Their surroundings did not grow darker once they left the surface. On the contrary, Glintstone lamps hung all along the route, lighting the road like streetlamps in the abyss.
As they descended deeper underground, however, the temperature gradually dropped, bringing a faint chill with it.
This was a bottomless chasm. If they had tried to descend by stepping from floating stone to floating stone, falling to their deaths would have been all too easy. Without this broad road, it would have been almost impossible for the army to advance smoothly.
When the Fire-Bearer Army's main force finally reached the underground, the faint sensation of unstable Gravitas vanished completely.
Nolan looked around and saw ruined walls and collapsed structures everywhere, a scene of total decay.
"Is something wrong?" Millicent asked curiously.
The Eternal City was a lost ancient civilization. It had sunk underground long before Millicent's original body, Malenia, had even been born, so she knew very little about this place.
"Mm. The outer city is our territory, and this is the main route back to the surface. I did say there was no need to send anyone to greet us, but have you seen a single guard?" Nolan asked.
At that, Millicent and Alecto quickly looked back.
All they saw was the broken city around them, along with bursts of clamor ringing in their ears.
It sounded like countless sharp pieces of metal clashing together, enough to make it feel as though war drums were pounding in their chests.
"Has something happened?" Alecto frowned and tightened her grip on the Dagger in her hand.
"Looks that way." Nolan looked expressionlessly toward the city where the strange noise was coming from.
In his sight, buildings in the distant city were collapsing, smoke and dust billowing upward as if the end of the world had arrived.
And amid that chaos, several knights were riding warhorses. Their figures flickered in and out of view through the dust, carrying an unstoppable urgency.
...
In the city of Nokron, the werewolf who looked like a butcher was wielding a Claymore and dodging with surprising agility.
Every time he moved, another building would be smashed apart with a crash, sending shattered stone and dust flying everywhere.
Suddenly, a violent storm swept through, tossing Blaidd, who had leaped into the air, about like a blade of grass in the wind.
He used every ounce of strength he had to drive his Claymore deep into the ground, keeping himself from being swept away by the gale like a kite with its string cut.
Once he steadied himself, Blaidd looked up and saw an enormous hole smashed into the ground. Through the swirling dust, three equally hideous and terrifying dragon heads slowly emerged.
Then came their massive bodies, over twenty meters tall, forcing the soldiers to crane their necks and look up.
These creatures' bodies looked hollowed out. Their exposed abdomens and tattered wings made them resemble rotting corpses more than anything else.
Their mountain-like forms gave off a suffocating pressure, instantly drawing every eye on the battlefield.
"The Noxians actually had two more Dragonkin Soldiers hidden away?" Even Blaidd could not help showing surprise.
He had fought this kind of monster before and knew very well how dangerous they were.
These Dragonkin Soldiers were biological weapons created by the Nox people. They were meant to become mighty dragons, but things had gone wrong.
They too were failed experiments, left to slowly march toward extinction in this aged, dragon-like yet not-dragon form.
In the previous battle, only one Dragonkin Soldier had appeared, cooperating with the Noxians to repel the Fire-Bearer Army jointly led by Blaidd and Eleonora.
"Roar!"
A deafening roar suddenly erupted, as if the entire city were trembling.
It came from the Dragonkin Soldiers. They lifted their heads toward the sky, white arcs of lightning spraying from their mouths and weaving together in midair to form a dazzling net of electricity.
Blaidd's pupils contracted sharply. He had not expected the people of Nokron to still have another card hidden away.
Clearly, they could not wait any longer. They intended to return to the surface today and stake their claim in this chaotic age.
Blaidd thought grimly that he had originally planned to take the inner city in one strike today, but from the look of things, that plan was impossible now.
Even facing a powerful Dragonkin Soldier, he would not normally be afraid. Against one, he had enough confidence to handle it. Against three, there was no fighting them.
Without the slightest hesitation, Blaidd immediately turned and roared at the Fire-Bearer Army behind him, "All troops, retreat! Set gunpowder along the spiral road!"
If the road was destroyed, it could be rebuilt. If these things got loose on the surface, there was no telling what kind of chaos they would cause.
Blaidd understood very well that now was not the time to fight the enemy to the death.
As for his secret mission to find and hunt down the Fingerslayer Blade, even Ranni herself was no longer particularly anxious about it.
And with Nolan here, Blaidd believed Nokron would fall sooner or later.
Though the werewolf still found that kid unpleasant to look at, mostly because Ranni might be taken away by Nolan.
But there was no denying that Nolan's feat of single-handedly killing Radahn in his prime had filled everyone, Blaidd included, with confidence in his strength.
"But the reinforcements haven't arrived yet," a knight replied with worry on his face.
"Stop waiting for reinforcements. Even if they come, it won't help. What we need to do now is keep these Noxians here and stop them from running wild!" Blaidd roared.
Blaidd knew exactly how strong Eleonora was. She was about equal to him, perhaps even slightly weaker.
Originally, everyone had believed that two top-tier champions would be enough to deal with a declining Eternal City. Even if they could not take Nokron, they should at least have been able to keep the Noxians contained.
Who would have thought these people would be so tenacious? The strength they had hidden away was not to be underestimated.
Boom!
The Dragonkin Soldiers leaped into the air, gripping their Greatswords and Halberds as their heavy bodies crashed into the middle of the battlefield like falling meteors.
Their weapons slammed violently into the ground, sending dust surging into the sky and blotting out the stars.
Blaidd stood where he was and took a deep breath. His figure moved like a phantom, dodging constantly between the weapons of the Dragonkin Soldiers.
One-on-one, he could win. One against three was truly impossible.
If those giant weapons hit him, he would likely die a heroic death on the spot without even seeing Ranni one last time.
The situation on the battlefield grew more chaotic by the moment.
The soldiers and the other Tarnished were fighting with all their strength, but against so many Noxians, they were beginning to struggle.
The Noxians surged in from every direction. There were not only enemies on the ground, but also horned bull-headed figures drawing bows from the tops of towering buildings.
They fired glowing blue arrows that drew blue arcs through the air, like Magic Power meteors released by Sorcerers.
The well-equipped Fire-Bearer Army warriors fared somewhat better. With Greatshields carefully forged by Misbegotten blacksmiths, they could just barely withstand the arrow barrage.
The free Tarnished had it far worse. The price of their freedom was that they could only rely on themselves for everything, and most of their weapons and equipment had been stripped from corpses.
Good shields and armor required runes, fine materials, and a skilled blacksmith to forge them.
Most of those resources were under official control, making them difficult for ordinary Tarnished to access.
Very few Tarnished had shields, and their battered, fragile armor could never stop arrows fired from high above.
In the blink of an eye, many of them were pinned straight to the ground, left with no choice but to wait as the blood drained from their bodies.
By contrast, the advantage of a proper army was clear.
Although the individual strength of ordinary Fire-Bearer Army soldiers was inferior to that of the Tarnished, under the cover of their Greatshields, they could not only retreat in an orderly manner, but also counterattack with Bolts and Jar Cannons.
Some knights even found chances to support Blaidd. When shells from the Jar Cannons struck their bodies, even the Dragonkin Soldiers were forced to slow their assault.