Chapter 76: Ten Thousand Renown Finally Put to Use—Black Banner Changes Tactics
Hall of Renown was quieter than Cassian expected.
No caravan.
No shouting merchants.
The white-stone hall stood more than ten meters tall on the southern wasteland of Riftward, with over a dozen Lords already gathered outside.
Tobias was at the front.
When Cassian stepped out of the Warden Gate, Tobias glanced first at the countdown hanging in the sky.
[Hall of Renown]
[Temporary Wild Building]
[Remaining Stable Time: 00:27:41]
[Access Requirement: Possess a valid Renown record]
"I thought you’d go look at Crystal Bastion first."
"It won’t disappear in twenty-seven minutes."
Tobias laughed.
"Fine. Take the thing that can disappear first."
Cassian walked into the hall.
There were no public shelves inside.
Every person who entered received a separate list.
Tobias glanced at his own.
"I’ve got a Rare hunting map."
Rowan shook his head.
"I don’t."
Cassian did not join the comparison.
Two lines had already appeared at the top of his interface.
[Renown State: Widely Known]
[Realm Renown: 10,000]
Then came one short explanation.
[Hall Exchange consumes Realm Renown. Renown States already achieved will not regress through normal exchange spending.]
Enough.
Cassian scrolled down.
Low-grade scrolls.
Route maps.
Building Blueprints.
Seeds.
There was a lot, but he moved through it quickly.
A Refined Spatial Seal Scroll was skipped without a second look.
He already had a Rare Spatial Lock Scroll.
Same purpose, lower Quality.
There was no reason to buy something just because it was cheap.
The next tactical scroll did make him stop.
[Communication Seal Scroll | Epic | One-Use]
[Exchange Cost: Realm Renown ×200]
[Effect Preview: Seals a designated area from outside Communication / Public Channel access.]
He had no target for it now.
But a one-use battlefield tool like this was exactly the kind of thing that became hard to find once he actually needed it.
"Exchange."
[Communication Seal Scroll ×1]
[Realm Renown: 10,000 → 9,800]
Cassian stored the scroll and kept moving through the list.
Two pages later, his hand stopped again.
[Rare Field Plot Blueprint]
[Exchange Cost: Realm Renown ×25 / Blueprint]
[Personal Stock: 10]
The next line sat directly beneath it.
[Rare Moonrice Seed]
[Specification: Field Batch]
[One batch is sufficient to sow one standard Field Plot]
[Exchange Cost: Realm Renown ×15 / Batch]
[Personal Stock: 10]
Moonrice.
That was not new.
Forgotten Shrine had found a Moonrice Patch near the beginning, and Cassian had even sold Refined Moonrice Meals before.
But he did not have Rare-grade Moonrice Seed.
The ordinary Field Plot Blueprint in his storage had also been sitting there for a long time without ever making it near the top of his priorities.
The reason was simple.
Slow.
Ore could be sold once it was mined.
The Royal Hall could Recruit troops.
The Fountain produced something every day.
Seeds had to be planted, then given time to grow.
But "slow" did not mean worthless.
Especially inside a Hall that could disappear at any moment, when all ten Rare Fields and all ten batches of Rare Seed cost only a small part of his Renown.
Cassian selected all of them.
[Rare Field Plot Blueprint ×10]
[Rare Moonrice Seed ×10 Field Batch]
[Total Cost: Realm Renown ×400]
"Confirm."
[Realm Renown: 9,800 → 9,400]
Tobias stared at him.
"You’re going to farm?"
"They’ll be useful eventually."
"Didn’t you always think farming was too slow?"
Cassian put both groups into his Inventory.
"That’s why it wasn’t a priority before."
He kept scrolling.
More than a dozen pages later, a gold-bordered item stopped in the center of the interface.
[Region Fortune Duel Writ]
[Exchange Cost: Realm Renown ×300]
[Personal Stock: 2]
[Usable by a Regional Warden.]
[The challenged Region cannot refuse. The defender receives Contest Category choice.]
[Three Categories are randomly drawn from the current rule pool.]
[After the Category is confirmed, the initiator determines the Region Fortune Stake.]
Cassian focused on the first line.
Region Fortune.
He had only confirmed yesterday that it was not some decorative number on a panel.
Gold Veins changed.
The Battle Essence Spring changed.
The Domain Aether Vein gained new probability benefits.
