Badge in Azure

Since the reinforcements from the Tribunal would be arriving in one more day, Saleen did not rush to send the 12 sorcerers away. After all, the army in the city needed to be reorganized and the defenses were in a rather messy state, so he needed the sorcerers to stick around and help keep the city safe.

The new schematics of Daliang City had just been sent to Metatrin City. The mages from Sreeger Island had designed a magic net in the shortest time possible, while having the alchemy factories craft all of the materials that were needed to construct this net at the same time.

Daliang City was far larger than Ceylon City, so naturally, the magic power furnace and metal towers that were required for constructing a magic net were also several times larger.

At the moment, Lex had to return to the Metal Titan to Metatrin City using the teleportation portal. This was because the mines in Metatrin City were unable to produce adequate amounts of the required metals quickly enough without the Metal Titan around.

Saleen had come to care little to nothing about the cost of using such portals, as he deemed it worth any cost, even if he had to use level nine magic nuclei to power them. Besides, Lex’s God’s Ring was capable of carrying large amount of supplies, which was something none of Saleen’s subordinates were capable of doing with their equipment. Even if Nailisi’s 12 Notes of First Purgatory was completed, its space would still have been smaller than the God’s Ring’s.

At the moment, an army of 120,000 was seen, moving slowly about 600 miles west of Daliang City. This army consisted of mostly black-armored wardens. There was also a force of 10,000 within it, and all of these units were clad in purplish red suits of armor.

The march of the army slowed to a halt by nightfall, as they set up camp according to their plan. At this time, the scouts at the forefront found the scattered units that were outside the city.

The scattered units from the allied forces were literally in shambles. They were unable to bring any supplies with them and their camps had all been destroyed. The ones who had escaped were all stronger warriors who were holed up near the border.

As for all of the low level holy masters and mages, they had perished in that magical catastrophe. There were even some grand mages and holy masters above level four who had been caught at the epicenter of the catastrophe. After being robbed of their flight abilities, they were pulled into the ground.

The officers of the scattered army gathered whatever was left of their forces, which now consisted of fewer than 10,000 units. The ones who ran were unable to be recalled, and the over 9000-strong force became the largest force that remained of the original allied forces.

There had been few elites in the Holy See army to begin with, and the scene of the magical catastrophe made the soldiers think that it was a manifestation of their god’s wrath. As such, most of the survivors were reluctant to rejoin the army and fight, so they ran out and hid in the wilderness instead. Those soldiers would have all chosen to surrender if it meant that they would be allowed inside Daliang City.

The magical catastrophe that Saleen had engineered killed 90 percent of his enemies, and any who survived were basically frightened to their cores. As for those people, what hit them the hardest was that they had lost their faith.

This was because, when the catastrophe happened, all of their divine arts were rendered ineffective. This explained why 90 percent of the army had perished.

In previous battles, it was easy to save the soldiers of the Holy See as long as they remained alive. What happened this time was different, as the surrounding areas of the city were rendered a living hell.

Those 9,000 surviving troops were put under the command of the vanguard forces, who forced them to surrender all of their weapons. The dozen officers of higher ranks and a level nine holy master were then relegated to the forces in the middle of the army.

At the moment three middle-aged men were sitting at a square table in a large tent in the army that was stationed at the middle. The ground was covered with planks and thick rugs, and there were many crystal lamps hanging around the camp. These lamps cast so much light in the tents that no shadows could be found at all.

The level nine holy master and a silver grand swordmaster, who held the rank of lieutenant, were looking grim as they were being brought into the camp. Over two dozen holy masters stood behind the three middle-aged men, and they were all looking at the two with cold expressions.

“Names!” the youngest of the three barked at both of the men, who were now kneeling.

A green emblem was sewed on his lapel. The embled depicted a snake that was coiling around a weapon that looked like a glaive. This was the mark of the Tribunal.

Even though those two men had never been to the Tribunal, they knew what rank those three were nonetheless, due to the fact that the trio could command such a large army. The Tribunal had clear-cut ranks, but the way that these ranks were divided according to the emblems they wore was much less complicated than that of the Pivotal Council. They could tell that these three were the newly appointed head inquisitors, all of whom were at the pinnacle of level nine.

The oracles had brought gifts for the Tribunal when they had descended, so all three of these newly appointed head inquisitors held godly items that had been bestowed upon them by the oracles. Any items which could be labeled as godly items were made of materials of at least level 13 or above.

The oracles themselves were but level 12, which meant they would not have been able to craft such godly items. Nonetheless, the Tribunal had an unusually huge stockpile of them. This was partly because the wealth that they had accumulated back when the Holy See was first established was simply too vast to count.

The equipment that the three newly appointed head inquisitors possessed was all heavily sealed, and these seals were not undone until the arrival of the oracles, which had brought their powers up several levels higher than what they had been.

There were many in the Tribunal just like them, and the fact that they were able to make it this far and be appointed as head inquisitors spoke volumes about their superior luck, at least compared to their peers.

Their names were Morpheus and Kredian, both of which were very common names. They both hailed from the bottom rung of society, and as such, it had been hard for them to come that far. Somewhere along the way, they had developed a great fear of the three middle-aged men, and they were terrified of offending them.

“We do not have names. We’re known as the fourth, the fifth, and the sixth head inquisitor,” the middle-aged man sitting in the middle said slowly. The two who were kneeling on the ground were trembling all over.

“Alright. We’ll put your sins aside for the moment. Tell us what happened.” After being asked this question by the fourth head inquisitor, Morpheus, the holy master, quickly began to tell them what happened that day.

