Chapter 3:
Amassing Forces
The central cathedral in Alsus—home to Pontiff Thanatos Sylvius Hilk, the leader of the Holy Hilk Kingdom—was situated deep in the Rutios mountain range. It was a magnificent building covered in a gleaming white façade and surrounded by an open-air corridor.
The white stone floor was polished to such a magnificent sheen that it could serve as a mirror, reflecting perfectly the ceiling above and the beautiful religious scenes painted across it. Grand chandeliers hung from the ceiling at regular intervals.
All these gorgeous works of art spoke to the Holy Hilk Kingdom’s long history, expansion, and rise to power.
But there was more inside.
In the confines of the cathedral sat an empty room that no follower of the Hilk had ever set foot inside. In the blink of an eye, a man dressed in elaborate, priestly robes appeared within.
The sign of the Hilk hung from the man’s neck, and he held an intricately decorated scepter in one hand. This was the master of this cathedral and the ruler of the entire Hilk Kingdom, Pontiff Thanatos.
He let out a ragged sigh.
However, his face showed no emotion. The man, after all, had neither face nor flesh attached to his barren skull, only the mitre that identified his status within the church.
From the mitre dangled the remains of a veil, under which gaped two vacant eye sockets, behind which a red flame, the manifestation of his soul, flickered ominously.
“What the hell was that?!”
Though by all appearances he looked undead, there was something decidedly human about the way he spoke. His yells echoed throughout the empty cathedral.
Earlier that day, Thanatos had traveled to one of his recently conquered cities, the capital of Lione in the Delfrent Kingdom. He’d gone there to bolster the ranks of his undead armies.
Imbuing human corpses with a rune stone and summoning the same dark spell over and over again was simple, if tedious, work.
It felt like a waste of his time and talent to have to create each and every piece of cannon fodder one by one. However, when he stepped back and looked at the huge forces he’d amassed, it all seemed worth it. It might have been menial work, but it was fulfilling.
There was also, of course, the other recent development, which had helped break up the pontiff’s monotonous life and given him something to focus his attention on.
It felt like several lifetimes ago that he’d somehow transferred from the virtual world and found himself stranded here. It was tough going at first, but he was unmatched in this world. Through diligent effort, he’d managed to carve out a place of power for himself.
Not too long ago, he’d lost the first of his most powerful disciples, one of the seven cardinals, in a land that he’d already conquered.
Thanatos had grown convinced that the only person who could have killed the cardinal was someone like himself—another player from the game. He was elated at the thought of meeting another outsider.
However, as this player continued killing his cardinals one by one, the pontiff decided it was time to offer them a warm welcome.
Having lived in this world for so long without interacting with anyone else from the old world, something inside Thanatos longed to battle his opponent to the death. This was probably due to his competitiveness as a gamer. Win or lose, it would be an exciting match.
Just the thought of such an encounter made even tedious task of building an army enjoyable. It was like he was playing the game all over again.
Things had really begun to kick off when a dragon showed up that morning. Thanatos had been busy transforming dead humans into soldiers, in his newly conquered domain of Lione.
He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen a dragon, but recalled that there were some players who could control and even ride them. However, the cost of owning and maintaining a dragon was far higher than that of undead soldiers. Sure, they looked impressive, but the cost versus payout was pretty poor.
When he caught sight of the humanoid figures clutching the dragon’s hind legs, that’s when he knew this was no mere monster roaming the skies.
After doing several loops around Lione, possibly to gauge Thanatos’s strength, the dragon had landed to the west of the city.
Thanatos had smirked under his veil. The other player who had come all the way to the Delfrent Kingdom didn’t even realize that he was here.
He called the majority of his forces back into the city and left a small contingent outside the walls to keep the enemy busy.
A dragon alone was hardly enough to level the playing field against the pontiff’s undead soldiers and specter warriors. Moreover, he had one of his cardinals, Tismo, with him. The dragon would be dead in a matter of moments.
Generally, you only enter into battle against a dragon with the understanding that you’re going to lose a great deal of your troops, but the pontiff had more than a few tricks up his sleeve. There was no way he’d lose this fight.
For starters, he could summon one of his demons to weaken the dragon enough to allow the specter warriors to overpower it. All he had to do was knock the dragon down a peg or two, and then the battle would get interesting.
His plan formed, Thanatos drew his army of undead back through the shattered walls that had once protected Lione.
With a powerful dragon backing them up, the small group of fighters must have thought they were a sufficient force for reconnaissance. If anything, it spoke to their bravery.
Once within the city’s wall, Thanatos was surprised when he looked out again and found the bodies of his undead soldiers and specter warriors littering the ground. He could count only a few left standing despite the relatively large force he’d left to defend the perimeter.
Even more surprising, though, were the three people standing with the dragon. One of them was a large knight clad from head to toe in silver armor, while the other two were an elf and a beast girl—species that the Holy Hilk Kingdom had spent years trying to eradicate.
