Chapter 363 [0361] The Power of Demacia and the Shield of Demacia

Walking barefoot on the cold rocks of Mount Targon, Taric did not feel much pain - on the contrary, this pain was the greatest comfort to him.

He started climbing from Kalamanda, and climbed over countless mountains of all sizes along the way. Now he finally came to the foot of Mount Targon. Even though the cold and danger here were far greater than before, he still had no intention of stopping.

Like Lux, Taric was also a prisoner of the Stone Crown.

Unlike Lux, he did not have a teacher to teach him how to climb Mount Targon, and before climbing, he himself had not really reached the extraordinary level.

For him, this was almost a climb that was sure to end in death.

However, since he set out from Kalamanda, Taric's steps have never hesitated.

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Taric was born in a small noble family in Jandal, Demacia. Although his grandfather only had a lordship that could not be passed on to his descendants, he was still considered a respectable person in the local area.

Therefore, Taric's father and Taric were able to wear full armor, ride a warhorse, join the army, and fight after they became adults.

However, unlike his grandfather's generation, there was no war on the border of Demacia when Taric joined the army.

As Demacia's biggest rival, Noxus was stuck in the quagmire of the Ionian War at this time, struggling to get out. The shift in strategic focus caused many principalities and city-states in Valoran that were sandwiched between the two to turn their heads to Demacia.

It was in this context that Taric joined the Demacia army and became a member of the Fearless Vanguard after being selected - and Garen Crownguard was among the new recruits of the same period as Taric.

Therefore, Taric's first mission after joining the army was to follow Garen to "suppress the rebellion" and deal with the nobles of the Mithril City.

Later, the situation in Demacia changed suddenly. Lux, who returned to the capital, set off an astonishing wave under the planning of Karya, and the Illuminati and the Council of Nobles were involved.

The whole incident ended with Lux's voluntary surrender and acceptance of the Stone Crown Punishment, which prevented the Illuminati and the Noble Council from causing any more trouble.

Since then, the rising star of the Crown Guard family has left the stage of history. Lux, who is no longer a threat, has become a model of nobility praised by all the nobles in Demacia. When she boarded the ship to Kalamanda, everything seemed to have finally settled.

As a bystander, Taric witnessed all the ups and downs with his own eyes.

Although he was not in the vortex of Demacia, he could clearly see from Garen beside him that this incident was a huge blow to the Crown Guard family - even a cheerful Garen was depressed for a long time after learning that his sister had to stay away from Demacia and might never return.

However, as Kalja expected, as Lux was exiled from Demacia and suffered the Stone Crown, the nobles of Demacia had to compensate the Crown Guard family.

No matter how bad the relationship with the Crown Guard family was, this time the Crown Guard family stood from the perspective of all the nobles and ruthlessly cut off the hand of the Illuminati that wanted to interfere in political affairs, and even paid the price of the eldest daughter running away and suffering the Stone Crown.

So, after Lux left Demacia, at the suggestion of King Jarvan III, Demacia held an unprecedented martial arts competition.

Relying on the Forbidden Magic Stone, Demacia is one of the countries in Runeland that lacks the desire for expansion the most. When the Noxians sank into the quagmire of war, Demacia seemed to have no choice but to use this kind of performance-style muscle-showing method to demonstrate its martial virtue.

Naturally, many nobles readily agreed to Jarvan III's proposal-civilians did not even have the qualifications to appear in such a competition. Now there was no military merit to brush, so it was natural for everyone to fight in the arena.

Therefore, the grand square of Demacia's capital was transformed into a temporary arena. From here, Demacia's envoys rushed to various principalities and city-states in the central area of ​​Valoran continent, inviting them to watch the ceremony as guests, and they could also send players to participate in the competition to join in the celebration.

As the "one pole" of Valoran continent, Demacia's invitation was naturally taken very seriously by many principalities and city-states. At this time when the Noxians were strategically shrinking, countries that wanted to have good relations with Demacia were like crucian carp crossing the river. So after receiving the invitation of the envoy, various city-states and principalities sent their sons and grandsons as their own envoys to Demacia.

The reason was to watch the competition and join in the celebration, but in fact, they regarded this conference as a diplomatic event.

Of course, this is also Demacia's external purpose.

As for the internal...

As the legitimate son of the Crown Guard family, Garen, who had been training diligently after receiving the news, was regarded as a seed player and became the "official hype target" of Demacia in this competition.

In a sense, Garen can be regarded as eating his sister's "political legacy".

