Badge in Azure

Fycro did not come back, and Saleen’s battle raged on till midnight. The reason for this was not because the Sikenqinyans were too strong, but that his elemental creatures were fatigued and needed rest. After all, they were not in the Imperial City of the Abyss, so the restoration rates of the elemental creatures’ powers were far inferior to when they were in the Imperial City.

At the moment, the camp in the north was broken down by Saleen’s and Aini’s combined forces. As for the camp in the south, it simply decided to retreat.

The massive Sikenqinyan army of a million strong crumbled completely after fighting for more than 10 hours. By this time, the elemental creatures were thoroughly exhausted, and Saleen knew that he still needed to keep six of each type of elemental creature as reserves.

The only exception to this were the Blue Ice Maidens, of which he kept 36. As there was no way that Gloria could help him in any battles within this coming year, as she had no way of restoring her lost minions, Saleen knew that he had to be prudent with his use of the water elemental creatures especially.

As for the surviving demons, they numbered less than a thousand. As such, it was impossible for him to rely solely on the elemental creatures to do all of the fighting. With the Sikenqinyan troops ganging up on them from both sides, casualties among the demons, which were now serving as the main force of the temple guards, were simply inevitable.

The casualty ratio between the demons and the humans had always had a great gap. For instance, taking down one demon would have resulted in more than five severely injured human lives. As long as the demon remained alive, it would easily get back on its feet, even without help from doctors or holy masters.

Saleen had only brought two battalions of temple guards with him, among which there were 4,000 magic infantry officers. There were hardly any casualties among these 4,000, but the battalions did suffer heavy losses in terms of suits of armor. Specifically, one-fifth of the suits of magic armors were completely broken, which caused the soldiers wearing to be forced to retreat from the front lines.

Tens of thousands of troops continued pouring out of Lonestar City and sweeping through the battlefield. Injured combatants were ferried back to the city by spirits in an orderly manner. Amid the battle, Saleen lost only 8,000 out of the 100,000 that he had brought with him, and these losses were mainly from the auxiliary troops.

However, losing nearly ten percent of one’s fighting force was still considered a huge loss nonetheless. If it had not been for the enemy’s suffering even heavier losses, Saleen could have even been been to have lost the battle.

At the moment, Saleen did a rough calculation in his mind, and while the combat capacities of the temple guards were indeed the most powerful in his army, having one battalion taking on five still proved to be too strenuous for his main forces. In hindsight, he figured that one battalion fighting two would have been more within reach.

At the moment, Saleen was no mood to sweep the battlefield. Fycro’s appearance had left a bad taste in his mouth, so he had holed up inside Lonestar City instead, handing over command of the army to Nicholas. He then headed straight for Lex’s magic tower after greeting Aini.

Lex did not make an appearance, despite the fighting outside having become quite intense. She simply continued performing magic experiments in her tower in a relaxed manner.

At the moment, she had more than a dozen grand mages standing by her side. As Saleen came in, it was normal that these grand mages would have to excuse themselves.

However, before they even had a chance to move, Lex said, “Just continue what you were doing.”

Talking reason with her at the moment would have proven useless, as Lex knew what was happening on the mainland. It was just that it was still hard for her to accept it emotionally.

As he thought of this, Saleen went to Lex’s side and greeted her, “Lex…”

“Yeah?” Lex replied simply.

“I’m here,” he said, trying to comfort her.

“I know,” Lex replied in an exasperated manner, which caused Saleen to chuckle.

Lex finally realized that he had only been doing what he had been doing because of his contract with the goddess. After all, he could not have brought himself to lead an army to take down the rule of Holy Rock City. It would have been far too brutal for him to think up such a thing himself!

Lex understood Saleen completely, but she still could not help but feel bitter inside, and she wanted to vent her anger on something or someone. The problem was that Saleen was not the one she could vent her frustration upon.

After all, they both signed the contract, so they shared the burden together. Plus, they were things that Lex had to do in the future. For instance, she still had to conquer Phoenix and make Guderian City the border between Metatrin and Qin.

