We left the area and went further away from the city before they could send any more forces after us. Along the way, through the annoying terrain of the raw rainforest and its many dangers, we talked about our plans to escape. We were still in the territory of the Edengar Kingdom, where it was the easiest for them to corner us all.
“The mountains are not very well-guarded,” I suggested. “We could just go to the dwarves and then circle back to New Grandera if we want. The monsters along the way should also be survivable.”
“It could work,” Granuel admitted. “But we’d have to circle a long way around if we want to remain unpursued. And they will pursue us to the end of the world because of what you did. Not that it was wrong! It was actually fucking cool.”
“How about that token you have?” Angerly asked. “If we’re going to New Grandera, then might as well have their own forces help us out. They still owe you one.”
She was talking about part of the reward that I got for pretending to be a goblin, making some goblins, and helping some nomadic tribe escape a few years back.
“Right. Sure. I’m not using it for anything.”
“Great!” Granuel smiled at how our plans were taking shape. “I know where we can discreetly meet with them.”
He made one hand sign, and gestured towards one particular direction. I immediately shot off towards it, and then found an ishkawtan man. I wasn’t sure what he was doing here, but I could guess, and I trusted Granuel’s judgement. I separated his head from his body, and came to a stop.
“One more!” I heard Granuel’s shout, and I dashed again. “NNE!” I reoriented myself slightly to the right, and then I caught a flash of motion that veered off to the left. I ran far faster than the human woman could flee, and she too suffered a lethal fate once I inevitably caught up to her.
“Is there any more?” I asked when my friends had caught up. “Oh and Granuel. Why?”
“They’re scouts. 99% sure from the city. And no, there aren’t any more. Not unless they brought someone who can evade even my senses… which isn’t impossible. Not with what we’ve done.”
He looked around, a slight panic entering his posture. I clapped him on the shoulder and gestured forward.
“We best keep moving then. Keep them away from us.”
He nodded hard. “Yes. We’ll get through this, and we’ll fucking beat them.”
“That’s the spirit.”
~~~
A few more scouting parties made their way towards us, then it was quiet for a few days. We made great time towards our destination with Granuel in the lead, until the scouting parties came again, but this time in greater numbers. I tried to hunt them all down, for I was the only one fast enough to catch and kill them, but even I could not catch them all if they separated and spread out.
The amount of scouting parties sent after us doubled again after that, and then the adventurers came.
“YOU!” a human woman cried as she pointed her staff at me.
“Me?” I asked to clarify, pointing at my perfectly red face and the helm that protected it but did not conceal what I was. I had Moonwash make this for me years ago just in case, and they accented my horns wonderfully as something that were my own, not a mere accessory of my gear.
“Yes, you! I believed in you! I thought you were the next hero! I listened to your songs, read your books, bought your paintings! I thought you looked so cool and dashing and professional, never leaving your armor! But now I see it was all a ruse! It was there to hide the hideous abomination underneath!”
My evil eyes darkened. I grew angrier. Not that I cared nor should I care about what she thought. I was a demon, and I looked so fucking bloody cool!
“I burned it all down! Everything of you! All of it! Because fuck you!”
That… actually deflated my anger just a little, to make way for a modest bout of laughter. “You know I don’t give a shit, right? I never sang, wrote books, or made any paintings. Those were all things you idiots decided to make and support all by yourselves.”
Well, that wasn’t entirely true. I did enjoy the fame, if not fully because it wasn’t actually me. But I really found people’s reaction to my ‘betrayal’ to be more humorous than anything else.
I just have to make them feel such awe and fear that they make even more art of me now that I am free.
My legend shall grow to encompass this world.
The woman went red in the face, and then she ordered her entire party to charge me while she strained to lift a massive boulder. She never got to shoot the projectile, because I mowed through her entire party, before giving her the same fate.
“A-Arck!” she croaked, as her guts spilled from the separated half of her body.
What did she expect? My hopes and dreams and beliefs and goals may have been a lie, but my achievements had been gravely understated if anything.
