"The battle of traitors" or "The meaningless battle," no matter what later generations thought of this battle, the long battle that went from autumn to winter in the year of the Griffin was destined to leave its mark on the history books. As the grand opening of a yet another countless new Holy War, this battle’s influence would last dozens, hundreds, even thousands of years.
The Elven Gods’ plan met with a hard wall immediately, the beastmen’s southern invasion would have to wait for the next Holy War, and due to a certain person’s plotting, taking advantage of their weakness, that person was able to plant visitors from the underground in both the elf and beastmen territories.
When the aftermath from this battle settled down, the underground lords would establish several dozens of satellite cities in these two areas, which would become the representative cities of the underground in the aboveground world. Of course, there were plenty of dark elves living in these cities, and no matter if they wanted to or not, they would become a buffer zone between the Sleuweir Kingdom and the elven kingdoms.
Of course, considering that Annie, Centaur Anya, Little Red and various other factions had all already applied to join the Mist Alliance, this could be said to be a new series of military outposts for the newly established Mist Alliance.
As for the terrible natural environment where they were now living? To be honest, it wasn’t much different from the underground. As long as they made preparations beforehand, in addition to having the new Mist Alliance’s full support, the underground residents had full confidence in creating new livable cities in this frigid land.
And taking the Tassel elves that might want to return to their homeland into consideration, I also had the underground residents leave a sufficiently large piece of land that included Tassel’s capital of Tassel City for the elves, so that they could still have a small piece of homeland to return to.
Of course, if my plan was entirely successful, then the gray elves that had a nice life in East Mist wouldn’t even want to return to the even further north where it was now snow and ice year-round and even more desolate.
And as for the beastmen from the plateaus, they would seem difficult to deal with, but due to the serious losses taken by the beastmen and an ancient custom of theirs, it was actually quite easy.
"When a tribe suffers serious losses, the tribe shall join a stronger tribe (and be annexed into it) in order to ensure the survival of the tribe."
And when the plateau beastmen who suffered losses to the point where not a single family was left with zero losses saw the strong and fresh underground beastmen moving in large numbers to their territory, they were completely unable to stop the underground beastmen. No, I should correct myself by saying that they were delighted to see themselves being annexed, as they lacked male beastmen and numerous resources after losing the battle to such a degree.
"If hatred is a dark ink that’s impossible to whiten, then just mix it with a large amount of clear water in order to dilute it. Even if pain is something that’s difficult to bear, time can lessen everything."
Perhaps the merging of the underground and plateau beastmen would require several dozens of or even several hundreds of years, but when the underground beastmen annexed this wild area that would always bring war, according to my agreement with the underground beastmen, both the plateau and underground beastmen became a part of the new Mist Alliance.
Of course, merging and getting along with each other was always a mutual effort. In order to avoid getting into another cycle of war with the beastmen, I would also inject other species’ members into this area, in order to dilute the one-species makeup of this area and make it into a balance between various species.
This may seem like an underhanded move by me, but it was also the only marvelous move that would truly break the cycle of battles between us and the beastmen where the beastmen would have a large southern invasion every few decades, even if I might never see the effects of this move of mine in my lifetime.
"…War is bad, but if war really does break out, then at the very least I need to grab the opportunity to change something, such as completely eliminating the foundational reason for having the next war."
And so, this was what I said next.
"Beastmen countries? Elf countries? Hey hey hey, why do we need to make such distinctions? From today on, in every single member country of the Mist Alliance, all borders will be eliminated between us, and only the simplest of procedures will be required for anyone to go as they please in this entire area for either traveling or moving.
This was doubtlessly a groundbreaking proposal for this feudal generation where land was at the center of everything, and population was considered an important resource. Every lord had their own system for managing their citizens and census; allowing the citizens to move and go as they pleased within this entire area was basically unheard of.
Just this suggestion that went against the times caused an uproar and even fierce opposition from the member countries of the Mist Alliance, and the Rhodes Kongdom that had already agreed to join the Mist Alliance was even now intentionally slowing down the process of officially joining us, thinking about backing out.