“What should I do, Lex?” Saleen asked.

“What do you mean?” one of the grand mages blurted out, while all of the grand mages turned their heads around in response.

Saleen responded to the random question with a glare, and then the grand mages had no choice but to leave them both alone. After all, they figured that the married couple had their own business to discuss, and it would have been awkward for any outsiders to stick around and eavesdrop. Saleen was their king, after all, and this time, Lex did not ask them to stay.

“I attracted the attention of the Holy See, and I have yet to kill the grand duke.”

“So what? Qin has only been able to build their empire after spending more than a hundred years attempting it. In fact, if the first generation of the Grukos are included, the total time spent doing so is more than 800 years! How long have you spent establishing your own kingdom?” she asked.

“More than 800 years? I’ll be dead by then!” Saleen responded.

“You really need to see beyond what is right in front of you right now,” Lex said, while sighing in an exasperating manner.

She had not meant to chastise him, but all that he had been doing recently was hardly considered long-term planning. That left Lex feeling somewhat frustrated. Saleen had simply been ignoring some of the plans that she had painstakingly laid.

“I need to focus on what is right in front of my eyes, Lex,” Saleen said as he took out his War Drum of Fear and put it in front of her. The ferocious-looking face on the drum had a menacing smirk on it, as if it wanted to eat Saleen alive.

“Is this the thing you told me about… The one you have been crafting?” Lex asked.

After all, she was still a mage, so it was a given that any magic equipment would pique her interest, even making her forget that she was having an argument with her husband just moments ago.

“Yeah. It’s a level 12 creature, with the skin of the angel of fear and a thread of the angel of fear’s linked soul inside,” Saleen said as he took out the broken jade pieces, which contained the souls of the angel of fear within them.

Lex took the jade pieces in her hand and studied them for a bit, then said, “There’s nothing we can do about them…”

“Indeed. Those two aren’t dumb, and they won’t fall for just anything, so there was nothing I could do to persuade them. Using them for crafting would have been a waste, and until I put one of those souls in the drum, it will just be a level nine piece of equipment,” Saleen agreed.

“What does this have to do with us?” Lex asked, suddenly feeling that her thoughts were being led astray by Saleen.

“Do you remember the first expeditionary force that was sent by the Holy See?” Saleen asked.

“Of course. There was hardly anyone powerful left in Metatrin City back then,” she replied.

“Do you know why Theisio sent armies to attack Metatrin City then?” he asked.

“What are you getting at? Just get to the point!” Lex glared at him.

“Nicholas told me that Pope Theisio had a dream before… Of me…” Saleen said.

“A dream about you?” Lex was startled by this, as she was absolutely sure that Saleen had never met Theisio before.

“Not just me, but the dream was also about this drum right here as well. He saw me using this thing in his dream, killing many of his believers,” Saleen explained.

“Could it be a divine omen?” Lex blurted out.

“Yes. A divine omen. I tested out the war drum’s power during the fight with the grand duke. While it was still just a piece of level nine equipment, its attacks were terrifying. The reason I didn’t use it this time was because I still lacked complete control over it, and I was afraid that I would have hurt the spirits if I tried to use it,” Saleen said.

Lex went silent for a while, pondering all of this in her head. The grand duke had definitely sent the information to the Holy See. Knowing what something like that was, the pope would definitely have complete faith in the divine omen, and that would have severely messed up both of her and Saleen’s plans.

“Lex, you don’t have to be angry anymore. It seems that I have just made myself into a big fat target for the Holy See…” Saleen said.

Saleen then let out a long sigh. He had only been testing out his new toy for fun. He never expected that his doing so would have brought about such severe repercussions!

“How about I go and exchange Daliang City for Phoenix? Would that help?” Lex suggested.

She knew that conquering the entire Phoenix region would enable her to build a pass at the southwestern mountains of the region, which could then ensure the safety of Metatrin City. After hearing her suggestion, Saleen was immensely touched.