~~~
Things continued in the same way for a few weeks, with the same occasional attacks that we had to deal with. The army was even mobilized at some point, as well as the templars, but they were never going to catch us with those large numbers in this terrain. The wildlife itself would inform us that there was a big disturbance somewhere, Granuel would scout it out from afar, and then we’d all run the fuck away and easily evade capture. They had to rest for longer during the night, meanwhile we sometimes carried each other just to keep moving. Only Angerly’s size made it impossible for us to keep moving forever, because while we could carry her and the much larger bags she was in charge of, that would just tire us out too much. Sometimes, I would even purposely and strategically set fire to a location that wasn’t where we were headed in order to both sow chaos and have them chase a dead end.
The larger army had lost track of us so many times, only to barely catch up again because of the reports of their brave scouts who now had such a terribly high rate of death. And by catch up, I of course meant that they got just close enough to maybe see smoke rise into the air if we started a fire on our position. They never actually got close enough to actually threaten us.
And then another army came. Granuel noticed a disturbance on one fateful night, and we traveled through the rain to confirm it. We immediately roused our friends after spotting the new threat, and then we redoubled our efforts to get away. The two armies tried desperately to catch up and surround us, and we found that they were actually making headway and successfully limiting the routes we could take.
I decided to take an even more proactive approach. Granuel knew where the powerful monsters were, or the larger swarms of them. The goblins in particular were becoming more numerous the closer we drew to the border. I asked my friend to point me in the right direction, and then I doused these creatures with some light hellfire. That sure lit a fire under their ass, and it took little taunting to get them to follow after me. Along the way, as we engaged in a super fun chase, I would stoke the flames of their wrath even further and drive them into a true frenzy. After which, I would just disappear into the distance, once I was sure that the monsters would meet one army or the other. This slowed down the soldiers even further, and we pulled ahead once more.
Of course, our enemies weren’t entirely dumb. More and more scouts and other forces were sent after me, but I slaughtered most of them who I could actually spot. My instincts warned me ahead of time, and I was only caught by their belfegor operatives a few times. Luckily for me, leaking great gouts of hellfire from my body was usually enough to get them off my back and escape the grapple. If not, then adding my full intimidation magic, including point-blank blasts of aspected wrath, would surely be enough.
Still, they did manage to injure me before they died, and it actually got truly dangerous this one time when I went after one particular party of enemies, only to have a hidden ambusher suddenly drop from the tree. The belfegor woman died to my magic, but the projectiles had come well before she breathed her last, and their melee units had me cornered by the time I got free.
It was a good plan, honestly. But I broke it anyway through sheer fucking power. My magic rushed out of me in a tide that was just of a far greater quantity than anything they could ever muster. The blood that they’d drawn from me turned against them in ritualistic explosions of power. And the sheer strength I was able to produce by casting my mini-rituals on myself broke even their physically strongest fighters in half.
I was left panting once all my enemies were dead. Even the pools of my own blood had evaporated. I was alone, with mangled bone and dented armor. I healed myself just enough to move and flee if more attackers came, and then I ran back to my friends to speed up the healing process. Moonwash did some quick repairs on the go to my gear by abusing magical means like heating the mythril with fireballs, and then using random boulders flattened and then enhanced with magic as an anvil. The results were still a bit crude, but more than serviceable, and that was all I needed right now.
I went back out to sow chaos, but this time I just blasted any enemy I came across from afar. I was still ambushed a few times, but even those who had a whole party with them could not fully capitalize on my momentary immobilization because I had the initiative of the first fast and heavy strike.
~~~
“This must be the spot,” Granuel said, looking around.
“Wow. Amazing.” All I could see was the same old rainforest, filled with the same old creatures.
And then I heard a rustle from the brush.
I quickly turned around, engaging my mind to determine if the entity was a nominal ally or an outright foe.
What came out to greet me was a naked goblin with nary a stick for a weapon.
I laughed and put the creature out of its misery.
