Chapter169

As expected, the moment she finished speaking, a faint red blush appeared beneath Oswyn's pale ears. His previously serious expression began to break, and with red ears, he looked at Elara with a mix of embarrassment and annoyance.

"Who wants to keep following you, hmph."

Elara nodded obediently and kept smiling at him. "Mm hm, you're not following me. I'm following you."

Oswyn's ears turned even redder.

After a long while, Oswyn finally forced down the waves of emotion in his heart. He deliberately put on a serious expression, gave a soft cough, and stared at Elara as he continued,

"The Gu eggs inside those pregnant men must all be laid for them to have a chance at returning to normal. I've calculated it. Each of them was implanted with about a thousand eggs. After developing in batches, they're usually laid over three or four rounds. Last time, you rescued five of them, so that means..."

Elara looked at his still red ears and didn't tease him. She interrupted, "Wait, just now in the Youdan Palace, there were probably more than a dozen boys showing the same condition. Go check on them later."

Oswyn paused for a second and gave a low grunt as a response, then went on,

"The Sect Leader implanted roughly the same number of Gu eggs in every host. Those boys in the palace probably have about a thousand eggs each too. When you go eliminate the Sect Leader, tell your people to watch out. If you come across similar cases, keep them alive."

"In total, if you manage to use all these Gu eggs on those scumbags, you could probably increase your puppet army by another twenty or thirty thousand without issue."

"These malicious tools are perfect for dealing with malicious people. This world is never short of scum. But I'll emphasize this again, Elara, these things must never be used on innocent people. If you ever do, I will not let it slide."

Elara propped her chin on her hand and looked at Oswyn's serious face. She nodded along with him and answered, "Got it, got it. Like I said, I'm always following you. You're watching over me."

Oswyn's ears, still red, flushed even deeper. He glared at her before continuing to explain her current physical state. "Also, aside from those Gu worms, your own blood now has a strong hypnotic and controlling effect. If you don't want to turn someone into a life-bound puppet, just have them drink your blood."

"If they drink one drop a day for seven days, they'll obey your every command until death."

"If you only want to control someone temporarily, just give them a single drop. For the next three hours, they'll follow your every order without resistance."

"All of this, of course, only applies to ordinary people with no internal power or resistance."

"If you run into someone skilled in martial arts or highly resistant to poison, your blood may not work on them even if they drink it."

"The stronger the internal power, or the longer someone has been exposed to toxins, the stronger their resistance."

"So don't think just because you've gained this polar divine blood that you can do anything you want. Your blood only has absolute control over regular people."

"Be cautious every time before using it."

The royal family had all been controlled by the Sect Leader and turned into personal puppets. It was easy to imagine what had become of the court in Youdan. It had long turned into a hollow shell with almost no normal people left.

After eliminating the Sect Leader and taking control of the hundred thousand puppet army, aside from the two hundred thousand Youdan troops sent to Marigold County, the entire Youdan nation had no strength left to resist. It directly became part of Plumera.

After learning about her new ability from Oswyn, Elara returned to the Youdan royal palace. In the little emperor's chambers, she found a list of Youdan ministers.

With the leftover information from the Sect Leader, Elara picked out all the officials on the list who had once committed corruption, murdered the innocent, or oppressed the people. She sent a puppet squad to deal with those people directly.

After removing eighty percent of those corrupt officials, Elara used the young emperor's imperial edict and pressed her own seal next to his, promoting a few remaining capable and conscientious officials to temporary positions in the court.

When issuing these orders, she also sent puppet teams to "assist" to prevent anyone from misjudging the situation and making unnecessary moves.

After this, Elara looked at the young emperor, who had been watching her with anticipation and longing since she entered the palace.

"You're called Youyu, right? I will keep your royal family's treatment and won't harm the people of your clan's land. Youdan will still belong to the You clan in name, counted as your clan's ancestral territory. But from today on, your clan will become one of Plumera's outer vassal lords. Youdan will be added to Plumera's territory and become one of Plumera's cities. From now on, Plumera's royal family will be its ruler. Do you understand?"

The little emperor didn't seem to understand what Elara meant at all. Having been raised like a pet, he had lost most of his basic communication skills and only had the instinct to seek affection.

Seeing Elara finally speak to him, his delicate and fair face immediately showed a pleasing smile. His loosely dressed body carefully crawled to Elara's feet, then slowly rubbed against her as if trying to merge into her.

Elara: ...

This kind of royal family had clearly lost all ability. Without supervision, they could starve themselves to death in three days, let alone govern a nation.

Knowing it was useless to speak further, Elara said nothing more to the emperor who only knew how to cling to her. She finished writing the edict, stamped both the emperor's and her own seal on it, and officially turned Youdan into a city of Plumera.

She had her people temporarily arrange the You clan royals, then left the palace herself, preparing to return and handle the final issue in Youdan — the two hundred thousand troops that had been deployed to Marigold County.

The two hundred thousand troops of Youdan were not completely under the control of Gu worms. But after swallowing the gold worm of the Sect Leader, Elara felt a new, vast, yet much weaker pulling force as she got closer to Marigold County on her way back.

She searched the information the gold worm had brought her and understood the cause.

The monsters of the Sect Leader truly had endless tricks.

Even without Gu worms, they still managed to make the two hundred thousand troops controlled by the Gu worm master.

This restraint was much weaker compared to actual Gu worms. Once affected, betrayal was rare, and even if someone did betray, the cost and pain would be extremely high.

But the Youdan army was still the enemy. They could think for themselves, and their number was too large. Elara couldn't just absorb them like she had done with the puppet army.

So when she arrived in front of Marigold County and saw the dark, massive army of Youdan, she didn't answer the call of Francis and the others who had rushed to open the city gates to welcome her back.

Instead, she stopped two kilometers away from the Youdan army and sent someone ahead with a message.

The Youdan army quickly responded. It was the Youdan general himself who came to answer.

They seemed to have already sensed what had happened and didn't show much resistance to the current situation.