Death Notice Book 8: Chapter 12: Peril of Survival

Release Date: 2026-05-28 03:22:56

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«Volume 8 Chapter 11: The Elf King’s Invitation

Volume 8 Chapter 13: The First Branch Plot »

“Well, okay!” Iristin frowned in thought, then suddenly her eyes lit up as she looked at Qin Lun with a hint of delight. “Maybe with your status, you could influence the thoughts of the tribe elders!”

My status? What does that mean? Qin Lun raised his eyebrows slightly, but he stayed silent and waited for Iristin to continue.

It seemed many things had been bottled up inside Iristin for a long time. Meeting Qin Lun might have tipped things over the edge, causing the Elven Druid to pour everything out.

Listening to Iristin’s account, Qin Lun began to grasp the current state of the Qiongda’er Elves and the challenges now facing the Magic Cup Court. Since the Shattered Starry Sky research into this world wasn’t deep, the background information it provided was rather vague.

Actually, the Qiongda’er Elves of this time had changed from those living before the Vale Calendar era. Their racial makeup was different.

Later, in the Second Dragon War, the Great Kaeldomo Forest split into the Forest of Dragons, the Dathyl Forest, and the Tethyr Forest. The Forest of Dragons and Dathyl Forest were part of the original northwest of the Great Kaeldomo Forest and contained two major elven nations: Ilfaron and Oliansheir. The Oliansheir Elves gradually died out during the wars, losing their Elf Court long ago.

The Great Tethyr Forest, where the Saeopiya and Serthel Kingdoms were situated, split again during the Era of Heavenly Fire in the war between Air Genies and Flame Genies. It fractured into the Ank Forest, Thornwood, Winter Forest, and Qiongda’er Forest. Winter Forest belonged to the Serthel Elf inheritance, while Ank Forest and Qiongda’er Forest held the Saeopiya Elf heritage.

Why the Saeopiya Elves split into two parts, each living in Ank Forest and Qiongda’er Forest, is unknown. The reason isn’t clear anymore, only suspected to relate to royal succession issues at the time.

Although the Saeopiya Elves split in two, as one of the two Elf Courts with the most intact inheritance (the other being the present Ilfaron Elf Court dwelling in the Mir Forest), their strength hadn’t suffered fundamental damage.

Compared to the Sun Elves who suffered devastating losses in the Supreme Forest, lost their ancient heritage, and migrated to the Great Cormanthor Forest in the northeast of the continent, the Moon Elves and Green Elves of Saeopiya certainly had reason to claim their orthodox lineage.

Whether settled in Ank Forest or Qiongda’er Forest, the main tribes of the Saeopiya Elves were composed of Moon Elves and Green Elves. Moon Elves held the dominant ruling position, while Green Elves were relatively weaker. Their seats on the Elf Elder Council were roughly three to one, and the Elf Kings were always Moon Elves.

This tradition continued in Ank Forest to this day. Qiongda’er Forest, however, was different. In the year 255 before the Valley Calendar, the Qiongda’er Elves faced an unprecedented challenge.

At that time, the human kingdom of Qundas north of the Qiongda’er Forest was rising quickly. It steadily expanded its influence southward, recklessly cutting trees in the Qiongda’er Forest and establishing human settlements.

After several unsuccessful negotiations, war finally erupted between the two peoples. Early in the war, the Qiongda’er Elves, militarily weaker, were confined to defending the forest. They couldn’t threaten the human cities on the northern plains.

In this situation, to prevent the ultimate destruction of the Qiongda’er Forest, the Elf Court activated a world-shattering ancient Forbidden Spell. At the cost of the Elf King and most Elf Elders’ lives, it transformed most of the Qundas Kingdom into a vast sea. This is the present Vihong Sea, connected to the Sea of Fallen Stars.

This war plunged the Qundas human kingdom from a continental powerhouse down to third-rate status. The Qiongda’er Elves also suffered heavy blows. Especially the Moon Elf clan, where no one proved capable of taking on the immense responsibility of Elf King. Eventually, a Green Elf had to become the new Elf King.

This Green Elf King was called Noien Greenleaf. He was the great-grandfather of the current Elf King – King Testiel.

Although Noien Greenleaf gained the throne legitimately and not through trickery, the vastly elevated Green Elf clan refused to remain subordinate to the greatly diminished Moon Elves. They united with the Elf King to suppress the Moon Elf clan.

The two Elf Kings after Noien Greenleaf also continued this suppression policy against the Moon Elves. Only after King Testiel ascended the throne did this situation ease. However, after three generations of suppression under Elf Kings, the Moon Elves of Qiongda’er Forest could endure no more. Most Moon Elves moved away from the Elf Court, establishing semi-independent Moon Elf Tribes on the forest’s fringes.

These Moon Elf Tribes set up their own Inter-Tribal Elders Council, functioning almost like independent entities. If this were human society, no ruler would tolerate such independence.

This, however, was elven society. Elves are fundamentally a race that cherishes peace, freedom, and life. For the Green Elves, expelling the Moon Elves from the Elf Court had been their limit. Harming their own kin beyond that was unthinkable. Though resentful at being pushed out of the Elf Court by Green Elves, the Moon Elves also never contemplated using violence to reclaim power.

