In Donatis in the civil office, one of the gate guards came running to report to the acting Lord of the town.
"Guard: sir. Using the farsight artifact we conformed that two groups of people are heading here with what seems to be hostile intent from the north"
"Lundel: were you able to identify them?"
"Guard: yes! One group appears to be from the main church and all of them have enchanted gear and the second group appears to be led by one of the permanent nobles of the kingdom and they are estimated to arrive in five hours"
"Lundel: they finally made their move"
As Lundel said that he activated the broadcasting artifact he had on his desk and started talking.
"Lundel: people of Donatis hear me out! In five hours from now, two groups of people will arrive at the town, one is from the main church and the other one is being led by one of the permanent nobles of the kingdom and both of them are coming here with hostile intent in their minds"
At that, the people of the town gave their full attention to Lundel. If an outsider were to look at them right now he would be confused and terrified at the same time, the reason is their reaction to the news.
Normally when presented with such news the people should start feeling afraid and start panicking but the people of Donatis did no such thing.
All of them are listening to the broadcast with calm expressions on their faces even the children are doing the same and some are smiling for some reason. in fact, there are two outsiders in the town right now and when they heard the broadcast they started to panic but stopped once they saw the reaction of the people.
Those two are Leon Morten Kazar and his wife Liz, they stopped by at the town to check it out before heading to the Holy Theocracy, and both of them are feeling extremely confused by the people's reaction and the reason for that is because they did not know about Ryo's management policies and, to be honest not even Lyara and co don't know about them and would be surprised too if they were present in the town.
The reason for that is because the policies Lyara is following are revolving around the concept of the strong protecting the weak that's why all of the people cooperating with her are extremely strong and talented, but Ryo is different than that. Ryo's management policies are revolving around teaching the people how to protect themselves and providing them with the tools needed to achieve that so rather than having 10% of your followers being strong and having them protect the others, he is going for having 100% of your followers being strong in their own way and having them protect themselves and the things they hold dear and this is one of the reasons that the Civil Rep of the town thinks that Ryo is really terrifying.
"Lundel: but be afraid not! Because this is our chance to prove our loyalty to Ruler-sama! All of you are well aware that them coming to this town with hostile intent is the same as wanting to harm our dear Ruler-sama and I'm well aware that none of you would allow something like that!"
At that moment the atmosphere in the town changed as the people of Donatis became angry and hostile and even the children are pissed off. and at the same time, a group of intimidation auras started emitting from the direction of the adventurers guild were Leo and his wife are, but it was not coming from them but from the guild master and a group of S and A rank adventurers that were present at the guild.
When Ryo visited the town the first time there were no S rank adventurers in the town and the reason for that is because they were locked up by the late Lord as slaves alongside their families but thanks to Ryo all of them are free right now and are working as guards and instructors and them hearing that someone is intending to harm their beloved savior caused their blood to boil to no end, the guild master is feeling the same because most of them were his friends and so he knows how they are feeling right now and more than that he is extremely pissed off at the idea of someone wanting to harm Ryo.
"Lundel: now everyone you know what we should do to those who dare to bare their fangs at Ruler-sama!! Be ready and take your positions and start doing your jobs in preparation for the upcoming battle!"
With that, the broadcast was cut off and at the same time, the men started equipping their gear and then they each went to their position and started warming up and the women went to prepare food and medicine for those who will be fighting and the children started spreading all over the town to act as information and supplies carriers.
The high ranked adventurers equipped their gear and headed to the centre of the town and started preparing for battle along with the acting Lord Lundel and the Reps, and right after that, a loud howl rang across the whole town.
*AAAAWWWWWWWWOOOOOOOOOOO!!*
And four Shadow Hounds appeared on top of four of the tallest buildings in the town and sat down there implying to the people that they are going to look over them and help them if they needed help which made the people of Donatis feel more thankful towards Ryo.
..
.
After a couple of hours, the two hostile groups arrived at the town's north gate.
"Earl: I'm Earl Rulf Elton from the Royal Capital and I'm in a special mission from the Royal Castle!"
