Badge in Azure

Chapter 1318: Taking on the Abominations (Part 2)

"What about me, Saleen?" Eleanor felt weird that she was not included in Saleen's arrangements.

"You and Qin shall await my orders," Saleen said. "I point, you shoot. There's no need to expose what you're capable of for now."

After giving his last order, he took Jola and Nicholas away from the Floating City. The four level 10 mage trainers, whom he had brought from Devil's Horn, were by his side.

Saleen brought 10,000 Bug Angel Warriors and 10,000 star figures, as well as 10,000 demons to a fortress east of Highland City. The 30,000-strong army was incapable of being stationed in the small fortresses, but he did not worry about that. He cast Lightning Constellation and summoned elemental creatures from his elemental badge before beginning to build a larger fortress.

The materials were picked on the spot. Prior to arriving, Saleen had already figured it that Fycro would not have laid out too many lines of defense. He still needed to depend on himself. Fycro was not someone like Saleen, who possessed a piece of equipment like the Lightning Constellation. The hundreds of thousands of lightning warriors within were all very strong and capable of building standard magic constructions any time.

Construction spanning over a mile in length commenced. The depth of the construction had a width spanning over 600 feet. The front of the construction was a 32-foot-thick stone wall. Metal towers were built behind the wall. It was flanked by four 10-floored magic towers. A wedge-shaped fortress was built at the rear.

Nothing about the line of defense looked extraordinary. If it had not been for the two basement floors below, which enabled him to keep his troops around, such a layout would have been a commonly seen defensive structure in Qin. However, such a conventional layout usually had six-floored magic towers at the sides instead of 10-floored ones.

Saleen had his reasons for laying the place out like that. The Holy See troops would have been unnerved seeing 10-floored magic towers around. While they were dealing with abominations at the moment, it was still a severely blasphemous act.

Fycro would not have objected to it, so Saleen was able to cut down on the number of floors of the towers. When the battle was over, the news of Fycro allying with a blasphemer would be known everywhere. Fycro would be at the point of no return by then.

Saleen was not stupid enough to let Fycro do as he pleased. He had his own ideas and principles. Grand Duke Iron Blood's identity was no secret, but he still refrained from sticking his nose at who Fycro recruited for help. Both parties defended two directions respectively. It would suffice so long as the abominations were contained within Highland City.

Highland City, per its namesake, was built at a high place. The area produced herbs and a rarely seen type of wood, which could be used to craft magic staffs. It was all low-level materials, so there had been few powerful professionals around. Fycro took over the city as soon as he showed up. He dispersed the people and made the place a suitable battlefield.

While the gods were pretentious and fake, they would have had such surface actions done properly by believers. Fycro was to become a god, so he did his best to protect common people.

There were hardly any residents left within 500 miles from the Highland City. All who remained were retired soldiers or professionals still capable of fighting. The 500-mile battlefield's focus was on the 100th mile at the center.

Saleen began to distribute armies of Stone Statue Soldiers, which he crafted on his own, to the mages as soon as he was done laying the line of defense. The army was not as powerful as the Elemental Stone Statue Soldiers in battle, but such compound summoning magic spells would not put a huge strain on the mages' mental powers.

On the second day after the line of defense was laid out, the ones at the front—Fycro's forces—had almost finished retreating. Saleen began to take over matters concerning defense of the Floating City. There were an army of bug angels of 60,000-strong assigned east of Highland City. A 50,000-strong demon army was waiting to fight.

The center of Highland City was the location of the huge portal. Abominations were continuously emerging. The abominations were first dealt with by the surrounding fortresses. When the ones remaining managed to find their way out of the barricade, more than 60 percent of the ones emerging still ended up dead. That was when the army of bug angels strike.

The Floating City's altitude was too low. The abominations were unable to fly as soon as they emerged, so they were only able to strike on land. The pressure on the group of fortresses were halved. The new year came, and the portal expanded to a radius of about 1,640 feet. More and more powerful abominations emerged. The soldiers and mages in the fortresses continued to keep fighting with high spirits.

The magic nuclei that Fycro bought from Saleen had proven their worth. Fycro traded for the magic nuclei using divine crystals. By trading for low-quality magic nuclei using high quality supplies, he had been able to acquire large numbers of magic nuclei. Doing so enabled the mages to keep fighting for longer periods of time.

The quality of magic nuclei used hardly made a difference to mages, unless they were used on magic arrays. The main usage of divine crystals was to replenish mental powers or used them on magic arrays or equipment. Common mages were incapable of using them to restore magic chords.

On the third of the new year, there were already level nine abominations showing up at the 1,640-foot-wide portal. The mages at the fortresses no longer attacked without a care. They simply hunkered down at the fortresses to prevent the abominations from moving out too quickly.

The creatures that emerged from the abomination plane were incredibly ferocious, but they were not quite as big as demons. Most of them were only around 6 feet tall. Only abominations above level six began to wear clothing and armor, as well as wielded weapons.

