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Chapter 595.1: Nora’s Desire (1)

Spatial spells had always been one of the research goals of the Sia Continent’s magicians, but there had been little progress on that front despite generations of effort over many centuries.

It was not due to a lack of talent, but because the spatial laws of the Sia Continent were unshakeable. Those who attempted to challenge them often landed themselves in pitiful states. That was also why Wilhelmina was horrified when she heard Roel’s words.

“Wait a moment, Roel. Are you really going to do that?”

“That’s the only thing we can do now.”

“But… that’s too dangerous! There’s no evidence that’ll work at all!”

“…”

Roel didn’t answer Wilhelmina’s concerns, but his determination didn’t waver in the least.

He had no evidence to prove his theory, but as someone whose soul had once contained the Six Calamities, as well as an inheritor of the Crown’s Stones, his intuition was telling him that the space here was not one-dimensional but layered, and this world of stopped time was only the first layer.

He could vaguely sense something hidden in a deeper spatial fold, and he suspected that it was Tark Stronghold’s missing personnel. Slowly, he clenched his fists as he hardened his will.

Meanwhile, Wilhelmina continued to rack her brain for an alternative solution.

“Roel, are you aware that I’m able to morph into a dragon through my bloodline?”

“Yes; you did that during our final battle in the Challenger Cup.”

“What if I morph into a dragon as soon as we leave this place and escape by air? How feasible do you think that strategy is?”

“It’ll work if we are up against normal deviant soldiers, but one of their Race Sovereigns is capable of flight.”

“But we will have reinforcements coming in too. As long as our Origin Level 1 transcendents manage to stall it, we should have a decent chance at escaping.”

“…”

Roel spent a moment to ponder the feasibility of Wilhelmina’s plan before eventually shaking his head, saying, “There’s still the Deviant Sovereign. We can’t turn a blind eye to his existence. He won’t allow us to leave just like that.”

“…”

Wilhelmina’s face turned grim. She vividly remembered how she had instantaneously lost half of her heart and nearly died.

To make things worse, even though they had crossed blows several times, they had gathered hardly any information about the Deviant Sovereign. So far, they had only uncovered its ability to bypass its enemy’s defense and destroy their heart, but as a being that had been around for countless years, it was bound to have more means than that.

At the very least, Roel didn’t think that it had revealed its trump card yet.

In contrast, both Roel and Wilhelmina had already revealed all of their means in the previous battle. This meant that their enemies could prepare countermeasures to deal with them, thus greatly discounting their effectiveness.

Given their current circumstances, their odds of besting the Deviant Sovereign were so low that it wasn’t worth the risk. That was why Roel insisted on saving Tark Stronghold’s personnel. Besides, Tark Stronghold’s hundred thousand elites were extremely important to humankind too.

So far, humankind had been evenly matched with the deviants, resulting in a stalemate, but the appearance of the Deviant Sovereign had tilted the balance in favor of the deviants. Humankind was currently at a disadvantage, so they needed something to even the scales once more.

On top of that, an elder, whom Roel had known from a young age and was the father of his lover, had disappeared together with Tark Stronghold. As long as there was a sliver of hope, he was determined to do everything he could to save him.

These factors fueled Roel’s determination to venture deeper into Shrouding Fog’s dimension.

Just by looking at his expression, Wilhelmina knew that it was impossible to dissuade him and let out a helpless sigh. Even so, she still gave him a reminder.

“I shan’t stop you if you have already made up your mind. It’s meaningless to stop a soldier who’s determined to brave the battlefield. However, you have to know that I won’t be able to return to the real world if something happens to you. The two of us are the stakes in this bet.”

“Mina…”

Roel’s resolute eyes shook upon hearing Wilhelmina’s words.

“I’m not saying this to shake your fighting will. Saving Tark Stronghold’s personnel is a great act of valor. I believe that it’s the right thing to do regardless of whether you succeed or fail.”

“Then…”

“What I want you to know is that I’m in this together with you.”

“!”

Roel’s golden eyes slowly widened.

Wilhelmina chuckled at his response. She walked over and gently grabbed his hand. Staring into his eyes, she told him, “We might not be physically together, but our fates are tied together. So that we can survive this ordeal together, please give it your all.”

“…Mm.” Roel nodded as he opened his arms wide and embraced her.

The two of them closed their eyes and felt each other’s heartbeat. It was a long time before their arms slowly loosened.

“I’ll be right back.”

“Have a safe journey.”

After a sentimental farewell, Roel released his arms and took a step back. He channeled his mana into his Crown’s Stone, releasing a brilliant glow. White fog manifested out of nowhere and instantaneously shrouded his body.

…

Meanwhile, at the human military encampment constructed along the outer perimeter of Hawe Desert, a briefing about an upcoming major operation was being held in one of the tents.

Two packed rows of seats lined a long table.

What was unusual about this briefing was that the majority of the military commanders gathered here were neither middle-aged veterans nor white-haired generals, but youths.

It wasn’t news that the average age of military commanders had been falling. As a matter of fact, the average age of military personnel in the united army had been steadily reducing as the war continued on. This was an inevitable result of the savagery of war.

As a result of the major battles last year, many of the older generals, especially those on the frontlines, had either lost their lives or been forced to take a back seat to recuperate from their injuries. Even renowned veterans like Holy Eminence John and Carter Ascart were no exception to the rule.

The casualties humankind had suffered in the war couldn’t be understated.

