Level 1 Fallen

Chapter 170: True Allies

An hour passed, and there was no sign of support from the elves. As Diane had expected when looking at the schedule, the dragons had set up an attack on the rift that they would have had to go through to reach us, temporarily forcing them back. However, Wisteria seemed rather calm about the whole situation, leaning back against the wall with an unconcerned expression.

“If they were really eager to protect your friend, they would wait for the last few seconds of the rift rotation, and then immediately rush through, that way they only had to deal with the attacks for less than a minute,” she pointed out, shaking her head. “However, that would require one of their experts to be willing to put themselves in danger to reach this place.”

“Would it really?” Ella asked curiously. “I mean, even if they died, they could just respawn. And surely, someone with grandmaster skills should have a way to keep themselves safe for at least a few seconds…”

However, Wisteria shook her head. “Any force that can afford to keep someone with that level of skill has their own methods. You never know when your opponent might be carrying something that could prevent you from respawning where you intend to.” As she said that, she pulled a black sphere from her inventory to show it off. “Take this, for instance. This is a high-level prison stone. If I hold this in my hand when I deal the killing blow to someone, it will lock them in the League’s highest security prison. One of these costs over a thousand platinum to purchase from the system, so I can only carry one at a time.”

After saying that, she stuck the stone back in her inventory. “However, if I don’t know whether my opponent has such a thing, I have to assume that they do. Similarly, other experts will assume that I have something like that, and am willing to use it on them. For that reason, death battles between grandmasters are rarely held. They only fight in major wars or against weaker opponents that they are confident in defeating.”

“If it weren’t for the sheer value of a king trait, as well as the compatibility between both of your traits and the dragons, I doubt that they would bring out even a single grandmaster for this war. Let alone the three or more that we’ve confirmed.” With that, she checked the time again, looking at Ella. “Any news? The Aurin rift just changed.”

Ella blinked, looking at her interface briefly before sighing. “They said that they were unable to secure the Aurin rift, so they will rush in with the Chimeris one.”

Wisteria chuckled, seeming unconvinced. “If they did rush, they’d definitely be able to make it. But only if they ignored the threat to their own safety. After all, the Aurin rift is now connected here. If I had to bet, the local rift is being attacked by the forces that were defending the Aurin side.”

After she said that, she glanced towards me, nodding her head. “It looks like you made the right call to ask for the connection with the League’s network. Ella, after this, I expect that the master will have something to talk to you about.”

With one last look at Ella, Wisteria vanished where she stood against the wall. Barely a second later, the door to her office burst open, and Killik emerged with an anxious expression. “We need to do something. The dragons are blockading the city to prevent any evacuations. Jafar and Syneria suggest that we use the emergency teleport to get as many NPCs out as we can.”

“They do?” Ella asked in confusion. “Do they not have faith that the elves will arrive with reinforcements?”

Killik hesitated, seeming unsure how to answer that. He looked between Ella and myself. “I… I really don’t know. From their expressions, they seemed to be resigned to a loss, though they are still actively trying to participate in the defense. Jafar moved to the central tower for the best sniping position, and Syneria is preparing some enchanted items to launch when the ceasefire ends.”

Ella lowered her head in thought. “In that case, there’s a good chance that they won’t be able to reliably protect us.”

“What’s the emergency teleport?” Diane asked, looking between Ella and Killik.

Ella didn’t hesitate to answer. “It’s an underground facility in the palace. By paying a substantial fee, everyone in the large room is teleported to the designated chamber in Evergreen. However, it can only be activated once, with a twenty-four hour cooldown. At best, we could save a few hundred NPCs, but there’s no way to decide who to save in the next hour.”

“Even if I tried to evacuate myself, the war would end in failure with the destruction of the city, and I’d lose my trait regardless. My only option is to fight with all I’ve got.” Ella sent me a concerned look after saying that. “I’d like to offer the chance to leave to you, but… I know that Evergreen isn’t exactly your biggest fans after our last encounter.”

“I wouldn’t leave like that either way,” I said firmly. If I really wanted to flee, I could run away without worrying about anyone being able to keep up with me. At worst, I’d fly back to the other rift and plot a course for Chimeris. However, I didn’t feel like that would be necessary.

Seeing Killik in the room, I couldn’t easily bring up the matter of the League out loud. Instead, I typed a message to Ella. Can’t you evacuate NPCs through the new gate you installed earlier?

