Chapter 1233 - The Dark Elves’ Choice (1/2)

Facing Rhode’s response, Durelle was completely speechless.

She was mentally prepared. As a matter of fact, when she heard his request, she heaved an inward sigh of relief. Matriarchs were most afraid of not knowing what was going on inside the other negotiator’s head. Even though the matriarchs correctly guessed that Rhode was surely plotting something with Carlesodar City, for safety’s sake, if the other negotiator said: “I don’t want anything. I just dislike dark elves like you”, the matriarchs could only head home and weep helplessly.

But now, Durelle felt restless because Rhode mentioned his conditions so effortlessly. It would be within the dark elves’ expectations if he overwhelmed them with one aggressive statement or spoke calmly to give them a chance to make decisions. But now, Rhode’s tone of voice was entirely as though he were saying: “Since I’m here, it would be a waste if I didn’t get my hands on something before heading back.”

There was no need to guess the true meaning behind that intention and it left Durelle depressed because she couldn’t figure out whether Rhode was joking or being serious.

No matter what, since Rhode gave them two choices, they could only choose one no matter how unwilling they were.

But the dark elves disliked both choices.

Rhode said he wanted 70 percent of Carlesodar’s assets, which was a huge amount. Of course, the dark elves could take their time, but Rhode apparently wasn’t amused. Durelle was also aware that Rhode wouldn’t wait for them to hand over 70 percent of their assets, but would seize all of them instead, before returning the remaining 30 percent to them…

And they weren’t sure if he would even return the 30 percent.

Therefore, this was entirely a joke. Maybe Rhode only spoke casually because the operability was truly too low and he couldn’t possibly not understand it. Rather than waiting for the dark elves to hand out their assets, Rhode would rather annihilate them all and take his time to recover the assets, wouldn’t he? At least, judging from the current situation, Rhode was capable of messing over all of Carlesodar City.

The reason why Rhode gave them two choices was entirely for cover. But everyone knew that it was apparent he intended to lay hands on Carlesodar City.

Durelle’s guess was right. Rhode had indeed decided to do it. But she didn’t know that he actually came up with this idea after the group of idiotic dark elves caused trouble for him. Before that, Rhode was honestly passing through the city…

But now, he changed his mind. As the saying went, ‘one chose to visit hell instead of heaven with its doors open’, since the dark elves were so eager, he wouldn’t mind taking advantage of them. However, despite the sudden idea, he had given it some serious considerations.

The underground races had always been unique in the Dragon Soul Continent. There was only one reason for that. Even though underground races were also inhabitants of Order, they didn’t live under the dragon soul protection. Rules were most stable on the continent and even in lands of Chaos, rules wouldn’t be eroded by Chaos.

Judging from this fact, it could be seen that the land itself possessed unique rules of Order. Due to that reason, creatures living in the underground were considered another force of Order because the underground world they resided in wasn’t influenced by the dragon soul protection.

Be it the dragon soul protection of the Void Dragon, Judgment Dragon, Trial Dragon, Dark Dragon, or Light Dragon, it didn’t influence the underground world too much. This was also why the Dark Dragon had to head down to the underground back then. His dragon soul protection was powerful on the surface, but it was a pity that it wasn’t useful in the underground. If not, he didn’t need to show up personally to deal with the dark elves and could simply manipulate the dragon soul protection to wreak havoc in the underground to make the dark elves go extinct.

But the Dark Dragon couldn’t achieve it. So he had to do it personally.

This was what the dark elves once relied upon because even though they were inhabitants of Order, they didn’t need the dragon soul protection. One of the reasons why they continued to follow the Country of Darkness was that its ‘cultural atmosphere’ was similar to theirs. The other reason was that undead creatures were their natural enemies. If they were to break into a war, the dark elves would definitely be crushed, which was why they gave in and became a part of the Country of Darkness.

And now, Rhode had the same plan in mind.

Of course, it wasn’t like Rhode had a strong desire for power and yearned to control the surface and underground world like the Dark Dragon. The problem for Rhode was that he knew that the Country of Darkness was in a complete mess right now, where he wasn’t even sure of how much Ion was under the influence of Chaos.

But he was certain that Chaos definitely wouldn’t let this large slice of the cake off. On the other hand, the dark elves had no experience in dealing with Chaos. Rather than letting them be annihilated and assimilated by Chaos to increase their strength, Rhode would rather add them to his force. That was why he made this decision. It went without saying that he understood the dark elves’ personality inside out. Even if he were to flatten Carlesodar City, they wouldn’t possibly be willing to follow him.

But Rhode naturally had his ways to manipulate them.

After hearing Rhode’s suggestion, Durelle didn’t answer immediately. She pondered for a few moments, lifted her head, and bowed respectfully to him.

“My apologies, Your Majesty the Void Dragon. This matter is of major importance. I think we will need some time to discuss.”