Badge in Azure Chapter 1443

Chapter 1443: Getting into Trouble (Part 1)

Saleen knew what that little girl was thinking: She was his key to finding the Lord of Glory’s divine kingdoms.
If it hadn’t been for that, he would have long ago had Nailisi purify her. The energy in the purgatory of purification was the most lethal against believers. The little girl was capable of contacting a god, and Saleen saw no reason to strip her of her powers.
She was in her cell, which had walls filled with lightning magic patterns. There was no way Saleen would let her contact her god anytime. The take-home from the last caper she pulled off was loud and clear. Until Saleen possessed ample powers, he would never want to get on the Lord of Glory’s wrong side again.
Saleen knew for sure that the little girl wouldn’t kill herself. He began making preparations for attacking the Holy See. He wasn’t heading out with the Floating City but had instead decided to attack with a massive army.
Don was in charge of amassing and organizing that army. Sikeqinya was completely thrown into chaos. The emperor was incapable of keeping the nobles in check. Saleen sent a 50,000-strong army to Laiyin Duchy but did not attack the place; he simply blockaded the path leading from Laiyin Duchy to Kroraina.
With that, he managed to seize control of Laiyin in the east and had Ceylon City in the west blockading the sea routes. He had first separated Sikeqinya and Tanggulasi, isolating the former to prevent any unforeseen circumstances.
Saleen didn’t participate in the early stages of the battle. In truth, he had already removed any obstacles standing between Kroraina to God Grace Duchy in the last attack. No other forces filled the vacuum that month.
Saleen had no need to worry about getting the army ready. He took Rafel and the others and headed straight to Grand Duke Iron Blood’s Palace At Sea.
He’d become adept at his current way of flight. Clouds wrapped around his body while yellow light flashed beneath his feet, covering several hundred meters of distance with just one step. This speed was such that even if the Lord of Glory’s double materialized again, he wouldn’t be able to keep up unless Saleen was totally oblivious to the god’s presence and was ambushed.
Saleen only realized the importance of elemental manipulation. His control abilities in the past had been seriously lacking. This meant it would only be convenient if he was holding onto a piece of bone crystal of the giant or had fallen at a given moment.
At present, his body was zipping through the air using just a bit of earth-elemental powers leaking from his Lightning Constellation. That speed was only slower than his Comet Flash.
Even though Saleen had already advanced to level-13, he still didn’t dare use Comet Flash continuously.
The sea was still windy and raging, but that was a smooth ride in Saleen’s opinion. He flew while sticking close to the surface. Before long, he arrived at the grand duke’s palace.
It had been a while since his last visit. Since then it had grown into a huge city. It seemed that the grand duke had indeed intended to continue maintaining control at sea. Saleen smirked and said, “Lord duke, Saleen’s here.”
He was messing around, as he addressed the grand duke by this title and simply called himself by his first name. The line said through Thundering Sound enabled it to strike through the island’s magic defenses and boom at the center.
“Your Highness Saleen, is there a need to be angry?” The grand duke’s voice was heard and the only Dragon Knight left in the world rode a seven-colored dragon, flying straight at Saleen from the center of the island.
Saleen stepped in the air and the yellow light beneath his feet took a solid form. He looked at the grand duke without doing anything; he just stared dead ahead at the man before him.
The grand duke stopped about 300 meters away from Saleen. That location was a testament of his respect for Saleen, a mage. He was a Dragon Knight. If he got a hundred or two meters closer, it would have been as if he was sticking his spear against Saleen’s throat.
“Mages don’t get angry. Grand duke, I’m here to ask if our alliance is still in effect.”
The grand duke was dumbfounded. He thought Saleen looked different. He had initially thought he would be able to steadily loom over Saleen after advancing. He did not expect to find Saleen’s power grown to the extent where he was no longer able to measure him.
An eye opened at Saleen’s brow all of a sudden. The seven-colored dragon beneath the grand duke howled in fright and fell to the sea as soon as the eye was opened. The grand duke was dazed for a brief moment as time stopped.
Saleen saw the grand duke’s weakness within that split second. But did it matter? Saleen didn’t think so. There was a soul bond between the grand duke and the dragon. So long as the dragon lived, any life force that the grand duke would have lost could be replenished through the dragon.
That was what made Dragon Knights so hard to deal with. That seven-colored dragon was of a formidable level. It was angry after being startled by Saleen. It swooped high in the air and looked down on the mage. It only quieted down after the grand duke patted its head a little bit.
“Master, the mage is peering at your weakness.”
“I saw that. If I kill the duke, I’ll need to kill you first,” Saleen said coldly.
The seven-colored dragon said nothing more, feeling doubtful. The mage before it, who was called Saleen, had such a terrifying third eye. It reminded the dragon of the three-eyed people’s bloodline. The three-eyed, however, wouldn’t have had such rules imbued in its eyes!
