Chapter 917: Act 91 – Sprite That Hits Wherever It Points
“Protect that silver dragon, don’t let them get close to her!” The battle above escalated to a fever pitch, with the dragon beasts circling around Mistral’s massive form. They flew lower and lower, like dark clouds hanging heavily in the sky, their shrieks and low growls intermingling, with only the commands of the lady knight cutting clearly through the chaos of the battlefield—under her orders, the gargoyles were relentlessly attacking the encroaching dragon beasts, as if two heavy clouds were crashing violently together. There was no deafening roar, but sporadic golden flames flashed instead of thunder, the remnants of the gargoyles fell like rain, while occasionally a massive creature would plunge from mid-air with a resounding crash.
The ground trembled ominously; when the silver dragon Mistral crashed to the ground, it turned several nearby streets into a flat wasteland. However, a circle of remaining buildings still bordered the open area, where the Summer Solstice Knights and the White Lion Guard had climbed these structures to assist the gargoyles in combat from the rooftops. They constructed a temporary, sturdy defensive line, temporarily managing to keep the dragon beasts firmly at bay outside the ruins.
Their casualties were equally severe; fireballs frequently fell from the sky, striking these isolated buildings. The brilliant blazes rising in the darkness often represented the loss of several lives.
The young prince and unarmed nobles had long been moved to a safer area by Dierphir and Princess Margadale, leaving only a few who dared to fight behind. Aike temporarily took on the role of commander of the White Lion Guard alongside Juliette, stepping into the position vacated by the unconscious Medisa. Surprisingly, the duchess insisted on staying to be with Marjory; she understood some rudimentary healing spells, and Bulfield, the deputy commander of the Summer Solstice Knights leading the perimeter defense, agreed to her request.
Just hold on for one more minute.
The silver dragon Mistral lay quietly atop the ruins, her wings drooping, her long neck curled. She half-closed her eyes, watching the battle above, only raising her head to unleash a blast of silver holy fire to incinerate any dragon beast that approached too closely through the defense.
The gargoyles in the sky were not lacking in intelligence; these constructs of the Buddhi gradually realized this detail and intentionally began to lead the dragon beasts above the ruins. Although Mistral’s holy fire inevitably resulted in some friendly fire, the fourth-tier gargoyles were far outmatched in combat by the seventh-tier hill dragons. Even if they led the beasts to crash into the silver dragon lady in a mutual destruction, it was preferable to a direct confrontation where the exchange rate was ten to one.
Mistral felt a tinge of annoyance at the actions of these gargoyles; in her mental communication, she replied to Brendel, “These toys of yours are Buddhi creations, right? If they dared to act like this under normal circumstances, I would’ve burned them to ash with a single breath long ago.”
It seemed only a giant dragon had the gall to label the finest air force of Vaunte before the Channel War as mere toys. Brendel pretended not to hear to avoid angering her and replied, “Don’t forget they are protecting you. Also, don’t attack again; time distortion will increase your actions, and be careful not to attract the attention of that creature up there.”
“But what about the heavy losses your toys are going to suffer? Isn’t that a problem?”
Brendel felt pained at the loss; having been given over a thousand gargoyles from the Buddhi, they were genuine high-quality goods, not the usual inferior versions. After this battle, he feared half would be lost. Although the steel automatons and gargoyles were originally intended to deal with the holy war, his imagined enemy was Duke Toquinin’s lionmen. Had he known he would face hill dragon beasts, he’d have sharply requested three thousand gargoyles instead of just a thousand.
The issue was that he had to proceed as was.
Brendel shook his head, too distracted to respond.
Mistral glanced at him and said, “You can trust me, human. If you survive, I’ll let you choose a treasure from my hoard. I guarantee its value will not be less than your losses today.”
Brendel’s heart stirred slightly; after all, it was dragon treasure. There was a legend in Vaunte—the dragon hoard, the kingdom’s treasury. This meant that a dragon’s treasure could be worth the entire foundation of a kingdom. These two treasures, along with the ancient ruins buried underground, could be considered the three ultimate treasures in the “Amber Sword.” Having any one of them would be enough to turn a penniless adventurer into someone wealthy beyond measure, yet matching the enticing rewards was the terrifying difficulty of obtaining them—dragons were obsessed with treasures, each one keenly aware of their possessions. Even if someone stole just a single gold coin from them, they would instantly notice; as for the kingdom’s treasury, it goes without saying that it was heavily guarded, filled with masters of various abilities. As for the ancient ruins, those were more elusive; south of Erluin, Brendel had only heard of Valhalla being successfully excavated.
