Once he'd set up some preliminary defenses, William pondered the current situation. He'd dealt with assassins several times before, and they always possessed tricky abilities that were catered to perfectly counter their target's abilities.

Even when he was a weak mortal in the Five Elements Sect, the assassin was several times stronger than the strength William displayed in the open at the time. If he was a few seconds slower inventing a new Array to handle the situation, William's journey would have ended right then and there.

The System's overpowered Talents don't give William an excuse to be complacent. Going forward, more and more powerful opponents would stand in his way. He should be ashamed if mere assassins lay even a scratch on him.

With Atticus scouting, there was a high probability that he'd discover the assassins before they found him, so William decided to play aggressively.

It is a common misconception to assume that being outnumbered means one should be defensive and hold their ground rather than pushing out. Say the assassins outnumber William ten-to-one, he should barricade and passively defend, right?

Not entirely.

While one shouldn't blindly press into enemy territory by themselves, people misunderstand what it means to be on the defense. If a sole defender wants to handle ten opponents, the last thing they should do is allow all ten to attack simultaneously.

What normal person can win a fistfight with ten people at the same time? Isn't it better to fight ten people in a row instead? To William, the second option appeared way more favorable.

That being said, how does one be aggressive while on the defense? How do they fight at equal odds when outnumbered? How does one avoid getting surrounded and taken down in one fell swoop?

These three questions boil down to two easy answers: time and space.

No, not the Legendary Elements of Time and Space, rather the idea of using time as a resource, trading space when necessary to keep an advantage. Similar to why pawns move forward on a chessboard, or why scouting is important to the beginning of any strategy game.

Both of these examples are using the free time one has before a conflict to gain territory. All territory gained using that time becomes the other resource. In chess, pawns stop the enemy pawns from moving further forward, while scouting gives more information on the surrounding area. If the scouts discover an enemy, this information allows one to adjust their plan accordingly, rather than being blindsided.

As for fighting with equal odds, William had too many ideas to split up large groups.

The assassins hadn't yet entered William's detection range, nor had Atticus located them. There's always a chance that their stealth capabilities exceed Atticus' perception, but William was betting on the fact that they simply hadn't arrived yet.

This is William's time resource, meaning he currently held an overwhelming advantage. He'd already laid some defenses, but before the assassins arrive there is no limit to how many preparations he can make.

With this thought, William made some changes to the locator in his hand.

He modified the Arrays to not only receive, but transmit back and forth between it and the amplifiers. This allowed him to send information to the amplifiers, remotely modifying their own Arrays.

Compared to if he was handling the amplifiers in person, this process was extremely difficult and more time consuming. Normally he could make changes in a few seconds, but using this method required him to make an Array on the locator that could make Arrays.

It was like creating a machine that could make other machines. Obviously, making the machine standalone would be easier, but William didn't have three days to travel to each amplifier and modify them in person. Or he might, but at that point the time spent laying defenses here would have been pointless.

On the upside, once William finished modifying his locator, he was able to duplicate the instructions and send them to every amplifier simultaneously. At the cost of a few hours, William actually saved himself three days of walking!

The new and improved amplifiers could now act as an early warning system for more than just Fria and the two newly Ascended Cultivators William sent from Efretta. Now, they were set to search for many different things.

Mana fluctuations, high-speed movement, metal, and many other things that might be indicative of an assassin. The amplifiers could report both the coordinates, speed of movement, and even which Element was being used!

He even filtered out population centers to be excluded from the reporting, removing hundreds of thousands of miscellaneous pings.

William's locator had to be physically modified some more so it could handle the large amount of information and display it on a screen, but once it was done he felt extremely satisfied. The only downside was that the amplifiers were extremely weak defensively, and sending information back and forth made them easier to locate despite the Concealment Arrays in their vicinity.

But these things were out of William's control, as he had no way to improve the Jack Of All Trades Talent that housed his Arrays sub-Talent. For that, he'd need to find and kill a Boomstone Giant, whatever that is.

William watched the locator's log for a while to establish a baseline, which would help him notice when something was out of the ordinary. Despite excluding population centers and some distance around them, all of his amplifiers combined were listening in on several hundred million kilometers. Discerning which was an assassin would be difficult.

Once he felt comfortable, William kept the locator close and focused on his secondary priority, which would be splitting up the assassins once they neared. As he was always fighting multiple opponents above his strength, William had too much experience in this aspect.

He set up Arrays to confuse and distract, natural traps to restrict, and obstacles to delay his enemies, spending a moderate amount of Mana in the process.

Given how much Mana William had already spent to conceal Atticus during his upgrade, the Mana Dominator Talent had to work overtime to recover his reserves. The moment Mana entered William's Reserve, it was used just as quickly.

He even found himself making use of the bonus effects, entering combat with some nearby Magical Beasts just so the Mana Dominator Talent would enter its combat mode and generate Mana faster.

He finished his preparations in this manner, sitting down cross-legged to Cultivate while an Ascension Realm Violent Sound Mouse did its best to break through his Forcefield.

Its little fangs clamped down viciously, suffering recoil from Attack Reflection with each bite. It tried again and again for several hours to no avail, eventually deciding to retreat.

As it turned around to hunt elsewhere, a Comet Pellet pierced through its heart, killing it instantly.

-Defeated a Violent Sound Mouse: +1,000,000 PP

Of course, William wasn't going to let go of loot or Potential Points. Without breaking his Cultivation, the Violent Sound Mouse was stored as smoothly as drinking a glass of water.

With the locator in his lap and his Mana slowly recovering, William waited calmly for a change in the situation. The more full his Reserve, the greater his chances of securing a flawless victory.