The five men scurried and scampered in an indifferent direction, trying to increase their chances of escape, no matter how slight those chances were; at this point, it was better than nothing. John watched them calmly from atop a branch. He sat there, relaxed.
"You're just making this more bothersome," John remarked before vanishing from his spot. His speed was so fast that it could be mistaken as teleportation rather than raw speed. John reappeared on the ground. A sword was already in his hand; it came from his countless and endless inventory, which he named "Aeoncradle."
Aeoncradle is a jutsu that holds an endless array of weapons and items that could bring all existence to oblivion. This incredible jutsu was only considered a low-ranking jutsu among all the jutsu he created and mastered. This jutsu creates countless subspaces that bound and exist in your soul, which acts as your inventory. The subspaces were organized to look like the inventory of a game. Each subspace possesses limitless capacity, and they are endless. During the creation of the subspaces, an automatic function was running, and it would create countless absurdly overpowered weapons and items and store them in the created subspaces.
These weapons and items are all bound to the subspace, and only the wielder can use them.
John grasped the hilt of the sword and was about to draw it, but before he could move further, an old man suddenly appeared out of nowhere and intervened.
The old man wore a blue robe, held a magic staff and a grimoire in the other. The old man's beard was long and white, including his hair, which reflected the long life he lived. This old man was none other than Alberto Lapis, an archmage of a neighboring kingdom.
"Stop!" Alberto said firmly, unwavering.
John stopped and looked over. In a calm voice, he asked, "Why would I do that?"
"I don't know why they're running from you, nor who you are, but one thing I am sure of—you can't afford to mess with the Orof Kingdom," Alberto said calmly, but there was an icy undertone in his voice.
Deep within his mind, he was busily assessing the man in front of him, who was John. He used two spells—Thought Acceleration, which increased his thought-processing speed from 2x to a hundred-millionth times, and Source Analysis, which analyzed the overall strength of its target. Nothing could hide from this magic; even the Gods and Dragons failed to do so.
The world remained still in Alberto's eyes, but his thoughts accelerated thousands of times. Then, a thin, invisible, and undetectable barrier swept in all directions like a pulse. The barrier passed through John. At this time, John's overall strength was laid bare to Alberto's magic—but it didn't happen. His Source Analysis failed for the first time.
"What's happening?" Alberto wondered. The feedback from Source Analysis was that the man before him was just a normal human, but the magic didn't state that was his limit, which confused Alberto. Normally, his magic would show both surface and full strength, along with the potential of the target. But this time, his magic only showed the surface strength of the man in front of him, which was a "normal human"—the rest was nothing. Surface strength was the strength a person wanted to show to everyone—a weak disguise to hide their true fangs.
Alberto jumped back, increasing his distance from John.
"Who are you?" Alberto spoke with vigilance. His vast and limitless magic, which he had been suppressing within him, started to leak. Then, an azure clock with countless magic circles engraved within materialized behind Alberto. This clock was known as the Clock of Dictation, the ultimate manifestation of his power.
In the blink of an eye, Alberto entered a combat state, ready for any attack thrown at him.
"Impressive. Are you the one leading those idiots? I mean, they're on a mission and stupid enough to relax and drink amidst it, which led to this," John said.
"Answer my question!" Alberto said calmly.
John didn't answer. He grabbed the hilt of his sword. His demeanor instantly shifted. His expression became sharp, and his calm and seemingly insignificant presence sharpened like a blade drawn from its sheath. An overwhelming bloodlust erupted from him. His killing intent was so dense and vast that it materialized into a black and reddish mist. In Alberto's eyes, the color of the world turned crimson, akin to blood, but to bystanders, they would see nothing abnormal.
John only showed an extremely small fraction of his bloodlust, and he controlled it to only target Alberto. If he let it go, the entire world would be submerged in his bloodlust, sending the world into chaos.
At that moment, Alberto felt fear—extreme fear—a primordial fear from his very soul and existence, like facing death. No, it is something primal, like he was facing the End Of All Things.
He wanted to run, but he couldn't. He wanted to resist and fight to the bitter end, but his body refused to move, and his magic power trembled in terror, refusing to respond. His mind began collapsing from the fear, eroding his mind and soul. He felt he was slowly going insane. His soul and life were slowly fading. His immortality was insignificant before it, like he was just a normal human—nothing more, nothing less.
Alberto refused to die like this. He, the archmage—one of the strongest on the continent—refused to die like this. A death that could only be described as being squashed like an insect. He pushed with all of his strength, magic, and willpower to kneel and try to survive.
Gritting his teeth, using all of his magic and will to push through the fear and pressure crushing him, he knelt on the ground and spoke pleadingly, "Take my life and kill those four, but please spare the one I chose."
Seeing the kneeling old man before him—his once dignified and confident demeanor now gone, begging him to spare someone in exchange for his life—John looked at him emotionlessly.
"Okay. But I won't take your life."
With a fast and fluid motion, John cut off Alberto's right hand.
"I'll only take this," John said while tossing Alberto's severed right hand up and down. After saying that, John retracted his bloodlust and vanished, leaving Alberto on the brink of losing consciousness while enduring the pain from his severed arm. After an hour, Alberto lost consciousness.