The Record of Unusual Creatures

A blinding crystal shell ripped through the air in a parabolic curve as it slammed against the city’s defensive barrier. The chaotic energies released when the shell was activated caused a chain of explosions on the barrier. With powerful magic interrupting each other and resonating, the sturdy barrier was slowly showing signs of crystallization as it was gradually being overwhelmed by gray noise.

Once the gray noise exceeded its limit, the energy barrier of Eagle City dissipated into shimmering light without a sound. This militarized satellite city in the heart of the empire was finally breached.

“The ‘Pholos’ Great Bombards have completed their salvo. Entering cool down!”

“The enemy’s barrier has disintegrated. The city gates have fallen!”

“Watch out for the rapid-fire cannons and lightning crystal chains. Spellbreaker company, interrupt their defensive fortifications. Broken Blades, attack!”

“The flanks have reached firing position… They are bombarding the walls!”

Smoke and debris covered the entire battlefield, as the massive explosions from the great bombards and the strategic level magic churned the land with violent and dangerous magic. And the uncontrolled magic converged as the battle progressed, forming wandering arcane monsters, and yet these monsters were soon drained by the sealing amulets of the warriors and perished, becoming another cog in reigniting the flames of war.

In the scorching battlefield, there were bodies everywhere, as the putrid smell from the distorted and rotten flesh filled the air as they burnt, and most of the corpses were the mutated monsters.

“Haaahhh!!” With a thunderous roar, a guardian giant raised his arms and hurled powerfully forward, and a streak of lightning was thrown out from his palms. This was far beyond the ‘lightning arrows’ cast by human mages, it was true lightning, even more powerful than the ones found in nature. It bolted across the entire battlefield and blew a part of the walls away as the hundreds of the anti-magic runic bricks glittered for a split second before disintegrating with the wall.

More and more guardians started to make for the city, and behind them were the advancing Knights of the Broken Blade and the Army of the North.

More and more monsters came surging out from the gaps in the walls, the broken gate, and the cracks on the ground.

Some of the monsters still bore the armor they had worn while they were still human, but some had bloated so much that their armors were folded into their own bodies. Parts of the monsters were destroyed by the bombards and the guardian’s magical attacks, but quite a number survived by sheer vitality, as they roared maniacally, letting out blasphemous sounds that would drive normal people insane, they quickly formed into formation and charged towards the guardians and the Army of the North.

“For Mother!” The commander of the giants yelled furiously as he saw the blasphemous monsters, “For all life!”

While the monsters of madness were powerful, before the guardian’s overwhelming strength, these regressed monsters soon buckled, and in this head-on battle, their numbers were being reduced rapidly.

Constance swung her sword, and as bright lightning coiled around her blade, and she diced a charging monster, probably a former high ranking Ebon Blade into cubes, and the black smog and fragments splattered against her armor.

She had returned to her original body, the one with the same face as ‘Ginnie’, but with a black long hair.

And behind her, was about a dozen female knights, and they wore a feminine armor with faces the same as her, the only difference was that they all had silver hair, just like Ginnie.

They were all Constance’s clones, and at the same time conduits of her consciousness, they will fight alongside Constance, and think alongside her, almost as if they were extensions of the Dragonsoul Princess.

As she heard the giant’s roar, Constance could not help but turn back to look Rheia who was walking leisurely as if she was in a garden, “They kept shouting ‘For Mother!’ everything they get into combat… Is this the religion of the Basilica of the World Tree? Do you worship a god with a maternal trait?”

Rheia was stunned for a bit as she heard that, as an imperceptible awkwardness appeared on her face. She then shook her head. “That’s not faith, it’s their real mother… it is their tradition to revere their mother…”

“Really? Then their mother must be a giantess as strong as them,” Constance turned back to look at the guardians who were dismantling the defenses of Eagle City, and lamented, “It is really all thanks to them.”

Rheia looked a little slumped, before she gripped her fist tightly, “Yes, their mother will grow up one day…”

Constance did not hear that. “I’m sorry, you were saying?”

“Ugh, nothing. Nothing.”Rheia shook her head as she shifted the topic. “The city is about to fall.”

“Yes, but we have no idea how many survived…” Constance sighed softly, “It was nothing but corruption all the way here…”

And finally, the last of the resistance of Eagle City was vanquished.