Ella glanced at the message, before shaking her head to deny the question. Wisteria said that we need to maintain utmost secrecy of that gate for now. Even though war has already been declared, there could still be an information leak. If the dragons know that the League is standing with us, they might invest even more of their powerhouses to ensure victory. That would be the worst-case scenario.

Reading the message, I let out a small sigh of annoyance. The next message I sent out went to Wisteria. Why can’t Evergreen set up portal gates like the ones that the League uses? They should definitely have the resources.

That’s the difference between an organization and a country.An organization like ours can get special features like gates and a faction store, but we can’t recruit knights, declare war, or other things that you kings can do. Evergreen also has a faction of their own, the Grove Watchers, but they don’t directly serve the kingdom. Instead, they work behind the scenes to protect Evergreen itself, and don’t get involved with external disputes unless they directly threaten Evergreen.

My brow twitched at Wisteria’s response. In other words, it was possible for a nation to also have its own organization, but the two were not directly connected. What are the requirements to form an organization like that?

I could practically feel the amusement in Wisteria’s message when she replied. An obscene amount of wealth, for starters. You also need one hundred starting members, a starting base, and a special token that can drop from raids starting around level four hundred. We sell those tokens in the faction store,  but given that you invested all of your points to get that gate, you can forget about buying one right now.

I doubted that I would have enough money to start the faction, even if I had the token. I offered a small nod of thanks, looking at Ella again. It was about time for the next chance for reinforcements that Diane had mentioned, going through Chimeris. However, this time, they would have to defend the Chimeris rift for longer, until it reconnected with Pyrrhos.

Seeing my gaze, Ella quickly checked her messages. “My contact in Evergreen said that they have successfully sent a pair of grandmasters to Chimeris, and that the gate there was unguarded.”

Bella huffed at that, shaking her head. “In other words, the dragons are using the local gate as the last line of defense, and just wanting to stall long enough to wipe us out here?”

Killik grimaced, but couldn’t deny those words. “That’s… a definite possibility. I don’t suppose that the three of you have any methods to overturn the situation?” He looked at myself, Diane, and Bella when he asked that, seeing how we all remained fairly calm.

“If we worked together with the element of surprise, we could probably defeat a single grandmaster, depending on their individual strength,” I answered with a small shrug. This wasn’t an idle boast,  but an objective assessment of our skills. “Though, we don’t have any way to stop them from just respawning and returning to the fight. As for buying time, we could probably do that for a little while. Diane? How much power can you currently use in your shadow dragon form?”

Diane hesitated, thinking it over. “At my current mastery, I can use roughly the same level of power as I could normally. If it comes to it, I’ll act as a defensive mage in this battle.”

I nodded my head in agreement. Unfortunately, this was a bad battle for an assassin. The enemies were too strong to assassinate, and we were the ones under siege. Moreover, with Dryax watching over the enemy leader, it was unlikely that Diane would be able to sneak up on him and kill him.

In that situation, the best use of her talents would be to have her work as a defensive unit, offsetting the attacks of the other dragons. “I’ll do my best to hold off the attacks of the grandmaster dragons,” I said, though I myself was not certain how well that would work. Still, I made my way towards the door. “Ella, let me know ten minutes before the battle. I’m going to try to make some last-minute preparations.”

Ella and the others watched as I left the room, moving towards an isolated area of the castle. If I wanted to make any further preparations at this point, there was only one thing that I could do, and that was to set up enchantments on my arms via Myriad Strikes-X. I’d just need something big enough that it would be able to make a difference in this battle.

First, I could combine Ki General with Martial King to arm my summoned units, Black Flame Mantle to defend against any fire attacks while absorbing the natural flames of Pyrrhos, and King of All Trades to create an aura of empowerment. With those skills working together, even Kelly should have to take it seriously.

Then, for the defensive side, I could combine Crystal Bastion-X, Walking Fortress, and Vitality of the Forest-X. With the last two, this combination should be able to create a much larger barrier, one that can constantly repair itself if damaged. How well the barrier would stand up against the army outside, I wasn’t sure. However, it would at least add an extra layer of defense.

Thus, I sat down in my secluded corner of the palace and began to focus, knowing that the success rate for these would be… rather pitifully low. I could get Diane to provide essences and runes to increase the odds, but I wanted to save those for now. After all, I wasn’t using any magic skills in this round of enchantments, so even if I failed, it was just a matter of starting over again. As opposed to my arm practically exploding if I were to add any magic skills into the mix…