Sovereign of the Ashes
Chapter 1102: Cruel and Intense War

Chapter 1102: Cruel and Intense War

Blackhaven’s harsh environment made its mages and knights even more unruly and battle-hungry than those in the rest of the Magus World.

Sometimes, just a verbal jab or even mild annoyance was enough to spark a deadly fight.

Sein’s fight with Harnban was honestly pretty ridiculous too.

All he did was fly over Harnban’s magic tower. Apparently, that alone was enough to offend the demigod-level black mage.

As an outsider, Sein had a hard time adjusting to Blackhaven’s way of life.

But after flying around for a while, he began to figure out how things worked here.

On his way to the Black Tower of Cinderbones, he made a point to steer clear of the more prominent towers.

He still ran into a few demigod-level black mages along the way, but the farther he got from the heart of Blackhaven, the fewer fights he had to deal with.

In Blackhaven, strength reigned supreme, and Sein realized that the stronger mages tended to cluster near its heart.

As he reached the outskirts, both the quantity and caliber of mages dropped noticeably.

At times, he could fly for long stretches without running into a single soul brave enough to get in his way.

Of course, that was also because he did not bother hiding his demigod-level aura—no one on the outskirts dared to mess with him.

During his journey from the center outward, news of his clashes with black mages like Harnban had spread.

Since he was a new face and never stuck around long, no one really knew who he was. They just started calling him the “Demon Warlock.”

It made sense. The demon form he took in battle probably made him look a lot like a Bloodline Warlock to most people.

Eventually, after stopping to ask a few Rank One and Rank Two mages for directions, the Black Tower of Cinderbones’ spire finally appeared in the distance.

Sein did not go in right away.

Instead, he tried to contact Leena using his crystal ball.

Unfortunately, she seemed too busy to respond.

As Sein got within range of the Black Tower of Cinderbones, he quickly realized that there was a war breaking out.

A full-blown war, not a skirmish.

In Blackhaven, it was not exactly rare for black mages to turn on each other. Every now and then, full-scale wars between black towers would erupt too.

Funnily enough, these tower wars tended to break out more often on the outskirts of Blackhaven.

What made it even stranger was that conflict between high-ranking black mages here was far less intense compared to those in the heart of the region.

And right now, the Black Tower of Cinderbones was clearly under siege—not just by one enemy but by multiple forces.

Among the hundreds of thousands of magic initiates caught up in the conflict, Sein also spotted hordes of undead creatures and chimeras flooding the battlefield as cannon fodder.

Leena had once mentioned the long-standing grudges between the Tower of Cinderbones and other forces like the Black Tower of Bone, the Black Tower of Dark Crystal, and the Black Order of Skra.

Judging from the scale of the conflict in front of him, there were clearly more forces involved than just those three.

Despite how intense the war was, Sein could not help but feel a flicker of excitement at the unfamiliar experience.

This was the Magus World’s internal conflict—far more brutal and savage than the “academy wars” between divine towers.

Those were glorified training sessions at best, with the purpose of toughening up the next generation of mages.

Even though Sein had yet to spot any demigod-level mages in this war, he could already sense the presence of Rank Three black mages locked in deadly combat.

The fact that he still could not get through to Leena, paired with the chaos unfolding before him, deepened the frown on his face.

Dozens of magic artifacts resembling catapults launched wave after wave of red projectiles, each trailing black smoke as they streaked across the sky.

These were no ordinary elemental projectiles, they seemed like some kind of corrosive bio-bombs.

Whatever they hit would melt into screaming puddles of flesh and gore.

Then, after a few seconds, monsters with mangled flesh would rise from those puddles and charge back into battle.

The whole process was so grotesque that even Sein—who had fought in his share of ineterplanar wars—felt his scalp crawl.

It reminded him a little of how undead armies were raised... but this was worse.

He could accept seeing corpses being turned into undead soldiers, but these abominations looked like something straight out of a nightmare.

“Is this what war looks like in Blackhaven?” Sein murmured, stunned as he watched three initiates get hit by one of those corrosive bombs, only to fuse and mutate into a two-meter-tall monster.

No wonder the Magus World had always tried to oppress the black mages—anyone capable of using tactics this brutal in a war on their own homeplane was never going to be accepted.

The battle raging around the outskirts of the Black Tower of Cinderbones showed no sign of dying down.

No one could tell how long it had already been going on or when it might end.

With Leena still unreachable and the brutality of this war gnawing at his nerves, Sein finally pulled out a metal compass and a single strand of hair from his space ring.

It was Leena’s.

He had never imagined he would actually end up using bloodline tracing magic just to find his own wife.

This technique had been a gift from his former mentor, Morsidor. It was how Sein had originally tracked down his long-lost family.

After years of studying bloodline theory and making real progress, Sein had improved it a lot. It was faster now and way more reliable.

After engraving his custom magic array onto the compass, a faint red glow began to rise, forming an arrow.

It pointed east and slightly downward, indicating that Leena was underground.

Holding the compass, Sein took off in that direction without hesitation.

He made no effort to hide his aura either.

This battlefield was already a complete mess, and honestly, Sein was seriously starting to consider taking Leena and getting the hell out of the Black Tower of Cinderbones altogether.

Even if erasing her identity as a black mage was impossible, she might be safer under the Spider Queen’s protection than living like this.

His expression darkened as he flew over the chaos and elemental explosions below.

Sure enough, the moment he unleashed his demigod-level aura, several black towers caught on to the energy fluctuation and responded one after another.

“What the hell is this? Who broke the rules and deployed a demigod?!” a furious voice roared.

A Rank Four black mage struck the ground with his palm, leaving behind a massive imprint.

That was the Black Tower Master of Bone—a relatively recent Rank Four who had only broken through a few thousand years ago.

He had always seen the Black Tower of Cinderbones as an eyesore and had long been itching to challenge its authority.

And now, he was one of the main forces driving this siege.

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