199 Dekan’s Expert Evaluation
The carriage was moving along the brightly lit urban roads of the Randir Kingdom.
Dekan looked out of the window; they were gradually moving away from the densely packed commercial district towards what seemed to be a rare park within the city.
The mansion allocated to them by the king must be inside this park.
However, as they were about to reach the mansion, Dekan spotted a group of fully armed knights.
Their leader was none other than Knight Commander Gavin, the same person they had encountered at the city gate that morning.
“Mr. Dekan, please wait a moment.”
In no time, the carriage was stopped by Gavin’s wave of the hand.
Gavin appeared to have been waiting for Dekan for quite some time.
“Has something happened?”
Dekan inquired upon seeing the solemn look on Gavin’s face outside the window.
Gavin nodded helplessly:
“We’ve received an alert from the Kingdom Union. Four Archbishops of the Rebirth Church have their operation zones suspected to overlap in the central-north part of the continent. Based on their movements, it’s highly possible their target is to gather in the Randir Kingdom!”
“Is that so?”
Upon hearing Gavin’s words, Dekan couldn’t help but be startled.
Startled, but not entirely so.
After all, he himself was also a bishop in a way.
From the intelligence Dekan had gathered, the Kingdom Union’s astrologers were always in a semi-dream, semi-awake state.
Calculating the movement trends of the Rebirth Church’s bishops was also intermittent.
Moreover, normal calculations could only roughly deduce the operational range of these bishops, unable to lock onto their exact positions.
Generally speaking, any kingdom falling within the operational range of a single bishop was a normal situation.
Occasionally, when the operational ranges of two bishops overlapped, nearby kingdoms would enter a state of military preparedness.
Once three bishops showed a tendency towards heading to the same place, it would trigger the highest level of alarm!
And the concept was completely different when four bishops gathered.
It might directly lead to the final showdown.
“The Randir Kingdom is now facing an unprecedented crisis. Although we have summoned all eighth-tier powers to return to defend the Capital City, if the four Archbishops insist on taking action within the Randir Kingdom, we still cannot fully prevent it.”
Gavin felt exhausted.
This was already beyond what he could handle.
Despite decisions made by the Randir Kingdom resembling the sacrificing of pawns to protect the king—abandoning the defense of all other townships and concentrating all strength to defend the Capital City—it was still better than dispersing the eighth-tier forces and letting the bishops hunt them individually.
After all, even the strongest eighth-tier power would have little hope of surviving under the combined attacks of four bishops.
“What does the Kingdom Union have to say?”
Dekan asked.
“The other countries have already sent reinforcements, but the Kingdom Union’s support will not arrive until three days later. Meanwhile, the seventh-tier team evaluation has been emergency canceled.”
Gavin answered while handing over a document to Dekan:
“However, the evaluation has been transformed into a new mission. The Kingdom Union needs to urgently requisition your forces. Your task is to safeguard the Capital City until reinforcements arrive.”
Dekan accepted the document, unsurprised by the Kingdom Union’s decision.
There were currently four seventh-tier teams in the Capital City at this moment.
Before the reinforcements arrived, they were the key combat forces.
Even though one of these teams might be a bishop.
Dekan saw it written on the document:
[Seventh-tier Team Evaluation (Temporary Change), Mission Target: Protect the Randir Kingdom’s Capital City from destruction by the Rebirth Church within three days.]
[Completing the mission target will suffice for passing the evaluation. Basic team score is 0.]
[Contributions to defeating the Rebirth Church will increase the score.]
In the original evaluation, the Kingdom Union would use a Man-made Shadow World activation device to simulate a seventh-tier Shadow World, then determine the eligibility of the team and provide a score, which would be converted into the team’s initial score.
The score of a seventh-tier team was of utmost importance.
Besides being obtained upon passing the seventh-tier team evaluation, it could only be gained when the team completed the passage of seventh-tier and above Shadow Worlds thereafter.
It determined the team’s priority in participating in future Shadow Worlds.
If there were too many applications for a newly emerged seventh-tier Shadow World, the team with higher scores would be prioritized to challenge it.
Because scores could directly reflect the comprehensive strength and experience of the team.
The difficulty of this new temporary evaluation task was unpredictable.
It might exceed expectations, or it might allow them to pass by simply doing nothing.
But if they did nothing, the score would be 0.
If they contributed significantly, they could earn a very high initial score.
Even if they passed this new evaluation by doing nothing, opening with 0 points, it would mean passing or not passing was almost the same.
In the future, when challenging seventh-tier Shadow Worlds, they could only pick up leftovers, waiting could drive them crazy. It would be better to retake the evaluation.
Thus, all the teams should aim to fight against the Rebirth Church to earn high scores.
“Rest assured, Mr. Gavin. I’ll capture at least one bishop alive for you. In this, I am an expert.”
Dekan said confidently with a smile, as if he had already taken full control of the situation.
This new question felt like a professional player attending an amateur competition to Dekan.
No one understood the Rebirth Church better than he did!
“… Mr. Dekan, I know you’re consoling us, but please also take care of your own safety. After all, this isn’t your duty.”
Gavin stared at Dekan’s confident look blankly and shook his head, smiling.
He was deeply moved.
Among the four teams, one team had a reluctant attitude, clearly intending to slack off.
Another team from the northern kingdom clearly had intentions to make trouble.
Only Dekan and a team from the southern kingdom expressed a firm determination to protect the Capital City.
Gavin knew Dekan was brash and recognized his real accomplishment in defeating the Destruction Archbishop Evans.
But this time, they were facing four bishops.
Even Dekan, it seemed, might find it hard to save himself.
…
After a brief conversation with Knight Commander Gavin, he took his team and left.
Dekan’s carriage continued towards the mansion.
Not long after, they arrived at the residence allocated by the king.
It was a stand-alone old building, and the lights lit inside indicated that Cornelia and the others had already returned.
“Huh, the king is quite generous.”
Dekan entered the mansion with Tarta, who was full of surprise.
Guided by the servants, they entered the first-floor hall, where Dekan immediately spotted Cornelia and Mia.
They seemed to have finished dinner and were leisurely lounging on the sofa with plant masks that Mia had newly developed.
After noticing someone returning, Cornelia and Mia lazily turned to look at the newcomers.
They had played all afternoon and were already very tired; all they wanted was to relax during their evening.
However.
Their attention was quickly drawn to the small figure beside Dekan!
Both of them stood up from the sofa, tore off their masks, and stared intensely at Tarta.
Cornelia seemed to have frozen momentarily.
She accidentally dropped Teacher Cat, who she was hugging, onto the sofa.
