Goddess Kaleidoscope

These imperial cavalrymen were not without courage, but the alchemical cannons' attack methods were completely beyond their existing understanding. The damage they caused was similar to magic, but magic couldn't reach this distance, nor could it fire three times in two minutes, or fire more than a dozen rounds in a row without stopping.

Seeing that the enemy had wiped out nearly two hundred of their men with a single volley of artillery fire, and that even their brave and fearless cavalry commander had fallen, rolling away several meters like a Kamen Rider, the remaining cavalry, though numbering seven or eight hundred, had lost the courage to continue their charge.

In Yanmu City, the Duke's son Jacob and his soldiers stood frozen on the city wall. The garrison had just witnessed the entire process of the Imperial Army being defeated by mysterious reinforcements using an incredible weapon, which made them feel unreal after being besieged for seventeen days!

Those arrogant imperial armies... were just driven back like that!?

It's no wonder the city's defenders found it unbelievable; the Imperial soldiers, whose battle lines were on the verge of collapse, were equally bewildered.

In terms of troop quality, Imperial soldiers are undoubtedly excellent. The army has transformed them from farmers into soldiers through rigorous training, but ultimately they have not transcended the limitations of the times. The rank-and-file soldiers can only obey orders, but they do not have higher levels of initiative.

Therefore, when a round of artillery fire swept away the entire command, including the corps commander, the remaining soldiers and junior officers were dumbfounded. They were stuck, unable to advance or retreat, and just stood there taking the beating.

It wasn't until they saw their comrades being cut down like wheat by the continuous barrage of shells that the fear of death finally overwhelmed their discipline. Soldiers began to disobey orders and retreat without permission, and this quickly became a chain reaction.

One could take away ten, and ten could take away a hundred. The imperial army, which should have been as indestructible as steel, was instantly shattered into a pile of sand!

Looking at the routed imperial army ahead, Lud did not expect that victory would come so easily. They did not even have a head-on close combat with the enemy, but simply used cannons to drive them into a rout.

The soldiers of the allied forces couldn't help but raise their arms and shout praises to the three goddesses of craftsmanship who had bestowed upon them the technology to manufacture cannons, and to Sura, the god of war who had taught them how to use them. This was all propaganda prepared in advance by Lud, and endorsed by the priesthood of the Pantheon and the Steel Whip Clan.

As for the once revered God of War, Tian Kuang, that brat has long been forgotten by everyone.

Looking at the routed Imperial army, the dwarf chieftain Gulig was about to order a full-scale attack, but as soon as he raised the command flag, Lud pressed it down again, preventing the troops from pursuing their victory.

Lud did not become complacent because of the initial victory with the artillery. The reason he was so cautious was that he discovered that none of the top imperial army experts and mage squadrons mentioned in the intelligence had appeared.

Lude knew very well that this magical world did indeed have some super strong men who could take cannonballs head-on, as well as powerful dream creatures like dragons and monster lords. Although cannons were powerful weapons of war that could determine victory, they were not invincible.

Seeing the enemy army retreat and the siege of Yanmu City successfully lifted, Lude immediately sent someone to contact the city's garrison. In order to prove their identity to Duke Krud, Gulig, who was an old acquaintance of Duke Krud, personally went to the city.

Soon, there was a response from within Yanmu City. The city gate on the north side was opened, allowing the large contingent of the allied forces to enter the city.

As soon as the allied forces entered the city, they were personally greeted by Duke Krud at the inner city gate. The old duke was stunned when he saw Lud, feeling that he had seen this mature-looking young priest somewhere before, but he couldn't quite remember where.

However, he had long heard of the name "Saint Rudd," who was now a household name throughout the kingdom.

After the two sides met, Ludger saw many familiar faces, including Duke Krud and his son Jacob, as well as Nomon, the local priest of the Church of War.

When Lude caused trouble in Yanmu City under the guise of "Hugo," he had met Priest Norman, who was known for his integrity, once. Although they didn't have much interaction, he had a good impression of him.

According to Lude's prior knowledge, after learning that the main altar had openly supported the empire, most of the clergy of the Cult of the God of War within the Kingdom of Duran obeyed the altar's orders and stood idly by in this invasion war. However, some clergy from Duran resigned from the cult in anger in order to defend their homeland.

Among these patriots, Nomen is undoubtedly the brightest star!

Because the Archbishop of Durand was his father, he openly contradicted his own father, not only leaving the Church of War but also severing ties with his father.

