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Chapter 516.1: Are You Doing Well? (1)

Roel Ascart had never experienced the joy of being carried by his teammates.

As a child, he was abruptly placed in the precarious position of an antagonist, forcing him to win the female capture targets’ trust and revitalize his noble house in order to survive. Barely after solving those problems, he suddenly found himself targeted by evil cultists because of his lineage.

It was as if he was jumping from one nightmare to another.

Half of the evil cultists on the Sia Continent had their eyes set on him. Most were small fry who couldn’t breach the protection of the Genesis Goddess Church and the Ascart House, but the remaining ones, especially the Savior’s worshipers and the Saints Convocation, posed a huge threat.

It was often said that those who survived for a long time became wily old foxes.

Having fought toe-to-toe with humankind for over a thousand years now, the two evil cults had pretty much maxed out all of their anti-detection means, making it nigh impossible to find their trails. More importantly, not many people had bothered looking for them.

The previous awakeners of the Kingmaker Bloodline, be it Ro Ascart or Winstor Ascart, were predominantly solo players unaffiliated with any powers. They had always fought against the enemies of the Ascart House by themselves, but Roel didn’t think that it was a wise measure.

Determined to do things differently, he had dragged the Xeclydes and the Sorofyas onto the same boat as him. He had Lilian in the Austine Empire to keep a lookout for him, and the Knight Kingdom was favorable toward him. Even Principal Antonio from the Country of Scholars was on his side.

That being said, it was not as if these relationships had conveniently appeared out of nowhere. He had undergone plenty of dangerous situations in order to forge these alliances, and it was heartening to see that they were paying off well.

He was so overjoyed to learn that Rosa’s crusade against the Saints Convocation was bearing fruit that he was ready to pop a bottle of champagne to celebrate the occasion.

Is this how it feels to have a victory delivered right into my lap?

Yet, the next piece of information he stumbled upon turned out to be even more explosive, so much that he dared not believe its authenticity.

Following the Saints Convocation, the Collector also left his tail exposed.

The intelligence came from Principal Antonio, or to be more exact, the special operation team he had founded to hunt down the Savior’s worshipers following the Fallens’ assault on Lilian. After half a year of effort, they had finally made a huge breakthrough.

The report mentioned that the special operation team had engaged someone suspected to be the Collector in the northern region of the Austine Empire. They tried to apprehend the suspect, but the latter was much more powerful than they had expected, forcing them to retreat.

This was quite an awkward outcome, considering how difficult it had been for them to find the Collector in the first place. Still, the way things turned out in the report sounded convincing to Roel, especially considering the Collector’s means.

After their encounter with the Collector, the special operation team continued tailing him while sending reports up the chain of command. Upon receiving the news, Principal Antonio quickly pulled together a team and headed to the northern mountainous region of the Austine Empire, where the Collector was last spotted.

Both sides hadn’t engaged each other yet, but just news on the Collector’s whereabouts was enough to spur Roel’s excitement. After all, the Collector was the greatest threat to the Ascart House.

The Collector’s strength was to be feared, but what was even more frightening than that was his deep understanding of the Ascart House. He was able to interfere in Roel’s Inner Sanctum, an intangible place that had even been out of reach to Roel himself.

For that reason, Roel was reluctant to get into a direct confrontation with the Collector despite having made significant advancements as a transcendent since then. It was a huge relief to him that Antonio was doing the job in his place.

To be frank, he initially hadn’t borne much hope for the crusades against the Saints Convocation and the Fallens, and the huge breakthroughs that had been made were truly a delightful surprise to him. Even so, his mood soon turned grim when he considered alternate possibilities.

Roel wasn’t too worried about the Saints Convocation.

He had crossed paths with them on numerous occasions, and he could vaguely sense that the cult was currently on the decline. There were multiple reasons behind that.

For one, the Mother Goddess utterly ignored the Saints Convocation and refused to grant them any blessings whatsoever, which was a stark contrast to her fervent interest in Roel. The Saints Convocation was aware of that, but there was nothing they could do about it. They could only set their sights onto her envoys, the Six Calamities.

From the aspect of organization philosophy, the Saints Convocation was also likely to be at its lowest point ever. Their cult warned about the imminent arrival of the apocalypse and declared that returning to the Mother Goddess’ embrace was the only way to achieve immortality.

Such teachings wouldn’t gain much traction during a peaceful era, and the Sia Continent had been relatively stable for centuries now. This resulted in them slowly losing power over time.

On top of that, the ones who had been dispatched to deal with the Saints Convocation this time around were Rosa’s elites. The Rosaian soldiers were equipped with Jewel Magic that curbed powers derived from the Six Calamities to some extent, granting them an advantage in this fight. From this perspective, it didn’t seem like there was much to worry about…

… unless the Saints Convocation decided to release an egg of the Six Calamities in pursuit of mutually assured destruction.

That was admittedly a terrifying possibility, but Roel didn’t think that it was a realistic move.

What was different about the Six Calamities of the current era compared to the preceding ones was that they were currently in their most active phase.

Even Kaldor Arde, one of the strongest awakeners of the Kingmaker Bloodline who had devoted his life to curbing the Six Calamities, had his seal broken by Flooding Death. The chances were unlikely that the Saints Convocation would have stronger means that allowed them to control the Six Calamities.

In the first place, would they dare to continue exerting their control on the Six Calamities?

The heightened activity of the Six Calamities could be viewed as the will of the Mother Goddess. As a cult that worshiped the Mother Goddess, was the Saints Convocation really going to continue imprisoning Her envoys? Needless to say, there was no way they would do something that blasphemous.

Having thought things through, Roel turned his attention toward the Collector.

Unlike the Mother Goddess, the Savior hadn’t been idling around. He had plenty of Fallens under his control despite still being in slumber, the most noteworthy one being Magician King Priestley Maxwell, who perpetrated Leinster’s tragedy four hundred years ago.

When it was shown that even someone of Priestley’s strength was susceptible to the Savior’s corruption, it became hard to accurately gauge just how powerful the Savior’s worshipers were. After all, it was possible that they were lurking amongst the upper echelons of humankind.

On top of that, some of the frighteningly powerful old monsters from the Second Epoch were still alive and kicking. The Treant High Priest they had encountered at Marlin Town was a perfect example, having nearly killed Roel with the Savior’s divine artifact.

Knowing this, Roel couldn’t help but wonder if the Collector had intentionally given away his whereabouts.

Supposing that the Collector had intentionally revealed his location, his intention was likely to lure Principal Antonio into a trap so as to take him down. Should he succeed, Roel would lose one of his strongest supporters and the human world could descend into chaos.

This put Roel in a dilemma.