Chapter 235
▪️LEGION OF CHOSEN ONES
"...I truly have never realized that the Chosen Ones have grown this much..."
Standing over the outer walls of the castle, the Saintess, Alice, gazed down at the thousands of densely packed players gathered below with a hint of wonder within her expression.
Although she knew that the Divine Matriarch had summoned Chosen Ones from other realms multiple times over the past few months, she had never truly realized its extent, as her activities were solely confined within the proximity of the Chosen City, primarily due to her role as the administrative NPC in charge of overseeing the day-to-day tasks of the players and such...
On normal days, all she did was continuously assign tasks to every players or coordinate the work in the church.
In such situation, even though Alice was aware that the Chosen Ones were increasing in number and growing stronger with each passing day, she didn't really feel it firsthand for herself...
At most, she had only learned from Li Mu that more than two thousand Chosen Ones, with most of them being at Iron-rank, had been mobilized when players pursued some human mercenaries that invaded the territory.
At that time, their rapidly growing strength had already astonished her, but she hadn't expected it to be far from their limit!
Only ten days had passed, yet the majority of the Chosen Ones have already advanced to the Iron-rank!
Great Mother of Nature above!
How terrifying was this speed?
Did the Goddess had foreseen all of this, too?
"Matriarch...just what kind of monsters have you summoned."
Alice was deeply shaken as she subconsciously gestured a tree-shaped symbol upon her chest.
"With almost ten thousand Chosen Ones, strategically placing each of them along the outer walls would prevent the Orcs from approaching the Elven Forest, unless the enemy decides to summon their Totem Guardians." Evé while masquerading as Zero stated confidently as she gazed at the players down below.
Black Dragon Castle originally only had one incomplete wall that surrounds it. However, over these past ten days, the Goddess had assigned daily tasks to reinforced the preexisting walls, and with the assistance of the Chosen Ones, the outer boundary of Black Dragon Castle now featured a ten-meter-tall fortification.
However, due to its rushed construction, the completed wall wasn't particularly sturdy.
Fortunately, Moe Moe Committee, along with the help of some experienced natives, managed to create a simplified version of the defensive core using the blueprints that was provided by the Goddess and this core was then relocated inside the Black castle.
Afterwards, the Saintess had also sent the Goddess statue from the Central Temple.
Once the core had been linked to the statue, although it couldn't generate a nearly flawless defensive divine spell like the original core in Blackrock Castle, the simplified core provided a reinforcement buff to the entire Black Dragon Castle upon its activation.
This significantly enhanced the wall's defenses, rendering it nearly impregnable.
After listening to the explanation of Zero, Alice subconsciously glanced at her and nodded in agreement.
The Saintess couldn't help but mutter to herself, "... If one day the Chosen Ones can recreate the Divine Matriarch's Legion of hundred thousand-strong Nature Warriors, "I can't even imagine what kind of spectacle would that be?"
Evé raised an eyebrow in secret.
A Legion of hundred thousand players?
Such numbers would be an understatement.
After all, the terror of the Fourth Cataclysm hadn't truly reached its pinnacle yet...¹
As the NPCs observed the players below the walls, the players themselves were also gazing up at the NPCs standing atop of the walls.
"This is truly an unprecedented grand event! Almost all the NPCs I know are here!"
"Alice, Aél, Zero, Berserker, Thranduil... huh? Is Rose even here too?"
"Rose as in...the Spider Queen?"
"Yes, that expressionless Arachnea over there."
"Ohhh... she's dressed quite skimpily. Isn't she cold?"
"She's an NPC, not a player. Why would she be cold?"
"Maybe it's because her strength is at the legendary-rank. Don't be fooled by her small size....her real body is really huge, and her specialty is making skewered meat."
"Skewered meat?"²
"A-Ahem...just pretend you didn't heard that."
"What about the Godwarden Zero, where is she?"
"Ah, she's the one standing next to Alice in black armor."
"Ohh, long legs! Nice~"
"Tch, you're already amazed by this? Just wait till you see the Goddess..."
"The Goddess? I already saw her when I first logged into the game and her 3D model is indeed quite fantastic! She's definitely my favorite."
"The Goddess is even more fantastic once you see her in person within the game."
"You can see her in the game too? Isn't the Goddess just a background character?"
"...Background character? Haven't you watched some ElvKing videos? The Goddess is far from just a background character, she's our faction's main pillar, you know..."
An hour quickly passed amidst the idle chatter and almost all the players who could attend the assembly had already gathered by now.
At this moment, gathered beneath the Black Dragon Castle, a massive crowd had formed, numbering over nine thousand five hundred people!
Among them, more than half were affiliated with the four major guilds.
With these guilds having more members, the advantages of being a member of a large guild became apparent.
That is... unity and organization.
Whrn viewed from above the castle, it became clear that the playerbase had divided into four distinct groups, with each player belonging to either one of the four major guilds, while smaller guilds and solo players were easily dwarfed by the big four.
The rowdiest and most chaotic players tended to come from recently established smaller guilds or were solo players. On the other hand, members of the Big Four, in particular, displayed considerably more discipline, thanks to the supervision of their respective leaders.
Especially the original three major guilds!
Raids in Elven Kingdom is much more massive and realistic compared to other online games.
Having gone through numerous Raid Events, seasoned and more experienced players had grasped the significance of unity and discipline during such massive operations. As a result, not only the guild leaders but also the ordinary members willingly adhered to the rules whenever a Raid Event took place.
