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Whether we were talking about those 14 female survivors, or those 27 soldiers, both had been completely robbed of their free will. And judging by the state of things, they might even turn their blades on me.

With that in mind… I should start by securing them. There’s been enough deaths in Southern Plains already, I do not want to add to that tally.

System, I’m looking for a tool here, do you have something to recommend to me?

“Definitely, how about the famous webbing of the Dryders? For just 998 points, you can purchase a set that will immobilize everyone. Not only will they be taken out of the picture, they will be kept safe as well. All that for just 998, delivery included too~”

Sounds a little pricey, but if it’s to protect the hypnotized, I guess I have no choice.

998, right, I’ll take it!

Still feels like a scam to me…

“Perfect, since our valued host is so decisive, the system has generously decided to just settle them on behalf of our valued host.”

Having said that, a storm of white threads blasted out of thin air. Then through some unknown miracle, the webbing sought out the survivors, and finally trapped them in a cocoon of their own. Like an ant that had gotten trapped in a web, the more they tried to break free, the tighter their binding became.

“Goddess, I see you’ve made your own preparations too.” Yamabe smiled deviously, not at all bothered by his pawns being immobilised. “I wanted to slowly have them commit suicide, but…”

“Surrender, you aren’t a match for me.” I coldly eyed him, a dangerous glint flashing across my eyes. “It will be too late if you force me to act.”

“We won’t know who will come out the winner till we try. You’d better be careful yourself, Goddess, you wouldn’t want to get caught by me.”

At that last word, he swiftly backed away, eyes closed as he did so… Was he trying to activate his ability?

I had witnessed him use his ability multiple times already. Each time, he had to prepare for a few seconds. The longest I’ve seen him prepare was ten seconds, and I had never seen him activate his ability instantaneously.

As long as I interrupted him during this period, his ability would fail to activate.

And that time was now!

I fired off a Fireball with a wave of my hands. In under a second, a roaring sphere of flames filled his entire field of vision – this was my victory!

Yet he already had his eyes open the moment I fired off that spell. And to my surprise, he even activated his psychokinesis.

“Begone!”

Powered by a mysterious energy, reality itself seemed to bend to his will.

As the words left his mouth, the sphere of flames immediately deviated off course and even did a one-eighty to fly back at me.

Flame Wall!

I waved my hands and cast a wall of flames, blocking the fiery projectile while obscuring his vision. With this window of opportunity, I summoned my Shadow Guardian.

Gifted with its own will, it did not even require any instruction on my part as it darted towards the retreating boy, as I had intended.

By now, Yamabe had managed to float up to the top of the zombie hill. He slowly sat himself down on his handmade throne for dramatic effect, then barked, “Flames!”

A second later, the white webbing around the survivors burst into flames! As the incandescent monster chewed through the webbing, the temperature around them only became more unbearable by the second. At this rate, the survivors would get burned to death before the webbing gave way.

Crap, I need to find a way to extinguish that fire, but I don’t have any water-based skills… and I don’t remember any being on sale either.

“Valued host, there’s no need to worry at all. As long as you have the points, your system has the goods.”

You scumbag, you’re trying to profit off my misfortune… How much?

Even if I hated her profiteering, I really had no choice now.

“Not much, just 200.”

I’ll pay! Extinguish those flames!

“My pleasure.”

As she promised, the white webbings immediately turned an icy blue and even began emitting a white mist… did she change the elemental nature of the web?

An instant later, the flames were snuffed out.

But if that was truly the case, wouldn’t that mean that the temperature was now super low? Are they going to get frozen to death?

“Not at all, every product your system has sold thus far has always been top quality. There’s no need to worry, dear valued host, the webbing won’t harm them.”

As she said, while her prices were criminal, they were never defective. With her guarantee, my worries were allayed.

“As expected of my Goddess, I am in awe.” Having countered every move he had made thus far, Yamabe clapped his hands in admiration as he continued, “I will admit, I did not expect your abilities to be this wondrous, but I guess that’s only to be expected of the Goddess I looked up to.”

“You aren’t too bad yourself, you scheming *******. Your ability can be activated instantly, can’t it? But you made sure to always prepare for a few seconds when you demonstrated it before me. I bet you were already scheming against me then. You’re the one with the true ulterior motives.”

“I am not, and I did not. All that was just a precaution, I did not expect that we would actually fight.”

“Keep acting, keep acting.” I glared at the boy hatefully. “I really thought we could be friends.”

“Friends? Not lovers?” He grinned evilly. “If we aren’t lovers, then…”

He never finished his sentence, as the next moment later, a black hand pierced his skull without any warning.

Yamabe Takuma was dead…

Silent as the night, he had no warning at all before my Shadow Guardian struck.

I looked at the boy’s lifeless face and sighed, my emotions a complicated mess right now. “I bet you never realised that some main characters actually die at the end of their novels, especially the dark heroes. But I guess it doesn’t matter now that you’re dead…”

“Explode!”

Then the unexpected happened. Even though Yamabe was clearly dead, I still heard his thunderous yell echo across the cavernous floor. Following which, his corpse exploded along with the Shadow Guardian which wasn’t able to return in time.

Thump…

At the same instant that the Shadow Guardian died, I could feel a heavy pain in my chest, knocking me breathless for a second.

“Too bad I’m not such a useless main character.”

Shameless Self-promotion

Announcement: I’ve re-opened my Patreon in case anyone wants to sponsor more chapters. Every end of the month, those chapters in early access will be released for free for all to read. If you sponsored a chapter, you will gain permanent early access to these chapters. Essentially, everyone gets more chapters to read, but those who donated get to read earlier. More chapters will then be translated at the start of the month. Explanation on the Patreon itself.

LINK HERE