The Heartbeat of the Cruel Elves

It was like the embodiment of an invisible hand of death, pushing them irresistibly, irresistibly and unavoidably into their destined death.

...However, the first vision that appeared in everyone's sight was not anything dangerous or terrifying, but a bright and deep light.

When the brilliant light first appeared in front of everyone after turning a corner, the dark elves' troops almost immediately fell into chaos. They thought it was some kind of enemy lighting, so they immediately became alarmed, stood still, swords drawn, and formed a strict formation under the order of their leader, waiting for the arrival of the terrifying thing that even the scarlet tide was afraid of.

But they waited for a long time, and the bright light, judging from the brightness and size of the light source, remained motionless and failed to appear.

Moreover, not to mention the dark elves who grew up in the underground world and have sharp eyesight, even Li Yin, a foreigner from the aboveground world, soon realized, after his eyes gradually adapted to the light, that this was not the warm light produced by a torch, nor the supernatural cold light produced by the magical "Eternal Flame", but the natural light emitted by the mineral crystals that are common in the underground world.

So, after a brief pause, under the orders of the two princesses, the troops continued to move forward.

It didn't take them long to reach the place where the bright light source was.

These were two huge clusters of crystals, about twice as tall as Li Yin, emitting a clear blue glow. They stood at the two ends of the tunnel, like two doorposts, welcoming the visit of these strange visitors.

Behind them are more huge crystal clusters of similar size and different colors, which are lined up on both sides of the tunnel like big trees and arranged at a certain distance.

This is a crystal avenue!

Under the illumination of the colorful crystal light, Li Yin and his party walked forward along the crystal tunnel and found that it was hundreds of feet long.

Then, after passing through this crystal tunnel, a light that was slightly dimmed by the bright light in front of them, but more shocking, came into their eyes.

Chapter 155: The Lost City

At the end of the crystal passage is the exit of the tunnel. The area outside the exit is empty. In the center of the huge open space in the distance, amidst the brilliant crystal lights of various colors and the pure white cold light of the eternal flame, a city that is 70% similar to Nevève in style stands tall.

They finally found the lost ruins of the city!

The dark elves were stunned at first, and then they broke into an uncontrollable whisper, the tiny voices were full of excitement and joy.

Cassia couldn't help but reveal a faint smile on her cold face.

"Be careful." However, after a brief moment of joy, her smile quickly faded. She straightened her face again and warned the dark elves: "Although we have successfully walked out of the maze and arrived at our destination."

"However, the danger that the Scarlet Spiders fear has not yet appeared."

Her warning cast a shadow over the hearts of the excited dark elves. However, in general, they finally walked out of the seemingly endless maze and arrived at their destination. This alone was enough to boost the morale of the troops. Therefore, after calming down their excitement, the dark elves continued to maintain a strict formation and moved forward cautiously.

The next section of the journey was first a downward slope of about a hundred feet, and then an endless plain. After walking about half a mile on the flat stone plain, a huge lake appeared on their left.

This was an unexpected surprise, so the entire army stopped to replenish water. When approaching the lake to get water, the dark elves were even more surprised to find that the lake was not a stagnant pool of water. Under the dark lake surface, some plants such as algae emitted sporadic glimmers, trembling slightly in the soft water. And with these swaying glimmers, from time to time, some faster black shadows could be seen passing by, making the swaying of the algae more intense.

"Fish!" The dark elves cheered in surprise.

So the whole army simply camped down, used local materials, had a delicious meal, and replenished the team's food reserves. After wandering in the maze for more than ten days, relying on dried meat and mushrooms every day to fill their stomachs, Li Yin was almost moved to tears by the taste of fresh fish meat. He turned his head and looked around, only to see the proud dark elves around him wolfing down their food, no longer caring about their former elegance and decency.

"The destination is so close, but you have the time to ask them to stop and have a picnic. This is not your style, Your Highness Cassia." In the distance, two princesses stood side by side, looking at the entire camp, taking in every move of the soldiers. Du Feiya suddenly spoke, jokingly saying to Cassia.

