The Thais had sent people here to scout the area before so they knew where the locations of the largest concentration of Anomalies were as well as where the Gatekeeper was located.

While some of the Vanguards stayed with the group that would set up a base and artillery platform around the portal to protect them, the rest started the journey towards the direction of the Gatekeeper.

I was now placed in the centre of the formation as we moved along the desolate field, my Guardians also surrounding me and keeping an eye out for any Anomalies.

For now, the place seemed completely empty and devoid of life so we weren’t sure just how big of a threat these Anomalies were at the moment.

This world seemed to feature mostly flat plains with the landscape being broken by things that looked like dead trees from time to time.

Right then, as if by magic, a figure shimmered into existence a distance away, towering over the trees and seemingly headed towards our direction.

"Demon!! Demon!!" Someone shouted, pointing in the figure’s direction.

I squinted my gaze and focused on the figure, its shape focusing to reveal a red skinned demonic creature that had horns and bulging muscles with its abnormally long arms dragging along the ground as it walked.

Honestly, it looked more like a red skinned, hairless gorilla with horns on its head.

Judging by its size, it’s at least as big as a two storey house and it’s currently barrelling its way towards us.

I had to take charge of course, being the leader of this expedition and all...

"Everyone, prepare for battle!! Hold this position!"

As soon as my order echoed around, the entire group began to move and arranged themselves into formation to face against the towering Anomaly.

Seems like everyone that had been chosen for this expedition was a veteran since they adapted to the situation quite quickly.

Not wanting to leave anything to chance, I exhaled and allowed the purple smoke to billow out of me and warp around my body.

Gasps of surprise filtered through the crowd as some turned to look in my direction, probably realising that they were getting buffed and figuring out that I was the one behind their sudden increase in strength.

The demon Anomaly swept its large arms and knocked over some of the dead trees, clearing a path for it to charge towards us.

"Ranged units! Fire!!" I ordered.

The armoured vehicles, which I recognised were the Stingray light tanks and Cadillac Gage Commandos of the V-one fifty variant, raised their turrets to point it at the Anomaly before opening fire.

Tank shells pierced through the air and struck the demon gorilla on the chest, exploding into shrapnel and smoke.

The Anomaly let out a roar of pain and stumbled back a step, parts of its flesh flying out from the explosion from the tank shells.

Despite the open wound on its chest, it seems like it was not enough to kill it as the Anomaly surged forward and continued its advance towards us with renewed rage.

The mages also started flinging their spells at it, striking the Anomaly with a bombardment of magic and slowing it down.

The Anomaly managed to take a few more steps before it wobbled unsteadily and fell to the side, crashing onto the ground heavily.

Hmm... That actually took quite a while to kill it and the tanks needed to fire two salvoes with about half a minute of constant magical barrage from the Vanguards to bring the Anomaly down.

All that just to kill a single Anomaly...

I turned to one of the Vanguards nearby, "Is that the standard power level of the Anomalies around here?"

The Vanguard I asked jumped a little in surprise but he quickly nodded his head, "That... That is the case, Mortal God..."

Hmm... So we can expect this difficulty of Anomalies every battle... And it’s going to be even tougher if they come in groups as well...

I can see why they are quite insistent on taking the route that avoids all the Anomaly ’nests’ even if it meant that the path there was longer.

I turned to my Guardians, "Do you guys want to try fighting one on your own?"

I honestly only asked the question just to see their reaction but Olivia answered immediately.

"Yes please, my Lord."

She seemed really excited by the prospect too, the red Oni practically pumped up and ready to fight. Then I remembered that she was the type that really liked to fight.

The whole reason why she had chosen to follow me was because I would be able to give her the opportunity to fight as much as she wanted.

I eyed the rest of my Guardians and they just shrugged, showing they didn’t care either way.

Guess we will be fighting the next Anomaly that shows up on our own.

It would also be a good chance to see how we’ll fare against these Anomalies as well in case things went south.

Even though the plan was to have the Thais handle most of the fighting, I don’t intend to just sit back and watch either.

There’s also the complication where I can’t use my full strength either since it wouldn’t be good for outsiders to have a gauge on what my limits were. But I also can’t hold back too much or else they would think that I was weak.

The good thing was that I have yet to fully awaken as a Mortal God anyway so whatever I show here will not be my full strength.

Also... I do intend to take on the strongest Anomaly around here to get its abilities as well so I’m going to need to convince them to let me fight the strongest Anomaly that would appear later on.

Everyone regrouped again and we continued on our way towards the Gatekeeper once more.

This time, we only needed to walk for a few minutes before another figure appeared in the distance to start stomping its way towards us, its height the same as the gorilla demon from earlier.

I wondered how they were able to just appear out of nowhere despite their big sizes? I would have thought that their size would have allowed us to see them from further away but they seemed to be able to just pop out into existence or something.

This time, the Anomaly looked more like a giant human except they were completely naked but with red coloured skin and two horns poking out from its bald head.

It was also devoid of any sexual characteristics and its crotch was just smooth skin.

I called for the group to halt and I turned to nod at my Guardians, prompting them to start running towards the Anomaly to intercept it.

The Vanguards parted like the red sea to allow my Guardians to pass, all of them eager to see just how strong my Guardians were.

Leena was the one leading the way as she sped towards the large Anomaly, her centaur form blurring as she flanked around it and started peppering it with her machinegun.

The bullets pierced through its skin and while it was too big for the attack to kill it, it still definitely hurt the Anomaly to cause its attention to be shifted towards her.

With its attention away from the rest of my Guardians, Kris leapt into the air and spun himself into a somersault before suddenly shooting towards the Anomaly like a meteor.

He crashed into the Anomaly’s chest and drew a large gash across the torso of the creature, the wound spurting out crimson red blood.

It yelled out in pain and tried to swing at Kris, only for a blue shield to materialise to deflect the punch away thanks to Jia Lian.

Olivia then jumped in front of it and gave the Anomaly a lightning punch across its jaw, sending it falling down onto the ground with an earth shaking crash.

It let out a low groan, showing that it was still very much alive though it definitely took damage from that.

It then tried to get up, only for shadow tendrils to appear from the ground and wrap around its neck, pulling it back down again.

The bindings could only hold for a second before the Anomaly reached up and tore it into pieces, but that was all the time that was needed before a tear in space opened above the Anomaly, allowing a giant meteor to fly through and crash down on top of it.

Jia Lian once again stood in front of us and materialised her shield again before the resulting shockwave blasted against the shield, which also prevented the dust cloud from reaching us.

A wind blew past us and the dust cloud was cleared to reveal an already dead Anomaly with a giant rock impaled through its torso, my Guardians standing in front of it proudly.

Nice one guys.