The last thing Dalia heard was the angelic chanting that called forth the goddess. The last thing she saw was that authoritative gaze that immediately collapsed her ego.
Dalia felt like she was submerged in endless muddy water. Light, sound, sensation as a whole felt distant and ethereal.
Just…how did she arrive in this place?
In the outside world, Dalia's body relaxed, her large head falling to the floor. Her eyes glazed over without a hint of consciousness, however, Dalia had yet to completely pass out.
Elena watched her calmly, waiting for her to reach this state.
"First question: What is your name and rank?" She asked commandingly.
"Dalia Necron, Leader of the Black Dragon Clan's 64th Attack Team."
The response she wanted came immediately. Dalia answered with slurred words, clearly unable to consciously understand her own actions.
Elena nodded matter-of-factly.
"Good. Why did you attack me today?"
Elena immediately got to the bulk of the issue.
After all, there was no need to continue stalling.
The spell was clearly in effect.
The Judgement Chains were only a single part of a whole, a condition necessary to activate the true judgment spell that Elena had just used.
With this spell, she could coerce the truth out of her enemies without worrying about bias or trickery.
However, this skill had many conditions, the most constraining of which only allowed her to use this attack on those at the same level as or more powerful than her.
The Valkyries were a race that represented absolute justice. They were a race that viewed the world in black and white, disallowing anything that didn't fit into their classifications.
While this was a trait that inevitably contributed to their extinction, it wasn't completely negative.
For instance, the Valkyries inherently didn't have any techniques that could be used to bully the weak.
Even Elena somewhat mirrored this sentiment, which was why she sent the 16th Infantry to fight Dylan and his group before taking action herself.
Nevertheless, Dalia's appearance was a great lucky chance for Elena from the beginning, which was why she pushed so hard during battle without regard for the atmosphere or secrecy, aiming to take Dalia down as quickly as possible.
"My purpose for coming was…" Dalia began.
"To be the best in the universe."
"Elaborate." Elena prodded.
"I was given intel about a woman who was both powerful and beautiful. If I cannot defeat such a woman, my path will be destroyed."
Elena almost directly scoffed at the stupid and selfish thought process, but she put her personal feelings aside.
"What is the Black Dragon Clan planning?"
"The—"
Kak…!
Dalia coughed out a mouthful of blood as her eyes mildly cleared up.
Elena's face turned dignified as she pushed her mana, encasing Dalia's consciousness in a proverbial film that didn't allow it to resurface.
'Looks like they aren't completely stupid.' Elena thought to herself.
Dalia definitely hadn't returned to consciousness by herself. There was definitely some sort of restriction in place preventing her from talking.
'Luckily I stopped pushing it before it got too bad. If I question her so directly, I won't be able to obtain any information at all.'
Elena sighed. At times like these, she truly wished she could directly read memories.
Unfortunately, such a power was already outside the bounds of universal law.
"Whatever. New question: how many comrades do you have in the vicinity?"
Elena phrased the question to avoid triggering thoughts about the Black Dragon Clan in title as well as the overarching goals of the clan. As such, she was hoping the restriction wouldn't activate.
"65 million troops are on Beast Emperor Star."
This time, Dalia was able to respond properly,
Elena's eyes sharpened.
"And what is the strength distribution among them?"
"64,900,000 3rd class and below, 70,000 early and middle stage 4th class, 20,000 late-stage 4th class, 5,000 peak 4th class, 2,000 1st and 2nd revolution, 1,000 3rd and 4th revolution, 1,000 5th and 6th revolution, 10 7th and 8th revolution, 1 9th revolution."
An egregious sum of individuals, and an egregious collection of strength.
Elena finally found out the true scale of the enemy she was facing.
She finally understood just how grand the current confrontation was.
A plan that had spanned for several generations, a grudge that had been festering for an unimaginable amount of time, how could it be something simple?
Even if it was only a single part of this plan, it was something that the Black Dragon Clan put every single bit of its resources into.
But Elena had no fear.
As long as she moved smartly using the information she could acquire from her target…
She didn't believe the Black Dragon Clan could bring her down.
***
Elena moved swiftly through Beast Emperor Star.
Dalia had already been thoroughly used and discarded, and with her unwittingly giving Elena a considerable amount of information, the need to keep anyone alive disappeared.
Nevertheless, Elena covered up the battle scene to the best of her abilities, incinerated the corpses, and immediately set off.
Her destination?
One of three main bases on Beast Emperor Star that the Black Dragon Clan was acting out of. This was the most important piece of information Elena was able to dig out of Dalia before her brain was melted by the restriction.
'It's unfortunate that I couldn't find the second or third bases, but I don't have the power to face the enemies in those bases either…I need to move quickly.'
The base where Dalia and Dylan came from was the weakest of the three, made evident by their low strength.
Elena didn't plan to just destroy the base, she planned to use it as a stepping stone to unearth the rest of the Black Dragon Clan.
The problem was, she was racing against time.
The Festival of Fate would last 5 days, and with each passing day, the Black Dragon Clan's plans would be furthered and their hostility would rise.
Before they could push matters to a full-blown war, Elena needed to smoke them out and hit them first.
'If I want to do that, I need to destroy this base and gather information on the other two within the day. If I'm not prepared to strike by the time 24 hours pass, I'll lose.'
It was a little terrifying to think of. Elena wasn't even at the extreme peak yet, but the enemy she faced even included a Supreme, an existence who was on the very cusp of Divinity.
However…
Was it different in Eien?
Elena left the Valhalla Mystic Realm around the same time Damien left Calypto, and just as he did, she experienced more than a few time dilations.
While she didn't gain nearly the number of years Damien did, she was able to gain a considerable amount of experience.
She knew what the true universe looked like, and she had faced the most harrowing battlefields known to man, those that existed in Eien.
After all, that was a place where innumerable existences were massacred every second.
'Haha, compared to those Nox Supremes, the Black Dragon Clan almost looks like a joke.'
Elena's confidence hit an all-time high.
And within a few minutes, she arrived at her destination.
