Adriana got to witness far more bloodshed than she should ever have had to, yet she could not force to avert her eyes from what was happening before her. No, she had to witness it all with her own eyes. How else would she pray for their souls to their god? She had long been on her knees, tears streaming down her cheeks at the sight. How was such cruelity and barbarism even concievable, how could her new master go on with doing what he was doing right now? She could understand the need for some bloodshed to end the battle, even if she herself would do her very best to try and avoid it firsthand, if at all possible. But this, this was something else.

Rex's constructs tore apart every enemy soldier that came in front of them. Be it tooth, nail or claw. And then, from the bloody remains of the fallen soldiers, new blood constructs rose, clearly her masters doing. And yet, even those who atempted to flee the sensless bloodshed, once it was clear they had no hope of victory, where chased down and murdered to the last, their blood drained just like everyone that fell before them, adding ever more blood constructs to the ranks of Rex's army.

"You think this is uncalled for? I will show you, what you should be more than aware of. The atrocities your nobility keeps on performing. Then, I want to see you justify the need to let any one of them, or their servants live." Rex spoke to her a moment later, clearly having sensed her disturbed emotions, having finally decided to grace her with an answer of any sort. Of course, she knew. She was well aware of the corruption and cruelity of the noble houses. How could she not? She was the head oracle after all.

---------------------------------

She was wrong. Uterly and absolutely wrong. The nobles were corrupt? Of course they were. The greater something grows, the more power amasses in the hands of the few, and inevitably, said power will atract those who are less pure of heart. Eventually the seats of power will either corrupt, or draw into them the already the corrupt. It was a law of the world. And yet, she could never expect the level to which their own ruling elites had sunk.

Hours after Echlisiarchies reinforcing army was was exterminated, and there was no other word she could use for what she had seen, Rex's army had arrived at the walls of the capital of Marr duchy. With most of the army having been sent to reinforce the temple of oracles, it was far too easy for Rex's army to crash the city walls, breach them and begin the extermination of the people of echlisiarchy. Though this time there were also other humans, Svergi as Rex had called them. His half giant half human subordianates. The men of this tribe came through a portal, yet another suprise Rex had forced upon her, and then in short order proceeded to round up the surviving members, whereever they could find any, and caralling them in one spot near said freshly deployed gate.

The Svergi were much more lax with their own standarts for selecting the people. much unlike Rex and his personal army, when they blasted through any of the confrontations. Even still, she felt sorry for all the people who were both herded off to their lifes in slavery as well as those that were killed along the way.

And then they reached the inner castle. That too fell fast enough, no matter how hard those inside tried to resist. And then, after capuring the family member of the Marr family in the inner castle, tying them up like some cattle and dropping them on to a few of the larger blood serpents like some sacks of merchandise, Rex brought her further inside the castle. There, a while latter they reached the dungeon. And there, she saw the very beggining of her conversion.

What she saw was even more repugnant than whatever savagery she saw during the battles. Torture room after torture room, with countless tools she could only imagine belonging to a butcher shop. There were just too many such rooms. And then, a floor lower, on the second level of the dungeon they saw the inmates, or so they would definetly be called by whomever put them there. Regardless, she saw true horror right them and there. People with barely a loincloth covering their forms. eyes sunken and listless, no hope or desire to live reflecting in those hopeless mirrors of the soul. Many of the closer ones were missing limbs. some were even sporting extremely freshly seared wounds. Some were even still twitching from ghost pain, clutching a freshly missing limb.

And then, further in she saw the children. And she threw up at the sight of the first cell. It was a cell with a rather odd set up. Three of the walls were made with full walls, not bars as one would expect, and the only wall with bars was facing the cells of the remaing children. And inside, lords have mercy, she saw the stuff of nightmares, no worse. Even in the most horrible nightmares she could not ever come up with anything like what was there.

Relion worms. An extremely nasty flesh eating worm that burrowed in the cadavers of some magical beasts, slowly consuming their flesh and speeding up the decomposition of said beasts, however, they were also extremely agressive and due to their powerfull jaws and the amount of mana enriched flesh they consume, they had no issue with leaving their home cadaver and attack whatever come too close to it, possibly killing whatever comes too close, enlarging their collony grounds.

And there, right in front of the rest of the children, with a gag in his mouth, the boy was strapped to a table that hung in the air, perfectly displaying the child to the rest pf them. Next to the boy, was a rune diagram of the human body, with lines drawn from the arms up to the shoulders, then traveling on the same sides of the body all around it, not going too deep. covering quite a large part of the kids body, untill finally the lines burrowed into the figures chest.

