Chapter 206: Returning Heroes
While Ernan finished what she had to do, hurled a bomb at the Demon King, and was returning to Hilderan, the dwarves stood before the undertaking of a lifeti.
A colossal vessel. The dwarves’ magnum opus that flew through the sky.
“To think I have to destroy this with my own hands.”
“Mm, I was dragged to the Sky Tower and forced to surrender, but I was the one piloting it around....”
“The kingdom’s treasure....”
“Destruction is the mother of creation! Only by breaking this can we build the Sky Tower! Which title do you want—repairer of the floating battleship, or creator of the Sky Tower!”
“Creator of the Sky Tower!”
“Destroyer! This kind of obsolete relic!”
“The longer we drag this out, the more it hurts, so let’s finish it as quickly as possible!”
“Who do you think we are! Sothing like this will take one day!”
“Waaaaah!”
Hundreds of dwarves sward over it all at once.
The floating battleship was too large to enter through the tower’s main gate, and it could not be dismantled in the deep sea either. Naturally, they had no choice but to dismantle it on the island being prepared for the pirates.
Thanks to that, the pirates had no choice but to witness the madness firsthand.
“Wow.”
“From today on, I’m never touching dwarf-made goods.”
“I’ve seen a lot of crazy bastards, but it’s my first ti seeing an entire race this crazy.”
“Well, that’s why they beca the Demon King’s vassals and made over a thousand mana cannons.”
“Then what about us, vassals of the Demon King?”
“We’re crazy about love. Milky-white Vivian!”
“But it’s kind of a sha. It would’ve been great if we had that.”
Pirating aboard a flying ship. Just imagining it was thrilling.
“Cut it out. You’ll get your tongue cut off if you insist on that.”
“Yeah. Lady Vivian told us not to covet that either. The dwarves reinforcing our ships and building us a port is more than enough.”
“That’s true.”
“They said the battle’s over, so I hope the elves co back soon.”
“You’re letting your eyes wander with Lady Vivian right there? Are you insane?”
“Shut up.”
“But they say they’re dismantling that and attaching it to the tower—is that true?”
“Then does that an the tower will fly?”
“....”
“....”
The pirates looked at one another.
“...We can’t thank Lady Vivian enough, even a hundred tis wouldn’t be enough. For accepting as a vassal.”
“Sa here.”
“Milky-white Vivian.”
A tower that flew through the sky while firing hundreds, perhaps thousands, of mana cannons.
The pirates let out sighs of relief.
* * *
A week had passed since the hero party was defeated by Berje and taken prisoner.
Fortunately, the main force was slower than expected, giving Berje ample ti.
Ti to persuade most of the heroes.
Ti to dismantle and destroy the floating battleship.
In the depths of the sea, the Demon King and the princess surfaced.
The Demon King asked,
“How far are they?”
The princess let out a small whistle. A rmaid poked her head out.
“About 12 km?”
“Just right.”
Berje opened a subspace and poured out the remnants that had once been the floating battleship. None of the rare materials such as floating stone remained, but as parts that had ford a colossal vessel, the sheer quantity was imnse.
And as if they had been waiting, the heroes drawn by the Demon King’s power surged up from the deep sea.
“Puhah...!”
“We’re outside!”
“The fleet is about 12 km away. It won’t take that long to get here. Until then, grab onto the debris and hold out on your own.”
“Yes!”
The heroes shouted in unison.
“Um, but what exactly are we supposed to do? You said you’d give us equipnt made from dragon bone depending on our achievents....”
“Live as you usually do. Hunt monsters and subjugate the Demon King. Ah, of course, excluding .”
If they did that,
“You’ll gain fa and beco a star like Hillan Cargill, or be called great heroes. Seize power that way. The asure of that power will be your achievents.”
“Yes!”
“We’ll keep it in mind!”
Berje checked the story one last ti.
“What happened to you all, again?”
“We climbed to the top of the tower, but failed when Balraf Dislode was defeated by the Demon King!”
“With as many as six stars, how did that happen?”
“The False Demon King was with him! And the legion he brought was far too nurous and powerful! Especially the False Demon King’s power was overwhelming!”
“And then?”
“Balraf Dislode died, and we had no choice but to retreat! In that process, the floating battleship was destroyed, and the dwarves went down with the ship and were completely wiped out!”
“Excellent.”
It provided justification for the heroes surviving without killing the floating battleship or the Demon King, and at the sa ti set a trap aid at the False Demon King.
