Countless black-robed figures began gathering at the edge beyond the fog's reach, their faces hidden beneath bamboo hats.
Vade Wisker sensed their auras. Quite a few were formidable.
This time, Wayne had held nothing back, gathering all the strength of the Necromancer Sect.
There were countless low-sequence members, with over a hundred Sequence 7 Abomination Butchers making up the largest group. Including Wayne, there were thirteen high-sequence members, but no demigods.
In Senegal, a force like this already rivaled the Knights Templar. If allowed to keep growing, it might even replace them.
Those people hiding away in the Ivory Tower had long forgotten their fighting spirit. A comfortable life had worn away their edge.
This was also one reason Vade Wisker had concealed his identity and come to the Outer City. He needed to select and train new recruits. Rather than waste time on a bunch of cowards, he would raise Transcendents with some backbone himself.
Just then, a thin young man approached Wayne and said respectfully:
"High Priest, all the disciples and Sealed Artifacts have been assembled."
Wade frowned at the dense throng. They were clearly preparing for a major offensive.
The Imperial City, the Second Prince, and now the Necromancer Sect. Senegal had truly descended into chaos.
They even had several Grade 0 Sealed Artifacts. Used properly, these things could cause as much destruction as high-sequence Transcendents.
"Storm the Imperial City! Overthrow Daniel! We will be our own masters!" Wayne roared.
Most of those who joined the Necromancer Sect were commoners who had been driven to the brink. The nobility's oppression had left them unable to breathe.
That was precisely why the Necromancer Sect had attracted so many recruits.
Soon, their chants thundered like a tsunami.
Soft footsteps first sounded in the darkness. Then, in the distance, a dim yellow Gas Lamp swayed as it moved forward.
As the light drew closer, it gradually revealed a slender, lovely figure. Her long golden hair was pinned into a bun, and she wore an elaborately patterned palace gown with glittering gems set into its hem.
She wore gold-rimmed glasses and had a serene face. Every so often, she stopped to examine the withered, mutated plants. Whenever she found something interesting, a faint smile curled her lips.
Without a word, she lifted her lovely eyes, adjusted her glasses, and chuckled softly.
"They're moving rather quickly. Looks like I'll have to pick up the pace." She wrinkled her nose reluctantly and quickened her steps a little.
A burst of urgent knocking woke Joey from his sleep. When he opened the door, his landlady, Naomi, stood smiling broadly at him with steaming food in her hands.
There was rice porridge, bread, and milk-things only people in the Inner City had the privilege of enjoying.
Rubbing his sleepy eyes, he said:
"Good morning, Mrs. Jeff."
This had happened far more than once or twice. Ever since he moved in, his landlady had found all sorts of excuses to strike up a conversation whenever he was home.
"Good morning, Joey. I seem to have made a little too much breakfast."
Joey stepped aside to let her in, then shuffled sleepily into the washroom.
"Give me a moment!"
Naomi carried the food to the dining table like a dutiful little wife.
Setting her age aside, she would have made a very suitable wife.
Still, Joey preferred blonde hair and blue eyes. Though Naomi had an impressive figure, her curly hair and dull complexion were a little hard for him to accept.
The cool water against his face helped wake him up.
Joey thought it was about time he moved out. If she kept pursuing him, he might end up making a mistake.
The biggest reason he dared not reject Naomi's advances was that he had no money. He genuinely feared ending up on the streets if things soured between them, and his hesitation had given Naomi the wrong impression.
"Joey, this area hasn't seemed very safe lately. I'm worried about you."
At her words, Joey paused with the milk in his hand, then feigned calm as he replied:
"It's nothing serious. Haven't they already signed a ceasefire agreement?"
They exchanged a glance, and the atmosphere grew a little awkward. Not wanting to continue the subject, Joey gave an uneasy smile.
"It's almost time for the morning gathering."
There was a church in the Inner City, and the morning gathering was when believers assembled to pray for safety.
Just then, a gentle woman's voice came from outside, followed by the door being softly pushed open.
