Chapter 59: You have Dragon Warriors, I have Dragon‑Slaying Arrows

Noon.

Sturgeon dock, the dim lower hold of a cargo ship.

While Puppet No. 2 seized Crescent Castle at the front, Luosen's main body remained in the rear, remotely commanding.

At that moment, he sat cross-legged on a pile of dry grass mats, holding a crude little clay pot in his hand.

This was the "Dragon's Blessing" potion stolen from Knight Ales.

Once the situation at Crescent Castle was settled, Levin immediately sent this to him.

This potion is the trump card of the Forest Spirit Witch Master, much like the ace in a game of victory chess, capable of directly deciding the outcome of a match.

Imagine a scene.

Hundreds of Forest Spirit warriors or traitorous human knights drink this, becoming invulnerable mighty warriors, then sneak up on Crescent City at midnight, scaling the outer wall less than four meters high, and massacre civilians indiscriminately.

It would definitely cause horrendous casualties.

If this were to happen, the excellent opening he had just built would be completely ruined.

So, he must quickly devise an effective countermeasure.

First, set up a concealment magic array whose main purpose is to mask magical fluctuations so that outsiders, especially Selena, won't notice any movement in the cabin.

Then, using Mage Hand, grab a few rats from the cabin, place them in a wooden cage temporarily crafted with Transformation Technique, and feed each rat some of the "Dragon's Blessing".

The potion is deep red, emitting a faint rust smell; after being fed to the rats, their bodies instantly gleam with a metallic luster, their tempers become extremely irritable, and they start constantly striking the wooden cage.

"Bang~ bang~ crack~ crack~"

A few strikes cracked the one‑centimeter‑thick wooden board.

"Mmm~ this strength increase is huge."

Rats are small, so their natural growth in strength is far greater than a human's, but if placed in a human, it would likely increase strength by one to two times.

If a High‑Level Warrior's strength were doubled, their physical power would surpass that of a Battle Master.

"I wonder if magic resistance has increased."

"Magic resistance, precisely speaking, is the ability to resist magical energy."

"Magical energy comes in many forms, so we must analyze each case specifically."

Luosen first tested the rats with the basic mind‑spirit spell 'Mind Suggestion'.

He quickly concluded: 'Mind resistance has actually increased dramatically, making the suggestion several times harder.'

That's bad news.

A High‑Level Warrior's will is already quite tenacious; after erupting battle aura, their mind resistance greatly increases, and if further boosted by the potion, they could almost become immune to mind‑magic.

Of course, if he used a super‑high‑ring mind spell, he could still forcefully break the opponent's mental defense, but that would pose him great risk, not to mention shatter the low‑mage image he had painstakingly maintained.

Luosen continued testing other types of magic resistance.

He tested common magic types such as arcane, force, lightning, fire, ice, and so on, one by one.

The result showed that all magic resistances had greatly increased; combined with a warrior's battle aura, they could completely ignore ordinary spell attacks.

"Hey, not only is it impervious to blades and spears, it also resists water and fire—this potion is ridiculously strong!"

The potion is called "Dragon's Blessing"; being deep red, Luosen couldn't help suspecting it was a dragon‑blood product, and very likely the blood of a pure‑bred dragon.

Because extraplanar dragons truly exist, ordinary people often see mixed‑blood dragons.

Luosen himself had once seen a land drake in a circus, its size comparable to an African elephant.

Though he had never seen a pure‑bred dragon, many records describe them as hexagonal warriors.

The situation grew ever more thorny.

"What should we do?"

After some thought, he tried various dispel spells.

Earlier, Levin's dispel attempt failed, but Levin is merely a puppet with limited performance; he can cast less than a third of the dispel spell types that the main body can.

At this point, Luosen cycled through fifteen dispel spells, trying every type from first‑ring to fifth‑ring strength, but none worked.

"Damn, do I really have to use a dispel of fifth ring or higher?"

After thinking, he decided to hit the rats with a sixth‑ring 'Forbidden Law Finger'.

Such high‑ring dispel spells are his own discoveries; there are five in total, and this is the lowest‑ring among them.

Although it's the lowest ring, it never fails; he has never had a dispel fail.

He raised his finger, made a strange hand sign, and pointed vaguely at the rats.

"Ban!"

No extra light or sound appeared, yet the spell took effect.

Only see a cluster of blood‑red light suddenly burst on the rats, lasting about five or six seconds; after the light faded, the potion's effect vanished as well.

"Tsk tsk, I actually have to use a sixth‑ring dispel?"

Being able to dispel it eased half of Luosen's worry, but a sixth‑ring dispel is truly high‑level and consumes a lot of mana; better not to use it if avoidable.

It would be best to use a more ordinary countermeasure.

"Just what is this potion made of?"

Dragon blood is just Luosen's random guess; it's not reliable.

But he isn't versed in potion‑making.

Fortunately, he has a mage under his command who is expert in potion‑making.

"Once we reach Crescent Castle, I'll give this medicine to Weige; perhaps she knows a dispel trick."

But as a lord, it's worst to put all one's stakes in a single place.

If you win, fine; if you lose, at best you lose great wealth, at worst you lose many subjects' lives.

Therefore, for everything one must prepare two, even three or four hands, to ensure safety as much as possible.

