Chapter 57 The Scramble
"Whoosh—!"
The three pursuers' gazes were quickly drawn to the golden spear light that struck Jiu Nian. Euphemia twisted her wrist and thrust the spear tip straight at his face.
"Whoosh..."
Jiu Nian, who was only focused on getting on his way, was unable to dodge in time and had a section of his long hair cut off. As his blood and qi surged, he spurted out a fiery snake tongue from his mouth.
The chase between the two was progressing at an extremely high speed, moving closer and closer to the densely populated urban area along the road.
"Wait a minute, how come his aura is so...? How did his injuries heal so quickly?" Cliff, who was following closely behind, suddenly paused when he observed Euphemia's movements.
Upon hearing this, Ye Feng decisively shook his head: "Impossible! He was the one who got beaten the worst back then... how could he still be so agile?"
"Well…"
The smirk on Euphemia's lips gradually faded with his movements. He deliberately created an opening, then took several steps back and coughed up blood onto his hand.
"bump--!"
Two beams of light collided violently in the twilight-shrouded road, Euphemiah's spear tip colliding with Jiu Nian's spiked club, instantly exploding into countless dazzling points of light.
"Not bad, blondie! The last guy who could fight me for this long was that red-haired guy!"
The two wielded their weapons faster and faster, and during their fight, they just happened to brush past the Holy Armor Priests who were engaged in a fierce battle below.
As the surrounding buildings grew increasingly dense, Euphemia sensed something was wrong. Crossing this town would soon lead to the first district.
The aftermath of the battle between the two archmages was undoubtedly a disaster for the common people!
"Boom—!"
The spire of the street clock tower collapsed with a crash, and flying fragments, wreathed in flames, crashed down on the street, causing civilians hiding in the shops to scream in terror.
"bump--!"
The lightning crackling from both sides' weapons was about to cut a building in half when Ye Feng quickly flashed over and kicked it away.
Patting his trousers, Ye Feng wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth and turned to Cliff beside him: "I'll handle these aftershocks. Kizaru, you're fast, go support Magellan's transport convoy."
"They haven't used their full strength yet; they're still wary of us..."
Cliff adjusted his glasses and squinted; he could clearly feel two magical forces locked onto him.
"Click..."
Ye Feng picked up a cigar from under the rubble, lit it with his index finger, and silently watched Aston, who had already joined the fight between the two.
"Our army has arrived too. It seems whether we can seize the Dead Sea Scrolls depends on these little guys." He slowly exhaled a smoke ring and leaped up to block wave after wave of aftershocks.
"Holy Judgment - Divine Punishment!" With a furious shout, Euphemiah's silver robes billowed wildly, and twelve halos spiraled out from the tip of his spear.
His diving posture resembled throwing thunder, the trailing flames of his spear burning the clouds thoroughly, and his counter-attack aimed at Jiu Nian's neck once more.
"Clang—!"
The unstoppable attack blasted Jiu Nian and Aston out of the area, and the three of them resumed their tug-of-war.
Ye Feng and Cliff followed closely behind.
The panic within the city was quickly suppressed with the arrival of Caesar's army.
As the first transit point before the coastal port, Magellan's transport caravans were very likely to pass through here, so the city's eight exits were quickly heavily guarded.
The aftershocks of the battle were deliberately contained, preventing significant damage, except for a few civilians trapped under the Adventurers' Guild's control.
"null...!"
Before the other adventurers could even begin to rescue them, a white-haired girl in a silver-gray cloak slowly appeared at the guild entrance and casually cleared away the wreckage.
The girl was Vivian. After the ship arrived at the port and she realized that the situation was not good, she immediately headed inland.
Although she didn't get much useful information, she did learn that there was such a thing as a Pope.
She pulled her hood down slightly and took out a few underwater treasures from her bag, tossing them to the receptionist.
After exchanging a few gold coins, she turned to leave, but then she heard the civilians who had just been rescued pointing to the horizon and discussing among themselves.
Rubbing his scraped arm, a child looked curiously at the middle-aged man beside him: "Who is that big monster... My goodness, he can fight the Pope to a standstill..."