“Ahh. You must be Haell and The Harvesters,” I heard a gleeful slithering voice from above, and my head snapped towards the source. My body had coiled and tensed, but I had enough wherewithal to realize that the belfegor man that I could only just barely spot atop the intertwining branches was probably the person we were looking for.
“Yes. That’s us,” Granuel answered for the group. “And we are here to seek your help.”
I pulled out my token and raised it high for him to see.
“Fascinating,” he giggled, still not deigning to fully show himself. “The new hero of Edengar, parlaying with the terrorist rebels. And she even has a token signifying her prior involvement, without even mentioning what she is.” He referred to my demon form, and I couldn’t help but puff out my chest in pride. “This has been a truly hilarious event, for there is nothing more comedic than people crying in the streets for the betrayal of someone they trusted, and building massive pyres to destroy that which they had once dedicated to you, oh great and mighty Haell Zharignan!”
I narrowed my eyes, but eventually smirked and laughed as well. “You’re right. It is incredibly funny. Shame I couldn’t see the massive parties for myself.”
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
“Oh yes, oh yes. Suffering from your success. But now, let us please get on to business. Those same annoying gnats will soon converge on this location, and I would need to change my spot because of you.”
“Well, we are sorry about that!” Granuel shouted back into the trees. “But it is for a good cause, I promise!”
“Oh, then this I must know.” The belfegor man climbed rapidly down from the trees, and his previously perfect camouflage looked weird now that the colors around him had changed.
Moonwash encased us in a sound bubble, and a rapid exchange of plans and information followed.
We had secured the help of New Grandera.
~~~
“Something’s here,” Therick said, kicking our sleeping allies awake.
The tension had admittedly bled out of me a little during the nightwatch, but my body immediately snapped back into readiness just before a terrifying claw streaked out from the darkness. The tyranights had been deployed again, and I was determined to kill as many as I could for their numbers were limited. The more I could kill now, the less we had to worry about later.
Hellfire exploded out of me and towards the trees around us. Its light was not the best at piercing through their stealth, but many of them messed up anyway when they came into contact with the flames, and that was all I needed to dash towards their tyrannosaurus-like bodies and at least cripple them while I went after their friends. I undid the web of wrath I'd instinctively woven into my sword and replaced it with a coating of bright hellish flames. It just worked better to banish the night magic of my large and menacing enemies.
The rest of my party just protected themselves while I did this, until finally Moonwash finished her ritual.
“Night-banisher Sun!”
An orb of light shot above us and stayed there, weakening the night magic of the tyranights. Tendrils of darkness still shot towards me, but I made sure to either evade or slash them apart because I could hardly give chase while blinded. Granuel pointed out the fleeing enemies to me, and tonight, hopefully, I had not allowed a single one to escape.
I went back to camp to execute those who had not yet died, and they begged in the expected way.
“No, please!”
“I have a family!”
“I was just listening to orders!”
“I’ll join you guys! I’ll help you!”
“You can’t do this! Why did you betray us!!??”
Therick looked at each of us, and then settled on me. I held his gaze, until he finally turned and walked away.
“I’m sorry. But you will continue to be a danger to us if I let you go. And I do not trust you.”
It was only to make myself feel better, I was aware, but I said those words anyway.
I was not the only one who did the executions tonight. Moonwash, Granuel, and Angerly helped me.
~~~
We were getting close to the borders now. Our enemies were demoralized, but they had also become more desperate, sending more and more parties towards us. So I had once again run off on my own to divert goblins and other sorts of monstrosities towards them until they fucking broke. I dodged and slaughtered through their many scouts as I did so, and then I curved back to my friends. That was when I saw a trail of smoke rising in the distance where they should be, and I used just a bit more wrath in my legs in order to arrive faster because they could be in danger. My hooves were exposed now so traveling was easier, but the terrain of the rainforest still slowed me down a little.
I arrived.
I froze for just a moment to take in the scene.