Could this be the silver knight he’d heard reports about? The one who’d killed his cardinal? By some strange twist of fate, here they both were.
The knight’s armor was accented with intricate white and blue designs. On his back fluttered a black cape, and he wielded a magnificent sword and beautifully decorated shield. He looked like a hero straight out of a legend.
At first glance, Thanatos knew this man was no mere soldier. Underneath his veil, his skeletal jaw contorted in an imitation of a smile.
He’d never expected to just happen across the other player like this, and especially not so soon. The knight looked over in his direction, and the pontiff’s heart began racing.
It didn’t seem like the knight was about to charge into battle, so Thanatos considered talking to him face to face.
It was time for him to greet his new friends…and do something about that dragon.
However, since the other player was evidently a Knight, while Thanatos himself was a Magus, he wouldn’t stand a chance if this battle turned physical. But being so close to his domain also gave Thanatos something of an advantage. He decided it was best to strike the opening blow.
Things went off exactly as planned. The pontiff’s Hell King Balam took on the dragon while Tismo went about killing the two women.
This left the human player to face off against the pontiff and his legions.
To stack the deck even further in his favor, Thanatos called upon Nether Resonance to make his soldiers go berserk. While this reduced his ability to control them, it greatly increased their attack power. With an army this large, the other player wouldn’t stand a chance, no matter powerful he was.
It would be unfortunate to kill the other player before they even had the chance to speak, but Thanatos figured the knight would retreat before that could happen. After all, he was up against an overwhelming army, and he shouldn’t have any particular attachment to this land.
But if the knight stayed, and Thanatos took him down, then at least the other player would be sent to the battle results screen and could figure out what had happened to him. Once there, he should be able to contact the developers, and things would ultimately play out the same for Thanatos.
The pontiff raised his hand, sending forth wave after wave of undead. As he watched, the knight retreated, and he felt all the more assured of his victory.
That changed almost immediately, however, when the silver knight suddenly reappeared at the pontiff’s side, swinging his heavy blade. Thanatos just barely managed to block the blow with his scepter, though the force of it still threw him back. A Magus could hardly stand up against a prolonged physical assault.
Back when Thanatos had started the game, he’d been presented with two options: to be a magical- or physical-attack character. Yet the player standing in front of him seemed to be a combination of both.
He felt annoyance wash over him at the thought that a new feature had been added without his knowledge.
Thanatos tried using Evil Thorn to hold off his opponent and suss out his weaknesses, but the results were surprising. The attack seemed to be especially ineffective against the silver knight.
He followed with another Evil Thorn, though the knight came striking back hard. His sword was now far bigger than it had been before, and he was swinging straight for Thanatos’s neck.
Only a hair’s breadth separated the pontiff from certain death. He barely made it.
At the time, Thanatos hadn’t understood why the silver knight paused his attack, but he decided not to dwell on it and quickly teleported into the middle of one of his armies. The undead dutifully shuffled around him, shielding him from sight.
He may have gotten away for now, but he still wasn’t safe. Thanatos kept teleporting, bouncing around to various locations until he was back in Lione.
Usually when a small force went up against a much more powerful army, the best strategy was to kill their leadership, and it looked like that was exactly what the silver knight was trying to do: teleport in close and try to cut the commander down with a single blow. It was an effective strategy for a Mystic Knight to use against a Magus.
In that case, the pontiff’s best defense was to simply stay out of his opponent’s line of sight, as short-distance teleportation required that you be able to see where you wanted to go. With all the undead soldiers filling the battlefield, teleportation should prove difficult, if not impossible.
Then, Thanatos would just have to sit back and wait for his berserking soldiers to tear the man apart.
At least, that was what he had hoped would happen.
But within a matter of minutes, Thanatos watched as the tide of the battle turned in an utterly unexpected direction.
Hell King Balam, a demon he’d put a lot of energy into summoning, had fought a tough battle against the massive dragon, though it was growing clear that Balam was on the losing end.
Tismo Ghoula Temprantia wasn’t faring much better against the two despicable non-humans. They fought too well together for him to put up any kind of meaningful resistance.
The pontiff returned his gaze to the silver knight and was taken aback by what he saw.
Though the knight had originally retreated in the face of so many berserking undead, after teleporting away, he’d executed a powerful magic attack.
The Magus class differed from physical classes in that it specialized in magical attacks with a wide area of effect. Yet here was this Mystic Knight, summoning an angel the likes of which Thanatos had never seen.
And that was just the beginning.
The knight called forth a meteor shower, killing at least half of the undead. He followed this up with a more focused meteor strike, scarring the very earth. With these two attacks, the pontiff’s army had been completely annihilated.
“Wh-what was that?” Thanatos’s question hung in the air, unanswered.
What he’d witnessed went beyond a mere overpowered player character. Being able to wipe out an entire army on your own didn’t just harm the balance of the game, it decimated the game’s very mechanics.
If players could become this powerful, then there was no sense bothering with subordinate team members—or even armies—in the first place.
