Chapter 102: The Night of Terror in Atad City, Adelaide Kingdom’s Strategic Border Town (Part 1)
Translator: The Light
In Third Young Master Hal’s room, as Clyde planned to take away those new victims, Hal’s crazy laughter came from that mysterious basement behind him.
A gloomy and cold undead aura blew over, but Clyde ignored this issue. That black iron crown worn by the Skeleton General could be used to trigger an undead calamity. Just a moment ago, Clyde hadn’t completely destroyed that black iron crown, giving Hal a chance to trigger an undead calamity once more.
This couldn’t be regarded as Clyde’s carelessness. Even if an Undead Shaman obtained this skeleton crown and wanted to trigger an undead calamity, he needed sacrificial offerings. Now, all the female prisoners in that mysterious basement had already been transferred away. If he wanted to trigger an undead calamity, then he could only offer himself up. This was the last resort of Undead Shamans. However, only a few human Undead Shamans were resolute enough to do so throughout history. Hal was such an exception. From that dark aura alone, his obsession and madness were clearly far above ordinary colleagues. He offered himself up as a sacrifice.
“Truly a hopeless lunatic. Forget it. If you like to stir up trouble, then stir up trouble. Considering that you are barely a colleague, I won’t take care of you.”
“Don’t move randomly; otherwise, I will leave you all here.”
Clyde found a small carriage near Hal’s room. He then untied those several unfortunate ladies who were hung upside down and placed them in the carriage, before transporting them to his room. Originally, these several ladies still thought to struggle for a while, but after hearing his warning, they instantly became obedient. Now, they were in their underwear only, with their mouths gagged and eyes blindfolded. It was a shameful state. They didn’t dare to go against his orders and accepted the arrangements of this man of unknown origin.
Standing above the Undead Calamity Ritual Magic Array, Hal put on that broken black iron skeleton crown and offered himself as a sacrifice to summon the undead calamity. As long as there were enough resentment spirits, an Undead Shaman could offer himself as a sacrifice to summon an undead calamity. However, he had to pay a very big price for success. The Undead Shaman would no longer be a human and would turn into a monster. For a human, losing one’s racial identity was a very big price.
If they could substitute sacrificial offerings, many Undead Shamans wouldn’t take this step. After all, many Undead Shamans just wanted to gain immense power by relying on the undead calamity to get higher statuses. Not many would offer themselves as a sacrifice. After all, not everyone had a deep obsession and big resentment like Hal did.
Hal was the Third Young Master, but his body was weak and ill. He was no match for his two older brothers. He basically had no chance to win without cultivating undead magic. He too was very interested in becoming the heir to Earl Harrison’s nobility. However, he was inferior to his two older brothers. In addition, Earl Harrison also hadn’t attached any importance to him; thus, resentment had inevitably emerged over time.
Initially, Hal’s undead magic had not been obtained from the legendary ** Demon King Asmode, but rather the poor management of Light Church. When Hal had accepted the empty title of being a member of the clergy, he had stumbled upon some banned Undead magic tomes that had escaped the Church’s destruction. From then on, the door to a new world had been opened, and things had steadily gotten out of hand until the appearance of today’s situation.
“Sire Clyde, the carriages are prepared. You truly have many goods in your hands.”
“Never mind. Harriet, I suggest for you to immediately use that teleportation magic scroll.”
“Sire Clyde, do you want to go out of the city from the backdoor now? With so many carriages, if the troops of Steinbeck Fief noticed and blocked you midway, then you will not be able to escape, and all the goods will be wasted.”
“No problem, I have a way to deal with the troops of Steinbeck Fief. Problems that can be solved with money are not big problems. What do you say, Sire Harriet?”
“Indeed, that is reasonable. I wish Sire Clyde to have a smooth journey.”
At the doorway, Clyde met Second Young Master Harriet who had prepared a carriage fleet according to the agreement. Upon seeing Clyde and several beauties in the small carriages, Harriet couldn’t help teasing him. Now, it was a dark and windy night, so Harriet was unable to clearly see the faces of those beauties in the carriages. He didn’t know that they were the golden daughters and ladies of illustrious and noble families. He thought that they were just ordinary female slaves. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be joking like now.
Considering this business partner had delivered him carriages and the token to leave town, Clyde graciously warned Harriet. But, whether this fellow could flee or not, that would depend on his luck. In any case, he had already done everything called for by humanity and duty. Harriet left soon after leaving behind the carriage fleet. Clyde then immediately made the arrangements, and Jenny and the others quickly transported those ladies into the carriages.
