Chapter 501: The Situation
TL: Rui88
Hydra was a large city located in the northeastern part of the Duchy of Eton, and it was also the duchy’s capital. The Duchy of Eton was a member of the New Protestant Alliance. After the war broke out, although the Duchy of Eton did not directly border the Church’s territory, it was one of the first countries to support the Horn Bay Alliance. The duchy quickly dispatched a force to the Horn Bay Alliance’s border to join with them.
However, when the Crusader Army, led by the Church, executed a grand flanking maneuver by conquering a group of small, neutral nations in the northern Horn Bay, the Duchy of Eton, its domestic military forces depleted, was immediately plunged into a perilous situation.
Not long ago, terrible news had arrived: the Crusader Army had captured Mata…the duchy’s most important fortress town in the north…opening the gate to Hydra.
It went without saying that the Crusader Army was now marching toward Hydra in great strides.
The entire city of Hydra had fallen into a panic. All sorts of rumors, both reliable and unreliable, were spreading through the streets and alleys. Some said the Crusader Army had carried out a great massacre in and around Mata. Others claimed the Crusader Army left those willing to respect the Church unharmed and only arrested the Protestants. There were also rumors that the Crusader Army had suffered heavy losses after a series of conquests and was already retreating.
Rumors were rampant and the people were unsettled. Many families were packing their belongings, preparing to flee the city to escape the ravages of war. Speeding carriages and pedestrians carrying bundles on their backs could be seen everywhere on the streets.
“Ah…ah…!”
A young mother kneeling on the ground screamed in terror. She was tightly holding a wailing infant in her arms. In the direction she was facing, a black carriage was racing toward them.
Just a moment ago, she had fallen in the middle of the street while dodging another carriage. The infant she was holding had rolled onto the road. Without a second thought, she had lunged forward to pick the child up again, but she never expected a new danger to arrive in an instant.The speed of the rushing carriage made the young mother’s mind go blank. She could not react at all and seemed to have given up hope. Or perhaps, she had no time to even consider giving up. Instinct made her shut her eyes tightly and let out an uncontrollable scream.
But with a loud crash, the gruesome scene of carnage that should have occurred did not happen.
The young mother, coming to her senses, tremblingly opened her eyes. A frightening image appeared before her.
Two black stallions…each one taller than a man…were lying on the road. They writhed their bodies, letting out continuous, painful neighs. They struggled, trying with all their might to get up, but it was destined to be futile. Although their forelegs were unharmed, their hind legs were a bloody mess.
A thick, long iron chain had wrapped around both the horses and the carriage, and then fell to the ground with a clang.
The people nearby saw clearly what had happened in that instant. Just as the horses’ hooves were about to trample the poor woman’s frail body, the thick iron chain had suddenly appeared. Like a giant black python coiling its body, it had instantly bound the carriage and horses together. The horses pulling the carriage were forcefully yanked to a halt by the chain, and the carriage behind them slammed into their rear due to inertia…the poor horses.
Standing to the side and rear of the carriage was a towering, burly man. He looked to be at least two meters tall. He wore only a pair of gray-green linen trousers, his upper body bare. His brown skin was covered in intricate tattoos. What was most astonishing were his broad shoulders and explosive muscles. His arms seemed thicker than an adult’s thigh, and his exaggerated physique made him look like an inverted triangle as he stood there.
The black, python-like iron chain came from the burly man. He held the end of the chain in both hands, his face devoid of any expression.
To the woman who had just escaped danger, the burly man’s appearance seemed even more intimidating than the carriage that had nearly run her over. She hastily scrambled up from the ground, said a trembling “thank you,” and ran off with her child, without even brushing the dust from her clothes.
The burly man said nothing. With a flick of his wrist, the iron chain that had been wrapped around the carriage returned to him as if it had a life of its own. It then coiled around his body, making it look from a distance as if he was wearing a suit of iron armor.
Beside the burly man was a black-haired young man. He smiled and clapped his hands. “You’re as helpful as ever, Sita!”
The man named Sita replied, “Helping the weak is a virtue.”
“Haha,” Nathan shrugged his shoulders.
Over at the carriage, the driver was unconscious. The sound of “bang, bang, bang” came from inside the carriage as someone pounded on the door. After a short while, the carriage door was flung open with a crack.
A middle-aged man dressed in magnificent clothes, with the appearance of a nobleman, leaned halfway out. He looked rather disheveled at the moment; crimson blood trickled from his forehead, and a large bruise covered his mouth and left cheek.
“Who! Who did this?”
He roared furiously at his surroundings, his voice hoarse.
The burly man who saved the woman and the young man beside him had long since disappeared.
The Grizzly Bear Inn was famous within Hydra for its unique architecture and decorative style. Architecture in the Horn Bay region was generally known for its exquisite elegance and vibrant colors, often using wood or high-quality fired red bricks as building materials, and the local taverns naturally followed suit. But the Grizzly Bear Inn, standing in Hydra’s commercial district, was like a great boulder set in the middle of a garden; it was constructed directly from large, quarried blocks of gray mountain rock.
The entire building was three stories tall. The first floor provided food and drink, serving as both a tavern and a restaurant, while the second and third floors offered lodging. The building’s roof was not pointed like other Horn Bay structures, but was instead flat. Even stranger, the roof was surrounded by battlements, a feature that made the Grizzly Bear Inn look like a fortress.
Merchants and travelers were not particularly fond of this inn, but it was extremely popular with adventurers and mercenaries. They believed the building helped them stay mentally and physically alert, thus preventing their willpower from being eroded by the lavish lifestyle of Horn Bay. Sleeping inside felt special; a real man should stay in this kind of inn.
For this very reason, after the war in Horn Bay began, when other inns saw their business decline as merchants and tourists fled for safety, the Grizzly Bear Inn’s business boomed, supported by the mercenaries and adventurers who had gathered, drawn by the scent of blood.
But what no one would have expected was that the Grizzly Bear Tavern was one of the secret strongholds of a certain mage organization in Horn Bay.
“Sigh, what a bunch of losers.” In a room on the third floor, in the southeast corner of the building, Edward complained to a red-haired lady.
The current situation made him extremely frustrated; it had truly been a waste of all his painstaking efforts.