Louis remained unfazed, calmly responding, "I do not wish to steal glory. I just hope to do what little I can."

After a moment of silence, Edmond finally sighed deeply, as if relieved of a weight on his heart.

"Alas, since you've come, you might as well stay. To be able to hold down Snow Peak County already makes you far superior to most Northern Territory nobility."

He put down his pen, his tone carrying a hint of weariness, "Now the Northern Territory... is in such chaos, eventually some new power will need to rise up."

"The Dragon Blood Legion will leave, and the Emperor cannot keep his hand here forever. When the Southern Nobles come to claim turf, I also want to see if you, Louis, can take a step further."

He looked at Louis, without the usual scrutiny in his eyes, replaced by a subtle yet noticeable hope.

"These old bones of mine will collapse sooner or later," he said softly, "but if the Northern Territory can ever rise again... then I hope that the one who props it up at least... acts like a man."

The glow of the hearth accentuated the wrinkles by his eyes, illuminating the last bit of expectation lingering in his heart.

And Louis just nodded slightly, as calm as always, "I dare not, but I will do my best."

The corner of his mouth barely imperceptibly curved upward.

The old Duke's words seemed offhanded, but Louis understood that more important behind them were "recognition" and "nurturing."

The Northern Territory is already devastated.

Among the Northern Territory families, many are dead or crippled, and only a few can now hold their own.

If the Empire intends to rebuild its defenses after the war, the Emperor will inevitably need "new nobles" to fill the gaps.

Having successfully defended Snow Peak County, organized the most effective resistance to the Insect Tide as a "new Lord," coupled with the marital link to the Edmond family...

He is already standing at the center stage.

Just one more display in a decisive battle, a deadly Magic Explosion Bullet, a raid to annihilate the Nest...

And he will have the chance to leap into becoming one of the most important nobles in the Northern Territory.

This is precisely what he fervently desires.

...

The wind and snow have not ceased, yet the flames of war have not abated.

In seven days, the ridges and valleys outside Frost Halberd City have long become a battlefield interwoven with scorched earth and ice marks.

The Dragon Blood Knight Order, like the Empire's blade slicing through the Northern Territory, gradually sever the "blood supply arteries" of the Doomsday Nest.

Thirteen medium-sized Nests, along with two hidden false lairs, have all been completely destroyed.

Their assault is as sharp as cutting iron, heavily-armored infantry advance like an iron mountain, suppressing the insect tide from the front, while Beheading Squad Knights, riding red-eyed warhorses, fly through the wings like shadows;

High Tier Fighting Energy blazes upward, crossing with the Mage Corps' magic, each strike precisely hitting the nerve center of the Insect Nest.

Not a hair's breadth off, almost perfect.

Everything unfolds as smoothly as a tactical drill, yet it cannot hide the intensifying scent of blood and fatigue in the air.

The Dragon Blood Knight Order, ultimately, are not divine beings.

They are humans, a war legion forged from flesh, blood, and will.

Even the strongest Beheading Squad suffers casualties; even the sharpest Fighting Energy grows heavy through repeated slaying.

With their blood, they've torn the surroundings of Frost Halberd City from the quagmire of the insect tide, paving a path straight to the Doomsday Nest.

The Doomsday Nest has undoubtedly fallen into desperation.

Yet that "mountain" steeped in black mist and insect blood remains unmoved.

The Doomsday Nest still stands, poised like a false god, as if everything is its sacrificial stage, awaiting the final act.

...

Deep within the Doomsday Nest, flesh writhes.

It is a hall seemingly formed from the wails and blood of the dead, walls woven with writhing intestines and bone teeth, the ceiling dripping with milky white nurturing fluid, the air suffused with a stench of death, decay, and birth.

The Desperate Witch sits majestically upon a "throne" assembled from twisted human bones and insect shells.

Clad in a crimson floor-length gown, her skin pale and translucent, like a sculpted jade statue.

His face is stunningly beautiful, gender indeterminate, with lips always curved in a faint mocking smile.

Yet when he speaks, it is with a deep and soft masculine whisper, as if whispering decay and fate into one's ear, "…It's almost time."

He opened his eyes, blood-red irises reflecting countless battle fragments of the dying battles

Insect corpses burning, Nests collapsing, Fighting Energy spent.

