Imperial Crown

"Nancy is just stubborn, not stupid." Raven's anger has almost subsided: "Don't worry, she will come back."

This sudden storm ended with Raven conquering Margaret, but he didn't have time to be happy now, because his condition was not as good as it seemed.

The Song of Dark Souls itself caused a considerable degree of damage to Raven, and his mental strength was also exhausted. He had a big fight with Nancy, and now he was so tired that he couldn't even open his eyelids.

"I want to rest for a while." Raven bent down and pulled out the enchanted crossbow arrows on the ground and put them away: "Continue to send people to watch the Scorpion Nest, report the movements at all times, and wake me up immediately if there is any situation."

"Yes, sir!" Volaf accepted the order respectfully.

Laying a blanket in the corner, Raven fell asleep wrapped in the blanket.

Raven didn't sleep well this time. Various scenes and pictures flashed through his mind, but he couldn't remember any of them clearly.

"Baron... Baron!" Volaf's voice sounded in his ears.

"Ah..." Raven opened his eyes and felt a splitting headache. This was the sequelae of excessive mental energy consumption without full replenishment: "How long have I slept?"

"Less than four hours..." Volaf paused and said a piece of news that was completely beyond Raven's expectations: "The brothers caught a tongue back."

"Oh? That's right to wake me up." Raven's eyes flashed with joy, and then he turned his sore shoulders: "Isn't it exposed?"

"No, sir." Volaf helped Raven up and said with ease: "The guy was originally letting the water out, and was pressed there by several brothers on the spot. He didn't have time to make a sound."

Standing up, Raven glanced and saw Nancy secretly glancing at him in the corner. After noticing his gaze, she immediately looked away.

Raven shook his head and stopped looking at her: "How is the situation at the Scorpion Nest?"

"Not optimistic." Volaf looked worried: "In just the past four hours, the Scorpion Nest has sent out eight waves of scouts, sixteen people, otherwise it would not be so easy for the brothers to capture people back."

"Hehe, Heleti is not stupid." Raven stood up and steadied his shaky body with the help of Volaf: "I know that I don't have enough intelligence, and now I am trying to make up for it."

Coming to the horse thief, Raven looked him up and down.

This is a man who looks less than thirty years old, with a face full of dust. At first glance, he is a guy who is used to living in the open air. He looked at Raven with a hint of disdain.

Raven winked, and Volaf understood. He stepped forward and pulled off the cloth that sealed the mouth of the horse thief scout, and a bloody stone fell out.

"Pah..." The horse thief scout moved his cheeks and spat out a mouthful of bloody saliva, looking at Raven provocatively: "Hey, you are their boss?"

"Bold!" Volaf scolded: "Look carefully, this is our Baron, don't confuse him with you!"

"What's the matter with the Baron, isn't he still one nose and two eyes?" The horse thief scout twisted his body: "I just can't understand, you have a good life, but you have to come to the bloody highlands to die, what's the point? Are the nobles all masochists?"

Stopped Volaf who was about to continue scolding, Raven stared into the horse thief's eyes: "What's your name?"

"None of your business." The horse thief scout looked away.

Raven would not get angry because of such a small matter, but he knew that it was useless to speak softly to the horse thief.

With a clang, Raven drew out the long sword from Volaf's waist and pressed it against the face of the horse thief scout: "Ask again, what's your name?"

A streak of blood flowed down the horse thief's face, and the latter's eyes condensed, and then revealed a trace of ruthlessness, and suddenly stood up and rushed towards the sword!

This action was too sudden. Raven had already put away the sword very quickly, but the sharp blade still opened a bloody wound on the face of the horse thief scout, almost piercing his right cheek.

"What are you doing!?" Volaf shouted loudly.

"I know what you want, isn't it just the information about the scorpion nest?" The horse thief scout raised his head, and the muscles on the wound kept twitching and squeezing out blood: "I won't tell you!"

"Lord Sha Wang, you will definitely avenge me!"

As he said this, he suddenly closed his mouth tightly.

Raven's heart tightened: "Stop him!"

But it was too late.

Just as Volav stretched out his hand to pinch the horse thief scout's cheeks, the latter had already opened his bloody mouth, and half of his tongue fell into the dust with blood mixed with saliva.

Even so, he did not forget to look at Raven with a provocative look.

Raven's mouth twitched slightly, and he thrust a sword into his throat, shook off the blood on the sword blade and inserted it back into Volav's waist.

"Baron, it's all my fault for reacting too slowly." Volav blamed himself.