He had already decided that if another chance appeared to fight for Fortune, he would keep taking it.
Now a method had placed itself directly in front of him.
Tobias saw it too.
"You just got five points."
"Which means I know better what they’re worth."
Cassian pressed exchange.
First Writ.
Second Writ.
No hesitation.
[Region Fortune Duel Writ ×2]
[Realm Renown: 9,400 → 8,800]
Tobias looked at him.
"There were two in stock and you really took both?"
"If I come back looking for one when I finally want to use it, there may not be another."
"Who are you planning to challenge?"
"Haven’t decided."
Cassian stored the Writs.
"First, I make sure the choice stays mine."
For the first time, he had actually spent some of that ten thousand Realm Renown.
He did not dump the rest into a pile of things that "might be useful someday" just to clear the number.
Eight thousand eight hundred remained.
Legend 100 remained untouched as well.
But the things he had actually lacked were now in his Inventory.
Ten Rare Fields.
Ten batches of Rare Moonrice Seed.
One Communication Seal Scroll for a battlefield he had not needed yet.
And two Writs capable of putting Region Fortune directly on the table.
Nineteen minutes remained on the Hall countdown.
Tobias was just about to ask about Crystal Bastion when the Shattered Marches Channel lit first.
Not an ordinary message.
A system-level notice.
At the same time—
Sable March.
Varek Sorn pushed a Black Banner internal battle review to the edge of his table.
The first page was the five seconds outside Forgotten Shrine.
The second was Sable March’s fourth place in the Ranking.
The third contained only one name.
Riftward.
First.
Nadia Serr stood beside the table.
"Someone in the Cohort is asking whether we should organize another formal assault."
"No."
Varek did not even look up.
"Not now."
Nadia did not argue.
The battle at the gate had already proved one thing.
Sending troops directly into Forgotten Shrine’s firing range only helped Cassian test whatever card he had hidden next.
She pushed another object across the table.
A thin golden Writ.
"What about this?"
Varek finally looked up.
[Region Fortune Duel Writ]
One had just been delivered to Sable March through Black Banner’s internal network.
It was not an army.
It did not have to cross a Warden Gate first.
And it definitely did not need to touch those twenty Rocketier firing lines.
Varek picked it up.
"Riftward has five Fortune."
"Sable only has one."
Nadia looked at him.
"That’s why it’s worth doing."
Varek activated the Writ.
The first step was only target selection.
[Please select the target Region for the Region Fortune Duel.]
He chose Riftward.
The system immediately displayed the simplest public comparison between the two sides.
[Riftward: Registered Lords 402]
[Sable March: Registered Lords | More than twice Riftward’s total]
No Hero list.
No hidden Troop roster.
No information about what anyone still had sitting in storage.
But this time, the contest was not about Cassian alone.
It was about the Region.
Varek studied the population comparison.
"He’s beaten us in personal strength, hidden force, and the Ranking."
"Then stop competing over how much one Lord can hide."
The Writ shattered between his fingers.
"Compete over the entire Region."
Outside Hall of Renown, a streak of golden light crossed the sky from the southeast.
No cannon fire.
No Waygate.
The light crossed the Region boundary directly and opened above Riftward.
Every Lord still browsing inside the Hall stopped.
[Region Fortune Duel initiated.]
[Challenger: Sable March]
[Regional Warden: Varek Sorn]
[Defender: Riftward]
[Regional Warden: Cassian Vale]
[Defender cannot refuse the Duel.]
[Defender receives Contest Category choice.]
Three options appeared at once.
[Troop Power]
[Agriculture Index]
[Resource Acquisition]
[Selection Countdown: 00:09:59]
The area outside the Hall fell silent.
Tobias first looked at the line saying Sable had more than twice their number of Lords.
Then at the three Categories.
"He’s not betting against you."
Rowan spoke from beside him.
"He’s trying to use more than twice as many Domains against four hundred and two."
Cassian did not answer.
His attention had stopped on the second line.
Agriculture Index.
Then his eyes moved to the ten Rare Field Plot Blueprints and ten batches of Rare Moonrice Seed he had just put into his Inventory.
Forgotten Shrine also held a layer whose exact rules no one else in the Shattered Marches knew.
The Deep Layer.
Time Acceleration.
A faint smile touched Cassian’s face.
Tobias noticed.
"What are you smiling at?"
Cassian kept looking at the second line.
"Someone’s bringing me Fortune."