Chereads / The Gods Must Die / Chapter 5 - Chapter V - Display of Power

Chapter 5 - Chapter V - Display of Power

"Pardon?"

Ultio sighed and eyed Eric warily. 'Is his hearing dysfunctional? But we had been conversing normally for the past few minutes, so that shouldn't be the case,' He thought and peered behind him at the door and the large windows of the storefront that revealed the street outside.

"The eye of a god," Ultio repeated himself politely, responding to Eric's request. "By the way, your attackers are closing in,"

Eric seemed overwhelmed by Ultio's offer and was forced to take a seat on his worktable. "How sure am I that you're not a swindler?" He asked after gulping audibly.

"Life hasn't given me the luxury to be a simple swindler,"

"T-then you're honest?"

Ultio sighed and had to rub his temples to control his disappointment. "Get your bearings back, young man,"

"M-my bad," Eric apologized hurriedly and adjusted his plain white shirt, before running a hand through the curls of his short blonde hair. He didn't even pay attention to the fact that Ultio had called him a young man, even though they looked about the same age.

"Now... Choose,"

*****

Ultio casually stared at the bald, aggressive-looking man standing before him.

Surrounding the two men were a dozen thugs, who were subordinates of this bald man.

"I am pleasantly surprised by your choice, Mister Midas," Ultio said to the blonde man, who was comfortably leaning against the wall of his store, watching as Ultio stood against Burek and his thugs.

"It wasn't hard to piece together. No matter what my choice was, you wouldn't want me to get hurt so I'll still be able to craft your apparel. So I chose the eye, knowing that you'll still protect me,"

Ultio chuckled and shrugged. "It's quite bold of you to claim you 'knew' I would have still protected you,"

Burek cracked his knuckles and interrupted the two's conversation. "Hey, hey, hey! You've got an opponent in front of you!" He said, somewhat annoyed that he was being ignored.

"I don't consider you as such," Ultio replied absentmindedly, his attention on his hands. He had only used his legs and feet to defeat Burek's thugs, and he had confirmed that Grimm Hand was only performed through his hands.

The large bald man called Burek growled like a beast.

Burek was a tall, broad-shouldered man with thick, bulging muscles. He wore a simple, short, blue vest– not unlike the one Eric was working on– on his torso, revealing his well-defined abdominal muscles. He had bandages wrapped around his forearms, but Ultio could tell he wasn't injured in anyway. Along with the white, baggy pants he wore, he had a red sash tied around his waist, and he wore a pair of black boots.

But he must eye-catching feature of this man, was the myriad of tattoos on his body. These tattoos were of powerful animals, and even some magical beasts.

"Hmph! Consider yourself honoured, because I will use this power against you," Burek said in a low tone, as the tattoos on his body began to glow. They were all of different colours, which made Burek look like a human rainbow.

These assault of different colours caused Ultio to smile slightly as a memory surfaced in his head. "You remind me of Bifröst," He said with a chuckle.

"Who?"

Ultio shook his head. "I don't know. But you remind me of it," He answered honestly, leaving both Burek and Eric confused.

"Hmph! Whatever," Burek muttered and shot forward. "Soul of the cheetah!"

The tattoo of a cheetah, which was on Burek's legs glowed brighter than the others. It was a bright yellow, and it glowed even through his clothes.

"Die!" Burek shouted and cocked his fist back.

"Soul of the ape!"

"Soul of the snake!"

"Soul of the tiger!"

"Soul of the buffalo!"

After seeing Ultio absolutely wreck all his trusted subordinates, Burek held nothing back as he unleashed his most powerful souls all at once. It put a large strain on his body, but he didn't mind as long as he could kill Ultio in one strike.

Ultio calmly watched Burek approaching him without even flinching. By the side, Eric had grown worried, seeing that Ultio hadn't moved an inch to dodge Burek's punch.

"This is the end for you, brat!" Burek said as he appeared right in front of Ultio. He was just about to let his fist fly, when the world suddenly crumbled away.

He found himself in an underground dungeon, staring at Ultio, who was casually standing a few steps away.

A quick glance around the dark dungeon revealed that it was just the two of them there. Nothing else was present. Nobody else was present.

"Where is this?" Burek asked cautiously as he still observed his new surroundings.

Ultio chuckled slightly. His irises were now red, with tiny runes forming the Alpha symbol in his right iris and the Omega symbol in his left. His black scleras made him appear slightly demonic, especially in the darkness of this dungeon.

"It's an illusionary world," Ultio replied lazily. "Now, I wouldn't waste words explaining the details, just know this; you should have never looked into my eyes,"

Burek widened his eyes and opened his mouth to speak, but at that moment something fell onto his right hand and the sound and smell of burning flesh filled the room. With watery eyes and clenched teeth, Burek turned to find a tiny, green slime on his hand, melting his flesh away.

"A-acid slime?" He asked with fear eating at his mind. Hesitantly, he looked up at the ceiling of the dungeon and his pupils shrank.

There were hundreds of them. And at that moment, they began to fall on him en masse.

Burek couldn't even scream, as the second acid slime to fall on him landed right on his face. The skin around his face began to melt away, and his eyeballs popped out of his skull, only to be melted as well. With his eyeballs gone, the slime slowly made its way into his skull and began to turn his brain into soup.

The next slime fell right into his mouth and nose, then crawled into his lungs and began to melt him from the inside. With that, his ability to breath was taken away from him.

"By the way, your suffering can go on for the rest of eternity– or until I decide to take your life. So in the mean time, enjoy." Ultio said to Burek as he calmly watched the man's slow, torturous death.

At this point, his entire upper body was just a mass of gooey flesh slowly falling off his skeleton. Even his internal organs were already liquefied and had pooled on the floor beneath him. Yet he still wasn't dead. The pain he was going through at this moment was far beyond what the human mind could bear, and even if Ultio released him without killing him, it would be a fate worse than death.

Meanwhile, Ultio sighed and shut his eyes. "There's no beauty in death,"

*****

Back in reality, Eric was really worried. Burek had just launched himself at Ultio, yet the mysterious man didn't even have any reaction.

He was about to shout for Ultio to run, but Burek suddenly froze when he was literally one foot away from Ultio. Like he stopped entirely. Even his momentum was halted instantly and he somehow balanced on one toe.

Ultio turned to Eric. "The materials needed for my clothes will arrive here soon enough. In the meantime, get your tools ready, I need to be elsewhere,"

"A... Minion of mine will be here to protect you, so have no fear,"

Eric's mouth hung agape, seeing that Ultio totally ignored Burek, who was still standing behind him with his fist cocked back.

"Don't worry about him, he's currently having his lungs melted from the inside out," Ultio said to dispel Eric's worries. "Also, you should be weary of your neighbours,"

It was at that moment that Eric realised that even with the ruckus caused by Ultio beating more than a dozen people up, no one in this area had left their homes or their stores to check out what was going on. Wait... Even the stores in the area were closed, and the owners hadn't come over since the day began.

"They don't have any ill intent towards you, but they are quite greedy," Ultio said, leaving Eric to piece together what had happened.

"He paid them off,"

Ultio nodded his head. "Indeed. Don't worry, I stole his memories, so I know where the rest of his goons are. I'll handle them later, but first..." He trailed off as his body suddenly disappeared.

In his place was a confused, clumsy-looking shadow in the shape of a soldier, with blue light peeking out from underneath his armour.