"The great Lord of the Azure Abyss has contacted me and he has a new mission for us!"

ROOOAAAR

Sylvera stood high beside the altar, looking at the roaring crowd of red-moon nagas and novarians.

Liam and Ruvia were standing on a nearby roof and watched the scene.

Sylvera waited for the crowd to quiet down and continued.

"This time, we have two tasks to accomplish. Our first target will be a small town of crow-men. They are much weaker than the spiders or the rats we've recently faced, but they are quite numerous, about 1500, and more important, very mobile. So novarians will join us this time."

"Then, I imagine many of you have noticed the presence of our guest. Our second task will be to escort her back to her grandfather safely. Since they live a bit far, we'll plunder the town first."

The crowd cheered, eager to return to the battlefield.

"Except for a few guardians who will watch over our world, every one able to fight will come. So, let’s now organize a huge ceremony, may God witness our faith and support us!"

"May God witness our faith and support us!"

The crowd repeated and bowed before the altar.

While Ruvia rolled her eyes, Sylvera began reciting the war psalms that the tribe performed before each conflict.

It was one of the things Liam had carried out. In exploration, war, or conflict, there would be no such prayer as it would attract too much attention.

Like the beliefs before the recovery of the aura, he created many prayers that every believer knew and could undertake every day when they had time.

"This is really ridiculous," said Ruvia. "You should know that gods don't exist. You're just wasting your time."

Among all the nagas, she knew only Nevra and Liam's incarnation would not be offended by such remarks.

Liam said nothing but smiled mysteriously.

The young Valyr found it a bit strange and looked away in a huff.

As the chants echoed through the city center, a certain pressure slowly began to spread from the altar.

Feeling it, the believers didn't panic but became more and more excited and fervent in their prayer.

Ruvia felt it too but thought it was just her imagination and that she had gotten carried away by the atmosphere.

However, she soon could no longer ignore it.

As the chant continued, the presence became more and more significant.

For the believers, it felt like a gentle embrace; a comforting warmth.

For Ruvia, however, it was as if she was face to face with an immense predator.

Rank 2, rank 3, rank 4,... It quickly surpassed all the common sense she had. The pressure was so intense that she could neither move nor breathe.

Her eyes were dilated to the maximum, and her entire mind was frozen in utter fear.

She felt as if an immense pair of eyes were staring at her and could kill her with a single thought.

The feeling continued to intensify but was suddenly replaced by a different sensation.

The pressure was still there; it no longer exuded a frightening aura but more an aura of majesty and overwhelming power.

"Interesting. You should pay more attention to your actions, young Valyr mage. Not all gods are as forgiving as I am towards someone who is trying to corrupt their believers. There won't be a next time!"

Ruvia felt a majestic voice resonate in her head. She couldn't say anything and was completely stunned. The voice continued to resonate and prevented her from thinking about anything.

When she came back to her senses, the ceremony just ended.

Her whole body was covered with cold sweat and her view of the world was completely overturned.

The gods were indeed real. Her grandfather, no, the entire Valyr race were completely mistaken.

"But then why didn't they discover them at that time? No, it would rather be why the gods didn't make a move at the time? Grandfather told me; for research, the Valyrs didn't hesitate to capture the races that believed in the gods and experiment on them."

Her mage mind quickly took control of the situation, and she came up with three possible conclusions.

"Either the deities believed in by these tribes are not real, or the gods didn't want to intervene, or they are limited in our world."

She had no way to confirm any of these claims, but she personally leaned towards the first one.

Clap

As she was lost in her thoughts, Liam clapped his hands and brought her back to reality with a start.

"Now I suppose you understand that everything we've shown you isn't just pure fantasy."

...

A large black mass moved in a wide river. In the middle of the convoy, a large turtle pulled a small boat where three silhouettes rested.

Liam and Ruvia were talking together while Sylvera looked around, ready for any eventuality.

They had already razed the crow-men's town, and none escaped. Liam had lost about fifty mortal or apprentice warriors, but no naga had died, while many novarians were promoted to warriors.

Ruvia helped them during the raid and cast a big fog spell over the city with every all her mana. Not only did it limit their vision, but it was also a magical fog that weakened the senses.

Before they realized the problem, Sylvera and the great naga warriors had already killed the town's only rank 3 and most of the rank 2. Meanwhile, the novarians spread out in the camp and massacred the crow-men.

With several dozen nagas surrounding the town and shooting at anything trying to escape, there were no survivors.

This was the real advantage of mages among lower beings.

Everyone would recognize it. A mage is often more powerful than a cultivator of the same level before becoming a higher being.

Well, more powerful doesn’t mean that a mage would beat a cultivator or an expert at the same rank; it’s just that on the battlefield, a mage who has not to focus on defense would create much more damage than anyone.

However, while almost everyone could cultivate or become an expert, becoming a mage was very complicated, and even more so to progress.

Anyway, now that the question of the quest was solved, they followed Ruvia's directions and headed to her grandfather's place.

