Badge in Azure

Sika hated the assassin to such an extreme that she refused to let him die. As such, the assassin was not even allowed to kill himself. Sika returned to her children’s side and had several demons protect them with their bodies. The demons were, in turn, surrounded by Caucasian warriors. Sika took up her staff and looked around.

The distance between the harbor and the temple was over three miles. The enemy must have had someone planted on Sika and Saleen’s side to enable such an attack. The enemy would not have learned her routine otherwise. However, the mole would have been one of a very low level, or they would have learned of the magic cannon installed at the White Rock Mountain. The magic cannon’s attack forced the assassin to use a precious teleportation scroll to make it onto shore.

When the assassins were in the water, Sika did not realize that someone powerful was among them.

The green aura seeped into the assassin’s body, burrowing right into his lungs and sprouting there, becoming a green plant. The assassin felt breathing to be very difficult. His heartbeat slowed and was unable to keep the sword aura going. His body turned limp after that.

A Caucasian warrior lifted his hair. The assassin’s limbs were all torn and the wounds were scarred over. The scars were dark brown and resembled the bark of a tree. The team moved slowly. The magic power furnace was in operation on White Rock Mountain. Two mages and two Caucasian warriors operated the huge cannon and turned the barrel towards the city, looking for suspicious targets with alchemy binoculars.

The magic alarm was sent into the magic tower. There were two magic towers near the harbor and every tower had a level nine sorcerer.

When Saleen’s children were attacked, all 36 magic towers were activated, locking down Metatrin City.

It became impossible for anyone to leave the city. The layout of the magic towers ensured that at least six towers would be capable of coordinated attacks within any given region.

Metatrin City was hardly larger than Daliang City, yet it had four times the number of magic towers. As such, it was impossible for the enemy to take out all of the towers. Furthermore, the walls of Metatrin City were magical construction. White stones, stacked according to Dante’s Sequence, amplified the power of magic towers within the city to horrifying levels.

When compared to Holy Rock City, all Metatrin City lacked was a set of large scale magic amplifiers.

Sika did not dare let her guard down, despite being under layers of protection. The fact that the Holy See had teleportation scrolls with them was terrifying. It had actually enabled a person to teleport onto a general coordinate when the magic towers were not in defense mode.

The ground at the center between the harbor and the temple shook violently all of a sudden. Six magic towers locked down on the position. There was someone intending to infiltrate the temple through the sewers, an action that triggered the magic arrays in place.

There were secret passages from the temple leading straight to the harbor with tens of checkpoints, all of which were laid using high level magic arrays. Saleen’s diving combat vessels were all launched from underwater and would never float on the surface. There were three passages. The one that Saleen used was incredibly deep and no one knew of its existence. The remaining two were connected to the barracks of the temple guards, so there were more who knew of them.

The trembling came from one of the passages, 50 meters below ground. A middle-aged man of average build was all curled up in a concave space cut out by a weapon. The passage was constructed using white stones. He was only able to make a place he could curl up in using all of his might.

The passage was filled with poisonous gas and magic beams shot indiscriminately, trapping him where he was. The assassin wore soft magic armor and held a very small sharpened targe.

The assassin’s face was pale. He was unaware of a trap being laid when he passed by a magic array, breaking the surface layer of the array and triggering the true attack. His leg was injured as a result. His speed, the most important aspect at being an assassin, was severely limited. He had no idea of how to leave. There were no branches to be found and the place was filled with powerful magic arrays. The intel he had gotten turned out to be completely false. The passage was a lethal impasse.

The assassin was hesitating on whether to move forward or go back to where he came from, but a bunch of huge bugs shimmering with blue light were coming in from in front. The poisonous gas that filled the place came from the bugs.

The assassin leapt out of his hiding place without hesitation. His sharpened targe hit the wall across where he stood. He turned around and dodged the wind blades shooting furiously from below.

The passages that Saleen had built were intended to serve as foundations for building an underground city. However, the environment turned out to be extremely weird. The entire city was sitting on top of an enormous white rock. The white rock was harder than steel, and it was beyond Saleen’s capabilities to carve out spaces to serve as an underground city. All he was able to do was carve out spaces to serve as warehouses and pipelines for both water supply and sewage.

Out of the three passages, only the deepest one was used for transporting troops. Saleen did not have sorcerers at his disposal in the beginning and Metatrin City was very vulnerable. Only the temple was operated and maintained painstakingly, which made it a necessity to keep the passage between it and the harbor smooth and free of obstacles, enabling the use of Pan Turtle Alchemy Ship for escape any time.

The two passages above were ones that only people with temple badges were able to pass through unharmed. The magic arrays that were connected to the magic towers would easily become lethal traps. The intel that the assassin had gathered was outdated. With 36 level nine sorcerers helping to defend the city, its defenses were extended to outside the city. The two passages were made obsolete and the defenses were activated all the time, as they only served to transport secret goods in the future.

