189 Meeting The System Higher Ups
The fight was already equally matched from the start. As the enemy abandoned the advantage of the city walls and defences, they were in a tight spot after me joining the fight.
I started roaming around with my chariot, taking a wide circular path around the city walls. By doing this, I created a growing vacant area which prevented the enemy reinforcements from reaching the battle.
And at the same time I cut down the road of retreat for those bastards.
The fight continued for four straight hours. During which the death toll created by my private forces was already terrifying! Just during this fight I gained almost close to one million souls.
That was crazy!
I didn’t think that such a number was created by my forces alone. The system must have considered Wryly and his forces to be on my side and counted their death toll with mine.
Anyway I didn’t have any reason to object. More souls meant more gains for me.
“Bro, this fight was awesome!”
Just after the fight was over, I scattered my warriors and the useless illusionists to collect the dead elites of the drags and other races and bring them to me.
I wouldn’t let any spoils be left alone, especially if it was related to the filthy rich dragons.
At the same time, Wryly came onboard with a group of his elites. As for my own teammates, I sent them orders to let our forces take their loot from this fight.
One million dead was a great boost to any of them. I was sure after this battle, each one of them would be able to buy more supplies and might even show a few surprises.
“It was great,” I knew how high these berserkers value fighting.
“This city is really magnificent! How come they built it?” Wryly’s eyes shone over the heavily defended city. Of course he had to feel this way. After all, such a price was painful even for someone like him.
“They are dragons, they can do that,” I shrugged before adding, “now I have something to do. I’ll trouble brother Wryly to supervise over things here. Don’t forget bro, that drag archlord is coming here.”
“I know,” he said while his eyes flashed as if he recalled something, “by the way, my paragon says he didn’t deliver your message.”
“What?!” I looked at him in pure rage and deep surprise. How daring of that paragon to act this way! How naive of Wryly to deliver me his message as well!
“He says the safety of the lady comes first,” Wryly helplessly said, “I tried to convince him but… You know…”
“That’s insane!” I couldn’t control my rage as my body faintly trembled. I took in successive deep breaths while calculating things in my mind. “At least tell me you have eyes over him.”
“This…” he paused and from his silence I knew things were doomed to be ugly.
“Damn it!” I punched the side of my chariot, “how can your paragon be this shameless? Is he a coward?”
“Bro, please be more respectful to my paragon,” despite him knowing I was speaking logically here, Wryly couldn’t tolerate hearing my insults to his paragon.
“He should have acted over the greater good, not for his own sake!” I was still mad. Yet whatever I said or did wouldn’t change what happened.
“Alright, go and summon more forces here,” I waved to dismiss him, “the next fight is going to be bitter. Also spread out scouts on a wider scale. Last thing we want is to have that bastard raiding us without knowing about his approach.”
“I… Will do that,” Wryly couldn’t argue back against my words. He simply nodded and went off my sight while lowering his head.
I couldn’t believe that bastard! What? Was that human girl a piece of jade or a rare beauty to charm him? Don’t tell me she was even prettier than those succubus girls!
I sent more instructions to everyone. I trusted Wryly I knew, but I didn’t trust his paragon. A man who wouldn’t dare to make harsh decisions for a girl wasn’t worthy of my trust.
I asked them to send our own scouts to be ready. Also I asked them to be careful. The next fight was going to be more brutal and much bloodier than the one we just had.
After that I started collecting my loot. My boys brought over ten thousand corpses. Most had decent things in their inventories, and a small number of them had literally bullshit stuff.
I put things I didn’t need into the market. My coins got inflated again by triple, yet not even close to what I had before.
“You’ll stay on guard,” I turned to my private army, “if enemies attacked, retaliate without needing me to say anything. Just make sure this chariot is safe like a hard rock in front of raging river waters.”
“Roar!”
“Yes lord.”
They all responded in their own ways. After finishing that, I had time to start my cultivation.
I just hoped my cultivation wouldn’t take a lot of time. That bastard was heading towards me. I was sure that lustful paragon would do anything to save that human girl.
That meant that the dragon archlord would lose sight of his prey. In such a case he would shift his gaze and come to attack us here.
This battle was taking serious detours from the plan I initially put on! Yet it wasn’t that desperate to consider it beyond salvage. I still had a chance, and that was directly related to my success in my cultivation.
I took out that big bone again and then activated my separation skill.
[Do you want to integrate this bone with your body?]
[Warning: This bone came from a dark realm monster. Dark realm monsters walk different paths than your race in cultivation. Do you still want to proceed?]
