Xyrin Empire-Chapter 1423

(Continuing to ask for the annual work votes~~ won’t ask for the monthly ones for now...)

General Angelie was the most senior general who led the Expeditionary Army to Dark Moon hundreds of years ago, and now that the Expeditionary Army has thrived in Dark Moon for centuries and established a city, General Angelie should also be the city’s manager — at least she should be an important figure found in the council hall. Since the elves in this world can live for hundreds or even thousands of years, General Angelie was very young when she went missing, so everyone believes she is still alive.

We had the Iron Knights trio tie the three horses they brought, which had been practically useless from start to finish, aside, then the group came in front of the large building called the council hall, only to be stopped by guards at the entrance. The gatekeepers were two young Elf Warriors, whom I judged should have been born in Dark Moon after the war ended. Seeing the familiar outfits on them, Joseph couldn’t help but mumble: "Such a nostalgic feeling — how come the Knight Order’s equipment is still the same as it was hundreds of years ago?"

"It’s already good that they maintained the status quo without regressing," I mumbled quietly, "just think about the teleportation technology that is now lost, how many things on the surface haven’t deteriorated?"

"What are you all doing?" The council hall guard asked with robust voice, but without any domineering attitude; he simply was fulfilling the duties of a gatekeeper, blocking us—the group of seemingly strange "civilians"—at the entrance.

"Silver-spoon kids, go!" I patted Joe’s shoulder from behind, "Just say you’re here to find your mom."

Joe hesitated, took a couple steps forward intending to speak, but quickly retreated: "Is that okay to say? My mom hasn’t seen me for hundreds of years; she doesn’t know what I look like now!"

I smacked my forehead; intelligence of the elf guy with mother’s fondness and near really dropped straight down, fortunately he didn’t actually take my joke literally. By this time, the two Elf Warriors at the gate were becoming increasingly suspicious of us; I guessed if Dark Moon’s total only consisted of one Surface People city, citizens wouldn’t turn into any revolutionaries that might have already drawn swords.

"We’re looking for General Angelie!" Ultimately, it was Anna with a functioning brain, who stepped forward and shouted loudly.

"General Angelie?" The two Elf Warriors exchanged a glance and then one reacted, smiling as he looked at Anna, "Oh, you’re looking for Lord Angelie, no one has called her ’General Angelie’ in many years; those who do are basically those living for hundreds of years. What are you looking for Lord for?"

"Is it okay to report important military intelligence?" Joseph stepped forward, asking very seriously.

"Military intelligence report?" The Elf Warrior said in surprise, then laughed out loud, "Stop joking, what kind of military intelligence could there be in Surface City? Who are you planning to wage war with?"

Surface City in Dark Moon has developed peacefully for hundreds of years, the warriors who originally came for the Expedition against the demons long lost reason to continue fighting Dark Moon People once discovering the truth here, so the city is now in a state of absolute neutrality; Joseph’s military intelligence report reason is indeed completely terrible. He scratched the back of his head awkwardly, negotiating with the gatekeepers: "Can’t report military intelligence? Wait, let me think up another reason... Hey Anna, help figure out how to say so we can enter?"

The two Elf Gatekeepers were dumbfounded, the one who spoke first couldn’t hold back anymore: "...you citizens, if you’re bored with nothing to do, go sit in a tavern; continuing to make trouble here in the council hall means we’ll have to expel you all."

"You three really can’t be relied on," Bingdisi coldly watched for a while, finally unable to help but sigh, approaching the two gatekeepers, "Isn’t the teleportation gate about to open? Many people want to return to the surface, can we submit a petition representing some of them?"

"This matter, why didn’t say earlier," the gatekeeper spread his hands, "yet this can’t let you all enter, many similar people already came these days, Lord is having a headache over this matter. You don’t even look like the batch of elders from back then, how come also... hey, hey, what are you doing!"

