I sipped my water while focusing on my stats once more. The recent fight had been a nice way to take my mind off my stats while using them in combat. It was hard work and painful, but I was going to keep focusing on them constantly to push them back into the correct position.

“Movement the East,” one of my guards said. I opened one eye and looked in that direction. There was some movement. “Intercept?” he asked me.

“No. Let them attack or whatever,” I replied and sipped more of my water. The stench of the corpses was getting annoying, but it would make the perfect statement about the current situation.

I felt a slight bit of danger. I slammed a foot down onto the ground, sending me into the air as a beam attack cut through where I had been sitting, destroying my chair. I landed back on the ground and turned to face the origin of the attack, which had some from a different location where movement had been spotted.

There was no follow up attack. I looked at the burning remains of my chair and spilled cup of water. I noted the table and other chairs my guards had been using were also destroyed. Their goal had gone from killing me to annoying me. That was a bad choice if they wanted to continue living in any capacity. Well, they were already marked for death.

I knew from the Divine Empress that chasing rats was a never-ending task. I just lay on the ground instead. “Should we respond?” one of my guards looked at me nervously.

“No. Just relax and wait out the attacks. The goal is to get us to chase and make us uncomfortable. But time is on our side, not theirs. Better to just wait patiently as they starve and get thirsty,” I said.

“With stats, they could last for a while,” the second guard said.

“They could, but only the majority needs to die off. I give it ten days at most. I am not going to be negotiating with rebels or terrorists. If I don’t crush this rebellion hard, then anyone will think they can rebel without consequences,” I replied. If they had been nice and surrendered, I might have put them in charge, but it was too late for that now.

They wanted a fight they were going to get a fight. A few minutes later another beam attack hit the ground a short distance from me. Then another hit the corpse pile. Their aim was clearly lacking then, summons were sent in. Low level summons.

The two guards and I rotated on clean up duty. I wasn’t threatened in the slightest by such low-level monsters. The guards would get minor injuries with their stats. The rebels kept the attack up all night and into the following day with no success. The guards got restorations from the store when needed, so they were never in any danger.

We had one pillar cleared that we kept an eye on specifically for this reason. If these rebels thought they could wear me down, they were utter idiots. I was not about to give in.

The evening of day 5,163 was a massive attack. Thousands of summons and multiple ranged attacks. I considered it good exercise. My guards went to the airship tower tunnel at the base and stayed there while I killed anyone entering the plaza while fighting my way through the hordes of summons.

These people were less skilled than Michelle, so it was easy to backtrack them and their location. I could easily cross that distance, kill them and anyone near them, and be back in the plaza, before the store could be accessed to purchase supplies. It was strangely therapeutic, just killing everything and anything in front of me.

When the battle finally ended mid-day of day 5,164 there was an eerie silence covering the city. My guards purchased restorations and got me some new clothes to wear and water so I could clean myself off. Punching people to death, was quite messy.

The airboat returned that day and we all went up to the top of the airship port to hear what the news was. “Sir, the road connecting the East Bastion to the rest of the Empire has been sealed off with a small force. However, I spotted a large group headed in that direction,” the pilot said. He had another three soldiers with him.

Things really had to be stretched thin, if that was all that could be brought out here. “You five can stay, make sure no one uses the store other than you. I will handle the fleeing group,” I said and boarded the airboat. The guards saluted and gave affirmatives as we took off.

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“Low and slow? Or fast?” the pilot asked me. Going low and slow would help us avoid aerial monsters. While the monsters in the zones could attack the bottom of the airship, it was easier to outpace them than the flying monsters.

“Low and slow,” I said, since I couldn’t use any skills at the moment. It was a boring flight until I spotted a large group of people on the road ahead of us. There had to be at least fifty.

“That them?” I asked.

“Yes, they shot at me before, and I had to circle. Direct approach?” the pilot asked me.

“I will get off here, hang back until I clear them out,” I said and leapt off before he could reply. I landed on the road and the group was already panicking. I didn’t listen to what they had to say as I punched my way through them, killing all the people who had been running away from East Bastion.

