Setelah melewati pagi hari yang cukup menggelisahkan, Turan melewatkan rutinitas sarapan dan perjalanannya ke Varaha, lalu langsung memanggil pasukan.
Itu adalah unit elit yang hanya beranggotakan dua puluh lima bangsawan, tanpa ada satupun ksatria.
Bahkan Meisa ada di antara mereka, jadi meskipun jumlahnya kecil, kekuatan itu cukup kuat untuk berhadapan langsung dengan keluarga bangsawan besar pada umumnya.
“Apakah semuanya sudah siap?”
“Ya, Kepala Keluarga!”
Turan, mendengar jawaban tegas mereka, menyuruh mereka naik ke atas Bije yang telah diperbesar dan membubung tinggi ke langit.
Beberapa orang di Kota Kalamaf mendongak menatap burung besar yang hampir menghalangi matahari dan berseru takjub.
“Itu burung Kepala Keluarga!”
“Wahai Elang Emas, lindungilah kami dengan sayap-sayap perkasa-Mu.......”
Tanpa menyadari doa-doa yang bergumam di bawah sana, Bije menggerutu dengan nada kesal.
-Aku bisa pergi lebih cepat tanpa orang-orang ini.
-Maklumi saja mereka. Kali ini lebih baik kita bepergian bersama.
Mungkin karena mereka baru saja bersenang-senang mengacaukan pasukan Ruvan sebagai duo, Bije merasa sangat tidak puas karena harus memperlambat lajunya dengan begitu banyak orang di atas punggungnya.
Jaraknya tidak terlalu jauh, dan tak lama kemudian mereka tiba di barisan pegunungan yang membatasi ruang antara Zona Abu-abu dan wilayah perbukitan.
Turan menghentikan penerbangan Bije di tengah udara dan bertanya kepada seorang bangsawan di dekatnya.
“Ke arah mana dari sini?”
“Sedikit lagi ke timur, Kepala Keluarga.”
Orang yang menjawab adalah seorang bangsawan yang wilayah kekuasaannya meliputi Solon, sebuah kota yang terletak tidak jauh dari sana.
Alasan mereka terbang ke sini adalah demi menindaklanjuti laporan dari pria ini.
Sebuah pasukan tak dikenal telah memasuki Zona Abu-abu.
Awalnya, mereka berencana mendekat dan mengumpulkan lebih banyak detail, namun yang mengejutkan, kelompok misterius itu telah mendirikan penghalang buram di sekeliling perkemahan mereka, menyembunyikan bagian dalamnya dari pandangan.
Itu saja sudah cukup untuk memastikan bahwa kelompok tersebut adalah pasukan penyihir yang terdiri dari banyak bangsawan.
Oleh karena itu, Turan terpaksa mengurungkan niatnya untuk menyerang pasukan pelarian dari Keluarga Ruvan.
Bagaimanapun juga, benteng pertahanan terpentingnya adalah Kalamaf dan Zona Abu-abu.
Beberapa menit perjalanan ke arah timur, Turan menangkap sebuah kehadiran melalui Sihir Pelacak dan mengubah jalur terbang Bije.
Tak lama kemudian, mereka melihat sebuah perkemahan yang terletak di salah satu sisi pegunungan.
“Hmm.......”
“Itu sudah pasti kekuatan militer, tidak diragukan lagi.”
Formasinya hampir mirip dengan yang digunakan oleh pasukan Ruvan, yang telah dikalahkan Turan belum lama ini.
Lokasinya berada di dekat puncak, sehingga sulit untuk memastikan secara pasti apakah tempat itu berada di wilayah Keluarga Carmine atau Keluarga Parsha.
Sambil menatap tajam ke bawah ke lokasi tersebut, Turan merapikan pakaiannya dan berkata,
“Aku harus melihatnya dari dekat. Tunggu di sini.”
Sebelum sempat ada yang menjawab, Turan melompat turun dari Bije, menggunakan sihir penyamaran dan penerbangan.
Kemudian, dengan menggunakan Sihir Magnetisme, tubuhnya melesat maju seolah ditarik oleh kekuatan tak kasat mata.
Meskipun hal itu menghabiskan banyak kekuatan sihir, untuk sesaat hal itu memungkinkannya terbang dengan kecepatan yang sebanding, atau bahkan lebih cepat, daripada Bije.
Itu adalah hasil dari usahanya meniru secara kasar teknik yang ditunjukkan oleh Badal Aravion di masa lalu.