[Warning: This bone’s grade is red grade but the cultivation stored within is simply way beyond what your human body can tolerate. Using it will have a certain risk of detonating your body into shreds if failed]
[Warning: you’ll need one hundred thousand soul points to integrate with it]
“Take them,” I shrugged and then another row of messages popped in front of my eyes. ρꪖꪕᦔꪖꪕꪫꪣꫀꪶ
[You can add another one hundred thousand souls and get the guidance from the system in process]
[Do you agree with that offer?]
“I agree,” without hesitation I paid the second hundred thousand souls to the system.
[A higher up is notified about the deal once again]
[He will be with you in ten minutes]
[Before that he asks if you already are familiar with the concept of cultivation]
“I learnt a lot of things but might need his help at some point,” I said while taking a peek at the surroundings. Everything down below was like a real war camp.
Many groups were roaming the place all around the city. Many were taking up their loot, while few were just patrolling or setting defences against the city’s inner forces.
I used my hawk skill and was glad to see many siege stuff being brought forth by my forces. That was the value of giving them a chance to collect the loot from such wealthy foes.
And it was also a sign of how my team members were adapting fast with the new times we were living in.
[The higher up will be here in ten minutes]
[Be ready to start your merge once he arrives as he has little time to spare]
I knew this seemed like a standard warning but I still was grateful for that head up warning. In addition to my cultivation, I also needed to ask him about a way to obtain a communication system for humans.
Leaving us alone without such communication was a clear biassed move from the system. I was sure this had something to do with those damn angels, but at least I got a chance to complain against that.
And might even have a chance to solve this problem once and for all.
Ten minutes passed in peace without anything happening. I kept myself busy checking over the general layout of our forces.
Per my previous warning, they acted as if Wryly and his forces weren’t here. The defences, the arrangements of the forces, everything was done in a way to not show a weakness if the berserkers retreated.
[Start the digging process] I simply said while pointing my hand outside my chariot and then the one hundred thousand digging tools I bought before landed on the ground below.
They were so big that they took a large amount of land. And being in such a large number emitted a very dangerous vibe to everyone looking at them.
[Bro, what are these dangerous things? Are they yours?] Wryly sent this message over but I decided to act ignorant as if I didn’t see the message.
[Start working now] I sent to all my team members, [Arrange units to guard these and make sure to have groups ready to take away the dirty]
I knew the drags inside wouldn’t sit idle when these machines started working. They weren’t like us, as this wasn’t their first apocalyptic experience.
So they would instantly recognise the machines I bought. That also would force the dragon archlord to drop the idea of chasing after that human girl and focus on her.
Would my forces be fast enough to dig the tunnels underneath the city walls? Or that bastard would arrive first? Or would I be able to finish my cultivation session faster than him?
This fight held many variables to be honest. I just hoped things wouldn’t go south pretty fast before I’d finish from my cultivation.
[Welcome human race Hye] just as I was lost in my own thoughts, this message came with a weird voice.
It wasn’t as majestic as I expected, yet it came directly into my mind. It seemed like that dude was using some sort of trick to speak directly towards my mind.
I ignored the message and said instead:
“Thanks for the trouble esteemed higher up, but I need your help here.”
[Of course dealing with such dangerous cultivation is something insane. I have to tell you this, you aren’t the first to try this approach but none succeeded so far]
“None!!” I was taken aback by such a bold declaration.
[Afraid?]
“Would be a liar if I said no,” I shrugged, “but this is the path I selected. So I decided to keep reading it.”
[Good luck then… I’m just here to notify you about the obstacles you’ll face when you start the merge. You know how cultivation works, right?]
I knew he had a tight schedule, but going directly into this matter was a little surprise for me. If I answered him and he finished telling his things, he might just leave and watch from his own place.
I couldn’t do that!
“Please sir, I have another thing to ask you about,” I gathered my courage and decided to act bold and direct as him.
[Another? Aren’t you going to start merging with this bone?] from his tone I felt little surprise and faint rage. As expected, he directly jumped towards the negative side of the story and thought I was playing him or something.
“I’m going to do that of course, but first there is something I have to complain about.”
[You know I have little time to spare with you. So wasting it for other things won’t help you at the end]
His threats weren’t that light but I had to accept this fate if it happened.
“It’s just the unfairness my race is facing compared with others!” As he had little time and acted this aggressively against me, I had to start showing my case instead of coating my way with words.
“Other races have their own private network of communication. Be it dragons, berserkers, even those angels have means to communicate with each other. All but humans have this, and this is unfair!”
[Hmm… Quite an interesting accusation] he spoke in a tone that told me he abandoned his rage but wasn’t that excited about my case, [But you have to know this… Each race didn’t have this advantage out of bias or something. They earned such privilege with their own effort]
“Earned it?!” I never expected to hear such a response.
[Indeed. Or do you think controlling worlds in the apocalypse doesn’t come with privileges to those who claim this honour! Your race is the one to be blamed not anyone else]