"Holy Knight: I'm Terrowin Tybalt one of the holy Knight's commanders, the commander of the tenth platoon and I'm here to deliver a holy message from Cardinal Althalos Carac himself"
Right after that, the northern gate was opened by the guards and allowed the two groups to enter the town which made them certain of their victory against the filthy commoner who dared the oppose those with blue blood.
But they were not led to the town's castle but to the town's square which made them confused by that action.
In the town's square, there was chairs and tables enough for all of the holy knights and the earl's soldiers to set down, which made the holy knights confused and pissed the earl off, and when they arrived at the where the chairs are they just stood up there as if waiting for something, but right then Lundel came forward and took a seat along with the adventurers guild master and the Reps.
"Lundel: I'm the acting Lord of Donatis Lundel"
"Mark: and I'm the guild master Mark, you may state your business"
"Rulf: what is the meaning of this?! Why lead us here? Take us to the castle right away you bastards!"
"Lundel: there is no such thing as a castle in this town and if you are talking about that building then let me inform you that it's not a castle but a school used to educate the citizens of Donatis and as a training ground for new solders"
"Rulf: bullshit! If you are the Acting Lord of the town then where are you ruling the town from?"
"Lundel: from the civil office over there"
Lundel pointed at a building that has a sign that says Donatis's Civil Office at the end of the town's square as he said that.
"Rulf: don't fuck with me! you filthy commoner! There is no way your nobles would agree to that!"
"Lundel: that's where you are mistaken. There are no nobles in this town because the whole noble system is not needed in this town, the people of the town are the ones who manage the town by themselves and my job as the Acting Lord is just to make sure that everyone is on the same page and to make sure that the people are happy with their living conditions"
"Rulf: you dare disregard the nobles and royals of your own country?! You filthy commoner!"
"Lundel: our country? Are you not mistaken in your own position here? Or did you forget that we are part of The Divine Blacksmith's domain?"
"Rulf: What?....."
"Lundel: we are loyal to The Divine Blacksmith and no one else, and if you think that you can use your position as an Earl of the Kazar Kingdom in here then you are greatly mistaken since your position means nothing in this domain so keep that in mind next time you speak, and you Mr. Holy Knight are here to just listen to this guy speak or what? I remember hearing you say that you have a message or whatever"
Both Rulf and Terrowin were taken aback by what Lundel said but Terrowin was the first to talk.
"Terrowin: the message I have from his greatness Cardinal Althalos Carac is that you people of Donatis are to return to the right road and re-embrace the Holy religion and to atone for your sin of leaving Holy religion behind your backs or you are be purged"
"Rulf: hear that you filthy commoners!? And are also to hand over the Rulership of the town to me Earl Rulf Elton! If you don't do that I'm going to brand all of you as Repels and execute the lot of you!"
"Lundel: I refuse both of your demands! We are Loyal to The Divine Blacksmith and no one else, and the religion of the Holy Church is prohibited in this domain because of its discriminatory aspects and unequal treatment to the people. and with that, you have no business in our town anymore, you may leave and if you do as I said, I'll forget about your declaration of war against us and will allow you to go back without any harm but if you don't, don't blame me if you lose your lives"
"Terrowin: what?!...."
"Rulf: you bastard! You brought this upon yourselves! As of this moment, every last one of you is a repel and to be executed here and now! Kill the lot of them! Don't leave anyone alive! Nor man no woman no child no elderly kill all of them!"
"Terrowin: they dared to go against our glorious gods and insult our doctrine! This a Holy War to purge those filthy heretics! God is with us! Justice is on our side! Let's purge the lot of them and God would surely reward us for our endeavors!"
"Lundel: you leave us no choice…"
At that moment more than 5000 men(and some female adventurers) started appearing from the buildings and space between them and on the roofs and surrounded the 250 men, 100 Holy knights and 150 elite soldiers. The 5000 men were clearly not from one affiliation because some were wearing uniform black and red armor(the soldiers and guards of the town) and some were wearing white and brown armor(normal citizens wearing armor used for emergencies) and the rest of them are wearing random armor indicating that they are adventurers, but what the 250 men failed to notice is that all of the equipment the 5000 men are enchanted.
But the 250 men were not afraid of the number 5000 because they are stronger than mere normal solders and have more experience in the battlefield than them.
