Staring with the outer wall of the city, Marcus began investigating the least guarded areas or the ones with the weakest magical defenses.
‘Yep, the northwestern side of the wall from mile sixty to mile sixty-five have the fewest mana cannons. Though I suppose that since that area outside of the wall is a marshland it makes the most sense. Hm, and the southern side is also just generally better defended in all regards. Maybe because of the hostile nations to the south?’
After searching the entirety of the outer wall over around four days, Marcus had made a very comprehensive list of the troop movements and magical defenses in each area.
Unfortunately, he did not find any glaring weakness in the setup, like a part of the wall that was heavily unguarded. But he did identify about eight areas that had the weakest defenses and would make good attack points.
Still, this was only the start, as Marcus also needed to search the city’s inner wall, and other fortifications.
Floating deeper into the city, Marcus began checking out the small forts that were built inside the city, making note of personnel and armaments.
Of course, for him to do this for the entire city would have taken a very long time, so he focused more on the areas and paths that directly in the way of the eight attack points he had identified on the outer wall.
‘Okay now it is time to check out the inner wall.’ Marcus thought as he finished up investigating the forces within the outer city.
Moving on to the inner wall, Marcus found that it was similarly protected by another detection barrier, though he knew this would not be a problem for him just like the last one..
Entering the outer wall, Marcus began searching through it looking for weak points and where the troop placements were the lowest, when suddenly his danger sense went off.
Abruptly moving to the side, Marcus barely avoided six spikes made out of earth that sprouted from the ceiling and were teaming with spiritual energy.
‘Shit.’
Understanding that he had been discovered somehow, Marcus boosted his float ability to the maximum speed he could and shot out of the inner wall.
However, as he exited, he found a woman clad in full top tier adamantine armor and wielding an equally impressive top tier adamantine crossbow that doubled as a battle ax.
‘Damn it.’ Marcus thought knowing who this was.
He had long since been given the description of all of the great knights in the kingdom, and he knew that the person in front of him was the rank seven great knight, Ziemia.
However, as he began looking for an escape route, the being that had attacked him earlier with the earth spikes came out of the top of the wall, and Marcus saw what looked like a giant mole.
Yet, he knew immediately that this was not some ordinary mole, or even some type of magical beast or monster.
‘A spirit!’
Recognizing that this mole was indeed another spirit, Marcus understood now how he had been found, and that he was in a very precarious situation.
‘This is really bad. No one told me that Ziemia had a contracted spirit with her.’ Marcus thought while trying to think of the best way out of this situation.
He had not anticipated being caught here. He figured everything would be fine so long as he did not try to investigate the castle, but instead he had been found out quite easily.
“So, you are the spirit that has joined up with those troublesome rebels that make a mockery of their king and kingdom. But it looks like you got overconfident in your abilities and did not think we would be ready for you. The second you passed into the inner wall our spirit detection formation picked you up. Now why don’t you surrender? If you are contracted to someone else, I can find a way to break it and you can become contracted with my family. We could always use another spirit to bolster our rank.” Ziemia said looking at Marcus greedily.
Naturally her family had grown in power due to the contact they made with the spirit that was currently contracted to her. And adding another one would only make them stronger and more prestigious.
Though obviously, Marcus had no intention of becoming anyone’s contracted spirit, and especially not to someone like Ziemia who was looking at him like a future possession, rather than a being with its own free will.
‘Solar flare.’
Knowing that the longer he stayed here the more likely reinforcements might show up, Marcus cast his tier three light magic spell and brightly lit up the area.
Using this as a distraction he beelined it towards the ground, hoping to escape deep underground where it would be impossible to track him.
“Grunt after him!” Ziemia shouted while trying to shake off the momentary blindness from Marcus’ spell.
Following his contractor’s orders, Grunt the molelike greater spirit began descending towards Marcus.
Quickly, Marcus made it into the ground where he traveled down for about a thousand feet, before heading in the direction of the city’s edge.
Except as he was passing though the ground, a large hole opened up in front of him, and Grunt, the earth spirit sent a barrage of spiritually charged pebbles at him.
Though while they were all just pebbles, they were moving as fast as bullets and definitely would hurt anyone they came in contact with.
‘Iron ramparts.’
Casting his defensive tier five iron magic spell, Marcus created a large wall of iron between himself and Grunt’s attack.
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!
As the earth pebbles impacted Marcus’ iron ramparts, they left huge dents in the sturdy wall, showing the amount of force that they had behind them.
Unfortunately, these were the least of Marcus’ worries, as the earth around him began shifting like liquid and moved to wrap him up.
And of course, since it was another spirit manipulating the earth, it had imbued it with its energy making it a credible threat to Marcus.
‘Embodiment of Darkness.’
‘Rending Void.’
Unleashing his tier six spell, Marcus began destroying everything around him including the ground.
He then directed this powerful attack right for Grunt, aiming to blow him away.
However, while grunt was two tiers of spirit below Marcus, his level was at sixty-five, and his powers were naturally focused more on defense.
Controlling the earth around him, Grunt created a powerful shield that took Marcus’ tier six spell on and dispersed the power it had.
Though as these two spirits fought below ground, the city above began shaking as if an earthquake rating of five on the Richter scale was happening.
With his attack having been blocked, Marcus prepared to use his combined tier six spells in order to push through Grunt, who as an earth spirit would make escape pretty much impossible.
Yet to make matters worse, the ground above Grunt opened up, and Ziemia descend into the cavern that her contracted spirit had created. All the while smiling smugly at Marcus.
“Do not think that you are going to escape so easily. This is only going to end one of two ways. Either you submit to me, or I destroy you.”
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