"I object, if we give them freedom, those bastard citizens would just all run off, and nobody would plant crops in the fields! Then our territories would become desolate and useless. This definitely can’t be allowed!"
"That’s because you’re far too harsh on your ordinary citizens, which is the only reason you’d be worried that they’d all leave. I feel that this is an excellent suggestion. Under this system, territories under wise and well-reputed lords will only flourish more and more, while unjust lords like you will be much worse off!"
"…There’s more to it that you’re not seeing. This old one and my ancestors have all been making such a great effort, but my territory naturally has a hostile terrain that’s impossible to improve. If a large amount of my citizens run off, this old one would be too ashamed to face my ancestors."
Considering that East Mist’s reputation was quite high and that Sleuweir was currently undergoing reconstruction during its weak period, I believed that I could borrow the renown gained from the battle to forcefully push through this idea of mine, but due to the forceful opposition from all the other local countries’ leaders, I was unable to pass it in the end.
Well, since free movement between all countries of the Mist Alliance was no longer a possibility, I tried for the next best thing, and passed through a movement policy between countries. Of course, the procedures required would be incredibly complex, and the number of people allotted for moving was also quite limited in number. But if someone chose either the beastmen or the elves’ territory, there were no limits, and that person would even receive a large number of benefits for free.
"…I had wanted to truly unify the Mist Alliance, and completely eliminate racial prejudices within the Mist Alliance, so this freedom of movement which is a representation of a peaceful age is something I absolutely have to realize. It seemed that I underestimated the old stubborn fools of this generation’s adherence to their outdated ideals. In that case, I’ll just bide my time, if this generation is no good, then I’ll wait for the second, if the second’s still no good, how about the fourth or the fifth? Then from today on, I’m also going to use the Church of Law to deal with those that are a bit overboard."
My goal had never changed. I wanted to have Sulfur Mountain City’s flourishment be reenacted aboveground, to have taurens and Holy Knights drink together in bars, to have "evil" dark elves also able to have holy jobs, to have everyone live in a way that wasn’t simply because of what species they belonged to, to live instead in a country where they would be judged by their personal qualities rather than their species. This was my dream, my wonderful dream that I had for half my life already.
"In order to have all the species live together under a blue sky, the first thing I need to do is to make them see their new neighbors without bias."
Only by accomplishing this would I be able to truly destroy this so-called concept known as a Holy War. Otherwise, the loser species from this time would always come back again in the future, and nobody would ever win unless they exterminated an entire race… was that possible? It was never possible to kill off an entire species! Hatred would only create new chains, and the snowball effect of battle would only keep increasing. What awaited in the end could only be total destruction with no winners on either side.
"True peace can’t be accomplished without thousands of years of accumulated buildup. In that case, while I’m still alive, at the very least I can go for peace on the surface…"
I had already created a standard (known as law) for judging people individually. The next step was to improve the relationship between all the species, letting them personally witness that their neighbors weren’t born evil, that their neighbors didn’t need to drink blood and eat human meat every day.
Bias was always born out of a combination of a sense of distance, feeling foreign, and fear. Many countries also used the popular and effective method of demonizing neighboring countries or other species in order to turn attention away from internal disagreements. Not to mention that there would always be those with no sense of morality whatsoever spreading false rumors to incite others, so there were always those that believed other species ate humans for food. It was only natural that there would be biases.
With all these stories and rumors combined, in most people’s eyes, beastmen were human-eating wild animals, the Shawen halfbloods were demons who were humans by day and beasts at night, and the northern barbarians were an undeveloped tribe who couldn’t even speak clearly. As for our People of the Mist, in the eyes of those major human countries in the central plains, we were also no better than a bunch of poor barbarians that lacked culture.
Just as how rumors would always become more ridiculous as they spread, people that were biased would always become more and more biased, and bias would further increase the conflicts between species, with even a small incident becoming a huge one.
