"The casualties were devastating." The President sighed.
"Several dozen Authority Holders on the human side died, and more than a dozen Apostles on the Crawlers' side died too."
There were very few Authority Holders on the Endless Sea. Even counting the enfeoffed Deputy Authority Holders and Island Lords with Authority Holder-level combat strength, the human side probably only had a few hundred.
Losing several dozen at once definitely counted as a major loss.
"We lost?"
Hearing the casualty figures for both sides, Lin Yuan's first reaction was that the humans had lost.
But on second thought, something seemed off.
If the humans had lost, the Golden Sea, which was closest to the Central Sea, could not possibly have been this peaceful.
"Of course not! In fact, strictly speaking, we won!" Sure enough, the President immediately rejected Lin Yuan's suggestion.
But after saying that, he sighed again.
"Though it doesn't really count as a victory either."
The President's words left Lin Yuan rather confused. Fortunately, the President had no intention of keeping him in suspense and explained directly:
"You know that not everyone at the so-called Authority Holder level is an actual Authority Holder, right?"
"Yes." Lin Yuan was already very familiar with all this. "The human side's Authority Holder-level experts should fall into three main categories: actual Authority Holders, Island Lords, and enfeoffed Deputy Authority Holders."
"Exactly." The President nodded.
"Since you know that, you must also realize that these three categories aren't equally important."
"This time, all our casualties were Deputy Authority Holders. We can easily create more through enfeoffment."
"But those who died on the Crawlers' side were all genuine Apostles."
"So even with several dozen casualties to their dozen or so, we still won."
Hearing the President's explanation, Lin Yuan's brow shifted slightly.
He knew that what