A couple of Relion worms had been planted on the boys arms, just as the starting lines on the diagram indicated. Both worms had rather sophisticated runes over their bodies, glowing in a dark black color. And the worms, they had been chewing through the boys flesh in accordance to the lines on the diagramm, having reached just a bit past the shoulders, starting their winding path around his torso. The straps around the arms and his head prevented the kid from moving too much and the gag kept the boy silent, though from the overly spread and bulging eyes, as well as the constant quivering and twitching of his body indicated that the boy was if nor entirely, then mostly lucid for sure and suffering unimaginable amounts of pain. And then there were a few magial circles both under the boy amd in a few other locations around.

As if knowing exactly what she was thinking, her master spoke, as he waved his hand and the boys eyes closed, drifting him to sleep and removing the two worms from their 'tracks', lifting the worms in the air and squishing the life out of both.

"The circle on the ground prevents the bleeding out of the boy, as well as keeps him perfectly awake and aware of whats happening. And the magical circle on the other children cell is a soundproofing, denying any and all sound from leaving said cell."

"And the few rune circles around those two armchairs provide quite the pleasant enviroment around said chairs. Like temperature and air humidity. And the one on the box there is for maintaining certain temoerature in said box." Rex explained the use of all the magical circles in the near vicinity, then he looked at the now unconscious boy that Adriana was closing in on and frowned.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

"STOP." he comanded Adriana, forcing her to interupt her advancement towards the hanging boy. "He is a lost cause. There is more than just the Relion worms that were eating him alive."

Then Rex created a mana spear construct and flung it, piercing the boys heart and ending his life. The mana spear then disipated, leaving a hole where it had been, causing blood to spill out through the now open hole with relative tempo. Adrianas eyes bulged in horror as from the wound that was now open, alongside the blood another, rather slim,the diameter of an adullt index finger, pale looking worm wriggled its way out of the bloodstream of the boy, falling on theground and 'helpessly' wiggling there. With another gesture of his hand, the space around the worm started to gold in on itself, tearing it apart. Only upon feeling the deadly tugging from its sides did the worm stoped the 'helpless wiglling' and as if a bullet shot, flung itself towards Adriana, who was at the moment the closest living being to it. Of course, untortunately for the worm, the space around it had been folded in a larger area, and only then was it beign constricted, causing it to trow itself in the tearing space forces, prompty ending its life.

"I knew Marrs were using demon mantis for their sick entertainment, but to have even this kind of bugs and their usage elicits even more disgust within me. And each and every family of the twelve has a sick hobby they practice as a family. Zekes were cannibals, with extremely developed and specific tastes regarding the species and body part they wanted to consume. Marr, as you can see, have their insect love." Rex slightly shivered in disgust as he spoke the last sentence. "Rufus family is slightly more normal in that regard, even if it is messed up either way. They love burning their victims, whoever would they be. The Frolens do love themselves the company of childern. Those around age ten to twelve are particularily beloved for their sexual acts." Rex scrounged his nose in apparent disgust for that one as well. While no legal loli lover himself, such a category of people he could still try to understand, but the Frolens, well, they were on the shit list already and waiting their turn.

"And the same I could tell about the rest of the twelve as well."

Then Rex carefully examined the remaining kids in the other cage and luckaly, they had not had the chance to recieve any similar gifts to the now dead kid.

"The rest are clea,. You can go and exercise your need on them, but be quick, I have no desire to stick around here for much longer."

Upon Rex words, Adriana reacted quickly and did as told, refocusing the entirety of her attention tothe remaining kids. Though there was still obvious disgust and horror platered on her face due to what she had just witnesed. It took little time to free the kids, who, once released from the cage, and in the arms of Adriana, who whispered sweet nothings about how they will be safe now, that its over, and so on, they began to wail, their pain seeping out of their little exausted forms.

Rex, in the meanwhile, focused his attention a lot more on his constructs that were even now purging the city, and with his elevated focus, their precision and efficiency rose notably, speeding up the rate of the extermination. He continiued this focused destruction for nearly thirty minutes, when he was finally able to return his focus back to the basement room he was currently in. The children had fallen asleep after their heavy crying, the exaustion finally taking over. Adriana had slowly alowed thm, to slide to the floor, where they were laid out and sleeping.

"Want to add them to your little orphan collection from your hidden village?" Rex asked with a small smile on his face. His newest named slave was quite soft hearted indeed. Though he already knew that, since it was precisely why she was not alongside the rest of the oracles.

