Inside the hold of the flagship, the crisp ringing of a gun’s trigger being pulled echoed several times in succession. Shattered gemstones morphed into golden light and scattered all over Roel’s body.
Under Charlotte’s relentless shots, the area around the Glacier Creator turned into a sea of flames. The onslaught of heat alleviated Roel’s condition, granting him his sanity back. However, it only took several seconds for the raging sea of flames to be put out in this cold environment.
The spell flames were like the flickerings of a candle on a windy night, always on the verge of being put out. However, Charlotte couldn’t care less. A dozen gemstones were only enough to provide Roel with a moment of warmth, but fortunately, she had more trump cards than this.
“Roar with ferocity.”
Charlotte’s emerald eyes suddenly glowed brilliantly as her bloodline began to heat up. She gave off the powerful disposition of a queen commanding an army of a thousand soldiers. Under her orders, the golden fluid wrapped around the egg began to move.
Weng!
An intense buzzing sound began to echo from the core of the ship. The golden fluid flowing through the pipes of the ship quickly gushed toward the origin of the frost, charging like an order of mounted knights. The shipmates looked at one another in confusion, perplexed as to what was going on.
At the same time, Isabella began making her move too.
“I see. So this is the ability of the Ascart House? How mysterious. It’s no wonder why the Assembly would send you here. As the big sister here, it’s only right for me to give you a push on the back.”
Looking at the duo fighting against the egg in the ship’s hold beneath her, Isabella’s final lingering doubts had at last been dispelled. A refreshing smile surfaced on her lips as the golden constellation of an ancient god suddenly formed behind her. It was the same one Charlotte had summoned during her first meeting with Roel, but the one summoned by Isabella had an even clearer presence.
“Arbiter of Fate!”
The beautiful and valiant woman ordered with her clear voice, and the golden constellation behind her raised the balance in its hand. At the same time, Isabella lifted her hand, and golden light began congregating in her hands to form 10 small chips.
“Charlotte, take a good look. This is the real way to use our bloodline. We aren’t servants but makers of fate!
“These are the chips that we have manifested as leverage using the fate of our lives. Be it our family, friends, or subordinates, glory or shame, prosperity or destruction; everything is encompassed within these 10 chips. With these as stakes, I shall steer the flow of fate!”
Isabella gazed down on the duo from the top of the stairs as she spoke. Stars began to fill the upper area of the ship’s hold as the golden constellation of the Goddess of Fate stretched her hand forth, and images began appearing on each side of the balance she was holding.
On one side was a black-haired, golden-eyed boy.
On the other was the embryonic monster growing inside the ice.
The balance swayed unstably for a moment before finally tilting toward the embryonic monster’s side. Seeing this, Isabella revealed a slight smile.
“If it’s just this much, one coin shall suffice. Chip of Fate, stake in!”
“Received.”
Isabella flicked her finger softly, and one of the golden chips flew in an arc before falling onto Roel’s side of the scale. The whirring of a mechanical system echoed for a brief moment as the equilibrium of the balance began moving once more. At the same time, the golden constellation emanated a brilliant glow of light too.
All of a sudden, the embryonic monster inside the ice began to weaken, as if it had been afflicted with some sort of curse. In just a few seconds, the frosty currents revolving around it had already mostly stilled to a halt, leaving it almost defenseless.
At the same time, Roel also sensed a mysterious power suffusing his body, as if someone was silently giving him a push. He finally understood the reason why the System had attributed such a high chance of success to this assimilation.
【10, 9, 8…】
With fate standing on his side and the support coming from his fiancée, Roel finally managed to absorb all of the frozen mana in the vicinity. With the completion of the process, the System’s notification immediately rang right away.
【Ding!】
【You have successfully absorbed a partial power of the mutated Crown’s Stone.】
【You have gained the ability: Glacial Touch】
Ah, I’ve finally succeeded.
Under the combined assault of capitalism and mysterious voodoo-like magic, the ancient monster was finally forced to lower its head. Roel heaved a relieved sigh.
Looks like the 300,000 gold coins spent hasn’t gone to waste!
There was a stiff smile on Roel’s face for a moment before his vision suddenly went dark.
…
Midnight, under the silver glow of the moon, a fleet of ships arrived at the area where the Golden Fleet had fought earlier before anchoring on the spot. There were a couple of smaller boats shrouded in a golden fluid rowing around the area, collecting samples.
At the bow of the flagship, there were a bunch of white-robed disciples gathered around their old leader as they prayed quietly to the moon. Such a sight could be seen on the bow of every single ship in the fleet, making quite an eerie sight.
The disciples continued murmuring the name of the Mother Goddess for half an hour before the ritual finally came to an end. The other crewmates proceeded to report their findings, and the command team resumed their discussions too.
“What? They suffered no losses at all? How could that be possible? Putting the other ships aside, SS Saint Paul should have been doomed!” exclaimed Gordon in disbelief after hearing the report from his subordinate.
His silvery hair drifted along with the night breeze, bestowing him with an air of desolation on top of his usual solemness.
Gordon had already lived for more than 200 years now, making him one of the rare ones who had lived in the Second Epoch. His wealth of experience, which could be traced back to the Ancient Austine Empire, sharpened his instincts for naval warfare, granting him the intuition to predict the conclusion of a battle even before the fight began.
SS Saint Paul was a large warship second only to the flagship, SS Saint Mary. Given its strategic importance, Gordon was actually planning to snatch it over prior to the breakout of the internal conflict, only for Vice-Captain Laure to find out about his plan and foil it.