The flesh behemoth that seemed like it was stitched by countless of limbs with tentacles swarming on its back was literally bludgeoned to death by the guardians and swiftly reduced into black mist under Rheia’s gaze. And as the last monster died, the city closest to the imperial capital finally fell into the hands of the Army of the North.

Constance, Rheia, and Duke Owen walked on the streets after the battle.

The place could no longer be called a street… It was a mess of ruins and rubble lined alongside a road.

The taint had exploded and spread across the entire heartland seemingly within a night due to the Mad Lord’s unique ability to spread its taint via the dream, and as negative emotions like fear grew stronger. Plus, its ability to corrupt everything the moment it appeared was a literal disaster for any populated areas.

The Knights of the Ebon Blade were spread across the entire empire, and particularly so in the central heartlands, and almost every town had Ebon Knight encampments. Thus, the moment the War of the Turn of the Eras started, the moment Berentine and his Ebon Blades were chosen as the conduit of Annihilation, the knights became the innumerable vector.

The knights and their squires infected the entire land in a short span of time. The soldiers of the imperial army were the first to be infected, then the commoners in the town and cities, then the town and cities itself.

The Army of the North had advanced rapidly, and with the guardian’s support, their advance was unstoppable. They had managed to save many uninfected civilians and imperial soldiers, but compared to the damage caused by the outbreak of the Mad Lord’s powers, this was but a mere fraction.

And as they approached the imperial capital, the corruption was more deep-rooted, and the number of rescues dwindled drastically.

Constance looked at the ruined walls by the side of the road, and the rotten as well as festering flesh that was burning in the ruins of the city as they were reduced into black smoke in the air. Even the bricks corrupted by the evil taint were slowly disintegrating, and this ancient and proud city was reduced to part of history.

The bodies of a number of civilians were pulled out from the basements by the soldiers of the north, their deaths were brutal, and while they had managed to retain their human form, there were signs of mutation.

A silver-haired clone was commanding the soldiers as they moved the bodies. “Burn their bodies. Send them off while they are still human.”

Constance sighed as she turned into another direction of the street. And at that moment, a soldier from the north ran over. “Survivors! We have found survivors!”

Constance soon arrived at the place where survivors were found.

They were hiding in a rather remote church… It was the local church, and there were many such churches across the empire. Even though the emperor himself did not propagate any religion, the commoners had a need for faith and so all sorts of churches were commonplace in the big cities. The church had almost fully collapsed, as part of its surface structure were turned into the lair of the monsters. After it was leveled in the battle, there was a large and sturdy underground basement where a small group of survivors hid inside as they lived through literal hell.

There were people of all ages and gender, and they were all starving, afraid and weak. The long isolation had them reeking of odor.

Constance noticed that one of the survivors were wearing an imperial uniform. A rank and file uniform of the imperial army.

“Give them food and water, and bring a physician over,” Constance said as she looked at the fearful, trembling survivors, she then turned towards one of the clones and purposely raised her voice, to calm the survivors down. “Send someone to watch them eat. Don’t let them choke themselves to death.”

After that, she let out a sigh of relief, as she whispered to Duke Owen. “A miracle.”

“Indeed, I never thought anyone was alive. I had assumed that for a place so close to the capital, everything would have been corrupted.”

Once they had a good portion of food and water, the feeble survivors were in better spirits now.

Constance came before the imperial soldier and bent down. “You’re a soldier. You should know more than others.”

“I was the one who organized the escape into the basement.” The imperial soldier recognized Constance and was slightly fearful, but as he stood up to bow he was pushed back down by the latter. “I… Thank you, Your Imperial Highness, I already know that your cause is just. Those… Those Ebon Blades, and my officers had all turned into monsters, are you here to save us?”

“Not only to save you.” Constance shook her head. “How did you survive? The entire city had already been engulfed by the aura of Annihilation, and even if the monsters did not find you, their aura had not extended into the basement?”

The soldier opened his mouth, but before he could even speak, an old granny beside him spoke first, “It’s the blessing of the gods, Your Imperial Highness. It must have been the god of dawn, Lamar and the god of dusk, Sur protecting us. This church is the key to save the w….”

It was clear that the god of dawn and the god of dusk were they key pantheons worshiped by this church, and the old granny was probably one of the adherents here, but the moment Constance heard that she stared coldly at the lady, “The gods will not save you, the gods will not do anything. Only man can save this world.”

Rheia pondered for a bit and decided to look down and play with her fingers, pretending that she heard nothing.