Chapter 553: Spoils of War
“Gem, goo?” Maisie pushed aside the white hair on her forehead, revealing a pair of curious, big eyes.
“It's a magic stone,” Agatha picked up a stone from the ground and examined it for a while. “Although it’s not clear what type it is yet, judging by the color, it should have been a high-quality God's Stone of Retaliation before the conversion.”
“The spoils of high-rank devils certainly won’t be bad,” Leaf smiled. “I just didn't expect it to hide the box inside its body.”
“Um, does that mean the other devils might have such boxes too, goo?” Maisie said excitedly. “I'll go look!”
“Be careful not to touch the jars storing the red mist!” Agatha reminded.
Half a quarter of an hour later, Maisie excitedly ran back with two black boxes in her arms. “Found them on the devil wearing colored clothes!”
Nightingale took out what was still a magic stone, but this time the stone looked dimmer and smaller, but there were quite a few of them.
Agatha collected the magic stones together and frowned.
“What's wrong?” Nightingale asked. “Is something amiss?”
“There seem to be… too many magic stones.”
“Isn't more a good thing?”
She shook her head gently. “The Union hunted down thousands of Fear Demons, if magic stones were so easy to obtain, the Seekers would not have painstakingly tried to capture and raise Chaos Beasts. Why would they carry so many magic stones with them?”
“Maybe they accumulated them over the past four hundred years?” Nightingale gave an awkward smile. “It’s like a poor guy who finally saved up a sum of money, decided to finish this job and go home to farm, but was shot dead by us, and we got all his inheritance.”
No one laughed. Everyone realized the meaning behind this—if a huge race had never stopped producing magic stones in four hundred years, to what extent would their war resources accumulate?
“Forget it, it’s useless to overthink it,” Agatha broke the silence after a brief pause. “Anyway, we don't have a second option.”
……
The First Army finally arrived at the forest under the guidance of Lightning.
“Are you all okay!” Wendy jumped off Lightning's back anxiously, checking on each of her sisters one by one. “Anna, is she…”
“A coma caused by exhaustion of magic power, don't worry,” Nightingale comforted. “Everyone is fine.”
“I told you,” Lightning's head was bandaged, only revealing the fine bangs on her forehead. “But Wendy kept urging me.”
“This, this is… what!” Brian looked at the row of corpses on the ground in surprise. “Are these devils?”
“That's right, dead devils,” Nightingale shrugged. “You need to have the soldiers move them all back, pieces of meat, armor, clothing, weapons they carried, nothing can be missing. This is His Majesty's order.”
“Yes!” Brian immediately became serious upon hearing the order. “I will arrange for someone to handle it.”
“It’s a pity we didn't catch a live devil,” Agatha sighed. “The plan to make sigils will have to be postponed again.”
“Live devil?” Lightning tilted her head. “Maybe there is one!”
“What?” Everyone looked at her in unison. “Where?”
“I’m not sure,” she blinked. “If devils can swim, then it might still be alive.”
……
In the afternoon, the paddle steamer left the riverbank and turned back to Neverwinter City.
The deck of one of the ships was crowded with curious and surprised First Army soldiers.
“Is this the enemy we will face in the future?”
“Doesn't seem like much, except they're a bit bigger.”
“Shh, what nonsense are you talking about,” someone whispered. “Didn't you see that His Majesty's witches were seriously injured? You’ve seen their abilities!”
“That's right, those dead guys must be extremely ferocious, at least harder to deal with than the demonic beasts. Even Lady Anna was hit,” another person added. “She blocked the breach in the city wall by herself at that time, stopping the impact of the demonic beast swarm.”
This sentence was approved by most of the soldiers.
“Ah… I was there that day too, Lady Anna saved my life!”
“If it weren't for her, I would have been trampled to death by a wild boar breed.”
“It's a pity that the angel xiaojie aren't here, otherwise they would get better soon.”
Nightingale and Agatha stood at the stern of the boat and looked at each other, shaking their heads with a smile.
Now these ordinary people regard witches as companions who can fight side by side, which is a new feeling for both of them—one originally lived in a witch empire that regarded mortals as slaves, and one who used to hide and suffer from public rejection and pohai… Although the content of the feelings is completely opposite, it is equally incredible.
“What do you think?” Nightingale asked after a moment of emotion.
“Are you referring to the regained test subject?” Agatha smiled. “I think it should be considered extremely lucky.”
The object the soldiers were surrounding was the Drowned Madman imprisoned in an iron cage.
Just as Lightning said, the unlucky devil was caught in the heatwave of the hydrogen balloon bàozhà, and only regained consciousness after falling into the water, but his body was severely injured. He struggled for a long time but couldn't swim back to shore, and was eventually captured by Maisie who was searching - according to the latter, if it hadn't been shouting loudly, she might not have noticed it. Obviously, the Madman regarded Maisie as a rescue Terrorbeast, but as soon as it landed, it became a prisoner of the witches.
Considering that Iffi's magic power and physical strength had reached their limit, and she might not be able to trap the devil for too long, everyone finally decided to cut off the devil's limbs, and then Agatha froze the wounds. In this way, the enemy could neither zisha nor die immediately before the red mist was exhausted.
“I didn’t expect that we could complete the mission satisfactorily after such a big change. It is indeed lucky enough.” Nightingale curled her lips.
“By the way, aren't you going to rest?” Agatha pointed to her waist.
“It’s much better after applying the herbs,” she waved her hand indifferently. “Before meeting Roland, all the injuries of the Mutual Aid Society were taken care of by Leaf.”
“It's good that everyone is safe and sound,” Agatha exhaled. “I was negligent this time.”
“High-rank devils? It’s not your fault.” Nightingale comforted. “No one knew they would appear alone in this remote place.”
“This is also something I don't understand… After all, they always hide behind the army and never act alone, and they are extremely rare. In the decades of fighting the Union, all the high-rank devils who appeared were recorded, including those who died in battle, and there were less than twenty of them.” She paused. “I thought I would have a chance to meet them until the Red Moon came, but after seeing those magic stones, I suddenly became uncertain.”
Nightingale quickly understood what she meant, but as soon as she figured it out, a chill rose in her heart.
“Nothing is known about the devil's lifespan, growth limit, promotion path, and reproduction method. What have they developed into in the past four hundred years?” Agatha said in a low voice. “If the enemy can accumulate a large number of magic stones, can they also accumulate a large number of high-rank devils?”
……
Ermu says:
The New Year is coming soon, and there will be more social gatherings and visits to relatives. In the past, I received lucky money, but now I have to pay lucky money to others~ Woo… So Ermu is taking a small leave here, from the 29th day of the twelfth lunar month (January 26th) to the second day of the new year (January 29th), there will be a single update, and the update time is 5 pm… In addition to spending time with my family, I will also give myself a small vacation. I would like to wish all my dear readers a happy New Year in advance~ There will still be red envelopes at noon, don’t forget everyone. Thank you very much, Ermu!