The Elf Gatekeeper’s words were cut short by Bingdisi who impatiently walked straight towards the door, this female hooligan adhering firmly to the policy of "discussing with you is merely a courtesy, what I decide to do is always a predetermined option", so actually what kind of response the unlucky gatekeepers might give was of no real significance to her. Seeing the arrogant lady blatantly attempting to forcibly enter the council hall, finally in astonishment a hand went to the long sword at his waist: "Halt! This is the council hall! One more step and it’s considered unauthorized entry!"

Bingdisi at this moment had already placed her hand on the main door, paused upon hearing the words, and then with a carefree swing, pushed the door open: "Yeah, that’s right, I’m just intruding, so what."

"Guards! Someone’s intruding into the council chamber!" The elf guard shouted loudly, and then both of them lunged at Bingdisi, but as they moved halfway, they froze in mid-air: Qianqian froze their time. These two guards wouldn’t be harmed, after all, they were just doing their duty, stopping them was enough.

By now, the commotion at the door had already caught the attention of the guards in various parts of the council chamber. A large number of patrolling soldiers began to converge here, but Qianqian couldn’t be bothered to distinguish them one by one, so she directly activated the time freeze halo. Anyone approaching us would get caught in it, so soon there was a scene where a small team blatantly barged into the council chamber door, while squads of patrolling soldiers swarmed from all directions. The closer they got to the "intruder," the slower these soldiers moved, until finally, it looked like a still image of a bunch of soldiers frozen in formation within ten meters of the door, one-third of them frozen mid-air with glaring eyes...

Anyway, since we’d come this far, and we were going to meet Joe’s mother, we didn’t have to worry about being high-profile or low-profile. The group followed behind Bingdisi as she walked inside. The Iron Knight trio were dumbfounded by the bizarre scene around them. They were pulled forward by us, and only after entering this large building did they finally react. Joseph suddenly jumped up: "Uh, is it alright for us to just barge in like this?!"

"Why not?" Bingdisi flipped her hair, pointing at the elf guy who also looked shocked and uneasy, "At worst, you can have him beg his mom for pardon later."

Joseph, mind in chaos, sorted out the subject, verb, and object of that sentence, and said with a long face, "But what if General Angelie doesn’t recognize him? Joe and she haven’t seen each other for hundreds of years. By then, if the general thinks we’re making fun of her son’s matter, she might act more swiftly."

"Oh, true," Bingdisi suddenly stopped and curiously looked at Joe, "Elf boy, do you have any relics to prove your identity? Like a bottle your mom used to feed you with or a diaper you used..."

The female hooligan’s words were loaded with sarcasm, and Joe was instantly choked speechless, then, after thinking, he suddenly spread his hands in frustration: "I really don’t have any, everything at home has been sold off, the trinkets I carry my mother may not even remember, I didn’t think about all this when I came—Mother wouldn’t not recognize me, right."

"You’re going to get us all killed one day!" Joseph jumped up, pointing at Joe’s nose. "Your mom left you when you were how old! Now you’re freaking six feet tall and you go tell General Angelie you’re her son, would you believe that?"

"Not necessarily," Lin Xue interjected mischievously, fearing a world without chaos, "I once recognized a daughter just as tall as me, and I believed it later, didn’t I?"

"This has nothing to do with you." I pulled the Miss behind me, meanwhile checking the surroundings. We had passed through the door and a short corridor, followed by a long train of soldiers who were either already frozen or gradually freezing, and in front of us was a fairly large hall. On either side stood a few stunned council officers, standing up from their desks, confused as to why an unannounced group of uninvited guests had barged in.

"We’re looking for the lord of this place," Bingdisi casually pushed Joe forward, "to deliver her a son."

Joseph finally realized he was tagging along with a completely unplanned, chaotic group that might abandon ship at any moment, so he sighed resigningly. He shakily pulled out pen and paper to write his last words, hesitating for ages before timidly turning to Anna: "Anna, how do you write ’last’ in last words?"

At this moment, a clatter of footsteps suddenly came from the nearby spiral staircase.

