On the other hand, the kingdom's army clashed once, but both sides only met outside the city. It was obvious that the kingdom's army was prepared to fight in the open with ten times their numbers. However, when they saw the dozen or so ten-meter-tall giants dragging twenty-meter-long logs as weapons, their morale immediately collapsed. They left behind a group of cannon fodder to cover their retreat, while the main force ran away.
Imagine how a mortal would feel when they saw a three-story tall giant. Even the bravest knight would run away. The difference in size was too great. Even the cannon fodder surrendered.
Just like that, the two provincial capitals were taken without any bloodshed. The kingdom directly gave up on these two provinces.
Afterwards, the two commanders of the church's army took the opportunity to take down two more provinces. Their armies only stopped when they reached the border of the province where the royal capital was located.
Lin Xiao had already taken seven out of the fifteen provinces of the kingdom.
The next seven provinces were located on the other side of the royal capital, so they had to take down the royal capital first.
After receiving the information, Lin Xiao decisively ordered his army to station at the border and also sent over a thousand people.
He guessed that the Divine God was about to be formed.
He was using almost unlimited resources to grow rapidly, and he didn't encounter any bottlenecks along the way. The plane's restrictions on supernatural powers were loosening faster than he expected. Now, the plane's restrictions on supernatural powers were about to reach the Legendary rank. According to Lin Xiao's estimation, the Divine God would be born once the plane's capacity reached the Legendary rank.
Of course, the newly born Divine God's power would still be restricted by the plane. At first, it wouldn't be too strong. Moreover, the Noer Kingdom wasn't the headquarters of the Holy Church. Even if the Divine God was born, it wouldn't be able to do anything to him.
However, once the Divine God was born, it would be able to bestow divine spells. The Holy Church would give birth to priests and other supernatural professions.
With the Holy Church's territory and resources, once the restrictions were loosened, their power would increase even faster than his. At that time, it would be extremely difficult to defeat the Holy Church.
Moreover, Lin Xiao was very worried about another thing. He was afraid that the awakened plane's will would choose the newly born Divine God as its representative, which was equivalent to the child of the plane.
But this wasn't the most terrifying thing. What he was most worried about was that the awakened Planar Will would directly use the newly born Divine God as an incarnation and directly occupy his divine body. That would be troublesome.
The plane's consciousness had come in person, which was equivalent to them going against the entire plane. Just the rejection of the plane alone was enough to make them suffer, not to mention the attack from the entire plane.
Thus, he had to make more preparations. Most importantly, he had to become a Totem Lord before the Divine God completely grasped his divine power. Only by becoming a Totem Lord with the special privileges granted by the Crystal Wall Universe would he be able to resist the Planar Will.
The Noehr Kingdom probably knew about this as well. Following this, both sides tacitly set up a standoff between the two provinces without crossing the border.
Less than three days after the truce, Lin Xiao gathered his subordinates for a secret meeting. The next day, Alfonsol sent out a large number of messengers to all the feudal lords in his seven provinces, ordering them to gather at Dell's Cathedral of Life.
During the meeting, Alphonso officially announced a number of important matters. One of them was the establishment of a duchy with the current seven provinces, and the other was the reduction of the feudal lord's authority.
The establishment of a duchy was mainly to centralize power, so as to better coordinate the territory and army.
The reduction of the feudal lord's authority mainly focused on the military, the right to coin, and the three aspects of the law. In other words, the feudal lord's army would be taken away, and they would not be able to establish a large-scale private army. They would not be allowed to privately print money, and all the territorial laws would be abolished.
The feudal lords basically agreed to the establishment of a duchy. After all, he was already the actual ruler of the seven provinces, and had the qualifications to establish a duchy.
However, the proposal to reduce the feudal lord's authority received the opposition of all the feudal lords. All the feudal lords present at the meeting were against it.
Of course, this opposition was useless. Alphonso had already been preparing when he gathered them.
When the negotiations broke down, the Church and the troops that Alphonso had sent out long ago took action at the same time. They first detained all the feudal lords who had gathered, and then used force or other methods to disarm the various territories.
There might have been some disturbances, but without a feudal lord presiding over it, the various territories only sporadically resisted, and were suppressed one by one.
Alphonso did not deprive the feudal lords of their territories. He only deprived them of their armies, removed the unnecessary checkpoints in their territories, took away most of their independent authority and ownership of some strategic resources, and restricted the territories from establishing armies again.
Doing this would definitely make the feudal lords resentful, but they had lost their military power, and could not resist anymore.
Furthermore, he did not go too far. The feudal lord's authority was not revoked, and they only lost their military authority. Furthermore, they still retained the limited authority of the guards. Thus, most of the nobles who did not have much ambition did not have much of a reaction to this, and such feudal lords made up the majority of the feudal lords.
Furthermore, Alphonso had established a monitoring department under Lin Xiao's guidance, specifically to monitor the various feudal lords. The moment they discovered any abnormalities, they would be arrested and stripped of their territories.
