The Rondos Federation.
Antinomia and Morso were two neighboring cities within the Federation.
Among them, Morso was coastal and excelled in shipbuilding. Antinomia, on the other hand, was slightly more inland—only a very small portion of its area touched the sea, while the majority lay inland.
The relationship between the two cities had never been particularly harmonious, and now, with tensions steadily escalating, they were practically at each other’s throats. Conflicts kept flaring up along the border between them.
This situation had already persisted for three full months. The friction between both sides grew increasingly fierce, and in the most recent clashes, each one felt like it could spark a full-scale war at any mont.
At the warzone boundary between Antinomia and Morso, amid the dense crackle of gunfire.
Many soldiers were struck and fell to the ground, while many others were burned into charred corpses.
Strangely enough, on Morso’s side, not a single soldier showed signs of psychological collapse.
Every soldier had bloodshot eyes, was panting heavily, and had a blood-colored steam emanating from their bodies.
In contrast, Antinomia’s side showed far more wavering morale.
Most of them were gripped by fear.
However, Antinomia was closer to the inland and placed greater emphasis on heavy industry. Their firearms and ammunition supplies far exceeded Morso’s.
Even though Morso possessed an unstoppable montum that Antinomia couldn’t match, they were still almost completely suppressed by Antinomia.
But just then, the ground suddenly began to tremble, emitting a rumbling roar.
It was caused by the hooves of a massive number of horses stampeding.
Thousands of cavalry soldiers, their bodies emitting blood-colored steam, burst out from behind Morso’s camp and charged into the battlefield.
These were cavalryn without any armor. Their eyes were both dazed and ferocious, their faces twisted with savagery as they stord into the battlefield, letting bullets strike their bodies without flinching.
In this era that had already stepped into hot weapons, such a backward thing as cavalry actually still existed.
More importantly, Morso was just a single city, yet it could field thousands of cavalry!
Soon, Antinomia’s gunners quickly noticed that sothing was off about those cavalryn.
Bullets could barely kill them. Even if they hit the heart or the brain, they only left a single hole gushing blood, failing to deliver a fatal blow.
And the blood that spurted out imdiately rged into the blood-colored steam rising from their bodies, making the steam even thicker.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
One shell after another fired from Antinomia’s camp, blasting into the cavalry’s formation.
So cavalryn were instantly blown to pieces, but most only suffered "minor injuries," like having half their body shattered.
And those cavalryn with only such minor injuries kept charging forward.
Soon, the cavalry reached the front lines of Antinomia, launching a devastating charge.
The plains were the cavalry’s ho turf, let alone dealing with cavalry that obviously seed abnormal—as if they were nearly unkillable.
If the two sides clashed head-on, Antinomia would definitely suffer heavy casualties.
Inside Antinomia’s camp, a man in a military uniform and mask stood on a temporary elevated platform, watching this scene from a distance.
He first showed a mont of confusion, then imdiately understood.
The horses the cavalry rode were not strong. Though they emitted a thick killing intent, their eyes were as dazed as newborn foals, making them look like forcibly matured young horses.
The cavalryn on the horses were in the sa condition.
"Madman..."
The officer muttered the word under his breath.
This wasn't a curse; it was stating an objective fact.
Though he didn’t know what Law Rhy the enemy commander possessed, the masked officer guessed that the enemy commander’s Law Marks likely included "Madman," "Warrior," and "Navigator."
In that way, combined with so unknown Law Rhy or Law Object, he could achieve this effect of turning every citizen into a soldier.
As for where the "soldiers" ca from...
He slowly raised his right hand above his head.
Thorns rapidly wrapped around his right hand, extending from his wrist all the way to his shoulder.
Snap!
He snapped his fingers.
Those thorns instantly beca sharper and thinner, directly piercing his skin, embedding into his arm, stabbing into his bones.
Then, his hand clenched into a fist, and he fiercely swung it downward.
Pfft, pfft...
One after another, ethereal thorns ford from condensed light burst out from the cavalryn’s bodies before they could charge into Antinomia’s camp.
So erged from their shoulders, so from their waists and abdons, so from their legs, and so from their heads.
From the inside out, impossible to block.
As soon as these thorns appeared, they began rapidly absorbing their blood.
Those cavalryn, who could still move even with most of their bodies missing, suddenly beca sluggish and limp, as if drained of all their strength.