Rebellions have consequences, even if you weren’t responsible or in charge, you let them happen. No one was going to be spared. I looked around at the corpses I had created and flicked my hand. A splatter of blood landed on the road. At least I was getting better at punching with my left hand. I let out a sigh, so much death that could have been avoided.

I got back in the airboat, and we flew back to East Bastion. There had been a couple more assaults on the store, but I had already taken out most of the summoners and hadn’t been gone for that long. I quickly tracked down and killed the people still making trouble.

The following day 5,164 we got our first desperate people. They each got a choice. Cut out an eye and go to the time out building or die. Some people tried, but no one managed to remove their eye. They got added to the corpse pile in the center of the plaza.

People were weak and lacked the will to live. I would rather have one lion than a hundred sheep. Maybe they thought I would spare them if they acted pathetically enough? Well, it was not my fault these people were suffering under delusions as I built up the massive corpse pile.

My personal guards and the three soldiers didn’t say anything as I purged the people of East Bastion. One after another, I refused to let rebellion ferment. I was no Divine Empress who took pleasure in such a thing. I also didn’t want to deal with something like this for a long time. Word would spread and people would know that I was no meek dictator.

That was one thing the Divine Empress had done right. She crushed her problems with her own hands. I could have ordered soldiers to do the killing, but I didn’t. They were only here to buy me supplies from the store and stay alive. If I was fit, I could have done this all myself without hesitation and far more quickly by zipping all over the city.

“You would think they would realize how outclassed they are,” I muttered loudly as I killed a woman kneeling on the ground saying something in a foreign language. One kick to her head snapped her spine. I then picked up her corpse and tossed it onto the others.

“Desperate people make bad decisions,” one of my guards said.

“Well, it is their choice to cut out an eye, which is temporary pain, or die. Also, their choice to rebel. Next time people should think twice about making such stupid decisions,” I replied. My guards nodded and gave sounds of agreement.

I could tell they weren’t really agreeing with me, but just agreeing to not draw my ire at the moment. While it would be nice to have a honest conversation, there was no point. My actions were extreme, but my Empire would break under the weight of kindness and compassion given out indiscriminately. It was a cost that we could not afford.

What other choices did I have? Talking to people and trying to reach a compromise? The very idea made me want to laugh. A rebellion was a rejection of the government. Killing people who were part of the government, even if they were bad people, was a rejection of the social order. If one did not respect that order, one should not expect to be protected by it.

Maybe there was some kind of mass psychosis where people thought they would just go to prison or be exiled. Both things weren’t real options. Prisons cost points, and exiling people was just asking them to come back and cause trouble later on.

I looked at the corpse pile. There was a one body, with an organ of some kind partially hanging out of a corpse. It caught my eye since the person had jerked slightly. They were still alive, not that it mattered. I had noted the soldiers kept as much distance from the pile as they could. It was disturbing, but it was effective against people trying to sneak over and use the store. Also, it was a powerful visual statement that would be remembered.

That’s when I remembered people could get water from buildings. It would take weeks to starve them out. “You five, cover the plaza. No one gets to the store, I am going hunting,” I said and stood up. No one said anything as I leapt away and made my way to the map building.

I had been too caught up in pointless nonsense and worrying and I had almost made a strategic mistake. “I really need to focus more,” I muttered. The pain from my stats wasn’t helping. Little mistakes would add up and compound. And my soldiers hadn’t said anything, but I hadn’t really explained the plan to them either.

Once I entered the map building, it was easy to locate groups of people clustered about the city. I memorized their locations and set off to kill them all. One after another, I killed the groups and people I found hiding within East Bastion. Once I couldn’t find anyone else, I went back to the map building and looked for more people.

It was taking time, but I was slowly clearing out the entire city, one person at a time. It was tedious, messy, and everyone screamed before they died. But I was long past caring. Wasting time, was wasting time. Better to just attack constantly, rather than going for a battle of attrition. Better to be on the offensive whenever possible so the other party was on the back foot.