At this moment, Nomon was no longer wearing the priest's robes of the Church of War, but instead, like most of the knights present, he had changed into a set of plate armor bearing the insignia of the Duran King's banner. However, Lud noticed with keen insight that this young man still possessed divine protection, seemingly not having lost the God of War's patronage despite leaving the church.

Lude only learned later that Nomen was once the chosen one of the God of War. Although his withdrawal from the church caused him to lose his priesthood and no longer be able to use divine magic, the God of War did not take back his blessing.

However, apart from these few familiar faces, Ludd looked around but did not see Hamilton and Debra, and a sense of foreboding crept into his heart.

"Your Grace, where are the two chief disciples of the Three-Person Tower?"

"Master Debra is injured and is recuperating at my residence. Master Hamilton, he..."

"What's wrong with him? Can you please not leave things unsaid?"

"He...he's been captured by the enemy!"

"What!?"

Upon hearing that Hamilton had been captured, Lud was stunned. After some questioning, he finally understood that yesterday, when the Imperial army attacked the city, Hamilton and Debra led the three-man tower of mages to fight against the Imperial mage army.

During the battle, several mysterious top experts suddenly appeared on the Empire's side and launched a sneak attack, disregarding martial ethics. Debra was injured, while Hamilton, in order to cover the retreat of Debra and her colleagues, fought alone against several martial arts masters of the same level and an entire squad of mages. In the end, he was exhausted and captured.

The capture of Hamilton alive delighted the Imperial Legion Commander. This old mage was not only one of the most powerful mages of his time, revered as the "Fire Saint" of the modern era, but also the maternal uncle of the current King Duran. Fearing that things might change, the Legion Commander arranged for most of the mage squadron and several hidden experts to escort Hamilton back to the Empire overnight, determined to deliver Hamilton alive to His Majesty the Emperor.

Upon learning this, Lud thought to himself, "No wonder I didn't see the Imperial Magisters' Corps in the previous battles. They were transferred away to escort Hamilton."

The old bald man was, after all, one of the strongest magicians of the time, and had already glimpsed the true nature of the elements. Apart from Debra, who was his natural enemy, it would be extremely difficult for other magicians to suppress his magic power. It would take a large number of magicians to work together to construct a magic-blocking array to barely trap him.

This is much more difficult than killing him with a single blow!

Duke Crude had long heard that Saint Rudd was the mortal representative of the Pantheon, a super priest chosen by the seven gods. Even Hamilton would show rare humility when mentioning this friend, admitting that he was inferior to Rudd and that he could only win 30/70 in a one-on-one fight!

Therefore, the Duke asked Ludd to intervene and rescue Hamilton from the Imperials.

At this time, the morale of the soldiers in the Second Army Corps of the Imperial Army was extremely low due to the crushing defeat they had just suffered during the day. Since the start of the war, the Imperial army had been invincible, and the backward noble army of the Durans was as vulnerable as chickens and dogs in front of them.

However, the easy succession of victories gradually made the Imperial Army arrogant and complacent from top to bottom, leading to the illusion that "the Great Canary Empire is invincible."

So the higher you float before, the harder you fall now!

The Second Army Corps has not suffered significant overall losses. Although the daytime artillery bombardment shattered their formations and caused a major rout, the Durans did not pursue them but instead allowed them to leave the battlefield.

Therefore, when the Imperial Legion gathered the routed soldiers, they found that they had suffered less than two thousand casualties, less than one-tenth of the Second Legion's total. With the addition of the second-line troops supplied to them from the rear of the Empire and the puppet troops provided by the local surrendered nobles, the Second Legion still had nearly fifty thousand usable soldiers.

The truly critical problem was that the officers were gone. A large number of high-ranking officers, including the corps commander, were killed in the first round of artillery fire. The cavalry commander also fell on the way to the charge; it is said that he was not dead but was captured by the enemy.

As a result, the highest-ranking officer in the entire Second Army Corps is a centurion in charge of logistics.

This quartermaster, who rose through nepotism, had neither the ability to lead troops into battle nor the prestige to command respect. Therefore, he could only honestly report the situation and shift the blame to the former corps commander, whom he could no longer confront. Then, the entire army huddled in the camp, waiting for a new corps commander to be parachuted in from above.