However, Daliang City was something that Lex had worked very hard to build. While it was nowhere as large as Phoenix, it was still a place that was directly linked to the development of the Principality of Bitterwater. The very reason why Lex was willing to just give it up like that was due solely to her wanting to protect the Kingdom of Metatrin.

“Lex, I can’t let you do that. Daliang City was where we held our wedding! We can’t just trade it! Besides, that place was destined to be the capital city, the center of your new empire!” Saleen immediately rejected the idea.

“We can still take it back,” Lex said.

She had clearly stopped being angry at Saleen. At the moment, she had only one concern, the safety of the Kingdom of Metatrin!

“Why don’t we just go take Phoenix then?” Saleen suggested.

“What?” Lex asked, surprised by his words.

Saleen quickly took out the magic map, spread it open, and pointed at it as he said, “What you meant to do was to build a pass here, and that would have made it very difficult to enter the region. This place is now under the control of the Qin Empire. So, even if you exchange it for Daliang City, you would still end up getting the short end of the stick.”

Saleen then pointed at the other side of the mountain pass on the map and said, “This entire place is a flatland, which makes it very difficult to defend. But, if I were to build a city here, do you think that the Holy See would try to take it by force? Or… Would they want to take a detour around it to attack Phoenix?”

Lex seemed to be in a daze as she was looking at the map. Seeing how she stayed quiet, even after quite a while, he tapped her on the shoulder.

It was only then that Lex realized that she had been spacing out, and she immediately pointed at Laiyin Duchy on the map and asked, “What do you mean… Build a city? Man, I think you have really gotten addicted to building cities! Take Laiyin Duchy, then Laiyin will be ours. We could then enter Didypus from the Chaotic Swamp and gobble up the entire Laiyin Duchy! Don’t you think your current firepower will be sufficient to manage that?”

Saleen let out a bitter laugh. He had thought of this same plan himself. Lex did have a good eye for strategy, as taking down Laiyin Duchy would be far easier than keeping Phoenix.

Plus, with so many level nine people serving under him, the duchy would be unable to stop him. But, there was Fycro in the swamp to consider.

With Joey pursuing Fycro, Saleen was unable to keep tabs on where things stood at the moment, and their attempting to pass through the swamp would be a joke unless Fycro was dead. And… If he was unable to cross the swamp and conquer Didypus, there would be no chance for Saleen to protect Laiyin!

Saleen had signed a contract with Fycro, and Fycro was in the swamp. It was a contract that not even Joey was able to break.

Moreover, the contract placed hundreds of times more restrictions on him than it did on Fycro. Saleen had only his helplessness to blame for such a huge oversight in judgment!

Upon hearing Saleen’s bitter laugh, Lex was reminded of that absurd contract, and she pointed at the Chaotic Swamp on the map and asked, “We can’t pass through here, can we?”

Saleen shook his head sadly. Lex knew that they were able to build smuggling routes here, but if they built a path large enough to accomodate armies, there was simply no certainty that Fycro would ensure the troops safe passage.

After all, this particular matter was not included in the clauses of the contract that had been signed by both parties back then. Thinking of this, both Saleen and Lex grew frustrated, especially Lex.

After all, Fycro wanted to use both the power of Saleen’s God’s Left Hand, as well as her God Ring. Now that the power of life of the goddess in Saleen’s left hand had been taken away, the contract between him and Fycro had grown problematic.

Lex took a look at the map and controlled the magic arrays, revealing the details of the map bit by bit. Now, every single river was marked, and only the Chaotic Swamp remained slightly blurry.

“Saleen, could Jason defend Metatrin City alone?” Lex asked suddenly.

“Most definitely,” Saleen answered confidently.

“Well then, let’s just attack this place then! I don’t see why not?” The magic map quickly shrunk, while the images were enlarged. Lex asked her question as she pointed at a spot that was within the Sikenqinya territory.

Saleen looked at Lex with a startled expression, then asked, “Ironwall City?”