The enemies were all burned to varying degrees. Berry was down, with multiple large fissures and cracks all over her carapace that bled blue. Moonwash was just barely staving off the assault of an assassin as she zoned him out with her shield and used wind and fire magic to stall and attack. The combination of the two elements could be particularly deadly, but her level 40 opponent was just too slippery. The rest of my friends were also injured as they desperately defended against a party of people that included a level 40 ishkawtan with a club. She was not very good at fighting, hell she frankly sucked, but they were still being pushed back by the sheer level disparity.
The calm passed.
I looked at the blood dripping from my friends, the continued danger Moonwash was in, and Berry who might be dead.
Then came the storm.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!”
As if I had just evolved and was yet unused to my magic. As if I had been reduced to a mere beast that could only rage. I roared into the heavens, and so too did the mana inside my body roar in return. My muscles pulsed painfully, and I exhibited strength that was previously only seen with the help of the greater magic. I would break this very world if I allowed any more harm to befall them. I would never forgive those who had chosen to do this while I was away!
My wings unfurled so fast that something broke. I dashed through the distance in the blink of an eye, and the assassin hounding Moonwash was barely able to react. He may as well not have as the confluence of the wrath that I felt in this very moment shattered his sword, destroyed the arm that held it, and demolished the body that came next.
Something cracked, and it was not from my dead opponent. I breathed like a slavering animal as the pain immediately came from how hard I had pushed myself, but the fight was still far from over. I turned my furious gaze towards the remaining enemies, and they stared at me dumbly as if their small and insignificant brains may finally realize that the first mistake they ever made was being born.
It was too little too late to take that back.
But I will try.
In another blink, I was in front of the ishkawtan with the club. My legs cracked from the pressure, but I did not let that stop me from swinging down. She somehow survived it as a crumpled mess, so I gritted my teeth in rage and screamed as I smashed down my weapon until her shattered armor could no longer be distinguished from the bits of flesh.
I kicked and stomped the smears away, and then I dragged my body forward to meet the rest of the enemies in full retreat.
I did not let them. I exploded with hellfire and shot the torturous flames in its rawest form against those that I abhorred. My blood melted to grant me one more burst of speed, and then I ravaged them each from behind until none could be recognized any longer for what they once were. They were only piles of charred sludges of meat that could not even be separated from one to the other.
I killed them all. I had killed them all. And I wanted more.
“Haell.”
I felt a hand grip my arm. I turned violently enough that another bone in my body cracked. Moonwash remained unfazed.
“You’re falling apart. You’ll die if you charge into enemy lines now. Please don’t.”
I breathed hard. It came out like the tortured howls of the damned. I remained silent for many long moments. I struggled to form any coherent thoughts through the haze of wrath… but I am a fucking demon and I am greater than that! I forcibly refocused my brain without yet getting rid of the rage. I found that every limb in my body was broken, and I was only moving through sheer wrath. That would not last forever, and I would eventually crash.
“Heal me, then.” I sat down and crossed my arms. “Are you alright? Berry?”
“Yes. And yes. She’ll live. So heal yourself first while we save her.”
“...Okay.”
~~~
I heard about what had happened while I waited to return to my top condition. Angerly carried Berry princess style and me in piggyback while we traveled and were healed, because we could not afford to stay still while our enemies moved about. This attack was not random, but rather something that they had specifically intended to unleash while I was away. The information made my blood boil and I wanted to slaughter them all right this instant, but I stopped myself from throwing my life away like that. There were only hundreds if not thousands that needed to die today, and I was not one of them.
I heard of the brave fight they fought without me. Moonwash opened with a powerful deluge of flames that left many injured and some dead. She was higher level, and of a higher evolution than me after all. If they didn’t have anyone to specifically target her, then she would’ve killed them all already without the need for my intervention. But because they had chosen to rely on such dirty and cowardly tactics, my girlfriend was forced to bleed. I had been able to mostly keep her away from the vanguard and able to work her magic throughout most of our fights before, but I could not blame my friends for being unable to do the same without my presence there. They had tried their best for how weak they were. It was only fortunate that Moonwash had received training on how to at least move and protect herself in melee thanks to her special promotion to gold rank almost a decade ago. The state had done a good thing by providing her with those tools. I had to insist that she refocus on that training at least a little, for I would not always be right next to her. My intentions would already bring me away very soon.
