Chapter 366: Disaster Transfer, Heading North

"I am deeply sorry, Your Highness, but I bring quite dreadful news."

In Alestle, at the mountaintop palace, the astrologer Celine stood once more before the throne, speaking to Doran Charlemagne seated upon it.

"No matter. Speak."

Doran Charlemagne gave no outward sign, his expression remaining entirely unaltered by the ill tidings Celine spoke of. He merely bid her continue. As a sovereign, he was not one to vent his royal displeasure upon his subordinates over any piece of news; the conventions of Earth held no sway here.

"The vanguard sent to the north to intercept the rebels has been completely annihilated. After a period of silence, the stars conveyed this grim report to me. Your Highness, what will be your next course of action?"

Celine delivered the news in a level voice, its contents naturally offering little in the way of comfort.

"..."

Doran Charlemagne fell silent for a time. Truly, he had not foreseen such an outcome. To dispatch two grand knights and a grand mage to intercept a single official mage, accompanied by a dragon unable to fully unleash its might and its sister, and to yet suffer defeat—it defied all reason.

"Can you discern any further details?"

His silence breaking, Doran Charlemagne pressed Celine with the question. He no longer cared for the result itself; though the loss was grievous, it was far more critical to understand how that small band of Alestle defectors possessed such strength.

"My deepest apologies, Your Highness. For a time, the vision of the stars was obscured by the void, leaving me blind to the particulars of the engagement."

"Yet from subsequent observations, it appears the trio of Blackborne, Paul, and Remo failed to leave us even a shred of intelligence using the items they carried. I fear the battle was not even a contest of equals."

Celine confessed her inability to divine what had transpired during the fray. Shael had taken the precaution of having "One" use the power of the void to shroud the battlefield, severely limiting Celine's second sight.

"To think these entities are maturing at such a staggering rate. And this is without accounting for that missing knight, Wang Yu, who has likely gone to cultivate the faith of the Night."

"The growth of this church of late has been terrifying. The array of blessings granted by worshipping this deity of the Night has earned it the highest praise from vast numbers of beings, to the point where even scholars within our kingdom secretly venerate this god..."

"..."

Resting his palm against his chin, Doran Charlemagne murmured his analysis. After a prolonged silence, his resolve was set.

"Celine, you are dismissed. Have the Minister of Military Affairs come hither."

With a wave of his hand, he signaled the astrologer's departure, calling for another of his ministers to attend him.

The astrologer withdrew, and the Minister of Military Affairs soon approached the throne with a bowed head, dropping to one knee in a reverent salute.

"Gerald, let me first impart a most grievous piece of news. Remo has fallen in the campaign to suppress the rebels. I trust you can find another right-hand man to your liking."

Doran Charlemagne offered no pretense, coldly and directly delivering the news of the demise of his subordinate’s capable officer.

"Your servant understands."

Minister of Military Affairs Gerald maintained his respectful tone. Though his heart burned with fury over the death of a subordinate he had nurtured for so long and found so reliable,

such emotion was neither necessary nor permissible to display in the open.

"I myself believed it unnecessary to raise a great stir over those few defectors from the kingdom. Yet now, it seems the matter is far from simple. Their threat is escalating at a pace much swifter than I had anticipated. Therefore, marshal your intelligence."

Doran Charlemagne spoke, and though his words were somewhat cryptic, they caused the minister below to snap his head up, a trace of astonishment evident in his eyes.

"Your Highness, you mean...?"

Gerald inquired, his voice laced with uncertainty.

"Indeed. Originally, I was loath to entangle our affairs with those creatures. They are quite clearly of a foreign race to us, and it is a rule we and the other human kingdoms have ever abided by—to never let other races intervene in our internal strifes."

"But we have more pressing matters at hand. This kingdom requires a stable domain. As for those rebels, let those who already seek them as their quarry deal with them."

"The intelligence regarding the clash near the Fading Peaks was transmitted by your own hand. You should already possess a fair estimation of the Dragon Cult's might, should you not?"

Doran Charlemagne methodically articulated his reasons for commanding Gerald to act thus.

"Convey the news to the Dragon Cult that the quarry they seek is heading north. The general bearing is the old lands of Sevantan. Do they not desire the dragon Zieg? Then let them have at it."

"As for us, we shall focus our efforts entirely on the matters to come."

Having explained the rationale, Doran Charlemagne delivered his command to Minister of Military Affairs Gerald in the form of a summary.

"Understood!"

Accepting

the order, the minister pressed the king with no further questions. Instead, he swiftly began to execute the task set before him, saluting and turning to depart.

"To give the word to that unsettling pack of Dragon Cultists is indeed a fine stratagem upon deeper reflection. It will cost Alestle none of its own strength, and those cultists possess ample power to contend with the rebels."

"In the final reckoning, Alestle has no better means to deal with a band of potential enemies wandering outside the kingdom. To squander limited resources upon them would be highly irrational."

"And next, does His Majesty finally intend to move against the Blade of Night? To divide rather than to destroy—is that the path you have chosen?"

Pondering these thoughts, Gerald began to prepare for the sequence of tasks that lay ahead.

...