And once a conflict intensified, then it would be time for "glorious achievements for the country" and "slaying demons and beasts" in war. Those executioners that invaded other countries to kill the females and young would be decorated into Epic heroes… the Mist Kingdom from long ago had collapsed just like this. In the overarching human society, since it was different from all the other human kingdoms, it was viewed with bias, and under the incitement of false tales, the neighboring countries treated the Mist Kingdom as the reason that they were financially poor, and in the end that battle that shouldn’t have happened to begin with ended up happening explosively.
"Increased communication and improved relationships are the only things that can eliminate bias. They were the foundation that allowed for the miracle of many species living together peacefully in Sulfur Mountain City to occur. Pushing forward such a system is the most important thing right now. On this alone, I’ll never back down!"
Sulfur Mountain City was a small-scale experiment for my utopia. Now that I already knew it could work and what was needed for my goal, how could I possibly give up?
Perhaps I could compromise on other topics, but on this one, I would never, ever back down!
Those lords’ objections? Heh heh, that was never a problem to begin with. Maybe I was acting too kindly these days, so that they’d all forgotten what I’d done in the past. Since I’d already transformed into an evil demon before, who cares if I have to be demonized again? As long as the result was good in the end, I was never one who minded dirtying my hands.
"…Elisa, the new ‘Observers’ squad has been successfully created already, right? Here’s your first mission, give me a list of all those who opposed me on this topic, no, add even those that were neutral to the list. On this issue, I won’t permit sitting on the fence."
"…Do we need to directly eliminate those people?"
"No, collect evidence of their crimes. I’m convinced that all these lords are probably guilty of some crimes. Don’t let them find out what you’re doing, these lords are all very cautious about such things…"
"Then, we’re only to collect evidence on their crimes, and have the old fellows in the courts come out and get some exercise?"
"Yes, make your preparations as thoroughly as possible, and we’re going to eliminate all of them in one fell swoop. As for the date, let’s make it today, two years from now. We have plenty of patience. This will even help to increase the Church of Law’s reputation as well as bring in funds for the national treasury when we confiscate those lords’ funds."
"What if there’s a family among them that’s as crime-free as an angel? That’s not completely impossible."
"This isn’t your first day on the job with me, do I still need to waste words…"
"I was just confirming whether or not you were still the same boss that I knew. Perhaps a relaxing life has changed your, or perhaps the beauty under the sunshine has caused you to stray away from the darkness."
Did this require any hesitation? I would still make the same decision. Afraid of getting my hands dirty? I think they’d never even been clean to begin with.
"If there’s any among them that are truly as pure as an angel, I’ll give that person another chance to choose. If they still decide to stand against me and be an obstacle to realizing my plan, heh, then let that person go become a real angel in the heavens."
Elisa faded into the shadows, leaving only the echo of her sentence behind.
"Your wish is our command."
---------
Sandstorms were everywhere, and the skies were filled with floating gigantic rocks, but the most difficult part to accept of all was that everything here was black and white, entirely colorless.
The monochrome black and white was psychologically difficult to adapt to, as looking at it for just a moment could cause dizziness and discomfort, not to mention the sand that everyone kept inhaling due to the fierce winds made it difficult to breathe.
The mountains in the distance were slowly moving, and those tall peaks were hidden in the clouds, but when assisted by binoculars, one could discover that those were only stone giants and beasts that appeared like mountains. They were simply so large that their upper halves couldn’t even be seen through the clouds and floating islands.
This was obviously no place suitable for living in, as this was the Earth Elemental Plane!
On a certain floating island here, a group of visitors that had just arrived here were beginning to set up camp.
And as for me, as I felt the tremendous will of the earth in the distance, I smiled in satisfaction.
"Little bro Emordilorcan, I wonder how you’re recuperating from your injuries, I’m here to see how you’re doing."
I could sense that somewhere deep within the core of the earth, that familiar Earth Elemental God was in a deep sleep. Perhaps he would be astonished to find us here when he woke up.
"You want to just run away after antagonizing me? Hmph, don’t even dream about it!"
I had wanted to say a few more fighting words to look cool, but behind me were numerous complaints already.
"Roland! Stop smiling so foolishly, hurry up and come help us set up the tents!" Adam seemed to be in a bad mood, probably because he realized that he would be sent to the frontlines again as a meat shield.