"Oh?" Cassia smiled slightly, "My style?"

"In your Highness' eyes, what should my style be like?" She looked at Du Feiya curiously.

Du Feiya tilted his head, pretending to think. After a while, he turned his head back and smiled, "I will enforce the orders and act vigorously. I will do things cleanly and neatly, without any procrastination."

"I thought that a commander like you would order them to continue advancing without stopping after seeing the ruins, straight to the city, and never stop until the place is turned upside down."

"If it was a city that needed to be conquered urgently, I might do so." Cassia pursed her lips. "After all, on the battlefield, the situation changes rapidly and opportunities are fleeting."

"But what we are about to explore now, according to the information from 'our' family." She emphasized the tone intentionally or unintentionally, "is a long-lost city that has long been uninhabited by elves."

"So, it doesn't matter if you go earlier or later."

"The city is always standing there, neither moving away nor coming closer to us." She turned sideways, raised her head, and looked at the city with colorful lights in the distance.

"Besides," after staring for a moment, she turned and looked at Du Feiya with a serious face, "Before the real danger comes, I think it is necessary to let our soldiers have a good rest."

Du Feiya nodded, also with a serious look.

------

After a short rest, the troops set off again.

After walking about a mile and a half, they did not see anything unusual along the way except for a few wild Los beasts gnawing on moss, nor did they see any signs of so-called "danger".

Finally, the troops arrived at the gates of the long-lost Dark Elf city.

The dozens-foot-high golden city gate was wide open in front of everyone, like a silent invitation, or an invisible trap.

Everyone held their breath and watched carefully.

Through the city gate, one can see the straight and wide streets. On both sides of the street, the street lamps with ever-burning flames and the colorful crystal decorations hanging on the houses are still shining, but there is not a single person in sight on the bright streets.

The fluorescence of the crystal will never fade, and the magical flame of the Eternal Flame, as its name suggests, will not fade with the passage of time. Therefore, the glory of this city is still as brilliant as before, but the elves who created it have long been silently annihilated in the long river of time.

After stopping for a while, the troops, under the orders of the two princesses, maintained a tight square formation, passed through the towering city gate, and officially entered the city.

Walking in this lost city, the absurd contrast between the deserted desolateness and the prosperity created by the brilliant lights became stronger. Li Yin followed the team and walked forward, glancing sideways frequently, sweeping his eyes across the streets and houses beside him.

The streets are very clean, the stone houses stand safely, and even the lamp posts on both sides of the street point straight to the dome without any crookedness... At first glance, there are no traces of war, and the possibility of natural disasters such as earthquakes can be ruled out. In short, all aspects of this city meet the standards of a naturally healthy, well-functioning and livable city - except that it is indeed uninhabited.

It looked as if the original inhabitants of this city, the dark elves, had not suffered any external threats, nor had any conflicts or disturbances, and had left the city peacefully. Li Yin could even imagine them evacuating here in an orderly manner - since everything here was still in order, Li Yin guessed that they were also leaving in the same way.

But... he was confused. According to Cassia, the dark elves of Nevre had never heard of other dark elf cities being active in such a nearby area, and even their archives had never recorded it...

This is somewhat unreasonable.

If the inhabitants here really migrated away on a large scale, even if their new place of residence was far away from here, as long as their tribe still existed, out of nostalgia, traces of this city would inevitably appear in their conversations and poems. And Nevévere, who maintained a smooth connection with the outside world, could easily discover the old place of the dark elves near her home from the rumors of the elves in the distance.

Why is there absolutely no information at all?

A thought flashed through Li Yin's mind. In this situation, it didn't seem like a safe evacuation, but more like all the residents had evaporated on the spot.

Feeling extremely confused, Li Yin followed the troops and went deeper into the city.

About half an hour later, the troops arrived at an open square.

