Chapter 58 -58-The Eternal Night Gate

Chapter 58: Chapter58-The Eternal Night Gate

The expeditionary force gradually approached the city gates.

The heavy grinding of machinery came from within the walls.

Rumble—

The gate, covered in thick iron plating, slowly rose.

An elite cavalry unit had already been waiting inside for some time.

At the very front stood a middle-aged man clad in dark-gold heavy armor.

He was not particularly tall or imposing.

Yet his presence felt as steady as the city walls themselves.

Large patches of gray-white ran through his short hair.

A cracked metal eyepatch covered his left eye.

A broad-bladed war sword hung from his waist, its scabbard covered in dried bloodstains.

[Loki Horne]

[Identity: Commander-in-Chief of the Dawnstar City Garrison.]

[Level: Unable to Appraise.]

[Rank: Unable to Appraise.]

[All Other Information: Unable to Appraise.]

The moment Rudy saw him, he dismounted.

Loki also strode forward to meet him.

The two battle-hardened commanders embraced forcefully and struck each other twice on the back.

Bang! Bang!

John’s eyelid twitched as he watched.

Their way of expressing friendship seemed somewhat hazardous to the ribs.

Loki released Rudy first.

"What took you so long?"

"According to the original schedule, you should have arrived an hour ago."

The smile on Rudy’s face faded slightly.

"We were ambushed by a Dark Realm army along the way."

"Selena appeared as well."

Loki’s expression instantly became serious.

"The Nightstalker?"

"She bypassed Dawnstar City and entered the rear lines?"

"That’s right."

Rudy nodded.

"She also brought nearly twenty thousand Dark Realm creatures."

Loki looked back toward the expeditionary force and noticed the significantly reduced number of regular soldiers.

"The Dark Realm’s movements have become increasingly strange lately."

"They used to attack only from the front through the gate."

"Recently, however, small elite units have repeatedly slipped past our defensive zones and appeared on our flanks or behind us."

He paused.

"Fortunately, you were leading the escort force."

"Since you’re standing here, Selena must have been driven back."

Rudy’s expression became somewhat strange.

"She’s dead."

Loki froze slightly.

"You killed her?"

"You could say it was a joint effort."

Rudy turned and searched the crowd for John.

However, John was still strolling along at the very rear of the formation and had yet to enter the gate.

Rudy did not explain immediately.

"I’ll tell you everything once we’re inside."

Loki nodded.

"Fine."

"You’ve all had a difficult journey."

"The barracks, medicine, and food have already been prepared."

He placed an arm across Rudy’s shoulder.

The two walked into the city side by side.

"Drinks tonight?"

"I need to write the casualty report first."

"Then drink while you write."

"You want me to record the wrong casualty count?"

"Add a few more. It’ll make applying for compensation easier."

"How have the kingdom’s finance officials not hanged you yet?"

Their voices gradually faded into the distance.

The recruits behind them began entering the city in an orderly fashion.

The moment some of the NPC recruits stepped into the safe zone, their legs began trembling uncontrollably.

Some collapsed directly onto the ground.

Others clutched the belongings of fallen companions and wept bitterly.

The Luna Wolf players were in a completely different state.

To them, death meant nothing more than losing EXP and equipment.

Everyone looked around curiously, trying to locate quest NPCs, the Military Merit Shop, and possible Hidden Storylines.

John was the last person to pass through the gate.

Boom!

The heavy portcullis dropped behind him.

The wind blowing across the wasteland was completely shut out.

...

The Expeditionary Army’s registration procedures were extremely complicated.

Identity verification.

Military Merit identification numbers.

Battlefield zone assignments.

Camp and bed arrangements.

Class-type registration.

They even had to sign wartime military orders.

Ordinary players stood in long lines and would need at least several hours to complete everything.

John possessed more than sixty thousand Expedition Contribution points—fifty thousand from the Boss and over ten thousand from the monsters—and had participated in killing a Legionbreaker-Tier Boss.

The quartermaster responsible for registration immediately became exceptionally polite after seeing his panel.

He took out a separate form.

"Class?"

"Mage."

John thought for a moment before adding,

"I occasionally use a bow too."

The quartermaster glanced at the Void Staff on his back.

In the end, he wrote the following in the class column:

[Ranged Spellcasting Unit.]

"You have been assigned to Defensive Sector Seven of the inner wall."

"Your primary responsibility will be providing ranged fire support."

"You may not enter the central battlefield without military orders."

"Daily shift changes take place at six in the morning and six in the evening."

"The barracks are located on the western side of the wall."

"Your bed assignment is Building Three, Sector Seven, Number Twenty-One."

John accepted the identification tag.

[You have officially joined the Dawnstar City Garrison!]

[Current Military Rank: Reserve Mage.]

[Current Military Merit: 50,000.]

[Current Assignment: Inner Wall Defensive Sector Seven.]

Most members of Luna Wolf Guild were warriors, knights, and shield guards.

They were collectively assigned to the Outer Ring Knight Corps.

The moment the Dark Realm launched a siege, they would be sent to the very front to withstand the direct assault.

The smaller number of archers, mages, and priests were divided among different sections of the walls.

Horus wanted the guild members to operate together.

However, wartime military regulations did not permit new recruits to choose their own assignments.

For the time being, they could only separate.

After completing the procedures, John climbed the military staircase leading to the inner wall.

Only after entering Dawnstar City did he realize just how enormous the city truly was.

The entirety of Dawnstar City formed a gigantic ring.

The outermost boundary was the first city wall.

Several kilometers farther inside stood an even thicker inner wall.

Together, the two walls enclosed the central battlefield.

Defensive Sector Seven, where John had been stationed, was located along the inner ring.

Standing atop the wall and looking in either direction, the gray-black structure extended all the way to the limits of his vision.

Only its faint curvature revealed that the wall eventually formed a complete circle.

The size of the central battlefield was even more astonishing.

Vast stretches of land had been stained black-red with blood.

The wreckage of siege engines, ballistae, magical towers, and Dark Realm war machines lay piled together.

Broken weapons and bones that had not yet been collected could be seen everywhere.

The wind blew across the battlefield.

The intense stench of blood and decay continually rose toward the wall.

Many corpses had already begun to rot.

Battles occurred far too frequently.

The defenders simply did not have enough time to clear the entire battlefield.

At the very center of the circular war zone—

An enormous mass of black light slowly pulsed.

It was oval-shaped.

Its width exceeded several hundred meters.

Its height pierced directly into the clouds.

Ripples like waves continuously spread across its pitch-black surface.

Occasionally, the vague silhouette of some colossal creature could be seen passing on the other side.

[Large-Scale Cross-Realm Passage: Eternal Night Gate.]

[Current Connected Region: Dark Realm.]

[Passage Status: Permanently Open.]

[Warning: This target exceeds your current appraisal range!]

This was the gate Dawnstar City had guarded for several hundred years.

John stared up at it for a long time.

A passage this enormous could accommodate an entire army passing through at once.

The fact that Dark Realm creatures had managed to circle around and ambush the expeditionary force from behind proved that some regions within Dawnstar City’s defenses had already fallen.

However, the ring-shaped city was simply too vast.

Heavy partition walls divided the inner and outer walls into dozens of independent defensive sectors.