'Kalau begitu...'
Dalam sekejap, Turan mencapai pinggiran perkemahan dan pertama-tama memeriksa penghalang yang mengelilinginya.
Biasanya, orang memasang penghalang seperti pagar untuk menghemat kekuatan sihir, tetapi penghalang yang ini adalah penghalang berbentuk bola yang dirancang dengan cermat, terbentang dari tanah hingga ke langit-langit.
Bahkan seorang bangsawan Zahar pun tidak dapat menembus penghalang seperti itu tanpa menghancurkannya.
Setiap kali seseorang melintasinya, seluruh penghalang itu harus diturunkan dan dipasang kembali, serta waktu dan tenaga untuk membuatnya sangat luar biasa besar, sehingga tidak ada seorang pun yang biasanya menggunakan metode seperti itu.
‘Zahar...... tidak, mereka jelas berjaga-jaga terhadapku. Aku bahkan tidak bisa merasakan siapa yang berada di dalam karena sihir di dalam penghalang itu. Siapa sebenarnya orang-orang ini?’
Rencana awalnya adalah menyusup dan mengidentifikasi para penyusup tersebut, tetapi dengan persiapan seperti ini, hal itu hampir mustahil dilakukan.
Turan berhenti sejenak di sana, menimbang-nimbang pilihannya.
Apakah akan meluncurkan serangan mendadak dan memusnahkan mereka seketika, atau melakukan kontak yang layak dan mengungkap identitas mereka.
Setelah sedikit pertimbangan, Turan memilih opsi yang terakhir.
Jika dia menyerang lebih dulu dan membunuh mereka semua, negosiasi akan menjadi tidak mungkin dilakukan setelahnya, dan yang lebih penting lagi, dia tidak datang sendirian kali ini.
1Akan merepotkan jika kabar menyebar dari mulut orang-orang yang datang bersamanya bahwa kepala Keluarga Parsha telah gegabah memusnahkan pasukan yang ditempatkan di perbatasan.
Bagaimanapun juga, mereka yang berada di posisi Kepala Keluarga dari keluarga bangsawan besar diharapkan dapat menampilkan tingkat martabat yang sesuai.
‘Mari kita lihat.’
Dengan keluwesan yang telah ia kuasai selama pertempuran berulang kali dengan Keluarga Ruvan, Turan segera menembakkan railgun ke arah bagian atas penghalang.
Dengan kilatan cahaya, penghalang itu melengkung dan merobek diri, membubarkan diri menjadi energi sihir dan lenyap.
Meskipun ukurannya lebih kecil, penghalang itu lebih kokoh daripada yang digunakan oleh pasukan Ruvan. Bahkan jika serangan itu dimaksudkan untuk membunuh, itu kemungkinan tidak akan menimbulkan luka fatal.
Kecuali jika selusin bangsawan dari Garis Darah Master Penghalang berkumpul di sini, sudah jelas mereka pasti membawa artefak tingkat Relik Suci.
After spending a rather unsettling morning, Turan skipped his usual breakfast routine and his commute to Varaha, and instead immediately summoned the army.
It was an elite unit made up of only twenty-five nobles, without a single knight.
Even Meisa was among them, so though the number was small, the force was strong enough to go head-to-head with a typical great noble house.
“Is everyone ready?”
“Yes, Family Head!”
Turan, hearing their resolute response, loaded them onto the enlarged Bije and soared high into the sky.
Some of the people in Kalamaf City looked up at the enormous bird that nearly blocked the sun and exclaimed in awe.
“It’s the Family Head’s bird!”
“O Golden Eagle, please shield us with your mighty wings.......”
Unaware of the prayers being muttered below, Bije grumbled in a sullen tone.
-I could go faster without these guys.
-Cut them some slack. This time it's better to travel together.
Perhaps because they’d just recently had fun messing with the Ruvan army as a duo, Bije was quite dissatisfied about slowing down with so many people aboard.
It wasn’t too far a distance, and soon they arrived at a mountain range blocking the space between the Gray Zone and the hilly region.
Turan brought Bije to a halt mid-flight and asked a nearby noble.
“Which direction from here?”
“Just a bit further east, Family Head.”
The one who answered was a noble whose territory included Solon, a city located nearby.
The reason they had flown here was precisely because of this man’s report.
An unidentified force had entered the Gray Zone.