In the center of the square stood a towering stone pillar, which looked very familiar to Li Yin. As they walked along, all the luminous objects, whether it was the magic street lamps on the street or the crystal decorations on the houses, had not lost their brilliance, with only one exception, which was the stone pillar in front of them. It should be the city's hour pillar. There was also such a pillar in the center of the city of Nevvell. Every day, a priest would cast a spell on the hour pillar to control its regularly changing light. For the dark elves, the brightness of this stone pillar was the scale of time. In the underground where there was no sunlight, they used this to determine what time of day they were in.

Now, the time pillar in front of us has long lost the dark elf priest who took care of it. Therefore, it has lost its former glory and has become completely black, becoming no different from an ordinary stone pillar.

There was no activity on the street, the time pillar had gone out... it seemed that even time itself had frozen in this place. Li Yin and other dark elves stared silently at the towering stone pillar in front of them, feeling an unusual silence.

Suddenly, in such deep silence, the sound of faint footsteps was heard.

Li Yin looked up in astonishment, and all the dark elves' hair stood on end in an instant. Because the footsteps did not come from the dark elf troops that had already gathered in the square - but from a place farther away!

The dense footsteps came from far away, gradually becoming clearer and more majestic. The sound was sonorous and sharp, and every soldier was very familiar with it - it was the hard sound of metal boots hitting the stone surface!

All the dark elves looked at each other in panic. What was approaching them was not a single creature, but seemed to be - an entire army? !

A riot of fear suddenly broke out among the crowd.

Li Yin, who was at the center of the army, was also inevitably caught up in the panic. However, in his anxiety, he managed to maintain a calm mind:

This shouldn't be the case... According to the Borgia family, isn't this place already deserted? Isn't this a lost relic?

Why, is there an army here?

What went wrong?

"Quiet!" At the same time, Cassia's loud shout came from the side.

"Form a line!" she ordered.

Under her command, the originally scattered formation began to gather again. The soldiers, with their swords drawn, faced the direction from which the sound came - which was exactly the opposite of the direction they came from, right in front of the square.

After a while, there was a sudden flash of light on the street across the square - it was the glittering light of metal armor under the light of the magic street lamp.

Accompanied by a rumbling sound like the sound of a steel tide, a team of fully armed soldiers appeared in the sight of many dark elves and Rein.

"No, it shouldn't be like this!" Amidst the shock and stupor, the previous doubts still lingered in Li Yin's mind.

Why are there still so many people in this lost city?

Even if the information sent back by the scouts of the Borginia family was wrong and these dark elves did not abandon their city, why did they see it like that?

Why was there not a single person on the street as they walked along? Perhaps this could be explained by some kind of large-scale gathering taking place in the city, but what about the city gates and walls? There was no one there either.

How could a normal city inhabited by intelligent species be so dilapidated and open to the public?

Questions one after another surrounded Li Yin, leaving him puzzled.

However, doubts aside, although everything before showed that this was not a city where elves were still actively living, before them, a fully armed army lined up in the center of this "open" city, and was now walking straight towards them, proclaiming to them without a doubt that this was not an unowned land. And this was the most urgent problem they needed to solve at the moment.

In Nevelle's army, a dark elf female officer, at the instruction of the two princesses, suddenly pushed aside many soldiers and came to the front of the battle.

"I'm sorry for coming here without your permission." She shouted in Dark Elf to the mysterious troops that were pouring into the square from the street and setting up battle array on the other side of the square. "We are a joint expedition team from the Borgia family and the Denitia family of Nevvell City. We came here to explore because we heard there is an uninhabited city-state nearby. Our arrival is purely a misunderstanding and we have no ill intentions."

"…We are very honored to be able to see this magnificent city. The beauty of this place has impressed us deeply…"

The words of the dark elf female officer were full of courtesy and politeness. Although the dark elves were a race that loved to conquer and kill, in this completely unexpected situation, they were facing a fully armed army, and the other side was also their own race that loved to conquer and kill... In short, Nevelle did not choose to immediately clashed with the other side, but wisely tried to see if there was any possibility of communication first.

