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Once everyone reached the end of the tunnel, the gates were still sealed shut. It made them quickly realize that they had imagined they would die there, and whoever took care of that, was already told to close them.
"Looks like we'll have to make our way through..." Blake squinted his eyes.
He slowly stood up and pointed his hand at the closed gates through the car's window. Everyone in the party panicked.
"W-Wait, Blake, don't break the gates, you might alert them of us!" Elfriedden said.
"Destroy? What type of person do you think I am?" Blake sighed. "{Deconstruct}"
FLASH!
A bright gray light surged from his hands, the power of Alchemy and Creation Elements converged together, affecting the very materials the entire wall was made of.
Within seconds, a neatly made opening was made, the car passed through it and then Blake simply closed the opening again.
There were no guards around, the entire area was completely sealed shut and there wasn't a single person waiting in the other side.
Using Blake's Deconstruct, they went through four more sealed gates until they arrived at the Rosenheim Dukedom, to further infiltrate, they used Cattalina's illusions to move across a group of guards outside, and then moved to the road, pretending to be just another car.
"The place looks... normal?" Erika wondered, looking through the window. "I can't really see anything bad here... Everyone's having a normal day."
Indeed, everyone was having a normal day, Erika and Blake noticed at first how awkward it felt. The people seemed completely unaware of what had happened just now. perhaps not even the guards were aware that their order of closing the gates had this meaning.
"It's weirdly bizarre how they pretend everything is okay..." Erdrich sighed, looking around. "Or I guess they don't know..."
"Let's go to the root of the entire situation, no need to engage with the people here anyways," Chris said, crossing his arms. "Blake, if it truly is what you might think it is, what do we do?"
They had yet to meet any noble though, most assumed they were simply not here gathered, and probably in their respective homes.
However, Blake had another idea about where they might be.
"His majesty is awaiting for you across this door, please make sure to be polite when greeting him. He has been on a rather... bad mood lately," sighed the butler. "The endless advance of the demons and Fafnir's army is worrying, our country is in chaos... I know this might come out of nowhere, but you and your group might be the very last hope we have."
"I understand, I shall do what I can to save your country," Blake nodded, simply going with the flow.
With a gentle push, he opened the door, Everfrost walking right by his side with Elfriedden and little Sapphirus who had just woken up.
The King sat down over his golden throne, the large throne room beautifully decorated with red and gold tapestry, large statues of knights and kings adorned the entrance, several guards lining up at left and right.
There was no mistress or any children this time, it was just the King alone, a tall, muscular elf man, with a long blonde beard and curly blonde hair, a gold and silver crown adorned his head.
His facial expression was sharp and masculine, his face looked strong and manly, a rather unusual sight as most elves, be it females or males, looked very delicate.
It was clear the King was much older than the majority of the population.
He wore silver armor over his body, a golden cape, and golden linings decorated his armor.
There was a long, silver and gold spear embedded with five colorful jewels, red, green, blue, orange, and yellow colored, imbuing the spear with high spiritual power.
"...Welcome, Summoner," the King spoke with an expressionless face, devoid of panic or anything that someone who was seeing the person they intended to kill alive would make. "I've been waiting for you."
"Your majesty..." Blake bowed, alongside the rest of his friends.
Despite the formalities, Blake's sharp red eyes glared directly into the King's golden eyes.
And both eyes met.
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