The temple guard’s demons did not bother searching the place even when they found the enemy. They simply released magic bugs instead. The bugs were combat types and all of them bore the mark of the temple guard, preventing them from triggering the magic array and magic towers. The demons’ crude and savage way of dealing with the threat proved to be the best method. The assassin became surrounded by thousands of huge bugs in no time. The concentration of the poisonous gas within the passage reached the point where it was able to corrode skin directly. The assassin did not have any respiratory equipment. It was only a matter of time before he ended up dead.

The assassins of the Holy See appeared at Metatrin City at the same time, infiltrating with different methods, yet none of them was able to reach the temple, as they had no idea how the core of the city worked. The attack was orchestrated from varying angles, in order to box Sika and her children in at the harbor.

Sika had passed through the passages and headed straight for the temple under the magic towers’ protection.

The seeds in the lungs of the assassin that Sika had captured had matured completely. The branches that grew from his nose and mouth worked like vines, enveloping the assassin’s head. He was completely dazed, so much so that he was unable to kill himself by ingesting poison. Sika said not to let him die, so he was unable to die.

The controlled power of a nature priest was powerful. Even someone like Sika, who had advanced from the warrior priest branch, had control skills that were just as complete as any other priests.

The assassin was hoisted by his belt with a spear and carried on a Caucasian warrior’s back. There were more demons gathering around, blocking the view of outsiders.

A small patrol team appeared far away. The magic cannon at the White Rock Mountain at the harbor fired furiously at them. Magic alarms had already been sent to every checkpoint secretly, and the patrols were forbidden to move. All patrol teams were taken over by the demons of the temple guard.

The demons that Saleen picked were all about five meters tall. The most gigantic humans were about three meters tall at most, making it impossible for anyone to disguise themselves as one of his demons.

The defenses of Metatrin City were laid in such a way that there was no way for the assassins to ever find an opening to exploit. 36 magic towers were able to deliver orders to every platoon. The towers were even capable of instructing individual soldiers should the need have risen.

The assassins were unable to disguise themselves as Metatrin patrol teams; they were even unable to disguise themselves as trees. Trees in Metatrin City possessed a measure of intelligence, as they were engineered by elves.

The patrol team that was hit by the magic cannon lost half of its members. It nearly swept through the entire team by attacking from above. The high temperatures of the attack injured the surviving assassins, scalding their skin to a crisp, almost falling off their bodies. The team of assassins had intended to attack using poison. They would release potent poisonous gas so long as they were able to get near their target, making them capable of killing even high level professionals.

The magic cannon attack rendered the poisons that the assassins carried completely useless. All toxins were cleansed under the high temperatures. A squad of demons attacked shortly after the magic cannon attack, making minced meat out of the surviving assassins.

When Sika’s team passed, things on the surface had been cleaned, without so much even a piece of bone left on it.

The assassins that the Holy See had planted continued their work within Metatrin City. Individual cells of assassins were unconnected with the others, a move that ensured the secrecy of their respective missions. However, there was no room for mistakes when executing their assigned tasks.

The assassins did not make any mistakes, but the ones who gave the orders at the Holy See did. The one who planned the operations did not have the true secrets of the city.

Even more powerful Caucasian warriors came to receive Sika from the temple. Under Jola’s lead and three sorcerers’ protection, Sika’s children were taken into the temple safely. After Sika became a nature priest, she was able to see the inner thoughts of warriors with Caucasian blood, which made it impossible for people of the Holy See to disguise themselves as Caucasian warriors.

All Caucasians who bore ill will towards them were cast out of Metatrin City by Sika.

Sika chose a room on the second floor when she returned to the temple, hoisting up the captured assassin with a rope. The children were entrusted to Eleanor and taken to Jason’s side. Sika did not want her children to see anything that she was about to do.

Sika stood before the assassin. He was hung upside down, his face at the same height as Sika’s head.

Sika looked at the assassin and as her eyes moved, the green plants that wrapped the assassin’s face unraveled its leaves, leaving the assassin’s face exposed. Sika asked without beating around the bush, “Talk. Who sent you? Tell me and I’ll let you die.”

The assassin had only regained the ability of speech at that moment. He screamed when he realized his situation. The plants that burrowed out of his nose twisted, turning his frightened screams into shrieks of pain.

“I know that you’re from the Holy See, but I’ll like to ask. Who planned all this? Who is that traitor in Metatrin City? I’ll be able to find out even if you say nothing. Tell me, and I’ll let you die.”

“I won’t tell you, otherwise…”

“Keep your mouth shut and enjoy it all then,” Sika said and turned to leave the room. The doors shut with a huge bang, sealing the room completely off. The assassin in the room shrieked eerily again, like a magic beast about to get slaughtered.