Whether it worked or not, it would beco a sharp dagger aid at Jason.
“The special orbs you consud will ensure that no one can tell you are my vassals. So act without worry! Go, build your foundations, and prepare to welco !”
“Yes!”
The heroes nodded vigorously.
Having consud Armani’s Orb and enticed by rewards based on achievents, the heroes had beco the Demon King’s loyal dogs.
* * *
The alliance could not be unified into one. Naturally so.
More than a dozen nations had gathered under the banner of subjugating the Demon King of Dark Fla, but many of them had been enemies until not long ago.
Each nation decided to have its own commander and move by mutual agreent.
However, despite the divided command structure, no one anticipated failure.
Six stars. A thousand heroes.
Among those stars was Balraf Dislode. Although he had failed several tis, one failure had been due to not finding the tower itself, and another ti he had even hunted a dragon.
And the last ti, he had rely fallen into an utterly unexpected trap; it was not a situation that called his abilities into question.
Thus, they did not doubt victory.
Not until they realized that the mage flying toward them, staggering and covered in wounds, was Rozel Charnte.
“Huff, huff...!”
Her entire body, drenched in blood, was riddled with wounds. Her complexion was pale, and her body was cold as ice.
“Lady Rozel?”
The naval captain in charge of the Arkan Kingdom’s fleet hurried to et her. He summoned healing mages.
“W-we lost.”
“Yes? Lost?”
“...Over there.”
She weakly extended her hand.
“There are survivors over there. We need to save them....”
Her body went limp.
“Lady Rozel!”
“Are the healing mages not here yet! Hurry!”
The ships began to move frantically. The discovery of the gravely wounded Rozel was soon relayed to all fleets.
And the allied forces, advancing at full speed in the direction she indicated, discovered the wreckage of the sunken floating battleship and the heroes clinging to it to survive.
“...My god.”
They faced despair.
“Rescue the survivors at once!”
“Pull the heroes aboard!”
The rescue made no distinction between nations. They carefully pulled the heroes up, and the number ca to a little over seven hundred.
“Balraf. Where is Lord Balraf?”
The rescue continued for over an hour, and the exhausted heroes gradually regained consciousness.
The imperial fleet captain asked Aina Diaphrin, who had just awakened,
“....”
“Lady Aina!”
Aina lowered her head in grief.
“Lord Balraf is....”
A tear dropped.
“Lord Balraf is....”
Unable to continue, Aina broke down in sobs. At the sight of her weeping, the captain and the nobles felt a dreadful premonition run down the backs of their necks.
“Don’t tell ....”
The captain asked again.
Although Aina’s condition looked serious, the ntal panic gripping him was even worse.
“It can’t be, right?”
“....”
“Lady Aina!”
“...I’m sorry.”
“Please answer us. What happened to Lord Balraf?”
“...Lord Balraf.”
Hic, Aina swallowed back her sobs once more and spoke with difficulty.
“He fought the Demon King in a decisive battle at the top of the tower, and then....”
“A-and then...?”
“...He was defeated by the Demon King.”
Thud—
The ripple spread quietly, yet faster than anything else.
To the captain, the nobles, the knights, the mages, the soldiers—to everyone in the allied forces.
“...Lord Balraf.”
“...He passed away?”
No one could speak hastily in the face of such an utterly unexpected shock. A chilling silence mingled with the sea.
“Why, why didn’t you wait for us! Why on earth!”
The captain’s scream did not escape the sea.
The allied forces, stricken by shock, did not move for a long ti. No, they could not.
And within that despair, the heroes thought,
‘She could be an actress.’
‘I think I’m about to cry too.’
‘Cry, cry your heart out.’
‘I feel like I might burst out laughing.’
‘Endure it through sheer will. If you laugh now, the Demon King will kill you.’
‘Wow, if you do it like that, who wouldn’t fall for it?’
That Aina Diaphrin was disgustingly good at acting.
* * *
Not long after the decisive battle between Berje and the hero party ended, Dorche returned blankly to his tower.
“Demon King?”
He could not answer even the adjutant’s call.
He slowly climbed up and collapsed onto the throne.
“Did sothing happen?”
“It did. Sothing very big.”
Was it absurd? No, it went beyond that.
What he had witnessed—
“It wasn’t just so ordinary Demon King.”
“Yes?”
“That bastard Berje Deias. Didn’t you say it’s only been two years since his descent?”
“Yes, that’s correct.”
“I can’t believe it.”
“Two years ago, he graduated from the Demon King Military Academy and descended upon Arein after being marked by Archduke Arkaine. All records remain.”