Even more troubling, the player’s comrades possessed impressive abilities in their own right, making simple work of the pontiff’s minions. There was something wrong with this whole scenario.
One thing was certain…if the system administrators knew about this, then they were utterly incompetent.
On the other hand, if they were unaware, then that meant the silver knight had hacked his character. Anger welled within the pontiff at the thought. His grip tightened around his scepter, and he rapped it on the stone floor.
Still, forcing an entirely new hacked class like the Mystic Knight into the game would have been no simple task. More likely, the class itself had been designed by the developers and the player had illegally altered his character’s stats.
Still atop Lione’s defensive wall, Thanatos reached into his robe and pulled out a transportation stone. The tiny gem, just small enough to fit comfortably in the palm of his hand, gave off a haunting purple glow.
Transportation stones allowed their users to take advantage of special teleportation platforms to move between locations. The only catch was that these locations were fixed. But they allowed for greater flexibility than short-distance teleportation magic, which required line of sight.
This came at a cost, of course, as each use consumed one of these rare gems.
Without a second thought, Thanatos threw the precious gem to the ground. A magic rune appeared at his feet as it shattered, and a moment later, he was back in the Alsus cathedral.
Thanatos immediately made his way toward the vault in his private chambers. Inside, he reached for another transportation stone and paused. His supply was running short.
“I’ll need to make some more.”
He took one of the stones and threw it at his feet. An instant later, the gleaming cathedral was replaced with a dimly lit office.
Shelves lined the walls, stuffed with books all the way up to the ceiling. Even more volumes were stacked haphazardly across the office floor, leaning towers of knowledge ready to topple at any moment. At the far end of the room was a large, wooden desk.
A young, muscular man with dark bags under his eyes sat behind the desk. Despite being in his twenties, his unkempt blond hair and unshaven face gave him the appearance of an old man.
As soon as the man saw Thanatos, he rushed over.
“Is something the matter, Your Holiness?”
This man was Cardinal Marcos Invidia Humanitas, who spent much of his time in Alsus here in his study.
Marcos’s surprise was understandable. It was incredibly rare for the pontiff to use a transportation stone to visit the cardinal’s study.
Even more baffling was the fact that the pontiff’s veil had been torn away, revealing his lack of face underneath. The cardinal hurried to a drawer and retrieved the extra veil he kept on hand.
Thanatos attached it to his mitre. “I want you to release Aamon and Mammon from the basement, then dispatch all of our remaining undead soldiers and specter warriors to close off the city.”
Cardinal Marcos gulped audibly at this. Aamon and Mammon were two spirit creatures that the pontiff had created as a last resort weapon against his enemies. Even the more powerful cardinals paled in comparison to them.
They’d been sealed off to keep them from wreaking havoc. Once that seal was lifted, there’d be no going back.
The pontiff’s authorization to unleash them could only mean that the Holy Hilk Kingdom was in grave danger.
The last Marcos had heard, the Holy Hilk Kingdom’s simultaneous invasions of its neighbors had been going well. He’d felt annoyed at being left behind to keep watch over the capital while his comrades served on the front lines, but such was his lot.
Sensing his underling’s confusion, the pontiff explained. “I can no longer feel Augrent. Did the invasion to the south also fail? But I can still feel Elin. What’s going on?”
Marcus was shocked to hear that his fellow cardinals had fallen.
Thanatos searched deep within himself, tugging at the spiritual threads that connected him to his cardinals, but it was still the same. He could no longer feel Cardinal Augrent, nor could he pinpoint Cardinal Elin’s location. It was utterly baffling.
What exactly had happened in the Salma Kingdom?
Considering how easily the silver knight’s comrades had held their own against Tismo, it wasn’t out of the realm of believability that similar creatures had taken down his other cardinals. Thanatos gritted his teeth as these dark thoughts flooded his mind.
The silver knight would almost certainly be making his way here shortly. As it stood, the pontiff’s likelihood of survival seemed fairly low. But he wasn’t ready to give up, not after so many years living in this game. No, he’d bring all the power he could muster and strike back.
“I’d like to assemble the remaining cardinals here to bolster our forces, but there’s no guarantee that he won’t strike while we gather them. If they send a small force by dragon, they could be here tomorrow, or possibly even today. Marcos, do you think you can handle it?”
Thanatos lifted his veil slightly, the glowing flame within his empty skull reflecting in the cardinal’s eyes. Marcos nodded solemnly.
The holy city he’d vowed to protect was now under attack. His heart swelled at the opportunity to prove himself in battle—to not only the pontiff, but to all those who’d doubted him. He would save the Holy Hilk Kingdom in its darkest hour.
Marcos bowed his head low and silently thanked the gods for granting him this chance.
If they were going to unleash the sealed beasts, then something would need to be done about Alsus’s citizens. But first, Cardinal Marcos needed to assemble the specter warriors. He strode from the room.
After watching the other man leave, Thanatos made his way over to the open window and looked down at the holy capital.
It was a clean, well-organized city, filled with thousands of smiling people going about their day.
