Chapter 132: Cold War [1]
"Well, you see, violence is not the only way to fight and win wars".
The middle-aged Demon grinned. "You can also win wars by starving your opponents".
Sir Alfred’s face turned cold as he looked into the Succubus’ eyes. "So Seraphina, tell me, you and I, who should be desperate?"
"Who should be scared?"
"Who should be shaking in fear?"
For a long time, Seraphina Duskveil didn’t say a single word as she looked into the deep grey eyes of the Demon.
She looked around at the distant castle which was still in stealth. Though she couldn’t see Dreadmoor, she knew its position as she could feel the qi densities of the powerful Awakened who were there and were ready to help the Demon to end her life if an S Rank battle did start.
’They came prepared...’ She thought quietly.
She thought of Ravenhelm.
The reason why she didn’t want to fight a head-on battle against Dreadmoor was simple, it was because the Demoness Sect simply couldn’t compare in a 1v1 comparison between both evil organizations.
The Demoness Sect were feared all around the world as an evil sect of Witches, but they were not at the pinnacle of evil organizations.
Zaratul’s Dreadmoor was.
At its peak, Dreadmoor feared no one. And it wasn’t just because of Zaratul, it was because of Alfred, it was because of Lilith, it was because of Pandora, it was because of Puck.
Together, they made Dreadmoor one of the most fearsome forces in all of Gomorra even without their leader.
1 on 1, the Demoness Sect simply didn’t have enough foot soldiers to counter the warriors of Dreadmoor.
And this was even more lopsided when it came to high-ranking Awakened.
This was why Seraphina was avoiding a head-on battle and was why her plan entailed hiding all of her subordinates, but now, Sir Alfred’s confident plan just put a big dent in her own plans for the war.
She thought of the implications of the words that the middle-aged looking Demon just said, she thought of how a cold and resources war was going to impact Ravenhelm and the answer she got wasn’t pretty.
The truth was that despite how it seemed that Samson gave them freedom to roam and claim the resources of the Midnight Forest for themselves for a decade, the truth was darker and harsher than that.
The truth was that though Samson never made an appearance in the last 10 years, his subordinates were still the rulers of the forest in his stead. And Seraphina dared not challenge this authority when Samson was still alive.
This meant that despite sharing the forest for 10 years, the Demoness Sect didn’t rule the Midnight Forest, the Druid Society did.
This was the reason why farmers from the surrounding Towns and Villages still came to the forest to hunt before now.
This was because the Druid Society still ruled the forest even with the recent presence of the Witches.
They have access to the biggest qi crystal veins in the forest, they have access to the best mines in the forest, they have access to the most productive greenhouse zones, they have the biggest farms and livestock farms in the forest, and they also have the biggest training grounds in the forest.
In the Midnight Forest, the Demoness Sect was the minority force.
For the past 10 years, all that the Witches got access to were what the Druids left for them and what the Druids left for them were crumbs. And they had no choice but to settle for it.
Afterall, power decides everything.
What this meant was that for 10 years, Ravenhelm had been starving. The ancient Witch castle was never fully fueled and resourced in the last 10 years, it was just barely surviving on crumbs.
This was why Alfred’s proposal made Seraphina wince, that was going to hurt the very foundations of her sect.
Seraphina’s brain whirred. ’If they truly follow through with this plan, we can easily last weeks like this at the very least, but at most, we can only survive for a month or two holed up inside’.
’Anything further and we’ll begin to cannibalize on ourselves to survive’.
’But even that is not sustainable,’ her eyes gleamed. ’At some point, we’ll run out of allies to cannibalize on and survive’.
’At some point, we’re going to be forced to come outside to search for food, sustenance, and resources’. Her eyes gleamed coldly.
These thoughts filled her head with anxiety, and the feeling of anxiety made her rage.
She snarled silently and glared at the middle-aged Demon, baring her fangs in a threatening manner.
