Chapter 834: Invitation
Although the Tower of Dusk was established in Doland, and only had influence over Doland and a few surrounding regions, their business network had long stretched outside the Breezy Plains.
That opponent hidden behind the scenes might be able to prevent the Tower of Dusk from selling any potion or any weapon, and from acquiring any piece of herb or ore in the Breezy Plains, but wouldn’t have the ability to do anything outside the Breezy Plains. They wouldn’t be able to control the royal office of Felan and Ledin, or influence the two great shrines in any way. If they had that ability, they wouldn’t have to fear the rise of the Tower of Dusk.
Of course, as Anril was a world that lacked space-related magical items, they needed traders to mobilize material resources. Hence, if they were to block the flow of goods with armed troops, they would be able to create real trouble for certain forces. Shortly after Lin Li returned from the underground palace, three of the 10 strongest bandit organizations attacked the Tower’s caravans successively. It was very obvious that the mastermind behind the scenes was attempting to cut off the connection the Tower of Dusk had with the outside world, and trap the Tower in Doland.
Perhaps knowing how scary it was to offend the Tower of Dusk, the three bandit organizations actually put aside the filthy tricks they had in their sleeves to form an alliance with one another to plan a strategy to prepare for a possible revenge made by the Tower. While these three bandit organizations were originally ranked in the middle, their combined power would bring them to the first place on that list. It would be no exaggeration to say that they would be able to match up to the former Dark Blade.
Based on the understanding the outside world had of the Tower of Dusk, the real deal was that young President and his two Undead servants in the Legendary-realm. Although the combined forces of the three bandit organizations were not sufficient to challenge the Tower of Dusk head-on, they thought that they would still be able to intimidate the Tower if they were to go against it at such a timing.
At once, all of the forces focused all their attention on the Tower of Dusk. They were all curious how the Tower of Dusk would approach the matter. Everyone thought that this would be a complex problem for the young President. If he did not respond, that might be a huge blow to the Tower of Dusk. If the Tower of Dusk wanted to take revenge on the three bandit organizations, it would only make sense for that young President and the other two Undead servants to participate in the battle, but this would benefit the other factions.
Yet, none of the forces had expected that the young President from the Tower of Dusk would not step in to handle the matter himself. He did not send his two Undead servants in the Legendary-realm to deal with it, either. It was a team of 40 Paladins that came out of the Tower of Dusk. Each of the Paladins was donned in a set of silver armor and was riding on a pure white unicorn. What stunned them even more was how they exuded the same kind of tremendous and pure Divine Power as the Holy Paladins from the Brilliance Shrine who were responsible for guarding the Holy Mountain.
The partnership between the Tower of Dusk and the Brilliance Shrine was known to everyone in the Breezy Plains. But, if the Brilliance Shrine would send their Holy Paladins to the Tower of Dusk, the nature of their alliance was definitely not as simple as what they thought it to be. Even if there were other authorities overseeing the operations in the Breezy Plains, how would they not reconsider their perception of the Tower of Dusk?
Everyone knew that the Holy Paladins were in charge of guarding the Holy Mountain that belonged to the Brilliance Shrine. They were the personal pontifical guards of Pope Rosario. The Holy Paladins would never leave the Holy Mountain unless the pope had to travel. Even when Prophet Willen had to purge the Retribution Knight Rodhart, there wasn’t any Holy Paladin deployed to assist him.
But, they could not help but wonder about the relationship between that young President of the newly risen Tower of Dusk and Pope Rosario of the Brilliance Shrine. These forces would have to consider this question really carefully before making their next move. Although they had been taking the orders from the mastermind to target the Tower of Dusk with all sorts of tactics, they should be weighing whether their life wouldn’t be more important than the rewards they gained with their deeds.
They would definitely not have imagined that these Holy Paladins were in fact Death Knights who had the ability to control Divine Power, and those white unicorns were merely transformed Nightmare Beasts. Not to mention their inability to imagine such an absurd idea, they would not believe it to be true even if they were told about it. To say that Undead creatures would have the power to control Divine Power would be more ridiculous than to say that the young mage of the Tower of Dusk was the illegitimate son of the Pope of the Brilliance Shrine.
Although the team of three bandit organizations had thought that the Tower of Dusk would not be seeking revenge any time soon, they could not help but gather their forces in the Dragon Mountains to await their retaliation in case of any miscalculation. But, they did not expect to meet the Holy Paladins from the Brilliance Shrine, and not the young President from Tower of Dusk.