He felt a twinge of regret, knowing the city he’d built would fall to ruin at the hands of Aamon and Mammon, but this was what they’d been created for. Thanatos had known this day would come eventually.
“Even if the game is over, this city can at least put up a good fight. It will serve its purpose. Whoever you are, silver knight, I hope you’re ready to take on my entire kingdom.”
A hollow laugh echoed out from behind Thanatos’s thin veil. Then he turned his back on the city and headed deep into the bowels of the cathedral to remove the seal on Aamon and Mammon.
***
Here in Lione, the once-lively city lay shrouded in oppressive silence. Even after the relentless undead assault, much of the capital remained standing, despite the invaders’ best efforts to level it.
Squares lined with shops the residents had patronized were now filled with their bodies. It was an awful sight to behold.
The only signs of life, if you could even call them that, were the few surviving undead soldiers and man-spiders roaming the streets, but we dispatched them with relative ease.
Even though I wasn’t able to sense the undead like Ariane and Chiyome, Ponta would wag its tail as soon as it caught the scent of one of these creatures. Following its nose, it would eventually lead me to an enemy, so at least I wouldn’t be caught totally off-guard.
“Kyii!”
Ponta had found an undead soldier half buried in the remains of a building, which I quickly dispatched with a single thrust from my sword. After making sure the coast was clear, I glanced around to get my bearings.
Much to my surprise, I found Ariane standing nearby, staring straight at me. “Are you even listening, Arc?”
She had her hands on her hips and her back arched, emphasizing her ample bosom. My gaze naturally fell to her gently bouncing chest.
Even though I was wearing a helmet, she somehow knew where I was looking. I could practically see the anger welling up within her, so I scratched the back of my head in embarrassment and returned my eyes to hers.
“Oh, uh…hey, Ariane! What brings you here?”
She glared at me. Apparently, I wasn’t as good at playing it cool as I’d thought.
“I’ll repeat myself, but just this once. I was asking you to show a little consideration and tell someone before you use an attack like that! You almost killed me and Chiyome!”
I bowed my head in apology. She had every right to be angry.
I had absolutely no idea just how massive Uriel’s attacks would be, though I probably could have guessed. Evidently, “savior” wasn’t just some fancy title.
The problem was that Paladin abilities were all so massively powerful. They put such an enormous strain on my mind and body that I couldn’t just try them out on a whim.
Archangel Guardian Raphael and Archangel Prophet Gabriel were still untested, but there was a chance I’d need to use them in the upcoming battle with the Hilk.
I cocked my head to the side in thought, but quickly thought better of it as I felt Ponta begin sliding off my helmet.
Ariane gave an exasperated sigh as she watched me mull things over. I could tell she was equal parts exhausted and annoyed. Fortunately, Chiyome chose that moment to arrive and save me.
She noiselessly hopped down from the roof she’d been standing on to survey the city. Her tail twitched behind her.
“You shouldn’t be too strict with him, Ariane. If it weren’t for Arc, we’d still be fighting the other undead. He got us out of that battle with no injuries.”
I stepped closer to Chiyome, my sole defender. However, Ariane wasn’t finished. She narrowed her eyes and pointed an accusatory finger in my direction.
“No, no, no! You can’t just let him off the hook like that, Chiyome! If you don’t drill it into Arc’s thick skull, then he’ll never understand. He tore up the earth right in front of us! Who knows what could’ve happened if he’d missed!”
I looked to Chiyome for more support, but she only shook her head.
“I suppose she’s right there.”
All I could do was bow my head and ask for forgiveness. “I promise to be more careful in the future.”
Ariane shrugged her shoulders and let out a loud, exaggerated sigh before turning her gaze upward. It looked like something else was troubling her.
“You know, ever since you two fought, Villiers Fim alternates between speaking to you as if you’re best friends and as if you were somehow higher status than him. Isn’t that odd?”
I followed her gaze to find the Dragon Lord flying in slow circles above the capital. I thought back on our relationship and couldn’t help but agree.
I must have gained his respect by showing myself equal to, or even more powerful than him. The real question was how our relationship would develop going forward. After all, I had little experience in these matters.
After the battle had ended, Villiers Fim had told me he’d keep watch above the city, and launched into the sky without another word.
“Kyii?” Ponta’s mewing interrupted my thoughts. It had picked up on something.
I looked around to see what had drawn Ponta’s attention. My gaze settled on a member of the Jinshin clan standing alone on a rooftop nearby. Like Chiyome, she jumped down soundlessly and hurried over to me.
“Goemon says he’s found what he believes to be survivors, but they’re trapped behind some rubble. Could you please come back with me and assist us?”
The young woman was dressed in the same black garb as Chiyome and wore a nervous look on her face.
“Of course. Please, lead the way.”
The young Jinshin warrior nodded once and started off.
Like Villiers Fim, she was also being overly polite.
“People really are laying it on thick huh?”
