In the underground world below Kurrus Fortress where Marquis Charles’s troops were stationed, underground ratmen welcomed a regime change. Underground Rat King Braund who had ruled over the underground ratmen for many years was betrayed by his cousin Boolean and died at Clyde’s hands. Thus, the throne of the underground ratmen was seized by Boolean.
Boolean, the ruler of the underground ratmen, had a deal with Clyde. According to their agreement, Boolean would provide the fastest routes to Kurrus Fortress, and Clyde would use these routes to carry out a surprise attack. Like this, they could bypass the solid defense lines of Kurrus Fortress and deal a fatal blow to Marquis Charles.
Marquis Charles had over 40,000 troops, which was double the number of troops under Clyde. But if the surprise attack was successful, the other party’s losses wouldn’t be small. Clyde took the lead to sneak into Kurrus Fortress, trying to find a way to minimize his side’s casualties. According to Boolean’s map, Clyde immediately found the nearest passage to enter Kurrus Fortress again.
The exit of this secret passage was located in the inner resting areas of Kurrus Fortress. As Clyde observed the situation, he saw several mysterious people wearing black robes walking over from the distance. These were Dark Shamans. Because of their shared camp attribute, even if they were disguised, Clyde could easily recognize their identities.
Clyde sunk into the shadow and followed them to their destination. After defeating the underground ratmen, these Dark Shamans were the last unstable factor beside Marquis Charles. After these Dark Shamans were eliminated, all of Marquis Charles’s important helping hands would be cleaned up.
“We cannot contact Braund. That fellow didn’t get killed by his cousin Boolean, did he?”
“I don’t know, but we cannot count on Braund this time. We have to break this deadlock!”
These Dark Shamans only had a simple cooperative relationship with Douglas Clan and Marquis Charles. Although allies on the surface, they had their own plans. These Dark Shamans belonged to a big organization, commonly known as the Dark Church, which contended with the Light Church. They had first appeared a few years later than the Light Church. Allegedly, it had been established by heretics who were persecuted and hunted by the Light Church. Because of secret cooperative relations with many aristocrats who protected them, the Light Church had failed to destroy the Dark Church until now.
Now, the Light Church simply turned a blind eye toward them, seeming to have reached a tacit agreement of non-interference. Like well-water not mixing with river water, as long as the Dark Church didn’t act in public, the Light Church wouldn’t move. They would just symbolically send someone to go through the motions without exterminating them. The dirtiest thing was that the Light Church even cooperated with the Dark Church to wipe out other religions. In Ximengsi Continent, these two had maintained a religious dominance for many years by joining hands to strangle any new religions.
Clyde followed the Dark Shamans into a discarded warehouse with locked doors and windows, illuminated by dim, red candlelight. A large summoning magic array drawn in blood could be vaguely seen. Clyde was not particularly knowledgeable about the magic arrays, so he could only discern that this was a summoning array. As for what type of monster would be summoned, Clyde wasn’t clear. Originally, he had planned to immediately execute those few Dark Shamans, but after hearing that they were girls from their voices, Clyde stopped his hands.
Basically, all the ritual magic arrays of the Dark Church were very evil. For their successful operation, equivalent sacrificial offerings were needed. This summoning ritual magic array was no exception. Before he arrived, the sacrificial offerings needed had already been placed and arranged in this discarded warehouse in a wicked manner.
In the discarded warehouse, several young and pretty beauties were imprisoned. They seemed to be the Marquis family’s maids. Without exception, their clothes had been stripped off, turning them into half-bare white lambs wearing some thin undergarments. These white lambs knelt on the ground with horizontal iron bars pressing on their heels. Their hands were also cuffed behind their backs. Iron chains were attached to their iron handcuffs with the other ends attached to the floor.
These sacrificial offerings wore black blindfolds and bit black rods, which sealed their mouths. They shivered in fear of their unknown fates. Originally, they had been Miss Sivia’s maids. After Clyde had taken Miss Sivia away, these maids had lost their jobs, and Marquis Charles hadn’t paid any attention to them. Thus, the Dark Shamans had secretly captured them and brought them here as sacrificial offerings for a certain evil ritual.