"If master would allow me to." She responded rather wisely. Rex could not argue with said response. The woman was quick to adapt, while still doing her best to save her personality from changing. Not that it would change just because she was now branded, Rex knew, but she could slowly over time grow colder, if Rex deployed certain, less than nice, methods. Then again, Rex saw no reason to do so. Adriana, after all, would be tasked with watching over the people she herself had saved.

"Sure, go ahead. I will lend you a construct or two to collect them."

"Thank you master."

With that said, Rex used his ever expanding arsenal of spells and tore a rather large hole in one of the walls, creating a tunnel ten or so meter long that connected the basemet to the surface. Then, through said tunnel, in slid two construct serpents, as Rex himself left, leaving behind an order to Adriana.

"I am off to oversee the purge personally. One you are done here, the constructs will bring you and your new wards to the gate. Be quick about it."

Without waiting for further response Rex left Adriana to her own devices and spent the next day or so once again expanding his own blood construct army. If he wanted to finish his purge before the start of Blythes next auction, that was getting closer and closer by the day, he could no longer personally be present to all of the citiy and village purges. And while he had already started on his force expansion, and indeed he had begun sending his construct forces to clean up villages along the way, he still had ten council families to take out.

And then, an idea came to his mind. But just how feasible it was, was another question. So, once the purge of the current city was done, and as his serpents split into more units to head out and exterminate the remaining villages, Rex retired to Elysion, having sent Adriana, Vella and their new orphans to the location he had moved the rest of archons from the hidden vilage, more than eager to bounce his idea among his women. Rashuun and Izumi being the most prominent of the women.

So, once he was back in his shard world mansion, and comfortably sat on a particularily nice sofa, with the two pregnant women on the other side, he moved right to the question at hand.

"So, I had this idea pop up in my head, but I dont know how effective it would be, so I need your input. This purge, while neccesary, is taking far more of my grinding time than I would like, so here is a potential solution to it. What do you girls think?"

Then Rex proceeded to explain his idea, which came down to a rather simple premise. He would erase a part of teh barriers, allowing the remainng ten duchies to connect to one another, at the same time he would anounce to all of the territories that within a month, their seat of power would be asaulted, brining their nation to an end. And it would be their task to repell the incoming army. That would allow Rex to anihilate the majority of the armies and leave the last of the purging to his construct armies he would unleash to finish the job, while he himself could focus on his girls and dungeon delving. Gods know, he had not had the time for that piece of entertainment for so long. And his hands were itching for aproper grind fest in a dungeon.

The duo spent a short while discussing the viability and efficiency of Rex's idea, coming to a rather pleasing conclusion.

"Yes" Izumi spoke "We believe it would be the quickest way to solve the issue. The question remains how are you going to deliver the news to the eney though? The adventurers guild has already left the teritories of the Echlisiarchy after all."

"Ow, that is not a problem, dont worry. What I need is your you girls to help me write the proper message to get them reeling and ensure the largest part of their soldiers, if not all, come to the battle we will be announcing."

The next hour or so was spent on doing precisely that- crafting a proper message to set up the stage for one of the biggest bloodbaths in the history of the continent, as well as the bloodiest one sided battle. After all, the blood spilled during it would be that of Echlisiarchies people. poetic justice that, as Rashuun put it as they finalized his message, and then, after a quick makeout session with the two mothers in wating, Rex once again returned to the Echlisiarchy territory, where he began his inacting his plan.

--------------------------------------

The next morning, the barriers slowly started to part in certain places, enabling the travel between duchies , even if heavily limited. That in and of itself would most likely remain unnoticed had Rex not proceeded with the second part of the plan. His ravens had been moved once again, creating a rather good coverage of the duchies, ensuring his message reaches each and every ingabited place within said duchies.

"IN A MONTHS TIME THE ARCHON WILL ENACT THE ATTACK ON THE DESPICABLE ECHLISIARCHIES SEAT OF COUNCIL. MARR AND ZEKE DUCHIES, AS WELL AS THE COUNTIES HAVE ALREADY FALLEN, NOT ABLE TO STAND ON THEIR OWN. WILL THE SAME BE ALLOWED TO HAPPEN TO YOUR HOLY CITY? AND THEN THE REST OF YOUR LANDS ONE BY ONE? IN ONE MONTH. WILL YOU DEFEND, OR WILL YOU WAIT AND WITHER AWAY?"