Chapter 106 - 106 Storm Dream
106 Storm Dream
In her dream, she steered an old ship into an endless storm.
Fragile masts were snapped, tattered sails were blown down, and the rotten deck shattered. Finally, the entire ship was wrecked to pieces by the violent storm.
As for Erin, the helmsman of the old, bloated, and rotten ship, she was thrown into the air before plummeting into the deep sea amidst the whistling winds.
The sea was filled with pale corpses. They stared at her with wide eyes as if they were saying: “This is all your fault.”
!!
Deep in the sea, a pair of huge pitch-black wings slowly spread out in front of her. Two blood-red eyes widened under the wings and stared fixedly at her.
Or rather, he stared fixedly at the illusory crow feather in her hand.
Erin struggled to escape, but she realized that her limbs had been entangled by countless transparent threads at some point. She was like a puppet being controlled as she uncontrollably swam towards the abyss deep in the sea, getting closer and closer to the devouring shadow…
The moment she was about to be devoured by the shadow, she screamed and broke free from this nightmare.
What made Erin’s hair stand on end was that the moment she woke up, she felt as if she could still smell the sea salt.
This isn’t a simple nightmare. There are too many obvious metaphors and hints in this dream…
This was the thought that appeared in her mind after she calmed down.
As the supreme empress of the Riel Empire, her mental state had always been the most tightly protected—be it the Platinum Palace’s restrictive barrier that had been upgrading for centuries, or the Illusion Mages and Exorcism Priests specially assigned to her by the Platinum Ring and the Holy Spirits Church. In the dark of this usually calm bedroom, countless protective measures were constantly in operation day and night, ensuring that all the decisions she made as empress were out of her will and not because of the bewitchment of magic and demons.
But this sudden nightmare…
The alarm in the bedroom didn’t sound. Even the scream she let out when she woke up from her dream didn’t cause any commotion. This meant that something had silently bypassed all the defensive measures and incepted this hint or warning into her mind.
In this world, only one existence could do this.
The Void Sovereign who wielded the authority of Nightmare—Zamara.
She was warning her not to hand the soul fragment to the person who had promised to calm the Shattered Sea storm. Otherwise, that person would bring about an even deeper disaster.
A Void Sovereign who often stirred up disasters in Currere through nightmares came to warn her of future disasters?
This sounded like a joke that wasn’t funny.
It was also at this moment that a light knock on the door echoed in the bedroom.
“Your Majesty, the Boss of the Crows requests an audience.”
…
William spread out the map of the Blackwater Province and used the magical medium in his hand to constantly mark it.
As for the tower guardian of Blacklight City’s Viper constellation lighthouse, Julianne stood nervously at the side, not knowing what to do.
It was no wonder. The strongest magic chanter who could chat with Absurdity Jester from a thousand years ago appeared in front of her, alive. Anyone would feel uneasy.
However, Julianne wasn’t just uneasy.
She was more excited.
Julianne had dreamed of reaching the peak of magic and winning the crown of the Divine Realm since she was young.
However, even though her background, talent, and hard work far exceeded that of ordinary people, coupled with the fact that she had been in seclusion in the Astral Lighthouse for five years, she only barely broke through to the Legendary domain. Even the Shadow spells she had studied the most only gave her a slight glimpse of the Divine Realm with the support of the Astral Lighthouse.
This was actually extremely normal. It was better to say that she was already considered talented to be able to reach this point. After all, there were less than five magic chanters in the entire Astral Council who could reach the Divine Realm. Moreover, most people had only crossed that threshold in one or two domains.
As for the man in front of her, he wasn’t only the pioneer of the modern magic system, but he was also the only Divine Realm mage recorded to have studied all 13 spells to the peak of the Divine Realm.
It wasn’t an exaggeration to call what he had attained the peak.
If even the Astral Lighthouse couldn’t help her step into that realm, then only the man in front of her in this world could guide her in…
“1, 2, 3, 4… If I choose the location to detonate the ascension ritual, these are probably the only places…”
While Julianne was in a daze, William marked a few locations on the map. Then, he took a few steps back and turned to the red-haired woman.
