Badge in Azure

Rafel thrust about with her spear, killing three sorcerers cleanly. The level difference was just too great. Compared to Saleen’s speed, all those sorcerers were moving so slow that they might have as well been crawling.

Rafel would have been able to punch a hole in Saleen while he was moving at full speed. Those sorcerers were no brainers in comparison.

But then again, if she were to actually thrust at Saleen, she would have had to deal with his very, very potent Crystal Finger. Saleen still had the Figure of Fate after all. Even if she were to lodge her spear into him, he still would have had time to blow her brains apart.

Furthermore, Saleen’s Crystal Finger was a skill devised specifically to deal with the gods. No divine arts would have been able to patch up a wound dealt using the Crystal Finger, and the wound would not have healed as well. A injury caused by the Crystal Finger would have stayed permanent.

The three sorcerers expected to encounter a god-killer. Their heads were cracked apart by the spear and their souls shattered right there and then. The divine power on the spear was not something sorcerers at such levels would have been able to deal with.

After she dealt with the three sorcerers, Rafel took away their space equipment along the way. Even if they were to be empty, the space equipment themselves would have been worth over 10000 gold coins. Better ones would have been worth over 100 thousand gold coins instead.

That was because the crafting of space equipment was an especially troublesome process. Anyone who was able to craft space equipment without fuss would have been above level 15. Level ten mages needed to slowly craft magic arrays when they were crafting space equipment, and there were also errors to consider as well.

Rafel learned to do all that from Saleen. Despite being unimaginably rich, Saleen still nonetheless paid attention to small expenditure. Unless he was held back by time constraints, he would have went out of his way to even take 300 to 500 gold coins.

The upkeep of maintaining troops and mages was hefty after all.

The Violet Angel took the corpses of all three mages away. If they were to be permitted to drop to the ground, it would have alerted the enemy. The black mist was still floating in the air, covering a great area, isolating the place from any probing measures. Even powerful mages on the ground would have had a hard time seeing through the black mist.

A scroll that combined wind and dark magic was very rare. It was something that only places like Alchemy City and Metatrin City would have produced. There were simply too many mages in those two places. Peculiar scrolls of all kinds would have been made along the way when the mages were doing experiments.

The Violet Angel emerged from the black mist and sounded painful. Playing dead was not all that difficult for the puppet, but playing injured was even easier.

The Violet Angel wobbled about and dropped to the ground, crashing onto a hill with a loud boom.

Rafel emerged from the black mist and turned into a ball of light, striking down beside a huge tree like a bolt of lightning.

Tens of magic alarms blared in the mountains. Rafel chuckled. So the mages are indeed unable to hold back seeing a dragon around eh? There was not even a need for them to fight their way into the mages’ lair. They only needed to take a stroll around the entrance and leave, and that would have driven the mages crazy.

With the location of their lair exposed, Alchemy City would have needed to speed up. It would not have taken long for whatever they were planning to be seen by everyone.

Rafel was forcing their hand. The mages of Alchemy City would have known that they were rushing into things, but there was little that they were able to do nonetheless. Things would have turned even dire when Saleen showed up on their door otherwise.

Rafel was more than just a brute who knew nothing but fighting. She had once commanded over a million angels after all, making her tactical prowess on par with that of any general.

Rafel narrowed her eyes and peered at the mages rushing up the hill. Saleen was right after all. Any living being with desires are easy to deal with.

Tens of mages rushed up to the hill. The Violet Angel pretended as if it was injured. It flapped its wings about, swatting three away and causing their bones to break.

He was then held in place using Fossilization. More warriors showed up on the hill, tying the Violet Angel up using magic chains.

The Violet Angel felt very pleased that it was being tied up, thinking that it felt rather comfortable being in chains. There was no need for it to do battle anymore, as it would have only needed to wait for Rafel to rescue it.

Those magic chains were not much in the eyes of the Violet Angel. It would have shrugged free of their bonds just by returning to its original humanoid form. Those chains were not godly items like the Shackles of the Fallen. They were but level ten equipment crafted by mages.

The mages cast tens of Hover on the Violet Angel, and the puppet lightened its own body in secret to avoid causing trouble. The mages commanded the warriors to tether to the lightened Violet as they flew.

The Violet Angel roared about like it was moaning instead, which caused Rafel to feel disgusted. What the hell is wrong with the puppet?

In actual fact, the Violet Angel was actually roaring out in high and comfort, which the mages mistook for it taking damage so heavy that it was unable to use dragon’s might. Two of the mages cast Chunlin spell on it and another fed magic liquid into its mouth.

The Violet Angel only stopped moaning by then, as its cover would have been blown if it were to go overboard.

“A metal dragon. A rare find indeed!” One of the mages said excitedly.

“No wonder it has such a low count of mental powers and its dragon’s might so weak.”

“Yeah, I kind of wonder…”

The mages looked at each. While it was true that they had taken the dragon, they were wondering what would have been by the time anything remaining trickled down from the top. Alchemy City was different from what it used to be. All manner of powers were completely taken control by the Elemental Hand.

No money was needed to be paid when distribution of materials was concerned, but everyone got less than what they used to be getting.

The only way to acquire more benefit was to join the Elemental Hand, submitting themselves to the higher-ups.

The Violet Angel was being dragged about in flight. The effects of tens of Hover spells and the power that it used, enabled the mages to have an easy time hauling their find. They simply thought that the dragon had no anti-magic properties on it.

