Ch.309310. Dark Elf (1)

Originally, returning to work after a long break is never an easy task.

Not knowing the changes that occurred before your return, nor the events that transpired during your absence. In such circumstances, how could it be easy to naturally blend in among existing workers and become part of the team?

Therefore, the difficulty of normally returning to work after a long break is considerably high and can take a long time, but…

At least this was certainly not applicable to Bjorn.

One might wonder what administrative work a warrior like Bjorn would handle, but Bjorn possesses the overwhelmingly high base abilities unique to Transcendents—especially intelligence.

Thanks to this transcendentally high intelligence stat—which, numerically speaking, surpasses even first-class wizards—Bjorn quickly adapted, finally showing why he was once implicitly called an administrative monster.

With thought processing speed comparable to a supercomputer, unique to Transcendents, he can perfectly analyze and understand a document in just a few seconds. In this state, even after working for dozens of hours, Bjorn doesn’t tire in the slightest.

Additionally, he possesses the perfect memory ability innately held by all Transcendents. Beyond simply having good memory, it’s fair to say he has a database and search engine in his head.

Most decisively, Bjorn has the transcendent level of insight that all Transcendents possess.

It’s almost like being able to open someone else’s status window as if from some electronics store—an incredible ability that analyzes detailed information about others at a glance and automatically produces results close to logical deduction.

With this, he can perfectly grasp and analyze content just by skimming documents, making his work processing speed comparable to that of an intelligent supercomputer.

Thus, as Bjorn diligently processed his work, he suddenly frowned upon seeing a particular parchment document and began reading it.

‘…Damn them, they’ve finally crossed the line.’

The content was about none other than the Dark Elves of the Southern Continent.

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The Dark Elves who fled after exploiting the locals when demons of “Wrath” invaded the Southern Continent were… simply put, a group of outcast elves.

Among the relatively open-minded High Elves, some are born with particularly antisocial tendencies and enjoy crime. When such an elf can’t hide their true nature and causes trouble, High Elf society banishes them beyond their social boundaries.

These banished elves, cutting ties with other High Elves and banding together with fellow outcasts, formed the faction known as Dark Elves, also called Shadow Elves—the evil elves.

Not only were they antisocial and skilled in crime from the beginning, but these Dark Elves were once High Elves with excellent navigation skills. Naturally, they actively utilized their talents to become infamous pirates specializing in piracy and smuggling.

As they roamed the seas doing anything profitable, they plundered merchant ships, smuggled prohibited goods, sometimes sold ordinary medicines (opium) to the Jin Empire, and wielded considerable influence in arms trading.

Because of this, even High Elf society noticed their danger and tried to counter with imprisonment instead of banishment, but it was already too late—the number of banished Dark Elves had grown enough to form an independent force.

Unlike other elves who are quite sexually repressed, Dark Elves formed a society beyond promiscuous to decadent. As a result of adapting to their environment, they evolved into a distinct subspecies with fertility periods several times longer than normal elves.

Now able to interbreed and produce offspring without new outcasts, they went so far as to raid High Elf colonies in the Southern Continent. The High Elves, unable to forgive the atrocities of these Dark Elves—their own blemish—sought to eradicate them.

Thus, the High Elves attacked Cape Town, a Dark Elf colony, and succeeded in completely dismantling the Dark Elf nation that had ruled the Southern Continent as a pirate state, but…

The problem was that the remnants of this Dark Elf nation transformed from a single power into multiple independent forces that steadily continued their piracy.

After their nation collapsed due to a major suppression operation, Dark Elves became reluctant to settle on land. Consequently, they moved their bases to massive ships that could be considered mobile villages.

Using the mysterious Black Thunder Wood that grows only in the Southern Continent, their black ships carried the divided buildings of their villages. When anchored at the coast, they would magically fix the ships together like assembling a mobile village.

Naturally, such villages could simply flee at any moment, making them virtually impossible to capture…

As they had always done, they fled as soon as they confirmed the demon invasion of the Southern Continent. Up to this point, one could simply consider that they fled to survive.

In reality, they were a malignant force composed of large criminal organizations, not even neutral parties. Even if they had stayed to fight, they would have been annihilated by Satan’s avatars anyway.

The problem was… that these fleeing Dark Elf pirates exploited the fierce battles of the demon invasion to conduct raids.

Whatever excuses they might have made for themselves, the Dark Elves who acted selfishly for profit alone while the whole world united… saw their reputation plummet to rock bottom.

Moreover, the Dark Elves didn’t stop there. Claiming the land as their own, they attempted to return to the Southern Continent and attacked settlers trying to develop the southern lands of the Southern Continent, which had been incorporated into the Dawn Empire’s territory.

Therefore, the Dawn Empire—Bjorn—resolved to no longer tolerate this and dispatched the mainland fleet, including their main warships.

The objective was singular: the eradication of the Dark Elf pirates.

The Dawn Empire’s naval vessels were all steam-sail ships utilizing rune-steam engines used in airships and rune-steam tanks, along with wind power.

Using runes that emit steam and heat to operate magical-steam engines, the flagship of this fleet had a displacement of about 5,000 tons and exceeded 100 meters in length—arguably the finest battleship of this era.

Its surface was armored with special steel—Bloody Iron—manufactured at the empire’s national ironworks, which was also used for the keel. Its main guns were none other than enlarged Blood Cannons, arranged in groups of three in rotating turrets.

On both sides were dozens of Blood Cannons as secondary guns, with energy for these Blood Cannons automatically loaded instantly by individual rune loading devices.

With 20 imperial flagships—a full 20—dispatched, combining Dwarven technology and Elven navigation, numerous lower-class vessels also participated in the fleet.

About 100 cruisers of 3,000 tons, over 200 escort destroyers, and including smaller vessels, the fleet numbered around 500 ships—a tremendous scale.

This fleet, moving with the reflected anger of those determined to deal with the vicious southern Dark Elves, naturally caused considerable anxiety among the Dark Elves.

This fleet, prepared to sweep away everything in sight, would inevitably diminish the Dark Elves’ power. Consequently, the Dark Elves of the southern part of the Southern Continent had no choice but to join hands.

Fortunately, if they all combined their strength, they would have just enough power to face their opponents.

The Black Thunder Wood, which grows only in the Southern Continent, can be somewhat arbitrarily shaped using lightning magic. Using this, the Dark Elves constructed numerous massive ships almost as large as cities.

Of course, most of these massive vessels were built as fortresses and maritime bases, so their offensive power wasn’t particularly strong. The key was the exceptional physical abilities unique to Dark Elf pirates.

In any case, having united their forces, the Dark Elves became overconfident and finally decided to settle the matter through a fleet battle…

Before long, the fleets of both forces encountered each other in the western waters of the Southern Continent.