The footsteps were hasty, sounding like a group of people rushing over. We looked towards the sound, and after a few seconds, saw an elf woman in plain clothes leading several people who looked like town council members appearing at the top of the stairs.

The elf woman was wearing a simple light green dress, with her light golden hair tied up high and coiled into a bun at the back of her head. She wasn’t very tall, yet she exuded a commanding presence. Although she didn’t seem very young, her appearance remained beautiful. Given the circumstances, seeing a female elf appearing surrounded by town council members made her identity quite obvious.

Joe’s body shook as if struck by lightning, and he walked forward in a daze. Two squads of soldiers rushed out from the side doors of the hall. Upon seeing Joe’s movements, they immediately charged at him: "Grab him!"

But Joe seemed to be completely unaware of his surroundings, just walking forward as if there were no one else. Qianqian had to expand the power of Time Freeze a bit more, and as Joe continued to advance, soon more floating "sculptures" appeared in mid-air on either side of him...

The elf woman, possibly General Angelie, frowned slightly upon seeing such a bizarre scene, seemingly confused, but she remained calm and slowly descended the stairs. Eventually, she focused her gaze on Joe, who had already walked up to her, there was a hint of curiosity in her eyes, but gradually, something else emerged: a bit of familiarity, followed by disbelief.

"Mother!" Joe bowed deeply.

Without a doubt, she was indeed the once most famous female hero of the Elf Clan, who led the Expeditionary Army to Dark Moon during the Fifth Dark Moon War hundreds of years ago, only to disappear with fifty thousand soldiers: General Angelie was still alive.

"You..." General Angelie, now a city lord, looked at the elf youth in front of her with disbelief. After hundreds of years apart, the latter was nearly a stranger to her. However, as a mother, that almost instinctive kinship intuition could not be defeated by mere time. "Joe? How are you here?!"

"This boy missed his mom, so we brought him up to meet you," Bingdisi said loudly, pointing outside. "Angelie, right? Could you first quiet down the soldiers outside? The house is almost becoming a wax museum, and if this goes on, we might have to freeze half the city."

"Who are you?" General Angelie looked in surprise at the group of strangers in the hall. She had come down after hearing the commotion outside and reports of someone forcibly entering the council hall. Upon arrival, she saw the bizarre phenomenon of Time Freeze, and coupled with the sudden appearance of an elf youth possibly her son, this nearly legendary female hero was indeed a bit bewildered.

"Mother, they are my friends," Joe quickly explained. "Without their help, I wouldn’t have been able to come here. Uh... we used a bit of force when we came in, there’s some chaos outside. Could you possibly disable the alarm first?"

Though still a bit unclear about the situation, General Angelie nodded immediately and instructed the person beside her: "Notify the guards, everyone back to their posts."

"See, our initial concerns were unnecessary," Lin Xue tilted her head slightly, whispering to me, "Mother and child are connected heart to heart. There’s nothing more accurate than a mother’s intuition—don’t say this General Angelie still knows what Joe looked like as a child, even though I’ve never seen Xiao Xue, didn’t I recognize my own child at first sight? You simplify the word ’mother’ too much."

I was just about to be moved by the greatness of maternal love when I suddenly realized: "On the other hand, you saw that with a prediction skill!"

Qianqian lifted the Time Freeze, and those soldiers who had been frozen were still shouting, rushing forward to stop the intruders. General Angelie surely hadn’t seen someone who could control time, so she initially thought her order was being ignored, but this commotion quickly ended. The confused soldiers who realized the misunderstanding left one after another under order, while Joe stood excitedly beside his mom. General Angelie tried to greet us several times, but her gaze simply didn’t want to leave her suddenly reunited son even for a moment, which we completely understood. Bingdisi greeted the long-separated mother and son from afar: "You two catch up first, elf boy, explain the situation to your mom. We’re going to rest over there."

Joseph also shouted from the back: "Joe, don’t forget to ask your mom to pardon us!"