Most abominations were capable of flight. Their ferocious, monstrous faces seemed to have stains of blood accumulated over thousands of years on them. The stench spreading out was so pungent that not even the mages' Cleaning spell had been of any use.

As soon as abominations took flight, the Floating City above quickly shot them down. Magic spells rained down on the front of the portal like they cost nothing. Most abominations were wiped out before they were even able to see what Myers Mainland was actually like.

Still, thousands of abominations managed to escape the fortresses and enter the city. That was due to a problem with Highland City's terrain. Although it was huge, there were few places actually considered habitable. The tall hills and boulders became garrisons.

Bug Angel Warriors were capable of flight, and the demons surrounded their enemies on the ground. The fighting was more intense than Saleen had imagined.

He stayed at the rear and did not venture outside to do battle. He was busy calculating the combat capacity of the abominations and casualties of his own army. Due to being clad in high-level armor, casualties were kept incredibly low in his army, rating at less than 100 per day. It was incredibly common for his units to sustain injuries. The nails of the abominations were sharper than many magic blades. The Bug Angel Armor was unable to sustain many blows before breaking.

In such situations, wealth became the key. The magic nuclei left on the Bug Angel Armor enabled the armor to be repaired. Saleen had to rotate the Bug Angel Warriors and demons every day, replacing 10,000 units about every eight hours. The armor of the 10,000 who were recalled suffered damage in various areas. The number of magic nuclei consumed exceeded what had incurred in any battle that Saleen had fought.

While the abominations were never able to actually break the lines of defenses laid out everywhere, Saleen knew that it was just the beginning. When level 10 abominations began to show, his lines of defenses were truly tested.

"My liege, I don't think we'll see the end just killing them like that," Jola said.

He had paid close attention to Saleen's magic array. There was a myriad of projections shown in the magic arrays. All of them depicted the battles between Saleen's warriors and the abominations.

"Any thoughts?" Saleen asked.

"The abominations' bodies would have made good alchemical materials," Jola said. "Don't we already have a mercenary system in place? If we were to use magic nuclei to buy the bodies of the abominations, we'd have the pressure lifted off our shoulders considerably."

"That matter with the abyssal creatures isn't over yet," Saleen said.

"Just recruit at Qin then. We have nothing to lose anyway," Jola said, reminding Saleen that other than Pompeii City, there had been nowhere else south of Qin caught in wars.

There were many mages to the south. Professionals were abundant. Most professionals were not able to find anyone who would hire them, so their days were rather hard. If there were to be high-paying battles, it would attract many professionals who had plenty of time to kill. Saleen could probably easily hire over 100,000 of them.

Saleen pondered Jola's words for a bit. Even though he had not been bringing many of his troops to the battle, all of them were elites. Those who died lacked training. They were there to train in the first place, so any who could remain alive would have a great future ahead of them.

"Forget it. I don't want to share the loot with others," he finally said.

The imps and demons were creatures from demon plane. Only through fighting alongside him would he have been made a central figure in their minds, making them take him seriously as their lord and master.

When powerful ones from the abomination plane showed up, Saleen would not have let the bug angels and demons take them on. He would lead a group of professionals to take those figures on to personally find out just how powerful those figures were. With the Floating City around, he could advance and retreat any time.

"Nicholas, how are things at Fycro's side?" Saleen asked.

"No noteworthy dangers around," Nicholas said. "As for the abominations… It's just numbers for the time being. The group of fortresses that Fycro built were mainly meant to hold back the rate of emergence and numbers. It works well. The armies at the outer fringes are more than enough to kill any abominations able to make it out. The Floating City ensured that no abominations took flight."

"It seems like Fycro has done his calculations well," Saleen said. "If it hadn't been for the Floating City, fighting would have looked very different here. What about Grand Duke Iron Blood?"

That last sentence was meant for Jola.

"No signs of danger," Jola said. "My liege, the invasion from the abomination kind of looks…"

He did not really know how to word it.

Saleen nodded and said, "Too weak. It shouldn't have alerted Fycro so much to begin with. Then again, Jola, the portal was sealed by Fycro using divine arts. It would have turned out to be a huge energy maelstrom with a diameter over a mile otherwise. The rate at which the abominations emerged could have only been seen clearly by high-level mages."

The ground right outside the portal had already been stained by blood while Saleen was still analyzing how things were.

The abominations spoke in an extremely high tempo. The communications between them sounded like high-pitched screeches, which was deafening. With the Floating City looming over the battlefield, the entire place was dark, eerie, and filled with dead bodies, which were decomposing at a very high rate. Venomous bugs emerged from the dead bodies and flew about.

"Myers Mainland! Why isn't the portal opened yet?"

A cold voice was heard roaring from the other side of the portal. A huge palm shot out and grabbed at a tower in front. The tower was made of pure steel, yet it was snapped right there and then by that hand.