Why Did You Summon Me?

Baiyi stood there in trepidation, but he chose to calm himself before the feeling could gain traction. He had already taken up the elderly couple’s request, and nothing could be done about that.

His psychic energy surged and began to spread until it covered the entire forest.

In this era, although human civilization was growing at a great pace, industrialization had not yet begun. Thus, natural entities were still in pristine condition, and wildlife — ranging from the mundane to the strange — thrived. A cursory sweep with his psychic energy allowed Baiyi to detect a plethora of animals and bizarre flora.

More importantly, he had detected a group of humans on the other side of the forest. There was a settlement there, which Baiyi suspected to be the village or encampment of outsiders.

Even during the golden age of the Empire, the Sage-Emperor of magi, who was the ruler at the time, could not achieve his dream of unifying Isythre. Despite the Empire’s impressive conquests, the area it occupied was not half as big as the Southern Continent of modern-day Isythre, not to mention the Northern Continent. The Walthart Empire was many times larger than the Ancient Rohlserlian Empire, even during the latter’s prime.

The problem was not that the Archmage wars were unsuccessful. On the contrary, the problem lied with the empire — the people and the economy; both could not keep up with his speed of conquest.

Hence, smaller nations, independent city-states, and tribal settlements were left scattered beyond the borders of the Empire. The Sage-Emperor had once dreamed of annexing other nations and destroying those that would not submit, but he could not accomplish it, up till the day he was accidentally kicked into the Void. In the time that Baiyi had been thrust into, it was no surprise that there were many outsider nations, as the Archmage’s rule had just begun.

Hence, it was also not a surprise that many outlander settlements lay close to Aegir, a town at the border of the ancient Rohserlian empire.

‘I really hope you were not abducted by some cruel outlanders, young man. I hope even more that you were not abducted by a group of really hungry cannibals,’  Baiyi thought. He soared into the air and shot in the direction of the settlement he had detected.

Baiyi landed near the settlement and masked his presence with modern stealth methods. Afterward, he easily snuck into the settlement.

He had expected the settlement to be an indigenous tribal village, but a few seconds of covert exploration robbed him of that notion. There were two hundred people in this settlement, and none of them were clad in leaves, had paints smeared all over, or held wooden spears. The residents were all fully dressed, albeit in clothes different in style from those worn by the Rohlserlians.

The residents had their own language, as well. It was not Ancient Rohlserlese, but Baiyi certainly did not hear any intelligible grunts or growls mixed with their speech. From their fearsome aura and thug-like appearance, Baiyi suspected this place to be a mountain settlement of outlaws, who were once soldiers and had escaped from their captors during a past war.

Robbery was common in the time of the ancient Rohlserlian Empire. This was not surprising for a place where wars of varying magnitude broke out frequently. Many of these outlaws were soldiers that had fled when their armies or countries were annihilated. Outlaws like these often lived in groups for survival and set up camps deep in the forests or the mountains, where it was easier to evade the empire’s surveillance. To survive, these bandits raided nearby towns, especially those at the border. They were a major headache for the ancient Rohlserlian Empire.

Although these outlaws were no match for the Empire’s border patrols, the military training they had undergone made it easy for them to bully normal villagers, who had zero combat experience. There had been some extreme cases recorded where entire towns had been torched and residents massacred by outlaws.

The worst thing about these outlaws was that they could not be wiped out completely, akin to weeds in a field of crops. These looters had survived despite the ancient Rohlserlian’s best efforts to wipe them out, and when the empire fell, they were the first to rush in and plunder what was left, to enrich themselves.

“My, my. Since I am  Emperor Rohlserl the Twentieth, I guess it is my responsibility to send you people to the afterlife,” Baiyi murmured. He raised a finger to cast a spell when he saw a few outlaws dragging a young man to a clearing at the center of the settlement.

They pushed the young man to the ground roughly, and his face fell at the feet of a man whose face was scarred. This man seemed to be their leader.

The young man looked haggard. His body was riddled with bruises, and his face had many black and blue spots. It was evident that a few fists had made contact with his face, at some point in time. The young man had been beaten so badly, it took Baiyi some time to mentally reconstruct his face. Only then did Baiyi realize that the poor man was the elderly couple’s missing son.

He had been abducted by the outlaws when he was out hunting and had been dragged across the forest, back to their settlement. That explained why no one in Aegir could find him.

“You! Tell me now: where is your town?!” The scar-faced chief barked in broken Ancient Rohlserlese. “Tell me, and I no kill you!”

These outlaws did not own a map, neither were they familiar with the terrain in which they built their settlement, so they needed outsiders to lead them to other villages, where they could plunder to their hearts’ content. Hence, scenes like this happened often.

Although the young man had been bruised and battered, he was more headstrong than the outlaws had hoped for. Despite the intense pain coursing through his body, the young man only gave a playful smile in reply. Parting his bloodied lips, he whispered, “F*** you.”