A mature woman in luxurious clothing and red high-top shoes stood there, holding a flower basket and smiling into the room.
"Naomi, I knew you'd be here. Good morning, little Joey!" she greeted them warmly.
"Good morning!" he replied, while inwardly grumbling, What's little about me?
Naomi shot her a glare, her expression stiffening as she complained:
"All right, all right. What's the hurry?"
Amid laughter as clear as silver bells, Joey's door gently closed, and the two women left for church together.
Cheap rent and someone bringing me breakfast. Those days will soon be behind me! I really will miss them.
After breakfast, he decided to visit the Adventurers' Bar, a hub for the exchange of information.
As things stood, he was completely in the dark. He knew the Necromancer Sect was preparing something big, but he had no useful information at all. As for 0-013, he could hardly count on it. With only a single page left, it now seemed capable of little more than keeping him company.
Following Vade Wisker's disappearance, the entire Sheriff's Office in West District 9 had been sealed off. Work would only resume once the higher-ups assigned a new captain.
The Sheriff's Office was merely a front. The actual Survey Corps squad consisted of only a handful of people-a captain leading a few members. With their strongest fighter, the captain, gone, the small fry beneath him could not complete missions on their own.
Missions determined their pay. With work suspended, he could not live on his base salary alone. It certainly would not cover moving.
The Adventurers' Bar also posted mercenary jobs from time to time. With his abilities, taking on a few simple ones would be easy.
The Adventurers' Bar.
Joey ordered a cold beer and sat at the counter.
After a few seconds of thought, he asked casually:
"Has anything strange happened lately?"
The young bartender's brow twitched slightly. With a discreet look, he asked in a low voice:
"Sir, what would you like to know?"
"West District 9, East District 3, or the royal family?"
Nobody working at the Adventurers' Bar was a fool. One look at the young man's shifty eyes told Joey exactly what he wanted.
Joey handed over a gold coin. The bartender pocketed it gleefully, smacked his lips, and spoke in a conspiratorial tone:
"There's a rumor going around lately that the Second Prince isn't actually Emperor Eng's biological son."
"Really...? Royal family drama is a soap opera in any world." He listened to the gossip with interest.
Had the rumors already spread this far?
It looked like the storm was coming!
Consolidating power required more than strength. It also required legitimacy.
The Daniel Royal Family had ruled Senegal for a full thousand years. Its political ideology was deeply entrenched and almost impossible to shake.
If Second Prince Charles really was proven not to be Emperor Eng's biological son, he would lose his claim to legitimacy.
What had originally been a political struggle within the royal family would not have had particularly far-reaching consequences. But if the rumor was confirmed, it would brand him irrevocably as a traitor.
Ordinary people in Senegal did not care about the royal family's scheming. Whoever held power would make little difference to their lives.
Senegal had an unwritten rule against slaughtering its people. Blood disease already shortened their lives, and the population was dwindling by the day.
If commoners were massacred, Senegal would soon vanish from the Black Soil on its own, even without foreign enemies.
Traitors were another matter. Who had caused Senegal's plight? Those who had betrayed the Sun God.
No one would tolerate a traitor.
A cause founded on rebellion could never gain a foothold. Submission, servility, and apathy defined the nation under Daniel's rule.
Those at the top controlled the few available resources and their distribution, fostering apathy among the oppressed commoners.
They never thought of resisting. They simply endured whatever came their way.
By the time Joey left the Adventurers' Bar, he had also learned another piece of news.
A mental illness had appeared in the Outer City. Many people were going mad for no apparent reason and attacking passersby.
This news forced Joey to change his plans and prepare for a trip back to the Outer City, because Alisa was still there.
So much had happened lately that he had barely been able to keep up, leaving him no chance to deal with Alisa's situation.
Since his work was suspended anyway, he decided to go back.
There were checkpoints all along the way. Without his Sheriff's Office identification, he would never have made it out.
The farther outward he went, the more deserted the once-bustling streets became. Eventually, he could not see a single person.
Many houses also looked as though they had been ransacked, and a rotten stench hung in the air.
