บท 68: Chapter 28
The army of nearly a hundred thousand marched resolutely towards Tempest as an unrelenting force of destruction. The frontline mages blasted the trees into smithereens with explosion spells to make way for the army.
Gelmud sat on his wooden throne in a slumped-down position, carried by four orcs. Beside him walked Gulbtro, his third in command. The grey-haired kijin was the leader of one of the lesser ogre clans and one of the few who had already evolved.
'The idiot could not even feel how powerful I have become. I even let him evolve into a kijin. What a waste.' Gelmud thought in annoyance. He had left Mundro behind, due to his constant attempts at stopping the attack and whining about Tempest being too strong for Gelmud's forces to take on.
In fact only Geld, out of his three commanders, was on the field today. Gelmud had left Gabiru behind as well, for the simple reason that he was unsure if the lizardman could be entrusted with any sort of command. Gabiru may be loyal to the core, but even being near him and his closest subordinates invited genocidal thoughts. 'How could I choose the biggest idiot of them all? Sure, he was meant to be a sacrifice for the Orc Lord, but couldn't having me name him instill at least some intelligence on his empty head?'
"Careful, you clumsy pigs!" He shouted at the four orcs carrying him when the throne leaned to one side.
"I'm sorry, my Lord, the terrain is very uneven." The lead orc said.
"Then watch your step!" Gelmud shouted once again, readjusting his position.
"Of course. We will not repeat the same mistake." The lead orc said in a frightful tone. It didn't take much to be replaced by someone who could carry out his master's will better.
Gelmud just waved at him dismissively, turning his attention towards the forest line that was continuously getting decimated. "Did the scouts report back?" He asked Gulbtro.
"Yes, my Lord. The border of Tempest is about an hour's march away and as of now, there are about five to seven thousand enemy soldiers near the border. To our overall estimate, they are each equal to lizardmen in terms of strength. By the lack of troop movements and defensive fortifications, it is safe to assume that they've been aware of our advancement for a while."
"As long as our mages are ready to defend against the magic that their leader used the last time, we have nothing to worry about. A pitiful thousand will not slow down our advance." Gelmud said while straightening up.
"I will trust your judgment, my Lord." The old kijin said with a light bow as he walked beside the orcs who held up the throne.
"As you are expected to. Is the special unit ready?"
"Yes, my Lord. The fifty chosen ones are ready. With your permission, I will join them now."
"Just kill that troublesome majin for me. This Momonga will pay dearly for killing so many of my soldiers. If he chooses to hide, then take down the leader of the defense."
"We will find and kill him for you!" Gulbtro said with determination and disappeared between the lines of the marching orc soldiers.
Left alone, Gelmud once again slumped down and let out a yawn as the throne gently rocked from side to side. Just one more hour and he would crush the troublesome competition that was in the way of his plans of taking over the Forest of Jura.
The next forty or so minutes were rather uneventful, until a moment when he noticed that the tree line suddenly disappeared. He took out the observation orb and adjusted it to an aerial view. Looking inside the borders of Tempest was impossible, but the territories just outside of it were not hidden.
As Gelmud observed a large clearing that looked custom-made for a large pitched battle, a strange suspicion welled up inside of him. 'What if Tempest is ready to defend against my armies? No, that can't be. They would have armies standing at the border waiting for me if they were prepared to face my forces.'
He quickly dismissed this worrisome thought. After all, at this point, he was close to becoming a demon lord seed in terms of raw power, and with each named servant under him, his power would only grew.
{ Assume assault position! } he sent out a command and waved the orcs to put down his throne.
Gelmud stood up from his seat and stretched, grabbing his staff. He looked through the observation orb once more to see if the enemy had started moving out of the hidden area.
'Wha…' The dark fog was gone. He now could clearly see past Tempest's border. He quickly tried looking deeper in, but the fog was still there, about five kilometers deep within the enemy territory.
{ My Lord, we have taken our positions, what are your orders? } Geld asked.
{ Start advancing! } He hastily responded and continued staring into the orb. Something was off, but he could not see what it was exactly.
Suddenly the sky darkened, and a jolt of lightning made him jump in fright.
"What just happened?" He asked no one in particular and looked up to see the sky covered in dark clouds.
'This must have been some type of advanced magic, but where is the caster?' He frantically looked around with the help of the orb but since vast areas were covered with trees, finding the caster responsible was next to impossible.
