Chapter 3043: Living Legends |
The walls of the city had withstood a year under a relentless siege. Effie and her mercenary army, as well as the inhabitants of the city whom Morgan had armed and trained, defended them with their lives, soaking the ancient stones with their blood. There were more than a few champions from other realms who had come to join the battle against Azarax, too. Overall, the forces supporting the Mason were quite fearsome, easily comparable to one of the Great Clans at the peak of their power.
The terrifying horde had descended upon the city a dozen times, but was repelled over and over again... even if the cost of these victories was dire.
Azarax commanded a nearly endless number of soldiers, so he could simply continue to throw them at the walls of the defiant city and wait for its citizens to fall to attrition. Behind him was a vast empire that spanned a hundred realms, capable of producing an almost infinite amount of resources to sustain the siege...
But it wasn't that simple.
The kingdom Azarax had built with fire and blood was a gluttonous beast sustained by conquest. If there were no new riches, spoils, and slaves flowing into its maw from the battlefield, it would starve and fall sick. It could even fall apart entirely.
More than that, what kept the beast from rebelling against its master was the fearsome reputation and dreadful prestige of the Plague of Steel — a relentless conqueror who had never been defeated.
If an insignificant Domain encompassing a single city — and a pacifist city, at that — managed to stall the conquest for a prolonged period of time, his prestige would be wounded, and his tyrannical hold on the unstable Domain would weaken.
So, Azarax had no incentive to be patient. Since a year of direct assaults had not produced the desired result, he was bound to turn his attention to more insidious means of warfare. Morgan had been anticipating it for a long while, and now, her warnings seemed to be coming true.
The plague that was slowly spreading in the city was a strange one. Its first symptom — hand tremors — was easy to miss. By the time the disease developed, though, it was already too late to stop it.
Mundane medicines were powerless against the plague, and since it spread through any means of personal contact while being difficult to detect during the early stages, preventing new cases was difficult.
The plague was deadly and mysterious...
Its source, however, was known to all.
A month ago, just before the previous assault, the trebuchets that had bombarded the walls of the city with stone projectiles before were loaded with far more morbid ammunition. This time, what they sent flying into the city were corpses — the rotting corpses of Azarax's own soldiers that were piled under the walls.
Not unfamiliar with the risk of disease in time of war, as well as with ways to weaponize it, Morgan sent squads of soldiers in protective gear to collect and dispose of the corpses.
A week later, however, the hands of the corpse collectors started to shake.
And a week after that, most of them were dead.
It was then that they understood the true nature of the disease. This plague was not natural — it had been created by a cabal of sorcerers that served Azarax, engineered to be as stealthy and virulent as possible, meant to destroy the city from within.
The plague had escaped into the streets of the city by then, though, and even Morgan was not sure how to eradicate it — short of culling the population to kill and burn all current carriers.
That would weaken the defending forces, too, not to mention destroying their morale. So, at the moment, things seemed to be turning from bad to worse for Effie and her companions.
She sighed.
“How is Seishan doing?"
Kai covered his nose with a hand and answered in a reserved tone:
"She is... struggling.”
Effie grimaced.
"Let's go pay her a visit, then."
Leaving the burning pyre behind, they walked away from the city gate, navigating their way through a maze of burned and devastated streets. As they did, many soldiers welcomed them with reverent bows and salutes, some even going so far as to kneel and press their foreheads against the ground.
Effie herself was surprised to still be alive. Needless to say, the six Transcendent champions who had managed to fight back against the Plague of Steel for an entire year earned a legendary status among the locals. They were venerated like gods by now, their orders carrying more weight than even those of the Mason and his descendants. That could have resulted in tiresome internal friction, but luckily, both the Supreme lord of the city and his heirs were quite reasonable, wisely avoiding becoming enemies with the very people who were defending their people.
Effie was not new to military command, but she had never experienced such a catastrophic level of casualties among her soldiers. The same people who looked at her with reverence and admiration today would be dead tomorrow, added to the great funeral pyres like the one they had left behind just minutes ago. So, their faith was a heavy burden.
She forced a confident smile to appear on her face and responded to respectful greetings with nods of acknowledgment.
"How long do you think this city has lasted in the real world?"
Her voice was quiet.
Kai hesitated for a long while, then shrugged.
"I am not sure. There is no city similar to this one anywhere in the Dream Realm, though — not even the ruins — so it was destroyed quite thoroughly at some point."
Effie's smile faltered.
"Yes. But didn't Sunny mention that Azarax had been defeated by a War Maiden? So this must be where his conquest ended, all those eons ago.”
Kai sighed.
"His conquest might have come to an end, but he was still alive by the time the Golden Age ended, and the Doom War began. So whatever happened here could not have been simple."
Effie had no choice but to nod in agreement.
By then, they reached the shore of the great river that flowed through the city, its waters rolling into the sea. That river used to be their greatest source of drinking water, but after Azarax and his soldiers started dumping their dead into its currents upstream, complicated sorcery had to be implemented to cleanse it.
There was a big opening in the impregnable wall of the city where the river flowed through it — the most glaring vulnerability in the city's defenses. Luckily, the Mason had accounted for it when constructing the wall, so at the moment, the opening was closed by a colossal metal grate.
That grate could be raised to allow ships to pass, or lowered to close the breach in the wall. The water still flowed, but enemy vessels could not pass — otherwise, Azarax would have already exploited that weakness by building an armada of boats and rafts to invade the city.
The grate was made from enchanted iron and looked very imposing, but it was still far weaker than the stone that surrounded it. It served its purpose, though — even a year after the siege began, the enemy could not use ships to breach the city's defenses and attack it from within.
Azarax did not have a strong navy, anyway, and every battleship he did command was being used to blockade the harbor.
Morgan was waiting for them on the shore, staring at the flowing water with a distant expression.
She did not turn even when they approached.
“Are you heading to Seishan’s lair?"
Her voice sounded distracted.
Effie frowned.
“How did you... actually, never mind. Yes, we are going to pay Seishan a visit to check on her progress. Care to join?"
Morgan remained silent for a while.
"Sure, why not?"
Instead of turning to join them, though, she took a step forward, slid down the muddy slope, and walked to the very edge of the water.
There, she summoned a dagger, bent down, and drove it into the mud.
Effie raised an eyebrow.
"What are you doing? Hunting for worms? No need — Nightwalker is back, so our food supply is in good form."
Leaving the dagger in the mud, Morgan straightened and looked at them somberly.
"Who even eats worms?"
With that, she leapt back to the walking path and shook her head.
“No need to answer, actually. I'd rather not know..."
The eastern sky was already brightening, so they hurried their steps, wanting to finish their task before the new day arrived. Morgan's dagger remained where she had left it, one side of its blade washed by flowing water.
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