Four-Armed Divine Emperor

According to reports from Ctesiphon and the Palace of Wisdom, they received news of Roman troop movements around Ctesiphon three days ago, but they paid no attention to it. Then, this morning, they suddenly discovered:

Their country's army suddenly arrived, or a more appropriate description would be:

With the help of both insiders and outsiders, they seized control of several acropolises around Ctesiphon, and then blocked the communication channels between Ctesiphon and the outside world, refusing anyone, even spellcasters, to enter or exit from the places they could control, that is, the ground.

The people of Ctesiphon were puzzled at first.

Their doubts are the same as those of the mages:

If you say that the remnants of the Old Ones invaded and caused chaos, then the blockade of Ctesiphon is useless. The 300,000 people in this city have been completely wiped out. Apart from shocking people around the world about the brutality of the remnants of the Old Ones and making them more supportive of the White Tower, it has no effect on the order of the White Tower.

On the contrary, the massacre of those who have close ties with the wizard will also create a large number of new generation enemies in the Palace of Wisdom who are extremely hostile to the old ones.

As for using Ctesiphon as a hostage to threaten the Palace of Wisdom... well, if anyone among the remnants of the old days would think so, the wizards would probably be celebrating. These exiles must have retreated to the void for thousands of years and their brains have probably degenerated.

And if the situation that "the old forces secretly controlled the new empire" was a misunderstanding, then neither wizards nor mortals could imagine that the people in power in this new Zoroastrian empire, let's call it "Rome", must be collectively crazy to provoke a sky city and directly challenge the majesty of the real "White Tower Order" at this juncture when they are being suspected?

The people of Ctesiphon are the mortal relatives and servants of the mages of the Palace of Wisdom, or to put it bluntly, their "pets" and "toys."

But that is also the wizard's family dog!

Which secular ruler would dare to do such a thing?

But that's what the Romans did.

And the "reasons" they gave for doing so, at least the ones they said, were also very strange:

The Iskhan law required Ctesiphon to hand over population and tax data for the past twenty years, as well as to hand over some enemies who had fled to Ctesiphon after their defeat in the civil war to avoid being hunted by Roman forces.

It seemed like a normal move for a newly emerged nation to eagerly expand its influence and strengthen its authority over the autonomous forces within the empire...

But that was Ctesiphon!

Ctesiphon is proud to be "belonging to the sky city and not the secular world"!

Which normal mortal king would choose such a target?

Even if there was a sane officer or general who received such an order from him, he would definitely disobey it.

Because of such a "ridiculous" reason...

Such a ridiculous reason... actually made the mages who had already started the secret war - which was not really secret, but because the scope of activities was limited to the Sky City, and the mages were still worried about misunderstandings and damage to their prestige, they suppressed the news. Therefore, the mages who were mobilized for the secret war and the mortal world did not know about it for the time being fell into confusion.

What the hell is going on?

Once Chief Celine lost contact, it was basically like she was tearing herself apart and telling Sky City clearly: White Tower! I'm fucking back!

If it were them, instead of blocking off Ctesiphon, something no sane person would do, they would probably infiltrate the Palace of Wisdom and then attempt to seize or destroy the Sky City with the help of internal and external forces...

and many more!

Thinking of this, the mages immediately requested that the Palace of Wisdom be raised to a high altitude and put on alert, paying special attention to guard against internal elements who might collude with the old times and launch a rebellion to seize the city.

No one would believe that the "Romans" were really just coming for Ctesiphon.

Even if it was coming for Taixifeng, it would be a slap in the face of the people of the Wisdom Palace and the White Tower.

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Going to war makes no difference.

Regardless of the truth, whether the "Old Ones" have come or not, openly using force that is insignificant to the mages is tantamount to directly challenging the authority of the mages. It is no different from secretly training royal mages in private, and will inevitably be punished by the White Tower.

Ctesiphon is not actually that important to mages, but as a city on the ground that has close ties with mages, it represents the "authority of mages" to some extent and is very important.

Regardless of the reason, this is tantamount to declaring war on the mage.

So how did the White Tower react to the "declaration of war"?

———They choose to wait and see first!

It's not that the mages are cowardly, but the behavior of the "Romans" is too confusing. If you say there is no problem behind him (in the past), how dare he use force to march on Ctesiphon and provoke the Palace of Wisdom?

You say he has a problem, but they really can't imagine that those mortal enemies have lurked and infiltrated so smoothly to control an empire this time, and when their disguise has been basically exposed, why don't they attack the real core strength of the White Tower, such as Sky City, and those spellcasters across the country who naturally stand on the side of the White Tower, but instead mobilize mortal armies to fight for the "mage's lover"?

