Volume 10 Bugs Chapter 28 The Widest Belt
There is an unwritten survival rule among experienced adventurers: if you can survive the first half hour in a dangerous area by your own strength, it means you have enough ability to gain a foothold here. Although this rule is not as clearly written on the walls of the tavern as mandatory rules such as "No credit in this store" and "No molesting of waitresses in this store", it is indeed very effective and has strong applicability most of the time - the same is true for us.
After going through the initial difficult time, we have fully adapted to the intensity of the battles in the Rubble Fortress, and the densely packed fortress guards can no longer threaten our lives.
For me personally, the death of the undead lich A. Vesalius is a double piece of good news: on the one hand, an evil demon lord who threatens the safety of the world has died; on the other hand, it means that I finally don't have to face those withered bones anymore. I'm tired of their super resistance to piercing attacks, which makes my sword skills not even half as powerful as they can be in battle. If you can only watch yourself "-20", "-30" to waste the enemy's life when your teammates can easily hit nearly 200 points of attack effect, this feeling of shame and anger is a serious damage to anyone's self-esteem.
Like the undead lich A. Vesalius, neither the troll shaman Tyken nor the vampire marquis Dobbs could stop us from saving the world. Although these diligent magic scholars have created terrible miracles comparable to divine power in the research and application of magic, their poor performance in battle is really inconsistent with their status as nearly 60-level magic masters. Of course, they are proficient in many powerful offensive magics, but these powerful spells all have a common problem that cannot be eliminated, that is, the more powerful the magic, the longer the spell to summon them, and the more time the caster needs to brew emotions. Once they are caught in fierce close combat, they will no longer have the opportunity to show their gorgeous and superb magic control skills.
From the corpse of the troll shaman, I also found "Part 2 of the Fusion Device". This is a crystal vessel that is quite intriguing. It is basically a trumpet-shaped bottle with a thin and long neck and a round container at the bottom. What is incredible is that a circular arc-shaped hollow pipe is pulled out of its neck, passing through the bottle wall and connected to the bottom of the bottle, which makes the inside and outside of this three-dimensional bottle incredibly combined together, that is, this "bottle" has only one surface. If an ant crawls on it, it can crawl from its "outside" to its "inside" without passing any edge.
At first glance, this vessel has nothing special except for its strange shape. But when you think about it carefully, you will find that it is really a wonderful thing. This ugly "bottle" seems to contain some mysterious power, breaking all the spatial laws we know so far. In my opinion, this is simply an "impossible" thing, and its existence seems to have some kind of philosophical subversive meaning. Holding it in my hand, I can clearly feel an unstable magical fluctuation flowing on its surface, as if it is connected to a dark and gloomy terrible place, and it may break the confinement of this space at any time. It seems that my soul is attached to its surface by a sticky substance, and it will be sucked to the other side of the space if I am not careful.
Even though I still don't understand what the two "fusion parts" can do, and what kind of magical instrument the "fusion" assembled from them is, the only thing I understand is that these are the genius crystals of the most knowledgeable and creative magic scholars in the Doomsday Empire. For the things these guys have worked so hard to make, I don't need to know what they are used for, I just need to know that they must be very awesome, and that's enough.
When the hordes of guards no longer posed a threat to us, and the three magic masters were easily dealt with by us, these brilliant achievements became a dangerous weight, causing the balance of reason to shift unconsciously. We inevitably took the last evil commander of this fortress, who was also the supreme ruler and the strongest guardian - Black Sir Arthur Denggot - lightly and did not pay enough attention to him. The too smooth battle journey made us take it for granted that this Black Sir "should" be no stronger than the three unworthy magic masters, and he "may" be easy to deal with. Everyone knows that underestimating the enemy is a dangerous beginning and will often become the seed of ultimate failure. But when you are really in it, this beautiful imagination of belittling the enemy makes people feel light all over, as if victory has been grasped in the palm of your hand, and people are reluctant to get rid of this beautiful illusion.
At this point, who cares that we are just a group of ordinary adventurers who have just reached level 50 - or even one of them has not reached level 50 yet - and that we are facing a powerful opponent who is ten levels higher than us?
The command tower of the Stone Fortress is located on the top of the mountain on the easternmost side of the fortress. It is the highest point of the entire fortress, with its back against the bottomless cliffs. This is a majestic cylindrical tall building. It would take at least more than 500 steps to walk around it. The window-side part of its interior is divided into many small compartments on each floor. Most of them were originally used as residences for garrison officers, and occasionally one or two were used as databases and offices. Today, these places have been occupied by the "Elite Fang Guards" of the Trolls in helmets and armor. These tall blue-skinned monsters guard the staircases leading to the top of the tower. The shining long swords and dense crossbows really took us a lot of effort. But in the end, we still passed here without any danger and climbed to the top floor in one go.
