Badge in Azure

Jalin’s speed had exceeded Saleen’s limit of flight capabilities. Even with the power of wind element provided in full force by two Tempest Dragon-mights, Saleen had no way of keeping up with her.

Saleen knew that unless he went summoning the leader of the Tempest Dragon-mights, there was simply no way he could close the distance between the two of them. If the one he was chasing after was Sika or Lex, he would have definitely summoned the Tempest Dragon-might leader by then. The one before him was Jalin though. Since Arbola was confident enough to leave her by his side, the chance of anything happening to her was close to nil.

Saleen lowered his flight altitude a bit, watching the ones wearing holy master regalia beneath him. He threw icicles at each one he saw, not caring if he would end up killing the enemy. If the ones being hit by the spell were holy masters below grade-7, Saleen did not think there was any way for them to defend against his mutated spell.

In truth, Saleen hardly saw anyone alive along the way. The camp was set up sparsely and the route which the winged skeleton took was not heading for the most densely populated areas. That was done to lower the difficulty in making their way across the camp. The ones who managed to survive the poison attacks were basically holy masters or soldiers armed with magic equipment.

The survivors struggled to resist the toxins, and Saleen needed little more than a grade-3 icicle to finish them off. Some even died under Jalin’s foot when she moved about. The stepping motions that she did when moving in the air carried the power of the earth. No one was left alive where she stepped.

Saleen caught up with the flying spirits shortly. The number of spirit casualties began to rise, and it was impossible for the winged skeleton to kill every single holy master who stood in his way. Jalin was nowhere to be seen, and Saleen knew she was probably caught in an enemy trap.

Their predicament only resulted in the considerable weakening of the enemy ground defenses.

Saleen made a snap decision to unleash six Vermillion Knights to start burning the camp. The knights did not need to do much, as everywhere they tread was set ablaze.

The Vermillion Knights practically burned a path on the ground. As the fires were not the result of magic, they were not quickly extinguished. The tall bodies of the Vermillion Knights were not something common human warriors were able to match. With Saleen in the air and the Vermillion Knights trampling about, they made it to the center of the camp in no time.

It was a given that the huge army gathered by the Holy See packed large-scale equipment. The route he took was devoid of any, and the ones nearby were being mobilized and gathered instead.

The Holy See’s large-scale equipment all had its own special traits. Most were controlled by holy masters, making them seem like some moving magic tower. At the same time, the large-scale equipment could not be moved by a single person. Such equipment utterly sacrificed mobility to maximize damage potential. On a battlefield, there was a variety of means to compensate for such glaring a weakness.

In their situation however, the Holy See army was not facing large-scale assaults by enemy forces, but a group of flying spirits with several powerful mages taking the lead.

It had been a long time since the last time anyone had seen such massive deployment of spirits on the Myers Mainland. Common death mages were capable of summoning spirits in the hundreds at most. Death sorcerers, while capable of summoning about 1,000 spirits, usually refrained from doing so, as the toll on their mental powers was simply too great. Only a being like the winged skeleton possessed the means of commanding more than 100,000 spirits at the same time.

The forces at Saleen’s flanks slowly closed in on them with their large-scale equipment in tow, yet they were quickly left in the dust by the flying spirits. Under the winged skeleton’s instructions, none of the flying spirits bothered dealing with the large-scale equipment, so as to prevent adding to the death toll of their own.

Saleen did not bother dealing with the large-scale equipment either. He knew Sika would have definitely installed magic cannons within Guderian City. As such, none of the large-scale equipment was capable of making it near the city, and its deployment put a heavy cost on the army’s supplies. Every deployment required considerable amounts of divine crystals or magic nuclei.

The holy masters, on top of their huge steel monsters, looked up at the mages flying by and were not able to do anything. Saleen flew at a high speed and was covered in clouds. He was further protected by two Tempest Dragon-mights. As such, only someone of his own level would be capable of posing a threat to him.

Arbola’s personal guards, under the protection provided by the elemental creatures, advanced into the camp from the rear. The mages behind them caught up while the guards were only about ten miles deep into enemy territory.

Arbola was of course concerned about her own guards, as all of them were of levels above middle class swordmasters. While there were few grand swordmasters among them, they were still young and had a great future ahead of them. Saleen had the troops experience war throughout the expedition, and casualties were kept low. That earned him Arbola’s approval, but Theisio was still nowhere to be seen despite having arrived right before the city itself. Arbola was done waiting, as she received news about Jalin going out on her own to pursue holy masters.

Arbola took more than 30 sorcerers with her and made it outside the camp. The sight of the camp being corroded by poison rendered her somewhat dumbfounded. If she had yet to reach grade-10, she would have been very, very wary of Saleen.

“Chief, isn’t this Saleen fellow going a little far with the killing?” An elder beside her asked.

“Against the Holy See? I wish he’d killed more.” Arbola scoffed at the elder with cold eyes.

The elder lowered their head. Despite Arbola’s young appearance, she was actually more than 300 years old, and had been in charge of the Grukos for more than 100 years. Her bearing was impressive, and every move of hers was capable of making the elders nervous.

“Remember not to spread too far out. No matter who you encounter, keep the formation of six in a group.” While Arbola was indeed harsh on her people, she was nonetheless concerned about casualties among the elders. The elders were still important figures within the clan. If the casualties suffered were too high, the clan would have had a hard time replenishing their numbers of grade-9 sorcerers.

