A blood moon hung in the sky, casting this land in thick oppressive atmosphere.
Under this dim moonlight, a large merchant caravan of over a hundred people was moving forward...
From afar, this merchant group looked like those other merchants risking their lives for fortune on this chaotic land, wearing tattered clothes and patched shoes, appearing to suffer from poverty.
The women all wore head scarves and held scriptures in their hands, looking like nuns from city churches.
The men either carried weapons walking beside goods, or drove horses and carts at the front of the group.
What was curious was that this group's leaders were actually two women.
One looked to be in her twenties, while the other appeared to be only in her teens.
They probably didn't know—this appearance was simply the best prey to target in bandits' eyes.
"Hey! This is a robbery!"
Sure enough, when this group advanced to a deep canyon, a gang of bandits wielding steel knives suddenly poured out from the mountain pass, blocking their path!
The bandit leader held up a lantern and shouted:
"Drop your weapons yourselves! Don't make pointless resistance!"
In his eyes, this group was so large in scale yet had so few armed personnel—weren't they just delivering themselves?
However, the reaction of the group members shocked him greatly.
After seeing them, these hundred-plus people... showed no emotional reaction whatsoever?
Observing the guards in front of him more carefully, he finally discovered what was wrong.
This group was definitely not normal merchants!
He had seen countless merchant caravans on this road.
Merchant groups with insufficient strength would immediately show fear upon seeing them, while powerful merchant groups would usually smile or make a few mocking remarks.
However... this group appeared extremely special.
They were like those soldiers who lived by the sword, showing almost no emotional reaction when seeing bandits...
The moment he saw all these people uniformly draw weapons from their bosoms under their female leader's command, the bandit knew—he was probably finished this time.
What he had encountered wasn't a merchant caravan at all, but a well-trained elite force!
...
"I'm really fed up. This is already the fifth group of bandits we've encountered since entering the Holy Kingdom."
After knocking all the bandits to the ground with sword flats, Dorothy, dressed as a nun, stood among the fallen bandits complaining.
Elashia, also dressed as a nun beside her, smiled helplessly:
"Sigh, the Holy Kingdom is quite chaotic after all..."
After arranging all aftermath matters, Elashia and Dorothy led over a hundred of Elasia's most elite knights disguised as merchants, infiltrating the Holy Kingdom through the northern forests.
Along this journey, they encountered all kinds of chaos.
Rampant bandits, soldiers demanding "protection fees" at every turn, large groups of physically disabled beggars, religious figures using divine names to scam money, massive crowds of disaster refugees, corpses somehow dead on roads with no one caring...
These knights and Dorothy had all experienced Elasia's darkest era, but compared to the current Holy Kingdom, that era seemed like a golden age...
Most deadly was the blood moon hanging in the sky.
Before coming to the Holy Kingdom, the knights who originally thought there was only a blood moon at night discovered after several days—the Holy Kingdom seemed to have no daytime at all?
Only that blood-red moon seemed to hang in the sky forever...
After Elashia's explanation, these knights learned—after the Blood Clan deployed "Blood Moon Generators" in the Holy Kingdom, the Holy Kingdom could no longer see sun or moon...
Now the Holy Kingdom's people ate crops imported from the Blood Clan that didn't need sunlight.
Those things tasted extremely awful and yielded far less than previous crops, but at least they could keep people alive...
Dorothy sheathed her sword and asked Elashia:
"Little Shia, should we handle them the same way as before?"
Elashia nodded.
"Yes, this is the best method."
As a golden flash appeared in Elashia's eyes, this gang of bandits immediately stopped struggling.
After Elashia implanted three mental stamps in their consciousness—"I want to join Northern Fire to resist the Holy Court," "I am a noble warrior," and "I just saw nothing"—these bandits became the most noble and fearless warriors.
"Big Sister Dorothy, let's continue. I've completely controlled all these people."
"After they get up, they'll go join nearby resistance organizations on their own."
After confirming in the dim moonlight that no bandits had escaped, Dorothy immediately ordered the soldiers:
"Alright, let's continue the march! Just leave these people here."
The soldiers responded "Understood!" in unison and resumed their previous formation to continue marching.
Walking ahead, Dorothy looked at the group of bandits knocked to the ground and sighed to Elashia:
"Sigh, if only Little Shia's skill could work on high-level combat units too."
Elashia smiled helplessly.
"Yes, then we could instantly control the Holy Kingdom."
Elashia's mind control only worked on ordinary people, and because mind control only worked on ordinary people, those controlled could never awaken to become high-level combat units afterward.
So Elashia tried not to use mind control when possible.
Large numbers of fearless basic combat units were still quite powerful in the early stages, but wouldn't be useful in later stages.
Elashia knew very well—excessive use of mind control would reduce humanity's war potential.
Moreover... there was actually no need to constantly control the opponent's combat units in large numbers when dealing with the Holy Kingdom.
Elashia smiled at Dorothy beside her:
"That's why I brought you all along."
"The Holy Kingdom has few high-level combat forces. When we encounter their high-level combat forces, we just need to rely on you all."
"And if we encounter their high-level combat forces, as long as I control their commanders, their armies will be paralyzed."
"This is actually enough."
Dorothy nodded.
"Alright."
After ending this topic, Dorothy looked at the endless mountain road ahead and asked Elashia:
"Speaking of which, how much longer do we need to travel?"
The group had been in the Holy Kingdom for five or six days already. Dorothy didn't know how much farther it was to their destination.
Elashia thought for a moment and replied:
"Probably... about two to three more days of travel."
"That far..."
Elasia's infiltration force into the Holy Kingdom was all elite high-level knights. Even at the speed of traveling over a thousand li per day, they still needed several days to reach the Holy Capital.
This made Dorothy, who was used to crossing half the country with rangers in two to three days in Elasia, very uncomfortable.
Elashia smiled:
"After all, the Holy Kingdom is nearly twice our size. It's normal for the journey to be longer."
Looking toward the distant road, Elashia smiled:
"Big Sister Dorothy, don't be anxious. The exciting parts of a comedy are all at the end."
"And before long, the 'good show' is about to begin~"