The top floor of the command tower is a huge circular hall. Normally, it can accommodate at least 200 people for military meetings. But at this moment, there is only one person in the empty hall. He is sitting on the only chair in the hall with his back to us. The tall back of the chair blocks his back. The reason why I can be sure that there is someone on the chair is because I see his left hand wrapped in a silver metal glove pressing on the armrest of the chair, and his middle and index fingers tapping lightly from time to time. The sun shines from his side, casting a dark shadow on the ground.
Above the back of the chair floated a line of red soul marks, which was "Black Sir Arthur Dengott".
The wall in front of the chair had been completely destroyed by the catapult, and disappeared without a trace. The walls on the left and right sides were almost half destroyed, and less than one-third of the roof was left. The entire top floor was almost a completely exposed empty platform. Looking around, the whole fortress was in sight without any obstruction. With the help of the telescope, I could even see the zombies and rotten beasts wandering around the fortress, not to mention the guards patrolling in the fortress. It seems that everything we did along the way was obviously under the surveillance of Lord Black Knight.
We were rampaging and wreaking havoc in his castle, but he just sat on the highest point of the castle and watched with indifference. I don't know why he was so reckless towards his enemies, but he could watch his subordinates being annihilated by us without a word, and this indifference and gloom made me feel a bit of chill in my heart.
When we were within about ten paces of him, Sir Arthur Dengott stood up and turned toward us.
“Eh…”
I immediately sighed in surprise, looked at his face in disbelief, and stood there at a loss.
There are three races of enemies in the fortress: the Corrupted, the Trolls, and the Bloods. For the sake of fairness, the highest commander of this army will not be selected from these three races. Therefore, I have always taken it for granted that the leader of this multi-race mixed force is either a tall and violent demon or a cunning and treacherous dark elf. However, even if the personnel appointment of the last king did not take fairness into consideration at all, the fact that Black Sir Arthur Denggot is still a Corrupted, Troll or Vampire would never surprise me as much as it does now.
The supreme leader of the Stone Fortress was tall, with long silver-gray hair that fell below her shoulders and covered her ears. Her fair skin was delicate and smooth, and her cheeks seemed to have no trace of redness due to lack of light. What caught people's attention most were her pale blue eyes. Her eyes were as bright and cold as gemstones, and there was a hint of mockery that was difficult to hide in her indifferent eyes - of course, it was also possible that she did not intend to hide it at all. She never stared at you intently, and even if her eyes occasionally stayed on someone for a moment, she would only look at you carelessly. But even so, you would feel that her eyes were more difficult to resist than the sharpest sword, as if they could penetrate your body at any time and shoot a trace of steep coldness straight into your soul.
She was wearing a bright silver metal armor. On the left side of the armor was a huge dragon-head-shaped shoulder guard. Her right shoulder and upper arm were exposed. Her hands were wearing a pair of gorgeous long metal gloves. The chest part of the armor showed a pleasing V-shaped hollow. The solid metal armor squeezed out an unfathomable steep ravine between her plump breasts. This V-shaped hollow shape was so shocking that it was only a millimeter away from the infinitely desirable "H" shape - this was a rather regrettable thing.
However, compared with her lower body, this V-neck light armor that reached her navel was a little conservative. She wore a pair of metal boots that just covered her calves, and her solid and round thighs were almost completely exposed. She only wore a gorgeous and exquisite metal skirt around her waist, symbolically covering her most private part - I swear this is the shortest skirt I have ever seen in my life. Please forgive my upbringing and reserve for not being able to describe in detail how short this skirt is, but it is certain that if it was a little shorter, it might become the widest belt I have ever seen in my life.
As I described, the legendary black knight Arthur Denggot, who was cruel, cold and contemptuous of life, was neither a demon nor a dark elf, nor a corrupted person, a troll or a vampire. She did not belong to any of the five major ethnic groups of the Doomsday Empire.
I swear to you by my eyes that she is a human being, and a cold, charming and beautiful woman at that!
Faced with such an enemy, my mind went blank.
We traveled through mountains and rivers, experienced life and death several times, faced thousands of enemies, sacrificed our lives, shed our blood, and used our lives to embark on a bloody and difficult journey, just to save the fertile land of our homeland that gave us life, and to save those fellow relatives who are connected to us by blood.
Now, this mission is only one step away from completion, and there is only one enemy standing in our way. However, I discovered that the murderer who has caused countless deaths, the devil who is bent on exterminating my homeland and people, is actually my compatriot.
This reality full of dark irony made me feel so confused that the pink silk panties that were faintly visible under my short skirt were not so attractive anymore.
"Ah, humans..." Sir Denggot glanced at us, and then gently cast her indifferent eyes on me, "...I haven't seen my compatriots for two hundred years..."
Black Jazz's voice was lazy and soft, with a hint of sweet hoarseness, like a sticky piece of "Moon Creek Honey Candy" that stuck tightly to the throat, making it impossible to swallow or spit out. It was so sweet and soft that it was suffocating.
