Chapter 70

  The Rusted South

  For three days, there had been no word from the south. The communication spells and artefacts lay silent at the former Thalorian dark tower, now the base of operations for the Clandor royal army.

  “Any news yet? What about the reinforcements you sent?” The former queen, who had arrived from the Clandor capital to support the central forces two days prior, broke the silence. She referred to the south, that had gone eerily silent after the council’s brutal crackdown.

  Reina, lost in thought, seemed oblivious to her mother's question. The former queen pressed, "Queen Reina, any news from the south?"

  “What? The Parvian brat?” Reina responded, confused.

  “No! The forces of Grimgar! Focus, Reina!” her mother chided. “That’s a nasty habit you have; letting those who interest you run wild just to see what they'll do. First, the half-blood, and now that bastard.”

  “You can’t deny it, mother. He is something—”

  “No!” The former queen's voice was sharp. “He is an anomaly that should have never existed. Your obsession with him is dangerous. You’ve allowed him to do whatever he wanted, just to see what he had in him and don’t tell me it was to gauge your future opponents. It was just your pure curiosity that you even forgot you are in the middle of war with the stakes of our existence.”

  “So about the east—”

  “Reina.” Former queen scolded, raising her voice.

  “Mother, didn't you want to hear the report? We're facing regular probing attacks, but nothing significant since the Parvians are engaged with Xandor in Thaloria. In the north, we're under full assault.” Reina shuffled some papers, concealing the old parchment among them.

  “It will be resolved soon,” the former queen assured her. “If it weren't for our laws... tsk, anyway, Eleanor is going there—

  “Mother! I'm the queen.” Reina stood abruptly.

  “I didn’t order him,” the former queen quickly denied. “His family is in the north, for God's sake.”

  As mother and daughter conversed in the central region, Hans and his companions finally tracked down the reinforcements, only to be met with a scene far more dire than they had anticipated.

  The ground was scorched and littered with debris and corpses. Craters from powerful spells marred the landscape, and the air was thick with the acrid smell of burnt wood and iron. The once-proud banners of Twin snakes and proud lion lay tattered and trampled in the mud.

  “These were the forces of Grimgar and Utar,” Rudolf confirmed as he turned one corpse to face him.

  “Look there, Grandpa,” Hans pointed.

  In the midst of this chaos, a floating warship hovered just a few feet above the ground. Its sleek, enchanted hulls glimmered with what little magic remained. It was the only structure left intact, a stark contrast to the carnage down the ground.

  From its decks, a few battered knights and weary mages looked down, their faces etched with exhaustion and despair.

  Hans swiftly jumped to them, his heart sinking at the sight. “What the—” he muttered, surveying the wreckage. “What happened here?” He asked.

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  A knight, his armour dented and stained with blood, descended from the deck above. Swiftly, he approached Hans and the group. “We were ambushed,” he hoarsely explained, looking at the familiar faces. “The enemy's magic was hidden; we didn’t know what hit us. It was too powerful, stealthy. We lost many good men and women.”

  Hans knew the man; he was the lord who shared a border with them at Grimgar, a warlock and duke of Reinhardt house. Rudolf listened intently, trying to make sense of what could have nearly wiped them out.

  Sierra, on the other hand, stepped forward, her eyes filled with concern. “How many survived?” she asked, her voice gentle but urgent.

  “Not enough,” the duke replied, shaking his head. “We have a few knights and even fewer mages. The warship managed to withstand the attack, but we're in desperate need of help.”

  His eyes asked the obvious from Sierra and as the sole master of divine mana. Responding to the unspoken request, Sierra lit up the site with six concentric circles, all glowing golden like Hans's eyes.

  Rudolf placed a reassuring hand on Reinhardt’s shoulder. “We’ll heal the wounded and prepare for what's to come. We might be few, but we are still better than having a paper army—

  “Something’s wrong here.” Delimira pointed. She had the keenest sight in the group, so they were instantly on alert.

  “What?” Hans quickly asked, his eyes searching for anomalies, but nothing caught his ManaVision. “There is nothing, Deli!”

  “Exactly, idiot. There’s nothing. Not even a squeak. An army of more than two thousand elites were wiped out, but the place is eerily silent. I don’t like this. We need to hurry!” she said urgently. “We are being watched.”

  “But I can’t feel anything!” Rudolf added, sharing the same unease. Reinhardt nodded, his face pale. “That’s what I'm telling you. We couldn’t detect anything.”

  A fear of the unknown gripped Rudolf. “We need to reach the southern stronghold quickly.”

  As they set to work, the remnants of the army rallied around them. Hans, Sierra, Rudolf, and the others began organising the survivors, tending to the injured, and preparing to depart on the warship. Only one ship had survived, thanks to Reinhardt pouring his all into defence during the attack.

  “Damn it.” Hans cursed, still feeling nothing in his ManaVision as the warship Ascended and picked them up. He sighed, “I wanted to ride this thing, but not with my butt in the hands.”

  Meanwhile, the masterminds behind the dreadful situation floated in the distance, their youthful appearances masking lifetimes of wisdom. “A foreign god... no, she's only half of one.” One of them remarked, licking his lips as if savoring a delectable treat.

  The other, too lazy to engage fully, grumbled, “I don’t care. This is such a drag. I was looking forward to welcoming a new wife, but no, some idiot had to ruin it, and here I am, following orders.”

  “That would have been your seventieth wife—”

  “They keep getting old. I hate wrinkled flesh touching mine.”

  “You really are incorrigible, even with more than two hundred years of living—”

  “I’m at least better than a hypocrite claiming celibacy by day and indulging with children by night.”

  As their horrendous conversation continued. The young lord of Aerandir, the house of mage assassins, listened with a bitter taste in his mouth. He was the youngest of all council members and had been tasked with luring Sierra to the south so the council’s main force could swiftly take down the central forces of Clandor.

  With Sierra now among the massacred reinforcements, his mission was halfway complete. All that remained was to create enough chaos and bloodshed to keep her occupied here.

  To aid him, the Torceran house had silently sent these two powerhouses, eccentric and dangerous, capable of turning the tide of war single-handedly. Fortunately, they followed Aerandir's orders, providing perfect stealth for him and his elite followers to showcase their bloody handiwork.

  But these two weren’t his only help. Another presence lurked in the shadows, an ethereal figure. “Remember, the boy is my prey. No one shall touch him,” it warned in a ghostly voice.

  “Tsk, what a world we live in, where a ghost tries to threaten us… but whatever. We want the brat to die too. If we weren’t under these restrictions, we’d have done it ourselves. I still can’t forget the day his father humiliated me,” grumbled the creepy man who claimed celibacy during the day, sharing the ghost’s animosity.

  SEIGE AT ECLIPSE, THALORIA,

  Homar was facing Xandor’s undead force for quite a while. Two days had passed in this stalemate battle. It was not a difficult battle for golden griffins, as they were swatting the undead like flies until knights, clad in obsidian armour, recruited and trained by the Eclipse showed up.

  However, the golden griffin, the strongest knight order, still persisted. It was also bearable at this point too, but all changed when the husk of undead king, Samson, showed up floating in the sky. The thumping sound, which had bolstered the Parvian army before, began to break their minds.