After three days of travel, Green and the Evil Crystal Stigma Wizard flew side by side, transformed into two flickering ghostly lights, and arrived in the relatively outer region of the Third-Ring Holy Tower.
It had been quite some time since the two had seen a decent town or village.
Ruins lay everywhere, smoke and haze permeated the air, all blanketed beneath a ghastly fluorescent green. Not a trace of life remained in the land.
"I never thought this place would have fallen so completely."
A trace of sorrow surfaced in the Evil Crystal Stigma Wizard's sunken eye sockets. Clearly, the horrific pollution and slaughter here had utterly transformed what had once been a prosperous region into ruins.
"This was once the famed Twenty-Two-City Economic Zone of the Third-Ring Holy Tower. Hundreds of wizard families were scattered throughout it, and the energy stone revenues it generated each year accounted for five to seven percent of the entire Third-Ring Holy Tower..."
Yet Green had grown accustomed to such sights along the way.
Although the other Holy Tower regions had suffered far less pollution than the Third-Ring Holy Tower, vast stretches of contaminated land still remained. All the sacrifices and efforts the Wizard World had made for environmental protection were worth less than a word to the Metal Destroyers. They wreaked destruction to their hearts' content; destruction had always been far easier and simpler than construction.
Green's tricolored eyes gazed into the distance. He reached out and gently brushed through the pale green breeze for a moment, carefully sensing the changes in the surrounding air before saying in a low voice, "That ominous, absurd rule has grown much denser. It should be nearby."
"Since there are no more villages, towns, or cities, there naturally shouldn't be any wizards either. I haven't received