Such circumstances forced the younger generation to prematurely join the battlefield and shoulder the weight borne by the older generation thus far. Through cruel natural selection on the battlefield, they grew at an astonishing pace.

And the ones gathered in this briefing today were the top-notch talents among them.

At the frontmost seat of the long table was a man with an extraordinarily large body, and seated directly opposite him was a cold-faced, golden-haired woman clad in armor. Both of them were Roel’s old comrades—Kurt Gustav and Brittany Lunde.

They were taking charge of this meeting in accordance with the current rules in the united army.

Now that humankind was under the imminent threat of being overrun by deviants, the united army had restructured its chain of command, such that decision-makers in military meetings were no longer chosen by seniority, but military accomplishments and kill count.

In other words, those who slew more deviants and brought humankind further away from danger had a greater say when it came to important decisions.

The one boasting the highest kill count in this meeting room was ‘Giant’ Kurt, whose vanguard battalion had eliminated an astounding 30,000 deviants. In second place was ‘Valkyrie’ Brittany, who also led a vanguard battalion and had accrued more than 24,000 kills.

It wasn’t surprising that this was the case.

The Giant Bloodline and the Valkyrie Bloodline were advantaged in warfare, and vanguard battalions comprised elites tasked with the responsibility of breaking the enemy’s formation. Given their prowess and positions, it was not surprising that they claimed the two highest ranks.

However, neither of them was the same person they used to be. Kurt had become much more composed and dignified, whereas Brittany was no longer the naive young miss who struck deals with Roel in order to get to Geralt, only to come under his command in the end.

War had forced them to mature from the youthful innocence of their academy years.

Kurt had a glaring scar racing from his neck to his cheek. Brittany was wearing an eye patch. Both of them had sustained severe wounds over the course of their duties, though there was nothing to complain about considering that the vanguard battalions typically suffered more than 60% casualties in each battle.

Trailing behind the two of them was ‘Ferocious Beast’ Selina, a rising star whose mountain battalion had reached a kill count of 20,000. Following that was ‘Queen of Night’ Juliana, whose night assault battalion strategically struck at crucial phases of the battle to obstruct the deviants and had raked up a total of 18,000 kills.

Neither Selina nor Juliana had sustained overly severe external injuries, unlike Kurt and Brittany, but the two of them gave off a cold and solemn aura.

The frontmost four seats of the long table had been monopolized by the youths of the golden generation, who had built their name back in their student days. In fact, half of those in the subsequent ten seats were familiar faces from Saint Freya Academy. Some were even from Roel’s Bluerose Faction.

“What a lineup. Those who didn’t know better might have thought we were holding a graduation ceremony,” Stuart remarked, despite having his eyes wrapped in black cloth, as he looked at the young military commanders gathered in this room.

“Indeed, but how can we hold a graduation ceremony without our chiefs, be it our past one or our current one?” Geralt replied with a nod.

Stuart, through his multitude of functional abilities, had so greatly contributed to the war effort that he was appointed the head of the united army’s intelligence department. Geralt, who used to be the vice-chief for the Bluerose Faction, had become an advisor at the united army’s war strategy department.

Despite having risen to positions of power in the united army, the two of them didn’t put on airs when they chatted with each other. They appeared to be the same as before.

“Our chief is going to be the witness for our marriage. We have to save him by hook or by crook,” Geralt said, glancing at Brittany.

“Now that I think about it, our chief did try to matchmake the two of you, though I have to say that I’m surprised that you’re already going to get married. You were so resistant to it back then.”

“How should I put it… Many things happened along the way,” Geralt said with a wistful voice as his eyes remained fixated on Brittany.

Stuart sensed that it was a heavy story and opted not to probe any further. He turned to the others in the room, who had been speaking to one another in whispers, and asked, “Are these all of the military commanders participating in the operation?”

“Yes. Excluding those from the Austine Empire, those who ought to be here are already here.”

“I see… Our current strength numbers around 200,000, right?”

“I’m afraid so, but those seated here are indebted to our chief. You can be certain they’ll give it their all for the operation,” Geralt replied with a heavy voice as he stared at the glaring number written on the intelligence report.

300,000—this was the strength of the deviants prowling in Hawe Desert, according to the intelligence provided by Stuart’s department. This was far greater than their strength of 200,000, and Geralt knew that the gap would only continue to widen with time.

It had been a week since the deviants scattered across Tark Prairie began marching toward Hawe Desert, and many deviants were joining their forces every single day.

“I took a brief look before coming here. Their strength increases by almost 10,000 every day,” Stuart reported the latest development.

“…I see. It looks like it’d be an extremely difficult fight,” Geralt replied with a heavy sigh.

None of those in this meeting room could shrug off the fact that they had lost in terms of both existing military strength and reinforcements.

Since the outbreak of the war, the united army had always strived to only take battles where they had numerical superiority. Unless cornered, they would never take a disadvantageous fight, as the deviants had the advantage over humans in terms of individual strength.

Although the ones seated here were elites of the united army—in particular, the battalions led by Kurt and the others were renowned aces—a gap of 100,000 troops was too big to bridge.

This wasn’t enough to shake the fighting will of those in the room, though it did weigh down the atmosphere before the briefing. Severe looks could be seen on the faces around.

“Are there any updates from the Austine Empire?”

“I didn’t receive any news, but those two in there should know more.”

Geralt glanced at the tent behind the meeting room. Stuart did the same.

The two of them then exchanged glances, as they prayed that the two women leading the operation could bring them some good news.

…