Even though Ruvia had hesitated for a long time before guiding them, she understood that if Liam really wanted to harm her grandfather, he could simply find him without her help; it would just take a bit more time.

In fact, she was still scared every time she thought back to the powerful consciousness she felt that day.

She had officially moved from the rank of non-believer to that of false-believer.

To explain these two ranks, non-believers don't even believe in the existence of gods and denigrate their existence.

False-believers are those who acknowledge the existence of gods and are well aware of their presence but refuse to put their faith in them.

For example, in a great plane where there are multiple gods, almost no one is a non-believer, but many are false-believers.

Even the saints of a certain god are somehow the false-believers of other gods.

However, false-believers bring so little faith that it would take nearly a thousand false believers to reach the faith value of a pan-believer.

It's only once they start to believe slightly in the gods that they move on to the stage of pan-believers and become somewhat useful.

However, Liam was satisfied. He had planted a small seed in her mind that would slowly grow as long as he watered it correctly.

After a few hours of travel, they finally reached the location indicated by Ruvia. They couldn't go any further by the river; they would have to cover the remaining few kilometers by land.

Liam took only a dozen red-moon nagas with him, including Sylvera and two beginner grand naga warriors, leaving the others on the shore to protect the group.

Liam didn't want to make a bad impression, so even though they could arrive quickly, they didn't rush and "walked" slowly while Ruvia led the way through the forest.

After nearly half an hour, they arrived in a small clearing in the middle of the forest. In the center, there was a small wooden cabin, very discreet.

As they approached, they felt a spiritual sense sweep over them and an old Valyr dressed in a white tunic emerged from the cabin.

He had the same peculiarities as Ruvia and was slightly different from the other members of his race.

He was stooped and leaned on a long magical staff engraved with runes.

At a glance, Liam saw that it was an extremely powerful mythril scepter, reaching the absolute pinnacle of rank 4 and very close to rank 5.

Although he seemed exhausted, he still emitted a very powerful aura that made the nagas shiver.

Mages focused mainly on energy and soul. Even if he couldn't use his energy, his soul was still very powerful.

As soon as Ruvia saw her grandfather, she rushed to his side and supported him.

"Grandpa, why did you come out? You're going to worsen your illness."

She forgot all her worries and was only concerned about her grandfather.

The old man smiled and placed his hand on her shoulder.

"Don't worry you little brat. I'm not going to kick the bucket yet."

He looked suspiciously at the nagas and especially at Liam. Even though he didn't perceive any aura from him, he felt a deadly threat when looking at him.

"Thank you for bringing back my granddaughter, but may I know who you are?"

Liam approached and clasped his hands in the manner of cultivators.

"Nice to meet you, my name is Lier Adlam."

...

Liam shamelessly created a new name and explained to the old man how they met Ruvia.

Relieved, the old man, whom Liam learned was named Ilbert Luminara, invited them inside to talk.

Liam entered with Sylvera and left the other nagas on guard outside.

He joined him in the living room, and they sat around a small round table, while Sylvera stood behind him.

"Thank you once again for rescuing my granddaughter, Mr. Adlam. I really don't know what I would do if she were to disappear."

Liam waved his hand.

"Don't worry. It's rare to come across a Valyr still alive after the Great War. After all, you were almost all massacred."

"What are you talking about? We all fled when we couldn't fight against the alliance of the crow-men and the Drakos," Ruvia exclaimed indignantly.

Ilbert sighed upon hearing his granddaughter, while Liam inwardly smiled. The gods had long since become masters of speech and could steer the conversation wherever they wanted.

The old man looked Ruvia straight in the eyes.

"Listen, Ruvia, the war was not the way you think. At the time, we Valyrs were nearly 150 000 and had over fifty celestial existences. We had many subordinate races and dominated the whole world."

His expression darkened as he continued.

"The use of spirit stones was already highly regulated at the time, but some of our celestial powerhouses became too much confident. Behind the royal family's back, they completely plundered several veins of spirit stones and used them to enhance their forces."

"When the will of the world realized this, it became enraged and launched an attack against these forces, directly flattening the city where dissident Valyrs gathered and several kilometers around it."

Liam was not surprised. It was the power of the will of a world. Although it was extremely powerful, it struggled to be precise on its own plane. It could only flatten everything on its path and often avoided intervening in its own world.

"Even though they had raised many other celestial powers, they couldn't even fight back and were all massacred in a few seconds." the old man continued.

"The will of the world then gathered the two most powerful races and sent them against us."

"Although we were powerful, they were simply too numerous. We were left with only about thirty celestial existences while they had nearly a hundred."

He got up with difficulty and returned with a small refined wooden box.

"At that time, we knew that we couldn't escape or defend ourselves. In desperation, the royal couple entrusted me with their newborn baby and begged me to flee with her."

"As my comrades fell one after the other, I, the great elder of the Valyr race and the former king, fled my people, carrying our last hope, while all the others activated the magic arrays and matrices of the capital and caused as much damage as possible."

He opened the box and revealed a beautiful golden seal, which he handed to Ruvia.

"This princess is you, Ruvia."