It is equivalent to two big countries with a population of one billion. After one country declared war on the other, it did not launch a surprise attack on the enemy's important cities, nor did it attack the enemy's legions. It did not even send a single soldier to the "border". Instead, it attacked a vassal city-state with a population of only 300,000... It exposed its intention to invade, but also failed to seize the advantage of preemptive strike. I don't know why.

If they could capture the Sky City and defeat the White Tower, turning them into slaves, losers, and exiles, then the entire mortal world would be theirs. What would the 300,000 people in Ctesiphon mean compared to the value of the entire mortal world?

Even if they captured ten, a hundred, or a thousand Ctesiphons, what would it matter as long as the Sky City did not fall and the wizards did not fail?

Once the extraordinary battlefield fails, even if these three hundred thousand, three million or thirty million mortals are determined to support the remnants of the old times, it will have no effect on the final result.

So the mages were deeply confused about this.

Just like the otherworldly "thinking for ten days and ten nights and still can't figure it out," the Romans' actions seemed meaningless in every way, except for completely exposing their Iron Wolf identities—you dare to provoke the mage? And you claim you're not colluding with the remnants of the old times!

Other than that, it has no effect.

No wonder the mages were stunned.

It's a bit like two people fighting, and the other person comes up, takes off his clothes, and slaps you twice. You can't help but wonder - is the other person mentally ill? Can't he kill someone without breaking the law? ... Hold on, wait and see what he does. If he really is sick, I'll have to pay attention.

But the Romans seemed unconcerned with these considerations.

After the Palace of Wisdom was launched into space, some people saw this as running away and retreating.

The Roman army marched into Ctesiphon without any resistance. For them, even the mages had temporarily retreated, so there was no need for them to insist on fighting to the death.

After all, the news that "Rome" was backed by the remnants of the old regime had spread throughout the continent and was the mainstream topic of the day. With the other side acting this way, even a fool would know that they were either mentally ill or had some kind of conspiracy. Regardless of the reason, the people of Ctesiphon could not, nor did they have the ability or courage to persist in opposing the Romans after their master left. They could only silently comply with the Romans' demands, handing over power to the city-state, accepting the officials stationed there, and reviewing the past years' affairs...

Everything seemed like a "normal" political and military conflict happening in the secular world.

Chapter 81: White Tower's Caution

The White Tower is silent, and the Palace of Wisdom is running.

To those who didn't know the truth, this was earth-shattering news. Sky City was actually "backing off" from the secular world?!

But many people also guessed the undercurrents accumulating behind the apparent peace.

It is absolutely impossible for the extraordinary to yield to the mortal world, no matter whether it is a kingdom or an empire. This has been an unchangeable truth since the establishment of the White Tower order.

Therefore, the move of the House of Wisdom to abandon its own back garden on the ground and retreat in the face of the Roman advance seems very suspicious.

Combining the preceding and following, with a little thought, it is not difficult for a smart person to guess the terrifying "truth" behind this.

really!

Those rumors are not groundless!

The Romans' actions were essentially a declaration of war against the White Tower, yet the White Tower remained silent. One could only imagine the level of their opponent who would remain unmoved if they chose to remain silent for the time being, while remaining unmoved without further action from the enemy...

For a time, the entire eastern part of the continent fell into "silence" at an extremely fast speed.

The warlords of the Golden Dynasty stopped fighting and seizing territory. The separatist forces in Canaan stopped making trouble. The princes of Bactria and the city-state kings of India...

Everyone held their breath and quietly looked east (west).

Given the strict control that the Four-Armed One maintains over his subordinates, if no information is leaked out at all, then most of the "Rome" departments, especially the core layer, will be like an airtight black box to the outside world, and they will have no way of knowing what is happening inside.

If this suddenly rising "Rome" is really as terrifying as the rumors, its rulers and core class have already

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It is now completely controlled by the forces from the remnants of the old times. Those who are famous are either pawns controlled by them, or remnants of the old times in disguise... This speculation is surprisingly similar to the truth. The only difference is that what controls this empire is not the "old" of the Il world, but the "new" power that came from a more distant and unknown world.

Then the largest war since the War of the Ancients might be about to come. To secretly subvert and control an empire is such a huge undertaking that even the momentum caused by the previous invasions of Neir combined is not as great as this one.

It seemed like the surrounding forces were afraid that if they made a noise at this time, they would attract the attention of either side in the confrontation between the two giants.

There is no need to raise the level to the extraordinary realm. Just the Zoroastrian Empire, a "mortal thing" existing in the secular world, can be crushed as long as it is injected with chicken blood and buffs such as reform and the rise of a new dynasty are arranged.

It was them who launched conspiracy theories, created momentum, and attacked the new country by claiming to "collude with the old." Now they realize that something is not right. Damn, I was just talking, are you really coming?

