Tier 3+ - Accidental Champion (Book 8) - Chapter 7 - You Mean You’re Serious?

The arena was dead silent.

Xavier stood at the centre, staring at the body of the elf. The elf—Nalthair—lay on his back, eyes open, mouth agape, face slack. Pale as a corpse, he looked like he’d slipped into the afterlife. The only hint the elf was alive was the shallowest of breaths and the slow, lazy beating of his heart, something that only happened twice per minute.

The young dragonkin had been counting.

“You said this wouldn’t hurt him much,” Xavier muttered, pointing his words to the dead Wanderer standing a few steps away, arms crossed.

Nalthair’s agonised scream echoed inside Xavier’s skull.

“I said the pain would be negligible.” Roln came to stand above the elf. “Though I have never performed such a thing on someone as weak at this.” He sniffed. “You also didn’t break the contract very… elegantly.”

Xavier balked. “That’s because you wouldn’t help.”

Roln blinked, cocked his head. “Wouldn’t help? I told you exactly what to do.”

“You usually help in more concrete ways than that.” Xavier tapped his skull. “You could have given me wiring, made it feel natural.”

Roln made a tut, tut, sound. “I think I’ve been spoiling you. There are some things you need to learn to navigate without that kind of assistance.” He raised an eyebrow. “Especially when you’re doing it for the first time.”

Xavier grunted. Frustratingly, despite not admitting out loud that the man was right, the mental construct smiled smugly. He didn’t need to say anything aloud for the dead Wanderer to know what he was thinking.

Nalthair’s eyes refocused. His gaze snapped to Xavier standing above him. “What…” He put a hand on the arena floor/ as he bent at the waist, sitting up in a slumped position in the dirt. His other hand touched his forehead. “What did you do to me?”

Fear wafted off the man. The fear wasn’t evident on the man’s face. It wasn’t even evident from his breathing, heartbeat, or perspiration—the elf had a good handle on his appearance.

But Xavier smelled it.

Before he could reply, the elf’s eyes widened.

“I feel…” Nalthair shook his head. “What in three hells am I feeling?” That last word was filled with anger.

“Your contracts are broken.” Xavier paused. “Actually, it would be more accurate to say they’ve been erased.”

“But… you can’t… that’s—”

“Impossible?”

“Insane!” the elf spat. He popped up to his feet and looked down at his body as though confused. Mostly, he looked at his heart, where he’d shoved a dagger deep inside.

That entire part of the fight had been a fiction. A convincing one. Xavier had infiltrated the man’s mind and was already in control. He altered Nalthair’s memories so he wouldn’t remember the moment reality paused and the fiction began. In the elf’s mind, the fight would have been seamless and ended with his death.

It allowed Xavier to get a feeling for how the man truly fought, and in the end, what he was capable of when his life was at risk and his back was up against a wall. It hadn’t surprised him—given what he knew of those raised in the System—that the man had been willing to throw away his life for the kill.

The depth of his loyalty, however, had come as a surprise. It might also become a problem. This Jhanku hadn’t simply enslaved the man, as The Collector had done to countless citizens in the Ventorin sector. Instead, from the glimpses Xavier had seen as he’d gone rifling through the elf’s mind, Jhanku had indoctrinated everyone within his domain since their birth. People like Nalthair, who’d been a part of one of the Orders, were the most loyal members of his society.

Fortunately, Xavier had been telling this man the truth. He didn’t break the man’s contract because he wanted to make him betray his master. He’d done it because he wanted to convert Jhanku to the cause—it would be something he’d have to do eventually, after all.

What better time to get started than right now?

“All that pain I felt, the arrows, the dagger I slammed into my chest… dying… How powerful are you to make me think that was all real?” The elf clutched his head with both hands. “And breaking my contracts…” He inhaled deeply, then released a long breath. “I shouldn’t believe that’s what you did and yet I can feel that it is true. I can feel that you did that to me.” He stared daggers into Xavier’s eyes. “Tell me—will Jhanku know? Will he know my contracts have broken?”

“He will know,” Roln said. “Many Denizens in this universe, especially A Grades, are able to feel contracts more acutely than others. However, he’ll think this elf died.”

“Jhanku will know,” Xavier said aloud as Nalthair, of course, couldn’t see or hear the dead Wanderer. “He will think you are dead until he finds out otherwise.”

Nalthair sunk to the ground. “This isn’t some lie? Another trick you’re playing in my head, like when I died?”

“I think you know it isn’t.”