Time passed as the territories were gradually digested. Two months later, Alphonso announced the establishment of the Alphonso Duchy, with the capital set in Dale City, and the Church of Life and Wisdom as the national religion.
At the same time, the four Children of Nightmares joined forces and once again defeated the allied army of the Church's knights and the local feudal lords in the Orm Province. They captured Orm City in one fell swoop, and with Orm City as the center, they quickly cleared out the surrounding rebels, intending to take the entire province in their hands.
Half a month later, in the neighboring Ghana Province, the three Children of Spirit also joined forces and mobilized all their forces to launch an attack on the capital of the Ghana Province.
The troops arrived at the city, and after a short rest, they attacked the city.
Eight days later, the news of the Children of Spirit's defeat appeared in Lin Xiao's hands. He was silent after reading the report.
An hour later, Alphonso and the Holy Knights appeared in the cathedral. He passed the report to them and said in a low voice,
"Our advantage is gradually disappearing. When they are ready, they will pose a greater threat to us. We need to …"
He pointed at a direction on the sand table in the hall …
"Boom!"
Several ten-meter-tall giants wearing steel plate armor thicker than red bricks rushed to the front of the city wall with a giant boulder the size of a house in their hands. They swung the boulder and smashed it down, creating a dozen holes in the city wall. The rest of the troops swarmed into the city.
After the marshal of the kingdom was captured alive by two Holy Knights who broke into the city, the defenders in the city surrendered in despair. The city of Bosa fell, and the 19,000 troops of the kingdom's main forces that had been mobilized from various places in the past few months all surrendered.
When the news spread, the kingdom was shaken, and the Church's knights on the other line of defense quickly retreated to the capital.
The most practical feedback was that Alphonso secretly met with many special envoys that night.
Five days later, the lords of three provinces joined forces to expel the Holy Church, leave the Noer Kingdom, and join the Alphonso Duchy.
At this time, the forces of the Church in these provinces had been mobilized, and there was almost no force left. Otherwise, they would not have dared to do so.
At this point, the Alphonso Duchy occupied ten out of the fifteen provinces of the kingdom.
The Children of Nightmares occupied one, and the Noer Kingdom was left with four.
These four provinces were also in chaos, with the pro-war faction and the surrenders faction fighting each other. It was chaotic.
At this time, the main forces of the Alphonso Duchy had already arrived at the Noer Kingdom's capital, confronting the last forces of the kingdom, mainly the Church's knights. As for the other provinces, most of their forces had surrendered in the previous battle, and with the internal chaos, they could not mobilize forces to support the capital.
Below the Noer Kingdom's capital, there was a camp set up by twenty-five thousand elite soldiers. Five thousand of them were the main force, and twenty thousand captives were at the back of the camp, not participating in the battle. Fifty ten-meter-tall giants wearing thick plate armor stood in the camp, giving the defenders on the city walls a huge psychological pressure.
Not to mention that they had never seen such huge giants before, there were legends of giants in some myths and legends, and legends of ancient powerful Holy Knights killing giants and beasts. However, those were only legends, and there were so many of them in front of them. More importantly, they were wearing a layer of plate armor that was thicker than a brick, and even had a helmet. This made them cry out in alarm. Even if their faith was firm, and even if there were priests using divine spells to calm them down, their morale still fell to the bottom.
Yes, at this time, the Holy Church had already given birth to priests, not long ago.
Lin Xiao had also received news that several Children of Spirit from the Ghana Province had attacked Ghana City. During this battle, priests from the Holy Church had appeared among the defenders of the city and used divine spells to stimulate the morale and fighting spirit of the Children of Spirit. They forcefully resisted the elites of the Children of Spirit and defeated them.
It was because of this news that Lin Xiao didn't dare to slowly digest the territory he currently had, and directly attacked and captured the main force of the Noer Kingdom, attacking the capital in one go.
Now, it could be confirmed that the Divine God had already been born. It was just that he was too far away from the Noer Kingdom, and he was stationed in Dale City. There weren't many followers of the Holy Church here, so he couldn't immediately sense his birth.
Fortunately, he had only just been born and could only bestow divine spells. There weren't many priests who had truly grasped divine spells, so there was still a chance.
After a short rest, the army left the camp. Twenty giants wearing thick plate armor walked out of the city and walked towards the city walls with heavy steps, carrying a pressure that made people's hearts tremble.
The morale of the defenders on the city walls plummeted, even for the knights of the Holy Church.
Although they were devout believers, no matter how devout they were, it was useless against these terrifying giants.
A few priests of the Holy Church walked up to the city walls and used divine spells to boost morale. Although it was only a simple blessing, it could indeed boost morale.
Seeing this, Lin Xiao chuckled and took a step forward, appearing in mid-air, which immediately caused a commotion.
Although the Spirit Qi Awakening had begun to appear, there was still no one who could fly. His move was quite miraculous.
But this wasn't the most miraculous thing. The most miraculous thing was naturally …
He took out a golden book that was as big as a door and opened it. As he muttered something, the golden pages of the book flipped to a certain page. As he waved his hand, a ball of golden light condensed on the page and turned into a ball of light that slowly rose up.
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