The 250 men rearranged themselves in two different formations, the Holy Knights made a formation with Terrowin in the lead since he is the strongest of them all and the job of the rest of them is to support him in an arrowhead formation.
And the elite soldiers did the exact opposite of what the Holy Knights did and formed a circle formation with Rulf in the center of the formation to protect him.
The battle started when the guild master Mark and Terrowin clashed with each other, Terrowin with his Holy sword and Mark with his enchanted battle-ax, Terrowin was surprised that Mark was able to block his attacks even though his sword was enchanted with a type of Holy magic that disintegrate weapons, shields and armor that stand in his way, the reason for that is simply the amount of mana inside the battle-ax is more than the amount of mana inside of Holy sword but he had no way of knowing that, and because of that he was stuck in a fight of strength, technique, and experience which the guild master have more of that than Terrowin the Holy knight commander.
The Holy knights other than Terrowin were in better shape than him, and each one of them has to fight against more than one opponent that's why they were not able to support Terrowin in his fight. But as expected of Holy Knights they were stronger than their opponents even though they were fighting against multiple opponents and before long their attacks started connecting almost killing their opponents but before they are able to finish them off their opponents would disappear and someone else would take their place which confused the Holy Knights a lot.
In reality, what was happening is that every time one of the people of Donatis is injured the Shadow Hounds would use Shadow Exchange to teleport them to the relief center in the other side of the town where the women are working to heal the injured peoples that are teleported to them and after letting them rest for some time they go back to the town's square to fight.
And at the same time, the children are stationed on the rooftops and their job is to monitor the flow of battle and to report back to the people at the relief center with the help of other kids who are stationed on the ground and their job is to run back and forth to relay information to the relief center.
The condition of the elite soldiers is much worse than the Holy Knights', and the reason for that is because of their lack of battle experience. From the start, the formation they took made it easier for their opponents to surround them separating them from the Holy Knights. But even so, they were stronger than the people of Donatis and were able to injure some of their opponents but as expected they disappeared before they had any chance to finish them off which made them confused.
There were some mages amongst the ranks of the Holy Knights and the elite soldiers but they were not able to fight properly because the people of Donatis were attacking them from a very close distance and that made it difficult to attack them with magic because of the risk of friendly fire, that's why they were left with the only option of using weak single target magic attacks, but each time they try to attack with weak single target magic attacks the adventurers would use barrier artifacts to block the magic attacks before they hit anyone.
The battle went on like this for nearly one hour before both the Holy knights and the elite soldiers noticed something strange happening…
"Holy knight: how?!... I injured you earlier and you disappeared?!"
"Elite solder: you disappeared earlier! How come you are here?"
They started noticing that the people who disappeared earlier are coming back and each time they would injure someone he would disappear and come back later which led to them panicking.
The adventurers saw this as a chance and started fighting more seriously and killing some of the elite soldiers and at the same time, the high ranked adventurers started fighting the Holy Knights and killing them one after the other.
Terrowin noticed that and started yelling at the Holy Knights to raise their morale.
"Terrowin: CALM DOWN! They must be using some kind of trick to confuse us! Pay more attention to your surroundings and figure the trick out!"
The Holy Knights calmed down and started to buy more attention at the battlefield.
At the same time, the high ranked adventurers started to hold back little by little to make the Holy Knights feel like they are winning again and they seceded at doing that. Terrowin was busy with guild master to notice that.
And before long one of the Holy Knights was able to notice four black creatures laying down on top of four tall buildings.
"Holy Knight: there are four black things on top of the tallest buildings! They must have something to do with it! I can see them! They are-….."
The moment he figured out the identity of the four creatures he lost all will to fight and his heart was filled with despair and stopped fighting which led to his death at the hands of one of the high ranked adventurers.
The reason no one noticed the four Shadow Hounds is that they were using {Hide Presence} from the very start, and the reason that Holy Knight was able to notice them is because they disabled {Hide Presence} and showed themselves to all to see.
More and more people started noticing the Shadow Hounds and more of them started losing their will to fight and despair filled their hearts leading to their deaths at the hands of the adventurers.
