Chapter 101 Fire and Thieves

The south city wall of the royal palace exploded in a deafening roar, flames erupting into the sky.

The searing flames were dazzlingly white, and the shockwave plunged underground, causing the entire city and the snow-capped mountains behind it to tremble.

A thunderous sound like a flood echoed, and looking up, one could see the perpetually frozen snow of Mount Loki collapsing, rushing down the mountainside.

However, the explosive power of the precision-targeted blast was contained within this section of the city wall, avoiding any innocent casualties.

Even the buildings of the royal palace behind the city wall suffered only minor damage.

Looking at the deep crater, tens of meters in diameter, that had been blasted before him, Su Lun raised an eyebrow, the explosion’s effect matching his expectations.

In his soul perception, the life force of the thousand or so individuals previously hidden within this magical barrier instantly vanished. However, wisps of “gray mist” densely covered the ruins.

As expected, the necromancer he had locked onto was also killed in the blast.

Seeing the soul lock’s negative status disappear from his panel, Su Lun breathed a sigh of relief.

The ruins of the city wall before him were a charred mess, with plumes of bluish smoke rising everywhere. The thousand-member mage legion, along with their storage rings, had been obliterated. The high temperature and energy shockwaves had reduced most materials to ash. Some metallic objects had melted into pools of molten liquid, their original shapes unrecognizable.

Su Lun didn't delay, rushing into the ruins to harvest the souls.

He harvested the soul of the mage who controlled the Soul-Sealing Lantern, gaining many rare insights into the laws of death. He was also surprised, “Oh... this necromancer was actually a member of the Holy Knights?”

Holy Knights were all expected to have the power of the top Legendary ranks, and also had some special abilities. This necromancer named "Hazel Howard" was originally very strong. His comprehension of the laws of death was the highest Su Lun had ever seen.

Even if they fought, it wouldn't be easy for Su Lun to kill him.

It was a pity that before he could use any of his abilities, he died in the explosion.

Looking at the ground again, the [Tartarus Soul-Sealing Lantern] was also blasted into dullness, displaying the words “Damaged and unusable.”

Well, at least the enemy couldn't use it even if they took it back.

With one less fatal method to restrict his spatial displacement, Su Lun also breathed a sigh of relief.

Fortunately, the higher the quality of the cursed objects, the better the materials. The item was still relatively complete. There was a group of mountain dwarves in the small Void Realm who were skilled in forging, as well as the living corpse made from the lingering thoughts of the dwarf king, Iron Helmet Ol.

Su Lun felt that it might be repairable.

This Soul Lantern seemed to be highly compatible with his death-related abilities, and he looked forward to the qualitative change that would occur when the Soul Lantern chains were inlaid together.

......

Originally, the plan of those mages from the Celestial Plane was to use this Soul-Sealing Lantern to control the people of the entire city, making it impossible for anyone to escape.

Within a limited range, the combat power of their ten-thousand-member legion was almost invincible.

There was originally nothing wrong with this plan.

Unfortunately, Su Lun used methods beyond their understanding to kill the lantern controller in a very short time, catching those guys off guard.

But the explosion at the palace city wall was too loud, instantly attracting the attention of everyone in the royal capital, Ekronessa.

This time, the people from the Celestial Plane mainly wanted to kill the Silver Dragon and Bartolo. Now that Plan A had failed, they naturally had backup plans.

Almost at the same time, magical lights like lighthouse beams lit up in all directions of the city, east, west, north, and south.

There was originally a magic tower at the city wall, and although it was destroyed, there was obviously a backup.

As soon as Su Lun saw this posture, having witnessed the ten-thousand-member legion in action many times, how could he not know that they were about to get serious?

Previously, those legions were still preparing to hide, waiting for the Silver Dragon to kill Bartolo before taking action.

But now that the soul mark was gone, they had no choice but to act in advance.

As soon as the ten-thousand-member legion revealed themselves, the Silver Dragon obviously became aware of it.

Such exaggerated magical fluctuations suddenly appeared in the city, even a fool would know there was danger.

Dragons were not only arrogant, but also cunning.

It remembered that someone had reminded it that someone was going to ambush it this time?

The Silver Dragon immediately became alert.

But its pride prevented it from immediately flying out of the city. Instead, it angrily observed who dared to try and strike it.

However, it was this moment of delay.