"...Since the battle in the Nafeson Wasteland, I have not seen humans. Not only humans, but also dwarves, elves, dwarves...I have not seen any of those sinister races living on the Farvi continent..." The plump and charming Black Knight leaned on the edge of the chair, speaking softly and gently, as if she had no hostility towards us at all. I was probably infected by her emotions and could not muster the enthusiasm to fight. Not only me, but my companions also did not show any intention of fighting - although they all looked a little impatient.
"It's always like this. He always nags for a long time before the fight starts..." Nocturne in B flat minor complained in a low voice.
"What do you know? This is the main storyline. We have to feel the plot of the game. It's so boring to just fight and kill all day long..." Tintin Xiaoge rolled his eyes at the dwarf bard, "...Look at how patient Niu Baiwan is. Only then can you feel the profound cultural connotation of this game..."
It was just as Tintin said. Niu Baiwan, who usually had little patience, was surprisingly calm at this moment. He sat aside calmly and listened attentively to Sir Denggot's story. He opened his huge bull eyes wide, without blinking. The whites of his eyes were full of red bloodshot, which made people worry that he would pop his eyeballs out if he tried hard. Looking in the direction, his focused gaze seemed to fall on a soft valley...
"Hey, Brother Niu, why is your nose bleeding?" The fairy who came down to earth suddenly exclaimed in surprise.
"You are absolutely right..." Nocturne in B-flat minor patted Ding Ding Xiaoge's arm, "...it really has a 'profound' cultural connotation..."
Ding Ding Xiaoge: "..."
How shameful! I glanced at Niu Baiwan with contempt and subconsciously touched my nostrils - well, luckily there was no bleeding.
Putting aside the ugly behavior of Niu Baiwan, Sir Arthur Denggot's story continued:
"...Perhaps you will be curious about my appearance. Those hypocritical old guys in the Continental Alliance will definitely not tell you the truth. They will only say that I am the same as those trolls, just a traitor who betrayed the continent. They will not tell you who is the real traitor, who sacrificed the lives of millions of allies just to exchange for a despicable victory, and this is exactly what I want to tell you..."
"...Two hundred years ago, the trolls, like the tauren, gnomes, elves, dwarves, and orcs, were a native tribe living on the Falvi continent. When the Doomsday Empire invaded, the trolls joined the Continental Alliance, bravely took up arms, and fought to the death to defend the land where they lived and all the lives on this land..."
"...In one battle, the trolls, under the command of the Alliance Headquarters, put all their efforts into the battle, fighting ten enemies at once, and held back the main force of the Empire's army in the Nafeshon Wasteland. It was a desperate and terrifying time, with thousands of deaths every day. The brave troll tribes died one after another, and even the elderly and children were sent to the battlefield. Urgent letters for help were sent to the Alliance Headquarters every day, but they fell into the sea without any news..."
"...And I was just an ordinary liaison officer sent to the trolls by the Alliance Headquarters at that time."
"... I rushed to the holy city of Freschit day and night with an urgent letter asking for help, and reported the danger faced by the trolls to Lord Dedotan. But he just waved his hand and asked me to retreat. He was not even interested in listening to the horrific experiences of those ugly allies..."
"...That night, by chance, I overheard the most despicable and shameless thing in the world: This was a trap. When the trolls were struggling on the brink of extinction and fighting desperately, Lord Dedotan - the wisest Lord Dedotan, the most merciful Lord Dedotan, the greatest Lord Dedotan, Lord Dedotan the Guardian of the Sky - had already sent the most elite troops in the alliance to the enemy-occupied area, and took advantage of the enemy's lack of time to attack the city and won the most glorious victory since the war began..."
"Dirty victory!" The woman roared and slammed the chair next to her, and the sturdy chair was instantly smashed into pieces.
"While those shameless nobles were intoxicated with unprecedented honor and victory, those troll children who had just grown their tender fangs were heading towards death in droves! How could they be so cruel, just because they were the smallest and weakest race in the alliance. And while they were sharing the glory, those who had been abandoned were still fighting with the last bit of their strength, still loyally guarding the flanks of the so-called 'allies', and still looking forward to the reinforcements that only existed in illusion!"
"I left! I returned to the wasteland submerged by death and told the trolls' high priest, 'Hand of the Void' Mlak, that they were abandoned and their sacrifice was meaningless. The other people who lived with them on this land were not worthy of their defense."
"The trolls surrendered under my persuasion. If I hadn't come back, these brave and simple warriors would have continued to fight until the last drop of troll blood was shed. Their bravery was respected by the last king and they became part of the empire. As the only human in the empire, I also gained stronger power, which allowed me to survive to this day and have the opportunity to return to this dirty land."
"And what I hope is to wipe out all the despicable and ugly creatures on this continent. Rot and destruction will be the most suitable ending for you. Now, no matter what you do, it will be useless. The poison that corrupts the world has been completely successful." Black Knight laughed triumphantly and took out a bottle of grayish sticky potion from under his cloak. If everything is as she said, then this bottle of potion is a powerful poison that can turn all creatures into decayed zombies.
"Then, let's destroy this world starting with you..." As he said this, a bone-chilling chill suddenly burst out in Sir Denggot's eyes!