In just a few seconds, these cavalryn had their blood completely sucked dry.
Thud, thud, thud.
They fell one after another, instantly dying once the blood in their bodies was drained.
They weren’t afraid of injury because they had no fatal weak points on their bodies.
But their movents required burning their own blood. Without blood, they were like machines running out of fuel—unable to move and dying instantly.
A normal human could last about a minute before dying after losing all their blood. These cavalryn, however, all died the mont their blood was completely drained.
The officer looked toward the enemy camp. His expression under the mask was unreadable, but the pressure around him was terrifyingly low.
He slowly raised his left hand and pointed a distant finger at the enemy camp.
Inside Antinomia’s camp, so large artillery pieces that had been inactive suddenly seed to sense sothing. All of them aid at the direction the officer was pointing.
Over the previous three months, most of the clashes had involved ordinary soldiers, with at most a few three- or four-mark Law Seekers appearing.
For the higher-ups on both sides, this was all within the "controllable" range.
But now, things were different.
Since the enemy’s Law Contemplator had made a move, he would naturally respond in kind.
"It seems this ti will be the trigger for a full-scale war," the officer silently murmured to himself, but he showed no intention of stopping his actions.
But just then, an unexpected change suddenly occurred.
A figure appeared in the sky above the battlefield.
...
One ironclad ship after another appeared on the sea surface. They advanced rapidly in column formation along a channel dense with hidden reefs.
But on the opposite side, another fleet of ironclad ships appeared.
This newly appeared fleet looked far more outdated, with poorer equipnt and fewer ships, appearing rusty and battered.
Clearly, Antinomia wasn’t particularly skilled in naval warfare.
Both sides aid their cannons at each other, but neither fired directly.
Over these three months, they often exchanged cannon fire, but always aid at the sea around the enemy fleet—serving as warnings and demonstrations.
Both fleets assud this ti would be the sa.
But just then, the captain of Morso’s flagship seed to hear sothing, twitching his ears.
The next mont, his eyes slowly turned red, and he nodded, as if responding to soone.
"Understood," he said in a low voice, rising from the captain’s chair in the bridge. He pushed open the door, walked out to the deck, and faced Antinomia’s fleet directly.
Antinomia’s fleet seed to sense sothing. The cannons that had been aid at the water surface lifted one after another, training directly on the ships.
And the captain stood at the bow, his eyes growing redder and redder.
Scales resembling fish scales began to erge on his body. Blood-colored steam seeped slowly from the gaps between the scales.
He opened his mouth, took a deep breath. The sky above, which had only a few clouds monts before, instantly beca covered with dark clouds.
Boom!
Antinomia’s fleet fired first.
At the sa ti, the captain exhaled the breath from his mouth.
Over a dozen tornadoes appeared on the sea. In less than a second, they transford into waterspouts, charging toward Antinomia’s fleet.
The shells fired by Antinomia’s fleet were instantly swept up by the waterspouts. The fleet itself began to rock violently under those massive waterspouts.
The next second, a ship’s bow erged from beneath the water’s surface. Seawater spread outward in all directions, churning up waves.
There had clearly been nothing underwater just before, yet this ship just drilled straight up from below.
It was as if it hadn’t traveled through the water at all, but had erged from the reflection on the surface.
This was a ship from Morso, but it had appeared directly behind Antinomia’s fleet.
The ship erged from underwater and then, without slowing down at all, rushed rapidly toward the port, crashing onto the coast.
Boom!
The ship slamd violently into the dock. Large cracks appeared across its hull.
Sailors with bloodshot eyes and blood-colored steam rising from their bodies jumped off the ship one after another. They grabbed their weapons and charged toward the coastal defense fortifications.
Then, one ship after another erged from underwater, appearing directly behind Antinomia’s fleet.
Antinomia’s fleet, which was already weak in naval combat, instantly found itself in a dilemma.
They wanted to turn back to defend, but couldn’t afford to be distracted while facing Antinomia’s fleet.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
One cannon blast after another exploded.
Shells fired one after another from the ships of Morso’s fleet.
Antinomia’s fleet could only barely return fire, but they were instantly suppressed, completely unable to tend to the camp behind them.
"War has broken out!"
These words appeared simultaneously in the minds of every soldier emitting blood-colored steam.
The next instant, they lost their fear, their timidity, their pity. Their hearts were filled with an endless torrent of murderous intent.
"Kill! Kill! Kill!"
