Badge in Azure

Chapter 1319: Being Set Up (Part 1)

At Fycro's main camp north of Highland City, Fycro was listening to reports from several holy masters.

"My lord, there are at least 100,000 mages on the Floating City. We can't take them out."

"Enchanters," Fycro corrected.

"Saleen only mobilized half of his forces. His followers and 30,000 of his elite troops have not participated in the fighting."

"Not even once?" Fycro asked.

"Saleen modified the Bug Angel Armor, and the weaknesses did not show at all," the holy masters explained in a dejected manner.

"That's normal. If he would have fallen for something like that, he wouldn't have been able to establish a kingdom of his own," Fycro said. "It's not your fault. Abominations of true might level will show in two more days. We only need to sit back and watch then."

None of the holy masters knew what he was up to, but all of them completely trusted their Lord Oracle.

"Keep a close eye to the south, the place where Grand Duke Iron Blood is." Fycro eyed his most trusted holy masters one by one. All of the holy masters looked rather tense. He continued, "Saleen captured one giant warship from the Grand Duke. What is that? Equipment from the First Dynasty. If the Grand Duke hadn't minded and actually became allies with Saleen despite that, that person would be our greatest obstacle."

"My lord, but Saleen…"

"He has no ambition, and his achievements would have been limited." Fycro completed the sentence as his silhouette slowly dissipated before everyone's eyes.

No one knew how he disappeared, and no one knew where he ended up in. As soon as he left, the white-robed holy masters discussed how to take Saleen's Floating City. They ran all simulations of various possible scenarios after the abominations stormed the Floating City. They left the camp after finding nothing wrong with the simulations, returning to their posts.

The places where the holy masters were posted looked no different from the ones that the conventional mages lived in. However, all of them had huge divine rune charm arrays laid underground, waiting to be activated at Fycro's command.

The huge hand snapped a metal tower before the portal. The warriors on the tower calmly dropped to the ground and escaped. The huge hand was impossible to defeat. The contract signed between the warriors and Fycro did not have them go all out. It was written clearly on the contract that once any residential structure was destroyed, they no longer needed to take risks and fight.

"Stupid humans. Their powers have actually dropped this far! They no longer have guts!" The huge hand swept around. Turbulences caused by the wind element spread all over the place, catching the escaped warriors and reducing them to dust.

"Sh*t!" Rossen, who was monitoring things on the Floating City was frightened.

The power bursting from the hand was calculated precisely by the enchanters. It was a level 12 abomination. Being at level 12 meant that its powers was able to burst to the limit on Myers Mainland. The portal had only been officially opened a few days, yet there was already a level 12 abomination showing up. It was only time before the portal broke altogether.

The individual that stuck that hand out labored to climb outside of the portal. The portal might have been 1,640-feet wide, but the limit imposed depended on the creature's level instead of the size of the portal itself. A level nine creature as huge as a mountain would have had no problem at all emerging from the portal. This abomination's level was too high, which meant that the portal placed a huge restriction on it.

The boastful abomination grunted in pain. The powers of Myers Mainland had not been loosened for long. The creature was simply too anxious. A level 12 creature should have waited for another half a month before emerging.

"Just you wait! I'll be back!" The huge hand was not seen again.

Pairs of abomination soldiers charged from the portal. Saleen's followers on the Floating City began to get excited. Abomination troops emerged instead of bestial ones that had no sense of order. This meant the true battle was about to begin.

True abomination soldiers were clad in heavy iron armor, which looked crudely made. Every single plate had twisted abomination script inscribed onto them. Those abominations formed 50-unit platoons. Each abomination was about 6-feet tall and held a battle axe. High-pitched howls shot from their helmets, conjuring mystical magic powers.

They were not trying to attack the enemy with that. They were boasting the combat capacity of their kind.

"Attack! Hahaha!" Nailisi got really excited. Those were the targets she intended to hunt.

"Nailisi, hold your horses," Sika ordered.

Nailisi pouted and said nothing else. Even with Rafel the archangel absent, Sika was able to overpower her.

Sika looked at Nailisi's expression and felt rather reluctant to hurt the imp's feelings. She asked, "What are you getting so anxious for? That big hand that showed up should have been your target."

Nailisi was actually thinking that Rafel should have been her target. That stupid angel actually went down there with Master. What fun is it being left behind all alone to take care of the Floating City?

In her perspective, such heated battles were what would have put her at ease. That would have been like having returned to the demon plane and living like a demon.

Nailisi summoned a large number of demons, but they never got a chance to fight. They looked rather bored. The powerful demons had even gotten lazy of hunting anything inside the purgatory of the devils. Instead, the imps and demonic spirits were having a great time. She thought, Is that how the demon plane works?