I hadn’t been saying this to anyone in particular, but Ariane’s ears perked up, and she elbowed me lightly in the side as we walked.
“Isn’t that what I said? They’re acting like you’re one of the Dragon Lords now. It makes sense, I guess, considering how you wiped out all those undead on your own. Plus, we didn’t even get to use the defensive line we spent so much time making.”
We’d built it under the assumption that we’d be facing a battle brimming with disorganized enemies, like we had back in Saureah. However, when the opportunity to draw all of the undead together and wipe them out with a single blow presented itself, I knew I had to take it. It was a better outcome overall, but it still felt bittersweet.
We’d carefully selected our fighting positions and had gone through so much effort to earn the support of the elves and Jinshin clan, and yet we hadn’t even used them. I could only imagine how demoralizing that was.
To a relative novice in military affairs like myself, though, a great victory meant ending the battle quickly, without needing to call reinforcements or suffer any casualties.
Up ahead, I saw the young cat person step into a garden and rush over to a building that looked as if it had collapsed during a fire.
The building had a rather austere appearance, as if someone had made a half-hearted attempt to turn a storehouse into a home. What had once been the second floor and roof had completely collapsed into a pile of bricks.
I spotted Goemon and several other muscular mountain people from the Jinshin clan, dressed in their familiar ninja garb, standing in front of the house. The group nodded to me as I approached. I felt like a foreman entering a construction site, ready to give orders.
Goemon stepped forward and, as had become our custom, raised his hand to bump my fist before jerking his chin toward the rubble.
“There.”
He wasn’t a man of many words, but he got the message across.
Many of the bricks had been hauled away from the area he indicated, and there was a large boulder blocking the entrance to what appeared to be a basement.
Chiyome walked over, her ears twitching. “I can sense some of our people down there.”
I gave her a quizzical look. “Due to the heavy influence of the Hilk teachings here, I would’ve figured that all of the mountain people were run out of town. Then again, there were quite a few living in secret back in Nohzan too.”
I thought of all the mountain people we’d set free back in Saureah. Even under the watchful eye of the Holy Hilk Kingdom, the most widely followed religion among humans, there would always be those who defied the church’s teachings.
Examining the large boulder blocking the basement, I couldn’t help but think that Goemon could’ve moved it himself. But it was big enough that he might’ve had to muscle it out of the way, risking debris falling on those below.
If Goemon, his warriors, and I all joined in together, we could probably lift it straight up, a much safer option.
Just as I was about to get into position, I saw a middle-aged man’s face appear in a gap between the boulder and the opening.
“Help’s finally arrived! Hurry up so I can get outta here! I’ve been trapped for so long I thought I was done for!”
The eager man’s face was dingy, covered in dirt and sweat. However, he looked distinctly human to me, and not one of the mountain people, as Chiyome had claimed.
I turned back to Ariane, Chiyome, and Goemon, hoping to get some feedback on the best course of action. But I was met with frowns from the two women and crossed arms from Goemon.
Personally, I thought this kind of job was best suited to Villiers Fim. However, he was currently enjoying keeping watch up in the air, and it didn’t seem like he planned on coming down anytime soon.
“Well, it’s not doing us any good to just stand around doing nothing. Let’s get this boulder out of the way.”
Goemon and three of his warriors stepped forward.
“All right, on three…”
After everyone had a grip, I gave the count, and we lifted in unison. The boulder was a lot lighter than I’d expected. When we dropped it in its new resting place nearby, the ground shook with the impact. Apparently, it wasn’t all that light—the Jinshin warriors were just that strong.
“Aw’right, finally! Dunno what took you guys so long. I’ve been stuck down there for days, I’ll have y’know!”
With the entrance now unblocked, the man came crawling out of the basement. He brushed the dust off his clothes as he stood, a look of annoyance on his face. His gaze froze on Goemon.
“Wait, what’s going on here? Beastmen…and elves?! Who are you guys?”
The man was probably forty years old or so and, despite the filth covering his body, he was dressed rather elaborately. Between that and his entitled demeanor, I reasoned he was a member of the nobility.
The man let out a blood curdling scream when he saw the burnt-out remains of his house.
“Nooooooo! What happened to my home?! Why, God, why?!”
We all watched as the man slumped to his knees and continued screaming unintelligibly. He clearly hadn’t grasped the enormity of the assault his city had suffered.
Ariane glowered at the man. “God, you’re a fool.”
She turned her attention to me.
“Let’s leave this pathetic excuse for a man here and check out what’s down below. I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”
Without another word, she hurried down the stairs with Chiyome on her heels. Ponta mewed agitatedly for me to join them.
“Kyii! Kyiiiii!”
I shot a quick glance back at Goemon, but he only offered a simple nod in response. He’d stand watch over the noble and leave the investigation up to us. I took off after Ariane.
At the bottom of the short stairwell, we found ourselves in a spacious room with a large bed in the center. The room had a musty odor to it.
On top of the bed lay a cat woman, her wrists bound by metal clasps affixed to the wall. It was a scene very similar to one I’d witnessed back in the Rhoden Kingdom.
