The Lemdria Campaign

The battle between Lemdria and the demon army had advanced as expected.
Before the demons’ overwhelming strength, Lemdria’s army suffered defeats one after another.
But even that was one of Prince Sion’s strategies.
Having rather extended supply lines, the demon army was troubled for food. Although they’d wanted to procure food locally, the humans wouldn’t allow that.
So even though the demons were continuing to win their battles, they themselves were being driven into a corner.

“A scorched earth strategy is it…”
Within the general’s tent, Halt groaned, troubled.
There was also another reason for his groan—the demon army did have a weakness.
The Machine Gods, those that were their strongest fighting potential, couldn’t be used that often.
A Machine God’s core was called a magic core, something made to be even more pure than a magic crystal. Filling it with so much mana took an equally frightening amount of labor and effort. Taking into account the Great Collapse that would be arriving soon after this, he wanted to preserve their strength.
It wasn’t just Haruto that was troubled. His staff was also deep in thought, brooding over what was to be done.
“Couldn’t we just assassinate Prince Sion?”
The one to say that was Rei. The reason she had come up with that sort of idea was due to her skill in intelligence gathering and assassinations. In truth, Haruto had repeatedly carried out assassinations in order to have the Sacred City surrender.
“It wouldn’t work. Prince Sion has strong guards surrounding him, as well as he himself being quite skilled.”
The person to object was Ferna, Halt following up on her statement.
“Yeah, but there’s another problem. We’ll all be in trouble if we can’t finish this battle by the Great Collapse and ruin our world’s fighting strength.”

This was another one of the demon army’s weaknesses.
They had to win. However, they couldn’t beat them too much and annihilate them.
This was a fatal weakness for them.
Yet even so, the demon army approached Lemdria’s Royal Capital.
They had to make plays for decisive battles against troops that held the home ground advantage.
Meanwhile, Lemdria’s army could easily preserve their supply lines due to their short supply routes and could continually retreat without suffering any decisive losses.
This strategy was something their kind had proactively decided on, the crown prince only halfheartedly supporting it.

*

Meanwhile, the demons’ battles towards Casalia were going overwhelmingly in their favor.
Although it was an important matter in war to supress the damage taken when defeated them, Casalia didn’t have such great generals as to follow that.
It could be said that through Ogress’ alliance with the demon army, the demons’ logistics division had less work to do.
“I’m just a pack mule again… I’d like to actually do something with my magic though…”
Although Serge was complaining, he understood just how important his role was.

Ogress sympathizing with the demons had dealt Casalia a major, shocking blow.
Although Ria was the queen of Ogress, she was first a princess of Casalia.
The repeated defeats had broken the spirit of Casalia’s leaders.
Just six months after the demons began their invasion, Casalia signed a peace treaty with them.
However, it wasn’t something that held any disadvantages towards Casalia, so it didn’t detract much from the royal family’s dignity.

“But seriously, are you alright with those conditions?”
Riding in a carriage with Asuka, Ria asked her a question.
The condition for peace was that Casalia would cede its wilderness to the demons. It was the same as what had happened with Ogress.
It would be normal to think that the conditions would be much more favorable to the side that held the overwhelming advantage.
But Asuka simply laughed in response.
“Fufun, we’ve developed terraforming techniques in the Demonlands. That’s how we’ve been able to support so many soldiers. This way, we’ll be able to farm outside of wartime.”
They were going for colonization. Although it was difficult to actually do in practice, it appears they’d had success with it in the Demonlands.
Besides that, they’d also been successful at various agricultural methods that even held merits for humanity.

Thinking about it, they were beginning to even scratch at the surface of modern agricultural techniques. They’d even be able to improve the crops’ breeds through using magic over the course of a millennia.
And it was even easier than that by using Haruto’s understanding of science.

*

There were huge movements even in Lemdria.
South of Lemdria, although having to make a detour, the Krasli Kingdom was beginning to resupply the demon army.
This was the result of Haruto’s long-time infiltration and, as far as Lemdria was concerned, was an unexpected smack to the face.
Although it wasn’t as though a war between Krasli and Lemdria would begin immediately, it was necessary for Lemdria to send its forces to the south.