The emergence of the abomination army changed how the battles at the group of fortresses surrounding the portal fought. The soldiers holed up in the fortresses were reluctant to come out and fight. Attacks were mainly performed using magic and alchemy crossbows.

Fycro bought huge amounts of alchemy crossbows from Saleen, and there was unusually expensive equipment. The extra cost had only loosened the level requirements of the weapons instead of increasing the crossbows' properties.

Many professionals charged outside the fortresses before the army emerged, taking out abominations that were singled out. The alchemy crossbows were fired slowly. They were only there to help their own people take out the powerful abominations. Despite the crossbows being used as the main mode of offense, they were no longer able to stop the abominations' advance.

Casualties among the abominations climbed considerably. While the platoons of soldiers all had decent gear, they were unable to resist bolts fired from the alchemy crossbows. While the range of the alchemy crossbows provided by Saleen was not increased, one out every three bolts fired had magic explosion bolts.

The Floating City in the sky was only 1,600 feet from the ground. At such a height, the city was literally pinning onto the heads of the abominations. There was the sound of war drums playing behind the abomination soldiers, urging the troops to die for the cause. There were soldiers taking flight, heading for the city above.

The Floating City began to retaliate in an orderly fashion under Rossen's command. There were 20,000 enchanters participating in the battle, making it absolutely certain that no soldiers got up to the Floating City. However, there was an increasingly high number of soldiers making breakthroughs on the ground as they headed east.

Rossen felt something was off. He sent word to Saleen, telling him that the newly appeared type of abominations no longer spread out everywhere. They had instead made for his line of defense in an orderly manner.

"Get 10,000 enchanters to home in on them. Block their advance," Saleen said in a relaxed manner.

He led 120,000 enchanters himself. They were split into six groups. 20,000 enchanters fought every day, and they were rotated throughout the week. Doing so ensured that the enchanters were able to get ample rest and would not be exhausted from battle.

Saleen was only using half of the enchanters assigned to the task to block their way. This ensured there would not be any ill effects on the operations of the Floating City.

Tens of thousands of abominations made it outside the fortresses and entered the area controlled by Saleen's troops. The armor worn by the abomination troops was incredibly thick. If they were not being shot at by the alchemy crossbows, not even the halberds of the demons would have been able to easily split them.

Hundreds of demons surrounded the 50-unit abomination platoons. The leader of the demons was a level nine supreme demon. He roared as he pummeled his halberd into the abominations' armor. The surrounding demons followed their superiors in an orderly manner and attacked from the flanks in rotation.

The platoon of 50 abominations was hardly able retaliate when they were being surrounded and attacked. They were quickly killed off. The supreme demon was rather taken aback. He had hacked more than four times before he was able to kill an abomination, and he was a level nine supreme demon.

Another platoon of abominations came up. That supreme demon was unable to help but cursed and shot a magic arrow as soon as he saw them. The magic arrow flew up into the sky and exploded, shining brilliantly in the dark.

More powerful attacks quickly came in the form of over 100 magic spells raining onto the platoon. It quickly killed them off without a fuss. At the rear of the line of defense, Saleen came to the top of the 32-foot-thick wall at the front. He was holding onto the War Drum of Fear.

He swung the bone hammer and began to hit the war drum. Tens of thousands of pests flew out. Under his control, they pounced onto the abominations.

Saleen was able to tell that the abominations below level nine attacked using physical means. Physical attacks had little to no effect on the pests. The very reason why he chose to use the War Drum of Fear instead of deploying his elites was because Rossen told him that when the abominations emerged, they headed in his direction without a care for the other three.

Something was indeed off. He had been set up by Fycro.

Saleen could have actually retreated. If he were to do so, he would have left a tarnished impression on the people of the mainland for running away from battle.

That was how ridiculous the world was. Some people wouldn't even come to the frontlines to help out with the war, yet they were quick to slander those who did. The morals of those people were ever-changing. When things were going their way, people like that would act like saints. When their interests were threatened, they quickly turned into madmen. They were capable of cursing the entire world for what they would have had to go through, and they were willing to chicken out instead of facing trouble head on.

"Your highness, the central fort is broken!" Rossen's voice suddenly rang out.

Saleen saw abominations wearing silver armor appear at the portal. They were all over 6 feet in height, and their weapons resembled battle axes. Those abominations were at level nine, but they were still soldiers. They got into formations and stormed the fortresses. They began to tear at the fortresses Fycro built.

The blood on the ground was unable to be cleared out. The soldiers stepped on the blood while howling in excitement as they toppled the buildings one after another, even though the blood was actually from their own kind.