"... No one could have thought of such a thing." Raven's face was gloomy, and his heart became heavier: "Move it out and bury it."

Volav led people to deal with the body, and Raven returned to his seat and sat down.

Closing his eyes and opening them again, Raven's eyes unconsciously fell on the open space where the horse thief scout was.

Although the body had been moved away, the blood was still there, and the half tongue was still there.

Raven's eyebrows twitched fiercely, and the look of the horse thief scout before his death appeared in his mind again.

In order to avoid exposing information, he chose to bite off his tongue. This kind of ruthlessness and decisiveness was the first time Raven had seen it.

If this was really a dead soldier, a spy, or a fanatical believer of a certain god, Raven wouldn't be so surprised.

"He's just a little horse thief scout."

The scouts are all like this, but what will the elites under Heleti look like?

Thinking of this, Raven's heart sank.

After thinking for a moment, he muttered in his mind: "Margaret, come out."

The next moment, a crow flew out from the corner and landed on the ground, revealing Margaret's deformed body.

A foul smell filled the air.

Raven frowned in disgust: "Can't you clean yourself?"

"This..." Margaret poked her forehead with her finger, her expression a little embarrassed: "Baron, it's not that I don't care about cleanliness, but we witches will have this smell as we get older."

"I'll give you a bottle of perfume later." Raven reluctantly pulled away a little, pulled the blanket to his nose, and lowered his voice:

"You said before that the curse in my body was unusual?"

"Yes, ancient, and powerful." Margaret's body trembled: "Just a little contact, I feel like I almost died of old age. We witches have a life span of thousands of years!"

"Then do you know how to break this curse?" Raven asked.

"Please forgive me, Master. The power of this curse far exceeds my limit." Margaret rubbed her fingers together: "But... judging from the way it works, it doesn't look like the handiwork of humans or our witches. , more like the methods of the elves.”

"Elf?" Raven raised an eyebrow: "This is interesting."

Through the link between the two, Raven knew clearly that Margaret could not deceive him, which meant that his curse was probably related to elves.

But this is so weird!

Since thousands of years ago, the elves have been huddled in the ancient forest in the southwest corner of the Middles continent, but the Griffith family is rooted in the northwest of the continent, which is more than half a continent away!

What did the ancestors of the Griffith family do to offend the elves and pass on such a vicious curse?

Raised an elf princess as a slave?

Or burn the world tree of the elves?

Shaking his head to expel these strange associations from his mind, feeling the increasingly pungent smell, Raven showed a trace of disgust on his face: "You can transform, why don't you become the 'Black Pearl' before? "

Although I know it is fake, even if it is not pleasing to the eye, it is good to look at.

"That requires very complicated procedures and rituals." Margaret felt Raven's disgust. Although she was dissatisfied, she could only answer honestly:

"I need to control the target first, make her unconscious, and then perform the ceremony, just like I did to you before, except that the time process will be longer. Once I succeed, I will be able to obtain a stand-in dummy, and then I can change Be like someone else.”

As she said that, she glanced at Nancy with evil intentions: "It's difficult for ordinary people to make a qualified stand-in puppet, but she is very suitable. By then, I will not only be able to retain some of the characteristics of a magician, but also be able to be beautiful from the inside out." Being exactly like her, I can serve you better!”

"If you dare to have such thoughts again, I will kill you." Raven's voice was calm but unquestionable: "If you do such a thing without my permission, I will kill you too."

Margaret felt awe-struck and nodded repeatedly: "Understood, Lord Baron!"

Raven's eyes once again fell on the spot where the horse thief scout fell dead.

Four hours and sixteen scouts showed that the Eagle Army's performance exceeded Heleti's expectations and made him wary.

In this case, it was meaningless just to let Vesdon yell.

In a castling position, if Raven is Heleti, and he cannot figure out the opponent's trump card, he has the home court advantage and has no responsibility to defend the ground, so static braking is the best option.

And Raven just didn't have the capital to drag it out any longer.

Now I am afraid that the Death Hand Order has begun to wreak havoc in the Nord Province and may affect the Eagle Territory at any time; the supplies carried by Raven and the others do not allow them to waste too much time.

Heleti must be drawn out as soon as possible to end this expedition.

Raven broke the silence and suddenly asked: "If the distance between you and me is too far, can you break free and weaken my control?"

"...Yes!" Margaret's mouth twitched, and she reluctantly spoke the truth: "The effective control distance of this curse is from here to the outside of the scorpion nest at most. If it is further away, I will execute your previous order. orders, but you cannot receive new instructions or make any feedback, and you cannot kill me with a curse during this period.”

