Chapter 449: Self-Detonation, Focus of Attention

The Archangel’s power is truly formidable; against an army of such uneven quality, a single bombardment, delivered without warning, is enough to push casualties to an unbearable threshold.

The infinite shroud of darkness, woven from the Lady of Night’s power, gradually receded from the sky. The massive void rift, torn open by Wang Yu, was slowly mended by the material world’s own repulsive forces, allowing the god’s power to return to the void and revealing the wretched state of the Losman army following the Archangel’s strike.

The bombardment had left a colossal crater at the heart of the army’s original position, where lava from the molten rock flowed in the depths. All soldiers in the immediate vicinity of the blast were torn to shreds, evaporated on the spot.

Further out, the survivors were nothing more than broken remnants, swept by a terrifying shockwave, their armor shattered, their bodies and minds shattered in turn. Having had their senses dismantled by the Lady of Night and then struck by a full-charge blast from the Archangel, this force—hardly the core of the Losman Kingdom’s military—was utterly routed.

Now, the surviving soldiers lacked the courage to fight on; the fear born from such a pure disparity in power could not be mended by morale or military orders. They cast aside their weapons and armor, fleeing in a desperate scramble toward the borders of Alastair.

Presumably, these wretches would spread word of the power Alastair possessed, fulfilling the dual purpose of testing and intimidation.

"It’s a pity the Archangel has limited uses. The material for its warheads is currently non-renewable; even the Sky Mechanical City can’t procure much. If I use substitutes, the drop in power won't be just a little."

Crouched on the hilltop, watching the results of the bombardment, Wang Yu rubbed his chin and muttered to himself.

"Wang Yu, there are minute fluctuations in the surrounding void. Someone is spying on us."

The girl’s reminder made Wang Yu narrow his eyes, casting his gaze toward the location she had marked on the perfect fractal lens. The target was outside the range of his Chariot Force, and Wang Yu had not sensed them.

Avia’s ability to perceive such faint traces of activity relied on her own wizardry, vastly amplified by Wang Yu’s Chariot Force. This power pushed the insight of the perfect fractal spell to a terrifying intensity.

"Is this thing Roland’s escaped living fortress?"

What to do when the Chariot Force couldn't reach? It was simple: let Avia open a void rift for him, and he would stick his head in to look with the exaggerated vision of his legendary-tier physique. What appeared before Wang Yu, far off in the void and seemingly cloaked by some power, was indeed the living fortress from which Wang Yu had previously stripped a room.

But before Wang Yu could take his next step, the thing vanished at high speed into the vast, boundless reaches of the void, invisible to them both.

"It left... what could this thing be planning?"

The girl was puzzled. The creature was elusive, and its intentions were unknown. The things left behind by Roland were as difficult to fathom as the man himself—the greatest wizard in human history.

"A step too slow this time. Next time, I’ll have the Lady of Night try to intercept it; perhaps we’ll gain something."

Wang Yu didn't dwell on it. Although it was highly probable that whatever the entity wanted to do wouldn't be simple, for the moment, it was just watching.

"True. Next, we wait for the arrangements in Shier. Now that Alastair has bared its fangs, other kingdoms will have to weigh the cost before attempting another invasion.

Besides, such an unprovoked invasion is bound to meet with opposition from civilians and even ordinary soldiers. The intelligence network is in place; we’ll have news soon..."

"And then, since the turmoil brought by these ancient relics has spread across the continent, Alastair—having demonstrated power capable of shaking the continent's landscape, including the dragon race—should soon see other intelligent races coming to make contact. Dealing with the chaos caused by these ancient relics is a task shared by all intelligent races."

The girl agreed, and as she cast the Phase Gate spell, she discussed the potential developments.

And as Avia had anticipated, the fallout from the four-nation offensive against Alastair swept across the continent with startling speed. Beyond the sudden display of power by the human kingdom of Alastair, the most striking news was the reappearance of dragons on the continent.

The "Stray Thorn" intelligence operatives under the Blade of Night, many of whom had long been embedded in the surrounding kingdoms, quickly relayed the intelligence from these neighboring lands back to Shier via the prayer communication network.

Walking the streets of the Losman Kingdom, the intelligence operative didn't even need to ask; the pedestrians were all discussing what the Losman army had encountered during the invasion of Alastair.

The sudden appearance of the massive dark shroud, and the fact that only a handful of survivors remained after it receded, left the public feeling bewildered and deeply uneasy.

Holding a freshly printed urgent newspaper, the Blade of Night operative leaned against a magic crystal streetlamp, listening casually to two middle-aged men who had just finished their shift at an alchemy workshop.

"Why did the kingdom suddenly attack Alastair? There wasn't a whisper of it before. The Alastairians and us don't have any real conflict, do we? It’s so strange to just attack like that."

One of them couldn't fathom the sudden aggression. Recalling the newspaper’s descriptions of Alastair—aside from reports on the war between Seuintan and Alastair long ago—he had almost no impression of the kingdom.

