Three Layers of Trump Cards

Victor's voice slowly faded, and he shrank back without realizing it. "But... there's a fatal problem..."

Shien raised a hand to press against his throbbing temple.

After directing the battle formation all night, his mind had been pushed to its limit. It felt as though fine needles were slowly piercing his brain.

He lifted his eyes to Victor. "Stop beating around the bush. Say it."

Victor took a deep breath, as if steeling himself. "The Blood Moon's Blood Mist has been eating away at it for too long. The Main Gear underground has contracted and warped from the toxins.

"Even if we scrape off all the Bloodrust, the metal teeth will still break apart. To keep it turning, we need high-grade alchemical machine oil that can neutralize the Blood Moon toxins and withstand high temperatures."

Shien's heart sank.

Such oil counted as a high-grade material even in an ordinary city. Here, clean water was hard enough to find, let alone alchemical oil.

Worse, he knew nothing about this branch of alchemy. If he could not understand a word Victor was saying, he could not even tell whether the old man was talking nonsense.

Fortunately, he had his Golden Finger. Shien lowered his eyelids and sank his consciousness deep into his mind. The illusory Canon of Grace and Righteousness opened without a sound.

After days of working together and receiving Shien's support, the value above Victor's head had long since passed green and settled in the deep-blue range.

Shien did not hesitate. He spent the Reward Value.

In the next instant, a vast body of unfamiliar yet complete knowledge flooded his mind: Wasteland Material Extraction, the smelting of Aberrant bones, the basic structure of alchemical materials...

The Canon had copied two abilities from Victor's mind: [Lv. 2 Aberrant Material Smelting] and [Lv. 2 Alchemy of Materials].

The brief dizziness passed, and Shien opened his eyes again.

The gulf in expertise that had seemed impossible to cross moments ago was gone.

"Could Holy Oil work? It resists heat and has consecrated properties. In theory, it should suppress the Blood Moon toxins."

Victor was silent for a few seconds before shaking his head with a bitter smile. "It would work, but we can't touch it. That's the base oil we have to pour into the rune channels to light the Sacred Flame."

After speaking, Victor slumped onto the stone steps, as if all his strength had suddenly left him.

When the dozen or so craftsmen around them understood, their faces grew even grimmer. If the Sacred Flame Altar could not be set turning, this place would never hold when the Blood Moon rose tonight.

Shien ignored their despairing looks. The knowledge he had just copied was racing through his mind, searching for the faintest possibility.

Suddenly, he turned and looked past the exhausted battle formation to the heap of corpses outside the defensive ring—the Bloodthirsty Rot Rats killed last night.

Shien raised a hand and pointed at the bodies. "Bloodthirsty Rot Rats spend their lives underground, feeding on the rotting flesh of Demonic Beasts. Their bodies have long since adapted to Blood Moon radiation.

"If we render the fat from those carcasses and treat it at high temperature..."

Victor froze, then sprang up. "Yes! Mutant Rat oil can already withstand high temperatures. If we refine it with Quicklime to make it corrosive enough to bite through Bloodrust, then mix in a little Holy Silver Powder to suppress the Corpse Poison..."

He clutched his gaunt head, his voice trembling. "It would make the perfect lubricant!"

Shien said nothing more. He pointed his sword toward the mound of corpses beyond the halo. "Drag those rats in. Set up cauldrons and render the oil."

At his side, the herald immediately turned to organize the Convicts.

With the Sacred Flame Altar's central problem solved, Shien's nerves, stretched taut all night, had yet to ease when an army clerk came running toward him.

"My lord..." The clerk held out a scroll of parchment to Shien. "We've counted last night's losses. Seven dead, twenty-five severely wounded, and over seventy more scratched."

Against a Rat Tide nearly ten thousand strong that had lasted all night, losing fewer than ten men was nothing short of a miracle.

Shien's expression did not change.

He knew exactly what that miracle had cost: tactical commands that had nearly exhausted his mind, and the flesh and blood of his fighters. That was all that had held the line.

Besides, those rats had been nothing but the cheapest cannon fodder.

He turned his gaze toward the perimeter. The makeshift barrier built from wagons with their wheels removed was already in ruins.

Claw marks had torn gaps all through the rough planks. Splinters littered the ground, and blackened blood had congealed in the gaps between the wagon beds.

Knight Fabien moved back and forth through the wounded camp with several priests.

Platinum-colored Holy Light flickered in their palms, slowly stripping the sickly green Corpse Poison from the wounds.

The Convicts silently dragged piles of rat corpses to iron cauldrons, skinned and butchered them, and tossed them into boiling oil. At the same time, they used stones and bloodstained planks to shore up the sections of wagon wall that were close to collapse.

Many knights and veterans still stood at the very front.

They had swung their swords all night. Their eyes were bloodshot and their greatswords nicked and bent, but they remained rooted to the ground.

Shien gave an order that left no room for argument. "Rotate the entire force. Everyone who held the breaches last night takes off their armor and rests. The second line will stand watch."

Several veterans tried to speak, but Shien's stare stopped them.

Fighting to exhaustion in a place like this was courting death.

"The real danger comes tonight. If you don't sleep now, you won't even be able to lift your swords after dark."

Shien paused, his gaze passing slowly over the veterans' faces. "Go sleep. Get your strength back. You'll need it tonight."

Armor came off with a series of dull clatters. The soldiers dragged their heavy legs toward the tents in the inner ring. Many collapsed into sleep the moment they went inside.

After arranging the rotation, Shien climbed back onto the high platform. His gaze crossed the halo of Sacred Flame to the churning Blood Mist at the edge of the wasteland.

That chill against the back of his neck last night had not been his imagination.

Something more powerful among the Dark Creatures had to be driving the Rat Tide. The situation was extremely dangerous.

Shien's mind raced through the possibilities.

If a massive High-Tier Demonic Beast appeared tonight, the line of broken wagons would be all but useless.

He could not stake everyone's lives on a single plan.

Shien quickly laid out three plans in his mind.

The first depended, of course, on Victor's progress.

If Victor could refine lubricant to a sufficient strength and scrape the Bloodrust from the base of the Ritual Altar bit by bit, they could light the Permanent Sacred Flame Platform before the defensive line was breached. Its platinum halo would be the camp's most reliable shield.

The second plan was for the wagon wall failing.

Shien refused to count on luck. Once a High-Tier Demonic Beast smashed through the outer wall, they would have to pull the defensive line back.

He gave another order. The Convicts were to dig a trench two meters wide along the seams between the stone slabs, five meters inside the wagon wall.

They were to pour in all the waste Rat Oil and offal left from rendering, then mix in a little Holy Silver Powder.

If the outer wall was breached, the reserves would set it alight at once.

The trench would become a Toxic Flame Wall, cutting off the Rat Tide. It would not be unbreakable, but it could buy them time.

As for the third plan, that was his final trump card.

Hidden beneath his dark cloak, Shien slipped his fingers inside the lining and felt the cold crystal through the fabric.

The Ember Pendant was the lifesaving gift Bishop Castian had personally given him: a combat crystal containing a single strike at the full power of a Tier-Four Knight.

As long as the inner defense had not truly collapsed, as long as the camp could maintain order, he would not crush it.

It was his last card to play.

The trench was soon finished. Bucket after bucket of low-grade Rat Oil was poured into it, filling the air with a pungent stench.

In the tents of the inner ring, the elite knights had shed their armor and fallen fast asleep. Their low, steady snores echoed through the exhausted camp.