Badge in Azure

The tenth of April was Saleen’s wedding day. On that day, it was certain that Cloudflow would launch an attack. Saleen had no idea how many spies there were in the city since he and Lex had recruited so many soldiers. Although they did use the lie detection spell, they only used it on suspicious people and not every single soldier.

Saleen could not possibly be fighting in the city on the night of his wedding. Excluding the armies involved in the city’s defense, he was only left with Gusion’s mercenaries.

Saleen did not know how loyal this group of mercenaries were, but one thing that was for certain was that there were no spies from other countries. The families of these mercenaries had all gone to Metatrin City. Gusion was their leader and also Saleen’s follower. Saleen had entrusted Gusion the heavy responsibility of guarding his own palace.

“Gusion, Cloudflow wants to embarrass me. They want the city to be in chaos on my wedding night. If Lex and I have to step in, Cloudflow will succeede in making us look bad.”

“My Lord, I understand.” Gusion held tight onto the dragon-slaughtering war banner and no longer felt a tinge of awkwardness. He was only feeling a little over-excited. Gusion had been toiling for so many years before eventually being kicked out of the Empire by Danny. He did not expect to be trusted with such heavy responsibilities here. He and his comrades would no longer have to worry about their futures!

Cuisi led Gusion to meet with the mages that would be training with him. Gusion had no words to describe how blessed he felt. Mages rarely trained with warriors and even if they did, the warriors were usually to complement them. That time around, Saleen had requested for four grand mages to train with him and his dragon-slaughtering war banner. It was simply unimaginable.

Saleen’s wedding day was in half a month’s time. Gusion still had sufficient time. He was so engrossed in the training that he almost forgot about the presence of Cuisi.

After Saleen had settled the issue with Gusion, he took a glance at the remaining documents on the table before asking Lex’s mages to bring them back.

For some reason, Saleen felt extremely nervous. The nervousness was not because of the trouble that Cloudflow would be causing, but because of Lex.

Saleen was getting married and the person he was marrying was a Princess and a grand mage who had territories across thousands of miles and was of a royal bloodline. As for him. Was he still the orphan that could not forget the feeling of being hungry and thirsty for days?

Saleen left the courtyard and walked towards the magic tower that Lex was training in. Three magic towers were left behind in the palace while another two would be shifted out of the city to form two triangles. Only then would they be able to establish an anti-flying zone.

When the magic arrays of three eight-storey magic towers and three seven-storey magic towers were all activated together, mages of grade-8 and below would not be able to fly over the city walls and even grade-9 mages would have a lot of difficulty doing so.

Once mages lost their speed, they would be easy targets for alchemy crossbows. By establishing an anti-flying zone, no mage would dare to take the risk even if they would be able to find a way to break through.

The only thing that they would have to take precautions against was soldiers rioting in the city. There were more than three-hundred-thousand new recruits. Most of them had had some experiences in the military so training them was easy, but the difficult part was knowing where their hearts and loyalties lied. There would likely be Cloudflow spies hiding amongst the soldiers.

In the magic tower, every inch of space was filled with thick elemental energy as Lex meditated. She had already accumulated enough energy and all she needed now was an understanding of souls, magic chords, and some beginner-level rules.

She already possessed all the other necessary conditions so all she was lacking in in this environment was the evolution of magic chords. The God’s ring stayed silent on Lex’s finger. If she relied on the help of godly item to advance, she would lose a lot instead.

This was Lex’s magic tower and she was the only person on the seventh storey. The six windows were tightly shut. The magic arrays on the ceiling and the ground were connected with each other and formed a space that was abnormally stable and thick for elements.

Naturally, the magic tower was made up of the best steel rock. Under the protection of six magic arrays, Lex would be safe from attacks, even those from the grade-9 sorcerer, until reinforcements arrived. Without the magic tower, it would be dangerous for a mage to advance. At that stage, Lex must not be disturbed and she would also not be able to resist any attacks.

Of course, Saleen would not allow Lex to come under any attacks at that stage. On the lower levels of the magic tower there were more than ten of Lex’s most trusted grand mages. They had been following her since she was young. In addition, there were one-hundred bodyguards and two-hundred swordmasters in the courtyard. Those one-hundred bodyguards were armed with elvish alchemy crossbows and were ready to engage anyone who would try to attack the magic tower, even if that was a scenario that was unlikely to take place.

When Saleen reached the bottom of the magic tower, the two-hundred swordmasters and one-hundred bodyguards recognized him, so they performed a simple bow as a form of greeting. Saleen looked up and saw that the color of the magic tower was dim under the gloomy clouds.

He could not help but think about what he and Lex had gone through in Rafael’s magic tower. Back then, he was still a low-level mage while Lex was already a grade-5 grand mage. Even after he advanced in the hell of God’s punishment, he still felt that Lex was beyond reach.

