bookbashuk Page 218
Page 218
He paused slightly, then abruptly turned the page of his book. In a flash of inspiration, the knowledge that had surfaced in his mind flowed out of his mouth:
"—The Path of the Hero?!"
The demons present were immediately drawn to his gaze, and all turned to look at him. Swell seemed to be trembling with unease.
"It is said that the goddess's gaze cannot penetrate the territory of the demons, so when human heroes set foot in the demon realm, their marks of heroism are weakened, and may even disappear completely over time!"
Therefore: their goal isn't to strengthen the mark, but rather to maintain its power for a short period, ensuring the hero is at their peak condition!
"I should have realized it! Everything the human kingdom did was paving the way for that hero of sin!!!"
Swail turned the pages and seemed to have found the answer:
"Sana, the Hero of Sin, will be making her move soon!"
"As for the time..."
Swell quickly recalled the second piece of intelligence from humanity: a live broadcast across the entire kingdom three days from now. In an instant, its pages flipped wildly, connecting all the suspicious points:
"Just three days from now!"
Swail was filled with astonishment and doubt, as if he were overwhelmed by the conclusion he had calculated:
"The human kingdoms will 'livestream' their full-scale counterattack against the Demon King's castle in three days!"
"The hero Shana will cross the Hero's Path at that time, heading straight for the Demon King's Castle. Her purpose may be to try to rescue Mino, or... to destroy the Demon King!"
At the head of the long table, the roses and vines that seemed to have grown on the chair suddenly came to life.
The blood-red rose petals exuded an alluring yet dangerous aura. The rose-patterned gown, a blend of crimson and emerald green, outlined her near-perfect figure. Above her swan-like white neck, Kletina opened her cherry-pink eyes.
A murderous intent began to spread deep within his pupils...
……
The outskirts of the royal capital.
The dark green rice stalks hung listlessly in the scorched, muddy fields. What should have been a golden grassland woven under the sun and breeze was now covered with fragile cracks on the thin, straight rice stalks. With a gentle step, the surrounding rice stalks crumbled into black ash like charcoal and sank into the withered earth.
"Even this most fertile land outside the capital has become like this. This famine must indeed be caused by other evil forces..."
Prince Ota pulled his hands, which were covered in black ash, back out and stood in the field, his face looking rather grim.
"Who would want to bring humanity to the brink of extinction? It can't be the demons; they don't have that kind of power yet."
But who else could it be? After Mino, all the major races on the continent forged the deepest bonds with him. Even the Goblin Sage of the demon race held Mino in awe and reverence…”
Regardless, finding the murderer was no longer the key issue; Ota's heart was heavy.
It is now harvest season, but the kingdom cannot even survive a single grain of rice in this famine, and even animal husbandry and fishing have been visibly affected.
This outcome was a near-annihilation blow to humanity; within a year, 90% of the kingdom's population would have starved to death from the famine alone.
“Famine is inevitable.” Ota clenched his fist. This conclusion had pierced his heart countless times, but as a king, he knew that no matter how desperate the situation, he must lead his people to fight to the very last moment.
"Three days."
He looked up at the dazzling sun overhead:
"Three days from now, after I clear Mino's name during the live broadcast of the roundtable, I will expose the crisis facing humanity to the public!"
"Even if despair and helplessness spread throughout the land, I will take Mino as a role model for all humanity! I urge all citizens to never abandon or give up, and to fight to the very last moment!!!"
Ota let out a long sigh, having made up his mind to witness the final moment. He looked towards the direction of the demon realm, his eyes filled with deep remembrance and sorrow.
"Give me one last helping hand, my dearest friend!!!"
Chapter 319 Why can't we just go directly to Mino's house and save her?
"Your Highness Ota, you have done your best."
Emerging from the farmland, Tus could clearly sense the dejection and helplessness in the young king before him, and offered words of comfort:
"The kingdom has tried everything these days, but ultimately, natural disasters are unavoidable."
“I know, Tus.” Ota sighed deeply, his tone full of dejection, but he quickly mustered his spirits and asked:
"Have the follow-up measures for dealing with the disaster been drafted?"
"Pope Tonk has brought us some ideas left behind by the Mino Warriors..." Tus said softly.
"Although it is too late to deal with the famine, the key to continuing the human race is food production within the kingdom. If the pollution of the land cannot be alleviated, we will need new ways to obtain food."
"Fortunately, it seems that the Mino Warrior once proposed a hydroponic cultivation concept, which, after verification by the scholars of the kingdom, is probably the solution with the highest success rate."
"If a year of testing and rollout is successful, we will be able to obtain enough food: although it will be too late by then, it will truly be humanity's last resort in the face of that bizarre famine."
Tus revealed a smile that was more like a grimace:
"Famine will lead to a large loss of population, but humanity will still have a chance to survive."
Upon hearing that familiar name, Ota's fingers twitched slightly. He raised his head again, his gaze filled with sorrow.
“Mino, it’s Mino again… The kingdom owes him so much, and now, even the people are being deceived and misled.”
Thinking of this, Ota clenched his fist: "Three days, three days from now! I will make the people of the kingdom realize once again Mino's greatness and innocence!"
"He will become the savior, the light of humanity, the Prometheus who preserves the human race, and the eternal ark that guides humanity through countless calamities!"
The tone gradually rose in the air, stirring up a mighty wave, but when it fell to the ground, it splashed down into low, drooping droplets.
"But he... will never come back."
Ota sat on the tree stump, somewhat lost in thought: "If he hadn't been defeated by the demons' conspiracy, none of this would have happened."
