Reginald

“Storm Lord’s Gale!”

Immediately upon hearing Nitya’s order, Reginald felt all the mana, qi, and psyforce of their 432 soldiers pour into him, something only possible due to the law armors they were all wearing. Then all that power was converted to the elements of wind and lightning through the influence of everyone’s Laws and he swung out his oversized axe.

A large storm wall blasted out from his weapon, pushing back all the enemies in their canyon right before they would have started to lose soldiers.

This was their desperation move, a technique they’d trained in for nearly thirty years to handle a case of being overwhelmed, and it was a testament to Lady Li’s commanding skills that the first time they had to use it was during the War of the Chosen’s semi-finals.

Earth was powerful—and it wasn’t just due to Lady Li, Lord Alvaro, and Isaiah. Every single soldier in their War of the Chosen army had at least a Heroic grade bloodline, a Rare grade race, and a middle grade Law Larva, with the average of each being a grade higher. And, while not all of Earth’s A rank talents were of the right age to participate in the War of the Chosen, five were, Nitya, Lady Krol, Mr. Garcia, Mr. Smith, and the daughter of Earth’s administrative leader, Ms. Davies.

Still, when compared to their opponent, the combined army of over a dozen A rank and divine forces, the resources Earth could provide were limited, so, while they were about equal in talent, the average Luck stat of Earth’s army was only about 80% of their opponent’s, and, as with their last two battles, this had resulted in slightly unfavorable battle conditions.

Lord Alvaro, with his Ruler’s Domain skill and his uniqueness which had advanced to Emperor, was way too overpowered for a fight between E ranks, and the law armor sets he’d made for their army, each at least Heroic in grade by this point, meant they were basically invincible if the entire army fought together, even without him. And this wasn’t even mentioning the powerful magical explosives, plagues, and other wondrous toys he’d provided. So, when their Luck was less than their opponents’, the battles had all started to have similar rules.

First, there was always something blocking the use of single-use artifacts and biological weapons, usually some powerhouse in the battle’s setting making arbitrary rules. For example, in the setting of this semifinals battle, using any artifacts other than weapons or armor which weren’t created by oneself was considered unfair and the local A rank would kill anyone who did so, both the user and the creator.

Second, there was always something which forced the army to split up.

The first two times, this resulted in rules which just enforced multi-zone battles, having three separate war zones with forces sent to a zone not able to leave and go reinforce another until all enemies in their own zone were annihilated.

But this generally wasn’t much of a problem. The two times this happened, Lady Li by herself, or with some help from a few of their other powerhouses depending on the rules, stalled the battle in one zone, the main army fought in another, and Lord Alvaro, by himself, destroyed all enemies in the third, the main army and Lord Alvaro then quickly heading to the first zone to help Lady Li.

In this semifinals battle, however, things were a bit different. The local A rank had enforced a set of arbitrary rules which forced the two armies to fight in three canyons, but, unlike the previous two rounds, no one could leave a canyon they had entered, and whoever controlled two of the three canyons at the end would win.

They didn’t have to send everyone in immediately, however, so Lady Li, as their commander, had sent some of their powerhouses into each canyon at the start, and then called reinforcements in as needed whenever they had the possibility of being overwhelmed, especially holding Lord Alvaro back for whenever the enemy made their final big push.

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Now, in a typical case for an army participating in the War of the Chosen with their level of power, this type of situation wouldn’t be difficult at all. They could just place Lord Alvaro by himself in one canyon and the rest of their army in another and they would easily win. But, sadly, the Earth army was not at all typical.

Unlike every other force able to get into the final 32, the Earth army wasn’t backed by a single god, let alone a group of them like the force they were currently facing, so they really cared about army points, the currency which could be traded in for rewards at the end of the War of the Chosen, not just their placement. This resulted in special cases like in this battle, where Lady Li wanted them to win in all three canyons, not just two, and, for a whole extra level of challenge, it meant their army couldn’t lose a single member until they won the entire war, something which hadn’t happened for more than several billion years.

Reginald didn’t know what was happening in the other two canyons, Nitya responsible for that type of communication, but, given their opponent had added an extra five hundred plus soldiers to this one, bringing their remaining count up to over seven hundred, it was pretty obvious the enemy was doing their final push. And, given Nitya’s order, Reginald wasn’t at all surprised when they received only a single unit as reinforcement.

Wearing the same armor as every other army member, a black and gray full body outfit made of oddly flexible metal, and holding a 1.5 meter long perfectly cylindrical metal staff, no different from the outside than every other army mage, there was no way for the enemy to tell who he was.

But then he moved.

In the period since Reginald’s arrival on Earth, Lord Alvaro had brought up all his Laws to high grade Law Pupae and then raised over seven of them to peak grade as well. This alone was terrifying. But, with his Ruler’s Domain skill combined with his Emperor uniqueness, all his stats were multiplied by a factor of 6 before any of his other boosts.

Then there were his two new Fabled grade skills.

Elevated Multi-Core gave Lord Alvaro six more core containers of the same size as his original, increasing his qi by 600%, but his combat power was more affected by his second skill, Law Steps.

Law Steps was a lot like the similar skill Elemental Steps. It was a movement skill which changed the way it operated depending on the Laws it was infused with. But there were some slight differences between the two skills. At the same grade and rank, Law Steps was demonstrably weaker than Elemental Steps when no Laws were infused, but, especially important for Lord Alvaro, Law Steps allowed for the infusion of far more Laws at the same time.

With a single step, Lord Alvaro’s high grade Law Pupae of Inertia, Kinetic Energy, and Atmosphere, along with his peak grade Law Pupae of Multi-Dimensional Geometry and Temporal Acceleration, were all infused into his movement skill at the same time, and he appeared between the two armies. Then, using his high grade Law Pupae of Plasma, Liquid, Solid, Gas, and Matter, he changed the nature of the air within his domain, allowing it to better hold mana, qi, and psyforce.

This was the technique which allowed Lord Alvaro to fight against Isaiah even when not using ruler’s domain to empower himself, and this time he used it to almost instantly create an array made up of seventeen separate fire and death related runes around himself, infusing them with his peak grade Law Pupae of Heat and Entropy.

Hellfire emanated out, and, over the next seven seconds or so, the enemy army was completely burnt to death.

“How are the other battlefields doing?” Reginald asked Lord Alvaro through the telepathic abilities built into everyone’s armor, using the designated open channel so all the soldiers could hear as well.

“They left the main force alone, reinforced this canyon with two thirds of their remaining soldiers, and then sent the rest of their soldiers and their commanders to the canyon Mila is defending by herself.” Lord Alvaro sounded mildly amused. “The idiots are now all dying from her explosives and D rank golems.”

The rules of the battle only said external artifacts couldn’t be used by those other than the cultivator who made them, but Lady Li could make use of Lord Alvaro’s skills, so she’d made golems, plagues, and other one time use artifacts of her own during her downtime in previous battles.

This wasn’t a secret on Earth, but it wasn’t something which had been exposed to the outside universe, so it made sense their opponent had made such a mistake.

Lady Li’s stealth abilities were too good, so the enemy wouldn’t be able to find her, and her golems and one time use artifacts were powerful enough to kill them all.

Earth had won quite easily even while not using Brom Karendesh or his assistant, who normally fought from inside war machines built by Lord Alvaro to hide their identities, but their next battle, the finals of the War of the Chosen, would not be so simple.

An army created from the combined forces of all the Primordial Humans, they hadn’t yet lost a single soldier as well, and, from the reports Reginald had seen, every single member of their army had maxed out stats, so their average Luck would be way higher than any force Earth had faced.