Chapter 3376: Sacrifice and Resentment

————It will be later~~

————

In the blink of an eye, all the strange phenomena dissipated, leaving only Kandela, with his solemn yet slightly callow face, blocking Dafuni's path.

"What a pity, you originally had a bright future!"

Just as Dafuni was about to say a few more words, her peripheral vision caught the traces of the magic array destroyed by the Annihilation Light behind Kandela, and suddenly, heavy strange phenomena appeared again; but compared to the ever-changing future, the phenomena of the past were relatively uniform.

It was a radiance of the extreme, as if she were looking at the sun. Dafuni felt a slight stinging pain in her eyes upon seeing this scene, but the pain was not the only harvest; that extreme radiance even blocked the Time Line, preventing her from continuing to peer into the past.

Looking around again, similar radiance was almost everywhere, and a warning bell immediately rang in Dafuni's heart——

This is a trap!

Subsequently, she launched an attack on Kandela without hesitation. There was no elemental fluctuation or Magic Net disturbance, only a starlight shooting from her eyes, which expanded as it enveloped Kandela.

Seeing this, Kandela's first reaction was to retreat. After all, this suddenly appearing enemy had positioned herself quite cleverly, right between them and the remaining members of the Moonshadow Family.

But precisely because of this, if he were to hand over the captives he had already controlled without even a hint of resistance, he feared that even he would face reprimand upon returning.

"So what if you are a high-level Mage? It's not like I haven't seen one before!"

Although Kandela rationally acknowledged the opponent's strength, or even invincibility, emotionally, he had an urge to defy her and try to clash with her.

"Stay calm, retreat first!"

Xia Duo issued the order through the Mind Link. Upon receiving the order, Kandela looked at the misty starlight rapidly covering him and knew that following the order to retreat was the best choice, but he was unwilling!

At this moment, his companions had already begun to retreat in the direction they came from under Xia Duo's command. Seeing this, Kandela gritted his teeth and had no choice but to retreat as well.

However, while retreating, he applied to Xia Duo through the Mind Link for an Annihilation Light strike, limited to the passage he was retreating through, in the form of a plane.

Once he chose to retreat, his rationality regained the upper hand. The opponent's starlight spell was clearly something he had never encountered before, and it didn't even cause any reaction from the Magic Net.

Under these circumstances, the only interception method he could think of was the Annihilation Light.

Fortunately, he won the gamble. Behind him, the Annihilation Light acted like a mirror of destruction; the misty starlight shot from Dafuni's eyes began to dissipate bit by bit before it even made substantial contact with it.

It was just that Kandela did not discover this scene; the Annihilation Light's disintegration of matter and annihilation of energy did not just target the enemy—the spellcaster's own spells were not spared either.

Only Xia Duo discovered this situation from the blind-spot-free 【Wide-Area Detection】.

Although he did not understand what kind of existence the starlight emanating from Dafuni's eyes was, it was enough that it could be countered by the Annihilation Light. Previously, when he was in Taiweimansa, because it was on Yierlan's territory, he could not summon the Annihilation Light.

But Tanzan Peak was not the territory of any country. Even if he were to completely erase this place, at most he would be accused of making a big fuss and damaging the environment; in reality, he wouldn't even need to pay compensation.

After all, it was ownerless land; no entity had the qualifications to accept his compensation.

Compared to the gains of completely eliminating the leader of the Illuminati, a little loss of reputation was, for Xia Duo, the most cost-effective deal, but—

Kandela was still there, so this account could not be settled that way.

If one added the youngest son of the Evereska High Elder and more than a dozen other Elite Mages, then it might not be cost-effective.

It is true that war has sacrifices, but those are mostly voluntary sacrifices, just like in the previous Tear Drop Lake operation, where those Elf mages chose to stay even knowing they would surely die.

It was not being "sacrificed" without knowing it. Right now, if he were to tell Kandela the truth, it was not that he looked down on him, but that Kandela's status was different after all, and his purpose for joining the Alliance was also different from others.

Nine times out of ten, he would not be willing to sacrifice himself voluntarily.

As for the other mages, given enough time to reason with them and appeal to their emotions, Xia Duo was confident he could persuade them; only Kandela was the exception.

At least in the short term, he had no confidence in persuading him to sacrifice himself voluntarily.

Fortunately, a "map-wide strike" was not the only option. Xia Duo's avatar was already on its way to Tanzan Peak; as long as Kandela could delay for a little time, that would be enough for him to perform.

……

Tanzan Peak, inside the mountain passage.

After confirming that the Annihilation Light was effective against the enemy, Kandela suddenly did not want to retreat anymore. Moreover, Xia Duo's order was for him to delay as much as possible, and under these circumstances, he had a new idea.

This time, he set his sights on the Moonshadow Family members who were still in a state of confinement. Since the opponent appeared just as he was about to guide the teleportation, the goal was likely to save those Moonshadow Family members.

Under these circumstances, the only possibility to hold the opponent back was to use those underage Elves.

With the support of the Computing Power Pool, Kandela quickly calculated a field coverage area that could block the newly appeared enemy from coming into contact with those underage Moonshadow Family members.

Soon, Xia Duo's main body at Yongle City received this Annihilation Light coverage area; it was not a simple ray or plane, but a hemispherical curved surface.

To achieve this kind of coverage strike, the interference of the Annihilation Light excitation field had to be extremely precise, similar to phased-array radar on Earth, using the interference of multiple wave sources to reshape new wave peaks with specific directivity, thereby achieving precise scanning or even tracking of specific areas without needing to rotate the radar main body.

Generally speaking, the more wave sources and the slightly greater the power of a single wave source, the larger the range that can be precisely scanned and tracked.

And the Annihilation Light of Yongle City was even more complex. Although there were only two "wave sources," or more accurately "field generation sources," the shaping targets for the excited Annihilation Light were very strict.

Even the most precise phased-array radar on Earth could not shape electromagnetic waves at will—for example, into the shape of Mickey Mouse; it was more about concentrating wave peaks to perform beam scanning.

The Annihilation Light could certainly do that, and it would be even simpler, but if one wanted to achieve truly precise strikes—for example, annihilating only a line, a plane, or a piece of spatial area—then exceptionally complex calculations were required.

If the War Magic Artifact of the Annihilation Light were upgraded to multi-field interference, it might be simpler, but the current Yongle City only had dual-field interference.

A complex curved surface was enough to give Xia Duo a headache.

Even with the assistance of the Computing Power Pool and the smart brain, he could not initiate the strike immediately.