Chapter 244

At this moment, a guard rushed in to report.

"Your Majesty, I have something important to report."

Losweiser lowered her eyes, her voice cold and authoritative, "Speak."

"Of the 27 hidden sentries deployed along the eastern border, only 26 remain. According to nearby sentries, they did not hear any fighting sounds at the time and only discovered it during the shift change."

Upon hearing what the guard said, Losweiser lowered her brow.

The eastern border was the first place she inspected when she took Leon on a tour a few days ago.

Everything was fine there at the time.

Following Leon's advice, she put more effort into the disguise of the sentries and also increased the number of patrol posts.

But today a guard came to report that there are only 26 hidden sentries left.

"So, a sentry post disappeared for no reason?"

"Yes, Your Majesty."

Losweiser's mind stirred slightly. "Let's go take a look."

This is no small matter.

There are several possibilities for an outpost to disappear into thin air.

Perhaps it was infiltrated by the enemy, or perhaps another traitor has emerged.

In short, whatever the reason, Losweiser needs to go and see for herself.

She lifted her skirt and walked down the stairs. Before she could even leave the house, she saw Leon return, looking travel-worn.

Leon glanced at her, then at the guard beside him, and asked, "Are you heading to the eastern border?"

Losweiser was taken aback. "How did you know?"

"No need to go, I just came back from there too."

Leon waved the camera in his hand. "And, he also brought back some important clues that you might be interested in."

In the room, Leon placed the camera on the table and sat down next to Losweiser.

"One of the 27 hidden sentries on the eastern border is missing, right?" Leon asked.

Losweiser nodded without saying a word, quietly waiting for Leon to continue.

"Moreover, the fact that there was no sound of fighting at the time indicates that the sentry was taken out quietly."

Leon continued, "Those who can achieve this level are usually top-tier assassins."

"Even the most skilled can't bypass so many patrol posts on your border without anyone noticing. And whether the other party continues to lurk in the shadows after succeeding, waiting for an opportunity to strike, or simply withdraws, they can't possibly leave no trace."

"But that's exactly how it was at the scene. The sentry could be said to have 'vanished into thin air,' and there was not a single trace of him."

As he spoke, Leon turned on the camera's preview magic projection.

Losweiser took the camera; these were all taken by Leon in the mountains and forests of the eastern border, including the original location of the vanished sentry.

It was a thicket of bushes. The sentries' camouflage method was to half-submerge underground and use the bushes to cover themselves.

However, now, the bushes appear unchanged on the outside, but the hidden sentries inside have mysteriously disappeared.

"Let's keep looking," Leon said.

Losweiser continued flipping through the camera, jumping to the next photo.

The photo shows the scene after the camouflage of the bushes was lifted, revealing a deep pit where the sentry had hidden himself.

"The infiltrator made the sentry at the outpost disappear without damaging the bushes or engaging in any fighting or conflict."

Leon said slowly, "It sounds weird, doesn't it?"

"It is somewhat eerie..."

"Moreover, this outpost isn't right next to the edge of the forest; it's slightly off to the side. In other words, the intruder managed to evade the detection of at least eight to ten hidden sentries before taking down the sentry in this thicket."

Leon said, "Such superb concealment skills are difficult even for Dragon Race, who are skilled at disguise. Or rather... they simply cannot do it."

Losweiser had previously encountered situations where outposts were attacked. Wu

However, most of these are outposts along the border demarcation line, because those areas are most vulnerable to attack. Whether the attack is provocative or a diversionary tactic, the other side always has a clear objective.

Moreover, the method of attack was never as bizarre as it is now.

Compared to the past, this attacker was more like a... ghost. (7)

Losweiser stared at the camera's preview projection, unconsciously biting her lower lip. "Are there any other clues?"

"Of course."

"Remember when we went to the border a few days ago?" Leon said. "I told you to send more men."

"Yes, I remember."

"The reason I asked you to do this is because I discovered a very, very neat and clear dividing line at the border of your territory."

"Divider line?"

"Yeah." i

Leon took the camera, flipped through a few photos, and then handed them to Losweiser. "Here, this is it."

Rossweisse glanced at him. different

Sure enough, in the preview projection, there was a neat dividing line, as if it had been cut by a knife.

Although it's not very long, it does seem somewhat out of place compared to the uneven environment surrounding the boundary.

"Of course, the world is full of wonders, and such dividing lines can also form naturally. So, in order to find out whether this is a coincidence or not, I went to several other places in the back mountain these past few days."

Leon flipped the preview projector. "As you can imagine, I found similar marks at every vulnerable checkpoint. It's safe to say that these neat dividing lines are no coincidence."

"But what does this clue have to do with the missing sentry?" Losweiser asked.

"Some."

Leon flipped the preview projection back to the one of the bush sentry posts, then zoomed in, pointing to the edge of one of the bushes.

"Look, although there are no signs of a struggle at the scene, one corner of this bush looks like it was neatly cut off, very smooth, and doesn't look like it fell off naturally or rotted."

"Also, there are smooth marks inside the deep pit under the bushes, as if it had been cut with a knife."

Leon put down his camera and looked at Losweiser.

"As I just said, even Dragon Race, who are skilled at disguise, couldn't do this, because it far exceeds the capabilities of a regular assassin. It's less of an assassination and more like seeing a ghost."

