Distractions
“All in all, Phosphorescence Swamp is going to be the safest right now, but the most dangerous place in the end……”
Leylin smiled reluctantly, ”It’s just that… do I have any other choices?”
At this time, he was sure the Azure Mountain King was hot on his heels. Once he left the Ouroboros Clan, he feared he would not get to live another day.
Unlike his rank 3 clone, the Azure Mountain King was a famed Morning Star Magus! The disparity in power was too large for any strategies to be of use.
Thus, he was left with no choice but to take a gamble. Fortunately, he had already exterminated the opposite party’s clone, earning him and the Ouroboros Clan some extra time!
Otherwise, if they allowed the Azure Mountain King to continue to stir up trouble, word may leak out to other power-thirsty parties, that the Ouroboros Clan no longer had Morning Star Magi defending it! He could imagine them swimming forward like sharks towards their prey.
For now, since the Azure Mountain King’s matter had been settled by Leylin, he’d presumed Leylin’s strength was why Gilbert and the others chose to lay low.
This was what Leylin was striving for, a little of their apprehension!
“Morning Star realm! I must advance to the Morning Star realm!” Leylin clenched his teeth.
At this moment, Tanasha brought forward a transparent box, “My Lord, this is our harvest.”
Inside the box were some scraps of flesh and hair, and even some blood-stained clothes and other fabrics and such.
“Well done! For your contributions, I shall reward you in the form of contribution points later on. Right now, let’s go home…..” In front of his subordinates, Leylin resumed the attitude of a master.
……
“My Lord!” Back at his own Magus Tower, upon hearing the green tower genie’s greetings, Leylin felt as if he had been away for a lifetime.
His departure had started with a banquet, celebrating Freya advancing to the Crystal Phase.
Who would’ve thought that, within such a short time, so many drastic changes would take place. Even the entire Ouroboros Clan was in a crisis, and was almost destroyed.
The failed mission of Gilbert and the other two was something Leylin could never have predicted.Morning Star Magi’s failed mission on a whole, was something Leylin could have never predicted.
After losing the deterrence of Morning Star Magi, the Ouroboros Clan immediately showed signs of instability.
“Tower genie, backup the entire experimental data to the A.I. Chip. Destroy all original experiments, starting from the natural resources. Prepare to transfer!” Leylin drew a deep breath, and requested.
“Authorization confirmed. Spiritual force connected, data transmission in progress!” Compared to a human Magus, the tower genie’s level of compliance is as good as first class. Immediately, a link was formed between it and the A.I. Chip.
Leylin had always held the habit of backing up his important experimental data to the A.I. Chip. The amount the genie had was only a small part of the whole, and he took the time to patch up the holes in his database.
The most important step was to destroy the experiments themselves. For the past century, Leylin had secretly carried out many bloodline experiments. He had been fortunate to not leave any clues behind, otherwise he would have gotten into deep water.
Following the command of the formation genie, many secret paths and doors started opening up, revealing the concealed spaces and storage facilities.
Inside, bountiful magic crystals and precious objects glowed in brilliant lights and vibrant colours. It was a feast for one’s eyes. Leylin heaved a sigh and picked out many of the stored magic crystals.
He was sure he had provoked the Azure Mountain King to the maximum this time, thus he didn’t have high hopes of being able to preserve the Magus Tower.
Compared with the main headquarters at the Phosphorescence Swamp, his Magus Tower would be the first to be ravaged. Since he had decided to seek refuge at the main headquarters, he didn’t want to be taken advantage of and lose his magic crystals.
With these thoughts in mind, he turned to the experimental room where he absorbed Lamia radiation.
After complicated and meticulous verification, Leylin saw the brilliant milky-white bone in the center of the crystal ball.
“A.I. Chip!” Leylin’s face contorted as he yelped.
“Begin compatibility scan, unscrambling data in progress…” A huge amount of data flowed in the form of blue streaks of light from Leylin’s eyes, and seeped into the crystal ball held by a machine.
After two minutes of data transmission, a clear, distinct sound echoed, as a tiny pin-sized hole appeared on the surface of the crystal ball, slowly enlarging.
“This is what my advancement to Morning Star will depend most upon!” Leylin exclaimed and sighed. He drew out a box made of crystal and carefully kept the Lamia bone.
Prior to this, he didn’t want the Lamia bone to be kept on him for fear of Gilbert finding out. But right now, there wasn’t even a single Morning Star Warlock in the headquarters, so Leylin naturally had nothing to be afraid of.
“Mentor, are we really leaving now?” Before they set off, Snoopy looked at the black tower and Onyx Castle in the distance, his eyes filled with a look of unwillingness to let go.
Having stayed here for more than a thousand years, he had already developed feelings for it, hence his hesitance to leave.
