'Summons? Never seen ones like this!' Ali narrowed his gaze as he studied the two colossal warriors of bronze, their armour gleaming beneath the rays of sunlight. They radiated a heavy pressure, one that even the wind bent around. Each time they shifted slightly, the ground beneath their feet compressed, indenting under their weight.
The massive shields they held were etched with ancient sigils, and their spears shimmered with the faint glow of runes long forgotten by time.
Then—
"Please calm down," a robotic voice cut through the thick tension like a surgical blade.
The bronze soldiers didn't react. But Atreus turned slowly, eyes sharp behind his helmet, searching for the speaker.
"I suggest you cancel your spell, King of Sparta," the voice added, laced with casual sarcasm and mockery. Despite its mechanical tone, it had a smugness to it—disarming, yet provoking.
"Who?" Atreus's voice rumbled low as he turned to face the new arrival.
There, behind him, stood a figure cloaked in a pitch-black hood. The figure was lean, around six feet tall, its face completely hidden beneath the fabric, save for the slight, unnatural gleam from within the darkness of the hood.
"How about we all just wait until the mission ends and we all go back safe and sound?" the figure said again. The robotic inflection remained, though now the playful tone was clearer. It moved with a human's casual grace, but everything about it screamed machine.
Atreus took in a deep breath, visibly restraining himself. His jaw tightened beneath his helmet as he gave Ali one final glare, then exhaled slowly. With a sharp tap of the spear's butt to the ground—less thunderous than before—he silently dismissed the massive bronze warriors. They flickered and dissolved into gold particles like the dying embers of a fading flame.
'Thank you, brothers,' he whispered inwardly in Ancient Greek as the soldiers vanished.
With quiet frustration, Atreus turned and walked back toward the fallen tree trunk. Removing his helmet, he revealed a cascade of thick, chestnut-brown hair that tumbled down his shoulders. Beneath the warlike exterior, his face was youthful and striking—stone-carved and noble, but burdened by the pride of kingship.
Ali walked forward, unbothered. As he neared, the hooded figure stepped aside and turned slightly, acknowledging him.
"You're welcome," the synthetic voice said, nonchalant.
Ali didn't even glance at it.
He passed by in silence.
"No thank you for saving your life?" the figure added, raising its voice just slightly.
"Maybe if you were here in person," Ali replied, cold and direct, still not turning his head.
'Why say thank you to a robot?' he thought. His hyper-attuned senses picked up no heartbeat, no pulse, no organic warmth. Only the quiet, rhythmic hum of an internal reactor softly vibrating within the figure's frame.
The hooded presence didn't speak again and simply drifted toward the back of the group, fading into the margins without another word.
Ali's black eyes scanned the rest of the gathered players, calculating and precise. 'Some high rankers here… even the gifted apostle of the Nature guild. First time I've seen him in person, but I've heard the stories. He's strong—far stronger than his rank lets on.'
From his seat upon a throne of living vines, the apostle sat silently. The plants had intertwined and woven themselves into a wide, regal chair beneath him, pulsing softly with a verdant glow.
"You killed Toji?" Geto asked from the edge of the clearing, his voice tense but laced with hope. The name had been whispered again and again among the players, each mention laced with fear or awe.
Ali didn't respond with words.
He simply snapped his fingers.
In a shimmer of light, the inverted heavenly spear materialised in his hand. He held it loosely, almost lazily, and then raised it up toward Geto.
"Do you know what this is?" Ali asked, his tone unreadable.
Geto straightened slightly, gathering what courage he could.
"Would you let us go if I told you?" he asked, carefully. There was a tremor in his voice, but he managed to meet Ali's gaze.
"Did I not warn you, sorcerer?" a voice called out from the side.
It was the Nature Apostle. His eyes glowed faintly as he leaned deeper into his throne of twisting bark and leaves.
He turned to Ali next.
"It's the Inverted Heavenly Spear. As far as I know, it's the strongest weapon in here," the apostle explained, his words measured, watching Ali with scholarly curiosity.
Ali looked down at the spear again. It was clean—eerily so, untouched by rust or age, sharp enough to whisper through air. Still, he frowned. "Really?" he murmured.
'I still can't figure out this weapon, can resist my Force and touch a lightsaber but that's it… and this is supposed to be the strongest this world has to offer? Maybe this Jujutsu place is low tier.'
UGHHHH
MMMMMMMMM
Ali's attention snapped toward the edge of the forest. His enhanced hearing caught the sound instantly—a stifled whimper, low and pained, coming from just beyond the tree line.
Geto tried again. "What do you want from us?" he asked, growing more anxious by the second. Amanai gripped his sleeve tightly behind him, her eyes scanning the players nervously.
He had thought Ali might be the sanest one here. After all, he'd saved them from Toji.
"Just wait here a little more and we'll all be gone. So shut up and be a good dog," Ali said without turning, waving him off casually as he walked away.
He followed the sound—steps light, focused.
'Let's see what we have here…'
As he neared the thick copse of trees, a figure emerged from the shadows.
The man was clad in a full-body suit of sleek black armor, his face hidden behind a futuristic helmet with a glowing red visor across the front. He had one hand resting calmly on a massive katana sheathed across his back.
'A modern samurai?' Ali thought, raising an eyebrow.
Then the man spoke.
"Ali?"
The voice was unmistakable.
"Mark?" Ali replied, immediately connecting the voice to the name.
The armoured man lifted his helmet off with a hiss of pressure, revealing a rugged, middle-aged face. A familiar smirk played on his lips despite the chaos around them.
Ali tilted his head. "Why are you crying behind a tree?" he asked bluntly.
