Only a few minutes later, Liora stood before the corpse of a wolf-shaped beast, whose aura was equivalent to a True Knight.

A tiny hole existed in the center of its forehead, signaling that it had died through a simple and clean strike.

"Let's see what will happen if it were to devour this beast...", Liora whispered as she took a glass vial out of the Space Orb and held it in her hands.

After carefully opening its cap, she turned it over and let the black blood within it flow out and drip onto the corpse.

The moment the Chimera's blood touched the wolf beast, an intense reaction occurred, like fire meeting water.

Countless mouths took form on the blood's surface, and they opened wide before biting down on the beast's cold flesh, devouring it bit by bit.

The blood was only a few drops at the start, and considering the beast's large size, its devouring was quite slow.

But as it swallowed more and more of the corpse, the Chimera's blood began multiplying at a terrifying rare.

Five drops, ten drops, twenty drops, fifty drops...

Soon, more than one hundred drops of black, squirming blood floated over the place where the corpse originally lay. With the many wide mouths on their surface, these droplets created a grotesque scene.

As a price to their increase in volume, the wolf's corpse had vanished completely.

Staring at the drops of blood that were gathered together, Liora's consciousness expanded, and she probed into it, examining it closely.

Instantly, she noticed that the blood had not only increased in quantity, but also in quality. It sounded strange, but it was obvious that it had become stronger and purer.

At the same time, the newborn consciousness inside it had grown stronger.

If it originally possessed no intelligence and only acted according to instincts, then it now possessed the intelligence of a very young child.

Evidence of that was that when it finished devouring the corpse, the blood immediately moved on its own.

With a swoosh, it shot through the air and attempted to escape.

Unfortunately for it, before it could go very far, Liora took action and stopped it.

She raised her hand upwards and cast Soul Annihilation, pulling the newborn consciousness into Nothingness and stunning it in place.

Then, she used her demonic energy to wrap it up and put it back into the vial.

As she placed the cap back, a crimson Devil Rune flashed on its glass surface, and the struggle of the Chimera's blood ceased abruptly.

It seemed as if the vial had become its prison, restricting its movements.

Seeing this, Liora placed the vial back in the Space Orb.

Her gaze landed on the place where the corpse originally lay and saw that a crater had appeared on the earth below, its surface covered in corrosion marks.

After observing it for a few more seconds, she quietly slipped away from this place.

She knew very well that staying in the Ancient Beast Wilderness for a long time was dangerous. Now that she had completed her goal, there was no longer a need to stay there.

--

The journey back to Hope City was uneventful. Liora seldom met any beasts, and the ones that she did meet were not worthy of her taking action.

Therefore, it didn't take her long to return to the city.

The moment she saw the familiar stone walls on the horizon, though, she immediately noticed something strange.

Although she had yet to enter Hope City, she could see that the atmosphere in the city had changed.

Since the humans had won the war and the beasts had been forced to withdraw, the atmosphere of the city had become almost festive.

Most of the soldiers had relaxed, evidenced by their carefree and happy smiles.

But now, Liora could only sense tension and gloom emanating from the city before her.

The air was frozen while clear murderous intent filled its interior, as if time had turned back to the battle with the beasts.

Curious, Liora couldn't help but speed up her pace. She quickly entered the city and followed the source of all these changes.

Not surprisingly, this led her to arrive at the large manor located at the city's center.

Being the residence of Duchess Lobelia, most soldiers usually stayed away from it, making it like a forbidden place.

Yet now, the manor was filled with people.

Part of them were soldiers of the city who were staring intently at the street before them, while the other part was a newly arrived army.

Wearing crimson armors engraved with a fire pattern and exuding fighting intent and a murderous aura, they stood out among the common soldiers and the personal armies of the nobles.

The weakest members of this newly army arrived were Knight Apprentices, while True Knights were extremely common.

Only Great Knights were somewhat rare, but more than a dozen could be found in total.

Clearly, this was an elite army. If these people were to attack Hope City, the city would not last for long.

But Liora's eyes didn't stay on these soldiers for long.

After she cast a glance at them and sized them up, her focus shifted to the front of the army, where a rough, muscular man was conversing with Duchess Lobelia.

The fact that the two talked as equals, coupled with the powerful aura that he exuded, made his identity apparent.

He was the Commander of the Infernal Army, a famous general throughout the Iron Armor Empire, and a person extremely close to becoming King of Knights.

"I didn't expect that Your Excellency would arrive so soon. I only got the news of your departure from the capital not long ago.", the Duchess's voice reached Liora's ears.

From afar, Liora saw that the Commander chuckled before replying.

"Haha. What else can I do? These are the orders of His Majesty. As a subordinate, I can only rush to complete his orders."

"By the way, Duchess Lobelia, do you know..."

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