Blood tax

Chapter 560 Civil War in Shutoral: Evil and Frost Death Knights
Raindrops fell on the ground, raising a familiar smell. A gust of cold wind that did not belong to this season blew, causing Lansada, who was wrapped in a cloak, to shiver.

The trainee nun has passed the entrance examination of Homemonworth, but now she is still a cleric of the Storm Squadron, leading a small team with Paxiu to patrol along the ancient walls of Homemonworth.

It was dark and cold, and patrolling was a real chore. When everyone stopped to rest, Lansada climbed up to the tower of the city wall and looked into the hazy rain and fog.

Under the slope of the southern wall of Homemonworth is the endless Whispering Forest. It is said that there is a road that leads through the dark green forest to the city of Beyelan. The lost curses from the ancient era have accumulated there for unknown reasons, making it an inaccessible and ominous place. When everyone was having a rest, they always said that there were innocent souls and strange mutated creatures wandering there. Anyone who didn't want to live could go there for a walk.

Surrounded by cliffs, fjords and whispering forests, Homemonworth is silent. The edge of the dim vision seemed to be drawn with a black line drawn by charcoal, which made people feel depressed.

The strong loneliness will turn into reality.

Lanzada's mood was so chaotic that she had no clue. First she doubted whether it was rational for her to come here to enroll in school in the fall. Then she thought that this was arranged by Griffith, whom she admired, and there was no reason to worry. Finally, slowly, she couldn't get rid of the bad situation. Emotionally, I began to doubt whether the captain's sanity was actually problematic...

There was an imperceptible, repetitive and vague whisper in the sound of the rain, hoarse and low, mixed with indescribable noises.

Lansada was agitated and looked around with his eyes wide open, looking for the source of the sound. However, she found nothing.

"I must not have had a good rest these past two days~" the trainee nun muttered, rubbing her forehead.

Vaguely, she seemed to see a faint firelight and two faint neighing sounds in the cemetery to the southwest.
"Lansada!"

"Ah——!" The girl was startled by the shout. She pulled out the hammer from her waist and moved towards the direction of the shout.

"Oh, hey, hey -" Paxiu, who had climbed up the tower, almost had his head smashed by the hammer and hurriedly took two steps back. "The ranger said you can't stare at the forest for a long time. Come on, let's make some hot food." Tea!"

"Hey, I'm sorry..." Lanzada put away his weapon in embarrassment, "Why did I forget this...wait, Mr. Kroger reminded me of this?"

Lanzada thought for a while and found that he had no impression of this matter at all.

"I must have said that! Yes, you have lost your mind just like Desai," Paxiu shook his head sympathetically, "I just said there is something wrong with this college. I heard it in my hometown, it is Hometown Watts Shadow, the labyrinth of illusion that consumes the mind!”

"Hmph!" Lanzada didn't believe this nonsense, "According to what you said, Count Larmore, Captain Griffith, and Desai, they are all rational and powerful law breakers, jumping in one after another. It’s a maze that you can’t extricate yourself from, right~”

Paxiu immediately caught the flaw: "But they have all abandoned the hopeless path of being a lawbreaker, haven't they! Desai will do the same sooner or later!"

The two of them kept arguing all the way downstairs. After walking up the last step, Lanzada suddenly froze.

"What about people?"

The other members of the team—the city defense troops dispatched from nearby and the employees of the college—were all gone. Their weapons, lanterns and wet cloaks were placed randomly, the campfire made a crackling sound, several wooden bowls used for drinking tea fell to the ground, and the steaming tea flowed along the ground to the corner.

Lanzada and Paxiu immediately raised their weapons and shields, back to back on guard. They held their breath and turned their eyes rapidly, not daring to miss any gaps between the roof and the corners of the walls.

The lower level of the tower was eerily quiet. Lanzada could even hear water dripping along the cracks in the stone, and Paxiu's heartbeat was beating like a war drum.

At this time, I heard rapid footsteps, very fast and very light. Lanzada faced the direction of the footsteps and silently recited a prayer. The spiritual energy circled the hammer, ready to strike at any time to shatter the darkness.

"Lansada, Paxiu!" The voice of Kallen from the Storm Squadron came from outside. She jumped into the room on the lower floor of the tower and shouted to her companions, "Come quickly, there is a situation in the cemetery."

……

Hometown Cemetery is where those who were not sent back to their hometowns are buried.

Here, just like the tower, the school guards who were guarding the building were all gone. Several tombs were seriously damaged. Many white tombstones were toppled, the tombs collapsed, and the coffins were dug up, leaving them empty. The excavated soil, messy footprints and broken branches curved and extended into the nearby woods.

"Who dares to come to Homonworth to rob the tomb?" Paxiu looked around, took out a flare and shot it into the sky, "They must not have gone far, let's catch up."

"wrong."