Arbola’s arrival relieved Saleen. He was also afraid of the possibility of a grade-10 holy master springing out of nowhere. He was alone, and all of his most powerful attacks were short-ranged ones. If something like that did happen, he would have had no choice but to run.

As such, Saleen refrained from using Hogina’s gun. While its rate of fire was high, the element of surprise would have been lost if it was used even once. It would have been very difficult to lock onto his enemies. It was no Grey Memory after all.

If all six of the barrels of the gun were used, it would work well to cover his escape for some time. Arbola would not simply watch him die from afar. If things got too dire, there was still the option of barricading himself behind the walls of his Magical Element Tower.

Saleen was actually being rather paranoid, as most of the grade-9 professionals were found on the other side of Guderian City’s walls instead. The deployment of the Holy See army was done in accordance to Theisio’s designs. Theisio brought oracles with him, intending for them to block Saleen off at the south. It was a sound plan.

Theisio was nowhere to be seen, and as such, the number of professionals stationed at the camp on the southern side of the city were few. The Holy See had actually wanted to deploy grade-10 professionals in the south as well, but grade-10 professionals were hard to come by.

The commander of the southern camp turned anxious as soon as they found Saleen coming. They deployed more than 20 holy masters to intercept him, yet none returned from their missions, resulting in further frustrations. The commander decided to take a different approach, which was to have a grade-9 holy master lure Saleen into a trap.

The one who was lured was Jalin instead of Saleen. Jalin was moving too fast for that holy master to finish setting up their trap, catching up with them in no time. The dozen holy masters lying in wait inside the trap had no choice but to engage her. As such, there was hardly anyone standing in Saleen’s way.

While Jalin was about as strong as Saleen, her way of movement caught people off-guard easily. She was no match for the dozen holy masters, but they failed to surround her. The commander at the southern camp was left with no choice but to try to buy time with Jalin and deployed some of their troops to find Saleen.

Three grade-9 professionals showed up before Saleen, with a black-robed holy master taking the lead. Two grand swordmasters followed closely behind.

Saleen caught all three of them in his sight. A brief analysis with his Eye told him that the two swordsmen behind him were silver grand swordmasters instead of golden ones. Saleen felt rather relieved about his findings.

Golden grand swordmasters remained a great threat to him. Even when armed with the Crystal Finger, his speed was still inferior to that of a golden grand swordmaster. Golden grand swordmasters also possessed formidable skills for holding back their enemies. If the ones tagging along with the black-robed holy master were indeed golden grand swordmasters, Saleen would have just turned tail and run.

Saleen was gradually able to feel the strength of his Elemental Eye. Even the likes of Arbola had problems seeing more than 100 miles away, yet he was capable of detecting his enemies acutely and effortlessly. By the time the trio got within two miles away from him, Saleen was done setting up his tactics.

Both sides closed in on each other rapidly. Saleen’s spell was readied when the distance between both parties were about a mile away.

800, 600, 400 yards…

Saleen could have just deployed Hogina’s gun, yet he deliberately refrained from doing so, as he did not want to deploy such a last resort just yet. The way Saleen saw it, the gun was reserved for fighting grade-10 professionals. If he happened to be fighting someone of his level, he would have rather used staffs or scrolls. While those were still stored spells as well, they needed personal control from him and they were required to work in tandem with other spells before a solid strategy could be formed.

From that point of view alone, it became apparent that the use of staffs or scrolls also served to deepen his understanding of magic.

His family badge offered no such maneuvering. It was capable of nothing other than blasting the enemy with a thick, menacing bolt of lightning, reducing the enemy to dust. The rules of lightning that Saleen was able to learn from every use were miniscule. He was able to learn more by quieting himself and prodding into the badge with his senses for further research instead.

Such a piece of equipment, while very useful in battle, proved to be of little help in furthering his practice.

It was something he came to comprehend after fighting Van Gogh. Van Gogh’s Lance of Order stopped Saleen’s attacks with the badge dead in its tracks. While the lightning attack ended up tearing the power within the lance apart, it nonetheless failed to kill Van Gogh. If Van Gogh were to be a grade-10 holy master, Saleen might have ended up dead.

Over reliance on any one piece of equipment would bring about his doom sooner or later.

There was no way for Saleen to know that if all underlying powers of his family badge were to be unlocked, no equipment of the same level would be able to withstand its attacks. The rules of lightning imbued within were not of the Myers Mainland, and it was not even a Crystal Wall type. A Crystal Wall type of lightning powers would have been far inferior.

As both parties got increasing near each other, the grade-9 holy master stood airborne with no intentions of moving, feeling glee that they had met their enemy. They knew that their attacks were far inferior compared to who they were about to fight. If Saleen decided to simply turn tail and run, there was little they would be able to do about it. Powerful divine spells required some measure of preparation, just like powerful magic spells.

The holy master looked rather menacing. The grade-9 holy master that the winged skeleton happened to kill was their friend. They had no idea that it was the Winged skeleton who killed their friend, however. As such he had decided to take it out on Saleen.

A hundred yards!

The holy master sped up all of a sudden with the grand swordmasters in tow. It was as if they teleported right before Saleen. The silver grand swordmasters crossed their swords and blasted him with golden sword aura.

A combined attack!

The power of the two silver grand swordmasters was raised to extreme levels, launching an attack with damage potential similar to that of a golden grand swordmaster. Tens of beams of sword aura were shot, cutting Saleen’s flanks off. The holy master unraveled a scroll and looked at Saleen as if they were seeing a dead man before them.