Shadow Covenant

Chapter 99 "Underground Battle"

The cold wind blowing from the long and narrow crack above carried the shadows mixed with the stomping sounds of moving arthropods and the noise of the city below into Elise's ears.

As the priest of the Spider Queen, she is wearing the attire she would only wear in a formal meeting today. She is wearing a mithril-mixed adamantine mail shirt inside, a robe with spider patterns painted on it, and a stick in her waist for communication The eight-legged scepter of the Queen of Darkness "Kosthust".

However, standing at the highest point of "Little Takia City" at the moment, Elise, who was at the top of a prism-shaped spike tower, scanned the city below with her pair of pitch-black eyes that blended with the darkness. A new drow city with the same name as the main city of the elves "Takia".His expression was a little dark and difficult to understand.

At this time, her state of mind was completely different from that when she climbed the tallest clock tower in Palermo one night to overlook the entire human city.

Because she knows, she failed!

After several years of planning, when only a few steps away from victory, the prey suddenly woke up, not only tore open the spider web, but also followed the spider web to find the trace of the behind-the-scenes.

This incident happened one after another in just a few days, from the initial exposure, to the subsequent cleansing, until today's invasion.

After receiving these messages, Elise felt sad and happy for a while.

The sad thing is that she is already facing failure. For the priest who made the "undefeated oath" in the Temple of the Spider Queen, this is an out-and-out life and death crisis.

Because as a price, she, together with the divine power bestowed in her body, will be used as a sacrifice to appease the anger of the "Queen of Darkness" Korsust, the god the drow believe in.

But she was overjoyed that the follow-up surface humans decided to invade the Underdark, which brought her back from a dead end, and she hasn't completely failed.

And with such a nature, she will change from being an out-and-out sinner to being ordered to take over the command of the city as a "four-eyed" priest.

Then, in this way, she will have the last chance, as long as she dedicates the flesh and blood of those invaders to the supreme Queen of Darkness, she will be able to perform crimes and make meritorious deeds.

She withdrew her gaze overlooking the underground city and looked back.

At this time, the small spider-belly conference hall was already full of people when she looked at it, and there was only one vacant seat left.

"Has Lu Zhani not arrived yet?"

Elise asked everyone in the meeting with a heavy voice. The martial art chief in charge of the drow warriors was silent every day, and the other "three-eyed" priests and sisters also looked at each other blankly,

After all, they are not familiar with the name Lu Zhani, but they only know that there is such a person in Taqia City, who is elusive, and is responsible for stealth assassination.

Seeing everyone's reactions, Elise knew that it was a waste of time to ask, so she patted the table and said.

"Don't care about her! According to the information from the spider shadow scouts, the surface army is not far from Takia's position. It has already reached the Xuanshui Waterfall, and after going through five caves, it will take you three kilometers down to the city outside our city. Black fungus forest, what do you think now?"

"Sit and wait?"

When she said this, her voice was raised by eight decibels, her expression was angry, and the shadows of spiders in the conference hall were reflected in her eyes.

But her words spread quickly in the air like some of the strangest poisons, accompanied by the slight starlight emitted by the lichens and moss covering the rock wall high outside the window, and spread to the disturbed faces of everyone present by the faint light.

Seeing that everyone still refused to answer, Elise sneered.

"Why don't you speak anymore? Or, you wait until you are on the stage of the Queen's Ceremony before you speak."

The Queen's Ceremony is a grand ceremony used by the drow to sacrifice to Korsust every year. Usually standing on the stage are gifts for pleasing Kosust. They are usually various creatures from the Underdark, used to divide spiders. Food, the last ceremony, even caught a ground dragon.

"Elise, I have used magic pets to investigate the group of surface humans. There are very powerful spellcasters inside. My suggestion is to retreat temporarily."

The one who spoke was also wearing a robe, but there was no drow in the robe wearing a fine gold locker like Elise.

And the exception is that he is a male drow who appears in a drow meeting where women are respected.

