Chapter 1260 (2/2)

“...yes, he’s waiting,” Randidly said slowly. Then he frowned as he remembered Obyrn’s calm acceptance of his earlier loss to Randidly. Obviously it was something of a gamble to assume that the seemingly autocratic leader of Nordawn would be similarly accepting of another’s superiority just based on power, but it was possible that the reason this leader was so dominant was that he simply hadn’t ever met his match.

Besides, Randidly wasn’t about to complain if this meeting would simply require a show of strength in order to convince the other to roll over. Randidly began to rub his chin. The entrance to the Ogre Gorge is probably too small for Kharon to go through, unfortunately… maybe it will be enough if I take my new evil genius island through…?

Well, I’ll probably fight either way. But I might as well arrive in style…

The sight of a small face peeking in the window made Randidly want to twist around and glare, but he quickly suppressed that impulse. With an evil smile on her face, Annie rested one hand on her stomach and stepped backward into the shadows in the corner of the room, out of the window watcher’s sightlines. Then she took another step back and simply phased through the wall.

Randidly’s mouth twitched with amusement as Dozer coughed to bring the focus back to him. “Who will be a part of the delegation who will go?”

Even Sam, the pseudo-uncle that he was, had a sinister gleam in his eyes as he finally focused on the meeting and answered Dozer’s question. “From what we know, the army from Nordawn is almost five hundred thousand strong. There’s no way we can compete in terms of size of our delegation, so we should go with only elites. Quality over quantity.”

Feeling slightly surreal, Randidly nodded along and said, “I planned on using my… island as our vehicle. Everyone who comes will need to be strong because the environment there is a bit… extreme.”

The actual point that Randidly made caused everyone to frown for a few seconds, but they no longer needed to continue with their fake meeting because a scream of terror came from the window. Rather bemused, Randidly followed after the grinning group to find Annie standing outside on the grass and tickling her daughter ruthlessly. Her hands were blurs as they rapidly moved to strike at the places that the little girl wasn’t defending with her hands.

The child, who appeared to be about five, squirmed and shrieked, but definitely seemed to be enjoying the attention. After thoroughly punishing the child who could only be her daughter, Annie said reprovingly. “You know you are not allowed to spy on us while we were having a grownup talk.”

“I know, but mommy a city just walked up and sat down next to us!” Delilah, who Randidly hadn’t seen since she was just a baby, somehow made her expression look pitiable and misunderstood at the same time. “I have questions! And I figured you would be madder if I snuck out than if I spied, so-”

Annie shook her head. “Yes, yes, you can go to Kharon later, it shouldn’t be a problem. But first, I want to introduce you to someone; Delilah, this is Randidly Ghosthound.”

“Hello,” Delilah said, instantly shifting to a polite smile. The girl had Annie’s brown hair and sly smile, but her eyes had all the focused intensity of Dozer at his most determined. The combination was surprisingly cute. She even had two extremely small daggers hanging at each hip, and Randidly’s Grim Intuition told him that those weapons had tasted blood before.

He wondered whether he was supposed to be proud or worried.

It was only after she walked up to Randidly, gave him a perfunctory hug, and then turned away that Delilah froze. “Wait… Randidly Ghosthound?!?!”

She leapt a few meters away and pointed dramatically toward Randidly. “You are the strongest man in the world? Stronger even then daddy and uncle Obby?!?!”

Randidly glanced sideways at the people looking at him while hiding smiles and could only roll his eyes. “Yes, that’s me.”

“You seem too small to be so strong,” Delilah frowned. She walked and patted on Randidly’s side in a sympathetic manner. The pat was extremely similar to the one that Annie had given Randidly earlier. “It’s okay, a lot of people don’t believe how powerful I am either, all because I’m small. Say, how powerful really are you? If I’m a 1, what would that make you?”

Again, Randidly glanced sideways. This time he looked at Dozer and Annie with a frown on his face as he wondered how honest he should be with this little girl. They nodded encouragingly, and Annie even gleefully gave him a look that told Randidly to crush her daughter's pride, so he looked down at the bright eyes of the child in front of him curiously. Then Randidly pondered the question for a few seconds.

Based on her movements, she already has some Stats and Skills, despite her young age… but even so, she’s probably only got 50 in her highest Stat… which would make her… at least 50 times weaker than me… not considering the advantage in Skill Levels, Skill Rarities, Nether and Aether Control, variety of attack patterns, experience fighting, images, and equipment that I have…

Finally, Randidly arrived at a number. But feeling that truthful number was a bit high, he divided it by ten. Still finding it a bit high, he cut that result in half. Finally, Randidly cleared his throat and said. “Probably a 100.”

Delilah considered that. “How long did it take you to get that strong?”

Randidly had to think about that too. All the weird variations in time made it difficult for him to track exactly how much time had passed since he had first encountered the System. Even with high Intelligence, it was a hassle to go through all the memories in his mind. “...about six years.”

Grinning without an ounce of guile, Delilah said, “A year longer than me, eh? No wonder you are so long. But lookout, because I’ll catch up next year.”

And at that moment, seeing the bright confidence of the young girl’s face, Randidly felt his own expression soften. Now he could understand why even Sam would get on the games with this girl. She truly was the first child born after the System arrive. Her knives had tasted blood but her optimism was untainted. Plus, she had been raised by two of the most capable people that Randidly knew.

“For the sake of the Earth, I really hope that’s the case,” Randidly said softly. And when he patted Delilah’s head, he surreptitiously created an Aether connection with her. There was already one partially present due to her being Annie’s daughter, who Randidly also had a connection with. But Randidly believed that this youngster deserved a flow of Aether of her very own.

As long as she could keep that pure confidence, she might someday save the Earth. That sort of certainty could birth an image that even Randidly would need to be cautious of.