As for the elite soldiers, they started running away upon noticing the Shadow Hounds but they could not run because of the formation that led to them being surrounded which led to their death at the hands of Donatis's solders, citizens and adventurers.
"Rulf: why is this happening to me?! How come these filthy commoners are stronger than us? Why am I losing? What are these monsters doing here?!"
"Terrowin: Impossible! Impossible! Impossible! Why? Why? Why is this happening to us? Wasn't The Divine Blacksmith supposed to be weak? Wasn't he taming Shadow Hounds just a lie he came up with to intimidate the kingdom?"
"Mark: you guys are really fools! There is no way an SS rank adventurer is weak! Especially that guy, he is a real monster who was able to tame hundreds of Shadow Hounds"
After that, the high ranked adventurers started fighting seriously and in less than 20 minutes all 250 Holy Knights and elite soldiers were killed leaving only Rulf and Terrowin alive, both of them are tied with steel chains enchanted with {Drain} and {Paralyze}.
"Rulf: w-w-what are y-you p-planning t-t-to do w-with u-u-u-us?"
"Terrowin: Guh…."
"Lundel: nothing much, all we are going to do with you is use both of you guys to conform if the kingdom and the church are really willing to go to war with us that's all"
As he said that one of the soldiers arrived and had with him two slave collars that have The Divine Blacksmith's crest on them.
"Rulf: y-y-you are s-s-surly not g-going t-t-to use that on u-u-us are you!"
"Terrowin: don't you dare to put that filthy thing on me!"
"Lundel: shut up! You guys are the ones how came attacking us and lost, you have no right complaining about we are going to do with you"
"Terrowin: kill me! I'd rather die than become a slave to your filthy Ruler!"
"Rulf: please don't! I'll give you money I'll give you anything you want! Please don't use that on me!"
"Lundel: Hmm… no can do"
Lundel said that and fitted the slave collar on both of them.
"Terrowin: GUHHHH!..."
"Rulf: HIIIIII!"
"Lundel: as of this moment you two are to not to talk or show emotions unless you are allowed to"
"Yes Sir"x2
After that Lundel asked everyone present to help him collect the bodies and equipment of the 250 men who came with Rulf and Terrowin and used one of the special enchantments used on the slave collars {Storage} and shoved the bodies and equipment of the Holy Knights in Terrowin's collar and did the same to the bodies and equipment of the elite soldiers and shoved them into Rulf's collar.
"Lundel: Terrowin you are to go back to the main church and report to them what happened here today and to show them the recording of the whole battle in your collar and give this letter to that Cardinal of yours"
"Terrowin: Yes Sir"
"Lundel: Rulf you are to go back to the Royal Castle and report to them what happened here today and to show them the recording of the whole battle in your collar and give this letter to the king"
"Rulf: Yes Sir"
With that, both Rulf and Terrowin dashed towards the northern gate and then towards the capital at a very high speed.
"Mark: thanks to {Hide Presence} and {Strength Enhancement} enchantments they should arrive at the capital in five days at most, now all we have to do is wait"
"Lundel: yeah…"
"Mark: for now let us forget about that! We have won! Its celebration time!"
*YYYEEEEAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!*
*AAAAAWWWWWWWWWWOOOOOOOOO!*
===============================================
In the sky above the area near the Dark Forest, three beastmen wearing Oni masks riding a wyvern each are heading towards the direction of Donatis when they noticed two guys running at high speed towards the direction of their young master.
What caught their attention was the fact that those two were using some type of concealment magic plus the strange mana reaction they gave off, and when they used an appraisal artifact the young master made for them, they discovered that the mana reaction was due to having demons summoned inside their bodies in an incomplete way.
"Oni No.1: those guys are part of The Blue Sun of Hope"
"Oni No.2: let's get some information from them!"
"Oni No.3: Oou!"
Down on the ground.
"Proxy No.1: he should be in this direction, right?"
"Proxy No.2: yeah…"
"Proxy No.1: then why can't we find any traces of him? He should be using his carriage so why are there no tracks?"
"Proxy No.2: hell if I know! I was with you the whole time! How do you expect me to know?!"