"Yeah, stop lazing around. Do you think that standing on that rock and talking to yourself means that you don’t need to work? Hurry up and come help us already."
Alright, my motive in pretending to make exclamations while standing here was seen through, and under the watchful angry gaze of everyone else, I obediently started helping out.
Camping out in such an environment was obviously no easy task. Those dimensional gnome merchants sold us tents that were obviously fake products. Not even bringing up the fact that the tents couldn’t even stand up properly, the "anti-sand enchantments" on them were nothing but a joke, as the endless amount of sand blown by the wind ended up burying the tents before long. And so, after a short discussion, we decided to just dig some holes in the ground as our temporary quarters.
"If we don’t eliminate the problem at the root, it’ll just come back for us again. Everyone’s seen Emordilorcan’s hatred and desire for revenge from last time, and his final revenge against us viciously hit us where we were weakest, almost causing our defeat. Such a guy will definitely take revenge on us again someday, and if he gives it his all and causes some major earthquakes in Antuen or a fissure to run through Diffindor, then we’d suffer major losses. It’s best to beat him while he’s down!"
I was no fool that would only passively react to threats. Since Emordilorcan had both the ability and motive to threaten us, and he might come out again at any time for revenge, it was only naturally that I would want the advantage by making the first move. However, he was quite strong, and he would only be stronger in the Earth Elemental Plane, so without sufficient strength behind me as backup, attacking him here would be no different from suicide.
And so, I sent out an invitation letter, but there was no response for a long time.
Two weeks ago, that familiar "friend" finally agreed to my invitation, but he brought along an unexpected guest.
The guest was an ethereal shadow that seemed to fluctuate between solidity and transparence, and when she took off her hat, I saw a blue-haired elven maiden.
Her silky sleek long hair reached all the way to the ground, and her crystal-like eyes seemed to be smiling warmly. Her beautiful face that I didn’t recognize was smiling at me as well, but her waves of divine power that were like water ripples were quite familiar to me. After only a short moment of surprise, I sucked in a breath of cold air.
"Alice? The Water Elemental Goddess?"
"The battle of traitors" or "The meaningless battle," no matter what later generations thought of this battle, the long battle that went from autumn to winter in the year of the Griffin was destined to leave its mark on the history books. As the grand opening of a yet another countless new Holy War, this battle’s influence would last dozens, hundreds, even thousands of years.
The Elven Gods’ plan met with a hard wall immediately, the beastmen’s southern invasion would have to wait for the next Holy War, and due to a certain person’s plotting, taking advantage of their weakness, that person was able to plant visitors from the underground in both the elf and beastmen territories.
When the aftermath from this battle settled down, the underground lords would establish several dozens of satellite cities in these two areas, which would become the representative cities of the underground in the aboveground world. Of course, there were plenty of dark elves living in these cities, and no matter if they wanted to or not, they would become a buffer zone between the Sleuweir Kingdom and the elven kingdoms.
Of course, considering that Annie, Centaur Anya, Little Red and various other factions had all already applied to join the Mist Alliance, this could be said to be a new series of military outposts for the newly established Mist Alliance.
As for the terrible natural environment where they were now living? To be honest, it wasn’t much different from the underground. As long as they made preparations beforehand, in addition to having the new Mist Alliance’s full support, the underground residents had full confidence in creating new livable cities in this frigid land.
And taking the Tassel elves that might want to return to their homeland into consideration, I also had the underground residents leave a sufficiently large piece of land that included Tassel’s capital of Tassel City for the elves, so that they could still have a small piece of homeland to return to.
Of course, if my plan was entirely successful, then the gray elves that had a nice life in East Mist wouldn’t even want to return to the even further north where it was now snow and ice year-round and even more desolate.
And as for the beastmen from the plateaus, they would seem difficult to deal with, but due to the serious losses taken by the beastmen and an ancient custom of theirs, it was actually quite easy.
"When a tribe suffers serious losses, the tribe shall join a stronger tribe (and be annexed into it) in order to ensure the survival of the tribe."