Mistral was an adult dragon; her treasure was undoubtedly vast and rich, containing many good things, perhaps even artifacts. Even if he could not choose freely, obtaining a mid-quality item would benefit him tremendously for a while.
But he quickly calmed down. “Let’s talk about it after surviving.”
Mistral’s mercury-like eyes flickered with surprise.
The passage of time was slowly turning; only a third of the journey had passed.
The maximum acceleration multiplier of this minor artifact was tenfold, but that was for Brendel—it operated under different rules on various levels. To accelerate for five minutes for someone like Mistral would require at least one minute of time, and in a battlefield where every second counted, it would be an exceedingly long duration. He had thought more than once how great it would be to have the Time Reversal Disk, which could revert back to the state of ten minutes ago, activating instantly without any experience cost. Ten minutes prior, Mistral was still strong and could match up against the black dragon Marlaxias; diverting the latter would have been quite simple.
However, that was merely a thought.
Forty seconds remaining.
Cooper listened nervously to the shrieks and roars outside the sky, the explosive flashes intermittently lighting up the night sky, while the ground quaked slightly amidst the rumble. Dust rained down from the ceiling, and he stared blankly at the dancing stone fragments on the floor, thinking this night might be the end of the world, where everyone could face annihilation at any moment. Nonetheless, being a noble on horseback, he composed himself far better than the trembling little nobles around him. Moreover, the young prince from Erluin, though pale, at least appeared sufficiently composed, which kept Cooper from losing face, especially with two beautiful ladies beside the young prince.
He recognized both Lady Marjory of Yanshi Castle and Princess Margadale.
Dierphir had just recovered from the backlash of her spell, looking quite unwell as she leaned weakly against Princess Margadale. Meanwhile, Earl Orkans sat across from them, his expression as dark as a thundercloud; what he was thinking was unknown. As one of Dierphir’s vassals, Cooper dared not to provoke him and could only hope that the Earl of Toniger could continue to create miracles, just like teaching their Cruzian border army a lesson and driving away that cursed black dragon.
A panicked figure rushed out from the adjacent room, and Cooper recognized this person—a small noble close to the Clover Plains’ border, a subordinate of Earl Ji’en, white and plump, with hands marred by no calluses, clearly an up-and-coming noble who climbed the ranks through connections, which was indeed the case; he gained the favor of Ji’en due to his outstanding sister.
This person stumbled over to Cooper and Earl Orkans, exclaiming as if he had seen a ghost, “Bad news, someone ran away, and someone’s dead!”
“What do you mean?” Cooper was taken aback. In this situation, deaths were too normal; it would be strange if no one died outside.
However, things were evidently not that simple. The plump man gesticulated and struggled to explain; in the end, they all had to rush to the scene, where Cooper finally understood what had happened.
A noble had escaped, killing another Cruzian noble before leaving. The unfortunate soul bore a long wound across his chest, as if he had been killed in a struggle, his head tilted aside, his complexion waxen—it was evident he had long since passed away, probably even before the battle began. It was not surprising that someone fled, but killing someone before fleeing raised perplexing questions for Cooper. Instinctively sensing something was off, he was about to order an investigation when suddenly, the Cruzian nobles outside began to scream.
“There he is!”
“The killer!”
Cooper’s heart raced as he hurriedly dashed outside. In an instant, he saw a figure trying to crawl up to the roof of a nearby building.
The person wore a black velvet coat of a viscount, with blood stains on the collar and cuffs. He held a dagger and quickly crawled up onto the roof, then stretched out his arms towards the sky—Cooper was puzzled, as he recognized this man. In fact, there were quite a few Cruzian nobles accompanying Brendel, not counting Sir Moore and a few others. Many were knights and gentlemen from the countryside who responded to the great lord’s call, bringing their own retainers and followers to intercept the Earl of Toniger. Since there were so many people involved in this endeavor across nearly all of Anzeruta, not every noble would recognize one another.
And this person, Cooper remembered, was someone he had saved from the crypt; at that time, this guy had quietly followed them, though they all did not know one another, and he had only thought of him as a local noble, completely unaware the latter would carry out such actions now.
He watched, wide-eyed, as the man climbed up the building, arms wide open, still clueless as to what the guy intended to do. It was evidently the most dangerous place on the battlefield at the moment; did this man kill someone and run out just to become a target?
This was illogical.
“Lord Marlaxias!” the man on the roof suddenly shouted, “I’m the contact, quick, save me!”
The sudden shout echoed insignificantly across the cacophony of the battlefield, but the black dragon Marlaxias still noticed. The dragon’s perceptual abilities were exceptionally keen; in fact, at this very moment in Gravel Town, even deep underground and in the nearby hills, it could eavesdrop on the faintest whispers—except for the area near the silver dragon Mistral, which it could not sense.