However, his appearance is almost the same as Elise, full of drow's unique beauty, his obsidian-like skin is extremely smooth, his light red eyes are like the most beautiful rubies, and his silver hair reflects the dazzling luster under the dim light outside the window , but there is a large scar in the shape of a spider on the flawless and delicate face, but this also proves his identity from the side.

The occupation is "Spider Mage", and he is also a high-level drow spellcaster who has undergone the "Tattoo Ritual".

Like Elise, he can cast spells with five rings or above, but what he casts is not divine spells, but the spider spells he learned from the descendants of Korsust.

"What are you talking about, Currea? Absolutely not like this! How much effort did it take us to build the city of Xintachia? Are you trying to run away? Just because of the death of the familiar and your fear of shit, you have to Quit with your Rosales family?"

Hearing this, Elise, who was originally angry, became more and more angry. She looked at the drow mage in front of her who had an obvious dark scar on her face after healing, and almost growled,
"But reason tells me that there is no better decision to stay here than to be buried with this city, and they won't live here. Holding a few spider corpses is enough for them to go back to business, isn't it?"

Cureya was not affected by the angry Elise at all, but stood up, walked up to the priest who believed in the Queen of Darkness, and sighed.

"Didn't the Spider Queen also tell us that we need to be patient? No hunting can be done in one go."

"Now going deeper underground, their supplies can't be maintained, can't they? And the shipment has already arrived, it's not impossible to get involved in Palermo again."

The drow mage's voice was exceptionally sensible, and his words were more convincing than Elise's anger.

"can not do this."

Elise was still quite unwilling to veto it, and no one knew about the oath she made in Kosuster. This was the price of her rapid growth, and she also could not tolerate failure.

She gritted her teeth.

"I didn't even fight. I don't agree with your intuition alone, and this time the high-ranking bishops of Palermo didn't follow."

"I have already completed the preparation ceremony for the Blood Alliance. This time, I will not allow them to approach Xintachia City no matter what."

The blood alliance is the highest ritual that Elise can perform. It can use sacrifices to call the descendants of the Queen of Darkness enshrined by the drow elves for generations, but the price is the death of countless creatures. This is a cruel living sacrifice, and it will also Let Elise lose at least one ring of divine authority.

"Ok."

The drow mage with the scar on his face nodded helplessly and said in a concentrated voice.

"Since you have decided to do so."

"Then I won't stop you, but I'll go prepare my back. If I really fail, I will take the remaining drow and hide deeper. At that time, I will wait for you on the ruins of the gray dwarves. "

"If you die, I will avenge you!"

……

At this moment in Palermo, in a luxurious study in the Lutov winery, there was a gloomy cloud.

When there was a knock on the door, the two middle-aged nobles who were sitting on the high chairs in a state of confusion woke up immediately.

"Master, I'm back." Said the man outside the door.

"Logan, I'll go."

Inside the door, Marco restrained his younger brother Logan's desire to get up with his hands, walked to the door, and skillfully removed the pick, and opened the locked door.

Standing outside the door was indeed the butler he sent out, Yasin Odom.

Yasin is a Xuya with beautiful orange eyes, which is one of the reasons why he bought him back from the slave market more than ten years ago.

"Yasin, what's the matter? Is everything done?"

Marco looked at his most loyal servant in front of him, even if he was as calm as he was usually, his tone at this time was inevitably a little hasty.

He subconsciously held the hand of the man in front of him, as if this could make him feel at ease.

"Reporting to the master, it's done. I have brought your words to tell those in the sea not to do anything to Edith Manor. They agreed, but they asked for compensation."

Feeling the man's big hand, Yassin frowned slightly calmly, but his tone was still respectful.

Marco, who was in the joy of the news, didn't notice any strangeness in Yassin, but closed the door, then excitedly took his hand, and let him sit on another chair in the study, He waved his big hand.

"You promise, how much they can eat with their fish-like appetites."

"Well, indeed, there are only fifty animals, not expensive. I have already asked people to prepare them. They should be satisfied when they enjoy them."

Yassin also nodded in agreement. Compared with the Sahuagin tribe whose resources were still in a barren period, and the Lutov family whose gold coin purchasing power was unprecedentedly high, the price of fifty livestock is not high, but rather low. terrible.