What if Weige also has no solution? How should he deal with such a powerful potion-warrior? Soon, Luosen had a new idea.

Since using magic isn't effective either, I'll just go back to the traditional method and have the warriors cut with swords." Ordinary blades can't cut it, so we can try using divine weapons.

But first, we need to find out just how hard this powerful dragon-warrior is.

Thinking this, Luosen took out a pure steel dagger, applied a little force, and tried to cut the rat's body.

Hiss~~

A slightly harsh sound came out; looking at the rat, its fur was broken in places, but its skin only had a faint white line, and even its body wasn't flattened by the dagger's force.

It was like a small iron lump shaped like a rat.

Luosen wouldn't believe it.

"I want to see just how hard your body can be."

He simply didn't believe there could be a shield that a spear couldn't pierce in this world.

Kaodelin said that even with all his strength in an axe strike, he could only leave a faint bloodstain on Ales.

Although the bloodstain was shallow, it meant the defense could be broken.

"The Island Knights' weapons are very ordinary; their battle axes are made of pig iron. If such an iron axe can leave a bloodstain, what if I use an arrowhead forged from high-carbon steel?"

He used Transformation Technique to turn the steel dagger in his hand into a needle, then applied a little force to prick the rat's skin.

It actually went in.

But he could also feel great resistance; the feel was soft and tough, many times harder to pierce than cowhide.

In a head-on battle, such enormous resistance would be highly disadvantageous; even if it pierced, it would be hard to cause a fatal wound.

So ordinary carbon steel is still not good enough.

"If you want the arrowhead to pierce hard, the material must definitely be hard."

"What is both hard and cheap?"

An answer came straight to mind.

"Diamond!"

"Ordinary diamond won't do; although it's hard, it's too brittle, but I can process it with magic, and then it should be usable."

Diamond is hard enough, its component is carbon, and raw materials are everywhere.

Using Five-ring strength Transmutation Alchemy, Luosen could synthesize artificial diamond.

He thought of it and just did it.

Luosen pried a piece of wood from the ship's hull, then used Transmutation Alchemy to remove impurities; in a short while he obtained a diamond spike.

He also released Four-ring strength Fortification Technique on that diamond spike.

Under the spell's effect, the brilliant diamond instantly showed a strange metallic luster.

Finally, he applied Advanced Constancy Technique to it, stabilizing the spell's effect.

After processing, Luosen picked up this extremely sharp diamond spike and, with a little force, nailed it onto the pure steel dagger.

Only a "ding" sounded, and the pure steel dagger was pierced through, as easy as pricking human skin with a steel needle.

Then he used this thing to prick the strengthened rat; only a "puff" sounded, and the rat was pierced straight through.

This method is very effective.

Considering that the potion-warrior also possesses immense strength, fighting it head-on would be difficult and would surely cause heavy casualties, so the best approach is to shoot it with arrows.

Find a few Divine Archers, use diamond arrows, and specialize in sniping these potion-warriors; it's safe and effective.

Moreover, there's no need for a pure diamond arrowhead sleeve; just a little bit is needed, placed on the tip of existing ordinary iron arrows, to achieve the same lethal effect.

Among the supplies shipped this time, there were about twenty thousand iron arrows.

Luosen quietly went to the dock warehouse and took a dozen bundles, about three hundred iron arrows back, and began to modify them quickly.

While modifying, he grinned: "Hehe, you have dragon-warriors, I have dragon-slaying arrows."

He also had a ready explanation for the arrows' origin.

Externally he'd say it was the Princess's dowry; to the Princess he'd say it was an Assassin's Mace given to him by Muladi.

Diamond isn't especially rare either; no one would spend a great cost to trace its origin.

After the three hundred diamond dragon-slaying arrows were modified, Luosen also crafted a few diamond daggers for self-defense.

After being busy like this, his magic consumption was about fifty percent, still fairly easy.

Only then did he secretly let out a sigh of relief.

After waiting a moment, many noisy sounds came from the dock direction—it was the Crescent City Knights arriving to meet and escort them.

Using a Mind's Eye, he secretly observed a bit and saw the dock had become extraordinarily lively.

Not long after, Selena, supported by Ailiya, boarded the high-end travel carriage brought by the ship, was then escorted by a group of Crescent City Knights in the middle, and headed for Crescent City.

Before and after the carriage was a long line of conscripts from Crescent City, come to help transport supplies.

At the same time, Levin was patrolling the nearby mountains and forests, ensuring the troop wouldn't be ambushed by Forest Spirits.

Everything was running according to Luosen's prearranged plan.

Luosen watched the high-end travel carriage go far away, and a thought arose in his mind.

"The Dragon's Blessing Potion is no longer a concern, but the Forest Spirit Witchcraft Master in the forest hasn't yet figured out the situation."

Not figuring it out means unknown power, and unknown means danger.

After a little thought, Luosen had a preliminary countermeasure.

"I am a Lord; I have plenty of subordinates, so there's no need to personally risk dealing with that witchcraft master."

"Besides, also let Levin go investigate properly."

One could also guess that the opposing witchcraft master probably had the same idea.

"So this is another game of victory; it just depends on who is one move better."

(End of Chapter)