Chapter 1398: Chapter 1398 - The Elemental Hand’s Brutality (Par
Chapter 1398: The Elemental Hand’s Brutality (Part 3)
Saleen’s 11 illusions surrounded the mages’ metal flying device; the spaces in-between were packed with warriors .
Zzzzzzz . Pang! The puppets crackled with lightning that made the mages’ hair stand on end .
The disk-shaped metal device they were flying in was bedecked with wind-magic arrays etched on the surface . The mages kept working even when shrouded by Saleen’s territory .
Meanwhile, the illusions focused their attention on their targets . A mage on the disk was trying to figure out which illusion was the real Saleen . As he extended his mental powers to probe them, blood splattered from their mouths and noses as the mages slumped to the floor .
“You people deserve worse than death,” an illusion muttered . While they could do little more than attack, speaking was no problem at all for the illusions .
“This is your fault! You’re the one who went looking for Safilos and alerted us!”
A young mage trainer in their midst yelled at Saleen .
“Don’t go making excuses for all the bad things you did . You’re worse than animals,” Saleen snapped as he cast eight-ball lightning: the balls were a lot faster now that he had advanced . To protect themselves, the mages immediately erected their magic shields .
It was futile: The ball lightning penetrated the shields and reduced the remaining mages to ashes .
The 500 puppets didn’t dare attack Saleen . The God of Lightning in the Lightning Constellation was also a puppet god . Dante had captured those puppets and thrown them into the Lightning Constellation to boost their combat strength .
Saleen pushed the huge metal disk into his magic amplifier . His power of soul was potent enough to activate the device with a diameter of hundreds of meters and transfer it to his space equipment .
This would have been unthinkable in the past . Now, it was a no-brainer .
Saleen killed eight mages in one go, including the one who had tried to bait his illusion . Nine level-10 mages assassinated in a minute—not bad! Such small victories gave Saleen little satisfaction .
The mages of the Elemental Hand were starting to get really crazy .
Forcefully enhanced powers filled those newly advanced mages with brutal rage . Back in the day, the old mages would have talked about the need for balance, a ridiculous idea to the new mages who only worshipped pure power at the moment .
What a terrifying thought as Saleen glanced down at the hundreds of sorcerers .
Alchemy City had acquired some ruins and massive wealth during its conquests, giving the city the means to literally mass-produce sorcerers .
Saleen’s magic net had regional limitations . Once the enchanters left the area, they were reduced to nothing . Alchemy City was different . It had created a surplus of mages who ended up as collateral damage on the battlefield .
Rafel and Safilos had finished fighting . Alchemy City did not expect Saleen to show up so quickly, much cause so much destruction and devastation .
Despite Safilos’s composed demeanor, Saleen perceived the brewing rage in his gray eyes .
“Your Highness, I’m truly sorry for causing you so much trouble . ” Saleen bowed slightly in the air . Safilos’s territory was moderate, but he still had over a dozen cities . The smallest had fewer than 2,000 people; the population of the largest was under 100,000 .
All those cities were destroyed by mages and casualties were heavy .
“Safilos, do you hate me?” Saleen asked, breaking the silence .
Safilos turned and flew off to his residence and said, “I only hate Alchemy City . ”
“It’s the Elemental Hand . ” Saleen went up to him .
By then, his place was in shambles . The two level-10 mage trainers were incapable of fending off the mages’ attacks . It’s too bad they resorted to a makeshift magic tower to protect where Safilos had been .
Because the two old mages had no intention of staying there very long, they didn’t bother to build magic towers . If they did, they would have been able to keep Safilos’s place intact .
By then those mages knew that Saleen was already a level-11 mage from the way he approached them . As such, they behaved respectfully toward him not because of Saleen’s power but because of his magical knowledge .
“Thank you for your gear, master . We wouldn’t have been able to hold out this long without it . ”
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Saleen presented them with gifts of level-10 magic nuclei and six level-10 magic scrolls in the sets of equipment . This proved to be decisive equipment . One of Alchemy City’s level-10 mage trainers had actually been killed by those things .
Upon presenting his gifts, Saleen knew they would come in handy someday .
Seeing them thank him personally, Saleen said, “You both did well to protect your liege . It’s good that his highness was left unscathed because many depend on him . Later, I’ll replenish the magic nuclei and scrolls you lost . The two of you might still make it to level-11 . ”
Saleen’s words put a sparkle in the old mages’ eyes, but the sparkle quickly dimmed .
The good thing is that they would be able to extend their lifespan after getting to level-11 . The bad thing is that they would have to depend on Saleen to advance to that level, and this meant doing a disservice to their liege .
Naturally, Saleen knew what was going on in the mages’ minds: Both had been following Safilos for decades . Safilos’s father had assigned those two to his son at birth .