All is clearly fed back into his mind.

"Death concentration... is almost there." he murmured softly, his tone akin to a lover's whisper.

In the next instant, he snapped his fingers gently.

Snap!

The entire Doomsday Nest suddenly came alive, letting out a piercing roar, a mix of a baby's screech and the shrill cries of myriad insects.

It was hair-raising.

Starting from the sac nucleus, an eerie red glow emanated from the depths of the nest, it was the "consciousness core" connecting all insect corpses, with every nerve seeming to be infused with blood flames, beginning to pulse rapidly.

Inside the incubation chamber, numerous dormant insect eggs expanded swiftly, cracking open, and the undeveloped "pseudo-offspring" gushed forth, resembling sticky blood infants crawling out of hell.

"Let every corpse in this world... become my tongue and tendrils."

A damp whisper emerged from his mouth, accompanied by the slithering at the bottom of the nest.

"Now, no one can stop this 'return.'" The Desperate Witch lightly licked her fingers, her smile growing gentler, "Welcome, my final feast is about to begin."

The "Doomsday Nest" has been activated.

The first movement came from the pair of raised arms.

Like a divine figure, the maternal arms spread wide, trembling slightly in the air, joints emitting twisted "creak" sounds.

A copious amount of milky white incubation fluid dripped from her eyeless face, as if a merciful Divine Being was weeping.

And her face—that face, a fusion of dozens of human visages, slowly lifted.

Every crease retained pleas and reverence, every open mouth softly whispered, "Come back... my children."

Her chest swelled slightly, and the next instant—

Snap!

The entire incubation chamber burst out with a sticky thudding sound, like a womb, as countless interwoven white and blood-red egg bubbles erupted, spawning upon contact with the ground, transforming into unformed offspring, struggling and screeching in plasma, releasing chilling infant cries.

Her chest and abdomen suddenly exploded, spewing large masses of egg bubbles, some splitting open in midair, scattering hot plasma and milky white insect embryos, landing to form a writhing nightmare.

The infant cries rose and fell in the air.

But they were not babies; they were embryos of slaughter, lives reconstructed after bones were snapped.

Each cry seemed to stir fear and regret deep within human instincts.

While at her lower half—that segment of writhing "spider base" also fully awakened.

Tendrils like columns, bones pierced into the earth, deeply buried in the rock layers of Frost Spear Mountain's belly, like roots of flesh and blood, voraciously consuming all surrounding energy.

Her body slowly lifted, dragging several miles of insect-shell passages, creating slick, rhythmic friction sounds as she moved, reminiscent of the tragedy of a giant infant sliding through the birth canal.

The moment the "Doomsday Nest" awakened, it was naturally the Dragon Blood Knights at the front line who first sensed it.

A loud command echoed in the knights' ears, "Put on masks, everyone in full armor—immediately."

The Dragon Blood Knights at the forefront didn't hesitate; they knew what the order meant.

All swiftly donned full-cover helmets, and the masks clicked onto the throat, sealing tightly with the breastplate.

Filtration talisman arrays and the flow of Fighting Energy intertwined within their breaths, isolating external gases.

The entire legion seemed to transform into a group of faceless beings in an instant.

Then, the earth trembled.

It was not an ordinary vibration but a deeper, "lower-frequency" resonance, as if the earth veins were moaning, yielding.

The rumble from deep within the mountain belly mixed with some viscous liquid squirming sound, drilling into the bones from beneath their feet.

In the next instant, a pungent odor hit.

Snow fell from above the nest, vaporizing upon contact, turning into pitch-black mist, spreading like the breath of mourners.

The knights heard a sort of whisper from "another world," as if not processed by ears but received through the marrow.

Someone quivered inside the helmet, "This is... a curse."

But before anyone could respond, the corpses on the ground moved.

Whether the knights fallen in ice and snow, remnants left by earlier insect corpses, or just a severed arm's bone, a segment of intestine, a broken face.

They all moved.

Driven by an indescribable will, they struggled, writhed, crawled as if summoned, entangled with each other.

Some crawled with broken limbs onto another decaying corpse, some bit into bones to forcefully stitch together, some stuffed shattered organs into empty cavities.

Combining, reorganizing, birthing.

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