Those were tough times. Their lives were in danger every single moment and they could never afford to think about the future.

Eleanor’s wings of an elf flew past in the sky. The anti-flying zone would not stop her nor Cuisi in his original form from flying. Suddenly, it occurred to Saleen that Cloudflow had flying magic beasts as well and that could potentially pose as a problem.

Most magic beasts’ flying abilities were due to their god-given talents on top of wings. The anti-flying zone would have little effect on them. Although Saleen already possessed the devil armor, he had yet to train up his demon corp so the devil armor could not be used even if they allowed for flying abilities. Even if they were to be given to humans, only high-level swordmasters would be able to wear them.

Eleanor’s shadow gradually vanished in the sky. She was familiarizing herself with the city as her longbow, Seven Night, hung behind her while and short bow was in her hand. The short bow was refined with divinecherry wood and had a very long range. Eleanor did not plan to waste her strength to attack with Seven Night unless necessary.

After all, she was only grade-6 and would not be able to utilize the full powers of Seven Night.

In the magic tower, Lex was in the midst of her meditation when she suddenly felt that the magic chords in her body were growing gradually. After this continued for ten straight hours, she could finally feel her magic chords becoming vibrant and beginning to evolve.

A layer of faint golden color wrapped around her six-colored magic chords. This was her clan’s secret technique, it allowed her not to be disrupted whether she was training in combat or magic.

This golden aura tangled together with the magic chords, restricting them from growing further. Lex had already accumulated to a very high level, so the golden aura began to seep into the magic chords under her control.

All of a sudden, Lex began to hallucinate and saw the six elements around her enter her body. She almost lost her consciousness momentarily.

“Stop!” Lex shouted. The golden aura vibrated intensively. The illusions vanished and Lex regained control over her senses.

The six-colored magic chords were extending out of her body from within and it looked like they were about to break through her skin.

With the addition of this golden aura, there were now seven colors to Lex’s magic chords. This was a secret technique known only to the Grukos clan. If Lex had chosen to train in swordsmanship, the sword aura that she could forge would have been unconquerable.

It was also because of this secret technique that Grand Emperor Chanake was able to defeat more than ten strong foes from the Holy See.

After the seven-colored magic chords grew out, that was when they began to absorb the elemental powers of the magic tower. The thirty-six small magic arrays placed at the six corners of the magic tower were finally activated and began to provide Lex with elemental power.

The six major elements that were in harmony were being absorbed by the magic chords. As a result, the magic chords grew tough and large. Lex was like a gigantic octopus in the ocean with her seven limbs.

If not for the fact that there were so many magic arrays in the magic tower with six high-level magic nuclei mounted in each array, Lex’s magic chords would not have been able to absorb sufficient elemental power.

Any mage that desired to advance to sorcerer needed an environment like the magic tower.

Lex felt incredibly comfortable. In comparison, she had a tough and painful time when she advanced to a grand mage back then. This time around, the growth of her magic chords transformed her body at the same time.

The six major elements were interchanging within her body continuously, forming a perfect harmony. Such a transformation to her body ensured that Lex would not have to worry about the retaliation of spells when she cast spells of grade-7 and below in the future. Technically, a sorcerer’s body was no longer the same as a normal human. It would be extremely difficult for them if they wished to bear offspring.

If Lex had not known that Saleen possessed magic chord medicine that would allow her to conceive, she would have suffered a blow which might have rendered all her efforts useless. With Saleen’s promise, she was able to put aside this concern, even if it meant having to spend up to eight-hundred-thousand gold coins.

In comparison to a child, eight-hundred-thousand gold coins were nothing.

The stability in her heart and how much she had accumulated thus far allowed Lex to have a much easier time advancing than Saleen. The seven-colored magic chords were absorbing the elemental powers hungrily. Magic chords that were fluid-like at first began to withdraw back into her body, ready to merge with it.

Lex forced the magic chords to stay outside her body for a while more. She needed stronger magic chords in order to raise her fighting abilities.

An ordinary mage’s magic chords would allow them to cast spells of the same grade twelve times. Lex knew that the size of Saleen’s magic chords were at least twice of hers. Every mage wished that their magic chords would become stronger so that they would be able to save time and money in their training.

Take Saleen for example, who was able to train twice as long as others. By the time he used up all his magic chords, the number of times he would have trained in spells of the same grade was twenty-four while other mages would only manage to train twelve times.

The seven-colored magic chords danced around Lex’s body as they grew bigger and more powerful. The thirty-six small magic arrays around the corners of the magic tower began to produce even thicker elemental powers. The colors of the high-level magic nuclei dimmed. Lex’s preparations were already sufficient, except that she had an extra magic chord and was trying to expand her mass. The amount of energy required was too much even for so many high-level magic nuclei.

Pah…

Finally, one of the high-level magic nuclei in one of the magic arrays could no longer withstand the absorption of the magic chords and had broken into pieces.