Finally, he noticed a deadman riding an enormous wolf with a winged woman clad in black plate flying beside him. A moment later, a huge black void appeared behind the deadman and a seemingly endless army started marching through from the other side.
Similar black voids started appearing in the sky as well, sending through swarms of flyers. 'That one, on the gigantic wolf, must be the leader! So that's how he plans to counter me. The clever bastard must have some type of transportation skill. No matter. Let's see how you fare against my ambush force'
He quickly sent the location to Gulbtro. { There he is! Kill him! }
{ At once, Lord Gelmud } Gulbtro responded with steel in his voice.
"You have one chance to turn around and leave!" A deep, regal voice came from high above.
'Veldora…? It can't be him. That has to be some sort of bluff!' { Do not listen to it! Attack! Kill them all! }
The moment his army started moving forward, the voice in the sky spoke once again. "You have chosen poorly!"
The heavens roared with thunder as lightning struck the first lines of attackers. Some truly enormous figure appeared between the enemy forces and his army, with two figures half its size appearing beside it a moment later.
At first, Gelmud was unsure of what he was witnessing. The vaguely humanoid-shaped mountain could not possibly be a living thing. 'It has to be an illusion. Does this majin only know how to hide behind cheap tr… It-it is moving! Something like that can't be alive!' Gelmud's hands started to shake, threatening to let go of the observation crystal he was holding.
The living mountain started moving, thundering its way towards him as his armies stopped in their tracks.
{My Lord, what should we do! } { What is that? } { Should we retreat? } A cacophony of messages flooded his mind. Yet the panicking army was not the worst of the news. 'No!' he gasped as he felt part of his strength slipping away.
'That thing can't be real. It… Gulbtro died… all of them died! No! This can't be happening.' The onslaught of messages from sub-commanders still assaulted his mind.
Gelmud's hands shook more and more uncontrollably as he watched the stone monstrosities reach the first lines of his army and started trampling his soldiers like mere ants. Meanwhile, the rest of the enemy forces had flanked his own army at unnatural speeds and started slaughtering his troops almost as easily as the elementals did. Parts of his army just gave up and started fleeing in a panic, only to be mercilessly hunted down by the swarms of flyers.
'They… they… it's not fair!' he hastily put the orb in his pocket and flew up to the sky, avoiding the enemy flyers.
The battle was already lost. The worthless morons that could not stand up to his enemies were on their own.
First, he needed to retreat to his stronghold, and then start thinking carefully about his next move. Going against Tempest had been a mistake, and the conquering of Jura was likely not even on the table anymore. Even so, he still had his skill, and as long as he could remain hidden he could grow in power.
'I will not be stopped. Not by Tempest, nor Clayman, nor any other demon lord. I will rise up again and again until this world is mine!'
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The existence of such a stone monstrosity was beyond anything he had imagined, even in his worst nightmares. Geld, King of the Orcs, did his best to move the troops out of its path… with little success.
{ Lord Gelmud, what should we do? } There was no answer. He tried to contact his master again a moment later, but Gelmud had seemingly blocked off all thought communication.
He noticed the red line in the sky, and for a moment stood frozen in place. 'Has Master abandoned us?'
{ Gulbtro! } He tried to contact the third in command, but the moment he tried to reach out, it became clear that the kijin had been killed.
'There is no one left!' Any chance of victory had evaporated, but maybe if the advance of the enemy could be slowed down by selected units, at least some might be able to escape the slaughter.
{ Gelmud has abandoned us and Gulbtro is dead. I am assuming command so at least some will survive. } He informed the remaining forces. A leader should not shy away from his duty, even in face of death.
Assigning suicide units was not an easy task, but he told each commander that their deaths will give a chance for others to escape. Without delay, the ogre, lizardmen, and orc troops moved to halt the unrelenting assault of the unstoppable enemy.
He and his two closest lieutenants would tackle the three enormous monsters in hopes of making them stop even for a second.
As he prepared to rush the walking mountain, a frantic message reached him. { My King, your son- argh…! among the enemy. }
'My son has joined Tempest. Our people have a place!' he could only hope his last thought communication would reach his son.
{ Son, save the remainder of our people. }
{ Father! } His son's shocked voice response reached him.
{ I hope your master sees the resolve of our people and shows them mercy, since my master has abandoned us }
With those parting words, he broke into a run and gathered all his might for a desperate jump aiming for the creature's knee. While he was in the air, for a split second he knew how much the hit would hurt, but it didn't matter.
As he collided with the creature's leg, Geld felt his bones break. But for the tiniest of moments, the walking mountain staggered and stopped to swat him off.