For the nobles, giving Garen, a silly boy, super treatment and making him a new name card and new benchmark for Demacia is a matter of killing two birds with one stone. On the one hand, it shows that everyone will not forget those "those who sacrificed for the noble cause", and on the other hand, it also puts the Crown Guard family under the spotlight of the moral high ground, forcing them to be truly loyal to the country and have no second thoughts. It's simply a win.

Lux, who is well-mannered and thoughtful, is a tough opponent for the nobles, but Garen, who is honest and thoughtful, is just like his father and uncle. It is a good thing to give him reputation and let him work hard!

It is precisely because Garen is a more honest kid that the nobles did not directly inform him when they were hyping him up. As a result, when Garen, who was full of confidence, stepped onto the arena, a shout of "Come on! Power of Demacia" from the crowd almost sent him away on the spot.

What the hell!

What Power of Demacia? That was the middle school title that Garen gave himself when he bullied the little girl before. He only mentioned it when Kashina "challenged a duel" to him!

Now it was called out by the "water army" that had been arranged long ago... Garen, who was suddenly x-on:ed by the black history, almost gave up the game on the spot!

Fortunately, although he felt ashamed, Garen's hard power was still very strong - he had been learning from Zhao Xin for many years, and although there was still a lot of room for improvement in skills, his physical development was becoming more and more incomprehensible.

Garen, who was just 19 years old, was more majestic than many adult players. He held a big sword like a door panel in his hand, and there was no trace of Zhao Xin's superb stabbing skills in the battle. He only relied on using momentum to suppress people and using force to break cleverness to overcome all the obstacles.

Even as a seed player, Garen's opponents were not a tough bone to chew, but Garen's own strength still made everyone look at him sideways - plus this method of one force defeating ten skills is the most intuitive and easiest to understand, so the title of Demacia's power has gradually changed from a unilateral hype by the navy to a consensus recognized by the public.

In the later stages of the game, every time Garen appeared, the people who came to watch the game would shout out the name "Demacia's power" like a tsunami, which made Garen almost the most dazzling among the young people.

The reason why it is "almost" is because there is a person who is more eye-catching than Garen, that is... Taric.

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As a player who is not optimistic about the future, Taric is the kind of "selected in the audition".

For the son of such a declining noble (strictly speaking, he is not a noble at all), the people who arrange the schedule will naturally not take any care. Considering that he rushed out of the audition all the way and has good strength, Taric was finally divided into the death group.

As for why this group is called the death group...

The reason is very simple. There are also contestants from Noxus in the same group as Taric.

Yes, the Noxians are here too.

Although the Noxians have already begun to decline in Ionia when the competition started, in line with the principle of benefiting without spending, Commander Darkwill still sent a special delegation to mess with the Demacians.

What? The Demacians want to show off their muscles?

Then I, Noxus, will definitely mess up the place!

With this in mind, several "gladiator slaves" were sent by the Noxians to join the competition.

Although they could refuse Noxus' participation in the competition, at this time when the Noxians' forces were shrinking, Demacia would not weaken its momentum in such a place anyway - and this was our home game, and magic and magic items were not allowed. Why are you Noxians so arrogant?

With the intention of making the Noxians look bad, Demacia allowed these people to participate in the competition.

However, in the preliminaries, the performance of these Noxians made the organizers of the competition feel a little scared.

Although they were gladiator slaves without heavy armor, these Noxians were really good at fighting, especially the one named Urgot, even Zhao Xin was speechless.

Is this monster with infinite strength and fearlessness of pain really a gladiator slave?

What tricks are the Noxians doing?

Noxus did use some tricks, but at this time Urgot... was really a gladiator slave.

The only difference between Urgot and other gladiator slaves is that his status as a slave is newly released. As the executioner of Noxus, he is a direct descendant of Darkwill. He was demoted to a slave with great pain, mainly because his overly bloodthirsty performance on the battlefield of Ionia aroused extremely fierce resistance, affecting Swain's battle plan, and was beaten to the ground by Swain on the spot.

For Urgot, sending him to Demacia to compete as a slave was not a punishment for him, but Darkwill's protection of his direct descendant. From a procedural point of view, being demoted to a gladiator slave was a punishment for him, but if he achieved good results in this competition and slapped the face of the Demacians, then it would be justified to use him again.

Noxus does not ask about the origin of people when hiring!