Logan even laughed heartily. After all, this was the only good news recently, and it finally stopped the originally planned death plan.

You know, he couldn't even drink a sip of wine these days, and what he thought of in his dream was that the Edith family found out what he had done, which led to a devastating blow to their Lutov family, not only The reputation was ruined, and the family name was also wiped out.

"Well done, Yashin! Cheers to a better tomorrow!"

After hearing the news, Logan also took a sip of the rich and mellow white wine in the goblet, then raised more than half of the wine glass and said to Yassin.

"Master Logan, dare not..."

"Haha, come on, come on, have a drink!"

"Brother, you come too..."

……

Listening to the hustle and bustle from behind and the exchange of glasses, Marco held up a sipped wine glass with one hand and propped it on the transparent embossed glass with the other. He felt that the dark sky outside the window was extraordinarily bright at this moment.

For the first time, I feel that the family wine business is about to be impacted and declined by the impact of fine wine brought about by the open trade of elves, which is also a good thing.

At least it will take half a year for this incident to affect Palermo from a distance, and if the sahuagin attack on the noble manor is exposed, they will not be able to stay in Palermo for a day, and they will have to pack their belongings overnight Run away.

But who knew that an ordinary viscount who had retired from the battlefield and lost his influence in the army would still have such great energy.

Not only does he have a good relationship with the Shrine of Dawn, but he can also be respected by Earl Reese. If he hadn't witnessed the swearing-in meeting a few days ago, he would not have believed it.

The reputation in the city has always been obscure, and the Edith family, which is unknown except for the wine industry, has hidden so deeply that they can call a legendary strong man.

If he had such strong support, what would be the point of retreating in Palermo? He would be able to dominate in St. Lawrence, the capital of the kingdom.

He was quite upset and thought with some jealousy, and immediately took a sip of wine.

But letting go of the most important thing can also make him start to think rationally about what the future should be like.

Now in the future, the high-end wines in Palermo will definitely be impacted by the fine wines of the elves, and the Lutov family will soon live up to the grand occasion and fall from the clouds to the dust.

Naturally, it was not something the two brothers could accept. Since their ancestors brought a handful of food and dared to follow the kingdom to open up knights, drive away monsters, and resist storms to build a port city here, the blood of unwillingness flowed in their bones.

The reason why they hooked up with the deserted murlocs was also because they wanted to trade with the tribes of the seabed in order to make profits.

It's just that the originally planned Thoreau murlocs are extremely xenophobic and invisible, and the sea elves are even more arrogant. The only thing they can contact in Qianfanhai is the sahuagin.

Having said that, I don't know how the damn diplomats of the Camille Empire persuaded the elves in the highest forest, and how they were willing to open up trade.

He has a deep understanding of how difficult the elves are. If he hadn't accidentally sent a sea elf slave back to the bottom of the sea, he wanted to find the sea elves, but he couldn't even meet him. But even so, he still couldn't handle the sea elves An extremely proud sea elf.

At most, there are two more useless elven wonders than others, one is a crooked conch-shaped token to prove his identity, and the other is an underwater breathing ring that allows people to move freely in the water.

Other than that, there is nothing else, it seems that this is the reward given by Haiyang for saving the slaves of the sea elves, but how can this be...

Perhaps because he was relieved of his serious troubles, he quickly realized that there was another possibility in front of him, that is, if he used this token given to him by the sea elves as a stepping stone to trade, and used it to bribe the elves in the highest forest, would it be possible? There is a possibility of success.

He heard that the land elves were equally interested in sea elf culture, and whether his token could please them.

If only I could...

Then he won the agency right of the elf wine in the Baviallo area, so he didn't have to worry about the decline of Lutov's winery, but it would prosper even more.

It only needs to increase the price of elf wine, then the wine of Lutov Winery will become a very cost-effective drinking substitute.

At this moment, for some reason, Marco suddenly found that his originally difficult and rugged future suddenly turned into a sunny and flat road at this moment.

On the other side, Yasin, the butler of the Lutov family, calmly borrowed a gesture of toasting, and covered the ring that was shining slightly red...

(End of this chapter)