Only that voice remained in their minds.
Whoosh!
In the sky covered with dark clouds, airships painted in dark brown flew out in dense swarms, like a hive of bees pressing down on the land.
Antinomia’s reinforcents had arrived.
Before the war fully erupted, Antinomia’s Law Seekers specializing in divination and prophecy had dispatched reinforcents in advance, barely arriving at the battlefield just as the fighting began.
They reached the airspace above the naval battlefield. The cannons on the ships’ hulls and the bomb bay doors opened one after another, aiming at the fleet below.
A hurricane wrapped in dark clouds ford a swirling barrier. The thick smoke from the ironclad ships’ smokestacks and the coal smoke from the airship engines interwove at low altitude, blocking out the sunlight.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The airships’ shells rained down from the sky.
Antinomia was weak in naval warfare, but air warfare was the complete opposite.
But that figure appeared once again.
He stood not far from the port’s periter.
He forcefully raised his hand, summoning a strong gale that locked the ships in place, stopping them from moving forward or backward.
The next second, countless bolts of lightning struck down frequently. The waves surged high and then collapsed heavily. The waves rose high, swept up by the wind, racing all the way to the clouds.
The war between Antinomia and Morso had erupted—fully and completely erupted.
The coastal and inland regions imdiately clashed, with almost no foreplay.
As the war between Antinomia and Morso exploded, the already tense atmosphere throughout the entire Federation detonated in an instant.
Flas rose in city after city. Gunfire erupted in city after city.
So were at the borders between cities, so within the cities themselves.
Roars, screams, the sound of guns and cannons...
The entire Federation was about to descend into utter chaos.
Once a full-scale war erupted, it would be nearly impossible to stop in a short ti.
How many would die? Unknown. What would the consequences be? Unknown.
But no one cared about that anymore.
Everyone had gone mad with bloodlust, only wanting to put their enemies to death.
Except for...
Boom!
An explosion sound appeared out of nowhere, but its source couldn’t be found.
Everyone heard that explosion sound.
On the battlefield, such an explosion sound shouldn’t have drawn attention.
But it caught everyone’s attention anyway.
In the combat zone between Antinomia and Morso, the officer subconsciously lifted his head, looking at the sky.
He saw a figure appear in the sky above the plains, looking down at what was below.
Subconsciously, he thought it was enemy reinforcents.
Because that person was looking down from above, looking down at the chaotic crowd, looking down at him.
The officer felt he couldn’t clearly see that person’s face at all, couldn’t see that person’s body.
Just one glance, and he felt his head was about to explode, felt like he couldn’t breathe anymore.
His vision, hearing, sll, touch, and taste had sohow all mixed together.
Only then did he finally feel he could barely understand what that person above looked like.
The next mont, he felt rage.
Sky-high fury, world-consuming fury.
Under this strange perception, he felt that the person above was the embodint of 【Wrath】 itself.
All of this happened in less than a second.
From when the officer saw the figure in the sky to when his five senses were completely filled by the emotion of 【Wrath】—it took less than a second.
Before the officer could react, he found that the guns and cannons in his camp were exploding one after another. Soldiers were being injured by sudden explosions one after another, their bodies bursting into flas. But they didn’t die—they just fell unconscious one after another.
Even he was not spared.
An explosion appeared from sowhere unknown, instantly scorching his body black.
It was his rage that had been detonated.
He didn’t know why, but he had that intuition.
In the mont before he blacked out, he looked toward Morso’s camp and found the exact sa situation over there.
People were exploding and catching fire one after another.
Before he could make sense of the situation, he had already lost consciousness, falling from the elevated platform.
It wasn’t just this area of the plains. Similar situations appeared on other battlefields as well.
Above the sea surface, above the forest, above the plains...
One after another, the sa figure appeared above every battlefield.
The ironclad ships exploded. The airships exploded. One by one, the people holding weapons were severely injured.
Every single person filled with anger throughout the entire Rondos Federation saw that figure floating in the sky at the sa mont. They saw him looking down at them, staring straight at them.
And then, their emotions were detonated—literally "detonated."
They didn’t die instantly, but whether they would survive was uncertain.
No matter which city they ca from, none were spared.
In less than ten seconds, the entire Rondos Federation fell silent.
In those ten seconds, nearly one-twentieth of the entire Federation’s population died. As for the rest, all of them were left in an uncertain state between life and death.
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