Badge in Azure

Chapter 1176: A City's Tragedy (Part 2)

Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

Nailisi heard Saleen's voice transmit through her soul and jumped in fright. She could not help but rejoice that she had only released about 3,000 or so demons and had not pursued and killed all of the enemy's troops.

She had been afraid that the demons' destruction would be too severe and that Saleen would be unhappy.

The demons were summoned back into the purgatory of devils. Nailisi grabbed onto Isabella's belt, incarnated as a demon and flew high into the skies. The skies continued to darken, and huge dark clouds covered the entire city.

Nailisi flew towards the snake that Jason was on, but Jason urged the great snake to rush towards the east part of the city.

It looked like it was about to rain, and lightning started to form.

The lightning was not naturally formed. Before the magical tower had collapsed, it had triggered energy fluctuations, resulting in a huge thunderstorm.

Sika summoned out her soul beast. The soul beast's current length was about 100 meters. She said to Jason, "Teacher, this thing is not afraid of lightning."

Jason was curious. He sent his great snake back into his summoning space and followed Saleen onto Sika's soul beast. Nailisi also rushed over. Saleen was completely focused on recording the event. At the 5,000 meter altitude, there were misty clouds everywhere. They had a tremendous amount of energy, but it was not targeted towards any particular person. Even if the soul beast flew amongst the clouds, it would not attract any lightning.

In Pompeii City, the troops and residents were all lost in a state of extreme panic. The mages had escaped, the aristocratic bureaucracy who were under Grand Duke Pompeii had lost their purpose, and the smaller lords had not even realized that disaster was coming. They were curled up at home and did not come out.

Every floor of the 10 floor magical tower in the city center released energy currents. They were wrapped around the magical tower, causing the magical tower to be completely sealed shut. A fire red bead appeared in the teleportation portal, continuously spinning.

An elemental creature also appeared — a wind swallow.

The wind swallow drilled into the fire red bead head first. The fire red bead quickly expanded and completely filled up all nine floors of the magical tower. It also expanded outwards.

The foundations of the 10 floor magical tower were very deep. It had a 1,000 meter metal pillar. It reached the most shallow part of the earth's terrain. The temperature there was high but still very far from the earth's magma. After the red bead expanded, it shot a white blaze down the metal pillar.

It rushed through the earth. The ground tremored, causing stones to split. The temperature became higher and higher. The elemental blaze flow penetrated the ground. Underground fires began to shoot upwards, causing the metal pillar to melt. The magic patterns on the metal pillar that were meant to protect against high temperatures were rendered useless.

Pompeii City had been built on top of a shallow lake of lava.

Because the earth's composition was extremely stable and the rock layer was sufficiently thick, there had been no danger. However, Alchemy City's mages had penetrated the rock layer. The underground fire could be triggered at any time.

Lightning began to form around Sika's sould beast, falling towards the ground. Most of the lightning bolts disappeared before they hit the ground. It was the first time that Saleen's Elemental Eye saw lightning from natural causes, and he watched, entranced. The lightning had an even greater might than his clan badge, but its dissipation was thousands of times faster.

If the energy could be utilized, the explosive energy of a thunderstorm would be enough to destroy any city, including Holy Rock City.

Jason saw the transformation of the 10 floor magical tower and sighed. "The Elemental Hand's people are so ruthless. They don't give any leeway when they do things. If it was not like this, the Devil's Horn and Sreeger Island's mages would not have reached the extent it did today. Alchemy City would not have faced a crisis either."

"Faced a crisis?" Saleen did not know. In his eyes, Alchemy City was indestructible.

"Mm, what Grand Duke Iron Blood wants to deal with is Alchemy City. He invited Inbosa to attack the south. Lianyun City's current range of influence has expanded to more than 500 kilometers. It is all made up of small cities along the coast. According to my information, Inbosa's subordinates include crowds of Iron Blood warriors. Their numbers have probably surpassed 5,000."

"5,000 Iron Blood warriors!" Although Saleen had more than 90,000 ancient warriors, he could control less than 1,000 of them, and in the future, the number he could control would definitely not exceed 10,000.

The level 9 ancient warriors, if directed well, were an unsurpassable military force on the Myers Continent. Based on his current strength, even just three to five hundred soldiers would not be able to do much to him. But for 5,000 level 9 warriors who could all fly, the only thing he could do was to escape.

Inbosa was probably level 10 now, right?

Salen recalled the mage who had modified half of their body into alchemic machinery and felt extremely uncomfortable. For the sake of attaining power, they could give up their human body. If this person were pushed to extremes, they would likely cause an exceptionally grave problem.

The level 10 magical tower rocked severely. Rain began to fall from the skies. The dense raindrops began to wash over Pompeii City in the direction of the wind element. The people in the city still did not know that judgment day had arrived.