"At least, with him fighting alongside me, even in a famine like this, we might find a way to get through it—"
Beside him, seeing the regretful expression on Prince Ota's face, Tus hesitated for a long time before finally speaking:
"Your Highness, I've been wondering for a long time why we don't try to find a way to rescue the Mino Warrior from the Demon King's castle?"
The wind suddenly died down.
Otta's figure froze for a moment, then he stood up from the tree stump, looked at his trusted minister, and his smile was slightly bitter:
“Tus, you don’t have outstanding combat or magical talent, nor do you have the experience of frequently fighting against demons like Erwin, so it’s normal that you don’t know some inside information.”
"Actually, on the day Mino was captured, I held a top-secret military meeting with Erwin and the others, but the truth is: it's not that we didn't want to, but that we had no way to successfully rescue Mino, who was imprisoned in the Demon King's Castle."
"—Even if we used the entire power of the kingdom, we couldn't do it!!!"
Ota's words fell heavily, causing a slight tremor in Tus's heart.
"Although many of the great demons in the demon race maintain human form, the life structure of the demon race itself is completely different from that of humans. The demon race is a collection of desires, evil creatures formed after nothingness turned into materiality."
"The entire territory of the demon race is filled with dense demonic energy. The demons lurking in the darkness have far more sensitive noses and eyes than we do."
"When humans with profound divine power venture into the territory of the demons, it's like adding a lighthouse in the darkness. For those great demons, there is nowhere to hide... The reason why those despicable black magicians are hated by everyone is precisely because after practicing black magic, their essence has become like that of the demons. They can hide in the demon realm, making it impossible for the kingdom to eradicate them."
"And that's not even the most difficult part."
Ota looked in the direction of the palace, a sense of感慨 (gǎnkǎi, a feeling of mixed emotions, including regret or
"Just as humanity has sacred churches and holy artifacts, and a sacred round table as a founding instrument."
"The demon race also has a Demon King's City."
"That ancient Demon King's castle, which has survived to this day, possesses an ability similar to a magician's round tower—an ability that is incredibly comprehensive and impossible to defend against. Humanity's understanding of it to this day is less than one ten-thousandth of its capabilities."
"The only certainty is that the demon strategist Swell is remotely commanding the entire demon army within the first and second lines of defense from the Demon King's city. Despite being in the heart of the demon realm, he is able to respond with unparalleled detail and timeliness, as if he were personally present on the scene!"
"And the deeper one goes into the territory of the demons, the more tightly the Demon King's city monitors every inch of land."
"Unless one has precise control over their internal power and aura, that is, a powerful being at the level of a Great Demon, equivalent to the peak combat strength of a human, they can escape the supervision of the Demon King's City without causing any disturbance."
"Throughout this thousand-year history, there has been no shortage of promising pillars of humanity, who either took advantage of the demons' unpreparedness to storm the Demon King's city or tore a deep rift in a weak point to confront the Demon King directly."
"But their seemingly intelligent and courageous actions were as if they had been anticipated, which led to the demons easily blocking their chance to escape."
"at last."
"It is also the most dangerous and terrifying obstacle, a terrifying existence shrouded in mystery to this day..."
Looking up, Ota's eyes were filled with excitement:
"Once those pillars of humanity arrive at the Demon King's castle, they will be greeted by the most powerful Demon King in the history of the demon race, whose true form has never been seen by anyone before—the Demon King of Time!"
"That is a power that can drive humanity to despair! After so many years of observation, scholars and archaeologists speculate that if the demon king had not only been willing to display his power in the depths of the demon realm, humanity would have perished a thousand times over."
"Cunning, sinister, cowardly as a child, yet undeniably powerful—"
"That kind of monster never leaves the Demon King's Castle and cannot be fought head-on. Even without the Demon King's Castle, who could slip away unnoticed and rescue Mino...?"
A deep shock appeared in Tus's eyes. He realized that the glory of humanity he had seen so far was only the tip of the iceberg, and there was nothing to be proud of.
"So, you mean..." Tus swallowed nervously and concluded:
"To rescue the Mino Hero from the Demon King's Castle, what's needed is a dark mage with the dark power to conceal themselves within the demonic energy of the Demon Realm, peak combat strength capable of negating the Demon King's Castle's deep sensing, and ideally, a rank comparable to or even higher than the 'Demon King of Time'?"
His voice trembled by the end, and Tus realized how absurd and impossible it was.
"That's it."
Ota nodded, raised his head, and looked towards the direction of the demon realm, a place never before deeply explored by humans, his tone both wistful and helpless:
"Even with five thousand years of history on this continent filled with heroes and outstanding figures, I simply cannot imagine any human being who could successfully rescue Mino from the Demon King's castle thousands of miles away—"
Chapter 320 Holy Light Leap: Super Dimensional Array!
The edge of the demon realm.
The scorching earth rendered the entire land barren, and the pitch-black soil spread along with the deathly scene, while the air currents carried a turbid and violent demonic aura.
With the Demon King's army completely withdrawing from the first line of defense, this area between the Holy Mino border and the second line of defense has become a desolate land with only a few monsters lingering around.
The already barren and desolate land was shrouded in a thick sense of death, making it impossible for humans to stay for long, thus turning it into a buffer zone for war.
On the far right of the isolation zone lies the Path of the Hero, which leads directly to the Demon King's Castle beyond the second line of defense; on the far left lies the Dimensional City, which has recently risen to prominence and been established by the border demons.
In the central area of the isolation zone, where the dark magic was most intense and turbulent—
A figure draped in a long, black robe stood amidst the mist.
The deep, murky demonic energy never welcomes anything foreign to this land. Its soul-corroding energy violently surged towards the seemingly frail body, but like scattered cotton wool, it was annihilated without even causing a ripple, disappearing through the robes—