The Knowledge Tower discovered Arcane and his group immediately. Although they were unclear how Arcane's party had bypassed the Knowledge Tower's restrictions to teleport in, based on their trust in Arcane, mages from the Knowledge Tower soon arrived to lead everyone inside.
The person responsible for liaising with Arcane was a middle-aged mage named Roy.
He scanned the group of Lampbearers beside Arcane and turned to ask him, "Raphael, who are these people?"
Arcane replied, "They are my friends. Having heard that the Knowledge Tower came under attack, they came specifically to support us!"
"Friends?"
Mage Roy hesitated for a moment but eventually nodded.
In a world with a power level like the Sixth Ring World, traversing space was not an incomprehensible matter; the Sorcerer Supremes had traveled to other worlds before. Occasionally, creatures from other worlds would stumble into the Sixth Ring World by accident.
Therefore, Mage Roy simply assumed Shinji's group were ordinary travelers from another world.
Arcane then asked somewhat urgently, "What exactly is going on?"
"Follow me!"
As Mage Roy spoke, he led Arcane and the group to a high platform atop the Knowledge Tower.
Pointing to a distant area filled with soaring flames and constant roaring, Mage Roy said, "Those monsters appeared three days ago. Initially, there was only one, which was eliminated by a mage squad stationed at an outer watchtower, so we didn't pay it much mind. Unexpectedly, these monsters became more and more numerous; the outer watchtowers fell one by one, and now they have closed in on the Knowledge Tower!"
Using the vantage point of the high platform, the group looked around and found that the vicinity of the Knowledge Tower was indeed covered in various battlefields.
The attackers were precisely the flesh puppets that had once rampaged across T33.
However, these flesh puppets were currently only in their primary form, standing about seven or eight meters tall—roughly the height of two or three stories. They were far less terrifying than the giant, mountain-like flesh puppets Shinji had seen before the destruction of T33!
"Flesh puppets!"
"As expected..."
"They've already targeted this place?"
Alice and the others looked solemn.
The appearance of the flesh puppets meant their plan was half-successful; the Propagation Hegemon had been lured over.
Arcane was so nervous his body began to tremble slightly. He asked in a hushed voice, "Does His Excellency Storm have any instructions?"
The Sorcerer Supreme guarding the Knowledge Tower was the Storm Sorcerer Supreme!
Mage Roy shook his head. "These monsters are very strange; even Sensei has been unable to analyze their true nature yet!"
Rumble...
At that moment, a violent explosion suddenly occurred on a nearby battlefield!
Arcane and Roy both shuddered, expressions of shock appearing on their faces. "A self-detonating magic staff?!"
It turned out the mages on that battlefield were unable to hold their ground, so one of them had no choice but to detonate their own magic staff in an attempt to destroy the flesh puppets.
The dust from the explosion soon cleared, and a massive figure slowly stepped out from the smoke, continuing its advance toward the Knowledge Tower.
Seeing this, the expressions of everyone on the high platform turned dark.
Mage Roy said, "Do you see? Those monsters seem to have absolutely no sense of pain and don't understand fear. Combined with their immense strength, even a high-level mage like me finds them very difficult to deal with. That is why we sent out the plea for help!"
Arcane nodded. "I understand!"
...
Roy then asked, "When will the follow-up mages from your Wisdom Tower arrive? I can send someone to meet them!"
Arcane replied, "For reinforcements, there are only the few of us for now!"
"What!? Only the few of you?"
Mage Roy's face darkened.
Arcane didn't explain. He directly pointed to an area where the flesh puppets were relatively dense and said, "We will be responsible for this sector. Please rest assured, we will not allow a single monster to approach the Knowledge Tower!"
With that, Arcane led the group of Lampbearers as they flew down from the Knowledge Tower's platform.
As soon as she entered the battlefield, Glory Alice activated her weapon modules, instantly transforming into a war angel and rapidly harvesting flesh puppets across the battlefield.
Greedy Wolf Hengo used the time Alice bought by sweeping through the flesh puppets to use several weapon and defense modules to set up a temporary war fortress in the combat zone, providing stable long-range fire output.
In just a few moments, under the joint efforts of Alice and Hengo, the flesh puppets in the sector designated by Arcane were wiped out.
On the high platform.
Watching the Lampbearers venting their firepower on the battlefield, Mage Roy stood dumbfounded, his face full of disbelief.
Not just him—the mages scattered across the various combat zones around the Knowledge Tower were also shocked by Alice and Hengo's ruthless and sharp offensive.
Inside Hengo's temporary war fortress, Shinji did not make a move; instead, he carefully observed the surroundings.
The appearance of flesh puppets in large batches meant the Propagation Hegemon had targeted this place, but the Sixth Ring World was singular. Shinji didn't believe the Plague Hegemon would turn a blind eye to the Propagation Hegemon's actions.
After pondering for a moment, Shinji said to Arcane beside him, "I'm going to look elsewhere!"
Whoosh...
Without waiting for Arcane to agree, Shinji soared into the sky, transforming into a streak of rainbow light and vanishing over the horizon in the blink of an eye.
His speed was so fast that let alone the fellow Lampbearers, even the Storm Sorcerer Supreme atop the Knowledge Tower let out a soft exclamation of surprise. Even for him, a Sorcerer Supreme, conventional flight speed could not reach such a level!
On Shinji's side, it took only a few moments to arrive before a polluted zone.
If the appearance of flesh puppets was evidence of the Propagation Hegemon's invasion of the Sixth Ring World, then the polluted zones spread throughout the world were the ironclad proof of the Plague Hegemon's invasion.
However, no matter how Shinji observed, he found nothing unusual within the polluted zone.
Refusing to give up, he vanished with a whoosh and soon arrived at another polluted zone.
"Why is it like this?"
He frowned slightly.
This polluted zone was the same as the previous one—no abnormalities, as if the Plague Hegemon had no reaction whatsoever to the Propagation Hegemon's arrival.
"Impossible! They are both unmitigated predators; they cannot possibly get along in harmony like this!"
Having experienced T33, Shinji knew very well how enraged the Propagation Hegemon became when facing a competitor for a world's energy. Thus, he did not believe the Plague Hegemon and the Propagation Hegemon—these two super-predators—could coexist peacefully.
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