With a loud crash, the magical tower was blown open. The fire element inside had expanded into a giant fireball. Saleen saw the violent energy rush towards the skies, forming layers and layers of circular energy rings that continuously spread outwards. As the fire element's energy spread out, all of the living creatures it passed were turned into dust. Constructions that were built with metal and rock were scorched. Some melted, and some were blown about by the wind element.

"They are vicious!" Saleen felt jittery. If he had gone to stop this, the Figure of Fate would probably have been destroyed at the core of the explosion. Whether or not he would have been able to survive would have depended entirely on luck.

Everything within a range of 500 meters was no longer in existence. Even if he had used original magic spell skills to preserve the image, he would have been affected.

Perhaps the Elemental Hand wanted to spread that Pompeii City had been destroyed by them?

"Anything that the Elemental Hand is unable to obtain, it will not leave behind for others to gain," Jason explained to Saleen.

"Teacher, this Alchemy City…"

"You find it strange, don't you. Normally, Alchemy City's mages protect civilians, so why would they do such a thing."

"No, I can understand. Protecting civilians is one of Alchemy City's strategies to limit other professionals and use their influence. It's just, what can they gain from destroying Pompeii City? The situation at Ironwall City was done by me. I don't care about being framed."

"The first reason is that there is a possibility of killing you. The second reason is that if you don't die, you would have reservations towards such power. When you handle matters in the future, you could be cautious and hold back. It is a form of demonstrating their power."

"Hmph!" Saleen scoffed. A large portion of the city below had been turned into a wasteland. Pompeii City was huge: close to 4 kilometers across. However, the 10 floor magical tower's explosion resulted in as much power as a magic spell above level 13. And the place where the magical tower disappeared, lava was already spurting into the air.

The thunderstorm and large fire mingled together, turning Pompeii City into hell on earth.

The rainwater was dissolved by elemental power, but helped the fire to become more intense. Even without such an outcome, any place the lava landed turned into a mess of destruction.

Pompeii City was on high ground, which was advantageous for defense. The lava was spilling down. so mone of Pompeii City's people had a place to hide.

Saleen felt somewhat mournful. When he and Lex had arrived there, they had liked the city so much.

The rich signs of life, beautiful constructions, and ancient history had disappeared, becoming a part of history.

The names of the heroes that were recorded on the stone tablet and the wall murals that were fixed along the site of the ancient battles were destroyed. The earth was still shaking. With the ruins of the magical tower as the center, it split into two sides.

The whole Pompeii City had broken apart. The temperature of the underground fires caused the clouds to evaporate, forming an even more intense elemental convection current.

Thunder boomed. Saleen saw humans running around madly for their lives. However, they could not escape the incineration of the underground fire.

"You really want to change this result, isn't that so?" Jason looked at his students and found that Saleen's expression revealed his reluctance.

"Yes. I am thinking, could my study of magic be only for my own sake? When such a situation occurs, millions of humans will die."

"Didn't you say that you don't care?"

"No, I care. When I destroyed Ironwall City, I gave people time to escape. But the Elemental Hand did not give people any opportunity to survive. I only killed enemies, but the Elemental Hand did not do so!"

"Saleen, you don't like to kill wilfully. This is very good, but you will understand sooner or later that killing enemies and killing uninvolved people is about the same," Jason spoke calmly. He had seen many magic images that had been passed down from ancient times.

Sometimes, an entire plane would be destroyed. What was being destroyed before their eyes was merely one city.

"How is that so?"

"Life has its own fate. The fate of these citizens of Pompeii City goes hand in hand with Grand Duke Pompeii, even though they did not have a choice and were innocent. However, who is there that is not innocent? Saleen, let me tell you a true story."

Jason stood on the back of the soul beast and looked towards the distant lightning that struck wildly. He did not need to worry about the ones who were not near the soul beast. He took advantage of the time to tell Saleen about a situation that he knew of.

"In an incomparably cold and gloomy plane, there were numerous living creatures living a difficult existence. On this plane, there was a powerful person who swore to change the state of the plane. He used 128,000 years to light divine fire. Then, he used another 300,00 years to become one of the plane's gods. He chose the path to protect this plane using his own life, but once he became a god, the plane transformed into his own divine kingdom."

"The plane ultimately collapsed?"

"No, the god did not die and the divine kingdom was not exterminated. But he became was a sun god. Everyday, he had to steer his sun chariot to fly across the skies of the divine kingdom to provide sufficient energy for the divine kingdom. This was to enable the farmers to plant vegetation, and to enable living creatures to breed."

"There are also selfless gods?"

"Yes, there are indeed. Just like how there are many selfish people among humanity."