During her long speech, the enemy's swift troops had already deployed in formation in the square, also armed with guns and crossbows, ready to face her side.

Li Yin noticed that their equipment was more sophisticated than he could have imagined, even better than his regular troops. Each of them wore full-body armor that covered their entire bodies and faces, wrapping them tightly like moving iron towers. The dark gold reflected a cold light under the magic street lights, as if a heavy and cold murderous aura was rolling and spreading between the iron towers...

Chapter 156: The Most Unexpected Warrior

If it weren't for the fact that this city and even the armor they wore had a distinct dark elf style, Li Yin would have first suspected the specific race of the mysterious creatures under the armor.

Now, although he had determined their ethnic identity, he still had doubts about the fact that they were still alive in this lost city.

Because this is totally unreasonable and completely contrary to what they had seen and heard before.

Suddenly, another thought flashed through his mind.

He conveyed this thought to Du Feiya through telepathy:

"Is it possible that they are not native to this city?"

At first, the Borginia family thought that there could only be one army of theirs in this place, until they encountered the Dinitia family in the maze.

Now, is there a possibility that the army in front of us is the third such family?

"Your guess makes sense." Upon hearing this, Du Feiya looked intently at the opposite side. After thinking for a while, a calm voice came from the bottom of her heart.

"However, the reason why our Dinitia family was able to come here is because..." She paused, "the guidance of the Borgia family."

"And how did this third family obtain the information?"

"Is it true, as I lied to you before, that scouts from another family discovered this long-lost city almost at the same time as the Borgia family?"

Li Yin was slightly surprised when he heard this.

"And," Du Feiya's violet eyes suddenly shone as she stared at the dark elf army opposite, as if she suddenly discovered something.

"I must remind you that there is not only the third family here. There are also the fourth, fifth, sixth... many families."

"Those soldiers." Her voice turned a little cold. "The emblems on them are disorganized and inconsistent. Moreover, each one of them is extremely unfamiliar. They are not from Nevre's family."

"But this is not the most important thing..."

"Most importantly, the variety of badges is bizarre - it's as if all the families in a city have been gathered here!"

"But this is not the number of troops from all the families in a city gathered together..." Telepathy made the communication between the two extremely fast. Li Yin immediately understood and added with a horrified look in his heart.

"That's right," Du Feiya said in a voice that was a little surprised and even panicked, "This is the weirdest thing about this army."

Li Yin understood how she felt.

Dark elves are the race that fights and clashes with each other most frequently. Even dark elves from the same city tend to act independently as a family. Just like the original form of this expedition, the Borgia family and the Denitia family acted alone. If it weren't for Dufia's weird personality among her kind, the encounter between the two sides would probably quickly turn into a disaster.

An event that could unite all the dark elf families in a city is by no means an ordinary event. Perhaps it can only be achieved when the survival of the entire city is at stake.

The dark elves in front of them gathered together so easily, which was not in line with the character and culture of the dark elves.

It was as if... they were just a group of mechanical ornaments without self-awareness, and an invisible hand had put them together randomly. Or, it was like a necromancer had randomly pieced together a hateful giant monster using the flesh and blood of various creatures.

At the same time, Li Yin also instantly understood why this group of dark elves were so well-equipped.

If they could gather together the best equipment from each family in Nevelle and equip their troops, they would certainly be able to reach this level of armament!

This is an elite armed force created by combining the strength of all the families in a city!

When he thought of this, Li Yin felt a little uneasy.

Not only because it is weird, but also because it is powerful.

Although their number is slightly smaller than their own, such a powerful force is probably not something that the expedition coalition led by two princesses from just two families in Nevelle can contend with.

Among the dark elves, when two unfamiliar forces meet unexpectedly, and one of them shows an obvious gap in strength compared to the other, the result is often not difficult to predict.

"...May I ask what we should call this beautiful city, and which noble family do you all come from?"