Originally, they had planned to approach and gather more details, but astonishingly, the unknown group had erected an opaque barrier around their entire camp, hiding the interior from view.
That alone was enough to confirm that the group was a wizard army composed of multiple nobles.
For this reason, Turan had to give up attacking the fleeing army of the House of Ruvan.
After all, his most important strongholds were Kalamaf and the Gray Zone.
A few more minutes eastward, Turan picked up a presence through Tracking Magic and altered Bije’s flight path.
Before long, they spotted a camp nestled on one side of the mountain range.
“Hmm.......”
“That’s definitely a military force, no doubt about it.”
It was a formation quite similar to the one Ruvan’s army had used, which Turan had defeated not long ago.
The location was near the peak, making it difficult to definitively determine whether it was in House Carmine's or House Parsha's territory.
Staring down quietly at the location, Turan brushed off his clothes and said,
“I need to get a closer look. Wait here.”
Before anyone could respond, Turan jumped off Bije, using concealment and flight magic.
Then, using Magnetism Magic, his body lunged forward as if pulled by an unseen force.
Though it consumed a great deal of magic power, for a short time it allowed him to fly at a speed comparable to, or even faster than, Bije.
It was the result of his efforts to crudely master the technique demonstrated by Badal Aravion in the past.
'Now then...'
In no time, Turan reached the outskirts of the camp and first examined the barrier surrounding it.
Normally, people set up barriers like fences to conserve magic power, but this one was a carefully crafted spherical barrier extending from ground to ceiling.
Not even a Zahar noble could penetrate such a barrier without breaking it.
Every time one crossed it, the whole thing would have to be taken down and reinstalled, and the time and effort to make it were absurdly immense, no one usually used such a method.
‘Zahar...... no, they’re definitely on guard against me. I can’t even sense who’s inside due to the magic in the barrier. Who the hell are these people?’
His original plan had been to infiltrate and identify the intruders, but with this kind of setup, that was going to be nearly impossible.
Turan paused there for a moment, weighing his options.
Whether to launch a surprise attack and annihilate them outright, or to make proper contact and uncover their identity.
After a brief moment of deliberation, Turan settled on the latter.
If he attacked first and killed them all, negotiation would be impossible afterward, and more importantly, he hadn’t come alone this time.
It would be troublesome if word spread, through the mouth of anyone among those who came with him, that the head of House Parsha had recklessly wiped out a force stationed at the border.
After all, those in the position of Family Head of a great noble house were expected to display a corresponding level of dignity.
‘Let’s see.’
With the fluidity he had grown accustomed to during repeated combat with House Ruvan, Turan immediately fired a railgun toward the upper part of the barrier.
With a flash of light, the barrier warped and tore apart, dispersing into magic energy and vanishing.
Though smaller in size, it was sturdier than the barrier used by the Ruvan army. Even if the attack had been intended to kill, it likely wouldn’t have inflicted a critical blow.
Unless over a dozen nobles from the Barrier Master Bloodline had gathered here, it was clear they must have brought a Sacred Relic-grade artifact.
"We're under attack!"
"Everyone, defensive positions!"
As expected, chaos erupted within the enemy ranks, but only briefly. Turan soon sensed Bije flying in from afar, carrying the army of House Parsha.
It must have been due to witnessing the aftermath of the railgun blast.
On the other side, the unidentified force also seemed to detect this, as they stopped floundering and turned their eyes warily toward the sky.
Thanks to that, Turan was able to approach the mysterious force without interference and observe their identity up close.
A few of them had conjured orbs of light, but this level of magic drain was something he could withstand.
‘So it’s the House Carmine, huh.’
More than half of them wielded the combined powers of the Rapids Bloodline, which controls water, and the Frost Bloodline, which controls cold.
The question was, why were these people encamped here?
Weren’t they supposed to be busy reclaiming their capital, which had been seized by the Great Sea Serpents by now?
Judging from the sensitivity of his Sacred Relic, their composition didn’t quite match that of a full-scale invasion force.
One high-ranking noble, five or six mid-ranks, about a dozen lower-ranks, and sixty or so knights made up the group.
Standing right next to the Carmine encampment, Turan shifted from complete Concealment to a lower-level version that only hid his appearance, and opened his mouth.
[How dare you bring an army into House Parsha's land? Does the Family Head of House Carmine desire war not only at sea but also on land? If not, then get down on your knees this instant.]
Empowered by Wind Magic, a voice with no discernible origin echoed eerily through the Carmine troops.
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