Chapter 54 Schemes

Compared to the heavy and tense atmosphere of cautious readiness on the surface, the bottom of the rift was a scene of utter chaos.

"Snap!"

As a sharp, piercing whip-crack echoed through the gloom, a shrill, screeching female voice rang out in unison.

"Move! Move, you useless trash! Charge, all of you!"

A female Drow, clad in an ornate purple-black tight leather suit with pitch-black skin and long, pointed ears, cracked her whip, herding a group of male Drow toward the steep, jagged rock walls much like a shepherd driving sheep.

"Charge! Break the human lines!"

The Drow commander whipped the air like a madman, completely ignoring the fact that the male Drow carried no tools whatsoever to aid in climbing.

Even though the Drow race possessed natural agility, figures still plummeted from the heights during the ascent, punctuated by dull thuds and abruptly silenced screams.

By the time the surviving male Drow had all scrambled up to the edge of the rift, nearly two hundred twisted corpses littered the valley floor.

Reaching the top of the rift and engaging in battle with the humans was the safest window of time these male Drow would ever know.

The top of the rift was blanketed by a dense, ink-like [Darkness], but this all-obscuring veil was entirely useless against them.

The absolute darkness that blinded surface dwellers was nothing more than a translucent veil to the Drow, whose [Superior Darkvision] allowed them to see with crystal clarity.

However, this safety was short-lived, for the Drow commanders and priestesses quickly followed right behind them, emerging onto the surface.

"What are you swine waiting for? Attack!"

Urged on by the Drow commanders and priestesses, they roared, bursting forth from the magic-induced darkness like a breached wall of black tide, hurling themselves toward the human encirclement that had long been waiting in readiness.

"Fire!"

At the command of the human leader, volley after volley of arrows whistled through the air with a piercing shriek, cutting down the charging Drow one after another and paving their path of charge with a carpet of blood and wails.

Human melee combatants formed a solemn semicircle in readiness, while priests held divine spells ready in their hands, waiting only for the appearance of the wounded.

Meanwhile, three high-ranking judgment mages stood completely idle—they were waiting for the Drow mages to make their move, preparing to counter them.

Among the human ranks, a combatant muttered in a mixture of shock and fury, "Damn Drow, have they lost their minds? Daring to charge head-on like this?"

"Hmph, take a good look."

The captain standing beside him let out a cold snort, pointing the tip of his sword at the poorly equipped Drow corpses lying in pools of blood:

"The ones rushing out here are all cannon fodder sent to die, not even a few of them have intermediate strength... This isn't an invasion at all; these are pieces of trash driven out here to die, they are cleaning house!"

And the facts were precisely that.

The Drow emerging from the dark veil were overwhelmingly of low-tier strength, with very few at the intermediate level and none at all at the high tier.

At the very rear of the charging force, within the dark veil at the edge of the rift, the Drow leadership watched quietly as one male Drow after another fell in pools of blood.

The whip-wielding commander, along with several robed female Drow mages and female Drow priestesses bearing obsidian spider holy symbols beside her, showed not a shred of pity for their kin, only naked cruelty and the excitement of bloodlust.

Just as the captain in the human lines had said, this was no surface invasion.

This was a sacrifice!

A sacrifice to Lolth, the Demon Queen of Spiders—the chaotic, evil deity of the Drow race who fed on conspiracies and agony!

In Lolth's twisted dogma, only the strongest who survived endless chaos and fratricide were worthy of her favor.

Those Drow who were the most cunning, the most cruel, and emerged victorious on the edge of betrayal and death were the true darlings of the Spider Queen.

Such behavior operated like an unceasing meat grinder, rapidly consuming the Drow population.

Yet what did it matter?

As long as they devoutly worshipped the Spider Queen and offered up a bloody sacrifice that pleased her, she would generously bestow her "grace," causing pregnant women in Drow cities to spawn dozens of infants at a time, much like spiders.

These siblings, born of the same mother, were cast into a deadly web of conspiracy and bloody training from the moment they learned to babble. In-fighting among siblings was a daily routine, and of dozens of kin, fewer than half usually managed to struggle through to adulthood.

Yet reaching adulthood was not the end of suffering, but rather the beginning of an even more cruel ritual.

Many Drow cities, such as Menzoberranzan where these Drow originated, prepared a "coming-of-age ceremony" each year for these soon-to-be adults—one they would never forget for the rest of their lives.

In human surface society, this "coming-of-age ceremony" could generally be translated as—culling the weak.

The male Drow now being driven like sheep toward the human lines were precisely the losers of these political struggles, the dregs of Drow society that needed to be pruned.

Unaware that they had been discarded, they still believed they were participating in their "coming-of-age ceremony."

And what they knew even less was that the coming-of-age ceremony of Menzoberranzan was a grand sacrifice of blood and life offered to Lolth under the guise of war.

At this moment, the Drow rushing toward the surface and the blades of the humans were simply the sacrificial offerings of this "coming-of-age ceremony."

The goal of the rulers of Menzoberranzan was not victory, but death.

Of course, a slim to nonexistent chance of survival naturally existed among them—provided they could break through this deadly blockade and rush into the surface world.

And this was precisely one of the goals of the female Drow commander: to let these weaklings, who had survived the blood sacrifice and barely shaken off their status as dregs, penetrate deep into the sunlit lands they loathed, using their Drow racial talents and the evil power bestowed by the Spider Queen to weave conspiracies, commit murders, and spread terror!

To scatter the chaos and agony beloved by the Spider Queen like a plague into the corners of surface civilization, embodying their dark dogma through action.

Only then did the three high-ranking judgment mages from the Vaneer Wizard Tower finally make their move.

It was unclear whether they communicated through magic, but the others simply saw two of the mages raise their staves as a faint glow simultaneously ignited upon them, yet nothing happened immediately afterward.

The staff of the third mage also lit up with a faint glow, but that radiance was slightly different, pulsing and flashing slowly as if breathing.

Within the dark veil, the female Drow mage suddenly froze, her expression shifting drastically the next second.

For she recognized the true meaning behind the inexplicable actions of those three mages.

Metamagic Technique—[Silent Spell]!

"Defense!"

She suddenly shouted at the top of her lungs to the Drow priestess, raising her own staff as a glow ignited upon it, preparing to strike the human mages.

Yet as the faint light on the staff of one human mage flickered and then died out, the spell she was about to cast instantly dissolved into nothingness.

The female Drow priestess beside her raised the holy symbol of the Spider Queen, shouting the name of her deity as she prepared to channel a divine spell. The staff of the second human mage likewise extinguished its glow, erasing her divine spell alongside it.

Taking advantage of this opening, the third human mage raised his flickering staff.

Eighth-circle, Evocation.

[Earthquake]!

"Rumble, rumble, rumble..."

The moment the earthquake struck, a chilling realization flashed through the mind of the Drow commander.

Could they, too, have been played for fools all along?