Within the magic barrier, a beam of light rapidly shot towards the Silver Dragon. It seemed to have been prepared long in advance, so decisive that the Silver Dragon's speed was too late to dodge.

Even after doing its best to avoid it, the beam still pierced the Silver Dragon's left wing, passing through.

Su Lun watched, his eyes narrowing. Even with his excellent eyesight, he only saw a shadow.

[Cadmus' Dragon Hunting Spear]

Detailed Explanation: The dwarves once used Eternal Gold to forge this spear to repel dragons; the spear is engraved with 'Dragon Slayer Runes,' 'Deception Runes,' and 'Flash Runes.' It possesses the speed of lightning, the ability to deceive a dragon's perception, and the armor-piercing ability to penetrate dragon scales.

Su Lun looked at the information he identified, feeling a little envious: "What a good thing!"

This spear could pierce the wings of an Eighth-Order Silver Dragon, which shows how sharp it was.

But only a hole was pierced in the wing, and this kind of injury was obviously insignificant.

But obviously, those of the Celestial Plane had a backup plan.

Just after the spear pierced through, a magical light flashed, and the airflow that looked like the spear's previous flight trajectory suddenly materialized, turning into a rope.

The rope pierced through the dragon's wings and immediately wrapped around them.

Su Lun's own [Wailing Banshee's Hair] was this kind of energy thread, so how could he not understand what had happened?

Looking at the identification again, it was indeed another treasure.

[Gleipnir's Entangler]

Detailed Explanation: This is a rope known as the most resilient in the world, with Resilience +999; the ancient gnomes made it from the sound of a cat's footsteps, the roots of stones, a woman's beard, the breath of fish, the alertness of bears, and the saliva of birds; this is a magical guide that can be stretched at will as long as there is enough magic power.

......

"These mages from the Celestial Plane really have a lot of treasures..."

Looking at these two treasures, Su Lun immediately felt that the Silver Dragon was in danger today.

The dragon wing was pierced by the spear, and this rope immediately bound its wings.

The Silver Dragon also knew that it had fallen into a trap, struggling to fly high, and the rope became longer and longer.

But at the same time, the Legion Magic Barrier formed by the nine magic towers also exerted force at the same time.

The magic tower was the anchor point of the rope. If the flying dragon wanted to run, it would be like dragging an entire city behind it, so naturally it could not escape.

The scene was like a fisherman catching a big fish, not in a hurry to pull the fish ashore. Both sides were in a stalemate.

This rope, as Su Lun identified, had almost unsolvable toughness.

How terrifying was the power of the Eighth-Order Silver Dragon?

But struggling, diving, circling... all kinds of fancy flying in the sky, there was no sign of breaking the rope at all.

On the contrary, the higher it flew into the sky, the tighter the rope was pulled, and the more strenuous it became.

The Silver Dragon roared angrily, turned around, and dived down, spewing dragon breath towards the city below.

Unfortunately, this was a carefully planned dragon hunting battle.

The Holy Light Dragon Breath that could easily scorch sand into crystals had no effect on the rope at all. Moreover, the dragon breath sprayed on the Legion Barrier was also dissolved into the magic barrier.

The Silver Dragon dived down and used its huge dragon body to hit one of the magic towers, but unfortunately, although the movement was loud, the thick layers of amber-colored magic shield completely blocked the physical shock wave.

Although some mages died in the barrier, the barrier was still intact.

The dragon breath and dragon claws were useless, and its wings were tied by the rope and it could not fly away...

In just an instant, the Silver Dragon fell into a situation where all methods were helpless. It was there, frantically spewing dragon breath and struggling...

Like a hooked big fish, waiting for exhaustion, it was time for the fisherman to harvest.

......

Su Lun was not surprised to see this.

The combat power of the ten-thousand-member legion was no less than that of the Ninth-Order, and with so many treasures and advance planning, it was inevitable that this Silver Dragon would be caught.

However, it seemed that the Silver Dragon's stamina would not be exhausted for a while, and those Legion mages could only hide in the barrier. The battle was also indistinguishable.

Now that there was no "soul lock," Su Lun was not panicked at all.

If he wanted to leave now, no one could stop him.

He looked at the struggling Silver Dragon, secretly praying that this arrogant lizard could hold on for a while longer.

With it restrained, the main force of the ten-thousand-member legion would not come looking for trouble.

However, Su Lun had no chance to destroy any more magic towers.