And when the plateau beastmen who suffered losses to the point where not a single family was left with zero losses saw the strong and fresh underground beastmen moving in large numbers to their territory, they were completely unable to stop the underground beastmen. No, I should correct myself by saying that they were delighted to see themselves being annexed, as they lacked male beastmen and numerous resources after losing the battle to such a degree.
"If hatred is a dark ink that’s impossible to whiten, then just mix it with a large amount of clear water in order to dilute it. Even if pain is something that’s difficult to bear, time can lessen everything."
Perhaps the merging of the underground and plateau beastmen would require several dozens of or even several hundreds of years, but when the underground beastmen annexed this wild area that would always bring war, according to my agreement with the underground beastmen, both the plateau and underground beastmen became a part of the new Mist Alliance.
Of course, merging and getting along with each other was always a mutual effort. In order to avoid getting into another cycle of war with the beastmen, I would also inject other species’ members into this area, in order to dilute the one-species makeup of this area and make it into a balance between various species.
This may seem like an underhanded move by me, but it was also the only marvelous move that would truly break the cycle of battles between us and the beastmen where the beastmen would have a large southern invasion every few decades, even if I might never see the effects of this move of mine in my lifetime.
"…War is bad, but if war really does break out, then at the very least I need to grab the opportunity to change something, such as completely eliminating the foundational reason for having the next war."
And so, this was what I said next.
"Beastmen countries? Elf countries? Hey hey hey, why do we need to make such distinctions? From today on, in every single member country of the Mist Alliance, all borders will be eliminated between us, and only the simplest of procedures will be required for anyone to go as they please in this entire area for either traveling or moving.
This was doubtlessly a groundbreaking proposal for this feudal generation where land was at the center of everything, and population was considered an important resource. Every lord had their own system for managing their citizens and census; allowing the citizens to move and go as they pleased within this entire area was basically unheard of.
Just this suggestion that went against the times caused an uproar and even fierce opposition from the member countries of the Mist Alliance, and the Rhodes Kongdom that had already agreed to join the Mist Alliance was even now intentionally slowing down the process of officially joining us, thinking about backing out.
"I object, if we give them freedom, those bastard citizens would just all run off, and nobody would plant crops in the fields! Then our territories would become desolate and useless. This definitely can’t be allowed!"
"That’s because you’re far too harsh on your ordinary citizens, which is the only reason you’d be worried that they’d all leave. I feel that this is an excellent suggestion. Under this system, territories under wise and well-reputed lords will only flourish more and more, while unjust lords like you will be much worse off!"
"…There’s more to it that you’re not seeing. This old one and my ancestors have all been making such a great effort, but my territory naturally has a hostile terrain that’s impossible to improve. If a large amount of my citizens run off, this old one would be too ashamed to face my ancestors."
Considering that East Mist’s reputation was quite high and that Sleuweir was currently undergoing reconstruction during its weak period, I believed that I could borrow the renown gained from the battle to forcefully push through this idea of mine, but due to the forceful opposition from all the other local countries’ leaders, I was unable to pass it in the end.
Well, since free movement between all countries of the Mist Alliance was no longer a possibility, I tried for the next best thing, and passed through a movement policy between countries. Of course, the procedures required would be incredibly complex, and the number of people allotted for moving was also quite limited in number. But if someone chose either the beastmen or the elves’ territory, there were no limits, and that person would even receive a large number of benefits for free.
"…I had wanted to truly unify the Mist Alliance, and completely eliminate racial prejudices within the Mist Alliance, so this freedom of movement which is a representation of a peaceful age is something I absolutely have to realize. It seemed that I underestimated the old stubborn fools of this generation’s adherence to their outdated ideals. In that case, I’ll just bide my time, if this generation is no good, then I’ll wait for the second, if the second’s still no good, how about the fourth or the fifth? Then from today on, I’m also going to use the Church of Law to deal with those that are a bit overboard."
My goal had never changed. I wanted to have Sulfur Mountain City’s flourishment be reenacted aboveground, to have taurens and Holy Knights drink together in bars, to have "evil" dark elves also able to have holy jobs, to have everyone live in a way that wasn’t simply because of what species they belonged to, to live instead in a country where they would be judged by their personal qualities rather than their species. This was my dream, my wonderful dream that I had for half my life already.
