CH655 Theolonium

***

Alex’s arms suddenly wrapped around her waist. Before Udara could react, he stole a quick kiss, catching her completely off guard and drawing a faint blush to her cheeks.

Then, before she could recover, he gave her backside a sharp smack, causing Udara to recoil in shock.

"What was that for, Master?" Udara asked, holding her buttocks with a pout.

"Stop trying that succubus act with me out here," Alex replied. "If you are truly that confident in yourself, try it somewhere more private and see whether or not I devour you whole."

The warning in his tone was playful, but not entirely lacking sincerity.

Before she could respond, Alex shifted his attention and reached out to the others through comms.

"SitRep."

"We have captured the base. All hostiles have been neutralised," Kavakan reported.

"We have secured all storage facilities and cargo," Silver followed. "There is something you need to see, Leader."

"Is that so? Alright, I’m on my way," Alex replied.

Alex and Udara returned to the Lost Heathens’ base settlement.

The Fury soldiers were attempting to clean up the aftermath, but the sheer scale of the carnage was far beyond what their limited numbers could handle in a short time. Instead, they prioritised recovering their spent crossbow bolts. 𝕗𝕣𝐞𝐞𝘄𝐞𝚋𝚗𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗹.𝚌𝕠𝚖

Producing those bolts placed considerable strain on their finances, so salvaging every reusable piece wherever possible was a necessity.

When Alex and Udara arrived at the warehouse, they found Eleanore and the scouting team already taking inventory of the goods stored inside.

"These look like they’re worth quite a lot," Udara commented as she glanced around.

Alex nodded slightly.

’Good thing I held back from using Special Warfare spells. Those would have likely destroyed half the valuables here,’ he thought to himself.

Eleanore and Kron Belloc stood together nearby, examining something closely.

"I heard you found something I needed to see," Alex said as he approached them.

Without a word, Eleanore handed him a chunk of ore.

Alex turned it over in his hand.

"What is this?" he asked.

"Theolonium," Kron Belloc revealed. "It is one of the best metals for containing and channelling divine energy. It is in extremely high demand among the Temples—for forging weapons and equipment for high-ranking clergy, and most importantly, for crafting divine statues for their most important sanctuaries."

"Is it rare or valuable?" Alex asked.

"Extremely rare—and extremely valuable," Kron replied. "To the right Temple, at the right time, what you are holding could easily be worth a high-grade berserk stone."

Alex let out a low whistle.

"That’s not bad."

"Leader, they have many large caches full of this," Kron continued. "If Brock Peyton has been trading this for a long time, then his resources—and the forces under his command—may be far greater than we initially assumed."

"I don’t think so," Sugud interjected from the other side of the hall.

He walked over and continued, "These ores make up only a small portion of the goods stored here. The scent of the Theolonium ore is faint compared to the other types of ore we’ve found. So unless they have another storage location elsewhere, they’ve only just begun mining this."

’The ore has a scent?’

Eleanore and Kron exchanged confused looks.

Kron even lifted the ore and tried to smell it himself, but he detected nothing unusual. All he could smell was dirt... or rather, the scent of raw earth.

Sugud took the ore from Alex and gave it a brief examination before continuing.

"If you look closely, you’ll notice these are all freshly mined ores. Not only that, judging by the damage to the ore’s mineral veins you can see along its form, I would wager they were strip-mined."

He passed the ore back to Alex.

"If this is truly their primary storage location, then combining that with what the ore tells us, I would say they only recently discovered this deposit—and they are extracting it as quickly as possible because they likely fear they won’t have the luxury of mining it peacefully for long."

"You got all of that from a single piece of ore?" Kron asked in disbelief.

Sugud gave a small shrug.

"Metals are the foundation of my life’s work. If I cannot do at least this much, then I would hardly call myself a competent metalworker."

Kron could only shrug in return.

Alex did not comment aloud, but the brief look he exchanged with Eleanore made it clear that he took the dwarf-elf hybrid’s assessment very seriously.

"They found something else over there. That’s the real reason Silver called you," Eleanore revealed.

Alex nodded.

Still absentmindedly turning the chunk of Theolonium in his hand, he walked towards another section of the warehouse, his thoughts partially occupied by how the discovery of the ore might affect his larger plans.

When he arrived, one of the crossbowmen stepped forward and led him down a narrow flight of stairs into what appeared to be a dungeon prison hidden beneath the warehouse.

The prison cells below were each packed with captives—dozens of them.

’It is a good thing I held back. If I had gone all out earlier, every one of these people would have died with the rest of the base,’ Alex thought, quietly letting out a breath of relief.

Unsurprisingly, most of the prisoners were native barbarians from the Wildlands.

Most of these barbarians were low in cultivation rank. However, their men possessed strong innate physical strength, while their women often had appearances and features considered highly desirable by most—especially with even the slightest refinement and cosmetics.

Unfortunately, these made them ideal slaves.

The men were sold for labour or used as expendable combat fodder, while the women were often forced into prostitution or made into servant maids for the wealthy and powerful.

Alex ignored the cries for help echoing through the cells. Wearing a cold, expressionless face, he walked towards Silver.

He found her speaking with a barbarian woman.

"Leader," Silver acknowledged immediately upon his arrival.

Alex gave a small nod.

"Why am I here? I already made it clear that all recovered slaves and captives would be handed over to the Black Scars to handle."

The barbarian woman immediately dropped into a kowtow.

"You are enemies of the people who captured us, right? Please... help us reclaim our village."

Alex folded his arms and looked down at her.

"Why should I help you do that?" he asked plainly.

The woman’s body trembled, but she maintained her kneeling posture, forehead nearly touching the floor.

Alex’s gaze remained cold.

"I think you are mistaken, woman. We are not agents of justice here to rescue you from captivity. We are simply another selfish group pursuing our own interests.

"In fact, if it suited us, we would be no different from the people who captured you—we could just as easily sell you into slavery ourselves."

***