That kind of plan could only be used once. Next time, if the other party knew that he had this method, it would never succeed.

"I wonder how Bartolo's injuries are..."

Su Lun thought, always feeling that those guys from the Celestial Plane must have other methods to target Bartolo.

He thought about going to take a look, so he teleported in the direction that Bartolo had fled before.

On the other hand, the entire city was in chaos.

After all, this giant dragon was the kingdom's guardian dragon. Now that someone dared to ambush the Silver Dragon in the royal capital, the royal guards naturally had to help the Silver Dragon fight.

Unfortunately, the extravagant and lecherous Gracie royal family did not have many supporters.

Those kingdom nobles, led by the Garcia family, had already secretly taken refuge in the people of the Celestial Plane.

Those magic towers were built with the secret support of the major nobles.

In this way, the nobles' private soldiers and the royal knights were mixed together in the streets, vaguely showing signs of surrounding the royal palace.

Except for the magic tower that Su Lun blew up, the others were all in the plan of the mages of the Celestial Plane.

......

In a dense forest more than ten kilometers outside the city, a fierce battle was taking place.

Although Bartolo's combat power was unparalleled, he was seriously injured after fighting the Silver Dragon alone before.

At this moment, his bare upper body was covered with wounds, and there was a dent in his chest, which was the injury of broken ribs left by the dragon claw attack before. This made his entire left arm and half of his body unable to exert force.

But compared to the injuries, what was worse was the distortion of his body.

Previously, in order to be able to fight the Silver Dragon with combat power comparable to the Ninth-Order, Bartolo used all his methods and barely dragged the Silver Dragon to be restrained after a hard battle.

He didn't expect that before he could escape the royal capital, the distortion on his body would break out.

He immediately realized that he had been cursed by a wizard.

The white-robed wizard Garcia Hayden had also left a hidden hand in his formula to suppress the distortion.

Those guys wanted to use distortion to kill him!

Fortunately, he had several [Distortion Inhibitors] given by Su Lun in his hand. After injection, the signs of distortion were miraculously suppressed.

But before Bartolo could rejoice, he was blocked by a five-hundred-member mage group, and he had been fighting fiercely until now.

He had exhausted most of his energy in the great battle with the Silver Dragon, and he also had to spare a part of his energy to suppress the distortion. Now he was a little overwhelmed.

Moreover, this five-hundred-member group in front of him was also extraordinary.

Although the leader was only a Seventh-Order, they seemed to be one body. Fighting one was like fighting five hundred at the same time, which was very tricky.

Bartolo knew that these were the mages from the Celestial Plane that Su Lun mentioned, but it was also the first time he had seen such a strange Seventh-Order, and the first time he had seen a magic legion.

Swords and knives hit these guys with golden lacquer skin, like hitting a metal body, with sparks flying everywhere.

They could make wounds, but they completely ignored the pain.

The more wounds they had and the more blood they shed, the stronger their combat power became.

Bartolo also felt a little bad. If he continued to consume energy, he would not be able to rely on his own strength to suppress the distortion. At that time, no potion would be useful.

However, at this moment, a spatial fluctuation suddenly flashed, and a figure appeared nearby.

Bartolo immediately recognized him. First, he was grateful. The only one who could come to help him at this critical moment was Su Lun.

But then he frowned.

Although he knew that Su Lun was very strong, in the current situation, one person could not solve the problem at all.

......

Fortunately, the battle here was quite loud, so Su Lun found it smoothly.

As soon as he came over, he noticed that Bartolo's back had five features that were completely clear, and the hellish aura on his body was visibly evaporating. This was a sign that he was on the verge of distortion at all times.

Looking at the needles on the ground, it seemed that he had already used the distortion potion.

If he didn't suppress it any longer, Bartolo would die.

Su Lun frowned.

Looking again, on the other side was a five-hundred-member mage group.

However, this group was different from other mages. They were wearing white robes like priests' robes.

Su Lun knew that these were the ascetic monks of the temple.

They could probably be understood as the reserve personnel of the Holy Knights.

The leader was a bald old man.

This skinny old man was full of sword marks, and the wounds were densely packed like fish scales.

But strangely, this guy's skin was like a layer of copper, and the bones that could be seen when the sword cut open were like black iron metal. Even the blood flowing on the ground was dark red, giving people the feeling of flowing liquid rust.