Ariane suddenly seemed very aware of my presence and hurriedly yanked the sheets off the bed to cover the naked woman.
“Could you, like, look away or something, Arc?”
I quickly averted my gaze and looked around the room instead.
In one of the corners stood a shelf built into the wall, on which sat a crystal lamp, some alcohol, and what I could only assume were snacks.
Next to the shelves was a small cooking area, where I spotted smoked meat, a knife, and some other utensils.
With all of the supplies down here, I figured the man could’ve survived a while longer with little trouble. The only question was whether the woman was actually being given any of this food.
By the way she was chained to the bed, it seemed likely she was a slave. Would an entitled member of the nobility share his limited food with someone he saw as property?
The question didn’t even need to be asked.
“I can’t find the key to the handcuffs…”
Chiyome had torn apart the area surrounding the bed and was still coming up short, so I walked over to the wall where the chains were fastened and broke them free. The sound of rending metal echoed throughout the room.
As I stepped forward to cast a curative spell on the woman and heal the bruises covering her body, I saw Chiyome’s cat ears twitch. Her eyes darted around the room.
“There’s a hidden chamber in here somewhere.”
“Kyii!” Ponta seemed to concur.
I set my furry companion down and followed Chiyome over to the shelf built into the wall and gave it a hard push. Much to my surprise, it slid backward on the stone flooring, revealing a hidden room.
Ariane gasped. “Wow, Chiyome, how did you know?”
Chiyome’s ears flittered. “It wasn’t anything special. The echo of the breaking chains didn’t sound right.”
She turned her gaze back to the dimly lit room, grabbed the crystal lamp, and stepped inside. Before I could follow her in, Ariane put up a hand to stop me.
“We’ll check this room out. Arc, could you help the woman?”
I turned and made my way back to the woman on the bed.
I tore the handcuffs away from her wrists, then cast Heal and gave her a quick once-over. She seemed to be breathing all right, though she didn’t do more than stare at the ceiling above. I hoped she was only tired.
It was then that I noticed a rather powerful stench coming from the room Chiyome and Ariane had disappeared into. I felt a weight forming in the pit of my stomach as my mind cycled through possible sources for the rotting smell.
Movement on the bed caught my eye. I turned back, but the woman was nowhere to be seen. I looked around to try and find her, but Chiyome had taken the only light source, making it nearly impossible for me to see more than a few feet.
“Ariane, I can’t find her!”
Ariane stepped out of the hidden room and began frantically looking for the woman.
“What?! She was just here a moment ago, wasn’t she?”
The room wasn’t all that large, so I figured that she must have rolled off the side of the bed and was now crouching there. As I leaned over to check, I heard a scream coming from outside.
“Gyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaugh!”
Ariane and I jerked our heads toward the stairs in unison.
“Outside, now!”
She bolted out of the room. As I tried to follow, my leg caught the side of the bed, sending splinters everywhere.
Back in the light of day, we found the cat woman dressed in a negligee and holding a knife in her hand. She was covered in blood, and her shoulders were shaking.
The noble lay on the ground, his throat slashed.
The woman dropped the knife and slumped down to her knees. “This… This bastard, he… My sister! My little sister! Right in front of me!”
No one knew what to say.
A moment later, Chiyome appeared at the top of the stairs behind us. She spoke matter-of-factly as she dimmed the crystal lamp.
“She was the only survivor.”
That was all we needed to hear.
The man had been keeping this woman and others locked away down there.
It was clear to me now that my idealistic notion of simply setting the mountain people free, like King Asparuh had done back in the Nohzan Kingdom, wouldn’t simply fix decades of slavery. It was going to take a lot of work.
This made me wonder what kind of impact destroying the Holy Hilk Kingdom would have.
I recalled the skeletal face of the pontiff—a face much like my own—and shook my head. That, too, wouldn’t just solve all our problems.
There would only be minor changes with the fall of the Hilk. Just as it had taken time for the rift to form between all these species, so too would it take time to repair it. A depressing prospect.
Ariane walked to the woman’s side and gently urged her away from the body of her blood-soaked captor.
I looked up at the massive capital around us and was suddenly struck by how massive the place was. There had to be a fair number of survivors hidden within the wreckage, but I didn’t have time to spare on them just now.
I figured I could leave Ariane, Chiyome, and Goemon behind to oversee rescue operations.
Dillan and I would return to the Nohzan Kingdom, report on the results of our battle, and then make our way to the Salma Kingdom to check on progress there.
As for Villiers Fim…well, I figured we could leave him here for now.
There was a lot to do.
***
Princess Riel was the first person to greet us as Dillan and I teleported into the Nohzan Kingdom. She came rushing over with her two bodyguards once she received word that we were back in the castle, and her eyes went wide with joy when she heard our report on the events back in Delfrent.
“Wow, I can’t believe it’s all over so quickly! I knew we could count on you, Arc!”