“Hmph! You think I have not seen stubborn idiot mules like you before? I have, but not one of them is you Rohlserlians! Rohlserlians are wimps; all weak-a**! Today, I teach you a very good lesson.” The scar-faced chief’s lips curled into a sadistic smile. He unsheathed a dagger hung at his waist and pointed it at one of the young man’s eyes. Both eyes had been swollen shut, but that had not deterred the chief.

In this situation, many would beg for their lives before succumbing to their oppressors, but the young man was more valiant and proud than he looked. He knew that his eyes were going to be gouged out, but he was hellbent on not giving the chief any satisfaction.

The young man smiled in disdain and opened his mouth, but no words came out; he was too exhausted to speak.

His head drooped, and he leaned forward, unconscious.

The chief was startled, and then his face flushed with embarrassment, as his prisoner had slept during his interrogation. He was just about to wake the prisoner when a voice resounded just beside him. “Not bad. Your courage makes your two brothers proud. But now, I think it’s time for a good rest. You’ll be home by the time you wake up.”

Suddenly, the two outlaws holding up the young man’s arms crashed to the ground loudly. Their heads had been twisted in an unnatural angle and their necks snapped.

When the young man’s arms were let go of, he fell forward, but before he crashed to the ground, an invisible force hoisted him up.

“Who the hell?!” The chief exclaimed in his native language, slashing his dagger wildly. A loud clang rang out as the dagger struck an armor that had materialized in its trajectory.

The chief’s face turned pale. He tried to pull his dagger back, but it was stuck between the fingers of the mysterious assailant. The blade would not budge an inch.

“Who you?!” The chief feigned anger, but the fear in his voice was still discernible.

“A stubborn mule. A stubborn Rohlserlian mule that you never dreamed you would meet,” Baiyi replied dismissively, twisting his fingers, which caused the blade to snap into two. He flicked his fingers casually, and one half of the blade flew and embedded itself in the space between the chief’s eyebrows.

The other outlaws were stunned. They screamed and scattered, fleeing as though they had just encountered a terrible monster.

“Uh. What a bunch of small fries,” Baiyi sneered. He carried the young man — who he had knocked out cold with his magic — and soared into the air with his mana. From above, he watched the fleeing outlaws. He raised his hand, calling for the Book of Servitude. He intended to end them all with a well-placed Forbidden Spell.

However, the Book of Servitude did not respond.

Startled, Baiyi searched for the Book within his consciousness. He could tell that his link with the book was not broken, but for reason, it did not respond to his call.

“Oh, s**t .” A thought surfaced in Baiyi’s mind, closely followed by a wave of anxiety. “Oh, s**t! Goddamnit! What have I done?!” Baiyi cursed as he watched the outlaws scamper like ants whose nest had been destroyed. A Forbidden Spell was out of the question, it seemed. He would have to kill them one by one.

For the next few minutes, bloodcurdling screams rang out in the forest, and the lush-green forest had become a mass grave irrigated by a stream of blood.

Silence soon returned to the forest.

“That was the last of them, right? Dammit! With a Forbidden Spell, I could have finished them all at once. Now, look at this place! It’s like I just committed genocide!” Baiyi complained.

“But, I’m more worried about the other thing. Oh, no, please don’t notice what I’ve done.”

Baiyi — who was now worried about the Book of Servitude — did not search for survivors. He flew off in Aegir’s direction, with the young man in tow.

After he had gone, a lone survivor crawled out from underneath the corpses of his partners. After taking in the surrounding with his eyes, the man’s heart could bear no more. He looked down for respite, only to find his feet drenched in the blood of his friends.

No longer able to contain himself, the surviving outlaw wailed.

Baiyi did not care if anyone had survived his assault. His psychic energy covered the area in front of him, and he flew as fast as possible. His psychic energy did not detect anyone chasing him.

Baiyi then probed the Book of Servitude with his consciousness and realized it was still not active

“Okay, he probably didn’t notice it. I mean, he has always been careless, right? It was only  for a second. It was too brief for an airhead like him to notice! Too subtle for him, right?” Baiyi muttered, trying to comfort himself.

Several miles away from his location, a grand procession was underway. At the center of the convoy was a majestic, open-roof coach. A man in his thirties, who had a face as chiseled as a mahjong piece, sat regally on a lavish cushion. Despite the merriment that was taking place around him, the man was focused on the golden scepter in his hand, which he was rubbing whilst wearing a sour expression.

One look at the coach and the man’s extravagant robe was enough to indicate that he was of high status.

The coach was surrounded by soldiers. They looked weary, but they had their chests out in pride as they marched forward. The army were on their way back after emerging victorious in a battle.

There were two sorcerers riding white horses just beside the coach. One of them noticed the noble man’s grim expression and leaned in closer, saying with a low voice, “Your Majesty, is our last victory not satisfactory? How much more should we achieve to finally earn your approv—”

“Silence! Not one more word from you,” the man in the coach snapped, rising from his seat.

He glared at the sorcerer and issued a command: “Bring your men and follow me.”