Not only the leader was like this, but the skin of the five hundred people behind him had varying degrees of golden lacquer color.

Because Su Lun had harvested some memories before, he recognized the identity of this guy: "The 'Ascetic Leader' of the Holy Knights, Vernal Van, a half-step Eighth-Order..."

No wonder these guys were covered in wounds, because they were all "stacking passives."

......

The daily practice of ascetic monks was to cultivate muscles and bones, belonging to the melee mage lineage.

They used their own suffering to save believers.

They had a very buggy passive ability called [Suffering Rage].

After being injured, they would fall into a state of rage. The more pain their bodies suffered, the stronger their combat power would be, stacking infinitely until death.

Even in a near-death state, they would even gain abilities close to those of gods, chanting the names of deities, repenting of their sins, and gaining divine power.

This was an ability that sounded incredible and whose battle process looked very morbid, but it had to be admitted that it was very strong.

Seeing this, Su Lun knew why Bartolo had not been able to take it down for a while.

These guys had extremely tenacious vitality, and they also had special abilities to heal and share damage as a group, making them difficult to kill.

Sharing one damage among five hundred people meant that there was not much damage left.

Killing one was almost equivalent to killing this five-hundred-member group.

But their attacks were like five hundred people condensing into one fist.

With the buggy abilities of the Ascetic Monk Legion, even an ordinary Eighth-Order could not do anything about it for a while.

......

Just in this moment of observation, Bartolo spat out another mouthful of old blood.

Looking at the old sword god with chaotic aura, Su Lun quickly said: "Senior Bartolo, don't do anything. Just leave these people to me."

"But..."

Bartolo frowned.

The methods of these enemies in front of him were so strange that they could never be dealt with by a Seventh-Order professional.

He wanted to remind Su Lun, and he also felt that he should help a little.

But before he could say anything, he was one step too late.

Su Lun didn't explain much, and as he made a Warlock Seal, countless Void fluctuations appeared.

In an instant, the light in the vicinity dimmed.

Looking again, densely packed gargoyles floated in mid-air, covering the sky.

Looking up, Bartolo was instantly stunned.

Not tens of them, but more than a thousand!

"How is this possible? Even a puppet grandmaster can't control so many puppets..."

Bartolo's eyes were full of disbelief.

He looked at these gargoyles with silver light shining all over their bodies, and instantly thought that Su Lun had just created them to form a formation, and he didn't necessarily have to be able to control them all at the same time.

But in the next instant, a bizarre scene unfolded.

Bartolo watched Su Lun's hands and the eight-armed spider spears behind him tremble slightly. One silk thread after another connected, and those more than a thousand gargoyle puppets moved together.

These more than a thousand puppets gathered in a formation that was obviously a legion battle formation, and their auras were connected.

Then, they began to charge.

Above those huge iron fists, spatial cracking fluctuations emerged, and they charged towards the five-hundred-member Ascetic Monk Group who had been rampaging!

In that instant, he seemed to see the momentum of the Royal Luying Legion charging in a cluster.

"This..."

Bartolo's eyes trembled, and he could no longer describe the shock in his heart.

......

Against this kind of Ascetic Monk Legion, it was indeed difficult for one person to do anything about it.

The collective aura they formed was protected by gods, and even Su Lun's death domain was extremely limited.

Moreover, no matter how strong the attack was, it was divided into five hundred parts, and the damage was very limited.

There were almost no means to restrain the Ascetic Monk Legion.

If there was, then only a legion could restrain a legion!

Su Lun's gargoyles all had the combat power of Fourth or Fifth-Order professionals, and they were no weaker than these Ascetic Monks.

The Ascetic Monks had Golden Vajra Rune bodies, but could they outlast real metal bodies?

The gargoyle's structure could resist most physical and magical attacks. Even if the fist was dented, the memory metal properties of [Activating Silver] could immediately restore it.

The Ascetic Monks were not afraid of life and death, and the puppets were equally unafraid.

Moreover, Su Lun was proficient in various legion battle formations of the Celestial Plane. Could a thousand-member legion lose to a five-hundred-member legion?

In the blink of an eye, the Gargoyle Legion turned into a torrent of steel and rampaged through everything.

"Boom", "Boom", "Boom"...

There was no fancy magic. Both sides were good at melee combat.

Fists collided, and the sound like a bell rang throughout the surroundings.

Bartolo, who had just been thinking about helping, was completely stunned.

