Zeke Katra was the head of the Katra Clan. The king never found it useful to know his name since calling him "Katra" was sufficient to order him around. He was the kings most loyal follower and his personal right-hand man. He alone, had the strength of the entire army of the Iron kingdom. His rend power and personal strength were beyond anything to be messed with. If he were to ever fight the king one on one, there was no telling who would win.

The king had just ordered him to go into the forest and confirm a suspicion he had. Walking to the forest was a day trip in itself. He would also need to make sure to ration his food and water as he went so he didn’t need to carry that much.

Putting on his strongest gear and grabbing his fabled blade, Katra headed west towards for the forest. The trip there was mostly uneventful. All he came across were innocent critters scurrying through the grassy fields and flowers. It wasn’t until he started getting closer to the forest did, he feel something... off.

First, it felt like something was watching him walk toward the forest with a chilling glare. Even though he was miles away, Katra could still feel it clearly. Then, it felt like the terrain was actively working against him, as if nature itself was warning him to turn back.

"What the hell is with these slopes? No wonder the king’s cohort got crushed. This terrain is madness."

Upon arriving to the first massive tree, night was already starting to overtake the sky, so Katra started setting up camp. However, instead of sleeping, he simply leaned himself against the trunk of the tree and kept watch over his surroundings the entire night. Throughout the entire night, Katra didn’t hear a single sound come from the forest.

"Yup. He’s here alright. What kind of forest doesn’t make any sound? Does he think I’m stupid?"

Slowly, Katra started walking through the thick brush of the trees. There were leaves and sticks littered everywhere on the ground, and it was hard to keep sense of his direction. Nevertheless, he kept moving forward with the same brave expression.

Eventually, he came upon a small clearing in the forest. In the middle of it was a small wooden cabin with fire coming out of his chimney.

"This idiot doesn’t even think to put out his fire. He knows I’m here and this is clearly a trap."

He turned around suddenly feeling a chill crawl up his spine. He couldn’t see anything.

’Damn it. He’s got the home turf advantage, and I don’t know how many duplicates he has. He could be watching me from all sides for all I know.’

Katra walked around the small clearing and found an abandoned lake. It had a strange glow illuminating from the bottom of it, but the surface was completely calm and still. It only took Katra a few moments to see through the water at what was at the bottom. There, standing together in a small bubble, was the king’s brother-in-law with a weird man holding a torch.

"Wow. This was a quick mission. I’m sure the king will be proud."

As he turned around to sneak away, there was already a man standing behind him. He was tall with defining features and a sharp chin. His hair fell down to his shoulders and his face looked flawless. His voice sounded calm and pleasant.

"Hey there friend. Are you lost?"

Katra looked at the man with a fake smile.

"On the contrary. I think I found what I came here looking for."

He unsheathed his blade from his hip and held it out in front of him. The man raised his hands and backed up.

"Woah, there’s no need to get violent. I’m sure we can just talk this out, right? I don’t want to have to kill you."

Katra laughed slightly.

"I think you have it backwards. I could kill you anytime I want."

It was the man’s turn to laugh... except, there was more than one laugh... then another, then another, until soon there were thousands of laughs echoing from the forest surrounding them. All of them shared the same voice as the man in front of Katra.

"Wow. Do you ever get tired of multiplying yourself?"

"Hm... it can be boring at times, I must admit."

"Why are we wasting time? I’m itching to get rid of a few thousand of you before I leave here anyway."

"Those words may just be your last. I hope you’re okay with that."

Katra chopped the man’s head off in front of him. The blade passed through his neck like butter. Blood spouted from the wound as his body hit the floor. Soon, hundreds of men wearing wooden armor and wielding makeshift weapons were coming at him at full speed. As soon as Katra was completely surrounded with thousands of soldiers ready to pounce on him, he uttered something under his breathe. 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

"Release."

Suddenly, thousands of soldiers were instantly squashed under a devastating force surrounding Katra. The ground started to crack under the bodies being pushed down more and more. However, just as quickly as he killed thousands, more and more kept piling out of the tree line.

"Ugh. It looks like this is going to take longer than I thought."

Katra pushed off his back leg and darted towards the first hoard of men. All of those in front of him were severed apart with his sword. All of those around him were crushed by his rend power: the ability to manipulate gravity. Not only was he manipulating gravity in an extremely vast area, but he was also manipulating the gravity of his sword as it fell to crush his enemies.

Piles upon piles of bodies started stacking up on each other. Katra found it more difficult to find footing the more men he killed. Rivers of blood were flowing around him, his armor seemed to be thirsting for more blood as he battled, his sword was screaming with dark glee as it flew through torsos with ease.

A few times, some men were able to throw a spear of shoot and arrow at his armor. However, everything that hit the armor perfectly bounced off as if nothing happened.

Three entire days had passed of non-stop fighting. Katra was starting to be pushed to his limits with how much longer he could last. He ran out of the energy to use most of his gravity manipulation on the second day, so right now he was fighting with pure muscle. He was being swarmed more and more by the second.

It felt like every time he struck one of the men down, ten more took its place. Everything looked and felt so hopeless.

’How? How is this even possible? I’ve had to have killed close to a million at this rate. There is no way he duplicated this much in such a short time.’

Eventually, Katra slipped on a huge puddle of guts on the ground and lost his balance for a short moment. That short moment was all it took for twenty men to hold his limbs down. Katra struggled against them, thrashing for his life. Two of the men grabbed hold of his helmet and kicked it right off his head, revealing Katra’s sweaty face.

Katra screamed and pushed himself off the ground, jumping thirty feet into the air. Looking all around him, he saw the brutal carnage of what he accomplished in the past few days. It looked like a tornado of steel had ripped through an entire empire, leaving all of its citizens dead. Thousands of bodies were stacked on top of each other with blood and guts constantly pouring out of them.

The smell of it all was attacking his nostrils as he fought.

’This is hell. I am in hell.’

Even with endless stacks of corpses surrounding the area, his opponent never once gave in. More and more kept piling out of the forest. When Katra fell back down into the chaos, he was swallowed whole by the mob. He clawed his way forward using all the strength he could throw his sword with.

’I have to get the hell out of here and warn the king. And is it just me, or do these guys feel stronger than the other ones I fought?’

Without a doubt, the army of duplicates seemed to be adapting to his fighting style more and more which meant one thing: Each duplicate could share the experience with another once it was defeated. This allowed for almost infinite growth in a short time period.

Katra had been defeated as soon as this became a battle of attrition. With each step he took, more men roared toward him with a myriad of weapons. The armor on his body was still in pristine condition, but now his face was exposed, and he needed to find his helmet in the horde.

Before he could even blink, a sword flashed across his right eye. Katra yelped out in pain, feeling his skin turn hot as blood gushed down his face. There was a man in the crowd among them who was much faster and stronger than all the other ones, but he was manipulating the duplicates to his advantage so Katra would never know when an attack was coming.

’I’m going to die here. I need to do a final gamble for my helmet or there’s no hope.’

Using the very last strength of his rend ability, he uttered the words once more.

"Release."

The area around him was completely crushed in a mist of blood. However, the radius was severely diminished due to the state he was in. With that extremely short respite, he saw his helmet stuck under one of the bodies he cut in half. Using everything he had, Katra lunged for the helmet and threw it on his face.

He rolled away from where he grabbed it and started running back east towards the kingdom. As more men tried to jump in front of him to slow him down, he would ram into them like a bull and keep pushing through. Katra didn’t stop running until he reached the front of the palace where he quickly kneeled to catch his breath.

The king’s right hand suffered a humiliating, crushing defeat.