"In order to have all the species live together under a blue sky, the first thing I need to do is to make them see their new neighbors without bias."
Only by accomplishing this would I be able to truly destroy this so-called concept known as a Holy War. Otherwise, the loser species from this time would always come back again in the future, and nobody would ever win unless they exterminated an entire race… was that possible? It was never possible to kill off an entire species! Hatred would only create new chains, and the snowball effect of battle would only keep increasing. What awaited in the end could only be total destruction with no winners on either side.
"True peace can’t be accomplished without thousands of years of accumulated buildup. In that case, while I’m still alive, at the very least I can go for peace on the surface…"
I had already created a standard (known as law) for judging people individually. The next step was to improve the relationship between all the species, letting them personally witness that their neighbors weren’t born evil, that their neighbors didn’t need to drink blood and eat human meat every day.
Bias was always born out of a combination of a sense of distance, feeling foreign, and fear. Many countries also used the popular and effective method of demonizing neighboring countries or other species in order to turn attention away from internal disagreements. Not to mention that there would always be those with no sense of morality whatsoever spreading false rumors to incite others, so there were always those that believed other species ate humans for food. It was only natural that there would be biases.
With all these stories and rumors combined, in most people’s eyes, beastmen were human-eating wild animals, the Shawen halfbloods were demons who were humans by day and beasts at night, and the northern barbarians were an undeveloped tribe who couldn’t even speak clearly. As for our People of the Mist, in the eyes of those major human countries in the central plains, we were also no better than a bunch of poor barbarians that lacked culture.
Just as how rumors would always become more ridiculous as they spread, people that were biased would always become more and more biased, and bias would further increase the conflicts between species, with even a small incident becoming a huge one.
And once a conflict intensified, then it would be time for "glorious achievements for the country" and "slaying demons and beasts" in war. Those executioners that invaded other countries to kill the females and young would be decorated into Epic heroes… the Mist Kingdom from long ago had collapsed just like this. In the overarching human society, since it was different from all the other human kingdoms, it was viewed with bias, and under the incitement of false tales, the neighboring countries treated the Mist Kingdom as the reason that they were financially poor, and in the end that battle that shouldn’t have happened to begin with ended up happening explosively.
"Increased communication and improved relationships are the only things that can eliminate bias. They were the foundation that allowed for the miracle of many species living together peacefully in Sulfur Mountain City to occur. Pushing forward such a system is the most important thing right now. On this alone, I’ll never back down!"
Sulfur Mountain City was a small-scale experiment for my utopia. Now that I already knew it could work and what was needed for my goal, how could I possibly give up?
Perhaps I could compromise on other topics, but on this one, I would never, ever back down!
Those lords’ objections? Heh heh, that was never a problem to begin with. Maybe I was acting too kindly these days, so that they’d all forgotten what I’d done in the past. Since I’d already transformed into an evil demon before, who cares if I have to be demonized again? As long as the result was good in the end, I was never one who minded dirtying my hands.
"…Elisa, the new ‘Observers’ squad has been successfully created already, right? Here’s your first mission, give me a list of all those who opposed me on this topic, no, add even those that were neutral to the list. On this issue, I won’t permit sitting on the fence."
"…Do we need to directly eliminate those people?"
"No, collect evidence of their crimes. I’m convinced that all these lords are probably guilty of some crimes. Don’t let them find out what you’re doing, these lords are all very cautious about such things…"
"Then, we’re only to collect evidence on their crimes, and have the old fellows in the courts come out and get some exercise?"
"Yes, make your preparations as thoroughly as possible, and we’re going to eliminate all of them in one fell swoop. As for the date, let’s make it today, two years from now. We have plenty of patience. This will even help to increase the Church of Law’s reputation as well as bring in funds for the national treasury when we confiscate those lords’ funds."
"What if there’s a family among them that’s as crime-free as an angel? That’s not completely impossible."
"This isn’t your first day on the job with me, do I still need to waste words…"
"I was just confirming whether or not you were still the same boss that I knew. Perhaps a relaxing life has changed your, or perhaps the beauty under the sunshine has caused you to stray away from the darkness."