"There is a risk that it will escape your control."

Raven nodded slowly and asked another question: "How far can your crow fly?"

Margaret immediately replied: "There is no hard limit, but the farther the distance, the more my magic power will be consumed, and I must focus on controlling and maintaining it."

"Hmm..." Raven pondered for a moment: "Flav, bring the paper and pen."

The soldier whose name was called handed over the parchment and charcoal, and Raven began to write dots on it without hesitation. After a while, he finished writing and handed it to Margaret:

"Use your crow and send it to Eric."

"You yourself cannot leave my effective control."

"Yes, Lord Baron!" Margaret took the envelope and walked to the corner to sit down. Then wisps of black energy arose from her body and condensed, turning into a crow with beautiful feathers. She picked up the envelope and flew out with flapping wings.

Just as he was about to close his eyes and rest, Raven saw Nancy walking over. Just as he was about to speak, Nancy had already preempted him: "...Why did you give this letter to her?"

Although there was some emotion, it didn't look like they were here to quarrel.

As long as she didn't make trouble, Raven didn't bother to meet her: "In just four hours, Heleti sent out eight groups of sixteen scouts, which shows that he has begun to be vigilant."

"The thieves in the Bloody Highlands are all very good at riding horses. Everyone is a qualified scout. Heleti will definitely not just let out a few people."

"So if I send personal soldiers to contact Eric, once discovered by the scouts of the Scorpion Nest and fail to silence them in time, Heleti will know that there is a troop that he doesn't know about hidden nearby. After confirming that we leave, Or he will never come out again until he dies."

Raven spoke very carefully, and Nancy heard it very clearly. She snorted, with dissatisfaction in her tone: "You can leave this kind of thing to me, no matter what kind of horse thief can escape my magic, absolutely not People will find out, why do we have to use her?”

"..." Raven lowered his head, really having no energy or interest to continue explaining.

Seeing that he didn't speak for a long time, Nancy felt a little bored and left muttering: "Humph, sooner or later you will regret it..."

Fatigue came over him, and Raven fell into a deep sleep again.

In the early morning of the next day, as soon as Raven woke up from his sleep, Margaret came up to him immediately: "Lord Baron, the letter has been delivered!"

"What did Eric say?"

"Sorry, Lord Baron, I didn't hear it." Margaret's voice was full of apology: "Such a long distance consumes too much of my magic power. I can no longer maintain the existence of the crow just after it was delivered to me."

Raven looked at her with a scrutinizing gaze, clearly seeing that she still had more than half of her energy left.

Although you can't disobey my orders, you can carry them out with discounts.

It's time to give the power of this "Song of Dark Souls" a try.

A ray of silver light flashed in Raven's eyes, and Margaret's expression immediately became distorted. She felt that the magic power in her body suddenly began to rebel, running rampant, and almost tearing her internal organs apart.

"Don't make any noise." Raven ordered calmly.

So Margaret opened her mouth, but couldn't make any sound. Her claw-like hands dug into the ground, bringing up large amounts of dust and dripping with blood.

It wasn't until a layer of dirty sweat soaked through her that the painful feeling finally disappeared.

"You can talk now."

Margaret's face turned gloomy: "Lord Baron, I, I never dare to..."

"Yes, I know." Raven interrupted her: "Next, use your crow to investigate the terrain and layout of the scorpion nest. The more detailed the better."

"yes……"

Margaret felt that she had simply become a tool, being used by Raven with ease.

But she didn't dare and couldn't resist, so she dragged her belly back to the corner and called out a crow.

The cave was peaceful and silent, except for the occasional crackle of the burning bonfire.

Raven leaned against the wall and glanced across the cave. He saw that the soldiers had fallen asleep and Nancy was curled up in the corner.

Finally, his eyes fell on Margaret's back.

Emotions that had been suppressed and ignored due to exhaustion quietly grew at this moment, and Raven's heart suddenly beat faster.

Reaching out and stroking the ground beneath him, Raven recalled the pain that seemed to tear him apart, the helpless despair, the feeling of facing death...

fear!

His hands suddenly began to tremble, and cold sweat trickled down his forehead.

He is afraid.

Just a little bit away from really dying!

Does Raven really have no murderous intention towards Margaret?

How is that possible! ?

It's just that reason trumps impulse. Raven knows how precious a witch is, especially a witch who is completely controlled by him.

He has a long life, magical magic, and specializes in the use and breaking of curses and poisons.

It can be used not only to deal with enemies, but also to protect yourself.

