William stared blankly at the dark sky.
'Huh. Lot to unpack there.'
It was as if he had understood what Sang Pianyi's motivations were a bit more.
'Poor guy.'
He thought about what he had just seen whilst standing inside a metro train. They had realized that since the malls still had electricity, the rest of the city likely functioned normally as well, so they traversed an abandoned metro station to find a faster form of transport.
'Setting aside how horrifically dark that story turned...There was some kind of entity there, and long before the Library descended at that...This could mean several things, but I should gain more information first before making any hasty deductions.'
While the small cohort patiently waited on the train, William thought about the vastness of the world.
'Reader, Scholar, Savant, Sage, Enchiridion, eh? If that's all that it takes to ascend to godhood, the leap of power between stages would be immensely vast. However, from what I experienced from Linen and that wind woman, they were much stronger, yes, and I don't think I could win against them alone in a head-on fight, if I were given favourable conditions, victory wouldn't be out of the picture. But, maybe the stage's powers are increasing exponentially, that'd explain it.'
Then a sudden thought came to mind.
'Hmm...The information about the five stages, how did we find out? This world has never even produced an enchiridion before!' William began to stress out internally.
'Oh, I believe I remember the World Council publishing a statement on it. Perhaps they found the information through some types of means? They are the strongest verifiers around after all.' William wondered, though these questions weren't exactly the most important regarding their current situation.
'I guess so.'
By this time, they had already arrived at their destination, so they hopped off the train and hopped up the stairs to reach...A more rural area of New Shanghai. The Jingliu district.
Upon exiting the station, they were greeted by a rather empty street. This was around a week into the Fame Game, so most ordinary participants had perished, and the stronger participants had joined with other factions.
William and company followed the directions of William's phone's GPS thoroughly. Given that they had travelled by metro line, they should have been ahead of Sang Pianyi's group, and shortly behind the kidnapper's, which meant that they could probably get the jump on them before Sang Pianyi did anything rash with whatever abilities he possessed.
There wasn't much to say about this stretch of the journey. Using the power of the pendants, they sensed that Sang Pianyi's group was a decent distance behind them, and likewise, they sensed that they were ahead of them.
Given what information they had, William's group could only follow the directions and hope they encountered the kidnappers. So they did exactly that.
For two whole hours!
Eventually, they caught a sign of life. They had arrived at a large clearing with a massive open field. This meant that footprints could be visible, and visible they were. The imprints of shoes, boots, and vehicles were scattered throughout the field, with a clear direction they were pointing in.
With prospects looking bright, the group made their way through the field, all with their guard up. The illusion bubble surrounding them was still intact, making outside detection difficult and giving them the stealth advantage here.
After reaching the middle of the clearing, William felt something was off, and for the first time in a while.
[Attribute: Avatar of the Records, yawns while gazing at leaves.]
'Y-yawns? What the hell does that mean!'
However, William would shortly find the answers to his queries, as the earth beneath them began to shake.
'A warning?'
The group barely had any time to react before the ground underneath them collapsed, revealing a massive chasm. At the bottom of the chasm, they could see what looked to be several people draped in shadows, likely the subordinates of the Lord of Shadows.
'Not Good...'
As he fell, William immediately sprang into action.
[Record: A Chaotic Odyssey has descended into reality.]
'Why did the name change...Hmm, hey whoever changed it, if you can hear this, make it better next time!'
He tried to summon a platform of Ingenuity and activate his skill, but it seemed this skill had a unique requirement for entirely physical entities, so he took off his coat and used it as a platform.
[Skill: Chariot, has been activated!]
The coat began to shine an ethereal gold. Like a beacon of hope in the center of the chasm. He quickly began swooping around and grabbing the rest of his squadron, using the pendants' feature to accurately swoop in and grab each of them, with Xiao Wei turning into a long, shadowy rope to hold them all together.
Thanks to his strength glove, he managed to bear the weight of them all, if only barely.
However, the enemy didn't just sit idly by and watch William try to save his followers. They began to fire all sorts of ranged attacks. Several beams, blasts, and other projectiles went straight for William, aiming to kill.
'Damn ranged attack abusers...'
William tried his best to avoid the attacks; a couple made it through and hit him. However, luckily, they managed to avoid any internal damage, just a couple of moderate wounds on the surface, nothing he wasn't used to.
He landed on the ledge of the chasm carrying a big, shadowy net containing his comrades, to which Xiao Wei would promptly dispel, turning back into a cat and hopping onto William's right shoulder.
He dusted his gloves off while panting softly, before staring at the area around them. Noone should stake their lives on a trap as simple as that one, and the number of people in the chasm was much fewer than the horde he had seen abducting his people, so they must have had some kind of backup.
He signaled for the Reader of Illusions to disable the bubble of illusionment; after all, it was clear they had decided to fight here. A strange decision, but one that worked in William's favor, so he didn't mind.
Turning around towards the grand field, he spoke calmly and loudly.
"This is your last warning, you f*cks, a courtesy call. Surrender all of the people you kidnapped, or all of you perish tonight." He declared with a sinister grin.
From the shadows in every direction, figures emerged. All clad in shadowy armor and hoods, obscuring their identities, genders, and ages. Every one of them was wielding some weapon: blades, spears, claymores, and axes.
The figures inside the chasm also turned into shadows at this time, forming a shadow tsunami that surged out of the hole and surrounded William's group, before reforming into shadowy figures. William estimated that there were around a hundred shadow soldiers, compared to their measly group of ten.
A battle that was heavily stacked in the enemy's odds, something William hadn't experienced in a while.
Behind the vast army in front of him, William managed to catch a glimpse of what looked like some kind of black-coloured carriage caravan. Large enough to house several dozen bodies, he stared at it with conviction.
'It's come time for me to prove myself as a leader, I suppose.'
Suddenly, a very familiar voice spoke, coming from in front of William; at the mere sound of it, William's eyes held a ghostly glint, as his smile turned even more murderous than before.
"Ehe~ What do we have here?"