“You made a mockery of everything I stand for! If he finds out I’m alive, my contracts broken, he will think I betrayed him! There will be no way for me to return to his services! I’m no traitor and yet you’ve made me into one!”

Xavier sighed. “Is that really what you’re concerned about? Being seen as a traitor?”

“You have seen into my mind. You tell me.” The elf raised his chin, staring at him defiantly. “I will not allow you to use me to betray my master.” A dagger appeared in his hand just as swiftly as before the man had slammed it into his heart in the mind simulation, and so Xavier knew exactly what was to happen next.

Not that he was about to let it happen.

He burst forward with a speed he hadn’t yet displayed during this fight. The Time dilation field was wrapped around him. He made time within it move as fast as he could make it. Xavier’s fingers were wrapped around the man’s wrist so fast he hadn’t raised the dagger yet. Xavier wrenched the dagger out of the man’s grip using his other hand, bare fingers grasping the metal. The blade cut into him even as he tore it from the elf. “First you won’t forfeit the fight, then you kill yourself in that simulation, now this? You’re just determined to die, aren’t you?”

The elf was seething. Xavier flapped his wings, bringing him five feet backward. He tossed the dagger away. “I’m sure you have more of those, but any efforts to off yourself won’t be successful. You are outmatched. Admit this, listen to me, and maybe then we can talk like adults.”

Xavier didn’t usually speak this way to people. Especially his enemies. He was getting more and more annoyed at this man.

He sighed, reached inside for that perfect state of calm, then slipped into it. He needed a clear mind for this. Telling Nalthair off wouldn’t get him what he wanted.

Nalthair’s gaze looked like it could cut just about as well as the dagger Xavier had taken from him. “Who are you really?” He looked at Xavier anew. “Because the things you’ve done…”

Xavier waved a dismissive hand. “Should be impossible. Yes. I know.” Okay. Perhaps that state of calm wasn’t as perfect as it could have been. He took a breath. “I am Xavier Collins. I am watched by the System for it believes I will become its weapon. I am the ruler of Earth and soon to be the ruler of the Ventorin sector. I am a human turned dragonkin. I am a man who walks two paths of advancement. I am this universe’s only hope for survival.” He flew down and landed on the ground in front of the man. “And I intend to unite the universe toward this end. To bring peace to every world and sector—and I will bring that peace, that unity, by any means necessary, for I believe it is the only way we can all be saved.” He raised his chin. “I broke your contracts to give you a fresh start. A clean slate. I don’t believe System-bound contracts are the way to peace. I believe trust is.”

Nalthair, Jhanku’s assassin and a member of the infamous Order of Death, threw back his head and let out a raucous laugh. Then, when Xavier’s face remained impassive, he wiped a tear from his eye and gaped. “You mean you’re serious?”

“I am, and I can prove it. How else would I have been able to defeat you so easily? I have no master. No one pulls my strings. No one handed me this power. Not even the System anticipated what I can do—it certainly wouldn’t like the fact t I erased its contracts.”

“How did you manage that?” Nalthair peered at him suspiciously.

“That isn’t important.” Xavier stepped forward. “Here. Let me show you the truth. I will open my memories, unaltered, for you to view.” Xavier pushed a contract toward the elf that laid out the terms of what he was to do.

System-bound contracts might not be the way to unify the universe, but Xavier would be a fool to say they weren’t useful.

The elf hesitated, but he clearly believed some of what Xavier had said earlier, the part about there being no escape for him—if not because of Xavier’s words, then because of his actions. There was something else, too. A twinkle of curiosity in the man’s eye. From all Xavier had said, why wouldn’t the man want to see if he was telling the truth? Even if there was no way he could see himself believing what Xavier was telling him, he wanted to know how he’d managed to do it all. How a man integrated into the System for less than a handful of years could have defeated a B Grade who’d been around for many thousands.

Actually, of what Xavier had glimpsed from the elf’s memories, he’d been around for hundreds of thousands of years, if not millions. It was easy to see how he struggled to believe.

And how his curiosity would take hold.

The contract was signed within less than a second of Xavier sending it to the elf. Nalthair did not stop Xavier reaching for his head. He did not flinch nor try to run, did not summon another weapon nor cast any spells.

He stood, stock-still, ten times the fear wafting off him than before.

Xavier touched Nalthair’s head. All the while, Roln stood silent, arms crossed. The mental construct didn’t need to speak for Xavier to know what he was thinking. To know that the dead Wanderer thought Nalthair only allowed him so close to trap him.

Xavier ignored the warning in the mental construct’s eyes and opened his memories to the man who should be his enemy.