Moreover, her crow is also a rare detection and communication tool in this era.

At that time, a quarrel broke out with Nancy. Raven seemed to be persuading Nancy, but why wasn't he persuading himself?

"Lux, your calculations are really accurate..."

With a wry smile, Raven stretched out her legs and recalled what she had said to herself the night before setting off.

Think carefully and make decisions carefully.

Could it be that the Lord of Light really has the ability to see the direction of the river of destiny?

Raven thought the danger came from Horati, but unexpectedly it came from Margaret.

If she hadn't been too greedy and hadn't used a curse, then she might not have been able to escape death.

"It's better to die." Raven put his hands together and moved his wrists:

"Maybe I can go back if I die."

His hands gradually stopped shaking, and Raven's mind calmed down. He closed his eyes and reviewed his entire plan.

Although Heleti's caution was beyond Raven's expectation, Eric also successfully defused Heleti's probing attack.

The plan had some twists and turns, but the overall process went smoothly.

The next thing to do is to prepare for the attack on the Scorpion Nest.

Raven's hand touched his waist, grasped a magic core and a crystal bottle in his hands, and then gently crushed the magic core.

At this moment, the energy flowed and merged into Raven's brows, and began to expand his magic power reserves, while the essence of the corrupted soul merged into the crystal bottle under the diversion of mental power.

Margaret seemed to have noticed something, and her neck shook slightly, but she didn't dare to look back in the end, and continued to maintain her concentration.

A comfortable feeling of fullness filled Raven's heart.

The upper limit of the magic power converted by the energy of a first-level magic core is comparable to Raven's meditation for about fourteen days.

Raven rarely used this method to strengthen his magic power before.

As a magician, in addition to the magic power itself, the growth of mental power is also very important. If the magic power grows too fast, it will make it difficult for the mental power to accurately control it, which will reduce the success rate of casting.

So before, Raven would take a break for a period of time, and wait until the meditation gradually made up the gap between mental power and magic power, and then continue to absorb magic cores.

But now the situation is different. Heleti's cautiousness exceeded Raven's expectations, and the bravery of his horse thieves also left a deep impression on him.

Even if the next plan goes smoothly, the outcome of this battle is still unknown.

So Raven must improve his strength and expand his magic power as soon as possible.

On the battlefield, it is good to release one more magic.

After absorbing the energy of three magic cores in succession, Margaret also took back the crow.

"Baron, the terrain has been surveyed clearly."

Looking at Raven's face, Margaret said cautiously: "In general, there is not much difference from what is marked on your map, that is, after entering the first city gate, there is a urn."

"Urn city..." Raven muttered this word, his brows knitted together.

The so-called urn city means that after entering the city gate, you will not go directly into the city, but there is an open space surrounded by a wall.

Even if the attacking party breaks through the first city gate, if it cannot quickly break through the second gate, it will become a live target for the archers on the city wall.

After a while, Raven took a deep breath and perked up: "What time is it now?"

Margaret calculated carefully: "From the direction of the moon-watching flower, it is about three to four in the morning."

Raven nodded, and suddenly clapped his hands heavily: "Assemble!"

The long-term habit made the sleeping guards wake up quickly, and they picked up their weapons at the first time: "Baron!"

Nancy also rubbed her sleepy eyes and sat up dissatisfiedly.

"Everyone, get ready for battle." Raven looked around at his personal soldiers: "Pack up your own equipment, prepare your horses, and set off on time in twenty minutes!"

"Why so early?" Nancy muttered dissatisfiedly: "It's not even daybreak yet."

This time Nancy helped Raven. He loudly explained this question to everyone: "It's because it's not even daybreak that we can avoid the eyes and ears of Heleti, sneak to the side of the scorpion nest, and catch Heleti off guard."

"Once it's daybreak, with the density of scouts in the scorpion nest now, it will be really troublesome!"

The personal soldiers were busy in an orderly manner, checking leather armor, weapons, crossbows, and feeding the horses with fine feed.

Before the battle, Raven and his entourage were lightly equipped. In addition to their own equipment, each person only brought a water bag and a ration. The luggage, supplies and pack horses were hidden in the cave.

Twenty minutes later, the guards, led by Raven, gathered in the dark night. Everyone was silent, and the horses were covered with leather bridles.

There was no fire, only the howling north wind and the rising snow.

Raven looked at them deeply, and carefully examined Margaret, who was covered in a black robe, and waved his hand and ordered:

"Let's go!"

Twenty-one people, twenty-one horses, disappeared in the whistling cold wind.

...