Similarly, Kubler, Parker and the others who were behind Leylin felt the exact same hesitance and unwillingness, even though they had obeyed Leylin’s orders and packed all their belongings.
“We must leave!” Leylin’s reply was resolute and decisive. “You should know the situation and how things are right now. Except for the main headquarters, everywhere else is dangerous….”
Parker and the rest solemnly nodded their heads. They had not found out about the three missing Morning Star Magi yet. However, the chaos that had happened was enough to keep them on the edge for a long time.
Magi who were able to live past three, four or five hundred years were all intelligent, and the recent spate of events had made them realise that something unusual was going on. Hence, their support for Leylin’s decision was unanimous.
Glancing at his rather muddle-headed apprentice, Leylin shook his head and patted his shoulders:”We will be back! I promise!”
“Mmm. I believe you, Mentor!” Snoopy nodded his head passionately. Parker, on the other hand, forced a smile.
…….
Inside Phosphorescence Swamp.
Numerous sulphur-filled bubbles rose from the sludge, becoming green balls of flame as they escaped.
Erected in the center of the swamp, the Warlock City was as busy as always. In fact, the population seemed to have increased.
It wasn’t just one or two families that could feel the oddity in the air. In the early days, when there were instabilities at the border, many Marquises and Counts had reallocated their families and servants over here, blowing up population and city.
As for the issues of their territories and such, they had no worry about that.
To the Warlocks at the top of society, commoners were like wild grass. After trimming them, come spring time and they would tenaciously grow again. So if the taxes were reduced for the people, in less than 10 years, the population would boom again.
Regardless of whether it was the invading troop or the defence troop , they did not need these commoners as resources, thus the commoners were able to lead a rather good life before and after the war with no major changes.
Compared to these commoners, the Warlocks’ regrets would be losing their castles, Magus Towers and such.
Just like Leylin, who had built his Magus Tower in his own territory. He supposed that after the war was over, his tower would be gone too. And it did not matter who the enemy was, they would be ruthless and would helped themselves to the structures. Also, once a tower genie discerned a master, she would never change. Thus, total destruction was the only way.
“Hehe… Leylin, it looks like the bad blood between you and the Oakheart Clan is serious. Looking at this latest intelligence report, your territory had been occupied by him and your Magus Tower has been demolished…” Freya smiled as she handed the intelligence report to Leylin.
“It is serious!” Leylin stroked his nose, ”Even their chief died in my hands!”
In his heart, he silently added ‘and a Morning Star’s clone’ next to it. Under such circumstances, if the opposite party were to be polite to him, it would truly be odd.
After moving to the Ouroboros Clan headquarters, over ten days had passed and within this time, many things had happened.
Every territory had its fair share of unceasing riots, and there were multiple forces would invade these areas. Naturally, Leylin’s territory was not spared .
Freya, too, had lost her territory. Hence, she teased Leylin with a bit of schadenfreude.
However, Leylin could sense the fear and restlessness beneath Freya’s smile. This time, the power of the enemy had surpassed the expectations of many. The Azure Mountain Clan was but one part only, there were other more powerful ones yet to show themselves.
The Ouroboros Clan was strong in appearance but weak in reality, and everyone could see it. Hence the minor skirmishes at the borders had escalated to entire territories being taken over.
Even the outer regions of Phosphorescence Swamp were not spared. From time to time, scouts sent by many different powerful families were discovered. Warlocks from the Ouroboros Clan could only rely on the headquarters’ defensive spells as a core, building an extremely narrow defensive perimeter and guarding it resolutely.
Anyone with a discerning eye could tell that if the Morning Star military strength did not make an appearance soon in the Ouroboros Clan, the entire clan could face imminent destruction.
“Over at the astral gate, how is the progress?” Seeing Freya’s strong and obstinate persona, Leylin couldn’t console her directly, as otherwise, he would have hurt her pride. Instead, he changed the subject and asked her a question.
The truth of the matter was, the root of all the problems were the three elders. If they could appear immediately, even if just one of them could show their face in public, not only would the Warlocks of the entire Ouroboros Clan gain confidence from their pillar of strength, the number of enemy scouts would reduce drastically too.
“Some of the Marquises from the technology department have been working for days in there…” Freya smiled wryly.
“But in the end…. Only someone of at least a Morning Star Magus status, can open an astral gate. Otherwise, no one can support the crossover of the body. Forget rescuing them, we can’t even find someone here qualified to open the astral gate…”
Seeing Freya, Leylin knew deep in her heart that she had some disagreements with the Blood Duchess Emma and the other two Morning Star Warlocks. But since she was a student of theirs, she couldn’t say anything.
“You can’t blame our Mentors, the allure of the Purgatory World is simply too huge…” Leylin sighed.