The phrase "Damn it!" was uttered in a cheerful tone, and a helpless smile flickered across Losweiser's somber face as she glanced back at Leon.

"So you mean that this infiltrator didn't use the conventional assassination methods we understand, but rather an assassination technique we never expected or encountered before?"

Jokes aside, which were meant to briefly lighten the mood, Losweiser could still discern the meaning behind Leon's jokes.

Leon nodded. "Besides investigating these traces these past few days, I've also looked for a lot of materials in the library. Your book, 'A Brief History of Dragon Kind,' has been a great help to me."

Losweiser raised her beautiful eyebrows. "How so?"

"The descriptions of all Dragon Race above are almost entirely positive and praiseworthy, so the author probably didn't want to offend any of the dragon kings."

Leon said, "And in one of them, I found this description:

Star Wandering Dragon King Ravi has achieved remarkable success in spatial magic; in his hands, space seems not to be a concept, but an art.

As Ravi's mastery of spatial magic improved, he began to try to incorporate this magic into his daily life, such as... construction.

All the buildings of the Star-wandering Dragon Clan are perfectly and precisely constructed. It is said that they never use any cutting, polishing, or explosive tools, because Ravi's spatial magic can precisely sever any superfluous or useless parts.

"After reading this description of Ravi, I did more research on so-called spatial magic and found that it can do much more than just build houses."

"A silent attack, a retreat without leaving a trace, and neat, uniform cutting marks—these are all things that spatial magic can do."

"So, let's make a bold assumption: it was Ravi, or someone else skilled in spatial magic, who used this magic to attack your sentries."

"It was this guy who put up those neat dividing lines at your borders and checkpoints."

Leon concluded, "Losweiser, the person who attacked the outpost wasn't some ghost or a demon; it was indeed an assassination technique we'd never encountered before—spatial magic."

Losweiser followed Leon's line of thought, "Indeed, if we apply the characteristics of spatial magic to this incident, then everything makes sense."

After a pause, Losweiser asked again, "But there's one thing I still don't understand. Since the other side is so skilled in spatial magic assassination, why did they only take out one of my sentries and draw a few neat dividing lines?"

Leon helped her continue her analysis.

"In my opinion, there are two possibilities for why the other party did this."

"The first type of spatial magic has many limitations and a certain range of application. Within a safe range, the opponent's limit is to eliminate you, the hidden sentry located in the middle of the mountains and forests."

"The second type is a declaration of war."

"... A challenge?"

"Um."

Leon's expression was serious. "They're telling us that the next attack, far surpassing the Battle of Constantine... is coming."

Twenty kilometers outside the Silver Dragon Border, on a towering General's Platform, a man walked to the side of Star Wandering Dragon King Ravi.

"I told you, intimidation has no effect on Leon Casmod. Your 'ghost' not only failed to frighten him, but also made him take precautions based on those clues."

A few days ago, Ravi used spatial magic to secretly eliminate a hidden sentry post in the Silver Dragon Border.

The original plan was to use this tactic to intimidate the opponent and see what level they were at.

As expected, Ravi underestimated his opponent's meticulousness and ability to react in the heat of battle.

Almost on the night the sentry was eliminated, the Silver Dragon race canceled all independent outposts and replaced them with mobile outposts consisting of five people each.

Moreover, the five people in each group are spaced twenty meters apart, forming a line that is one hundred meters long, leaving no place for any "ghost" to escape.

Ravi's spatial magic no longer dared to act rashly.

But Ravi merely scoffed at the man beside him's hindsight advice.

"How can you be so sure that this counterattack tactic was devised by Leon Casmod?"

The man shrugged indifferently. "He used this tactic when he served the Empire before. It can be considered one of his classic counter-ambush tactics."

"Your spatial magic has a limited range of application, while each of his arrays is stretched to a hundred meters, with each one watching the other. You simply have no way to attack."

"Heh... If you ask me, we shouldn't have started this psychological warfare in the first place. We should have just sent Star over directly."

Radiant Star Dragon King Star's seniority among the Dragon Race even surpasses that of Constantine.

Ravi's gaze slowly shifted from the Silver Dragon territory to the face of the man beside him.

His tone was low, even somewhat threatening.

"Nacho Salaman, the Empire and our Dragon Race are only partners, not superiors and subordinates. Understand your place. The Radiant Star Dragon King is not someone you can summon and dismiss at will."

It's clear that Ravi has great respect for Sta.

But Nacho didn't care.

He just sneered, "It wasn't me who sent Stah, it was 'that person's' order."

When Nacho mentioned 'that person,' his face was full of piety, as if 'that person' was right beside him.

Ravi frowned slightly.

He knew that Nacho was so arrogant and dared to spout nonsense in front of him, the Dragon King, entirely because of the 'that person' he mentioned.

The fact that Ravi is here today to oversee the battle is also on the orders of 'that person'.

The 'master' said that although the Radiant Star Dragon King is powerful, it is still necessary to have two plans in case of emergency.

The phrase "preparing for both possibilities" refers to Ravi.

Kolavi simply couldn't understand how there could possibly be a human in this world capable of defeating Star.

Having only defeated Constantine, he dares to wear the word "invincible" on his face.

Humans... are ultimately a narrow-minded race, Ravi thought to himself.

"Speaking of which, Ravi, that secret weapon you, Blair, Jaggs were working on should be perfected by now, right?" Nacho asked.