"Hey, handsome, where are you headed? Stop walking. It'll be night soon. Why not stay and rest here? Just two silver coins."
As he passed a run-down street, a second-floor window opened. A heavily made-up woman posed seductively and batted her eyes at him.
Two silver coins would not even buy a piece of bread in the Inner City. Ridiculously enough, in the Outer City, they could buy a comfortable place to stay and a woman's company.
Joey kept walking without looking back, his heart heavy. Behind him, he could still hear her cursing, "Another penniless fool rushing off to die."
"Does a Senegal like this really need to exist?"
He could see no light ahead, only darkness.
Over a thousand years of internal strife had reduced the population to a pitiful number.
Even with the divide between the Inner and Outer Cities, any random person one picked might turn out to be a blood relative.
The lack of sunlight caused blood disease, leaving blood replacement as the only way to survive. If this continued, humanity would gradually disappear as time passed.
In the beginning, there had not been so many mutated monsters or Night Demons. Now, Night Demons had penned Senegal into a tiny corner.
The main reason was the lack of normal food. People could only eat mutated species, which caused their own bodies to deteriorate. Many entered the darkness on their own after realizing something was wrong with them.
Rather than live in terror, they wanted to become the ones spreading it.
There was no way to stop this behavior, nor could anyone prevent it.
In the end, their territory could only shrink bit by bit, until just two urban districts remained. Beyond them lay the habitats of beasts.
It was already well past midnight when Joey reached Udil Beckett Farm.
The place had long since been deserted. Houses had collapsed, and a jumble of footprints covered the ground. It looked as though it had been pillaged.
A terrible foreboding stirred within him. He jogged into the basement, but it was empty. There was no one there.
Alisa's former room had been turned upside down.
He leaned against the wall in a daze. If he had a cigarette right then, he would have dearly wanted a puff.
A profound helplessness weighed on his heart.
His old man, Tony Crevi, was dead. Now Alisa, the only person he could call a friend, was gone too.
Maybe she was still alive, since there was no body?
Before leaving the city, he had still held a shred of hope. But with every step of the journey, his heart had sunk further.
Mental deterioration had driven many people mad. He had encountered several on the way here. Without a gun, he probably would not have made it safely.
Those people were merely crazed, not entirely devoid of reason. The sight of a gun still gave them pause.
Joey did not even know how he returned to the Inner City. By the time he reached home, it was broad daylight. Heavyhearted, he collapsed onto the sofa and fell asleep.
On Senegal's outskirts, in the opposite direction from the Necromancer Sect, a vast procession slowly advanced.
This was a procession of commoners, forming a stark contrast to the Deathless Disciples. Every face beamed with a smile, and everyone looked full of energy.
Their clothes were ragged, yet their faces were rosy with health-a far cry from the commoners who lived on mutated food and never had enough to eat.
One man with a bulging belly laughed heartily. "It's almost mealtime. I wonder what we're having for lunch."
Another voice teased him. "Look at that belly of yours. You sure you're not pregnant? Hahaha!"
He looked toward the rear of the procession and licked his dry lips, his expression eager with anticipation as he remarked:
"You know, ever since I started following the Divine Maiden, I've actually begun to miss those hungry days."
"Oh, please. If you miss them, leave the procession. Nobody's stopping you."
"Hehe, come on, I was only joking. Once we follow the Divine Maiden and overthrow the Daniel Royal Family, everyone will have a good life."
Conversations like this frequently arose throughout the procession.
They all firmly believed one thing: the Divine Maiden was an emissary sent by the Sun God to save Senegal. They were not betraying anyone, merely following divine revelation.
At the very center stood a twelve-wheeled cart, with gears at both ends. People hauled on the gears by hand to turn the wheels and drive it forward.
The cart's upper compartment was spacious, like a house mounted on wheels.
Suddenly, a strange explosion rang out, followed by spreading black smoke.
A potbellied middle-aged man scrambled onto the cart, pulled open the door, and rushed inside, shouting anxiously:
"Alisa, are you all right?"