SSS Awakening: I am the First Legendary Mage

"Then why do you all look so serious?" Alex asked. He found their expressions strange considering that they had just agreed to join him.

Roan and Noah exchanged a look before Noah stepped forward. He pulled his phone from his pocket, tapped the screen several times, and then held it out toward Alex.

"It’s because of this," Noah said.

A video was playing on the phone, and Alex watched it from beginning to end without saying anything. By the time it finished, his brows had furrowed, and the relaxed expression on his face had changed.

The video had apparently been recorded by a man who claimed to be in Washington, D.C. According to him, a giant blue cross had appeared high above the White House, and it had been pulsing in the sky for several hours.

Then dark clouds suddenly began gathering around it, and the portal’s pulsing intensified.

The clouds quickly covered a large part of the sky, and a giant figure appeared somewhere above them, likely from the portal. The monster, or whatever the figure was, remained hidden within the clouds, so the person recording the video couldn’t see its appearance.

A moment later, a thick beam descended from the sky and passed through the clouds. Even though the video had been recorded from a considerable distance, the beam looked enormous as it struck the White House.

An explosion followed, and the video immediately cut off.

Alex could guess what had happened to the person who had been recording it. The footage continued with a drone recording that had apparently been attached later by the person who uploaded the video to Dwitter.

The drone showed what remained of Washington. A gigantic crater covered the area below, and it was so large that Alex couldn’t properly comprehend its scale. The edge of the crater couldn’t even be seen from the drone’s position, while smoke and dust continued to rise from the destroyed area.

Then a voice came from the video.

"As you can see, Washington has been... erased from the map. To all Ascendants who can see this video, please focus on getting stronger, because otherwise, we might all become toys to these monsters."

The video ended shortly afterward. Alex remained silent as he thought about what he had just seen.

’What was above those clouds that fired that attack? Was it a monster, or was it some kind of weapon?’ he wondered.

Alex couldn’t determine the answer from the footage. He also doubted that the entire city had literally vanished, but as far as the video showed, everything visible had been completely destroyed.

’If it was a monster, then monsters this powerful are already appearing on Earth.’

That thought immediately made Alex think about Hell Difficulty.

If something this powerful could already appear on Earth, wouldn’t there be even stronger monsters in Hell Difficulty? After all, Hell Difficulty was supposed to be the most dangerous of the four, so it wouldn’t be surprising if there were monsters there that were even stronger than the creature shown in the video. Alex’s throat bobbed as he swallowed. If he said he wasn’t afraid, he would be lying. Xithali casually erasing the missiles with a wave of her hand had already been shocking, but the attack on Washington was no less terrifying because the sheer scale of the destruction made the threat much easier to understand.

Despite those complicated feelings, however, another emotion began to rise inside Alex.

Excitement.

If monsters this powerful existed, then Alex could eventually fight them and become as strong as they were. He could learn by watching them, understand their abilities, and perhaps discover new ways to use his own powers.

Alex took a breath and forced himself to calm down. He couldn’t rush toward something far stronger than himself simply because he was excited about the possibility of becoming stronger, because if he encountered such a monster without enough strength to protect himself, he would simply die.

And Alex had no intention of dying.

He needed to focus on getting stronger first. Only after he had enough strength to survive against powerful monsters could he consider fighting them directly.

With that thought, Alex felt as though a fire had been lit inside him, and he began thinking about how he could improve his abilities. In particular, he started to secretly practice his Elastic Trap Spell because he needed to learn how useful it could become in an actual battle.

After settling his thoughts, Alex lifted his gaze toward Noah, who was pulling his phone back into his pocket. He then looked toward Eve, who was still sobbing and trying to hold back her tears.

’She probably knew someone in Washington,’ he theorized.

Alex didn’t ask her about it because there was no need to make her explain something that was obviously painful.

"If monsters like this exist, then we need to become as strong as possible as quickly as possible. That means completing our Quests, so we’ve decided not to wait for the military and instead join your faction," Noah said.

"All right," Alex said with a nod.

As soon as Alex and Roan had decided to merge their factions, they both understood what needed to happen next. Under normal circumstances, Alex might have joked about how the System should provide important information beforehand instead of revealing things like this at the exact moment, but the somber atmosphere in the room made him keep the thought to himself.

Eve was still crying, and the others didn’t look much better after seeing the video. Alex simply stepped forward and shook Roan’s hand, accepting the decision they had made.

Roan suddenly stared into the air, likely looking at a System notification. A moment later, another notification appeared directly in front of Alex.

[Faction (Unnamed, Leader: Roan Ackley) wants to merge his faction with yours.]

[Would you like to absorb the Faction (Unnamed, Leader: Roan Ackley)?]

[Yes/No.]

’Yes.’

..

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