An alliance of cities to the east of Lemdria sat and watched all of this play out.
Since the alliance of cities had long been warring with Lemdria repeatedly, there were cities popping up that stopped aiding Lemdria.
Although it wasn’t as though they’d counted too much on those cities, since they had to separate their military yet again to defend their east, Lemdria was forced into a dilemma.

And then the demon army’s invasion began.
They’d had to devote a number of their troops to their supply train, but they still totaled a hundred thousand strong.

Above all, the Demon King stood with them at the forefront.
A carefully selected group of elites commended the invasion into Lemdria’s territory. To deal with this threat, Lemdria sent a host of 300,000. It was commanded by Prince Ryuke Sion. It was Lemdria’s greatest war potential.
These two forces clashed in an expanse of vast plains.
The result was an atrocity.

Having knowledge of contemporary warfare and holding air superiority, the demon army made the best use of its magic-specialized races and clashed head-on.
Even Prince Sion, the greatest tactician of the age, was unable to oppose them.
The Machine Gods freely landing within Lemdria’s formations easily broke apart and decimated any attempts to make a comeback.
Tactical levels of magic broke through Lemdria’s defensive lines and routed their vanguards.
Like this, Lemdria’s greatest war potential was defeated.

*

Lemdria’s war potential, its Royal Capital included, still remained. But as to whether or not it could win against the gathered demon army was something that King Ryuke Hollyn was skeptical of.
Even Prince Ryuke Sion had been defeated. He realized that the level of their tactical prowess was simply too different.

A messenger arrived from the demon army.
It was a Dark Elf with dark, tanned skin and silver hair. They’d come to ask for peace under Demon General Rei’s name and the conditions weren’t at all unfavorable to Lemdria.
They had to give the former empire’s territory that had become a wasteland to the demons. That was all.
Withdrawing from the territory that had already been invaded and putting up a buffer zone, it was actually rather advantageous for Lemdria.
This caused a rather heated discussion in their court, but when they tried thinking about it calmly, they truly only had a single choice.
Like this, the humans’ greatest nation, Lemdria Kingdom, was forced into coexistence with the demons.

*

“So it’s over…”
Receiving all of the reports in Manesh’s court, Ria muttered.
Falling back into the sofa, she looked at the papers. Carla and Guinevere were sitting on either side of her.
“This will be the end of the demon’s invasion for now, won’t it?”
Guinevere asked. Ria gave her the explanation she’d gotten from Asuka.
“From what I heard, the former empire’s territory should be enough to cover the demons’ population. The supply line to invade down to the southern part of the continent would just be too long.”
The Millennium’s war between humans and demons would come to a close with this. And although there was still postwar processing to deal with, it was still something rather troublesome to deal with.
“It’s finally time, is it…”
Carla muttered. This was the end of the Millennium. Next would be the real trial, the Great Collapse.
“A collision between two worlds, huh. Honestly, I still don’t get what that really means.”
It was simply too abstract. Even with Serge’s knowledge, it was still ambiguous.
But what was definitely was that the real thing had yet to come.

*

Several days later, a messenger from the demons arrived in Manesh’s court.
It was Asuka, someone they’d already grown familiar with. She was visiting the castle as an official envoy.

Seeing the contents of the documents she’d brought, Ria was astonished.
It was inviting each major nation’s leaders to work out measures to take against the Great Collapse in Lemdria’s castle of all things.
“Why is it going to be held in the castle of a country you just recently fought rather than in the former empire’s territory?”
Seeing her be astonished, Asuka spoke with a smile.”
“That’s why His Majesty is amazing. If he’d said to meet in a place under our control, those cowardly humans wouldn’t come now would they?”
It’s as she said. Anyone without the ability to fight like Ria would very likely not want to enter the demons’ lair.
Even so, the time for the meeting was incredibly soon.

“Wow, that’s soon.”
Asuka watched Ria with uncharacteristically serious eyes.
“It’s because the Great Collapse will happen soon.”
Losing the support of humans and demons killing each other, the Soul Cycle had grown weak.
So, naturally, the boundary between worlds grew fuzzy. They would collide before long.
Nodding, Ria said she’d go.

*

The Great Collapse.
“Let me see just what sort of fight’ll be coming this time…”
A ghastly era that not even the war-loving Ria could comprehend was about to come knocking.