Although some of the stolen goods were what the Tower of Dusk had purchased from the Brilliance Shrine, they did not believe that that would offend the Holy Paladins. Offending the Tower of Dusk and offending the Brilliance Shrine were two separate matters. The Brilliance Shrine was known to be one of the strongest forces in the whole of Anril, and was not an organization which anyone would dare to confront. The three Legendary-level leaders from the bandit organizations were still hoping that it was just a misunderstanding as they brought their men out of their hideouts in trepidation. They stuttered as they tried their best to clarify the misunderstanding before the 40 armored Paladin who exuded Divine Power from head to toe.
Yet, these Paladin-like men had no interest in hearing the three leaders explain themselves. The Retribution Knight in the team raised his Holy Cross Spear and led the Nightmare Beasts towards the team of bandits without any warning. The Death Knights behind him exuded great holy aura as they got into an arrow formation and charged towards the bandits.
The other forces sent their spies to assess the situation right after the Holy Paladins left the scene of the massacre. A once hustling city had become dead quiet. Bodies were everywhere, and on each of their faces was a peculiar smile that caused the spies to shudder in trepidation. Their prior experience of witnessing large-scale battles did not help to allay their fear at all.
It only took the Holy Paladins half a day to purge the three Legendary-level leaders and their 1,000 bandit elites with the Holy Light. This outcome was a validation of the identity of the Paladins. Except for the Holy Paladins from Brilliance Shrine, no one in the whole of Anril would have such a formidable ability.
The goods that had been robbed by the three organizations were all left untouched in their warehouse. Although they were not collected by the Holy Paladins, none of the forces dared to lay their hands on that huge wealth. To them, these goods were no wealth, but the scariest curse in this world. The bodies lying outside were the proof of this theory.
The appearance of the Holy Paladins made the forces cease all of their suppression of the Tower of Dusk. Although none of them understood the relationship between the Tower of Dusk and the Brilliance Shrine, the fact that the personal imperial guards of the Pope of Brilliance Shrine appeared at such a place explained the gist of the situation. Now, none of the forces would dare to provoke the Tower of Dusk before they received any new instruction from the hidden mastermind.
In the beginning, this incident had created a lot of worry among the people in the Tower of Dusk. They knew that it would be extremely dangerous if the forces were successful in their efforts to block their operations. Yet, this worry did not last. The 40 Holy Paladins only took half a day to resolve the matter. That was like a glimpse of light in the dark tunnel for the originally pessimistic mages. They became extremely confident about the future of the Tower of Dusk.
What difficulties can’t be solved with Mr. President’s massive powers and the support he has from the Brilliance Shrine? While these mages were still unclear about the reason behind the appearance of the Holy Paladins at their Tower, that did not matter to them anymore. Their appearance was sufficient to prove the extreme support the Tower of Dusk had from the Brilliance Shrine.
“Mr. President, we have an invitation letter,” said a young mage as he went up to Lin Li quickly upon seeing him come out of the laboratory. He had been waiting outside.
Lin Li had just finished a meeting with the pharmacists. He was explaining some new potion formula to replace those that had been stolen. He was confident that the potion would be ready for mass production very soon. It was the same in the forging workshop. The workshop had already started producing new magical equipment, and Lin Li was certain that their new products would be a deal-breaker against the opponent’s corporate raid.
Lin Li did not expect the invitation letter. He knew that people he had closer ties with, such as the Brilliance Shrine and Darkness Shrine, would not send him a mere letter if they had to look for him.
Could it be the next tactic of that mastermind? Lin Li received the letter and discovered that it was without an envelope. It was a very normal piece of letter paper with creases on it. Yet, a very unique magical wave radiated from the folded letter.
Lin Li was taken aback before he could read the words written on it clearly. Despite being a common piece of letter paper, the ink on it was a precious type of magical ink used to inscribe Master-level mageweaths. As a Guru of Inscription, Lin Li was familiar with the formulas of all types of magical ink. Because of that, he could not help but feel that the letter was a ridiculous one. Not to mention that the sender had used a precious magical ink, what was absurd was that the ink was written on a piece of extremely ordinary letter paper. He just could not imagine who would squander on such a trivial matter.
There were not a lot of words in the invitation letter. There were only a date and an address. The date was five days from today, and the contents of the letter were extremely simple. It did not mention any provinces or regions, but just a name of a location: “Gran Town”. The letter ended with the signature of the sender—Ashen Warlock.