He did not actually know what had happened, but he did know that the catastrophe surrounding Daliang City was triggered by magic. As someone stationed at the outskirts, he had no idea what was going on inside Daliang City.

“Is that all?” The fourth head inquisitor looked displeased.

He had hoped that they would have been able to get some useful intel. However, the only thing they were sure of was that there were no living persons left within 120 miles of Daliang City.

The holy master and the silver grand swordmaster shivered with fear. If they angered the head inquisitor, they knew that they would be made to suffer!

“We’ll give you a chance…” The fourth head inquisitor dragged his voice out as he said, “Gather all of the scattered troops within the week and organize them. Your supplies shall be provided by the Tribunal. As the officers of the army, you two will be in charge of the first wave of assaults in the city.”

After hearing this, both of them were elated. While their mission was clearly to serve as cannon fodder, it was still better than being taken away by the Tribunal to be used for experiments.

“Of course, we can’t just let you off the hook.” As the fourth head inquisitor waved his hand, a black-robed holy master came around the table and stood before the two men. He then took out a whip and whipped them hard with it!

Both of them held themselves still, not daring to try to evade it. The whip had a massive amount of holy prose on it, so every single lash left very apparent marks on their faces.

It was actually a very light sentence, more like a shame whipping. The wounds created by the whipping were not severe, but the holy prose left deep marks not only on their bodies, but in their souls as well. This was because holy prose would continue to torture them until they finished their given tasks.

After dismissing the two runaways, the head inquisitors looked into possible solutions for their problems. Their wardens were indeed elites, and they had brought the hidden power of the Tribunal with them this time, which was the Blood Army!

The Tribunal had not fought in any wars for hundreds of years, and they had the highest number of divine smiths with them. The Blood Army was also a force that was rarely seen in the Holy See.

The soldiers were born in the Tribunal and were raised by dark holy masters, who brainwashed them into being the most loyal warriors that ever served the Tribunal. The gruesomeness of their training was done with the sole objective of preparing them for truly brutal battles.

However, it was still difficult for a 120,000-strong army to take Daliang City. Worse still, the necessary large scale equipment would only arrive in a week.

This was why the fourth head inquisitor had tasked Morpheus with gathering the scattered units within the week. It was done in preparation for the arrival of the large scale equipment.

The Tribunal had mobilized millions in order to take Daliang City and loot the rumored ruins. They had even gotten the Cloudflow people to mobilize armies in the hundreds of thousands to help them.

Their operation had resulted in a great number of casualties, which made the three feel lucky that their armies had not arrived sooner. Otherwise, they would have suffered the same fate.

After all, none of them were idiots. They knew that a magical catastrophe that had damaged over a hundred miles surrounding the city was not something that a lone mage could face.

In fact, it would ever be difficult if all of the mages in Alchemy City were to face it. But, since the place was being guarded so heavily, it certainly seemed that the rumors about some ancient ruins sitting beneath the city were true!

The fourth head inquisitor then said to the other two inquisitors beside him, “Fifth, sixth, should we call for backup from the great head inquisitor?”

He had used a casual tone when asking the question. Those two, who had been his partners for many years, understood exactly what he meant.

One of them replied, “If we call for backup right away, it would make us look incompetent. We have no enemies within Kroraina anyway, so we’ll just call all of the forces around the city here.”

The sixth then added, “Furthermore, we still have the punishers. The great head inquisitor did give us the permission to mobilize them when we left…”

“Punishers? But… They are meant to use when we take Holy Rock City!” the fourth quipped in a half-joking manner.

The fifth then added, “The punishers are just being sent to their deaths if they attack Holy Rock City! After all, the only ones capable of threatening Holy Rock City are the terminators. Daliang City is considered a second class city, after all, so it won’t be seen as leaking secrets if we use the punishers here.”

He paused to take a breath, then added, “We’ve messed up Northern Qin enough, but it would still take us three to five years before we can attack Holy Rock City. By then, who would can guarantee that our weapons will still be under wraps?”

“It’s good that you two are not against it, and I sure hope that the great head inquisitor will understand what we’re doing and why we’re doing it. After all, we just don’t have enough troops…” The fourth head inquisitor sighed.

Then, paying no heed to the fact that the holy masters were standing right behind them, he started issuing orders immediately.

The area that was once the Titan Duchy territory was now the main camp of the Tribunal. News from the frontlines was delivered through the divine rune charm array.

When the inquisitors in charge of the camp read the orders from the head inquisitors, they felt rather surprised. Nonetheless, they did as they were told and mobilized the punishers.

The punishers served as the main weapons of the war. Every army with 20,000 men had 1,000 among them who were in charge of transporting the punishers.

The punishers were a type of large scale equipment that was developed by the Tribunal. They looked like thorn dragons on the outside, but were much larger, measuring around 18 meters in length.

The punishers’ scales were made of metals that had been forged by divine smiths, and they had spikes that were over a meter long each all over them. The punishers all had human faces, and huge divine crystals were embedded where human eyes would have normally been.

The two armies had a total of 40 punishers with them, all of which were mobilized and transported to Daliang City immediately. As the punishers’ huge bodies ran forth, a huge rumble was heard with every step they took. Pained wails and shrieks were also heard coming from within the punishers’ bodies.

It was terrifying to see such massive machines of war moving in such a nimble manner. This alone made them even more terrifying than true thorn dragons!

The punisher armies consisted of only cavalry units, which were running at great speeds, following right behind the punishers. If one looked at the scene from above, one could see 40 dusty trails that were streaking for several miles from the east to the west.

The head inquisitors’ orders were to have all 40 punishers reach Daliang City within a week. This was no easy task!