“And this will be the most dangerous place, so your mission is to command the remaining military forces in Blacklight City to keep it under control… Are you listening to what I’m saying?”
“Ah?”
Upon hearing William raise his voice slightly, Julianne snapped out of her daze and replied, “I’m listening… Guard Blacklight City well.”
William sighed and corrected her.
“I’m not asking you to guard Blacklight City well, but to keep this exposed Moon Realm rift under control.”
The Moon Realm rift wasn’t just a portal, but a transfer station.
With the Moon Realm rift as the center, according to the scale of the Moon Realm rift, it was possible for a Moon Realm portal of different sizes to randomly appear on the land dozens to thousands of kilometers around it. Moreover, the probability of successfully holding a summoning ritual for Moon Realm believers in this range would also increase exponentially.
Other than Lunar Monsters with high statures like Demon Generals or Void Sovereign incarnations that could only enter Currere through the Moon Realm rift, the other low-level Lunar Monsters usually entered Currere through a portal near the Moon Realm rift. It was precisely because of this that the Moon Realm’s invasion seemed so impossible to guard against.
“I’ve set up some simple spatial seals over the rift, but because I don’t have any materials that can completely seal the rift, Lunar Monsters will be active in the entire western region of Nakuland for a long time. When that happens, your manpower will probably be scattered,” William said.
Julianne carefully replied, “That’s not a problem, but sir, you previously got the logistics personnel in the fortress area to evacuate to the south of the Grief Mountains. We haven’t been able to contact them… After we completely purge the Moon Realm believers in Blacklight City, we have to replenish our consumables, repair the damaged weapons, and rest before we can get them to leave Blacklight City for a mission. Look…”
William replied without changing his expression, “I’ll get the logisticians in charge of taking care of the daily needs and maintaining the weapons and their families to return as soon as possible, but those alchemists and enchanters might be delayed… However, since Battle Mages don’t need to rely on those enchantment consumables, just get them to carry out the mission first. Get the Spellblade troops to be on standby in the city.”
Julianne was about to ask in detail why they were delayed when the door to the war room suddenly opened.
A youth with a dark-blue lake sword at his waist and blood all over his body walked in. He shakily half-knelt and bowed to the two of them.
“Lords, we’ve already destroyed the Gift Church’s headquarters, but Prelate Rudolph and a few core members escaped under the cover of the Lunar Monsters.”
Julianne asked in surprise, “Didn’t I get Dennis to lead the team? How could he fail?”
Dennis was the president of the Battle Mage Order and was at the peak of the Master realm. If there were advancement vacancies, he had a chance of advancing to Legendary in three years.
“Master Dennis was severely injured by the Gift Church’s Prelate Rudolph. He’s recuperating in the Hall of Life,” the young man holding the sword suppressed the trembling in his voice and replied.
Then, he continued, “It’s basically confirmed that Rudolph has advanced to the Legendary stage through a Moon Realm contract.”
Regarding this, Julianne asked in confusion, “Since the other party has already advanced to Legendary, how did he escape?”
There was a qualitative difference between a Master and a Legendary.
In the era of the Golden Calendar, people called the godly heroes who had sworn oaths ‘Legendary.’ And in the era after classical magic was born, the Tacma Church used the strength of a godly hero as a Legendary standard when demarcating the magic chanter realms.
If Rudolph had reached the Legendary stage, he wouldn’t have needed to escape at all.
“Because there’s a…”
As he spoke, he subconsciously looked out the door behind him.
Julianne’s gaze traced it, but there was nothing there.
“What is it?” Julianne asked.
William snapped his fingers, and a floating spirit with countless howling souls of affliction in its cloak appeared quietly with an invisible sickle in his hand.
Cold sweat dripped down the young man’s face.
“Before I followed you to the Sealing Chamber, I was worried that an accident would happen during the purge, so I sent it over to follow you,” William said.
Julianne didn’t say a word for a moment. She only stared at the floating spirit with wide eyes. After a long time, she exclaimed, “Death Spirit! This spell has been lost for more than 500 years!”