Chapter 1438 (1/2)

Randidly glanced up at the looming form of Dozer in front of him. He had been surprised that Dozer made the trip up to his island, and even more surprised by what he had to say. “You want… to go into my Soulskill? Why?”

It was night and with the constant presence of the silver mist, Dozer’s silhouette was large and dark. The overhanging clouds even smothered any hope of starlight. They were facing each other in near darkness. The man tilted his head to the side. “I believe it is my duty as a father.”

That certainly made Randidly alarmed. He put his hands on his knees, slightly distracted by the coolness of his metal left hand against his thigh. “Did something happen?”

“No. And I don’t think it ever will,” Dozer replied in a placid tone. After a moment of scrutiny, Randidly leaned back and considered that. He was actually very impressed by Dozer’s self-control; it was clear from a single look at his image that Dozer was deeply upset. But considering the iron grip that he had over his reactions, Randidly didn’t think that Dozer would go wild within his Soulskill. Despite the fact this matter clearly was related to Delilah.

Besides, the people in his Soulskill weren’t that easy to bully. If Dozer behaved too wildly, he might encounter quite a bit of resistance.

Randidly thought for several seconds and Dozer stood still in the darkness and didn’t push. That was enough to convince him.

So Randidly agreed and teleported Dozer to within his Soulskill. After monitoring him for a few seconds to make sure he didn’t immediately destroy the surroundings, Randidly pulled his attention away and made a mental note to ask Lucretia about the situation later. Then Randidly turned his attention back to the swirling Nether Nebula in his chest. Yet only a few seconds later, Randidly frowned and looked over to the Southwest.

Dusk had fallen, with the Order Ducis managing to endure through all ten of the preliminaries to arrive at the goal of reducing the number of duos to 1000. The process of Randidly monitoring the situation and removing defeated teams while also counting points proved both tedious and unnecessary; the people participating in the tournament were so enthusiastic about the violent competition that they quickly fought until their numbers dropped to the appropriate amount without needing Randidly to count at all.

However, they faced a new problem after the preliminaries were over: complaints.

It seemed like every one of the defeated people had special circumstances that made their loss unfair. They were ambushed. They were lied to. The elements of the preliminary were particularly harmful to them. Their opponent had cheated. They hadn’t realized that the match had started before they were attacked.

On and on, these complainers ranted about their lot in life. They found the Order Ducis members that were busy keeping the peace and kept them from doing their jobs. The huge crowds and the festive atmosphere already strained the small city’s resources; even the Order Ducis couldn’t handle everything itself, let alone with the buzzing of these flies.

So Randidly had intervened, creating a Redemption Arena that would go on throughout the night until the matches started again tomorrow. After all, the ideal number for a tournament would be 1024, so the matches could proceed to the finals without byes. So Randidly allowed that the 24 most powerful duos from the Redemption Arena would become a finalist, even though they had lost in the preliminaries.

Randidly had quickly constructed an arena in a forest to the Southwest, but that area had quickly been destroyed and the rubble flattened by the sheer number of people who enthusiastically participated. Randidly’s eyelid twitched as he clearly sensed that many people that hadn’t been allowed into the tournament rushed to participate. The place quickly evolved into a raging brawl with no signs of abating after several hours of conflict.

After all, there were no rules to this arena. It had been created too quickly, just to alleviate the other problems. So after people were wounded, individuals could leave the worst of the fighting and recover some before returning to the action. Randidly crossed his fingers and hoped that the mass of bodies would be able to agree on the 24 strongest, come dawn.

Helen and Ajax had been all too happy to monitor the situation so things didn’t get too out of hand, but they just ended up joining the melee. But as long as they understood that they wouldn’t be able to join the tournament, Randidly didn’t mind their enthusiasm. He just welcomed the chance for a break.

Tatiana did say that Senator Firefly sent over a short letter requesting that Randidly and Kharon help with the clean-up effort afterward, considering that a sizable area that was being demolished while the Redemption Arena raged. The television broadcasts trained on the area went all night, and talk show hosts apparently began claiming that Randidly’s image was so powerful that it “incited anyone nearby to violence” and referring to him sometimes as a ‘Chaotic God of War’.

Tatiana found it very amusing. But Randidly could only grimace. It felt… extremely strange to have the world so casually push all the responsibility for their repressed and violent population on to his shoulders.

Shaking his head, Randidly refocused himself. He quickly pushed away the chaotic noises and images from the fighting below. From the level of the people participating, Helen and Ajax were more than capable of handling it. They didn’t need his help. Instead, he focused again on his Nether Nebula and the slowly increasing weight at its core.

The pale streaks of grey around that core were increasing as time passed, seemingly churned outward as the Nether Nebula completed a rotation. Those grey streaks began to change the character of his Nether. Randidly clearly felt that, if he hadn’t been suppressing the Nether around him into a thin disc, he could rather easily destabilize the space around him.

Congratulations! Your Skill Nether Sensation (L) has grown to Level 237!

The question is whether I need to do something about this before heading to the Nexus… Randidly thought with narrowed eyes. In addition, how can I establish the equivalent of a Class within my Nether? Perhaps if I give the Nether more structure, it won’t occupy such a large area or be so obvious…

The problem with this idea was that Randidly truly didn’t have the slightest clue where to begin. His mind flashed back to Yystrix’s movie and he cursed her for not showing more of her interactions with the Nether King. Without an example, Randidly was essentially groping in the dark.