Chapter 44: A Chain Reaction
“You’re cornered, mage assassin.”
Medusa, after her continuous escapes, finally found herself completely surrounded.
The enemy seemed to have been lying in wait nearby. And her last blast of cyan flames had exposed her presence.
Now, even the slow-witted Medusa finally realized that the villa was a complete decoy.
“Your men have surrounded me, but you still don’t dare to show your face?” Medusa said with a smile, looking at the Crusader knights standing guard.
“I don’t dare.” Alfred’s voice came from a communicator carried by one of the knights. “After all, you are a mage assassin with high-sequence Fire abilities. What if you shoot a fireball at me and we both die?”
“So you’re letting your subordinates die?” Medusa retorted.
“Trying to sow discord is useless.” Alfred replied. “My position is not suitable for frontal assault, and these brave Crusader knights are all wearing fireproof asbestos cloth specifically to counter you. I’m curious, how much of your fire ability’s destructive power can you still exert under these circumstances?”
“Asbestos cloth is not a panacea.” Medusa sneered.
“But it’s enough to deal with you, respected mage.” Alfred asked, “How about it? Want to cooperate with me?”
“Cooperate?”
“If I’m not mistaken, you should have reached level 5, your abilities are ‘Fire IV’ + ‘Mind I’, correct?” Alfred said leisurely. “You understand what that means, don’t you? The Steep Path, the existence of Fire IV, makes the probability of losing control when you take heterologous potions extremely high, your path of advancement will become narrower and narrower.”
“This is not surprising, of course. Olympia is training you as a suicide weapon, naturally, they don’t care about your future.”
“But we are different. The nascent Kingdom of Thessaloniki urgently needs the help of Transcendents. Even if you develop along the Fire and Mind sequences and can only reach level 8 at most, you can still get a very generous reward here, enough for you to live comfortably for the rest of your life.”
The more Medusa listened, the more she felt something was wrong. The current magic tide level cap was only level 5. If she could reach level 5, that was already the limit. Why did this person speak as if it was a pity she couldn’t reach level 10?
Did this guy know that the magic tide was about to rise again? That the level cap would be raised again?
“So, what can you offer?” Medusa asked tentatively. “Don’t talk to me about money, I don’t believe you are richer than Olympia.”
“And you believe in Solomon Catholicism, how can I trust that you won’t capture me and burn me as a heretic and a witch?”
“Isn’t the evidence right here?” Alfred sneered. “You are surrounded now, with no escape. We have the absolute advantage, but we didn’t kill you immediately, doesn’t this prove our goodwill?”
“The Church hasn’t sent a bishop to Thessaloniki yet. The one responsible for spreading the faith in the diocese is our Crusader chaplain, and he will turn a blind eye to you.”
“What we can offer you is a title. Your fief will be in Serres, on the plains east of the Struma River valley. The land is fertile and rich in products, enough for you to establish a profitable manor.”
“That’s tempting.” Medusa said with a coquettish smile.
A little tempted meant she wasn’t fully convinced.
Pretending to think for a moment, Medusa continued to ask:
“Besides the title and fief, don’t you have anything more valuable? Like transcendental materials? Potion formulas? Supernatural items that can reduce the probability of losing control?”
“You’re joking. We are devout Crusader warriors, how could we collect those heretical and evil things? It took us a lot of effort to persuade the chaplain to turn a blind eye to you.”
Alfred said with a smile, “Please think again. On one side of the scale of fate is death, and on the other side is a title and fief, what are you still hesitating about?”
Alfred, sitting in the room, paused and asked the communicator next to him, “Why is there so much noise in this call?”
“It’s not a communication quality issue, it’s the sound coming from the other side.” The communicator picked up the communication device. “Sir Stekar, your breathing is too loud, it’s affecting the communication quality.”
“Sorry.” The powered armor knight wearing the communicator said, panting slightly. “It’s too hot.”
Too hot? Alfred froze for a moment, then immediately jumped up from his seat and roared:
“Fire! Kill her immediately!”
“Too late!” While the knights were stunned, extremely hot flames had already erupted from around Medusa.
She laughed hysterically amidst the flames, almost to the point of tears.
The teardrops at the corners of her eyes quickly evaporated, turning into steam.
“You think you don’t have to be afraid of flames just because you have asbestos cloth!” Her laughter stopped abruptly, replaced by a ferocious and crazed smile. “With a high enough temperature, I can even burn the air clean!!!”
An even stronger light shone from her, and a torrential heatwave spread in all directions.
The knights covered their visors with their left hands and fired blindly ahead with their right hands. A moment later, the sounds of guns exploding one after another rang out.
Because the muzzles had melted and violently collided with the ejected bullets.
Then, with the rapidly increasing brightness, even hotter flames erupted from around her.
The asbestos cloth exploded from the surface of the armor, the air contained within rapidly expanding due to the heat, and then the heat-insulating coating on the surface of the powered armor melted.
Some of the knights tried to escape, but their feet seemed to be stuck to the ground – the weight of the powered armor caused them to sink into the melting earth.
Then the single-phase nuclear fusion batteries inside their armor also malfunctioned and broke down in the extreme heat. A chain of explosions briefly suppressed the central light source, mushroom clouds rising one after another, forming a huge and strange black cloud in the air.
“Close your eyes and ears, lie down!” Guided by Mia, the Azure Longsword team, who had just entered the city, suddenly saw the dazzling light erupting ahead, and Asker quickly issued a warning.
The girls immediately lay down on the ground without thinking (from this, one could see the effect of their usual training). Then the huge shockwave of the explosion arrived, the entire ground shaking violently as if in an earthquake, causing some of the girls’ chests to ache.
Although they covered their ears with their hands, everyone was deafened for a moment, their heads buzzing.
They vaguely heard Asker shout: “Hold your breath!”
Then the shockwave of the explosion, mixed with a hurricane of radioactive dust, swept over them. Everyone hurriedly closed their eyes, pinched their noses, and lay on the ground, feeling as if they were being washed by an endless gale, sand and small stones hitting their foreheads.
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