Chapter 1157: Silver-Blue Reaction I
The confluence of the river that emptied the Tyrant’s Lake and the Blue Feather River connecting Artorion, the King’s Ocean, and the Finger Lakes was a large junction. The Blue Feather River wasn’t small before, but once joined with the river from Tyrant’s Lake, it became truly massive. At its narrowest point after that confluence, the Blue Feather River was almost half a mile wide.
The land around the confluence was relatively flat to the east, while to the west were the foothills leading into the mountain range on the edge of the Storm Lands. With forces from Shatufan and Sentudon sailing south from the Finger Lakes and another force sailing southwest from Rolor’s Highcastle, Leon judged the plain to the east of this confluence to be the best staging area for those forces along the entire river.
Even if it wasn’t, then all three of these forces would have to pass through it to reach Artorion. The arks from Krizos were more flexible, able to fly where they pleased.
Since three of these four forces were stuck following their respective rivers, Leon, accompanied by only a few trusted individuals, set out from Artorion under the cover of darkness—literally, as Leon’s people used their armor’s in-built invisibility enchantments, while Leon used an invisibility ring he’d quickly forged while he worked out a design for a new armor set. Their destination was the foothills on the west side of the confluence.
Upon reaching the highest hill in the area, Leon led his group in making a quick landing. He didn’t give the order to lower their invisibility just yet, however, and chose instead to try something new. He called upon light magic and inscribed an ancient rune into the air. The rune itself meant ‘illusion’, but Leon focused hard on the idea of a dome of light surrounding his people, allowing no one to be seen within it.
Once he was sure the magic was up, he lowered his personal invisibility, trusting that the ships and arks on a course for Artorion weren’t able to see him. The rest of his party followed suit.
Alix, Alcander, Red, Anna, Gaius, Marcus, Anzu, Valeria, Maia, and Cassandra appeared beside him, and all of them stared north and eastward.
“How many, do you think?” Marcus whispered, looking strong if a little pale. Clear Day had healed him well, but he was still not quite up to one hundred percent. Leon thought he was up to the task at hand, however.
“For the force from Highcastle,” Valeria said, “there are likely less than a thousand warriors total in their four arks. Their ships, however, might have as many as ten thousand warriors.”