“It’s a pity that Miss Sivia disappeared; using a dark magician for the core of this array would have been the best. Those ogre warriors sent to capture her yesterday actually died in such a dubious manner!”
“The maids of the Marquis family are not bad. Although they can’t use magic, they are bareilly sufficient. Once this summoning ritual is successful, we’ll…”
“The time is almost there. I guess those shamans couldn’t find a suitable substitute sacrificial offering for the array’s core. Let’s execute the final plan!”
From the conversations between these Dark Shaman beauties, Clyde determined that those ogre warriors he had killed when taking Sivia away had been summoned by these Dark Shamans.
However, this didn’t dispel these Dark Shamans’ madness. In order to summon a certain terrifying existence, they planned to use themselves as sacrificial offerings to make up for the lacking array core. When those Dark Shaman beauties opened their lapels, Clyde discovered that they unexpectedly wore nothing inside, not even undergarments. Under those black robes were white, flawless alluring bare bodies. Before they came here, they had already prepared for the worst. Clyde regretted it a bit. If he had known that they were in bare states inside, he would have stopped them midway without giving them a chance to come to this discarded warehouse.
While Clyde watched, the Dark Shamans took action. They sat down at the core position of that mysterious summoning magic array at the five corners of that five-edged star, before chanting a dark incantation. Then, the leader Dark Shaman sister walked to the center of that five-edged star and sat cross-legged on the array’s core. Along with their chanting voices, the temperature inside the warehouse dropped and became incomparably cold. Then, evil energy gathered, causing these Dark Shamans’ robes to burn by a mysterious flame, leaving them in bare states. Their beautiful but cold faces were filled with sweat, and they seemed to be in great pain, but under the influence of their faith, they did their utmost to endure it and didn’t leave their positions.
It was not just limited to those Dark Shamans; the last fabrics of those maids were also burned by the mysterious flames. Clyde wasn’t a gentleman and gazed with envy. The evil energy rapidly spread as if the gate to the Ghost Realm had been opened. The summoning ritual was on the verge success.
Clyde was thinking about how to stop this evil summoning magic array without killing people. Although killing the summoners was the most straightforward way, it was simple and crude and wouldn’t bring him many benefits. After some brief consideration, Clyde’s eyes lit up: he had a reaction to this summoning magic array. Apparently, this evil summoning magic array would issue summoning requests to nearby monsters. If anyone responded, the summoning would be successful. Clyde calculated that since it had not been long since the summoning ritual had started. He could cut the line and squeeze out the other party from this summoning ritual. Once the summoning target changed, the final price the sacrificial offerings would pay would be entirely up to the summoned target.
Thinking this, a wicked smile unintentionally appeared on his face. He responded to the invitation of this evil summoning ritual magic array, quickly sinking into the dark energy vortex on the ground and seizing the Dark Shamans’ original summoning target. He directly squeezed out the other party from the summoning sequence. Although cutting the line had happened before, it was a rare occurrence. Generally speaking, the assigned summoning target had a home field advantage. If a latecomer wanted to cut the line, he would have to be several levels stronger than the other party. Moreover, this would easily offend someone from the same camp, so most monsters didn’t do this. Only Clyde, this very unscrupulous existence, dared to rob from people on the same side like this.
At the center of the evil ritual summoning magic array, the original summoning target was intercepted by a certain person. The response time for the summoning array was too long, which confused the Dark Shamans. Normally, the other party would have already responded to their summoning. While they worried, countless black energy tentacles sprang out of the ground and rushed towards those Dark Shamans.
“How can this be? It shouldn’t be like this…”
“No, wrong… Don’t… don’t come!”
There was a commotion in the warehouse that was quickly suppressed. Because the patrolling soldiers nearby feared the Dark Shamans and the special orders they had received in advance, no one dared to inspect the situation. Those black tentacles were influenced by their master’s consciousness and would indiscriminately attack people of the same sex while entertaining the opposite sex.