Meanwhile, on the other side, in a remote border town called "Horseshoe Mark," Archmage Potter Consley, the captain of the Third Archmage Battalion, who was personally escorting an "important prisoner" back to the Empire, also received news the next day about the Second Legion's "battle failure."

Looking at the contents of the intelligence note in his hand, Potter's expression resembled that of an old man on the subway looking at his phone. He simply couldn't understand how the Second Legion, with its 50,000 men, could have managed to turn the tide against the remnants of the 10,000-strong Kingdom army that had besieged Yanmu City.

"That bookworm Yero Wayne (commander of the Second Legion) is utterly useless and a complete idiot! He's supposed to be the top graduate of the Imperial War God Academy, but he's nothing but a worthless fool!"

The enraged archmage roared, the intelligence note in his hand turning to ashes in the flames. The note only vaguely stated that the kingdom's army had sent a highly elite reinforcement, and that they carried a powerful secret weapon. Potter instinctively assumed the kingdom had deployed some kind of "ancient artifact," but this could not excuse the Second Legion Commander's dereliction of duty.

The Canary Empire also possesses ancient artifacts, and in fact, it has far more than the Kingdom of Duran. After all, the two countries have vastly different histories; the Empire is a millennium-old nation that existed before the War of the Gods, while the Kingdom of Duran is a newly established nation that arose after the War of the Gods, so their foundations are naturally quite different.

After cursing the Second Legion Commander, who was now dead, for a while, Potter still seemed unsatisfied and launched into a tirade against the Grand Consul, who had forced him to leave the front lines with a transfer order. If the Grand Consul hadn't insisted that he escort the living Hamilton back to the capital, he wouldn't have left the front lines, much less taken away most of the Archmage Corps.

According to Potter's original plan, they should have detained Hamilton on the spot and used a fixed anti-magic array to trap this great mage of the same level as themselves. It would have been better to send him to the rear once the binding artifact that could seal the magic power of a great mage was delivered.

But the Grand Consul was clearly impatient and demanded that Porter immediately take Hamilton back to the capital without the slightest delay.

Left with no other option, Potter resorted to a crude method: he brought along most of his magicians to form another magic circle that could move but required dozens of high-ranking magicians to act as "movement nodes" in order to imprison Hamilton.

As soon as he left, the kingdom's reinforcements arrived the very next day.

Porter believed that if he hadn't been transferred, the Second Army would have been absolutely safe!

Watching Potter hurling insults at the Grand Consul, and the insults getting increasingly vulgar, the two wizards who were also his deputies and disciples stood silently to the side, keeping their eyes down and not daring to utter a sound, but they couldn't help but complain inwardly.

If it weren't for your eagerness to claim credit, Master Potter, and your insistence on activating the emergency communication crystal to report to the capital after capturing Hamilton, how could the Grand Consul in the rear have known so quickly that they had captured Hamilton?

But you absolutely must not say this in front of your master, because if you do, you might really get beaten to death by him!

After venting his anger by berating everyone involved except himself, Archmage Potter finally regained his composure and rationality. After a moment's thought, he decided that turning back to the front lines would be pointless, so he simply pretended not to know anything and took Hamilton back to the capital.

Anyway, when His Majesty the Emperor blames him, he has the Grand Consul's order on record, and he is just obeying orders from his superiors. Moreover, he is one of the few great mages in the empire. Even if the Emperor really punishes him, it will only be a matter of slapping him on the wrist.

So once Porter calmed down, he was fearless!

Taking a few deep breaths, Potter regained his composure as an archmage, then left the room and headed towards the room where Hamilton was being held.

Putting aside the fact that his side had a numerical advantage, Porter felt that he had defeated Hamilton in a fair contest, so he always put on the composure of a victor in front of his opponent and treated Hamilton with great courtesy on the way to the prison.

Besides what he thought was "heroes cherish heroes," Potter had another purpose in showing goodwill to Hamilton: to find out his secrets.

Although Potter had heard of Hamilton's great name long ago, their first meeting was on the battlefield, and Potter was immediately awestruck by Hamilton's talent!

Potter couldn't understand why everyone else was majoring in fire magic, while he, Potter, was already bald from being too young to turn bald, having lost most of his life and not even having eyebrows left, while Hamilton had such a thick and smooth head of "hair," which Potter found unacceptable.

So on the way back to the capital, Potter hoped to pry open the man's mouth and get the secret of his growth.

However, just as Potter was about to go to Hamilton for tea, a commotion suddenly broke out outside, along with the magical fluctuations of a sorcerer casting a spell.