Furthermore, Hover was not some kind of attack magic. Such boost magic spells were usually less resisted by the dragons.

Rafel followed them to fly over the mountains and none of her enemies detected her. With her green spear in hand, Rafel melded with nature. The mages kept using Detection and yet they were unable to detect anything out of the ordinary.

A straight, tall mountains was seen before them, which had an eerie green color. If one were to look down from above, they would have only found that the colors of the mountain to be somewhat paler. It was something that was commonly seen in nature and it would not have drawn any attention.

Rafel lowered her altitude in flight and got near the mountain. She twisted her body about, letting the rays from concealed magic arrays to slide past her bodies’ distortion, preventing any magic alarm from being sounded.

Rafel sealed her powers until they were at level one in that instant.

It was an ability unique to combat angels and no other races would have been able to learn it. One could have damaged one’s body by sealing one’s own powers.

Generally-speaking, sealing one level away was of no consequence, but sealing over two levels away would have been akin to sustaining injuries in battle, and Rafel was suppressing her powers by 12 levels.

It was some measures that the mages would have found baffling. With the gods long gone, no one would have suspected that a level 13 angel was on their tails.

The tall mountain was hollowed out and the mages stationed within detected anomalies in the magic arrays, but deemed it to simply be caused by a common beast passing by. There were many beasts at the mountain and all of them would have at least been of level one magic beasts in terms of powers.

Rafel was concealing herself well, as the mage let her off after taking only one look.

The mages took the Violet Angel and continued flying forward, ramming straight at the moment. Mirages were seen wobbling about before both mages and dragon disappeared. The warriors took a detour around the peak and continued to fly in the valley.

Rafel thought for a bit and quickly realized that the warriors were not allowed to enter.

Rafel flashed about and dived into the mountain alongside the mages. The huge illusion was not a barrier, as no one would have created such a huge barrier to begin with, due to the massive magic nuclei consumption that would have been incurred.

Alchemy City did not have access to magic power furnace technology. The higher the quality of the barrier, the greater the magic nuclei consumption. But if that barrier were to be a low quality one, it would not have been of any use in terms of defense.

Many defensive facilities became limited due to factors involving magic nuclei, if they were to be done without use of magic power furnaces.

They were not in ancient times, where powerful magic beasts were easily found everywhere, and killing them would have easily yielded required magic nuclei.

Rafel saw a large gate after flying into the mountain. It was actually a portal, which measured to over 60 meters in width. Its true width would have probably been over 200 meters. Any living being other than giants would have been able to pass through such huge portals.

Rafel hesitated, as those mages were about to drag the Violet Angel into the portal.

If she were to follow them into the portal, her cover would have no doubt been blown. But if she were to stay outside, the Violet Angel would have been made a prisoner. Could that thing kill its way out?

The Violet Angel knew what it was getting into at the moment, it turned around to take one look at Rafel when it was being dragged into the portal. Its eyes were incredibly sad and resentful ones, as if it was expecting Rafel to save it.

Rafel actually felt some urge to just kill her way through the mages and take the Violet Angel away. But after seeing the disgusting eyes of the Violet Angel, she stopped hesitating, turning around and leaving the mountain altogether.

I can’t stand those eyes. Is that thing even a puppet?

Better to just head back and tell Saleen instead. Those mages would have needed to look into that thing after capturing it after all. They wouldn’t have thought of taking the Violet Angel apart within three to five days.

Some mages might have even tried to forge a contract with the Violet Angel. So long as the contract was not a soul bond, it would not have affected the Violet Angel’s original contract. Doing so would have enabled it to fool everyone around it for the time being.

The Violet Angel was thoroughly frightened after seeing Rafel leave. However, it was brought by the mages to another place after passing through the portal, and they were entirely cut off from the place they came from.

Rafel was careful not to trigger any magic arrays after she left. She only hastened after leaving the mountain’s vicinity, heading straight for Safilos’ territory.

The project at the seaside was already in full swing when Rafel returned to Safilos’ territory.

Huge metallic machines were installed in seawater and small puppets were laid out below, which were linked to the port directly.

Saleen had gotten very used to controlling those machines. He elaborated to Safilos as he worked. Those metal rails could have been used to install carriages that had magic power sources installed, allowing goods to be transported to the city.

Safilos asked a really funny question.

“Saleen, if that thing is really that economical in terms of fuel consumption, why haven’t the empire built a rail that was over 10000 kilometers long? If they were to use magic coaches for everywhere, transportation of army, food, weapons would have gotten a lot faster, making it far cheaper than keeping horses.”

“Your highness, there are many magic beasts in the world that like to chew on metal. If the rail were to be laid out at such lengths, the numbers on annual maintenance would have looked like monsters,” Saleen explained exasperatedly.

“How about setting up magic net around the rails then? If there were to be enchanters guarding the rails, it would have been easy to repel those special beasts then.”

Safilos’ comeback made Saleen think.

If things were to truly be laid out like Safilos put it, the entire world would have seen fundamental change in many ways. Common people would have been able to gain access to magic powers and the speed of transportation of goods would have been raised over 100 times faster.

There were many places that were forbidden to such projects pulled off due to geographical reasons, but there were definitely other places that would have allowed large cities to be built. Humans were ones a powerful race, but even then, they did not truly explored and exploited every inch of the mainland’s land.

Safilos’ words might have sounded ridiculous, but if one were to really think on it, one would have quickly found his ideas to be great ones.