Chapter 158: Turmoil in the Ranks of the Living
"That should do it. I don't know how accurate the simulation of the time loop in the head of Sophia she got by reading historical passages, but that is none of my concern."
Back in the command center of the undead army, [Guide] sighed. He felt bad for the living generals who have to serve Sophia with the thought that they might be sold off to another country, but he also understood that they would be phased out quickly if they stayed in a place littered with undeads. Also, those living beings are the last flesh and blood reminder to Sophia that she was once a living being because right now, she's already a bonafide undead.
_Also, they were not killed from the start because Sophia subconsciously wants a living family, so she is very reluctant to kill these people and turn them into undeads... really, how complicated it is to become a human._
She's called the glitch in the matrix and is now fighting one of the world's smartest beings. Yet she made such a stupid decision and doesn't want to fix it even though she can most definitely impose a very easy solution on her subordinates.
"Ah, forget it, I am not that advanced that I can understand all of the intricacies of the human brain, which, in fact, can match the universe in mysteriousness."
[Guide] pulled out some random knowledge he learned from browsing Sophia's mind as he looked at the table he was in, in there are two magic circles, one is just an inch to connect the neurons like inscriptions, the magic circle to counter engineer the magic circle that is used to seal up the resurrection sequence of the undeads which came to be as easier as what [Guide] have expected, too easy in fact, and the other one is a complete magic circle, this is the sealing circle for the artificial hero prospect crystal, it already worked to Sisa who was given the maximum priority treatment, so she was sealed of her ability to use mana and use the crystal that replaced her heart, so she is now practically dead unless otherwise desired by [Guide].
"Now that Sisa is gone, the plan of the generals of the living to use her knight order as fuel to their own will fail, I will individually target them with my generals, this will be guessed despite the mana intoxication caused by the alcoholic levels of mana they are receiving from their cores. However, in the end, they are still fighting drunk and also grew confident of their artificially given strength, and will not even be able to think of this magic circle."
The reason for the magic circle of [Guide] is not only so that they can match the strength of the generals but also to catch them off guard for a fast and decisive victory because after that, they still have to invade Indio, create a defense line from the coast of Stardust to Kamatayan, Sophia is stubborn to not attack and wait for the invasion of Gjallarhorn.
[Guide] did not think further, he contacted Eleanor, memorized the circle, and then said.
"You can now finish your fight."
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Human-Elven Army, commander's tent: 2 hours after the defeat of Sisa's knight order, 5 individuals, 3 elves 2 humans, are present in the tent, all of the people are silent, unaware of Sisa's capture, and the enemy is able to even out the 1v1 situation of the generals, originally, Ruphas was tapped to deal with Sisa, being the second strongest fighter of Bulawan as well as the one with the highest defense, but he was immediately pulled out when [Guide] realized the space magic of Sisa.
One would say that Ruphas was very lucky. However, the generals of the living don't care about this, nor do they analyze such sequence in the undead's war execution, like [Guide] said, all of them are essentially drunk because of mana, and they don't have the King of Tydings, the deputy commander general of the elven-human army to analyze such things, they just made their strategy, and mind you, such strategy is to kill or injure their strongest warrior and absorb the army that tried to rescue her after they escaped from the hands of the monster army. [Guide], or rather Sophia, is really on point when she says that these people will not act like their age, they did not even consider that the knight order will be caught or slaughtered.
They just waited, for two hours at that, before a burly white elf, something very strange for an elf of the white variety, finally spoke, impatience clear on his tone.
"What the hell is that crazy son of a gun doing? Why is she taking so long? Could she be dead?"
A human male with a glowing ring on his right ring finger immediately shook his head.
"How can she die? She's an assassin, Tyding's strongest, in fact, even the generals of the undead army don't dare come close to her, remember that those undeads are already the most potent fighting force of the Kamatayan queendom after their three queens, how can those living soldiers of theirs who somehow was allowed to exist in their queendom kill her?"
At this moment, it was the turn of a lady elf with a bow in her back to frown as she chimed in.
"But aren't you two the ones who said that she can be heavily injured there? What in the world are you two planning if she can't be harmed there then?"
The woman's eyes were muddled, but it was clear that she wanted to win the war, and she knew how crucial Sisa was for their success, she was an avid opposition to such a loosely made plan.
"According to the data given by the observers outside the walls of Gjallarhorn, the walls of Bulawan have a light that damaged the eyes of knights of some nobles that tried to attack them. Sisa just needed to alert their walls, and she would be blinded, after that, because of her manic desire to see her children, she would walk around blind, which would give the protectors of Bulawan a chance to punch several holes in her body, such is the strategy."
The woman sighed.
"That is what you call the best-case scenario."
She glared at the two men in front of her, she is a servant of Lord Aerendil, thus, unlike the humans who just want to test out their powers, she wants to, she needs to win to not disappoint her lord.
"What's the difference!?"
The burly elf, who was supposed to be on their side, was angry, this is his suggestion that was seconded by the human, he stood up and went in front of the woman, towering over her, the elf woman did not back down, she stood up slowly, not breaking eye contact.