It felt good to be praised by the young princess.
With that out of the way, I left Dillan in Saureah and used Transport Gate to make my way to the fort on the border between the Salma Kingdom and Brahniey, where our forces had prepared for their stand.
I found myself in a scene completely unlike the one I’d sketched in my teleportation diary.
The landscape was littered with armor—armor that had no doubt been worn by the undead horde before their bodies had faded away.
I also noticed an odd boulder in the middle of the plain. It looked almost like a small mountain had erupted out of the ground. Whatever happened here, the battle had clearly been intense, judging by the ravaged landscape.
Probably the biggest change of all was the massive crater that ran across the Wiel, just a short way off from the fort. Water was slowly filling the newly formed basin, creating a small pond.
“I can’t believe… Well, actually, I suppose I can believe it.”
There was only one person I knew who could completely transform the earth like this in such a short amount of time: Felfi Visrotte, the Dragon Lord.
Judging by the size of the crater, I figured she could’ve stood toe to toe with Archangel Savior Uriel, if not beat him outright. It absolutely blew my mind that beings like Felfi Visrotte even existed.
Looking closer, I saw that her attack hadn’t just affected the enemy. The two forts where we’d stationed our troops had also suffered extensive damage to their outer walls. The stone bridge that had once spanned the river had also been reduced to rubble. It was pure chaos.
I looked around for the person—or dragon, rather—that had caused this damage.
“Kyii! Kyiiiii!”
Ponta drew my attention behind me. I turned to see the Dragon Lord approaching in her humanoid form. Her long, violet hair billowed in the wind.
“Well, fancy meeting you here! So, I guess that means you guys’ve finished things on your end too?”
I nodded. “I came to pick up Fangas, Margrave Brahniey, and Prince Sekt, so we can report on the Salma front to those back in Saureah. Do you know where they are?”
The Dragon Lord glanced from one fort to the other. She smirked as she spoke.
“Fangas and the Margrave are giving cleanup orders to their troops. Sekt suffered an injury and is resting.”
Looking back over the cluttered battlefield, I could see that the enemy forces hadn’t managed to inflict anywhere near the damage they’d done in Delfrent.
I wondered just how many casualties we’d suffered along the way. If Prince Sekt, the leader of the Rhoden forces, had been injured, that could greatly harm our unification efforts, which was something I wanted to avoid at all costs.
“Well then, I think I’ll check in on Sekt and see if I can help him.”
I figured I’d cast a healing spell on the prince and then on anyone else who was seriously injured. That should at least keep us from losing too many soldiers. I wouldn’t have time to heal everyone right now, so those with lesser injuries would just have to tough it out the traditional way.
“I’ll let the other two know you’ve arrived.”
With that, Felfi Visrotte was off into the sky. I felt strange using a Dragon Lord as a messenger, but she seemed to want to do it, so who was I to stop her?
It was difficult to get a sense of Sekt’s injuries just by looking at him, but he seemed to have suffered several broken bones. After casting Over Heal on him, though, he seemed to be fine.
His eyes went wide at how quickly his body healed, and he even smacked himself a few times to check for lingering pain, against the protests of his soldiers. The prince looked like a new man.
Sekt then asked me to heal a few dozen of his troops, a task I happily took on. Just as I was finishing that up, Fangas and Brahniey entered the fort.
The margrave offered a few words of praise as he entered the room.
“Ah, Arc. Felfi Visrotte told us we’d find you here. I hear you were able to clear out the Delfrent Kingdom with little trouble. Good on ya, lad.”
Fangas hefted his mammoth hammer onto his shoulder and turned the subject to his granddaughter.
“How did Ariane and the others fare?”
Something told me that if I mentioned I’d almost wiped out his beloved granddaughter with a powerful magic attack, his hammer might very well find its way to my face, so I decided to gloss over that part.
“Ariane and Chiyome are still back in Lione, heading up the search for survivors.”
Fangas nodded. “All right then. We’ll leave the rest to our commanders. Brahniey and I will accompany you back to Saureah.”
Prince Sekt wasn’t too keen on this idea.
“Now wait just a moment. I should go too, as a representative of the Rhoden Kingdom.”
It seemed like he was back to his normal self.
Fangas raised a skeptical eyebrow at the young prince. “If you insist, then so be it. Arc?”
“Got it.”
Even though his injuries had been healed, it still would do some good for the Prince to rest up. Alas, it didn’t seem like he was going to change his mind.
A few moments later, we were back in Saureah, the capital of the Nohzan Kingdom.
The faces in the castle’s meeting room were decidedly brighter than they had been the last time we’d gathered. Princess Riel was practically beaming.
“You’ve already freed Delfrent?” King Asparuh asked in disbelief.
Dillan opted to keep his response vague. “Well, let’s just say that our plan went a lot better than expected.”
I could feel the village elder’s eyes on me, but I kept my eyes fixed on the map laid out on the table.
Next to speak was Margrave Brahniey. He turned to Fangas and Dillan and bowed low before offering his report.
