Mydei gazed up at the sky. Against the already dim heavens, a vast black shadow spread slowly, like a drop of ink bleeding into a pond.
Strangely, he had looked up at the sky several times while traveling through other regions but had never seen this shadow. Only now, standing directly beneath it, could he perceive its presence.
The cold, damp divine power of the Child of Flesh seeped downward from this celestial shadow. Seeing this, Mydei immediately understood why the Dragon Ember Empire had fallen into such a state.
The Sun God had long been weakened, the brilliant white daylight that once illuminated the world reduced to a dim golden glow. Under these conditions, it was entirely possible that a momentary lapse—perhaps due to the Sun God's own negligence or a minor interference from an Outer God—had caused the golden light covering the world to falter, leaving a small area unprotected.
The Child of Flesh, wielding its own Authority, had seized this opportunity to infiltrate, precipitating the current disaster.
The Dragon Ember Empire was simply unlucky. The Sun God's lapse had occurred directly over their territory.
As Mydei pondered this, he and Gerald entered the area enveloped by the black shadow. The two men and the dragon were instantly plunged into a completely pitch-black environment, as if they had been suddenly blindfolded. They couldn't see a single thing.
Gerald retrieved a gemstone from his person, rubbed it a few times, and muttered an incantation. A soft white light bloomed from the gem, illuminating a radius of about thirty meters around them.
While thirty meters might seem like a large area, Mydei and Gerald were currently traveling at a speed far exceeding thirty meters per second. This meant that if anything appeared at the edge of the light's range, they would have less than a second to react.
Because of this, Thor said, "Shouldn't we slow down a bit? It would be bad if we crashed into something."
But Gerald scoffed, "What's there to be afraid of? If we hit something, we'll just smash it to pieces!"
As he spoke, Gerald produced another magic item—this time a bracelet. After activating it, he said, "This is a Sixth-Level Force Field Shield, strong enough to handle impacts at this speed."
Seeing all the items Gerald was carrying, Mydei couldn't help but ask, "So when you went back to 'manage Imperial affairs,' you were really just grabbing all this stuff, weren't you?"
"Not entirely," Gerald replied. "I did speak with a few ministers I ran into. I told them to do their best to manage the Empire and that I'd be back soon."
Mydei was speechless.
He couldn't tell if this Emperor had too much faith in his ministers or if he was simply out of his mind. Was this something a normal person would do?
Then, Gerald said, "Fly straight for another ten minutes, then make a slight left turn. We should be close."
Despite having only thirty meters of visibility high in the sky, where they should have seen nothing, Gerald spoke as if he knew their exact location and destination perfectly.
Wyvern Thor nodded. Following Gerald's commands, he flew, turned, slowed, and descended. Soon, the silhouette of a city appeared before the two men and their dragon—the first city to be shrouded in the Shadow.
As they arrived directly above the city gates, Gerald's thirty-meter sphere of light illuminated the scene below. Mydei was astonished to see civilians still active within the city!
These people were clad in slightly worn, full sets of armor and carried weapons, patrolling in groups of three to five. When they saw the light in the sky and Gerald mounted on his wyvern, they froze for a moment before immediately dropping to their knees and crying out, "Your Majesty!!!"
Gerald's gaze swept over them, his tone no longer the casual, flippant one he'd used with Mydei, but now stern and commanding. "Report the situation."
"Yes, Your Majesty!" one man stepped forward and began to explain in a clear voice. It turned out these people were the city's permanent garrison. When the disaster struck, the natural first response would have been to evacuate the populace and flee to safety.
But the Shadow spread too quickly, far exceeding the speed at which ordinary people could travel. So, after careful consideration, the city's nobles decided not to flee but to hold their ground within the city.
With the badges provided by Okhema, they faced little danger as long as they didn't do anything reckless. The city's food reserves were also sufficient to last for at least several months. These nobles trusted their Emperor completely, believing he would surely come to rescue them within that time.
However, simply waiting—eating and sleeping day after day—was not a viable plan. The nobles didn't want His Majesty to arrive and find them acting like useless pigs. So they devised a plan: they would at least try to investigate something.
For example, they would gather a large group of fully armed soldiers in an open area. Once everyone was ready, one soldier would remove their badge to lure a monster, and then all the soldiers would attack and surround it together!
The soldier reporting pounded his right fist against his heart and declared, "Although we haven't uncovered any useful information so far, we haven't been idle either. The Imperial Seventy-Third Legion has hunted down fifty monsters from the Shadow to date!"
Hearing this, Gerald couldn't help but laugh. "Excellent! Worthy of Imperial soldiers. You've done well! Sitting around waiting to die is not the Imperial soldier's way. This is how it should be!"
In terms of execution and cohesion, the Empire far surpassed the neighboring All Nations Alliance. Listening to their conversation, Mydei suddenly wondered: Perhaps the Sun God hadn't made a mistake? Could this have been intentional?
It was like someone who knew they were about to fall would try to land on something soft.
If the Child of Flesh's power had manifested in a desolate wilderness or a weak nation, it would likely have caused the country's swift collapse, allowing the Child of Flesh's influence to spread unchecked. But it had appeared in the Empire—a nation that had already begun to fight back on its own, even before Mydei's arrival.
Gerald then asked, "Do you know where the Shadow first descended?"
"Yes, sir!" the soldier replied.
"Take us there," Gerald commanded.
However, just as Gerald finished speaking, before anyone could move, a faint rustling sound reached their ears, rapidly closing in on Mydei's position.