After three generations of recuperation, the surviving Moon Elves in the Qiongda’er Forest had regained their strength. They produced many High Rank Elven Rangers and Druids. Among them, Iristin stood out as a promising talent among the younger generation.

Iristin carried the blood of the original Moon Elf royal line. In other words, she descended from the Moon Elf royal lineage. Due to their long lives and the fact that some elves are born directly from World Tree Fruit, elves don’t place high importance on bloodline relationships. Their method of recognizing royal blood is simple: they assess the purity of the bloodline.

Hearing this, Qin Lun finally understood. Why had Iristin become friendly after examining his blood? Why did King Testiel specifically try to win over him, an elven mercenary from a small forest tribe?

Because the High Moonlight Elf Bloodline represented an extremely pure Moon Elf lineage. They saw Qin Lun as a descendant of the Moon Elf royal family.

King Testiel’s earlier invitation was likely just an initial approach. Since King Testiel sought to reunite with the Moon Elves and bring them back under the rule of the Qiongda’er Elf system, he couldn’t possibly offer just a single spot in the Royal Guard.

Had Qin Lun accepted back then, given the Elf Court’s current predicament, King Testiel would probably have assigned him a low-risk (but vitally important) Plot Mission.

In other words, it would have been a way to give him credibility (‘gold plating’), paving the way for elevating Qin Lun’s status later. Using his “royal blood,” they could then steadily reunite Moon Elf hearts and minds and end the semi-independent status of the Moon Elf Tribes.

Realizing this, Qin Lun felt a slight pang of regret. Had it not been for the Fortress Team, he might have received the ‘safest’ Plot Mission since coming to the Shattered Starry Sky. Even if the direct rewards weren’t huge, he stood to gain significantly from the Elf King himself.

The current King Testiel was probably the wisest ruler since Qiongda’er Forest broke away from Tethyr Forest. From the time he took the throne over thirty years ago, he had constantly worked to mend the rift between Moon Elves and Green Elves.

Give him a hundred or two hundred years, and the Qiongda’er Elves might well reclaim its former glory. Unfortunately, time was a luxury he didn’t have. Leaving aside the increasingly powerful human forces on the continent, the Qiongda’er Forest was already trapped in a massive internal crisis.

The World Tree, the foundation of the Magic Cup Court and the source of all Qiongda’er Elf heritage, was dying. In fact, except for the first-generation World Trees of the original Sun Elf homeland, the Supreme Forest (the Grandfather Tree, already lost), all second-generation World Trees scattered across the forests of the continents were gradually dying.

Facing this crisis, the Sun Elves of Cormanthor were undertaking a great migration to move most of their people to Evermeet. There, they had successfully cultivated a thriving third-generation World Tree.

This was a desperate move, however. World Trees possess immense life force, but their seedlings have a very low survival rate, requiring the elves’ Ancient Inheritance of secret methods. Despite Cormanthor’s Sun Elves having the continent’s largest forest area and population, they had lost their Ancient Inheritance during the Five Crown Wars. Thus, they could only rely on Evermeet’s unique environment to cultivate their third-generation World Tree.

In contrast, Saeopiya elf descendants in Ank Forest (with relatively well-preserved Ancient Inheritance), Ilfaron descendants in Mir Forest, and the descendants of the alliance between Maiyelita and Santa Osriel in the east of the Supreme Forest, also successfully nurtured third-generation World Trees.

Meanwhile, descendants of the Serthel Elves in the Thornwood Forest and Winter Forest, lacking the secret World Tree inheritance, failed to raise surviving third-generation saplings. Each was now devising its own methods to survive this heritage crisis.

The Serpian descendants in Qiongda’er Forest faced a crisis entirely of their own making. When the three generations of Green Elf Kings suppressed the Moon Elves, they completely overlooked the Moon Elves’ unique role in preserving the World Tree’s secret inheritance methods. Consequently, all saplings left by the second-generation World Tree failed to take root and grow.

In fact, the elven merchant caravan Qin Lun was with happened to be an envoy group dispatched by King Testiel seeking outside help. Their destination was the Mir Forest, to ask the Ilfaron descendants there for assistance in acquiring another World Tree Seed.

“Why not ask for help from the much closer Ank Forest?” Qin Lun couldn’t help but ask, finding this strange.

The Anker Elves and Qiongda’er Elves were both Saeopiya descendants, considerably closer than the Ilfaron descendants of the Mir Forest. Though they split during the Second Dragon War and the Genie Wars (Air and Fire), that had been over seven thousand years ago.

“Because the Anke Elf Court is actively recruiting Moon Elves from Qiongda’er! Their condition for helping King Testiel was that the Magic Cup Court could not hinder any Qiongda’er Moon Elf who wished to join Ank Forest!” Iristin replied with a bitter smile.

So that was it! Although finer details remained unclear, they weren’t important to Qin Lun. Based on Iristin’s revelations, he could already map out several major Plot Mission paths unfolding around the Magic Cup Court.

Simultaneously, a prompt sounded in the Death Notice. He had triggered a mission storyline!

«Volume 8 Chapter 11: The Elf King’s Invitation

Index

Volume 8 Chapter 13: The First Branch Plot »