"One is made by idiots, and one is made by strategists, pick which is which."
The tall elf was even more furious; his hand immediately became that of a falcon's talon, it stretched from the table all the way to the simulation board, which is at least 3 meters across, at the same time, a shadow immediately appeared his hands, in the blink of an eye, another elf with two daggers in his hands appeared in the burly man's back and pointed his knives towards the sides of the burly man's neck.
"Another inch from that chicken leg, and you're dead."
The two humans watched in amusement, in front of them were three old farts fighting against each other, however, a rustle in the entrance of the tent made them go back to reality, all of the generals looked at the entrance, and there they saw a knight with a lot of dents in his armor, looking at them in increasing confusion and anger.
"You... generals... this is not the time to be arguing! Captain Sisa has been captured; she have almost 80 percent of her bones poking out of her skin when she was thrown out of the 4th dimension! Not only that, I am the only one that was not imprisoned! You... all of you will be attacked without the protection of General Sisa!"
The knight wanted to be respectful as much as possible; however, seeing the generals that conspired against his own general fight because they thought it was wrong strategically to endanger their strongest soldier when the damage was already done is still infuriating, he cannot help but shout, causing the other human, the one without any equipment to glare at the knight, he pointed his index finger at the knight and then went into the act of snapping his fingers.
"You dare get angry at us?"
The human said as his mana flared up, the knight looked at him without fear, if he was to choose, of course, he wanted to live, but if he was to die, he would be satisfied too as at least he pissed off one of the people who planned against his general, if not for the fact that the human with the ring held the hand of the other human, the knight would have perished.
"Please leave the place immediately and rest, we will discuss our next actions, please take a rest and be assured that your concerns will be addressed."
The knight snickered for a moment, much to the annoyance of the 5, yet they ignored him as he went out of the tent.
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The generals immediately went into a furious argument, blaming each other for the jeopardized plan and also making a case that it was a good thing that they would finally be able to get a good fight, in any case, no one in the higher-ups is compromising as they criticized the timidity and stupidity of each other, this is something that was heard by the knight, a look of disgust present in his eyes.
_These people just threw out general away and hoped for the best? If the general is not insane, she would have laughed her ass off if she was with these people, now, these people will be attacked, and no one from their orders will be coming to rescue our general._
As mad as Sisa was, she was still a general who somehow was able to create a conducive training and deployment system for the knights under her wing, she was even able to produce the most elite despite being muddled by her obsession for her children, her knights were respectful and proud of her. Thus, they tried to save her despite knowing the bastardic plan of the generals.
_But what can I do? I can only be a proud survivor of General Sisa's elites._
The knight started to plan, and in the end, what he did was very simple: he sneaked away from the patrol routes of the soldiers and then went to the back of the mages and archers. He then stole an archer gear and, just like that, assumed a relatively safe position, like he said, he wanted to be a proud survivor and not a rouge knight. Thus, he did not escape from the war but only wanted to assume a not-too-close-to-the-frontline role.
That is the last thing she could do for his Captain Sisa.
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Sunrise, the King Tydings IV vs Queen Eleanor I battlefield.
The once lush forest of the outskirts of Stardust has now officially entered its barren state, all over hundreds of meters were chunks of organic-shaped obsidians and glasses, whilst in the middle of such a strange combination is a poodle of lava that, again, is starting to harden to create more obsidian, for the past few days, several sands, earth and glass matters as well as lava, lahar, and obsidian ones were hurled by the two fighters, King Tydings and Eleanor left and right, depending on the direction of their opponent, non-stop.
One can say the intoxicating effect of the explosion of the numerous mana cores inside his body has turned his seriousness and excitement into that of great annoyance; the reason is simple: the opponent in front of him is too crafty and creative, at first, she just uses his sand to attack and defend, however, soon, she started to use the glass that is made by the collision of the sand and magma, not only that, she can make the glass dig to the ground and then randomly shoot them up at almost supersonic speeds if she needed crowd control, she can use glass as a shield, turn them into blades that will attack him that King Tydings IV will then dodge, he then have to attack the woman and won't have the time to destroy the shards that will then bury themselves to the ground.
Even if King Tydings IV obstructed such a pattern several times, he would be given another set of chained attacks, and if he broke through, another one and another and another.
_This is annoying.... First, somehow, maybe because of a unique skill, she can last for days fighting me without breaking a sweat... my only hope is her already deeming magic construct that is probably supplying her with immense mana..._
Indeed, that was his only hope, as not only is he not thinking straight despite fighting so well for so long, but he is also lacking in finesse, as his ability is so destructive that he doesn't need to be creative.
_That or if she somehow got distracted for a split second._
It was as if on cue, Tydings saw Eleanor freeze for a moment as a smile crept on her face, this made Tydings become restless, such a smile bode bad omen. Thus, he did not hesitate, he used the obsidian below the foot of the floating Eleanor and punched her down hard to the ground.
"I finally caught you."