The grand duke laughed and said, “Your Highness Saleen, what do you mean by that? Of course, our alliance is still in effect. You have disappeared for more than a month and I have been keeping a tight leash on my people instead of giving you any trouble.”
The eye on Saleen’s head was already closed. Lightning runes glittered in his blue eyes. The eerie scene made the grand duke’s heart race.
“Duke, I’m heading out to raze the Tanggulasi Empire. Will you be joining me?”
The grand duke frowned and recalled that Saleen had always been a calm, steady person. What’s up with him now?
“Of course I’m not going, the Cloudflow side…”
“If you’re not going, you’d have nothing to gain.” Saleen interrupted the grand duke.
The grand duke frowned tightly without getting angry. Then he said to Saleen, “You can’t just leap in the dark with national wars like that. Didn’t you come back empty-handed after you last took the Floating City to attack the Tanggulasi Empire?”
“The Lord of Glory dropped his double on me. A level-14 one. If he does that again, you won’t be able to fight him even if you have your dragon regain its strength.”
The grand duke was speechless. He looked at Saleen in a way that suggested he was hoping Saleen was trying to dupe him. A level-14 god was indeed invincible at the moment, but given how Saleen somehow managed to stay alive, it was a clear indication that Saleen had dealt with that trouble.
“The powers of Myers Mainland are loosening up. That god will be able to drop another double very soon. Are you going to just keep waiting, duke?”
The grand duke wanted to say something but the waves on the ocean shot up high in the sky without warning.
“Sh*t!” The grand duke didn’t say anything to Saleen before summoning yet another dragon right away. It had a golden body and saw considerable changes. It had not been like that the last time Saleen had seen it.
That dragon dived straight into the ocean at which point the grand duke said, “Your highness, Imposa is trying to capture a huge creature here. That’s why I set up the Palace At Sea. How about…”
Saleen sensed from the core of his being that the power that emerged from the sea resembled the commotion caused when the god materialized. That powerful creature was probably something even he might be able to take on.
But the rules of Myers Mainland…
Things were worse than Saleen imagined. Myers Mainland had advanced again before he knew it.
Even if that was the case, the only thing he could do was pray that the Lord of Glory wouldn’t show up for the time being.
As he was at the moment, Saleen was able to withstand one or two hits from the Lord of Glory, but there was no way he could resist a level-15 god capable of bringing all his might to bear.
It was when he observed the grand duke that he realized the island behind looked off. When he used his Eye of Souls to take another look, he found that the island was very much alive.
That island is a living thing then?
No! That island consists of a bunch of eggshells. Because the shell’s surface is irregular, lots of rocks and sand have accumulated on it. Saleen had never bothered looking into what was beneath before, which was why he overlooked it.
The grand duke had built a city atop eggshells of some powerful creatures! Imagined if they burst out of those shells…
Saleen no longer knew how to describe those two. Imposa had no doubt been a lunatic, but he never expected the grand duke to be just as loco.
“Your highness!” The island behind the grand duke’s back shook, and his expression changed. There are about 10,000 magic arrays at work and still, they fail to suppress that thing?
Saleen flew to the sky exasperatedly and slowly unleashed his Floating City. Thousands of powerful beings took flight on the island. It was a result of receiving a magic alarm, telling them that the thing beneath could no longer be contained.
Saleen was unfazed. While the thing Imposa pulled off was no doubt ridiculous, it was well within expectations from some mages like him. The creature in the eggshells caused such a commotion before it even hatched. If Imposa subjugated such a creature, it would almost make him the most powerful mage on the mainland.
Those professionals on the island rose and flew straight to the Floating City. Everyone was really panicked at the moment. None anticipated how something that powerful could not be contained even with years of work and up to 10,000 magic arrays around it.
Crack…
The palace cracked opened from the center of the island. Saleen saw a jet of flames blowing out. The flames were white, and the jet was almost up to 1,000 meters high. Every professional running away from the flames was eventually caught and reduced to ash.
The grand duke was exasperated at the situation. Saleen then pointed at the sea at his side. Saleen moved a massive volume of seawater and transformed it into a water snake, slithering toward that crack.
His elemental manipulation ability had grown to the point of no longer needing chants to work. He could cast magic better using the power of the soul.
The water snake had a head but no tail, which in truth was him sending seawater into that crack continuously.
It was a fire-elemental creature within the eggshells.
Explosions continued blasting. Saleen’s water snake was imbued with Water Flame and the construct was no longer in liquid form; it had taken a crystalline form that was more resilient than the hardest hard ice.
Because those crystalline beings were finer than dust, it looked as if they were still moving around like liquid.
The fire-elemental creature was really tough. The temperature of Saleen’s water snake neared the absolute ice point, yet it was still unable to subjugate that fire-elemental creature. The frozen crystalline vaporized at once before exploding, forging a wider crack.