Chapter 268: Battle Flags and Crowns

"I can agree to this one on His behalf; continue," Teclis nodded.

"The second point is simple enough. I am the master of this land and the chosen of the gods. If you want to spread your faith here, you have to show some sincerity—why not bribe me?" Sinuoli crossed his legs and made a gesture of counting gold coins, trying his best to imitate the expression other clansmen had when they saw a treasury.

"You mud-legged lot, you can never shake off that stench of copper!" Teclis muttered, which caused Krag Master to raise his hammer. However, this was consistent with other races' long-standing perception of Dwarfs, and Teclis must have prepared a contingency plan for solving problems through offering gifts before he arrived.

"How many gold coins do you want?" The Archmage's tense back relaxed. His intelligence reports said that this Sinuoli before him was nicknamed "the Generous One." He had looked at him differently back then, but now, it seemed he was nothing special.

"Hahaha, my respected Prince, when one's strength and influence reach our level, what value do ordinary gold coins have?" Sinuoli laughed out loud. How could he be dismissed with money? The vaults of the Everpeak were full of shiny little darlings.

"Then what do you want?" Teclis frowned tightly.

"Treasures! I'm not used to your gear, and you can't even lift our products. Surely there are still relics from the War of the Beard?" The Dwarf King revealed his money-grubbing expression once again.

During that war which lasted for hundreds of years, both sides had many high-level casualties. The Warrior King Kaleduo Ershi was slain, the Phoenix Crown is still kept at the Everpeak to this day, and on the Dwarf side, the son and brother of Gotrek-Suixingzhe also died on the battlefield.

"Hmm..." Teclis adjusted his sitting posture. Both shipments transported from the Old World were in short supply of strategic materials, and the interior decoration of Kalake-Zuen had not kept up; the stone chairs were uncomfortable for an Elf to sit on.

"There is a battle flag in the White Tower's collection. An army carrying that flag into battle will give their opponents an illusion, making them appear even taller."

"Is it inscribed with mixed Dragon Blood?" Krag Master, who had been silent the whole time, suddenly interjected.

"My gods above!" Teclis turned his head away, not wanting to continue the conversation. Compared to Krag, who always brought up the most sensitive topics, Sinuoli sounded as sweet-voiced as a choir member.

"The Disaster of the Dragon Clan battle flag; that was the work of Jiesen-Telawieke. He was a Rune Master who had taken the Slayer Oath. The fortress he belonged to was destroyed by a dragon, and when he was forced to evacuate, he swore to kill as many dragons as he could for the rest of his life," Krag introduced to Sinuoli.

"A dragon-slaying squad from an epic?" Sinuoli's eyes lit up. In the early stages of the War of the Beard, the Dwarfs suffered from a lack of air superiority and could only defend passively. At that juncture, Master Telawieke organized a special operations unit.

The members of the squad were all powerhouses determined to slay dragons. Some, like Telawieke, had their homes and loved ones harmed by dragons, while others simply wanted to make a name for themselves by slaying dragons.

These powerhouses gathered together, coordinating tacitly across different professions, and relied on strategic locations like mountain outposts, the Earth Vein Network, and fortress firing ports to fight in the east and west against the dragons. Their most famous achievement was the "Longmianzhidi," where an entire squad of Caledor Dragon Princes was sniped by them one after another.

Master Telawieke collected the heart-blood and skin of every dragon slain, mixed them together as raw materials to create a battle flag imbued with Master-class fear Runes as the squad's emblem.

Regrettably, after one mission, the squad lost contact. Their courage and achievements were remembered by their kin, and to this day, their story is still sung in taverns.

"A lost treasure, not bad. But my faith in the Ancestor Gods is very pious! To make me reach a decision that goes against my ancestors..." Sinuoli patted his chest and made a prayer gesture.

"Greedy..." Teclis felt disgusted by Sinuoli's clumsy acting, but he held back from spitting out insulting terms like "dwarf" to provoke Krag again.

"Heh, if you ask me, there are many treasures you have clearly recorded that even if I took them out for you, you wouldn't dare use them, would you?" The Archmage looked at the Book of Grudges placed on the table and suddenly had an idea; he was undoubtedly a high-intelligence Elf.

"Uh..." This time it was Sinuoli's turn to be speechless. Indeed, he really couldn't ask for those treasures that were known to all and clearly taken as war trophies by the Elves.

He could barely make up a story, of course, but if the Elves sent witnesses to present their side, and it was discovered he was colluding with the pointy-ears, being branded a "Dwarf-traitor" and having his reputation ruined would be almost inevitable.

"Then you decide!" Sinuoli simply took a step back.

"What kind of item do you want?" The Archmage was also calculating in his heart which of the war trophies from those years he could obtain at a relatively low cost.

"A necklace, a cloak, or something else with an adjustable size." Sinuoli had thought about this question before. In his plan, he would try to solve future battles by throwing the Storm Hammer and using Rune strikes from a distance; if he had to engage in melee, he would definitely be using the Avatar of the Gods.

"Adjustable size?" Teclis looked at Sinuoli with a suspicious expression; he didn't quite understand the source of the Dwarf's requirements. "How about this?" He gently shook his staff, and a crown appeared in the reflection.

It was a crescent-shaped ring; the base was not a closed circle, so it could withstand a certain range of deformation. The top was shaped like the character "mountain," with three protruding Rune slots, though the one on the left was not inscribed.

To Sinuoli, this thing had a bit of Elven aesthetic style and should have been a product of the honeymoon period between the two races during the Golden Age. Dwarfs didn't like these kinds of products now, but he was a pragmatist and didn't care much for things that strained the neck.

"A Master-class Jizhi Rune and a Rune of Determination; it's quite good for a crown," Krag Master commented. Dwarf Rune products still had that old problem: the smaller the size, the harder it was to inscribe Runes.

"Then this one it is!" Hearing his master's praise, Sinuoli naturally had no objections. He was now a king in his own right and was just missing a crown.

"Continue, what other requirements do you have?" Teclis also breathed a sigh of relief; these two items were still within his capabilities. If Sinuoli had demanded the Battle Axe of the High Prince from back then or the Haojiaobao Guanmian—things that were also considered important war trophies by the Elves—he would have been in a difficult position.

"The last point: His clergy must not interfere with my administration and judiciary."

Sinuoli had been thinking about this point since the day he decided to introduce the population of the Knight Kingdom. He had several solutions, but none of them could be called perfect.