Perched atop the city walls, Evé felt immense satisfaction as she silently observed the players. Unlike Alice and the others, as the game system's creator, Evé had access to additional information, such as players' guild affiliations, levels, and statuses. She could even manipulate her divine power to create a mini-map that shows real-time positions of each player within her consciousness.
Suddenly, she had the feeling that she was playing a massive real-time strategy game, with the players as her army units.
This is something she had never experienced before!
"This feels good!" Evé nodded to herself and began to settle the assembly task and issue some new ones.
[❗]
[Assembly complete : All Players who successfully arrived at the rendezvous point shall receive '100' contribution points.]
[❗]
[Selection of Legion Commander : Guilds with over '1000' members shall be given the right to select one player to be given the role of "Legion Commander."]
[Legion Commander : Gain the exclusive title "Legion Commander" and create a special team, "Legion of Chosen Ones" during warfare, and receive the Goddess' 'favour' as a blessing.]
[Goddess Favour : All players in the Legion shall receive an additional 5% contribution points when completing war tasks.]
"Commander role?"
"Are the devs finally letting a player become a commander?"
Upon reading the content of the notification message, players were stirred into a commotion.
In previous major events, due to the relatively low number of participants, the players had only spontaneously formed a rudimentary command structure.
In the past, the one who usually took on the unofficial commanding role was Li Mu.
However, as the concurrent participant numbers surged from two thousand to over ten thousand during this entire event, Evé had made the decision to officially appoint an authoritative figure among the Chosen ones to maintain better control over the crowd in a more precise and efficient manner.
She might have been the Supreme Commander, but she wouldn't micro-manage the players. Instead, she would only oversee the legions formed by the players themselves, and each legion would have its own independent Commanders that managed it.
In other words, Evé was just 'formalizing' things.
Currently, there are only four guilds with over a thousand members, so ultimately, the four Chosen Legions would be centered around these major guilds, with other non-member players can attach themselves to them.
As for who the Legion Commanders would be, Evé would let the players decide for themselves but she could already make an educated guess.
And sure enough, shortly after this announcement, the players had already chosen their respective Legion Commanders.
The familiar faces included Li Mu, Strir-FriedTomato, and Transformer Ji Gang.
However, she was slightly surprised when Evé saw the commander chosen by Moe Moe Committee.
"Boxlunch?"
It wasn't their Guildmaster Little Salty Cat or even HootyBird, but actually, the highest-leveled player on the entire server—Boxlunch.
Upon closer inspection, Evé realized that at some point, this rather reclusive player had somehow joined Salty Cat's guild.
"It's somewhat understandable. Neither Salty Cat nor HootyBird are known for their leadership skills, but Boxlunch often leads his own combat team so he does have some capabilities as a leader. And if I'm not mistaken, Nightingale and Salty Cat are pretty close friends, so maybe Salty Cat had gotten Boxlunch into Moe Moe through her connections with Nightingale..."
Evé speculated showing slight interest.
After the players had selected their Legion Commanders and formed legions centered around their guilds, a new system message appeared to everyone.
[❗ ]
[Four Legion Commanders, please ascend to the city walls to receive war tasks!]
Several moments later, four players climbed up the castle wall and approached Evé and the other NPCs, with each of them displaying a different set of emotions.
Li Mu appeared calm and respectful, adopting a humble demeanor.
Meanwhile, Tomato exuded a strong sense of determination and unwavering confidence.
Boxlunch on the other hand was silent and reserved, like a dormant volcano on the brink of eruption.
Finally Ji Gang seemed totally excited and could hardly suppress his inner excitement...
Afterwards, a scripted cutscene began.
At that moment, all players' assembled at the venue automatically moved their heads and focused their views towards the castle walls in unison.
The game's background music also changed into a more powerful and exhilarating tune, as if a great army was about to march.
As she looked at the players representing everyone before her, Zeo spoke coldly, "Oh, Chosen Ones... In this war, I shall take on the mantle of Supreme Commander of the Elven Legion, and together, we shall smite the sinister invasion of the Orcs within our sacred woodlands!"
Her current demeanor carries an air of solemnity and coldness, complemented by Eve's serious expression and the underlying authority of someone higher up, causing the players' expressions to instantly turn serious.
"...Are you all ready?" Evé asked, looking at them.
"Ready!" the players replied in unison, loudly and firmly.
"Very well then!" Evé nodded curtly and proceeded to draw a tree symbol upon her chest, with her expression brimming with fervor and devotion.
"For the glory of the Goddess and the Elves!"
"For the glory of the Goddess and the Elves!!"
The four Legion Commanders also followed suit, gesturing to themselves the symbol of nature upon their chests while also solemnly shouting.
"Excellent!" Evé nodded again and began issuing various orders to the rest of the players. These orders were then delivered in the form of system tasks which are side-quests for the main questline, [War of Faith.]
After the Legion Commanders received their tasks and began descending from the castle walls to manage their respective Legions, Alice hesitated for a moment and couldn't help but ask, "Lord Zero, is this all right? Don't we need to issue a formal war mobilization or perhaps even a speech to boost the Chosen Ones' morale?"
"No need."
Evé shook her head.
"The quest rewards...are the greatest source of motivation for them."
¹ To reiterate, the term 'Fouth Crisis/Cataclysm' originated from a game called Stellaris wherein during the later stages of the game, a galaxy-wide crisis event occurs, known as Crisis. Chinese authors mostly use this term to refer to summoned players.
² This refers to the time wherein Rose skewered the players like barbecue sticks with her legs.
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