"Proxy No.1: I know but…. If we were unable to get some information on him or at least what he looks like we will be in a huge mess"
"Proxy No.2: I know! But I can't do anything about it!..."
Suddenly both of them were stopped forcefully by gluing their feet to the ground by their own shadows breaking their legs.
"Proxy No.1: what?!..."
"Proxy No.2: Guh!!"
They both fell down on their faces and when they tried to move they couldn't and that caused them to become confused and to look around for the reason they were stopped forcefully like this they noticed that their shadows were looking different for some reason, the shadows were very dark to the point of not being able to see the ground and right now their bodies were stuck to the ground as if they were glued to it.
And suddenly two shadows fell from the sky and landed in front of the two proxies, the shadows turned out to be two guys wearing strange masks on their faces and wore black clothes and had beastmen ears and tails sticking out of their heads and lower backs and with that the confusion they had in their hearts transformed into fear, the reason for that is the fact that they were paralyzed rather than killed and because of the two black wyverns that landed behind the two masked beastmen shortly after they did.
But what terrified them the most was not the masked beastmen nor was it the wyverns, it was the crest that the two beastmen had on their chests and backs, it was the crest of the man they were searching for, The Divine Blacksmith. And the fact that they were captured alive means that they are going to be interrogated for information about The Blue Sun of Hope.
Noticing that they tried to escape but to no avail, and so they decided to take the two masked beastmen with them by completing the demon summoning ritual done to them by stabbing themselves with a cursed blade that they have many of all over their bodies, the cursed blades were installed all over their bodies in a way that requires them to just move certain parts of their bodies a little in a certain way as a precaution to this type of situations.
But before they were able to go with their plan, two very small throwing knives stabbed their arms out of nowhere roping them of their control over their bodies and mana making it impossible for them to complete demon summoning ritual or anything else really, and then suddenly a third masked beastman landed to their right and shortly after a third wyvern landed behind him.
After that, the two members of The Blue Sun of Hope were interrogated using black magic and mind control magic which led to the first destruction of a base belonging to The Blue Sun of Hope in the history, and it was made known that the one who caused the destruction is The Divine Blacksmith's followers by his crest painted all over the place there.
And thanks to the fact that the Renzhe clan is registered with the adventurers guild they were able to destroy the base as a quest from the guild making it impossible for anyone to object or to spread false rumors about them and thus announcing the return of The Renzhe as followers of The Divine Blacksmith.
===============================================
In the royal castle of the Kazar kingdom, in the throne room.
The nobles and royals along with the king and prime minister and the royal guards and soldiers, all were looking at a single man standing in the center of the room.
The man's name is Earl Rulf Elton.
He came out of nowhere and asked for all those people to assemble in the throne room because he had something to report, but the prime minister objected at first which caused the king to be suspicious of him and asked for the requested people to gather so he can hear the report Rulf brought with him.
"Rulf: I am Earl Rulf Elton as all of you know already, I am here to report that I was asked by the prime minister Marrd Morten Kazar to attack the town of Donatis and to take its Rulership for myself because The Divine Blacksmith is not in the town at the moment"
With that, all present looked at the prime minister with varied expressions on their faces, only the king was holding his head with both hands with a despaired expression on his face, the reason for that is that they might have made an enemy of the SS rank The Divine Blacksmith, but after a moment of thinking, he noticed something and asked Rulf to stop his report.
"Forten: Rulf, could you stop for a moment?"
"Rulf: …why?"
"Forten: I want the people of the capital to take part in this, I'll activate the broadcasting artifact and then you may report all that happened to the whole capital"
"Marrd: your majesty you can't-!.."
"Rulf: ….. I understand"
And with that, the king activated the artifact and asked the people of the capital to hear him out and after that.
"Forten: Earl Rulf Elton, you may report!"
"Rulf: I am Earl Rulf Elton as all of you know already, I am here to report that I was asked by the prime minister Marrd Morten Kazar to attack the town of Donatis and to take its Rulership for myself because The Divine Blacksmith is not in the town at the moment, and I was not alone because on my way to the town of Donatis I met with Terrowin Tybalt Holy Knight's commander of the tenth platoon who was heading to Donatis with the same goal as mine.
