Dragon Monarch System

"So, did you find any weakness in these creatures?" Aditya asked.

"Well.....!!" Hearing this, Julia paused and looked at Riya.

"Riya, you can take over." Riya just nodded her head.

"Well, as Julia said before, these creatures are artificial beings created by a technique left behind by the legendary Alchemist Arcanum."

"To be honest, I don't know if I should call this a weakness of these Homunculus or not."

"What we have found is that these creatures do not have any emotions. They aren't capable of speaking unless they transform into Duplicates of cultivators or people."

"Once one of the Voidfigures does transform into a Duplicate, then it is impossible for that Voidfigure to transform back into its base or original form." Aditya nodded his head.

"At their base form, these Voidfigures do not have any intelligence. They act upon their instinct, which is to seek Mana to absorb from cultivators and become a Duplicate."

"We believe that these Voidfigures are being controlled by the mastermind. Otherwise, how could a Homunculus with no intelligence know where to attack or move in groups? Clearly, someone has been directing their movements."

"But this possibility also comes with a question or a dead block."

"What's that?" Aditya asked.

Riya and Julia looked at each other and responded. "Till now, millions of Voidfigures have attacked various of the Istarin Empire. To control this many Voidfigures at the same time, one would need to have an enormous amount of Mana."

"I don't see any problem here...!!" Aditya did not understand the question here.

"According to a rough calculation that Alicia had done earlier, the amount of Mana that the mastermind would need just to control a million of the Voidfigures is so enormous that it's simply not possible for a Cultivator's body to hold this huge amount of Mana."

"To put it into a simpler context, you're the only odd Cultivator that we know who has such an enormous amount of Mana. If the Mastermind wants to control one million Voidfigures, then he would at least need 100 times your Mana reserve."

"Or, in other words, this much energy would be enough to power all the 4-star Mana Defensive Barriers of the Istarin Empire for over one month. And this isn't normal, Aditya." Aditya was already an odd factor in terms of the sheer amount of Mana that was in his body. There can never be anything or anyone that would have more Mana than Aditya.

This is the reason why Riya and Julia weren't sure if the mastermind was a single person.

Hearing all this, Aditya calmly closed his eyes and thought for a second. If he had faced similar problems, then there was only one way that he would have solved this issue.

"You know, I can solve this issue by making a Special Rune Formation."

"Well, it's possible.....!!" Amelia felt that what Aditya was saying could be achieved.

"The issue of energy could be solved by using Mana Stones."

"Arcanum was a genius of his time. A person like him must definitely know the limitations of his technique. So, I wouldn't be surprised if he had developed a Special Rune Formation or made a special artifact for this very purpose. Since we don't have any information on what he did in the latter part of his life, there are a lot of possibilities."

"Maybe, he did not create the Special Rune Formation instead, he had someone else make it for him and then later he maybe have modified the formation to suit his technique. Anything is possible." Riya and Julia nodded their heads.

"This should give us a clue." Aditya stood up and looked at the Voidfigure that was being held in her laboratory.

"There must be an energy signal between the Voidfigure and the Rune Formation. Without this connection, the Voidfigures wouldn't stay under the mastermind's control. Riya and Julia, please try to see if you two can feel this energy and locate its source." Aditya knew that this task was extremely difficult.

In fact, for a normal alchemist, this might be an impossible task. But they were the Goddess of Alchemy and the Goddess of Nature. With both of their divine abilities combined, it wouldn't be an impossible task.

Hearing this, both Julia and Riya looked at each other and smiled.

"Actually, we have managed to detect this connection using an ancient artifact that Mom lent us."

Hearing this, Aditya looked at Amelia.

"Thank you, Aunty!!" Aditya was grateful to Amelia. In times like this, every help mattered a lot.

"There is no need to thank me. You have helped the Celestial Terrain so many times that I have lost count. "Moreover, aren't we a family?"Family members don't thank each other.

"Aditya, we will need another day or two to find out the source of this connection." Julia and Riya already have started working together. It shouldn't take long before they find the location of the Special Rune Array.

Coming to Julia's laboratory has certainly made Aditya relieved. Before coming here, the whole situation looked very bleak and hopeless. It was as if he was fighting an opponent in the darkness. He couldn't see his opponent but his opponent could clearly see him and knew of his weakness.

The mastermind was targeting his weakness.

But now, he had a way of finding out exactly who the mastermind was.

These days, only Aditya knew just how stressed he had been because of this.

Aditya was about to leave the laboratory as he had more work to do when suddenly the doors were pushed open by Watson.

Watson hurriedly entered inside and frantically searched for Aditya.

"Your Majesty, bad news?" Watson was sweating. Not because he ran here but because of what he saw and heard.

"What happened?" For some reason, Aditya had a bad feeling in his heart.

Huff.....!!! Huff....!!!

Watson took a few long breaths to calm down and prepare himself to break the news to His Majesty.

"All of our allies except the Celestial Terrain and the Deep Sea Palace Empire have waged war against the Istarin Empire."

"What?" Even Aditya couldn't sit still hearing this.

Amelia, Julia, and Riya all froze and stared at Watson in utter shock. Just hearing the news, their bodies suddenly become cold.

"All of our allies except the Celestial Terrain and the Deep Sea Palace Empire have waged war against .....!!"

Aditya interrupted Watson and asked. "I heard you but is this true?" Aditya just couldn't believe that his allies would turn against him. This is so unexpected. He did not see this coming.

After all, The Istarin Empire has maintained a very peaceful and friendly relationship with all of its allies. if their relationships were somewhat strained, then Aditya would have kicked them out of the alliance.

Just a few days ago, all of their alliance members except for Empress Laura had gathered. Everyone chatted, enjoyed drinks, and shared laughter together. What could have possibly changed within few days.

"It's true."

"Just a few minutes ago, all of our allies sent their people to let us know that they are breaking their alliance with the Istarin Empire. All agreements with the Empire have been broken. And they also declared war against us."

Hearing all of this, Aditya did not know what to say.

He simply sat down on the chair and rubbed his head.

He had never expected the situation to change like this.

'Just when I was thinking that I was getting close to solving one problem, another problem rose.' Aditya sighed out loud while rubbing his head.

Everyone's eyes were on Aditya.

But the girls were equally, if not more, shocked than Aditya.

Watson nervously stood in front of Aditya. He knew very well that Aditya hated backstabbers more than anything in this world. He was afraid of the violent reaction that Aditya was going to have.

Watson has never felt this nervous in his life before. Although he knew that Aditya won't do any harm to him, yet he felt like he was standing very close to death.

With the palms of his hands, he wiped the sweat from his face. Right now, his whole body was soaked in sweat.

Watson waited for Aditya to speak but Aditya did not say anything. This silence lasted for more than 5 minutes until Watson couldn't endure the silence anymore. With each passing minute, the tension in the room was only growing. Watson was feeling more and more nervous.

"Your...Majesty.....!!" Watson nervously called out to Aditya.

At the same time, outside of the Dragon Palace, dark clouds took over. Although it has not started to rain yet, violent crimson lightning is cracking in the sky.

This sudden change in weather was very unexpected to everyone.

"Watson...!!" Aditya called Watson in a low yet bone-chillingly cold tone.

As he raised his head and glanced at Watson, looking at those red eyes, Watson felt his very soul tremble. His legs began shaking while his face turned pale.

At the same time, due to the heavy killing intent coming out of Aditya's body, the girls also had to take a few steps back.

"The Istarin Empire is going to war.....!!"

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