Despite so, Gordon still managed to destroy a large portion of its Control Room, creating an opening for the Scalemen to take it down. Yet, why would it…
The unexpected turn of events left him deeply troubled. He was the kind of person who hated uncertainty and variables, especially after all of the painful choices he had to make throughout his life.
Gordon had witnessed the peak of the Ancient Austine Empire, but he had also been through the hardships and despair of the mass migration westward. Those in his generation really didn’t have it easy. There were challenges at every turn, and the end appeared to be never in sight. Many of his peers eventually succumbed to the stress and ended their own lives. Even those who pulled through the storms couldn’t always break free of the past, trapped in dreams of the prosperity and glory they once enjoyed.
To some extent, Gordon was the same as this latter group of people. However, unlike the others who reminisced about the Ancient Austine Empire, what he dreamt of traced even further back, something even grander. He was pursuing the origin of his bloodline, the glory of the high elves.
The Mother Goddess was his and his comrades’ greatest belief, and it was also the greatest conflict between them and Isabella’s faction.
There was a period of time when Gordon was a member of the ignorant masses who believed in human supremacy. However, when he learned that the Spirit Cataclysm of the Capital was induced by one of the supreme existences and saw how the Ancient Austine Empire, which he believed to be impregnable and infallible, fell apart, he was forced to change his mind.
The gods were powerful and inviolable. Before them, humans were no more than fleeting, insignificant existences. Against those supreme beings, resistance was futile. The only viable option was to obey them.
Gordon’s past experiences, further fueled by his Loyal Origin Attribute, built up his unwavering faith in the Mother Goddess. Thus, he thought that Isabella’s pursuit was just a product of her ignorance, and he looked upon her efforts in disdain.
To choose humans over the gods and attempt to defy the predestined downfall of civilization; that was nothing more than blind arrogance. Countless civilizations before them had already succumbed to the gods. Humankind’s westward mass migration was nothing more than an attempt to delay the inevitable.
“Destruction is the end of our journey. Only by forsaking our human selves, remaining true to our High Elf Bloodline, and serving the Mother Goddess will we be able to relive our past glory.”
These were the beliefs driving Gordon and his extremist conservative faction.
It wasn’t hard to imagine how pleasantly surprised they were when they were approached by another organization who believed in the Mother Goddess as well—the Saints Convocation.
The Saints Convocation was a mysterious organization based at the north end of humanity’s territories, and their ultimate goal was to support the six God’s Envoys in the revival of the Mother Goddess, and they were determined to achieve it regardless of the price they had to pay. So far, based on the intelligence gathered, the organization appeared to be hostile toward the other elusive transcendent organization Isabella was in.
With common enemies and common goals, the paths of Gordon’s conservative faction and the Saints Convocation naturally converged with one another. In fact, the Saints Convocation had contributed greatly to the rebellion of the conservative faction against Isabella.
“Esteemed King of the South, you seem to have some lingering doubts in your mind?”
A white-robed young man named Doyle walked up to Gordon to check in with him. He was one of the executives of the Saints Convocation. Gordon turned his head over to look at Doyle as his eyes narrowed a little.
“I am no King of the South. I am just an old man who knows my own place.”
“A wealth of experience does bring about wisdom. Only an Outliver like you could understand the greatness of the gods. Isabella might be talented, but the short twenty years she has lived has limited the depth of her vision. Before someone who has lived centuries like you, she’s probably no more than a child.”
There were a few strands of black hair peeking out of Doyle’s cap, and he had a pale complexion that made him look gentle and amiable. He could easily win the goodwill of others with just his words, but his charisma didn’t seem to be working on Gordon at all.
“What’s your motive? Why did you choose to help us?”
Gordon voiced his own doubts with an impassive look on his face.
“My goal is to bring our clan back to its era of prosperity and glory and survive the impending calamities along with the Mother Goddess. However, these should mean nothing to outsiders like you. I want to know what your aim, or rather, the Saints Convocation’s aim is,” added Gordon.
“You’re right to say that we have no vested interests in the Sofya House. However, if we’re just talking about aims here, we do have the same intentions in mind. It’s only a matter of time before the Mother Goddess returns; there’s no doubt about that. Our duty, as her believers, is to clear off all obstacles standing in her path before her return.”
“Clear off all obstacles, you say? In other words, you’re claiming that the resurrection of the Mother Goddess is related to the six God’s Envoys?”
Sensing an important clue in Doyle’s words, Gordon tried to probe a little deeper, only to be responded with a silent chuckle.
“You appear a little worried. Did something happen?” asked Doyle.
“… A ripple in fate has just occurred. Another powerful bloodline possessor seems to have gotten involved in this matter. This means that there are two people on Isabella’s side to activate the Perpetual Seal, making it even more difficult for us to snatch it over.”
The wrinkles on Gordon’s face deepened as he said those words.
The Perpetual Seal was the final measure of the Sofya House. It could only be activated and dispelled by those who carried the purest High Elf Bloodline, making it nigh impossible to tamper with it. Once activated, the egg would be permanently buried in the darkest depths of the boundless sea.
Originally, all they had to do was kill Isabella in order to stop it from happening. However, the emergence of yet another powerful bloodline possessor on the Golden Fleet meant that the number of variables had just increased greatly.
“I understand.”
Hearing Gordon’s worries, the white-robed young man nodded his head with a gentle smile on his lips.
“You can leave the assassination of the other bloodline possessor to me.”
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