Harriet’s work was quite detailed. After learning that Clyde wanted to use the carriage fleet to transport slaves, all the carriages he had supplied were of a special-type. The carriages had sturdy iron cages as well as black cloths that were especially used to cover the cages, making things convenient for covert transportation.
Miss Paladin Alicia along with the beautiful female knights under her leadership were now in restricted states like lambs. They didn’t know about the wicked arrangements of Clyde, but even after entering the iron cages, they didn’t struggle. The other white lambs were also the same. When dealing with Princess Halisi along with Miss Sophy, Second Miss Rebecca, as well as Third Miss Vignia, the assassin captain Jenny was clearly hesitant. Clyde could see that she was thinking of releasing them.
“What’s up? Jenny, why are you hesitating? Rest assured. Although I am not an envoy of justice, I will not do anything bad to them.”
“Master, you don’t seem to have asked for their opinions? Isn’t that not very good?”
“There was no time to ask. An undead calamity is about to erupt here. If they don’t leave now, then none of them will survive. I have already messaged Natalie; she will be withdrawing her troops to dodge this hazard.”
Jenny no longer hesitated. After transferring all the loot into the carriages, she left towards the back door area of Atad according to Clyde’s instructions. Although it an emergency now, the carriages of Clyde’s party had Young Master Harriet’s pass token, so they were unimpeded all the way. The troops of Adelaide Kingdom guarding the checkpoints let Clyde’s party pass after seeing the pass token in his hand. With this pass token, the usual procedures of routine inspections of goods and cross-examinations were also skipped.
These defending troops weren’t stupid. The matter of Young Master Harriet giving pass tokens to merchants of Atad to furnish smuggling, evading customs and trade taxes was not rare. Even before Clyde, such matters had been repeated many times in the past. Those defending troops were already used to it and skipped all inspections with this token. Even if one used a toe to think, all knew that such smuggled goods were dubious, knowing too much was just detrimental to them. The defending troops also didn’t dare to offend Young Master Harriet. He, however, was the heir of Earl Harrison’s rank, the future Earl, the new master.
“Your Excellency Clyde, take the grand avenue after going out of the backdoor. Then, you can go straight to Vernon.”
“I troubled you all, this is a small token of appreciation. There’s no need to treat me as an outsider.”
“Your Excellency Clyde, you are too polite.”
All along the way, Clyde gave the soldiers guarding each checkpoint some gold coins. The defending troops of Adelaide that received his bribery were unable to conceal their happiness. Such a generous smuggling merchant like Clyde was already considered a very rare species. Usually, if those merchants passing in the middle of the night gave them a few copper coins, then that would be considered pretty good. Many didn’t give anything. Thinking this, their movements became even quicker. In the past, they would take a lot of time to open the gate, but tonight, they opened the gate much faster.
There was no one among these soldiers who noticed that Clyde was looking at them like they were dead. Most of these pitiful fellows were doomed to die tonight, unable to see the sun of tomorrow, but they still hadn’t realized this point yet. Since they didn’t examine Clyde’s carriages, the last chance to find Princess Halisi, Sophie, and the others slipped away. Clyde’s carriages smoothly passed through the backdoor of Atad and advanced towards the grand avenue.
It was still foul weather outside. However, Clyde’s carriages weren’t affected much. The horses arranged by Harriet were all completely trained mixed-blood horses that had a part of a demonic beasts’ bloodline. They quickly adapted to the rainstorm environment. Almost at the same time, the troops of Steinbeck Fief that had almost knocked down Earl Harrison’s residence suddenly withdrew. Princess Natalie signaled to cease the attack and commanded the army to retreat.
“What’s going on? Why did they suddenly withdraw? Don’t pursue the retreating enemy!”
“Your Excellency Harman, they must have been scared by your bravery. The army of Steinbeck Fief is just a group of boorish fellows without formal military training. They will not attack the city again; they are not worth fearing.”
Standing on the walls of Earl Harrison’s residence palace, Young Master Harman had a lingering fear. Watching the retreating troops of Steinbeck Fief, he felt uneasy. The strength of that female general was clearly above his. If she hadn’t intentionally shown mercy before in the war, then he would have already been beheaded by her.
Now, the other side was withdrawing their troops without rhyme nor reason. Harman not only didn’t feel the joy of victory, but he also vaguely felt fear like something terrifying was about to happen. Steinbeck’s troops clearly had ample time and could have calmly retreated after sorting through the intact corpses of their companions. But now, they weren’t even looking at their companions’ corpses, rather choosing to quickly retreat like fugitives. This in itself was very abnormal.
“Quickly look! That corpse... corpse over there moved.”
“No, that corpse doesn’t have a head. How can it stand up?”