“We were able to hold the defensive line at Brahniey’s border and destroy the invaders from the Holy Hilk Kingdom. Felfi Visrotte’s power truly defies all human understanding.”
The Margrave ran a hand through his receding gray hair and let out a sigh of amazement.
The same thought had crossed my own mind. It was hard to put into words just how awe-inspiring it was to witness the immense power involved in creating a lake where there had only been an empty plain.
The people of this world were no strangers to the monsters roaming their lands, but the power wielded by the Dragon Lord was something else entirely—something more in the domain of gods or demons.
Were Ariane here, she would almost certainly have pointed out that I, too, was able to perform such feats, but I didn’t feel like Felfi Visrotte and I were even remotely on the same level. While my Paladin class could inflict a great deal of damage, I was keenly aware of the fact that this was only because I was borrowing the power of the archangels.
I’d slowly come to acknowledge the immense power lurking within me, but I still didn’t feel like I could take credit for it. Summoning Uriel had really driven this point home. Alas, I didn’t feel like I could explain this feeling in words.
“…which means we should be free to move on the Holy Hilk Kingdom.” Dillan’s voice broke through my thoughts. He was pointing out landmarks on the map and discussing our next steps. “We’ll teleport our forces to Fehrbio Alsus and strike at the capital.”
This plan seemed to take the humans in the room by surprise. King Asparuh was the first to speak up.
“Now, let’s just wait a moment. Yes, we agreed that the Holy Hilk Kingdom was next, and that hasn’t changed, but attacking the capital directly without a proper strategy…that’s something else entirely.”
From what I could infer, his greatest concern was that if we were to invade a foreign country without properly securing supply lines, then we risked our armies becoming completely cut off.
But that only applied to normal armies.
“Your concerns are well-founded, King Asparuh. However, our plan is to teleport straight into the heart of the Holy Hilk Kingdom and deliver a decisive blow. Not only does this eliminate our need for dedicated supply lines, but we also won’t need a direction to fall back in if we’re routed. After all, we could easily return here if need be. Our goal is to take out the pontiff. That’s all.”
Dillan pointed to the black token sitting on the capital of the Holy Hilk Kingdom.
King Asparuh, Margrave Brahniey, and Prince Sekt frowned at the map. They didn’t seem convinced that this strategy would succeed.
Between the gifted elven soldiers, the speed at which this war was progressing, and my ability to teleport soldiers in and out of a battlefield at will, the human side of this equation didn’t have much to contribute. This was beyond anything they’d ever experienced.
My power in particular was like being able to move any piece directly next to your opponent’s king in chess.
And that was only taking the front-line troops into account. With the immense power the Dragon Lords harbored, it was like flipping the entire chess board over and playing with new rules made up on the fly.
Prince Sekt was the first to break the silence, a sly grin on his face. “I see no problem with a quick, decisive battle. I assume we can count on the Dragon Lords to join us?”
Dillan nodded. “Yes, we’ll need their support. I’d like to limit the amount of time we have to keep our forces away from home.”
King Asparuh agreed to this as well. But something still seemed to be bothering the margrave. After glaring at the spot on the map that marked Larisa in the Salma Kingdom, he looked up and addressed the room.
“I see no problem with your plan to attack the capital. However, I would like to ask for your assistance in liberating Larisa. From what you mentioned earlier, Arc, the capital is still occupied by the undead. If there are any survivors left within the city’s walls, I want to rescue them as soon as possible.”
While the capital of Delfrent was being cleared out, we’d only managed to hold the line at the Wiel River, the border between the Salma Kingdom proper and the Brahniey domain. With the bridge now out of service, it would take a considerable amount of time before he could send help.
Since I’d already sketched Larisa, I could teleport there anytime I wanted. Bringing a force large enough to secure the city wouldn’t be much of a challenge.
Furthermore, it would probably do us a lot of good in the long run to liberate the capital of the Salma Kingdom.
Dillan thought this over for a moment. “Looking for undead can be hard work. Why don’t we split the elven and Jinshin forces in Delfrent and send half of them to Larisa? I figure they should be able to clear out both cities in around two days. Then we can give them all a day to rest up.”
Not needing to rely on sight alone, the elves and mountain people were especially well-suited to the task of tracking down and slaying any lingering undead. The same task would take far longer if the humans were to do it alone.
Everyone seemed to agree with Dillan’s plan.
“All right then. Margrave, we’ll move your forces stationed near the Wiel up to the capital and leave operational control to you. The survivors would probably be happier to see a fellow Brahniey leading them.”
After a look around the room to check for consensus, the matter was settled, and everyone hurried off to begin their preparations.
I gazed out the window. In just three days’ time, we’d be taking the fight to the Holy Hilk Kingdom and putting an end to this once and for all.
The vast sky above seemed utterly unconcerned with the huge losses suffered in the neighboring nations, nor the massive battle about to take place. No matter where, or even when, you happened to live, the sky was always the same, brilliant shade of blue.
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