Having served fifteen years as a soldier, he was a bit uncertain about the act of breaking into the council hall.

General Angelie finally turned her face toward us outsiders to say something: "Guests, please wait in the adjacent lounge for a while. I’ll have many questions I want to ask you later," then turned back, holding Joe’s hand and chatting away.

The staff in the council hall was basically all confused, but the officer’s orders were still effective. Led by a dwarf girl, we arrived in a rest room with a bit of elf style. That dwarf girl looked even shorter than Pandora, quick and agile, seemingly in charge of serving tea and water in the council hall. In a daze, she led us, prepared tea water for the guests, served snacks to the guests, and finally couldn’t resist running up to me: "Are you guys here to introduce godchildren to bigwigs? Still recruiting anyone?"

Me: "...They’re real children! We’re from the surface!"

The dwarf girl uttered a disappointed "Oh" and only half a moment later reacted with surprise: "Whoa! You’re from the surface?!"

"Why does everyone in this world have such distinct personalities?" Bingdisi waved her hand to let this tea-serving girl leave, muttering while Visca quickly beckoned the dwarf girl closer: "Sit here."

The dwarf girl hesitated: "But you’re guests..."

"When I say sit, you sit!" Visca glared fiercely at her, patting the seat between her and Pandora. When the dwarf girl finally sat down with trepidation, both the one-meter-twos leaned back into their chairs and exhaled contentedly: they came seeking psychological balance! These two spent a whole day in the Shadow City’s Dwarf District and Dwarf District, I knew...

We were lounging aimlessly in the rest room, not knowing how long Joe and his long-lost mother would talk. Qianqian squatted by the wall, studying the Otherworld-style fireplace, shaping the flames into various forms while exclaiming: "Even if we don’t learn much today, haven’t we done a good deed, right Ah Jun?"

"What exactly are you trying to find out?" Joseph seemed to have been holding back this question the whole way, "I always feel like you came here for some undisclosed purpose, what are you guys up to?"

"Leave out the word undisclosed, we’re here to save the world," I relaxed in the chair, stretching, "Have you ever seen us do anything bad since you knew us?"

Joseph thought about it and truthfully said: "I’ve only known you for a few days?"

So uncooperative!

Just then, someone pushed open the rest room door from the outside, and Joe and General Angelie appeared at the entrance: this mother-son recognition process was quite fast.

I could see that their emotions still seemed very excited, and even the mature and composed General Angelie’s eyes were a bit reddened. This mother and son must have had a lot yet unsaid, but General Angelie still allocated a bit of precious time for the guests.

"I already learned from Joe how you all came over, you all deserve thanks," once seated, General Angelie quickly composed herself and smiled faintly at me, "Your name is Chen Jun, right? Such a strange name... sorry, it’s not an insult, just can’t immediately tell which country’s naming convention it follows. I’ve been away from my homeland for hundreds of years, not knowing what the Surface World is like now, so there’re many things I want to ask you guests."

"We also have plenty to ask you," Bingdisi said with deep intent, "You probably know more about the Dark Moon War than anyone—especially regarding those four people."

General Angelie’s expression indeed changed.

Finally, I highly recommend Moonlight Little Sheep’s new work "The Girl is Not Below," Book Number 3040365.

Moonlight Little Sheep is the author of the transformation classic "Candidacy Saintess" from back then, returning now. The new book after "Saintess" continues the novel divine unfolding style, the protagonist is still a cheerful, peculiar victim of a crossing transformation case, those liking this genre, or those who read the transformation classic nine years ago, go support it!

Just to say one very important thing—Moonlight Little Sheep and his "Candidacy Saintess" were some of my earliest introductions to online literature, nine years of resentment finally fulfilled! (To be continued. If you enjoy this work, welcome to Qidian (qidian.com) to vote for recommendation and monthly tickets. Your support is my greatest motivation. Mobile users visit m.qidian.com for reading.)