With his consciousness fading, overwhelmed with pain, he knew he made it stop. Even if it was just one less step the monster would take, some of his people might have a chance to survive.
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'Disappointing.' Momonga watched the enemy army getting massacred with casual indifference. The battle had been won already, and the only thing that remained was to crush them completely.
Beside him stood Albedo with her helmet off, holding her bardiche up as the blood slowly dripped from its blade. To their right was a large pile of kijin and ogre corpses, the result of an unsuccessful attack on Momonga.
Suddenly, Gargantua stopped. Momonga stared at him, curious about what made him stop, but the floor guardian resumed his movement right away.
{ Demiurge, what made Gargantua stop? } He contacted Demiurge who was overseeing the battle from Nazarick with both the remote-view mirrors and the specters on the field.
{ The last enemy commander charged him in hopes of slowing Gargantua down, Lord Momonga. }
{ What about Gelmud? We had confirmation that he was on the battlefield. }
{ He fled and abandoned his army the moment we started our offensive, my Lord. Please, a moment… It seems that the orc who attacked Gargantua was Geld's father. Geld received one last message from him asking us to spare his people and informing his son that Gelmud had abandoned the battle. }
'How could he just leave his subordinates behind like this?' Momonga stroked the fur of Ranga and glanced at Albedo who was floating beside him with determination on her face. 'They both would sacrifice themselves without even thinking if I would come to danger. To betray such devotion is despicable! He…' a sudden wave of calmness flooded him mid-thought, 'right. Why does it have to activate like this? I need to find a way to better control it. At least I can think clearly once again. Still, discarding your own people as if they were broken tools, he is a despicable worm. Nothing more.'
It didn't matter if it was because of the naming or the |Nazarick| skill, but he cared about each and every monster he had given a name. Of course, some were more important than others, but to throw someone under the bus the moment things go awry would be a deep and personal betrayal, and yet this cowardly majin abandoned the entirety of his army.
Returning his attention back to the present, Momonga observed the battlefield with |Remote Viewing|. At this point, the only thing remaining of Gelmud's army was a fleeing disorganized mess that was being mercilessly cut down at every step they took.
'Those are not my people, so why should I care about their lives?' Momonga thought about the prospect of sparing the retreating enemy forces. It was clear that Gelmud was not a threat and the retreating remnants of an army could not mount a successful assault.
He came to a simple realization. 'I guess my humanity is really gone.' There were his people, Nazarick and Tempest, who he cared about and the rest were inconsequential.
{ The battle is won. I will leave it to you to decide when to stop giving chase to the strugglers. } He messaged Demiurge.
"Albedo, send the cleanup crews to gather the corpses. Our part here is done." Momonga ordered as he opened a gate.
"At once, Lord Momonga." She eagerly responded as she flew beside him.
As Ranga carried him back to the capital, he noticed that the gigantic wolf looked rather downtrodden.
"Ranga, is something wrong?" Momonga asked as he stopped the wolf in the middle of the main street.
{ I didn't have a chance to prove myself to you master. The enemy was not even worth your consideration. } Ranga responded with what sounded like a whine.
"You already have earned your place, both as the leader of dire wolves and as my loyal pet." Momonga said, leaning forward and stroking the fur between Ranga's ears. "I have no doubt there will be harder battles in the future where your might will be a great boon to our forces."
A scream from behind him made Momonga turn his head to see that Ranga's wagging tail had caused winds strong enough to send some of the lighter Tempest denizens flying.
"Ranga, return to your small size." Momonga said and flew off the wolf's back. The moment Ranga had obeyed the command, he teleported with him and Albedo back to the castle, where Demiurge was waiting for him with a large folder in his hands.
He patted Ranga one last time before letting him disappear into his shadow.
"Let's go over…" He stopped mid-sentence as both Albedo and Demiurge leaned forward and lowered their heads.
'Seriously? You are not PETS!' …There was no helping it anymore. Reluctantly, he stretched out his arms and patted both.
'Maybe I just need to get used to it. I mean they both look so happy. It is not that weird, right?'
There was no helping it. If head pats made them happy, he had no reason to deny them so, at least in private.
Proofreading by CreamY, kamijazz, Sad_Smiles, Somnium Hypnos, and I AM THE STRING CUTTER
AN: Thank you for reading the story, and if you have caught up to the latest chapter, you can check out my other work or join my discord server (Link is in my profile) where additional chapters are available.
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