Unfazed, Sir Alfred looked back at her.
Seraphina’s gray qi swirled around her like wisps of smoke, yet she didn’t do anything as she threw a brief glance at Samson who was quietly looking at her with an expression like he was daring her to make the first move.
She looked down and briefly paid attention to the powerful Trident that was in the grasp of the World Sovereign, then she snorted and looked Sir Alfred in the eye. "You’ll regret this".
BZZZ!
She teleported away.
"..."
For a few seconds after the S Rank Fate Sovereign disappeared, Sir Alfred stayed quiet and looked at her previous location, then he finally raised his left hand and gave the signal.
Elena understood and responded immediately.
WOOOOOOOOOOH...!
The A Rank Harpy blew the horn of war, and instantly the innumerable soldiers that were inside Dreadmoor began pouring out.
Elena led them outward, flapping her mighty wings even as the other Lieutenants of Zaratul’s army spread among the soldiers, taking points in different cardinal points of the army.
After that, they began spreading through the forest under the supervising stare of the World Sovereign.
The war strategy was not just to hold the Witches of the Demoness Sect inside their Fate Realm though, the real strategy entailed holding them in and forcing them into an endurance and resources war, then eventually forcing them into a cold war that’ll result in the end of the Demoness Sect.
The moment Seraphina Duskveil retreated, she fulfilled the final conditions to set the true war plan in motion.
With the Lieutenants of Zaratul’s army leading a specific quadrant of the army, powerful enough to protect them from skirmishing attacks, the first mission of each quadrant was to search the Midnight Forest in search of the Fate Realm.
By searching for Ravenhelm, they would be putting even more pressure on the Witches to not settle down to think and to make a mistake.
This was to accelerate the war and not turn it into a slow burn.
The search started.
BZZZZ!
War dogs, tamed Qi Beasts with enhanced senses and tracking abilities, and Witch Class Awakened led the search for Ravenhelm.
...
The war started and time moved fast.
1 week later, the hundreds of thousands of soldiers of Dreadmoor were still in a deadlock as they searched everywhere in search of the ancient castle of the Demoness Sect.
For 1 entire week, Seraphina Duskveil and her coven of Witches were forced indoors, forcing them to manage resources and not come out.
It was a quiet, patient, and seemingly boring war but beneath all the quiet, Dreadmoor was silently dealing damage to the Demoness Sect as they chipped at their resources and storage.
And during the past week, while searching for the headquarters of the Demoness Sect, the higher-ups of Dreadmoor’s army allowed their subordinates to go loose in the forest, rampantly hunting Qi Beasts non-stop to increase their power.
All of these activities happening at the same time created a loop that was extremely disadvantageous to the Witches.
While they were forced to hole up inside their castle with zero sustenance, their resources dwindling further with each day, their enemies basked in abundance outside as they hunted Qi Beasts and trained to become even stronger.
All the while, Samson watched like a War Dog.
He never slept, he never rested, he just stayed in the background like a stationery painting or a work of art, watching the war like a custodian as he stayed alert to prevent a potential S Rank clash before it even started.
Both forces continued their stalemate even as Dreadmoor’s forces swept through the forest like a plague, only avoiding the official territories and settlements of the Druid Society.
The first week passed, and the second week soon came.
Nothing much changed.
2 weeks passed, nothing changed.
During this time, multiple Demons and Harpies of Dreadmoor’s army kept on leveling up, growing even stronger.
Dante and Xoreth both leveled up once during this time as they occasionally hunted extremely powerful Qi Beasts.
The third week soon came, nothing changed.
And then, the third week also passed, and that was when it happened...
CRACK!
A tiny crack opened in the Fate Realm, letting out a small and elite team of Witches to sneak outside in search of food.
Unfortunately for them, Lilith was at alert for exactly a scenario like this for the past 3 straight weeks.
She detected the anomaly in the fate threads immediately.
They responded and officially, the cold war started.
The first major clash happened!