"Nalu… Is it convenient to talk to you at the moment?" On the other side of the communication stone, Merking Havelok's voice sounded.
"Your Majesty… and the rest of the esteemed Monarch and Leaders, we are ready… In fact, Lady El and Doctor Kayden are also here with us." Prince Nalu looked at Eli and Kayden as if asking their permission to reveal their whereabouts to which the two agreed.
"The Young Lady and the Great Doctor? How come they are with you? If there's nothing wrong, they should have gone back inside the temple, right?" Merking Havelok's voice was filled with surprise and worry the moment he heard about Eli and Kayden.
This also caused a huge commotion among the leaders on the other side.
"Allow me to explain… Your Highnesses…" Kayden looked at his companions and immediately explained the matter.
How Abaddon and Gabriel noticed their arrival and how they were confronted just earlier.
Hearing the entire story, the Leaders were taken aback. They could not help but feel complicated and relieved at the same time.
While it is good that Abbadon and Gabriel expressed that they weren't an enemy, they were not sure about cooperating with them.
In contrast, High Priest Enoch seemed to have been filled with hope and energy the moment he heard of their names.
"Hahaha! The heavens still gave mercy to his people… The Great One did not allow all of his servants to be snatched by the evil ones!" He exclaimed in rejoicing and a hint of helplessness.
Fortunately… The temple is not completely dead and the believers of the Great One are still not wiped out.
Then after calming his emotions, he took a step forward and said in the communication stone, "Abaddon and Gabriel are two of the strongest captains in all of the ordained captains in Prasinos. They are also good friends of Mishael… you can be sure that they are trustworthy…"
"The fact that they remained untainted even though they were surrounded by countless curse users proved that we can trust them to do the job." High Priest Enoch said, but his words were not really to convince Eli and Kayden on the other side, but the leaders surrounding him.
Hearing the High Priest the leaders looked at each other and discussed among themselves. Occasionally they asked Kayden's team about how the two captains planned their attack and the scale of people that would go with him that time.
When they studied the specific situation on the holy island's side, it was indeed as the captains have said. It is better to attack now than to wait until the Pope arrives.
This way, it will put pressure on both the Vanderford Empire and the Pope who was rushing to regroup with the rest on the other end of the continent.
The discussion went on quite long and Eli could only listen to their discussions at the moment. While she had the power and capability to fight, she did not have any experience in warfare.
With that, she diligently listened to their discussion, hoping to learn something out of it. Only from time to time she would raise her specific concerns but not to the extent of hindering the leaders' line of thought.
In the end, they have come to a decision and that is to support Abaddon and Gabriel in their impending fight less than two days from now.
"Prince Nalu and Great Doctor Kayden, we would like to ask you to set up a large-scale array as near as possible in the Holy Island while we gather troops to help you and the untainted Temple knights.
We also agree to let the rest of the crew gather more warriors in the Green Wave Continent, with all the Chief of the other races here, we give your full permission.
We can only wish that this support would be enough to handle the people on the Holy Island. Rest assured, we will also do our best to gather stronger armies here to be teleported into the island."
It was the Chief Dragon Fafnir who announced the results, while the other leaders, including Emperor Valentin nodded in support.
With that, the decision on Eli's side was solidified and all they had to do was to take action on the tasks that needed to be done.
On the other side, Emperor Valentin quickly moved and announced, "I'll contact the grandmasters and see what they can do."
The Leaders agreed and supported Emperor Valentin. They too have realized the importance of winning the battle on the Holy Island.
It will determine how much force will remain on the Spectre's side when the troops and the resources from the Holy Island have been annihilated. It will also reveal to the world how deep the so-called holy temple has fallen to evil.
Just like that the two parties prepared as much as they could before the fateful day of confrontation arrived.
That evening, all the nine captains were assembled in the Cardinal's discussion hall.
"Is everyone here?"
"Ecanus, of the 10th order, is here reporting to His Eminence!"
"Abaddon, of the 9th order, is here reporting to His Eminence!"
"Jehoel, of the 8th order, is here reporting to His Eminence!"
"Pashcar, of the 6th order, is here reporting to His Eminence!"
"Ishida, of the 5th order, is here reporting to His Eminence!"
"Colopatiron, of the 4th order, is here reporting to His Eminence!"
"Gabriel, of the 3rd order, is here reporting to His Eminence!"
"Rashnu, of the 2nd order, is here reporting to His Eminence!"
"Uriel, of the 1st order, is here reporting to His Eminence!"
Hearing all reports with diligence, the Cardinal gave a satisfied nod and immediately commenced the meeting, "Good good!"
"Now let's start our discussion. As you may have heard just today, someone was able to sneak inside the temple and was able to even successfully infiltrate the laboratory. If not for Abaddon and Gabriel's quick thinking they would have successfully leaked everything they saw inside our facility."
The surroundings became tense at the mention of the so-called spies who ran around their noses.
"Who's in charge of security?" The Rashnu of the second order scanned his eyes to the rest of the captains and asked in a low voice.
Paschar of the sixth order seemed to have understood Rashnu's intentions and immediately retaliated, "Knowing the in-charge for what? So that we can all point at somebody to blame for the incident?"
The others also agreed with Pashcar's point and also voiced their displeasure.
A debate started to ensue, one side was insisting to punish the order who was assigned to scan the people entering the temple that day, and another was opposing the idea.
"Right, it does not matter who was assigned to security at that time. We are all to be blamed because all of us are here yet none of us was able to detect them inside." Ecanus of the last order tried to soothe things.
"Yes, Ecanus is right…" Gabriel also chimed in, there was even a trace of embarrassment in his eyes when he continued.
"In fact, even I and Abaddon would have not noticed something wrong about them till the last minute. It was even the line leader of the outer courtyard workers who gave us the notice of their sudden disappearance.
What I meant is, this should be a lesson for us. We have to be more vigilant now because this is a warring time. Spies might be able to try and enter again."
Hearing Gabriel's words everyone became silent, especially Rashnu.
In fact, the reason why Rashnu has been adamant to punish the assigned personnel was that he wants to vent his anger due to the fact that Gabriel and Abaddon gained the limelight.
If not for those complacent security knights who clumsily did their jobs, Gabriel and Abaddon would not have been praised right now.
But seeing that Gabriel himself showed a humble side and even admitted his shortcomings, Rashnu could only bottle up his envy.
"The captain of the third order is right… Those things are not important at the moment. That is because we need every manpower we could assemble right now." The Cardinal finally reacted and announced to everyone.
"In the next two days assemble all your troops and get ready to set off to the Vanderford Empire. There we will group with them to meet the Pope and the Paladin. As for ensuring if there were still spies around, I am taking this to Abaddon and Gabriel.
The reason is that their teams have already been coincidentally mobilized because of the commotion earlier. To the rest, you need to do your best to organize your troops and be ready as early as possible. Do you have any objections?"
The Cardinal's scrutinizing gaze swept on each of the captains at the long table.
Rashnu could only steal a glance at Gabriel and Abaddon who still wore a neutral expressions before gritting his teeth and answering with the rest of the Captains,
"Yes… we have no objections, Cardinal!"
Just like that all of the parties were now secretly doing their own task to be ready for the fateful day.
As for who would emerge as the winner of this confrontation… they could only wait until the battle started!
