Homesteading in a fantasy world

So I wouldn’t lose my initiative, I didn’t stop with just one step; instead, I accelerated so I would have more movement speed. What I didn’t do was use my movement ability to get close to any of them. Instead, I let go of my sword with my left hand so I could produce and throw multiple throwing knives.

Most of these I could only empower a little bit as they didn’t stay connected to me long, but one was special. That ranger wasn’t the only one who could hide their actions.

That being said, even this shouldn't have been enough to hurt any of these people, and as expected, every single one of them was able to block my attack easily enough or even dodge it, except one.

The ranger who had attacked me had most likely used every bit of his power. Because of my quick actions and the surprise of the rest of his party members, they weren’t quick enough to react to the single real attack.

The knife buried itself in his skull, immediately ending his life. That was for the damaged breastplate. However, there wasn’t any time to wait or be happy that another one of my attackers was dead.

Now was the right time to use my movement skill, but even so, the mage I appeared in front of wasn’t surprised. She already had her defensive shield up. The strike I made still cracked it, but it saved her life as one of the shield users was able to make it to me.

He used some sort of charging skill, and the hit he managed to land on me was decent. He still wasn’t able to move me even an inch. The quick pommel strike I did to his head was devastating. He started to drop him to the ground, but he received a wave of healing magic and was able to stay up.

Before I could execute my next attack, my mind was assaulted. This time, the attack wasn't a probing one or meant to freeze me; it was designed to break down my defenses. There was no physical indication, but I still took a sideways step from this blow alone.

Near the connection point he used to connect with my mind the stone wall meant to protect me shook from the assault. Another blow came a moment later, and the stone started to crack.

This time, however, I was able to remain unaffected in the real world and was able to protect myself against the sword strikes coming towards me. Everything was still a little bit muddled. "Don't worry, I got this," Alan said in my mind palace as he started to command the stone golems.

The constant attacks still forced me to be aware of what was happening in my mental state, but I was now a little bit faster in the real world and started to fight back against the three close-range attackers who were slowly pushing me back.

All of these people here seemed to be extremely well-trained and, more importantly, had properly built builds for their classes.

It was time to burst. I increased my energy output, and with the surprise burst of power, I was able to cut down one of my attackers by simply powering through their defense. That attack on my mind doubled at that moment, nearly causing me to take a knee.

Inside my mind, I did not see soldiers attacking my fortress but concepts. Somehow, my stone golems were still able to attack these concepts, slowing down their assault. Still, the wall would not hold for long, but my mind wasn't protected by a single wall; I had a large citadel, and what was currently being attacked were simple fortifications built around the connection points to my mind.

In the real world, however, I now knew why the attacks on my mind doubled. Multiple abilities started to hit me, not to seek damage but to suppress and hinder me.

I had never felt proper debuffs before, and now that I had, I never wanted to experience them again. For a moment there, I felt like I was 90 years old, barely able to move but still carrying 300 kg of weight up a steep hill.

Multiple attacks hit me, and I could only block one. A few were diverted by my armor, but three of them got through and drew blood for the first time in this battle. They were still shallow wounds, and I was glad to see that my energy was eating away at my debuffs at a visible rate.

I did not know if anyone else could see it, but since my full energy control reached outside my body, the different colors of the debuffs laid around that bubble. Now, however, small holes started to appear where my energy was eating away at the effects of the debuffs.

The ones that were mana-based were the more volatile ones, but thanks to all of my abilities and traits, I wasn’t consuming too much energy fighting these debuffs.

The exchanges were still in their favor for a little bit, but slowly I was gaining back strength. When my first wall fell inside my mind palace, I heard the mind reader yell, "Attack now!"

Everyone around me disregarded their defenses and fully committed to an attack. I used my core energy to dispel most of the debuffs as fast as I could, and with them not focusing on defense, it came as a complete surprise to them when I was all of a sudden able to attack them nearly at my peak strength.

Through my connection with the mind reader, I was able to feel his surprise when he noticed how well-protected my mind actually was. However, he was too late to warn his party members as I quickly got through four of them before the rest were able to get their defenses up. I didn’t let up, however, but there was only one proper close-range fighter left.

Everyone else seemed to realize that as well, as they stopped debuffing me and instead started to buff their last chance at victory. It seems that was the correct choice.

He was the best fighter out of the ones who attacked me and with the buffs, he was actually pushing me back. My swordsmanship simply wasn't as good as his, and while I was stronger and had more energy to constantly use abilities, the ones he used were refined to a scary degree.

We crossed blades for over 30 seconds and in that time one thing became clear: if I continued like that, I would be defeated. My mind was still secure as now many more stone columns were able to attack, reducing the amount of damage the mind reader could do.