The only difference was whether it chose to take notice.
Marlaxias lowered its head from the air when it heard the term “contact,” looking down at the earth and the creature on the roof, which was waving its hands. It pondered for a moment before recalling the significance of this loathsome mortal’s presence.
It let out a low hum.
When Wilard Valen saw the dreadful shadow in the sky turn its head toward him, he felt an overwhelming joy of surviving a cataclysm. Wilard Valen was his public name, yet his true name was Ferguson, with a code name of ‘Knight.’ He was the one who had closely followed the Tanpu, but unlike the speculations of the Chancellor’s daughter, he was neither a nobleman of the Earl of Toniger nor an aide to Tanpu. He seldom appeared in public, and few knew his true identity.
In reality, when that foolish troglodyte sealed his fate, Ferguson immediately hid in the crypt, locking himself away; those idiotic local nobles indeed did not recognize his identity, considering him a companion, and nobody checked his identity.
What made him even more overjoyed was that the commander was actually one from Erluin, which led to a bold plan. Fully aware that he would never be exposed, he chose not to flee, instead creepily following along.
Just as he had anticipated, no one suspected him throughout the entire ordeal, only encountering minor complications just before attempting to escape.
None of that mattered. Now was his best opportunity; Ferguson believed he had fully seized this chance—Tanpu, that fool, had no idea what he had obtained, but Ferguson recognized it. That stupid troglodyte had treated such a treasure as scrap metal, and it was no wonder it brought about its own disgrace. He hadn’t intended to alert that foolish underground creature; he had planned to hand that item over to another, but now survival took precedence.
He raised his hands to the sky in front of Marlaxias and spoke again—
Twenty seconds remaining.
The dragon beasts still hadn’t breached the gargoyles’ defense until the very last moment; the long sixty seconds seemed to have finally drawn to a close. Just as Brendel was about to breathe a sigh of relief, he instinctively turned his head, and just then caught sight of this scene. The moment he saw Ferguson standing on a distant rooftop shouting that damn lizard’s name, he realized something was wrong. Rogers and the others had long suspected a traitor existed within the empire, but he never imagined this traitor was hiding in Gravel Town and chose this moment to reveal themselves.
In an instant, he grasped what was happening and could not help but swear at the fool Cooper in his mind.
“Respected lady, we may have to end the spell prematurely; Marlaxias will likely intervene right away,” Brendel quickly asked through mental communication, “Can you restore it ahead of time?”
“Perhaps not yet,” Mistral understood what happened, but she still couldn’t act. Otherwise, she would only invite Marlaxias’s retaliation. She replied softly, “With my current injuries, it is difficult to draw away Marlaxias.”
Brendel fell silent.
Now, they could only hope that Nemeses would swiftly take care of that guy before he drew Marlaxias’s attention.
Yet Ferguson understood this point as well; in his heart, he knew of the dragon’s pride. If he could not pique the other’s interest immediately, he would likely not even know how he would die. He shouted boldly, “Lord Marlaxias, the War Slate—”
Before he finished, an arrow flew toward him from the darkness, colliding against a layer of shimmering golden netting, instantly turning to ash.
Nearby, a White Lion Guard officer wielding a longbow let out a miserable cry, engulfed in flames before tumbling off the roof.
“What did you say?” Marlaxias’s voice thundered in the air.
“It’s over!” At that moment, although Brendel’s view was obscured by Mistral’s wings, preventing him from seeing exactly what had happened, the instant that damn lizard spoke, it signified they had missed their last chance.
Nearby, Cooper’s countenance had turned pale, his eyes wide with realization, as he finally understood what had occurred. Meanwhile, Nemeses’s expression darkened; the lady knight had thought several times to reach for her longbow behind her, but ultimately restrained herself from moving.
The final ten seconds felt increasingly unattainable—
“War Slate!” Ferguson knew he was now under Marlaxias’s protection and breathed a sigh of relief, even shooting a somewhat smug glance at the astonished Sir Cooper before continuing, “Do you remember the artifact response from a few days ago near this area, esteemed Lord Marlaxias? I am—”
But this sentence never reached completion. Just at that moment, everyone heard a soft buzzing sound.
In the void, a straight silver line shot from some unknown direction, piercing through the smoke over the battlefield. It extended from another street concealed by the darkness and directly landed on Ferguson’s chest, leaving a small glow where it landed.
Ferguson paused slightly, looking at the scene in a daze.
What was this?
This was likely the shared concern in everyone’s heart at that moment.
But there was soon an answer.
In an instant, a silvery beam shot through the night sky—