They were the ones who immediately fell silent, which was quite darkly humorous.

It's not their fault. After all, the conspiracy theory that "the rise of the Romans is shrouded in mystery, and it is suspected that there are "foreign forces" behind it. It is recommended that @Ping An Bai Ta investigate it strictly" was only an argument put forward by a few people. At first, they just lamented that the fall of the Azad Dynasty was too rapid and the situation developed too fast. There were many mysteries that made people curious. Later, it was because it was consistent with the fear of neighboring countries that after the rise of the new empire, they would immediately seek to "recover" the fragments of the empire, that is, to target them.

After some clever thinking, they came up with a propaganda offensive to attack the Romans that was difficult to disprove unless the truth was revealed, proving their innocence.

Bai Ta certainly wouldn't care what the matter actually is. They would just investigate if there was any suspicion. Things like this would definitely not be solved in a day or two, and it might take a year or two.

If they had tried harder, if the White Tower's investigative team had stayed in Rome for another four, five, seven, or eight years, Rome would have been under suspicion and would have been unlikely to resort to military action. The warlords' conflict within the Golden Dynasty would have had more time to decide the outcome, and the separatist movement in Canaan could have been resolved.

So in essence, the people who promote this don’t necessarily actually believe that the Romans were in collusion with the Old Ones.

This is just a spearhead for attack.

But who would have thought...hey, what a coincidence.

This conspiracy theory actually points to the truth!

Once exposed, the Romans showed their hand. I stopped pretending and directly blockaded Ctesiphon and forced the Palace of Wisdom to retreat. It was shocking, but I also couldn't understand why they did this?

The secular elites' thoughts are highly consistent with the White Tower on this point:

No, buddy, you have already torn your face apart. If you can't attack the Palace of Wisdom, what's the use of taking Taisifeng, buddy?

Doesn't this tell me that you are a tough guy?

However, it was obviously impossible for them to guess what the Romans were thinking.

This action successfully "shocked" the White Tower. Of course, no one knows whether the Romans who did this had this idea themselves.

But Bai Ta was obviously bluffed by the strategy.

Not understanding the enemy's operations means feeling unknown about the enemy, and the unknown represents risk.

Celine's disappearance has shown that the enemy has a top combat force that is equal to or even better than the White Tower.

Celine's disappearance can be said to be silent, without any movement. If she was defeated in a battle with others, then with Celine's power, the stargazing towers and divination towers erected by the White Tower around the world, as well as the instruments and magic that monitor the world and elemental fluctuations, should have had some reaction.

However, her disappearance was so silent, like a drop of water falling into the ocean, no one could find its whereabouts.

If Celine had not been so arrogant, although she did not believe the rumors in the mortal world and ran to the Alan Empire alone with her disciples, people at her level would always have various means. El controlled her then and later, that is, now, but could not affect the layout she had made before - of course, he did not have this idea.

Celine left her spell mark in the Mage Tower, which only her true disciples can enter and exit. Based on its performance, one can roughly infer its situation, such as whether it is alive or dead, injured or intact, whether it has escaped outside the world barrier, and its current location.

However, after she went to Alan, the magic mark dimmed...

This situation has never occurred before.

But because it doesn't fit the situation of death, and it's impossible that nothing happened, Bai Ta can only assume the worst:

Everything is true.

Celine encounters an extremely powerful enemy (possibly multiple);

Now dead or captured.

This put Bai Ta under tremendous pressure.

Celine's own strength is definitely among the top few in the mortal world today, and she should be in the top three. After all, there is basically no one with a higher "generation" than her.

Elves are immortal, so they can endure repetition for hundreds or thousands of years. However, it is different for humans, who have the largest number of extraordinary beings. A few hundred years are enough for them to reduce their attachment to and concern for the mortal world to a minimum, and they can't wait to explore the stars.

Therefore, among the first sages who stayed, the non-human immortal species

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The proportion is the highest.

And such a legendary figure disappeared silently in Rome...

This really cannot make Bai Ta not vigilant and alert.

Therefore, when the opponent was not fully exposed yet, they did not choose to attack rashly, but decided to test the waters a bit.

Since you chose to act so openly and deceive me in a worldly way...

Well then, I'll play this game of chess with you.

For the mages, starting a war at the level of the Sky City would mean an all-out war, and the casualties would be their own people, but they did not care if the power of the mortal world was used. No matter how many of the so-called "Crown", "Elite" and "Ace" legions on the ground died, as long as they were mainly mortals, they would not feel sorry.

Please take a day

rt

Chapter 82: "Siege of Rome"

So this war, which should normally have been earth-shattering and so devastating that it would be hard to describe it, kicked off in a strange way.