Lansada knelt half on the ground and examined it carefully. There were no signs of knocking, hacking, or even scratches on the surface of the damaged coffin. The wooden boards were smashed from the inside, and a lot of dirt fell from the coffin. There was very little dirt next to the tomb.

"The tomb was dug from the inside," Lanzada said seriously. "Look at the traces nearby. The soil flew up and spread around, and then collapsed downwards."

Paxiu and Kallen were both stunned. They had heard about Raven's incident and read the reports, but this was the first time they had seen it with their own eyes, and it happened in Homemonworth...

"Get out of here!" Lanzada raised his shield and prayed to the Holy Light. The golden light dispelled the darkness, but revealed the ominous things hidden there. The air was freezing, even the breath turned into white smoke in the ice mist, and the bone-eroding chill spread along the toes and towards the spinal cord. The ghost howls, and bursts of indescribable murmurs penetrate people's hearts.

The terrifying and distant shouts were getting closer and closer, and their aura even caught the three of them, making their bodies stiff and unable to move their eyes away. Lanzada couldn't see clearly the figure emerging from the shadows, but he could hear the heavy horse's hooves and the neighing of the horses. The overwhelming sense of oppression that made him unable to look directly made him breathless.

It comes from a distant world, and every sound and every breath hints of disaster.

There are two.

"Bow down to us, mortals."

Lanzada, Paxiu and Kallen knelt down uncontrollably, as if there was a mountain pressing on them.

In the shadows and mist, two knights riding black horses slowly appeared. They wore gleaming plate armor and black robes, and their long black and white hair hung down from the gaps in their ferocious and sharp helmets.

The horse's hooves hit the tombstone, making a harsh crackling sound, and the high-quality stone tablet followed suit, making people tremble from the bottom of their hearts at the terrifying power of the knight. Just by seeing the shadows and iron hooves on the ground, Lansada already felt that his soul was about to be torn apart. He wanted to run away, but he couldn't move an inch.

"Lift your head and look me in the eyes," a cold voice commanded.

The shackles of his thoughts loosened a little, and Paxiu raised his hand a little, and his voice suddenly changed in shock:

"Hey, it's a death knight! Back away!"

A gust of wind swept past and directly threw Paxiu out. Kallen, who had the weakest resistance, couldn't bear the pressure of dark psychic energy and fainted. Lansada gritted her teeth and tried her best to face the unbelievable horror:
"Why didn't your souls go to the kingdom of God? Do you still want to stay in the mortal world and become the knights of the immortal king?
"Nonna Octavius,
"Culala Litigne."

The white-haired death knight raised his hand and held it empty, and the ice froze Lansada's body.

"She is Griffith's confidant and useful."

"I know, let her become a servant and lead us closer to the goal."

The ice ring tightened around Lanzada's throat, making it impossible to breathe. Her vitality was losing, and some kind of weird, cold breath was taking over her body bit by bit.

Unable to struggle, the trainee nun slipped towards the icy abyss, and the darkness sank deeper and deeper. Sudden--!
A sinuous arc of silver shattered the darkness and ice. The scarlet magic eye, as bright as a gem, burst out with a pressure crazier than the chill of death, and the aura as vast and distant as the starry sky gazed at it under the guidance of the magic eye.

The death knights Nona and Kulala sensed the approaching danger and hurriedly drove the skeleton horses to dodge to both sides. A group of extremely chaotic ghouls emerged from the darkness behind them and pounced on the scarlet evil eye.

A sharp, slender scarlet electric light suddenly fell from the air, like a thin sword thrust out of the darkness, straight into the heart and lungs, and it also carried an indescribable aura of nothingness.

The ghouls that rushed forward were hit by this lightning, and exploded in groups like bursting water bladders. Amid the strong burnt smell, a large amount of finely chopped carrion and bone foam was sprinkled.

Ophelia was surrounded by terrifying crimson arcs and came to Lanzada's side. With one tap from her, the novice nun was freed from her confinement.

"Get out of here quickly and send a warning," Ophelia stood in front of Lansada and looked at her familiar friends. "Mura and Russell will be sad, and Berthier, he misses you too. Become crazy……

"How can you face each other when this happens?

"How to do it……

"I can only crush you and let them blame me..."

Nona and Kulala are in danger. They drove skeletal horses and armed with cold bone swords and ice spears, flanking them from the left and right.

A hurricane-like vortex suddenly appeared in Ophelia's hand, and the irresistible force was like a group of rapidly rotating sharp blades. At the center of the storm, a black crack the size of a grain of rice was trembling and shrinking.

There is nothing in the black rift, only endless darkness and nothingness, and not even light can escape its swallowing.

Ophelia raised her right hand high and threw down the whirlpool of the void:
“The time of annihilation has come, destruction is coming.

"The tentacles of nothingness have wrapped around you...

"Darkness overpowering!"