He never thought that a puppeteer could be this strong!

Controlling a thousand puppets at the same time?

He also knew legion battle formations, and the cooperation was completely without flaws, and he was calm to the point of being numb...

Moreover, it seemed that this was far from Su Lun's limit. He obviously had more hidden methods in his hand.

Bartolo murmured to himself in his heart: "What an outstanding young man..."

He originally thought that "Thousand Stripes" was already an incredible talented swordsman he had met, but he didn't expect that this Su Lun was even more special.

For a time, he thought of the former Black Sam Pirate Group. Only like-minded and excellent partners could gather together.

But as he spoke, he couldn't help but spit out a mouthful of scarlet blood, and quickly sat down cross-legged and meditated.

......

Everyone knew that the only weakness of a puppeteer was the main body.

As long as the main body was killed, everything would be defeated without a fight.

Unfortunately, Su Lun, the Puppet Master, had no weaknesses.

Without special abilities to restrain him, and without rank suppression, no matter how strong he was below the Eighth-Order, it was meaningless.

The number of people in front of him was also meaningless.

Now Su Lun's ability to save his life, it was almost impossible to kill him below the Eighth-Order.

And although the Zealot [Suffering Rage] was a state of continuous stacking of passives, the more serious the injury, the stronger he became.

But the human body itself had an upper limit. After the rage reached the upper limit, it was death on the spot.

And the Gargoyle Legion was not afraid of battle damage, and there were always constant supplements.

In this way, the two sides clashed head-on for several waves.

From the initial thousand against five hundred, it gradually became a thousand against four hundred, a thousand against three hundred, a thousand against two hundred...

More and more people were dying violently in the fanatics, and their combat power became weaker and weaker.

But always, there were so many gargoyles.

The "Ascetic Leader" Vernal also intended to kill Su Lun, but how could it be so easy?

Not only was Su Lun's puppet strong, but the combat power of his main body was even stronger.

In the end, Su Lun solved the battle simply and rudely in a very short time by using the method of legion suppression.

The ground was full of corpses, without exception.

Su Lun stood in the center of the pile of corpses, with the phantom of the god of death appearing behind him, harvesting the five hundred souls.

His eyes were shining brightly.

The body refining secret method of this group of Ascetic Monks was of great benefit to him.

The corpses and trophies were all taken into the small Void Realm, and as the silk thread was pulled, the puppets all disappeared.

If it were not for the messy battle traces all over the ground, it would not be seen that five hundred people had just died here.

Su Lun turned his head and saw that Bartolo was meditating with his eyes closed in the distance.

The hellish aura all over his body was already extremely manic, and his expression was vaguely ferocious.

How could Su Lun not know that he was about to distort.

He also saw that there was a mysterious external force similar to a "curse" accelerating his distortion.

Without any delay, he threw him into the small Void Realm.

With the isolation of the plane, any curse would fail.

Moreover, there were Doctor Banks and them in the small Void Realm, and the distortion should be able to be suppressed.

Whether he could survive depended on Bartolo's own luck.

After doing all this, Su Lun looked at the distant royal capital, Ekronessa.

At this moment, he could still hear the angry dragon roar, and the battle was obviously still fierce.

......

"Next, where should I go?"

Su Lun squinted his eyes.

Because the Silver Dragon was dragging the main force of the ten-thousand-member legion, even if those guys knew that the Holy Ascetic Monk Legion had been killed, they probably couldn't spare their hands.

If Su Lun left now, it would indeed be safe.

But he felt that this was a good opportunity.

The other party had plotted against him once. If he didn't return it, it didn't seem to fit his character.

Moreover, that Silver Dragon was an Eighth-Order pure-blooded giant dragon.

Now the situation had reversed.

He had become the mantis stalking the cicada, and there was too much room for operation.

"Should I go to the Gracie royal treasure vault first?"

A thought suddenly popped into Su Lun's mind, and his face immediately lit up.

He was a pirate!

He liked robbing the most.

Previously, because he was an invited guest, he didn't have this thought. But it could be predicted that once the Silver Dragon was killed, the Gracie royal family would be overthrown, and the entire kingdom would become the divine kingdom of the Celestial Plane, and everything in the royal treasure vault would be the spoils of war of the Celestial Plane.

What belongs to the enemy is mine.

Should I go take a look first?

As soon as Su Lun had this thought, his figure disappeared from the spot.