The Conquerors Path

Chapter 1056: Chapter 1054-The Grand Wards of the Aethelgard Capital

Austin POV :

“Did you have a good time?”

Orpheus said as she weaved through my hair. It’s been close to 2 weeks since I came here. I spent the time just relaxing away, enjoying the warmth and love of Orpheus. Had a lot of fun, I tell you, a lot of fun.

“I thought you would ask me about the whole situation with the Goddess of Death.”

I suddenly spoke.

“Why would I care about that flat board woman who doesn’t even know the joy of love and life?”

‘That pretty much sums it up.’

Feeling so, I just left the topic. Now knowing that she doesn’t give any shit about my contacts with the Goddess of Death, I just relaxed myself into the warm touch of her hand. We lay at one of the highest points of the Yggdrasil tree, on a branch, watching the sun set with the cool wind ruffling the two of us.

And for a moment, a hesitation came to me, though in the end I spoke my mind.

“I am a bit confused….”

“Hm? Tell me about it.”

Orpheus replied with a smile.

“Krave, I mean the Kraken, invited me to spend some time seeing the sea, enjoying it all, rather than just moving to my next goal. But I am hesitant, I….”

“You feel like time is running out, that you are being hunted and that if you rest even for a moment, things might turn bad.”

Orpheus finished my words, correctly understanding me.

“Sure, I can count this as a vacation and relaxation, but I am also really interested in seeing and enjoying what the sea has to give with Luna. Krave being a good guide in it all.”

I ended my words there. It was just the truth. What Orpheus gave me is a great relaxation, but I also want to see and enjoy the waters, but…..

“Since when did you start pushing away your own desires?”

Orpheus suddenly asked, surprising me. My eyes went wide for a moment, after which a helpless smile came to my face.

“I guess pissing off the Goddess of Fate gave me some tension.”

“Don’t let your duties eat another desire. You are MY son, a God. Don’t let your duties burden you. Do what you want, destroy the world, break it or recreate it, whatever you do, I got your back.”

Orpheus’s words brought a sense of great warmth to my chest. A relaxed smile came to my face as I responded.

“Sure, I will do what I want….”

“Good…”

And thus we just enjoyed the breeze of the day.

…

“You are back.”

Krave said as she saw me arrive back at the same position from which I left. Luna directly waved around my chest while I was looking at Krave and responded.

“Let’s see the sea.”

Krave smiled at my words, a wide, creepy smile from my angle, those eyes blinking with mischief.

“Perfect.”

….

“Come on, slowpokes! You are going to miss the absolute best angle of the gate!”

Krave said. She spun around, swimming backwards with a fluid grace. Her female form was practically buzzing with a manic, uncontainable energy. Dark hair fanned out around her face like a halo of spun ink, and a bright, genuinely thrilled smile lit up her features. For an ancient, god-like entity of the deep, she was currently acting like a teenager dragging her completely exhausted chaperones to a carnival.

I drifted forward at a leisurely pace, my hands resting in my pockets.

“We have all the time in the world, Krave. The gates aren’t going anywhere.”

“They might! You never know with the Aethelgard architects; they love moving things just to show off.”

She shot back, waving a slender arm toward the monolithic structures rising out of the trench ahead.

Through the deep indigo waters, the capital of the Aethelgard Dukedom finally revealed itself. It was a staggering feat of deep-sea engineering, a sprawling megalopolis grown rather than built. Massive, impossibly tall spires of jagged black obsidian pierced the water, serving as the skeletal foundation for the city.

Woven around and through these dark pillars were vibrant, colourful coral growths in shades of neon cyan, piercing magenta, and toxic yellow. The coral pulsed with a steady, rhythmic light, acting as both a natural defence mechanism and a street-lighting system for the millions of citizens dwelling within the twisting terraces.

“It is loud, and it smells like too much salt and overgrown fish.”

Luna muttered, her voice projecting directly into my mind. The silver wolf was currently perched on my right shoulder, securely wrapped within the secondary localised barrier I kept anchored around my neck. She hadn’t paddled a single inch since we left the surface.

“You’re in the ocean, Luna, the salt and the fish are generally considered standard features.”

I replied mildly. She let out a soft huff, her claws pricking lightly against the fabric of my coat.

“I still don’t understand why we couldn’t just spatial shift over it.”

“Because we are tourists today, and tourists do not do that. They walk. They gawk. They buy overpriced street meat.”

Krave declared, performing a flawless, unnecessary backflip through a localised thermal vent.

We approached the main thoroughfare leading toward the capital’s glittering perimeter. Thousands of aquatic beings swarmed the grand coral bridges—armoured triton guards riding massive, heavily plated crab-mounts, nomadic sea-elf merchants dragging glowing kelp-nets full of trade goods, and lesser nobility lounging in gilded carriages pulled by harnessed tiger-sharks.

It was a chaotic, beautiful mess of high society and desperate commerce. And we were about to walk right through the middle of it.

As we stepped onto the main entry bridge. A massive, multi-ton transport crab lumbered directly toward me. I didn’t break my stride. As the beast’s plated leg swung down, threatening to crush me, the spatial dimensions around my body simply folded. The crab’s leg slid past me, landing heavily on the coral pavement exactly a fraction of an inch to my left. The rider atop the beast didn’t notice the micro-shift in trajectory.

Two sea-elf merchants, locked in a heated argument over the price of glowing sea-grapes, walked straight into Krave’s path. Krave didn’t stop either. My aura suppression washed over the merchants, their brains unconsciously receiving an overpowering signal that the space in front of them was blocked by an immovable wall.

We were phantoms walking through a living painting.