Did this require any hesitation? I would still make the same decision. Afraid of getting my hands dirty? I think they’d never even been clean to begin with.
"If there’s any among them that are truly as pure as an angel, I’ll give that person another chance to choose. If they still decide to stand against me and be an obstacle to realizing my plan, heh, then let that person go become a real angel in the heavens."
Elisa faded into the shadows, leaving only the echo of her sentence behind.
"Your wish is our command."
---------
Sandstorms were everywhere, and the skies were filled with floating gigantic rocks, but the most difficult part to accept of all was that everything here was black and white, entirely colorless.
The monochrome black and white was psychologically difficult to adapt to, as looking at it for just a moment could cause dizziness and discomfort, not to mention the sand that everyone kept inhaling due to the fierce winds made it difficult to breathe.
The mountains in the distance were slowly moving, and those tall peaks were hidden in the clouds, but when assisted by binoculars, one could discover that those were only stone giants and beasts that appeared like mountains. They were simply so large that their upper halves couldn’t even be seen through the clouds and floating islands.
This was obviously no place suitable for living in, as this was the Earth Elemental Plane!
On a certain floating island here, a group of visitors that had just arrived here were beginning to set up camp.
And as for me, as I felt the tremendous will of the earth in the distance, I smiled in satisfaction.
"Little bro Emordilorcan, I wonder how you’re recuperating from your injuries, I’m here to see how you’re doing."
I could sense that somewhere deep within the core of the earth, that familiar Earth Elemental God was in a deep sleep. Perhaps he would be astonished to find us here when he woke up.
"You want to just run away after antagonizing me? Hmph, don’t even dream about it!"
I had wanted to say a few more fighting words to look cool, but behind me were numerous complaints already.
"Roland! Stop smiling so foolishly, hurry up and come help us set up the tents!" Adam seemed to be in a bad mood, probably because he realized that he would be sent to the frontlines again as a meat shield.
"Yeah, stop lazing around. Do you think that standing on that rock and talking to yourself means that you don’t need to work? Hurry up and come help us already."
Alright, my motive in pretending to make exclamations while standing here was seen through, and under the watchful angry gaze of everyone else, I obediently started helping out.
Camping out in such an environment was obviously no easy task. Those dimensional gnome merchants sold us tents that were obviously fake products. Not even bringing up the fact that the tents couldn’t even stand up properly, the "anti-sand enchantments" on them were nothing but a joke, as the endless amount of sand blown by the wind ended up burying the tents before long. And so, after a short discussion, we decided to just dig some holes in the ground as our temporary quarters.
"If we don’t eliminate the problem at the root, it’ll just come back for us again. Everyone’s seen Emordilorcan’s hatred and desire for revenge from last time, and his final revenge against us viciously hit us where we were weakest, almost causing our defeat. Such a guy will definitely take revenge on us again someday, and if he gives it his all and causes some major earthquakes in Antuen or a fissure to run through Diffindor, then we’d suffer major losses. It’s best to beat him while he’s down!"
I was no fool that would only passively react to threats. Since Emordilorcan had both the ability and motive to threaten us, and he might come out again at any time for revenge, it was only naturally that I would want the advantage by making the first move. However, he was quite strong, and he would only be stronger in the Earth Elemental Plane, so without sufficient strength behind me as backup, attacking him here would be no different from suicide.
And so, I sent out an invitation letter, but there was no response for a long time.
Two weeks ago, that familiar "friend" finally agreed to my invitation, but he brought along an unexpected guest.
The guest was an ethereal shadow that seemed to fluctuate between solidity and transparence, and when she took off her hat, I saw a blue-haired elven maiden.
Her silky sleek long hair reached all the way to the ground, and her crystal-like eyes seemed to be smiling warmly. Her beautiful face that I didn’t recognize was smiling at me as well, but her waves of divine power that were like water ripples were quite familiar to me. After only a short moment of surprise, I sucked in a breath of cold air.
"Alice? The Water Elemental Goddess?"