But it ended in a complete failure"
"Forten: was The Divine Blacksmith still in the town?"
"Rulf: no he was not in the town, the ones who fought us were the people of Donatis themselves and the killed all of my 150 elite soldiers and all of the 100 Holy knights of the tenth platoon leaving only me and Terrowin-dono alive, they made us into slaves and ordered me to report to the king of the Kazar kingdom and Terrowin-dono to the cardinal of the Holy Church, and to show you a recording of what happened in Donatis from start to end"
"Forten: recording?"
"Rulf: yes"
"Forten: could you show it to the people of the capital as well?"
"Rulf: ….no problem {Activate}"
*Earl: I'm Earl Rulf Elton from the Royal Capital and I'm in a special mission from the Royal Castle!*
*Holy Knight: I'm Terrowin Tybalt one of the holy Knight's commanders, the commander of the tenth platoon and I'm here to deliver a holy message from Cardinal Althalos Carac himself*
.
.
*Lundel: I'm the acting Lord of Donatis Lundel*
*Mark: and I'm the guild master Mark, you may state your business*
*Rulf: what is the meaning of this?! Why lead us here? Take us to the castle right away you bastards!*
*Lundel: there is no such thing as a castle in this town and if you are talking about that building then let me inform you that it's not a castle but a school used to educate the citizens of Donatis and as a training ground for new solders*
*Rulf: bullshit! If you are the Acting Lord of the town then where are Ruling the town from?*
*Lundel: from the civil office over there*
Lundel pointed at a building that has a sign that says Donatis's Civil Office at the end of the town's square as he said that.
*Rulf: don't fuck with me! you filthy commoner! There is no way your nobles would agree to that!*
*Lundel: that's where you are mistaken. There are no nobles in this town because the whole noble system is not needed in this town, the people of the town are the ones who manage the town by themselves and my job as the Acting Lord is just to make sure that everyone is on the same page and to make sure that the people are happy with their living conditions*
*Rulf: you dare disregard the nobles and royals of your own country?! You filthy commoner!*
*Lundel: our country? Are you not mistaken your own position here? Or did you forget that we are part of The Divine Blacksmith's domain?*
*Rulf: What?.....*
*Lundel: we are loyal to The Divine Blacksmith and no one else, and if you think that you can use your position as an Earl of the Kazar Kingdom in here then your greatly mistaken since your position means nothing in this domain so keep that in mind next time you speak, and you Mr. Holy Knight are here to just listen to this guy speak or what? I remember hearing you say that you have a message or whatever*
*Terrowin: the message I have from his greatness Cardinal Althalos Carac is that you people of Donatis are to return to the right road and re-embrace the Holy religion and to atone for your sin of leaving Holy religion behind your backs or you are be purged*
*Rulf: hear that you filthy commoners!? And are also to hand over the Rulership of the town to me Earl Rulf Elton! If you don't do that I'm going to brand all of you as Repels and execute the lot of you!*
*Lundel: I refuse both of your demands! We are Loyal to The Divine Blacksmith and no one else, and the religion of the Holy Church is prohibited in this domain because of its discriminatory aspects and none equal treatment to the people. and with that, you have no business in our town anymore, you may leave and if you do as I said, I'll forget about your declaration of war against us and will allow you to go back without any harm but if you don't, don't blame me if you lose your lives*
*Terrowin: what?!....*
*Rulf: you bastard! You brought this upon yourselves! As of this moment, every last one of you is a repel and to be executed here and now! Kill the lot of them! Don't leave anyone alive! Nor man no woman no child no elderly kill all of them!*
*Terrowin: they dared to go against our glorious gods and insult our doctrine! This a Holy War to purge those filthy heretics! God is with us! Justice is on our side! Let's purge the lot of them and God would surely reward us for our endeavors!*
*Lundel: you leave us no choice…*
After that, the battle unfolded and everyone was surprised by the appearance of the 5000 fighters and then were surprised at the disappearance of the injured before being killed.
And when the four Shadow Hounds appeared all of them were terrified beyond limits, Marrd fall back on his butt and was shaking in fear, some of the soldiers tried to escape before remembering that it's a recording, and most of the people in the throne room had the same reactions and the king, Forten was watching with eyes full of despair.
