Chapter 459: The Nine Children of the Monarch of Stars

Shicang continued explaining himself. "The butcher's sudden death sent alarm bells ringing in my head—I needed to do something to strengthen myself, and absorbing his troops into mine isn't a bad idea."

The elder clutched his wound as he shouted, "Help! Help!"

Shicang smiled. "There's no need to try to call for help. Listen closely—none of them have the freedom to help you."

To the elder's shock and dismay, a huge commotion could be heard outside his tent as the sura troops fought against one another.

Shicang continued, "While you were worrying about what had happened to your king, I killed and resurrected most of your troops as corpses."

The elder shouted, "Don't you think the monarch of stars will be informed of this?!"

Shicang shrugged. "I'll simply blame it on the mastermind behind Renhuang. After you all become my forces, who would know the truth?"

"Damn it!" The elder tried to run off, but he found that his arms and legs were immobile. As though he had become a puppet, they had lost all sensation.

Shicang's smile reached his eyes. "Do you know why I chose not to make a move on you immediately? Why I continued talking to you about my plans?"

The elder's eyes widened. He was about to say something when he found that his lips refused to open.

"You should have noticed it earlier, really—why did it take you so long to notice the clashes from outside the tent when they were so loud? It's because I've been controlling your sense of hearing for quite some time now. You simply haven't noticed because of your anger. You want to know when I made my move, don't you?"

The elder did, but he couldn't even nod in response.

Shicang continued, "The moment I stepped into this tent, I used my own special techniques to corrupt your soul. Your attention was focused entirely on me, so you didn't realize."

The elder wondered why a sura king would have to expend so much effort to deal with a lowly elder like him.

Shicang replied calmly, "I'm a cautious sura, and I prize certainty over all else."

The elder would have raised his eyebrows if he could. How did Shicang know what he was thinking without his having spoken?

"It's because your soul's under my control, so I can hear your mental thoughts as well. By the way, if you had tried to resist my influence, you could have escaped my control—but you were so curious about my answer that you've missed your opportunity. Well, this is it for you."

The elder's will slowly dissipated. In his last moments, there was only one thought left in his mind: Why didn't I quit sooner?!

A huge black bird hung in the sky above Shicang's tent as it surveyed everything going on down below. Only when the fighting had settled did it fly off once more.

Zhang Lie claimed Shouta's blade from his body. It didn't have a special name, but it did have a unique history and ability. It was a blade once used by the monarch of stars himself, which had later been presented as a gift to his first godson.

The blade was able to store the souls of the enemies it had killed and transmute those souls into enhanced power. The blood-red glow that the blade had given off when it cut a chunk off the city walls was a manifestation of this power.

There was, however, one downside to the blade—any who wielded it would become corrupted by the blade and turn into a crazed fool whose only purpose in life was to slaughter. The wielder's intelligence would also decrease dramatically; the blade's corruption was much like a drug addiction.

Zhang Lie could hardly use a blade like this himself. He summoned Whitey, which curled around the blade and sucked up the spiritual matter that had been stored within.

The monarch of stars, and particularly Shouta, had done impressive work storing spiritual matter in the blade, and all that spiritual matter was now going to Whitey.

Whitey fattened up by a noticeable degree. All the souls he had sucked up in a battlefield or another had made him now over eight meters long, and he wrapped indolently around Zhang Lie's body.

Just then, the members of Team Zenith and the three clan leaders headed in.

"Governor, did you summon us all so urgently because of the sura forces?"

"That's right."

The people in the room didn't seem particularly surprised. After raiding a sura kingdom, it was only normal that the sura would retaliate.

"Seven kingdoms are coming at once."

The members of Team Zenith reacted with dismay. One sura kingdom was easy enough to deal with, and even two wouldn't be a big problem. Three would be a struggle, but one they could overcome, but four, five, six, seven?

"What's going on?"

"The first sura kingdom we destroyed, Xuechi, and the second kingdom, Xueju, where we're currently located, belong to an empire, the empire of stars. The monarch of that empire was extremely enraged to hear that Xuechi and Xueju had been destroyed, and he's dispatching forces from his seven subordinate kingdoms to destroy Renhuang.

The Yeluo chieftain asked, "Governor, what's your plan?"

Sun Mengmeng replied seriously, "Captain, no matter what you decide, we'll follow your orders!"

𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

Zhang Lie smiled as he saw everyone's resolute expressions.

"A defensive battle isn't in our favor, and Renhuang can't hold out against the bombardment of seven sets of sura troops. Even if we were to eke out a victory, Renhuang would be destroyed.

This means that we have to strike preemptively before they can do so."

Strike preemptively?! Everyone was taken aback by Zhang Lie's bold declaration, but despite their misgivings, they believed wholeheartedly in Zhang Lie.

"We'll always listen to you, Captain!" Sun Mengmeng promised.

Zhang Lie nodded. "We don't have to rush things for the moment. Let Yu Huantian and his crag eagles scout the vicinity first—once we have the necessary information, we can decide on our battle strategy."

Sun Mengmeng raised her hand. "I have information about eight sura kings. Could it be useful?"

Li Feng glanced at her in surprise. Eight sura kings? How?"

"It was recorded in Xuechi's diary."

"Hold on—wasn't that supposed to be a diary for lifeforms to be hunted down?"

Fang Yi suggested, "Perhaps in Xuechi's eyes, his brothers were no different from genetic lifeforms themselves..."

Everyone turned silent.

After a pregnant pause, Sun Mengmeng began anew. "The sura king had nine godsons, the first of whom was Shouta. He likes constructing towers made of the heads of his decapitated enemies, and his weapon is the blade once used by the monarch of stars himself.

"The second son is Shicang, of unknown heritage and background. He wears a black robe at all times, and no one has seen his true appearance. It's not even certain that he's a sura himself. According to Xuechi, this son received the monarch of stars' knowledge about the soul. His main power is necromancy; he's transformed his kingdom into a necropolis."

Everyone sucked in a deep breath.

"The third son is Fenghe, who received the monarch of stars' inheritance about biological research on genetic lifeforms. He enjoys splicing creatures together into monsters, and his main fighting force consists of those monsters."