Fortunately, the mages were occupied and couldn't directly attack me, but it still didn't matter. Now perhaps I could outlast them, but I was uncertain and I needed to use tremendous amounts of energy to keep up with this swordsman.

After parrying and trying to counterattack, only for that counterattack to be used against me, I came to a conclusion: why continue to fight him?

For the first time in this battle, I disengaged and, thanks to my tattoo storage, it was easy enough to switch my sword for a bow. My brief bow attack didn't catch them off guard, but one of my arrows was still able to wound one of the mages.

Before the swordsman caught up with me, I switched weapons once again. Waiting for the right time. I did my weapons swap once again.

Everyone expected me to shoot at the mages once more, so instead, I shot the swordsman. He was incredibly fast, but one of the arrows still buried itself in his thigh. What they also didn’t expect was for me not to switch to my sword but instead get close up with two knives.

He was good enough to block me even if he was barely able to use his sword so close up. But as soon as he grabbed one of my hands to block, he and I both knew that he had messed up.

With the sword, he had the advantage, but close up, when only strength mattered, he was hopelessly outmatched. Before he knew what happened, I had him in a bear hug and actually dropped myself to the ground with him on top of me.

He had to drop the sword and both of his hands were trying to choke me, but simply flexing my neck muscles made it still possible for me to breathe. He, on the other hand, quickly started to lose consciousness.

Some of the mages started to attack my hands and even my exposed side. They were doing some damage, but my defenses were currently holding up and they wouldn’t break through in time.

The fight was still loud, but the crack was deafening when the first rib of the swordsman broke. The rest followed quickly, but before he could properly pass out, his spine cracked as well.

He was still clinging to life. I threw him off me, waiting for the mage's attack, but no attack came towards me. It took me a moment to realize that they were actually running away.

I quickly stabbed the swordsman just in case, ending his life, and then started to follow the mages. My mind was still being attacked, but the mind mage was the fastest at running. For some reason, that did not surprise me.

With my movement skill, it was easy enough to catch up, and while each of the mages put up a bit of a fight, they died quickly enough until only one was left.

We had traveled for a decent distance before I was finally able to catch up, cornering him against a cliff wall.

"If you kill me, the Fort commander will have your life." I chose not to kill him immediately, even if he was still trying to attack my mind. "Perhaps, but I will still kill you, and what happens to me afterwards shouldn't be your concern."

My words even managed to pause the attacks he was launching against my mind, but only momentarily.

"You think you're special? I do not know what you did to deserve such recognition, but even if the Fort leader does nothing, I will simply have to turn your bounty in, and your life would be over. I want you to sign a contract that would make you my servant."

It was now my turn for my brain to grind to a halt. What was this person on about? “Are you confused?” He laughed at my confusion but then got serious.

“I didn’t really think that I could kill you. What I didn’t expect was for you to be so tenacious; perhaps I should have expected it. Do you really think that I can’t escape right now, it would still be a waste to see you killed alongside everyone you knew. With you in my control, I would have two of the 16.”

"Two of the 16, what do you mean?" I asked in genuine confusion. "Do you truly not know?" he replied. He reached into one of his pockets and pulled out what looked to be a trading card.

He had his guard up for almost that entire time, but when he glanced at the card for the briefest of moments, there was an opening. Immediately, I rushed him, but I didn’t stab; no, with one of my hands I grabbed hold of his body and with the other cover his mouth.

He tried to fight back, but he didn't have the strength to even contest me a little bit. There was a little bit of fear in his eyes, but not enough.

He tried to activate some sort of teleportation, but with my energy control, I made the surroundings so thick and full of it that the connection simply fizzled out.

Still, there was no proper fear in his eyes. "I suspected you would have a few different ways out, but if I can't kill you physically without you escaping, perhaps I can kill your mind?"

"Alan, go on the attack and destroy the mind," I heard a chuckle. "As you command," the gates opened up, and this time the walls didn’t shake from the attacks but from the marching of the stone golems.

This time I did see fear. He started to struggle, but it was useless. His mind, however, was really powerful, so it took a bit over half an hour to destroy his mind enough that his body died.

Finally, I was able to stand up and, in doing so, I noticed the trading card just out of hand's reach. I went and picked it up to see what this was about.

The card's name was ‘Supreme General’, and it featured a picture of me in command behind a round table. On the card, however, it said ‘one of one.’ There was also no description, but then I noticed in smaller print at the bottom edge of the card, ‘15/16.’

So, I guess this collection has 16 cards in total, mine being the 15th. But how would controlling me be able to control two of these cards? No, wait, I think he meant controlling the people these cards represented.

So if I was one of them, who was the second person he would be controlling through me? The first name that came to mind was Arabella. This, however, didn’t explain anything. I, however, had a feeling that this was not a good thing. Will the troubles never end?