Elden: Ring of Calamity

Chapter 550 Implosion
“I don’t care what He said,” Lucia said calmly. “I only care about what He did, which I’ve always hated.”

"Yes, He has always been so annoying. When playing chess, everyone relies on their own abilities, but there are always people who want to overturn the chessboard after losing. Losing to Him is the will of Heaven and the trend of the times, while winning against Him is touching taboos and going against destiny. Ha, who gave Him the power to determine the fate of all living beings?"

"He didn't want Marika to grant you the Law of Life, but Marika did. He wanted Black Sword to avert your destined death, but Black Sword didn't—which led to you slicing Estelle's head off with a single blow. Enraged, He wanted to fight Marika and even push Radagan to power earlier than originally planned. However, Marika, who had endured for a hundred years, couldn't bear it this time and fought Him to a standstill."

"As a god, He was wounded by the god He himself chose. Regardless of whether He only had half His power left, or whether that god had become the true god of the borderlands, He had already lost because of this wound alone. As a loser, He could no longer maintain the suppression of His other half. What was shaken was not only His power, but also His heart, which had been dominated by the aspect of order since the Golden Age."

Lucia lowered her eyes and said, "The Beta incident last year proved that His order is just a piece of waste paper without that supreme power. And losing to Marika proved that that power is no longer 'supreme'. As you said, our god has never had any sportsmanship. A battle of shattered stars caused Him to lose two games in public. It is common for a cornered dog to do something desperate."

"Yes, so our Lord Alpha, who has always valued order the most, personally chose to compromise with the heinous Chaos Omega. The two sides joined forces to launch the Mad Fire Chaos. Internally, they wanted to launch a surprise attack to kill Fulsanx and uproot your Ancient Dragon Temple. Externally, they relied on secret envoys to make contact with the Giants' Court, intending to use Chareleus to bury you in the North."

“Before the Jedi Seal was raised, the New Party had instigated spies planted in the Northern Expeditionary Army to spread the news that the three dynasties of Asia were at war, in order to shake the morale of the army,” Lucia recalled the soldier named Lucius, shaking his head as he said, “But those arrogant bastards sitting high in the temple will never understand that even steel mixed with impurities, after being forged a thousand times, burned by fire, and tempered by frost, can be forged into a famous sword so pure that it cannot be tainted by any conspiracy or trickery.”

The queen, nestled in his arms, smiled with pride and said, "I thought those spies would cause you a lot of trouble, and I even secretly prepared an elite group of followers to track them down, thinking that if things went wrong, they would come out to help you quell the situation. But I didn't expect that your ability to bewitch people far exceeded my expectations. You managed to break through the encirclement of 300,000 giants in the royal court with just 8,000 remnants of your army."

"If it weren't for this, I wouldn't have had the chance to ignite my source and wait for His Majesty to personally save me."

"Hmph, you still have to talk! This time the plan was interrupted, and not only have you not paid off your debt to me, it will be doubled!"

"Yes, yes, I never renege on my promises. Explain your plan clearly this time, and I'll help you refine it. I guarantee it will double!"

The Queen rolled her eyes at him, withdrew her arms from around him, and knelt down again, still leaning slightly against him as he held her. After a moment of contemplation, she said, "I just said all this to make sure you, a fool who plunged headlong into the quagmire of the North, understand the cause and effect. To show their sincerity, the New Party leaked the news of Marika's serious injury and hibernation to the north. The Giants' Court suspected something was amiss and sent Vaegir to lead an army south to personally confirm the extinguishing of the Magic Ring at the Roghar defense line. Needless to say, the two sides colluded to launch open and covert attacks against you afterward. At that time, I had already infiltrated the upper echelons of the Royal Court as the Sixth Ancestor, Ophelia. What I was concerned with was not these trivial details, but the extinguishing of the Magic Ring itself."

"No matter how many meticulous plans the Alpha, the secret envoy, and the New Party insects thought were to take advantage of the situation were hidden behind this matter, there is one thing they can't hide—the clash between Marika and Alpha must have left both sides severely injured, and the Elden Ring, the vessel that maintains the Golden Law and is manifested from the Law of Life, must have weakened to a level it hasn't seen in a hundred years. Coupled with the already fragile balance between Alpha and Omega that could collapse at the slightest touch, the foot of the Golden Tree is no longer the indestructible, prosperous royal city, but a powder keg that has reached its limit and will explode with just a spark."

She glanced at the ley line formation beneath her feet, ready to erupt, and said softly, "What I have prepared for them is not Mars, but a volcano that has been silent for two thousand years, waiting to erupt today."

"Over ninety percent of the vast energy from the largest ley line in the border region's furnace-like ley lines, guided in a directed manner, surged into the royal city. The magic ring, temporarily deprived of the true god's control, was bound to shatter under the massive influx of runes, carrying even more runes along the golden tree trunk like a landslide and tsunami, rushing underground and into the five fingers' bodies." "You've probably seen those mosquitoes that crawl on the surface of livestock, sucking blood with their mouthparts, their bellies swollen like beads of blood, haven't you?"

"Alpha, who has just been defeated by Marika and is currently in a weakened state, fearing that he will be devoured by his other half, is probably sucking blood to the point of oblivion right now. Tell me, what would happen if the speed of the blood flow suddenly exceeded the expected speed by tens of thousands of times, to the point that the blood that a mosquito could not exhaust for thousands of years was all poured into its abdominal cavity?"

"puff."

She raised a slender hand and made a popping gesture.

"He will drag his brothers and his lackeys along, and explode them into a bright red flower of blood, dying like a real insect."

Lucia stared at his reflection in those dark, night-like pupils. Even though he often considered himself cold-blooded, the shock of Katpera's nonchalantly stated crazy plan left him with lingering fear and a deep sense of inferiority after the initial shock.

He couldn't do such a plan, and he would never even think of it.

"According to this plan, after the ley lines flow back to the royal city, the Golden Tree, along with the entire Rodel, will be blown to pieces by the chaotic burst of energy. The eight million Golden People, as well as tens of millions of ordinary people living in the central part of the Altar, will all die."

Katpera's eyes darkened slightly, but she still looked directly at him without flinching and said earnestly, "I know."

"With the power of supreme will, even Alpha, who directly receives the greatest impact, may not die. Omega will at most be seriously injured. Afterwards, not only will he not die, but he will also take over all the remaining power under the guidance of the chaotic will."

“I know that too,” her eyes brightened again, “but at that time His power was only a fraction of what it once was, while you, with the remaining ley lines here, were able to go even further, first destroying Chareleus, then digesting the entire legacy of the Giants’ Court, and finally gathering the power of the Dragon Moon Kingdom and the followers of the God Skin Cult to rule the Altar. Without Marika and Godwin, you are the only god and king in the world—a mere wandering ghost is nothing to you, you can destroy it with a snap of your fingers.”

(End of this chapter)