Darkwill's idea was very good, and Urgot's performance did not live up to the trust of the commander-in-chief. In the preliminaries, even though he was the focus of attention because of his identity as a Noxian, the Demacian noble swordsman who fought against him was still beheaded on the spot within three moves!

The Demacia tournament is different from the Noxian gladiatorial contest. It is not a fight to the death, and contestants are not allowed to finish off their opponents. Once their opponents lose resistance, any further damage will result in them being disqualified. However, Urgot acted too quickly, and after killing his opponent, he simply threw away his axe, grinning and saying "This guy is too weak, it was my own carelessness", embarrassing the Demacian on the spot.

Even though they were so ruthless, the Demacians were ultimately unable to do anything to Urgot. In the end, they could only artificially create a death group, sending all members who could pose a threat to Urgot to this group, and handing this guy over to Garen for execution.

For these people, being able to hit something out of Urgot was considered a success!

No one had any expectations for Taric, and no one would think that a lord's grandson from the countryside of Jandel would be able to fight against this terrifying and bloodthirsty Noxian.

However, even in this situation where no one was optimistic, in the quarter-finals, Taric, who was not wearing armor that day, but only holding a hammer and a shield, completed a perfect counterattack under the attention of everyone.

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For any Demacian watching the game, the battle between Taric and Urgot was an impressive and even unforgettable game.

Although Taric, with his long hair, was as tall as his opponent, he had a green face and seemed to be no match for the opponent at all.

However, completely different from his appearance, Taric was surprisingly calm.

Urgot, wielding a battle axe, charged again and again in a roar, and raised his sharp axe to split Huashan again and again, as if he could chop Taric in two at any time.

However, Taric, who rolled and dodged on the ground, was always like a light boat in the raging waves. Even if he looked like an egg in danger, he never capsized.

Having carefully studied Urgot's fighting style, Taric naturally had his own ideas. He did not think that his absolute strength could deal with Urgot, but he saw the characteristics of Urgot's bloodthirsty, furious and impatient personality.

Therefore, he did not fight Urgot head-on with armor and armor, because in front of such an opponent, armor - even the best rune steel armor - was not enough to save his life.

For this kind of opponent with great strength, who was like opening a can when beating an opponent with armor and armor, his choice was to go into battle lightly, anger the opponent and consume the opponent in a roving way, and win by counterattack!

Facing every slash from Urgot, he would raise his shield and smash out his one-handed hammer, but this was not a head-on wrestling match, but a roundabout interference from the side. It was not necessary to completely block it, as long as you cut it off.

Tariq's tactics made Urgot extremely angry.

Being turned into a gladiator slave had already made him furious. Even though the commander-in-chief explained the purpose of this trip to him, he was still in a state of ignition - now, this Demacia kid in front of him still used this tactic, how could he tolerate it!

Urgot, with his blood boiling, swung his axe after another, and even though Taric had avoided the axe blade when blocking, the surface of this solid shield was still covered with scars.

In order to release the power of Urgot's slash as much as possible, Taric would roll over almost every time after blocking. His long black hair was soon wet with sweat and covered with mud. He seemed to have turned into a mud monkey, looking embarrassed.

But even so, Tariq's eyes became brighter and brighter. He could clearly hear Urgot's increasingly heavy breathing, and he could clearly feel Urgot's blood and energy declining. He had seen the dawn of victory!

Finally, when Urgot swept his axe again, Tariq finally raised his one-handed hammer and faced Urgot's attack head-on for the first time.

With a tooth-grinding sound of metal, the two lost their weapons at the same time.

Urgot used a two-handed axe, and he could only bend down to pick it up after losing his weapon.

But in Tariq's left hand, there was still a shield full of dents!

At the moment when Urgot bent down, Tariq used all his strength to swing the shield that had been beaten for a whole game - when Urgot's fingertips finally touched the handle of his battle axe, the shield full of dents finally hit his face hard.

The tall Urgot was hit by this blow, and the whole person almost flew out sideways. When he barely regained consciousness and struggled to get up, Taric's boots stepped on his chest mercilessly.

Amid the cheers of the audience, after the Power of Demacia, there is now another Shield of Demacia.

Kalya's small class · Different climbing routes:

If you start from Kalamanda in the north to climb the Targon, you need to climb dozens of large and small mountains along the way to reach the main peak of the Targon; and if you go from Nerimaj, the main peak of the Targon is right outside the door.

Therefore, Lux and Ino only climbed for more than two days to cross the snow line, while Taric had spent three months all the way - this was mainly due to the different climbing directions.