"Kaido, one of the Four Emperors, is one of the rulers of the seas. In terms of power, he might even be a little higher than the Pope..." For some reason, Vivian subconsciously answered the child's question.
"..."
The middle-aged man next to him trembled, as if his sore spot had been touched, and stood up: "Shh... How dare you say such a thing!? Do you also want to be [divinely removed]?"
Lowering her head, Vivian's lips curled into a sneer: "Just telling the truth, at least I'm certainly not stupid enough to believe that there is a God in this world."
"Wow...you!"
"You know, ever since this guild's [Operation Wind Chaser] started, the Pope has been extremely strict with adventurers! Just a few days ago, an elephant-like person who spoke a strange language was directly..."
The middle-aged man exaggerated his experiences in a threatening manner, describing what he had seen and heard, and finally made a very serious throat-slitting gesture.
With a disdainful laugh, Vivian grabbed a newspaper from the doorway and left without looking back.
"Personnel missing near Loch Ness in Mamika City? Suspected appearance of a new, unknown monster?"
She muttered the title to herself, silently pursing her lips as she pondered it.
...
"As expected of the Pope who has conquered 65% of the world's land, he's much more interesting than those three sickly men!" Jiu Nian bared his fangs and let out a deafening roar, crimson lightning spreading from his neck to the handle of his spiked club.
Thunder condensed into a ferocious dragon head on the tip of the staff. He spun around and swung it in a crescent-shaped trajectory to ram the staff head-on. The shockwave generated by the collision of the two forces slammed vertically into the ground.
They fought from 300 feet in the air to the side of a church spire. Not wanting to be taken advantage of by Ye Feng and his companions, they occasionally used each other's attacks to strike their own backs.
As the spear tip pierced the demon warrior's left shoulder, the spiked club also grazed Euphemia's waist.
Golden divine blood and purple demonic blood dripped down simultaneously, but were evaporated by the energy turbulence during their fall.
The two moved extremely fast, and after exchanging blows for a few more rounds, they arrived at the edge of a town.
"null--!"
The sudden aftershocks immediately affected a boy with blue hair.
In a sudden reaction, the black letter flew out of his hand and drifted away in the next aftershock, the sealing wax of the six-pointed star being rubbed off in an instant.
"Damn it...! Erdes! Quick... get to the point!" the boy cursed under his breath and slapped the elf next to him on the back of the head.
"The Pope? And Kaido! Why are they here?! Dracula never told me that working for him would put my life in danger!"
"Stop talking nonsense, the envelope has drifted into the guild...we have to go in and get it back!" The boy grinned, grabbed Erdes's hand, and disappeared down the street without stopping.
While the four were locked in fierce combat in the air, Magellan's crew had already divided the supplies into several batches and transported them to Nash's Tarot City via 16 different routes.
Since the transport teams had already gone far away, and there were hundreds of routes connecting the port, the situation was different.
The two divisions of the Beasts Pirates, who were deeply tracking the situation, had to split up, which meant they had to face both the Caesar Empire's army and the Holy Armor Priests at the same time.
"So you're the Three Disasters of the Beasts Pirates, right? Sorry, His Holiness the Pope has ordered that this road is closed—!"
A bishop, his light red robes fluttering in the wind, stood in the sky, protecting Magellan's attacked convoy, and questioned the newcomers.
Upon hearing this, a burly man standing on the wreckage of the carriage shrugged, straightened his mink coat, and said without any politeness, "I am Drought Jack!"
A tiger demon beside him also impatiently pushed up his sunglasses: "Don't be afraid, he's just a bishop. I've seen it in the newspapers. He can't cause much trouble."
Meanwhile, a petite figure hovered in the sky; it was Dongfang Qing, silently watching everything below.
Compared to players, natives are more talented at gambling. Jiu Nian's Three Calamities happened to bet on one of the 16 routes correctly.
"Tap tap tap..."
Looking back, he once again caught sight of tens of thousands of cavalry approaching, led by none other than Dracula.
"It is an honor to have our Bishop grace us with his presence