"Your Majesty, how exactly did that mysterious powerhouse accomplish it?"
After a brief moment of stunned silence, the Third Prince was the first to recover, voicing the question that was on everyone's mind.
A hundred thousand soldiers!
Even if they were lined up like pigs waiting to be slaughtered, it would still take days and nights of relentless killing to wipe them out!
He simply couldn't fathom how that mysterious figure had managed to achieve such an unimaginable feat.
The other nobles present turned their gazes toward Arnaud IV as well.
They too were burning with curiosity, struggling to understand what kind of terrifying individual could accomplish something so impossible.
Under the intense scrutiny of so many of his court officials and nobles, Arnaud IV's expression grew increasingly peculiar.
At last, he spoke, his voice laced with a strange mix of awe and confusion:
"It is said that the mysterious powerhouse was able to unleash plagues and chaos.
With a single sword strike, the entire charging army was stricken with a devastating sickness.
They all lost control of their bodies, succumbing to uncontrollable diarrhea.
Then, deafening explosions echoed one after another, like the rumbling collapse of mountains.
In mere moments, the army lost all ability to resist and suffered catastrophic casualties."
At these words, the faces of the assembled nobles twisted into expressions of sheer disbelief.
One strike?
And a hundred thousand elite soldiers, many of them battle-hardened Awakeners, were reduced to a chaotic, helpless mass?
These weren't ordinary men!
They were the cream of Nashen Kingdom's military might—individuals selected for their resilience, physical strength, and mana resistance.
Yet this mysterious powerhouse had effortlessly shattered their defenses and crushed their will to fight.
Was it truly a plague?
Or some unimaginable supernatural technique?
Most importantly—
The sheer scale of the destruction.
In the past, facing such an overwhelming tide of soldiers, even top-tier Awakeners had no choice but to avoid head-on engagements.
At best, they could only retreat behind towering fortress walls, using terrain advantages to delay the inevitable.
Facing such a "steel flood" directly had always been a death sentence.
Yet now, a single individual had dealt a devastating blow to a hundred-thousand-strong army.
It was something none of them had ever dared to even imagine.
The nobles began whispering among themselves, their minds filled with equal parts shock and frantic speculation.
Who could this mysterious figure possibly be?
Meanwhile, Arnaud IV sat on the throne, his eyes narrowing dangerously.
A nameless fury was steadily building within him.
Setting aside the fact that these days were supposed to be a period of joyful celebration for his birthday—
more importantly, the Kingdom had been taken completely off-guard.
He had received no prior intelligence.
No warning signs whatsoever.
Had it not been for the intervention of this mysterious powerhouse, they might have been celebrating even as Nashen's forces surrounded the capital itself!
It was clear now:
Nashen's invasion had not been a spur-of-the-moment decision.
It was a meticulously premeditated strike.
Worse yet—there was a traitor within their own Macedonian Kingdom.
How else could Nashen Kingdom have known that the border defenses were so dangerously thin?
How could their intelligence network have failed to detect the mobilization of a hundred thousand troops?
If the Kingdom had been properly warned, even facing such overwhelming numbers,
they could have prepared defenses, bought time, and mounted a counterattack.
Instead, they had been caught completely off-guard.
"Basta!"
A sudden bellow from the Captain of the Royal Guard echoed through the hall, silencing the whispers at once.
Arnaud IV took a deep breath, his tone grave and commanding as he continued:
"There are two matters of utmost importance right now!"
"First, we must reclaim the border cities seized by Nashen Kingdom. That land is part of our sovereign territory, and it must be recovered!"
"Second, we must find that mysterious powerhouse.
Had it not been for him, we might not even have realized Nashen's forces were upon us until it was far too late!"
"Although he has deliberately concealed his identity,
his aid to the Macedonian Kingdom is undeniable and monumental.
We must express our gratitude,
and offer him the rewards and honors he rightfully deserves.
We cannot afford to let those who contribute to the Kingdom be left disheartened!"
Hearing these words, the focus of discussion among the nobles quickly shifted to the two urgent tasks at hand.
But everyone knew—there was a third, unspoken matter looming over them all:
Who within the Kingdom had colluded with Nashen?
The betrayal had come swiftly and without warning.
There were far too many suspicious points:
the suddenness of the attack, the scale of the mobilization, the perfect timing against the Kingdom's weakest moment.
All of it pointed to treachery from within.
Many of the nobles instinctively shifted their gazes toward the assembled princes.
Everyone knew that Arnaud IV's health was failing.
The battle for the throne had grown increasingly fierce behind closed doors.
And now, this sudden invasion was clearly aimed at discrediting the Third Prince, who had been in charge of the border defenses.
With the borders breached, the Third Prince's prestige would surely plummet, weakening his claim to the throne.
The timing was simply too perfect to be coincidence.
—
Meanwhile,
throughout the cities of the Macedonian Kingdom,
the common people buzzed with panic and frantic discussion.
The news had spread like wildfire:
Nashen Kingdom had launched a sudden attack!
The borders had been breached!
The shock and terror were palpable.
Without the natural defense line of the border fortresses, the interior of the Macedonian Kingdom was exposed like a flat plain—
wide open to lightning cavalry raids and devastating assaults.
If the enemy cavalry swept through unchecked,
no city in the Kingdom would be safe.
However, when the people learned of the mysterious powerhouse who had intervened at the critical moment,
their fear was replaced by stunned awe.
Macedonian citizens were well aware of the might of the Nashen Kingdom.
For years, they had lived with the constant threat posed by their neighbor's military strength.
It had become a lingering nightmare rooted deep in their hearts.
Yet now,
that same terrifying army had been utterly annihilated by a single unknown hero.
The news seemed almost too incredible to believe.
After their initial shock, gratitude swelled within the people's hearts.
Without that mysterious figure's intervention,
they would have been helpless—
their cities would have fallen,
and their families would have been slaughtered.
That mysterious powerhouse was nothing less than their savior!
Speculation about the hero's identity ran rampant.
Some believed it must be one of the Kingdom's hidden ancient experts—those hermits who only intervened in moments of national crisis.
Others suggested that it might have been a wandering foreign master who, moved by pity, acted to save innocent lives.
Theories abounded, but no concrete evidence surfaced.
—
At the same time, within the sacred halls of the Temple of Prophets,
a cataclysmic event was unfolding.
A bolt of silver lightning, as thick as a barrel,
suddenly split the heavens, tearing apart the gloom and illuminating the world like the noonday sun!
Within the temple's grand central chamber,
an aged Prophet with white hair vomited a mouthful of blood.
His face drained of all color, he raised trembling eyes toward the sky.
"Who is this mysterious powerhouse?
Why is it that no matter how I probe,
I cannot glimpse even the slightest thread of fate?"
As a Prophet, he possessed the sacred ability to glimpse into both past and future.
Even the most powerful figures in the land could rarely hide entirely from his divinations.
But today, when he attempted to peer into the secrets surrounding the mysterious powerhouse,
he encountered nothing but blinding chaos—
and suffered a devastating backlash for his efforts.
It was as if the figure who had acted against Nashen's army…
simply did not exist within the fabric of fate itself.