Potter immediately realized that they had been attacked by the enemy.

Upon hearing the news of an enemy attack outside, Potter understood that it must be the Kingdom sending people to rescue Hamilton, but he showed no panic and even a mocking sneer on his face.

"Hmph! Foolish Duran barbarian, he's asking for death!"

Confident in himself as one of the world's top spellcasters, Potter completely disregarded the attackers. In his memory, the top experts of the Duran Kingdom were just familiar faces.

Of the three chiefs of the Three Towers, Hamilton was captured, Debra was injured, and Vradigor, whose strength was unfathomable, could not directly participate in the battle because as an elf he had to abide by the ancient covenant and remain neutral.

Most of the remaining strongmen are at the Yordle Fortress. Potter doesn't think there are any particularly powerful figures among the attackers. Moreover, even if there are, the team escorting Hamilton includes four top-tier experts, including himself, making them practically invincible!

So Potter confidently picked up his staff and walked out of the room, when a humanoid shadow flew straight towards him. Potter instinctively cast a magical barrier, which the shadow slammed into with a "smack." Only then did Potter realize that the one flying towards him... seemed to be one of his own.

"Lord Gordon!?"

Upon seeing the figure's appearance, Potter was completely stunned. Gordon was no insignificant nobody, but one of the three top experts traveling with him—a great warrior skilled in ancient martial arts. While this powerful figure's attack power wasn't particularly outstanding, his defense was incredibly strong; he was a standard tank.

The attack had only lasted a few minutes when he was beaten so badly that he was unrecognizable. His face was swollen and looked like a pig's head. Potter was able to recognize him only because of the attacker's ancestral knight's armor, but that armor was also badly damaged.

Seeing Gordon's miserable state, Potter's heart skipped a beat, realizing that the attackers were probably not the small fry he had initially thought. So he calmed himself down a bit and shouted loudly towards the front.

Who goes there?

"You're the one who came here, you son of a bitch!"

The voice that answered Potter was that of a young woman. Then Potter saw a stunningly beautiful black-haired nun descend slowly from the sky like a falling leaf to the center of the courtyard. In her hand she held a black, thorny leather whip that fit perfectly against Gordon's wounds.

Potter subconsciously looked around, trying to find if there were any other attackers nearby, because he really couldn't imagine that this girl, who looked to be no more than twenty years old, could beat Potter into such a sorry state!

"Who are you? State your name!"

"Pantheon, Apprentice Priest Shanis, by order of my master, Master Lud, and in accordance with the will of the goddess Shablcorn, you are to help the people of Duran fight against the invaders. Lay down your staff, and I will allow you to surrender with dignity."

"Let...let this old man surrender to you?"

Faced with the young nun's attempt to persuade him to surrender, Potter was so enraged by her contemptuous tone that his blood pressure nearly spiked. However, when he glanced down at Gordon, who had already fainted, he had no choice but to suppress his anger and regain his composure.

He had only vaguely heard of the Pantheon before. It was said to be a "small sect" in the northern region of the Kingdom of Duran, originally known for its skill in making medicine. Later, it seemed to have gotten involved with the Holy Church of Light, supposedly in collaboration to promote a new type of stage play called "film".

As a high priest, Potter had little interest in these frivolous entertainments, so his understanding of them was very limited. He thought the Pantheon was just a third-rate sect that did nothing but gain some fame through these low-class tricks. He never imagined it would be so awesome.

In fact, it wasn't just Potter; the entire intelligence agency of the Canary Empire had seriously misjudged the Pantheon. After all, before this, the Pantheon was perceived as a peace-loving entity. Although it was very famous, it was actually quite small. Its leader, Rudd, was a renowned chosen saint, rumored to possess unfathomable strength, but the Empire had the undisclosed support of the Cult of War, so they completely disregarded the insignificant Pantheon.

The unexpected appearance of a powerful figure put considerable pressure on Potter, so he silently layered shields around himself while shouting loudly to those around him.

"I am Porter Consley, the Royal Archmage of the Canary Empire. My friend in the shadows, would you please show yourself and have a proper chat? Sending out a little girl as a smokescreen is surely damaging to your reputation! Am I right, Saint Rudd?"

Even at this point, Potter still didn't believe Gordon had been defeated by the young nun in front of him. He thought the real master was still hiding in the shadows, and most likely it was the legendary Saint Rudd.