“It’s nonsense. How could he, in just two years....”
It wasn’t simply a matter of combat power.
“Now I understand why that Jason bastard couldn’t handle it himself and asked Archduke Arkaine for help.”
Originally, he had planned to observe the situation—if the heroes won, he would devour the exhausted heroes; if Berje won, he would devour the exhausted Berje.
But he couldn’t.
The shocking power Berje displayed could not be overco with his current interference power.
He had no confidence of winning.
Against a re fledgling who had descended only two years ago, and was still in his first dinsion.
‘Fledgling? That?’
Then all fledglings must be dead.
He was strong. Incredibly strong. And moreover—
“...He was using them.”
“Yes?”
“He was using Demon Kings.”
“What do you an...!”
“Reina Sordein.”
A noble demon supported by countless frost demons.
“And Vivian Blunt.”
A being who had experience conquering a dinsion, the hand of Archduke Arkaine who had been dispatched earlier.
“Those two were helping him.”
“Are you saying other Demon Kings helped him? That violates the Standard....”
“No. It wasn’t simply a matter of helping.”
A dragon’s eyes, the authority of a seasoned dragon, could see far more.
“They were vassals of Berje Deias.”
“...My god.”
The adjutant was horrified. It wasn’t impossible for a Demon King to beco a vassal. After all, from the perspective of the Demon Realm, a Demon King was rely one demon.
But there had never been a single case where Demon Kings who descended together into a lower dinsion beca vassals of another Demon King.
“Th-that is...!”
Should this be called a violation of the Standard?
Demon Kings attacking other Demon Kings was strictly forbidden beyond the Standard.
But Demon Kings accepting other Demon Kings as vassals? He didn’t know. The adjutant was thrown into confusion.
“If that were all, it would be fine.”
Dorche let out a self-mocking laugh.
“...What else is there?”
“He was like a lower-dinsion dragon. His subordinates were the sa.”
“You an he accepted lower-dinsion races, not monsters, as vassals?”
“Humans, elves, dwarves—quite a variety.”
“So he completely abandoned his pride as a Demon King?”
“Can you really call that abandoning it?”
“What?”
The adjutant was shocked. Wasn’t Dorche himself the very embodint of an arrogant Demon Dragon, overflowing with pride as a demon, as a Demon Dragon, as a Demon King?
Then why suddenly—
“If he were ordinary, I would have mocked Berje just like you. I would have shouted that he had gone too far, that he had disgraced the honor of Demon Dragons, and raged.”
But among them—
“What if there was a contractor of a Spirit King?”
“...A Spirit King, you say? No, why would such a person follow the Demon King Berje Deias?”
The Spirit Realm was a higher dinsion like the Demon Realm. The four kings who ruled it were so strong that even most archdukes would hesitate to challenge them if they were serious.
Moreover, the number of spirits was overwhelmingly small compared to lower dinsions, and naturally, the number of summoners capable of contracting a Spirit King was also small.
Even so, a contractor of a Spirit King could be considered among the strongest in this dinsion—no, strong enough not to be ignored even in the Demon Realm. So why would such a person not protect Arein?
“How would I know that?”
“I overstepped.”
The adjutant bowed his head, then asked again,
“Then what do you plan to do?”
“For now, the plan to wait for an opportunity and kill him is scrapped.”
That was impossible.
And more than anything, Dorche was suspicious of Jason.
“Jason, you damn bastard. To think you didn’t tell sothing this important.”
“It certainly is strange. He’s endured in Arein for a long ti and should know Berje well—there’s no way he wouldn’t know this.”
“Unless he deliberately tried to lure into a trap.”
“But he has no reason to do that.”
“No, that doesn’t matter.”
Whether Jason knew or didn’t know, the fact that Berje had two Demon Kings as vassals was what mattered.
If he knew, he tried to set a trap.
Even if he didn’t, that was no excuse.
“I’ll use this as leverage to extract more Demonic Points.”
To deal with Berje Deias, he needed at least to fully recover his true power.
“Will he give them?”
“He’ll have no choice. If I report this to Archduke Arkaine, it’ll be Jason who has to bear the archduke’s wrath for not explaining things properly.”
Berje was a problem to think about afterward.
For now, no matter how much he pondered, there was no answer.
Dorche was a Demon King overflowing with action, befitting a Demon Dragon.
He imdiately established communication with Jason, and that day, seventy-one glass cups in Jason Kokemundo’s office were shattered.
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