*Swoosh-clack-clack!*

A blood-red chain was hurled by Wang Yu out into the vast, boundless snowscape. The sharp spearhead at its tip pierced through the thick layer of snow, impaling the target Wang Yu had aimed for, before being yanked back by his pulling motion.

"Splendid. Animals in cold regions are exceptionally plump."

Grasping the snow rabbit—which was a good size larger than his own head—in his hand, Wang Yu plunged a small dagger formed of blood into the creature's flesh. The blood coursed and crawled within the prey, cleanly separating the skin from the meat in its entirety.

"Must you procure food no matter where you go?"

Edward sat in the rear seat of the blood-refined sled crafted by Avia, watching Wang Yu casually cast his chain to haul a fat rabbit from the snow, and asked idly.

After dealing with the trio sent to assassinate them, Wang Yu and his companions had pressed on without pause, delving deeper into the snowfields to continue

their northward journey. As they advanced north, the land had become utterly consumed by ice and snow.

The perennial snow fell without a moment's respite. Previously, there had been areas untouched by the frost, but now, further north, barring human intervention, the world was a stark, absolute expanse of white, completely buried in ice.

This, however, liberated Wang Yu, sparing him from journeying on foot. Under favorable conditions, the speed of the alchemical sled was still somewhat faster than his steady running pace.

"Naturally. When it comes to eating, I've no intention of neglecting it in this lifetime. Don't ask questions; just tell me if you're eating or not."

Wang Yu curled his lip and immediately began to dress the rabbit. Truth be told, this denizen of the snowfields might have been unfortunate, but once stripped of its pelt, the exposed meat possessed a rich marbling of fat and a tenderness that was evident at a glance.

"I'll eat."

The reply came without a shred of hesitation. When passing the time with these true friends of his, Edward, who usually had to maintain his public image, found no need to fuss over such trivialities.

"Excellent!"

Giving Edward a thumbs-up, Wang Yu ignited a spark of occult fire with one hand while holding the rabbit meat with the other, preparing to demonstrate his skills at hand-roasting a rabbit.

*Thwack.*

"Who else could be as ravenous as you? Honestly, hand it over. I'll prepare it properly before you eat."

Wang Yu received a rap on the head from a hand materialized out of thin air. The girl emerged halfway from the space of the Seed of Eden, snatching the luckless rabbit—no, the rabbit meat—from Wang Yu's grasp.

"Yes!"

Edward made a fist gesture at Wang Yu, who was rubbing his head, mimicking Shael's playful antics. Yet this was close to his actual

sentiment. Wang Yu was rather unrefined; he could roast it directly and still find it savory, but Edward had sampled Avia's culinary skills before, and they were miles ahead of anything this fellow could produce.

"Very well, I shall await the feast then."

Wang Yu shrugged, leaning back against the sled seat, and began to converse with Edward behind him regarding recent events.

"We intend to visit the Professor's homeland to take a look. Lately, a host of chaotic matters seem to have some vague connection to that place. That lot known as the Dragon Cult is thoroughly loathsome, stirring up trouble everywhere. I assume you already know about what happened at the Fading Peaks."

Wang Yu briefly touched upon his future objectives with Edward, taking the opportunity to inquire about what the latter knew of the Dragon Cult.

"Yes, through the prayer communication network, it was plain to see; the power wielded by the dragons and the Dragon Cult alike is staggering, and their clash brought forth nothing less than a true cataclysm."

"Many innocents were harmed, though thankfully the Church of Night, the Church of the Light God, and several branches of the Goddess of Wealth and the Nature God’s sects intervened, or the death toll would have been far greater."

"Yet, because of this very event, many who were aided by the Church of Night have chosen to join its ranks, and the faith of the Lady of the Night spreads ever wider, but..."

Nodding in response, Edward sighed; he still harbored a deep aversion to seeing the innocent suffer.

"Indeed, the Lady of the Night would likely not wish to gain more followers through such tragedies, but in the end, this matter had nothing to do with us, and faith, at the very least, provides the helpless with the strength to survive such disasters."

Wang Yu naturally understood the implication behind Edward’s unfinished sentence.

"There was also a battle between the Dragon Cult and a dragon in the Ash Barrens; a black dragon tore the earth of that region to shreds, burst forth, and fought the cultists before vanishing, though since no one lived there, no innocents perished."

Edward recounted the recent intelligence he had gathered for Wang Yu.

"The Ash Barrens? That lies directly above the City of Sin, doesn't it? A black dragon, indeed—to think it could dwell in such a place; no wonder the Dragon Cult could never track it down."

Startled by the news, Wang Yu, who had pored over countless continental secrets, knew exactly what lay beneath the Ash Barrens: an eternal purgatory for the damned, its origins and the race that built it lost to the mists of time.

In any case, Sieg’s assessment was that if he were to descend in his dragon form and remain for an hour, he might not emerge alive, which begged the question of just how terrifying the constitution of that black dragon hiding in the City of Sin must truly be.

As the two discussed recent events, the alchemical sled sped northward, carrying them across the frozen expanse.

With the majestic silhouette of the Saint Anna Snowfield gradually revealing itself in its entirety before Wang Yu, who was busy chewing on roasted rabbit, the first waypoint on their journey to the Endless Sea had finally been reached.