“This is the Ossanreef district, the ruling family, the House of Aethelgard, had this specific spire grown from the calcified remains of an ancient behemoth. The first Duke was a paranoid little squid-kisser. He thought the abyssal worms were going to eat his treasury, so he ordered his weavers to bind the coral directly into the volcanic vents below.”

Krave announced, taking full advantage of the fact that I was handling the stealth. She gestured grandly to a towering terrace heavily decorated with woven kelp-silk banners. She had fully stepped into her role as our personal tour guide.

“Fascinating.”

I said, entirely neutral, watching a group of heavily armed palace guards march past us. One guard’s spear clipped directly through the space where my arm was, his weapon cleanly bypassing reality to emerge unharmed on the other side.

“Oh, it gets better, the second Duke, his grandson, decided the volcanic vents were too ugly. So he spent fifty years importing polished obsidian from the shattered deep-mountains to cover up the foundation. It cost him his entire treasury. The abyssal worms ended up eating him anyway when he couldn’t afford to pay his personal guard. I watched it happen from a trench about three miles over. It was hilarious.”

Krave continued, swimming backwards again so she could face us, her dark eyes entirely focused on sharing her wealth of knowledge.

“Your sense of humour is severely damaged.”

Luna commented dryly from my shoulder.

“I have excellent taste in comedy. Anyway, the current ruling family is much smarter. They realised that the real wealth doesn’t come from the deep. It comes from the land.”

Krave shot back with a wink.

‘She just loves the sea.’

I thought she spun around, pointing a pale finger toward a massive, distinct section of the city. As we drifted deeper into the capital, the vibrant, water-filled districts began to give way to something entirely alien to the ocean floor.

A colossal, shimmering dome of violent, golden magic stretched across an entire quadrant of the city. Even from a distance, I could feel the sheer, staggering amount of mana required to sustain it. The water directly pressing against the dome was boiling slightly, fighting against the boundary, but it was being systematically pushed back.

“Welcome to the Dry Wards.”

Krave said, her voice dropping into a dramatic whisper,

I narrowed my eyes, analysing the magical structure as we approached. It was a masterpiece of elemental and spatial engineering. The runes etched into the seafloor weren’t just blocking the water; they were actively draining it. Giant spatial funnels, anchored by massive crystalline pillars, drew the crushing ocean water out of the district and shunted it miles away into the open currents. Simultaneously, a secondary set of arrays was pulling breathable, oxygen-rich air directly from the ocean’s surface, heavily filtering it, and pumping it down into the massive pocket.

“They built a pocket dimension of air at the bottom of the ocean, just for tourists?”

I observed, genuinely impressed.

“Land-dwelling tourists with deep pockets, the Aethelgard Dukedom is famous for it. Human nobles, elven royals from the surface, wealthy dwarven merchants—they all pay a fortune to experience the deep sea without, you know, having their lungs instantly crushed into diamonds.”

Krave corrected eagerly.

We reached the boundary of the dome. The golden magical membrane hummed with a deep, vibrating frequency. Triton guards stood at the grand arched gateways, checking heavily enchanted passes and stripping surface-dwellers of their weapons before allowing them inside.

“We’re not waiting in line”

I stated.

“Of course not. Walk right through.”

Krave said, already stepping toward the shimmering barrier.

I didn’t even adjust my stride. As my chest met the golden barrier, my aura effortlessly synchronised with the ward’s frequency. The magic didn’t recognise an intrusion; it recognised empty air. Krave passed through with a delighted laugh, and I followed a second later.

The transition was instantaneous and jarring.

The comforting, frictionless glide of the deep ocean vanished. The heavy, undeniable pull of gravity slammed back into my bones. My boots hit solid, polished stone with a sharp click. The ambient, muffled silence of the underwater world was instantly replaced by a roaring cacophony of sound.

Merchants shouting in a dozen different surface languages. The clatter of metal mugs spilling dark ale onto cobblestones. The heavy scent of roasted meats, excessive perfumes, and unwashed bodies mingled in the artificially heated air.

We were standing in a massive, sprawling city district that looked like it had been ripped straight out of a wealthy surface kingdom and dropped into a glass bowl. Buildings of stone and wood—materials that had no business being down here—lined the dry streets. Above us, the golden dome held back billions of gallons of crushing black water, while massive deep-sea leviathans occasionally drifted past the barrier, casting terrifying, beautiful shadows over the bustling streets below.

“This is completely unnatural.”

Luna growled.

The lack of buoyancy hit her immediately. Stripped of the water’s support, she had to rely entirely on her own muscles again. She scrambled up my arm, her claws finding purchase on the thick material of my coat, until she claimed the absolute highest spot she could find. She draped herself over my shoulders, wrapping partially around the back of my neck like a heavily disgruntled silver scarf.

“It’s loud, it’s dry, and the air smells like cheap grease and human sweat. Why would anyone pay to be here?”

Luna complained, staring down her snout at the throngs of gawking tourists wandering the streets.

“Because they want to feel dangerous without actually being in danger.”

I said, glancing at a group of wealthy human nobles who were pointing excitedly at a horrifying angler-fish pressing its face against the dome above.

“Exactly!”

Krave clapped her hands together, her voice devoid of any of her usual divine resonance now that she was relying on actual vocal cords to push air.

“And the best part? The food in the Dry Wards is heavily spiced to compensate for the pressure changes, and the alcohol is completely undiluted! I haven’t been properly drunk in four thousand years!”

She didn’t wait for permission. Krave grabbed my sleeve—her grip still carrying the terrifying, latent strength of a kraken despite her delicate-looking hands—and began dragging me down the cobblestone street, ignoring the throngs of people my stealth casually parted around us.

“Come on, I’m going to show you how to hustle a land-merchant out of his life savings.”

She beamed, her eyes locking onto a multi-story tavern constructed entirely from the hollowed-out skull of a sea dragon.