Even though they called Safilos their liege, they considered him family .
When Safilos was young and his bloodline had yet to awaken, there was still hope for him to become emperor . Those two mages were the last candidates chosen for protecting Safilos .
Chanake’s bloodline awakened before Safilos’s; the former’s was pure to the point where he could inherit the most powerful of secret arts of their family . By contrast, Safilos was made a prince right there and then was prevented from becoming emperor .
Safilos only began to take control of the army when Chanake came to the throne . The two old mages stayed at his side the whole time . Most mages who served in Safilos’s army had been recruited by the two of them .
The two old mages only retreated behind the scene after the number of powerful mages close to Safilos expanded and he began to focus on their own training . That was the reason for their training delay .
Safilos respected both of them very much; out of loyalty, the two mages couldn’t bring themselves to betray him .
“I have a lot of followers and can relate to how you might be feeling . I’m only offering assistance out of respect to you two,” Saleen said while taking out magic nuclei and scrolls and handing them to the mages in Safilos’s presence .
“Take them . We’ll need Saleen’s help rebuilding our kingdom . ” Safilos didn’t ask the mages to refuse . They had given a lot for his sake . If they were to advance further, the least Safilos could do was not stand in the way of their training .
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With the most powerful of mages killed by Saleen, Rafel would take care of the rest . Plus, the Violet Angel was a powerful being on its own .
Saleen was confident in his ability to crush Alchemy City’s power . The key was that he didn’t want his name attached to the effort .
Alchemy City, at present, probably no longer cared about its reputation because it had never acquired sufficient power to be a major player .
Saleen did not want to clash head-on with Alchemy City; instead, he wanted to borrow Safilos’s name in doing so . However, Safilos’s forces were all stationed at Holy Rock City . There were also pathetically few mages around .
Saleen wanted to talk about deploying troops with Safilos next .
If he had not been Lex’s husband, that would have been a sensitive topic of conversation . But since Saleen was currently a prince of the empire, no one would have said anything regardless of what he was doing with Safilos .
Saleen realized from what he saw in the trajectory of fate that reputation still mattered a lot, especially when he was trying to expand the Nature Faith . He needed to first ensure that people were okay with this .
If everyone had doubts and kept their guard up, the expansion of Nature Faith wouldn’t happen .
Saleen had no time to wait . The millennium-long promise would have been up before he realized it .
Regardless of how kind the Goddess of Nature was, he would have been punished if he violated the contract . There had probably been a good number of people who had entered the temples and acquired power left behind by the goddess .
There was no doubt one needed to pay for the power acquired .
Saleen did not want to see himself advancing to the very last stages and losing his life because of a puny contract like that .
The sooner the goddess was resurrected the better . Saleen was most afraid of the goddess leaving some measures behind that allowed her to grow too powerful when she was resurrected . If that happened, he’d lose control of the Nature Faith .
Safilos’s hatred of Alchemy City had reached a critical point . He didn’t really resent Saleen, as the location of his kingdom was probably not that far from where the mages of Alchemy City were hiding . It was only a matter of time before he became Alchemy City’s target .
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Those mages needed to find shelter since they couldn’t return to their city . Safilos’s kingdom was at the border of the mainland and the environment was semi-enclosed, making the region a perfect spot for the mages to live .
Safilos then asked, “Saleen, you said you’d provide me with a fleet and mages too . I want them now . When can you get them to me?”
“Right away,” Saleen smiled and answered .
“Right away?”
“Yes . I came with the Floating City . There are tens of thousands of construction puppets on it, so the cities can be repaired in no time . They can also start digging out deep-water ports . I’m going to provide you with 10,000 enchanters to make sure this never happens again unless it’s god coming down personally,” Saleen replied .
Safilos somehow managed to keep pent-up rage under control and said, “Very well . I’m going to hit Alchemy City personally . I want to chop off the heads of those mages one by one . ”
“Rest assured . I’ll join you . Those mages…” Saleen didn’t finish his sentence . It was too late for words . A great number of Safilos’s subjects died and he couldn’t replenish his resources in such a short period of time .
Saleen did make good on his word right away, though, leaving the place with Safilos and taking to the air before unleashing the Floating City .
The entire city was covered as soon as the Floating City appeared . The area turned dark as night . Saleen had the enchanters unleash magic powers to shine light onto the city . Tens of thousands of construction puppets were sent below to help Safilos with the building project .
Other than those construction puppets, there were demons helping to deepen the ports . The details were seen to by the enchanters . They sucked the dirt at the bottom up using vortexes and used Dissolution to deal with the coral and rocks .
After excavation, they turned to Fossilization to stabilize the undersea terrain . The area under excavation was vast . Saleen lost a good number of magic nuclei getting the project going . The enchanters used the stores of the Floating City for casting magic
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