The rest of the recording went on like that and before long a huge commotion was heard from outside the castle and then one of the guards came reporting.
"Guard: s-sir! The people of the capital have stormed the castle and are asking the king to take responsibility for making an enemy of Donatis and The Divine Blacksmith!"
The people's reaction was natural, the Shadow Hounds are Titan class monsters that have the ability to destroy whole countries if they were to be aggravated, but at the same time, they are completely harmless if no one dared to attack or intrude on their territory and this threat is shared by all Titan class monsters.
But this time someone from the kingdom attacked the domain of the one who was able to tame hundreds of the Shadow Hounds and if he so desired to retaliate not only the kingdom all human countries are going to be annihilated, and that stupid someone was an Earl of the kingdom and he was sent by none other the very prime minister of the kingdom.
Seeing that the people of the capital all started running towards the royal castle to demand from the king to take responsibility for that, and the soldiers and guards who should have stopped the people from storming the castle joined them instead, the guard who came to report that to the king is one of the guards who joined the people and he came to the throne room to ask the king to take responsibility as the representative of the people storming the castle right now.
The people in the throne room all looked at the king waiting for him to say something, the king, Forten looked at Rulf and started talking to him.
"Forten: is that the end of your report?"
"Rulf: no, I have a letter from the acting Lord of Donatis Lundel-sama"
"Forten: letter?"
"Rulf: yes, here"
Saying that Rulf handed the letter to the king and waited for him to read it.
The king opened the letter and started reading it out loud so everyone can hear him and this was written in it:
~From The Acting Lord Of Donatis: Lundel.
To the king of the Kazar Kingdom Forten Morten Kazar, are you our enemy?
If you are really our enemy then-
"Rulf: …!"
And before the king was able to read what came next, Rulf was beheaded by his collar and his head dropped down rolling by the king's feet.
The people present were shocked by what happened but at the same time, they all knew the meaning behind what happened to Rulf. And the king continued reading the rest of the letter.
~But if you are not our enemy, I'll be waiting to hear from you in the near future.
And by the way, we didn't need the remains of your Elite soldiers and so I'm returning them back to you~
As the king finished reading the letter, the collar around Rulf's neck started emitting light and then soon after imploded sending the remains of the 150 Elite soldiers all over the throne room, but the king ignored that for the time being and gave his next order.
"Forten: as all of you saw, we have incurred the wrath of The Divine Blacksmith because of our meaningless pride, but instead of annihilating us he has given us a chance to redeem ourselves and asked us if we are his enemies or not. And so, to show him that we are not his enemies and as an apology and as a sign of our regret we are going to send him a letter indicating just that along with a thousand Platinum coins and ten treasures from the royal treasury one of them being my family's heirloom, plus a thousand of our Elite soldiers to guard our letter all the way to Donatis and to kneel down and apologize to the people of Donatis in my name"
*Author Note: currency system changed to 100 copper coins= 1 silver coin, 100 silver coins= 1 gold coin, 100 gold coins= 1 platinum coin.*
The reaction of the Royal and noble families was divided into two main reactions, the King's faction gave the king knowing looks while the Royal faction were all looking at the ground looking as if they have swallowed a bug.
The knowing looks from the King's faction were due to him giving his family's heirloom to The Divine Blacksmith, the very same heirloom used to crown a new king for the Kazar kingdom.
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At the same time, the same thing happened at the main church of the Kazar kingdom, in the audience room were the Cardinal and the commanders of Holy knight's platoons along with the big wigs of the Holy Church in the Kazar kingdom, and they are right now surrounding Terrowin Tybalt's headless corpse and the remains of the 100 Holy Knights of the tenth platoon.
And the Holy Church's response to the letter was…
"Althalos: by my name Althalos Carac the Cardinal of the Holy Church of the Kazar kingdom, as of this moment The Divine Blacksmith is to be branded a heretic along with those who follow him and to be considered our mortal enemy, and here I order all of the platoons to hunt him down and to drag his rotten corpse in front of his followers and purge the lot of them afterwards!"
"YES SIR!!"
Marking the start of the downfall of the Holy Church in the Kazar Kingdom.