Mark chuckled and raised a hand. "It's not me—"
"SHHH. Shut up—owww…"
A smaller voice interrupted from behind the tree. It was the voice of a young girl, followed by a pained groan. The sound carried a mix of frustration and genuine distress.
Ali's eyes narrowed.
Mark smiled and gave a small shake of his head as he stepped aside, allowing Ali to move forward.
Ali did, his boots crunching softly on the grass as he stepped around the wide tree trunk. Mark followed beside him, and both men looked down in unison at the scene behind it.
There, nestled in the crook of roots and dirt, was a blonde teenage girl sitting on the forest floor. Her face was streaked with tears, her cheeks flushed red with heat and humiliation. She held her right arm tightly against her chest, cradling it with visible pain etched across her features.
Her breathing hitched the moment she saw Ali. The tears slowed, and the embarrassment quickly overtook the pain. Her entire face went beet red, burning with the vulnerability of being seen in such a state.
"Don't look," the young girl muttered, immediately turning her head away, hiding her face from Ali's eyes. Her voice cracked with emotion, raw and shaken.
"Careful with the arm," Mark said gently, crouching beside her and helping shift her into a more comfortable sitting position without aggravating the injury. His hands were careful, practiced—he'd clearly done this before.
Ali's eyes, however, weren't focused on her injury.
He studied Clare's face closely, immediately registering the subtle but undeniable changes in her. 'Her eyes… completely red. And those sharp canines…' The signs were clear.
"You're a vampire," Ali said matter-of-factly, his voice calm but laced with curiosity. The words seemed to echo through the moment, drawing Clare's full attention.
She blinked at him in surprise, caught off guard. "How'd you know?" she asked, astonished, as if her traits weren't already screaming it to anyone who knew what to look for.
Before Ali could answer, Clare winced.
"Owww—it hurts…" she whimpered, the pain of her broken arm yanking her thoughts back into the present.
Mark reminded her again, softly but firmly, not to move too much. Then he stood, stepping back beside Ali, his arms crossed as he looked at the girl with a mixture of pity and protectiveness.
"Do you have a painkiller for her?" Mark asked hopefully, glancing at Ali with a tinge of desperation.
"No," Ali replied, his voice still flat. "All you can do is wait. It should be over soon anyway." He flicked open his interface, checking for the telltale signs of the world event's conclusion.
"You're right… and it's all thanks to you, ah?" Mark let out a soft chuckle, running a hand through his hair. "You should've seen these high-rankers. All of them standing around, waiting for someone else to go down into the temple first. Cowards. Including me—but I've got a kid to take care of." He nodded toward Clare, who was still writhing slightly on the ground.
'She is a kid after all,' Ali thought, watching her quietly. 'You give a child superpowers, but in the end… they're still just kids.'
"It was fun," Ali said simply.
Mark scoffed and shook his head, his grin widening. "Of course. Only you would call fighting a monster like Toji 'fun'—walk away without a scratch and say that."
"So even those two didn't want to try?" Ali asked, nodding toward the other players. His gaze drifted across the clearing to where the apostle of the Nature Guild sat cross-legged on his throne of vines, reading his glowing grimoire in silence. Not far from him, Atreus was wiping blood off his bronze spear with absolute focus.
"Even them," Mark replied with a sigh. "Toji's too much of a risk. Well—maybe not him, but his cursed tools… those are what really scare people."
"What about his tools?" Ali asked.
Mark turned toward him, raising a brow in disbelief. "Wait—you don't know?" He stared at Ali like he'd just confessed to flying blind. "You fought the Sorcerer Killer without knowing about his weapons? Do you do this on purpose?"
"Just say it," Ali replied coolly, unmoved by the reaction.
Mark sighed and rubbed his forehead. "Alright. I know about two—and that's already more than enough for me to stay the hell away from him. See, besides his insane speed and strength—which, by the way, I'd say is around five points—he has this katana. Thing's legendary. Super sharp, and known for being an edge-breaker. Anyone who fights him in close range gets shredded. Doesn't matter how good your gear is, that thing will ruin it—and you."
'Yeah… I felt that firsthand,' Ali thought, remembering the way his quinque cracked against Toji's blade.
"But the real problem," Mark continued, "is his other weapon: the Inverted Spear of Heaven. Supposedly the strongest cursed tool in all of Jujutsu Kaisen. Sharp as hell, like the katana—but way more dangerous. It has an ability that lets it cancel out any kind of magic. Doesn't matter what world it's from. If it's magic or supernatural—it'll cut right through it." Mark exhaled, letting the weight of the words settle.
"In the hands of someone like Toji?" he added, shaking his head. "You know better than I do how lethal that is."
"I see…" Ali raised his hand and snapped his fingers.
In a flicker of golden light, the spear appeared in his palm. Mark's eyes widened as if they might fall out of his skull.
Mark took a stunned step back.
"He was really unlucky to go up against me then," Ali said casually, flipping the spear and studying the weapon again. The light glinted off the deadly edge.
'A hand-to-hand expert who doesn't need magic—and a better body. For Toji, what gave him an advantage in every other battle was the very thing that doomed him against me.' Ali's thoughts were calm.
Mark opened his mouth to respond—but the world around them changed before he could speak.
All at once, the vibrant forest, the players, the very fabric of the realm itself dissolved into shimmering blue light.
Geto and Amanai collapsed to the ground in confusion as the energy evaporated into the sky, their wide eyes watching as the strangers around them vanished into fading blue lights.
They had no way of knowing the full truth. No way of realising what their world had just endured. How it had been invaded, twisted, drained—its most sacred resource harvested like by oblivious humans.
It had all happened without warning. And now, like a fading dream, it was over.
Their world would never be the same.
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Five chapters ahead of webnovel on patreon.com/Rondo312