmet — a real face-to-face, in the most literal sense.
The one-sided, gory kill left everyone frozen in place.
Just as the underlings started to waver and back off, their leader held them in place.
“Don’t panic!
Ice shards, fireballs, throw whatever you’ve got!
There’s no way he could be—”
INVINCIBLE (gray text on a white background)
But reality had other plans.
Originium Arts, crossbow bolts, blades — countless attacks came flying at him all at once.
But Leon just kept his hands clasped behind his back, hovering there, and took every last one of them head-on.
Once the smoke cleared, not even the hem of his coat had so much as a smudge on it.
That gave him a decent read on the overall power level of Terra.
Roughly speaking, the average Sarkaz had noticeably better physical stats than a human, and their weapon materials had some strong points too.
So, conservatively speaking, a top-tier Sarkaz swordsman might actually manage to nick his clothes.
Pair that with a few Arts, and maybe even leave a mark?
Not that that was anywhere near actually killing him, but still — nothing to sneeze at.
Too bad.
Leon had actually been hoping to see a few more Originium Arts in action, but this batch had already lost their will to fight.
Looking at the Sarkaz standing there in a daze, gripping their broken blades, he said:
“Alright then.
My turn.”
And before the fear could even fully register in their eyes, he cut every last one of them down.
Only the leader — after witnessing all of it, a well of despair rising up in his chest — still raised his blade and charged at Leon.
“For all our souls!”
Leon passed straight through the blade without the slightest resistance, and crushed the man’s skull in his grip.
“Commendable courage.”
With that word of approval left behind, he flicked the blood clean off his hand.
A ring of displaced air rippled outward and vanished on the spot, and the dust it kicked up folded into the raging wind, flowing like a river.
By the time the dust settled, the ground was spotless — a scene fit for children’s programming, more or less.
By now, the Doctor had completely given up trying to make sense of everything that had just happened.
But the man responsible for all of it was already drifting toward her.
She swallowed hard, doing her best not to take a single step back.
Except, the first thing out of his mouth was about the kid:
“You look like a sharp person.
Judging by the structure here, would clearing away the rubble on top directly cause any secondary injuries?”
At the same time, Leon checked in with the group chat to let everyone know things were under control.
[Viltrum’s Top Student]: @Everyone Crisis handled.
Can someone help me figure out how to take this pile apart?
[Not-a-God Yellow Weasel]: Let me take a look.
[Orange-Haired, Gold-Eyed Menace to Humanity]: Wow, Mr.
Leon’s that efficient?
This is reminding me of someone I know…
who was it again?
Weird.
[The Tiger of West Junior High]: @Mala Donkey Head how are you holding up?
[Viltrum’s Top Student]: Vitals are stable.
She just took too big a shock and passed out.
[Kansas Farm Boy]: Um…
just take it apart like that?
Leon just ignored that walking biological-force-field cheat code of a guy, but both the Emperor and the Doctor gave the go-ahead in the end.
After telling the Doctor to keep an eye on Amiya’s condition from below, he felt around until he found a good grip point.
Dust cascaded down like a waterfall as he lifted the massive metal structure with ease.
He just…
lifted that?
But just a second ago I was…
The Doctor froze for a split second in shock, but quickly composed herself, her mind precise as a machine, running through everything that had just happened.
The kind of physical strength it’d take to handle a Sarkaz bare-handed like that was…
okay, fine, she was still stuck in her own misconception.
To him, this much weight was probably no different from a feather.
“Ma’am?”
At the sound of Leon’s voice, the Doctor shook off her scattered thoughts and stepped forward to examine Amiya’s family.
Her eyes swept over the crystal growth on the girl’s right hand.
Then over to her parents’ violently heaving chests, and the same black crystal growing there too.
Her expression grave, she gave her verdict:
“The girl’s life isn’t in danger, but she’s contracted Oripathy.
As for her parents…
If that speed of yours can carry people, I’d ask you to take this whole family to Babel — at least that way, they can see each other one last time.”
The Doctor’s pleading gaze collided with Leon’s indifference — an indifference that seemed like it would never change, not in a lifetime.
For a seemingly-frail woman who’d just witnessed everything that happened, it took no small amount of courage to even ask.
After checking in with the Emperor once, Leon nodded:
“Tell me where.”
And at that exact moment, the System announced the quest was complete.
[Quest Complete.
1000 points earned.
Special reward from this world incoming.]
[If you do not exit the world voluntarily, you will be automatically returned after 24 hours.]
To be continued…