The Eagle's Nest's Spoils

By human instinct, stopping at a moment like this usually meant it was time to negotiate terms and name a price. What should he say?

Sure enough, the Battle Priest spoke.

"I am the Eagle Priest. The Eagle God will not forgive your insolence. If you are willing to stop, I am willing to pray to the Eagle God and spare you from His puni—"

"Spare my ass. Take this!" Landen gave the priest no chance to finish and immediately raised his blade to attack.

The priest had not expected Landen to disregard the usual rules. He hastily raised his sword to block, only to catch sight of a dagger flying toward him from the corner of his eye.

The priest groaned inwardly. The dagger arrived first, while the saber had yet to reach him. He could only block the flying dagger first. Just as the Magic Pattern Sword in his hand came down, Landen charged at him again.

Seeing the priest prepare to block the dagger, Landen immediately used Charge. The saber followed right behind the dagger and ultimately cut the priest down. Its blade swept across the golden mask, splitting it in two and sending both halves flying as the priest collapsed.

When the Barbarians of the Eagle Tribe saw their supreme Eagle-Face Mask cleaved in half by Landen's blade, they were so frightened that they dropped to their knees. They scarcely dared breathe, terrified of the Eagle God's punishment.

Yet aside from the Eagle Priest's death, nothing happened. The Eagle God seemed to have forgotten His own priest. The surrounding Barbarians all held their breath until Landen confirmed that the Eagle Priest had truly stopped breathing. Only then did his subordinates erupt in cheers, while even the Barbarians of the Eagle Tribe let out sighs of relief.

Gallop Plains was covered by Magic Turbulence. Even the most powerful gods found it difficult to answer the prayers of believers on Gallop Plains.

The Eagle Eye Technique gained by generations of Eagle Tribe priests at the cost of their lives—rather than being the price of a divine spell, the sacrifice of life was more like a communication fee.

As for Kansa, he had always worshipped the gods halfheartedly. The daily noon ritual was merely meant to establish his own authority; he had never truly contacted the Eagle God. Now that Landen had cut him down with one strike, naturally no god came looking for him.

Just as Landen had expected, the Eagle Priest wore a full set of Magic Pattern Equipment. Beneath the feathers, that armor was covered in Magic Pattern arrays. After Landen put it on, he found it even more useful than the Wandering Badger Tribe's Magic Pattern Iron Armor—though it also consumed more Krypton Crystals.

The knowledgeable Albert recognized it. This armor was probably high-end merchandise from the Red-Dragon Shop in Dragon Tooth City, the Royal Capital. Its leather base material had come from at least an intermediate magical beast, and its Magic Patterns were the work of a Master-level Archmage. The conclusion was that if neither the Eagle Priest nor Landen used Magic Crystals to replenish their Battle Qi, Landen would never have been able to cut through the other man's armor. Landen knew that as well; after all, even with Battle Qi, he had failed to cut through the priest's Leather Armor.

Kansa had left Landen even more wealth than the Black-Eyed Wandering Badger Tribe. When Landen entered the priest's great tent, aside from several trembling Priest Apprentices, the first thing he saw was a strange mask. Between its two enormous eye sockets, a base protruded from its forehead, with a crystal embedded atop it.

"This... could it be used for transformation?" Landen did not know the mask's purpose, but seeing the dense Magic Arrays upon it, he felt that it was extraordinarily impressive even though he could not understand its exact function.

"What does this mask do?" Landen asked the Apprentices.

"My lord, we don't know. The priest never allowed us to touch his mask!"

"Your priest was already cut down by our chief in one strike. If you dare lie to our chief, then you must think you've lived too long!" Neil thought the Priest Apprentices were deceiving Landen, so he decided to frighten the girls.

Landen held the mask and watched the girls weep. Thinking back on the Eagle Priest's behavior, he felt that the man did not seem like someone who had left behind some powerful trump card. So he put the golden mask over his face.

"...Albert." After wearing it for several seconds, the first thing Landen said was Albert's name.

Everyone else withdrew from the tent. Landen took off the mask and handed it to Albert.

"...Landen, this... this should be... Mage's Eye?" Once Albert put on the mask, he quickly understood the connection between it and the God Pillar. "Could it be that the truth behind the so-called Eagle Tribe is that they tied a Mage's Eye Magic Array to a pillar?"

"Magic Pattern Leather Armor, a Magic Pattern scimitar, a Mage's Eye Magic Array. It seems this Barbarian priest wasn't as divine as we imagined, but he was smarter than we thought," Landen said aloud, while thinking, I thought you had a drone. Turns out you just had a mast.

A mast certainly could not compare to a drone, but its advantage was that anyone could use it.

The Eagle Tribe camp had two Junior Knights, two Reserve Knights, and eight Human Race Mana-Wielders. So many people were maintained solely to transport that God Pillar mast. To preserve the sanctity of the Divine Wood, the Eagle Priest had to ensure the thirty-meter mast remained intact. But now that Landen had discovered its secret, he did not need to be so rigid. He could simply divide the mast into three sections, making it easier to transport.

Besides the carriage, mast, and Human Race Mana-Wielders, more than thirty Barbarian Mana-Wielders from the Eagle Tribe directly joined the Gallop Tribe because of Landen's victory in the duel. In addition, the four Priest Apprentices selected by Kansa had not yet awakened their Mana-Wielder Bloodlines, but Landen felt that they all had considerable potential.

Although the four girls had been guarded against by the priest and were not allowed to learn the most crucial secrets, having followed him for so long, they had noticed many things. For instance, two of them could communicate with the hawks raised in the camp, while the other two could clearly sense the light emitted by the Magic Patterns when the priest's Leather Armor was operating.

Landen was troubled by the fact that there were no Mages or Priests in his territory. He could not teach the girls anything for now, so he could only have Nila take charge of their daily lives.