"That’s not the point. It wasn't just our kingdom that moved against Alastair. I heard that all the surrounding kingdoms did—Sariben, Visconti, and the others."

His friend clearly knew more, revealing that they weren't the only ones.

"What is going on? Did Alastair do something that harmed all the other kingdoms? Otherwise, why would so many attack at once? Could it be... an evil god ritual?"

The man who had first raised the question was even more confused. How could Alastair suddenly be under siege by everyone?

"Unlikely. Even with void evil gods, it’s never reached this level. At most, a kingdom sends troops to suppress them internally; who goes off to attack another kingdom? Considering Seuintan was wiped out by Alastair, maybe Alastair wanted to strike the surrounding kingdoms, so we acted first?"

Dismissing his friend’s guess, the latter offered his own view.

"Who knows? I just hope they stop fighting. We have no idea what those people at the top are thinking. If they keep fighting, life will get harder."

The two finished their cigarette-like items, tossed them aside, and parted ways at the intersection, heading home.

The Blade of Night operative, having listened for half the day, recorded the conversation verbatim and sent it back to Shier.

Intelligence from the four kingdoms was aggregated and received by Shier via the prayer network. Most of the content consisted of the residents' guesses and opinions, essentially a repetition of their idle chatter—disorganized and seemingly meaningless—but this was exactly what Shier needed.

"Ordinary residents have no hostility toward Alastair; they don't even know why the kingdom mobilized. It seems this was orchestrated from the level of the nobility and above."

Sorting through the chatter with the devil "One," Shier analyzed what he needed.

The residents' guesses about the reasons for the invasion were bizarre—evil god invasions, preemptive self-defense, even a joint training exercise between the five nations—reasons so absurd they made Shier’s eyelids twitch.

It was precisely this absurdity that proved the citizens of the other kingdoms were completely in the dark, forced to speculate wildly. And the "they" those residents often mentioned—the source of their information—were actually the Blade of Night operatives.

By spreading information about what happened and observing the reaction, they achieved their goal of gathering intelligence. At the same time, these informed residents would naturally develop a psychological opposition to this inexplicable war. Shier wanted to see if those in power dared to continue the war in the face of such opposition.

"What? Is Winter City alright!?"

Just then, a message from Edward caused Shier to shudder in alarm, and he urgently confirmed the situation there.

"The situation is okay. The Lady of Night sensed the energy tide in the void and the tremors from the ancient relics beneath the St. Anna Snowfields in advance, and quickly warned me. With the help of the dragons, we are safe, but..."

Edward’s response came quickly. Before he could finish, he sent a final image.

The St. Anna Snowfields, which had stood for so long in the northern reaches of Seuintan, had collapsed by half. On the ruined half of the mountain range, huge, hideous blast marks remained.

From the snowfields to Winter City, all the snow had been lifted by the shockwave of the explosion, revealing a cracked and heaving earth. The ceaseless wind and snow had stopped. Looking at the image, Shier didn't even recognize the place as the northern snowfields.

The initial news Edward relayed was that the ancient relic beneath the St. Anna Snowfields had suddenly detonated. All the secrets within, which were slated for future exploration, were buried along with that earth-shattering blast.

But that wasn't the point. If not for the Lady of Night’s warning and the dragons' help, Edward wouldn't have had the chance to speak to Shier.

"Damn it, the lead we finally had in our hands is broken again."

Shier was annoyed. He had intended to investigate the relic thoroughly, but the thing had simply self-destructed.

"I suppose I’ll have to hope other intelligent kingdoms can unearth some information from the relics appearing in their own territories..."

Sighing, Shier muttered to himself.

...

"Is it really okay to just destroy an anchor point like that?"

The orc Bassaka asked the white-haired youth, whose body had transformed into a gorgeous energy state the color of the starry sky. Following the void tide the other had just released, one of the planned anchor points had collapsed and annihilated.

"It matters not. We have two backup nodes, do we not?"

The white-haired youth broke his connection with the void, waved his hand with a smile, and responded to the orc’s skepticism.

"But those were backups. To discard one so decisively... you should explain your reasoning."

Such a simple answer could not satisfy the other.

"Fine. Let’s put it this way: from the very beginning, things didn't go according to plan over there. Two kingdoms—Alastair and Seuintan—had already been influenced..."

The kingdom, yet the final trajectory of events was fundamentally askew, and such a derailment must surely have a catalyst for this anomaly; this self-inflicted amputation is merely to avoid that singular point, and through this node, glimpse into something more.

The white-haired youth offered the true reason.

Hmm, I would make the same choice as you; the dragon kin, these beings were never part of the plan.

The orc Berserker nodded in agreement, finding no fault in the white-haired youth’s actions.

No, you have missed the point; those dragons are of no consequence, their strength is one-sided, like hollow shells devoid of souls, and without reaching that step, they could never influence our future plans.

What matters is the situation in the eastern reaches of Alestler, you and I both sense it, do we not? It is a complete divine descent; it is only natural that you cannot comprehend it, I can only say this: it should have been an absolute impossibility.