Back to the fight, Berry and the rest did their best to push back the rest of the enemies other than the assassin, and my crustecar friend protected everyone until she could literally not move anymore. That ishkawtan gold-ranker of theirs was the probable cause of why they were able to ambush us like that, as they had watched us for an opening from outside Granuel’s own radius. My friend blamed himself for not spotting them sooner, but we were up against the might of a vassal kingdom here if not an entire empire. We would always be pushed to our very limits.
I would only make sure that it was us who survived and thrived in the end.
~~~
I floated above an army in the dead of night. I flew far above and towards the outskirts of their camp. They had no idea I was there at all, for I had circled around and taken a different route to the large clearing that they had made. The soldiers were still focused on the goblin horde I’d directed towards them, like they had already forgotten that I could fly just because I had not for the duration of this campaign so far. But that would all change soon.
Hellfire rained.
The black skies glowed red like blood, and it wept tears of flame.
The rainforest below me was set ablaze, and the soldiers screamed a symphony that reached me from all the way up in the air.
Panic immediately seized their ranks, and the rank-and-file grew confused as to whether to address this new threat, or address the existing goblins.
The hellscape spread further as those set ablaze ran around like headless chickens.
Tents burned, sleeping officers were woken up, and dwindling supplies were torched. I even took out my bow and attempted to aim at the most crucial targets. I missed the first few times, and I gnashed my teeth at my failure, but I forced myself to calm down because all that tension only made me miss my shots more.
I had to be cool. Wield my rage like a sword sharpened to a fine edge. Ignore the overwhelming desire to fly down there and rip them apart with my bare hands for daring to touch those that I cared about. I know that it’s just how war is, but I can absolutely act on my anger, for that too is war. May you all fucking die!
Finally, someone began shouting orders, and I made my escape before things could turn sideways.
They all deserved to die, and I would burn them all in my infernal blaze, but I had promised myself and my friends that I would be logical about this.
I will systematically crush their will.
~~~
I repeated the same tactic a few more times, until I was shot down in the fourth. Thanks to my positioning, I was already in the outer reaches of their formation, and I managed to glide even further away before I completely lost altitude. Some soldiers and adventurers managed to reach my landing spot anyway, but they were easy enough to kill. I ran away after that and just waited for the sun to rise.
Come daylight, Granuel informed me that the one army I had targeted was now in full retreat. It did not take us long to lose the one that remained.
~~~
We made it near the border. Several platoons had been redirected to intercept us, but not as many as they would’ve liked for such a high-profile case as ourselves. Our arrival here perfectly coincided with a concentrated push by New Grandera after all, and a whole lot of other people would try to cross in either direction at the same time. This was the deal we had made, and it was not only good for us, but amazing for the various spy and resistance groups as well. My betrayal already had the vassal kingdom of Edengar in an uproar, and now their already fraying resources would be stretched even thinner.
We continued to travel through the darkness. There would be no rest for us tonight. There were many forts and outposts along the border, and we had picked the perfect spot near the impossibly tall mountains. The goblins had taken over an entire fort for themselves, and the nearby outposts were too busy freaking out over this recent development to devote all their forces into countering us. A few platoons were still in pursuit, but we had lost some of them, while others had been diverted away by the goblins and the many other conflicts surrounding us. The green fuckers attacked us too for they were no one’s ally, but we were such a small group that they often preferred to swarm the various groups surrounding us instead. And New Grandera had mustered in force and was invading this area among many others, so everyone truly had their hands full.
There was just so much going on, and it was all utter chaos, but that was precisely why we had chosen this theater of war to disappear into. Trails of smoke rose from various directions in the sky, and it was not rare to encounter dead bodies leaking blood to water the roots of the rainforest, or to walk into conflicts that were currently in progress. Few of them had the leeway to try and divert troops towards us, and Granuel was able to steer us away most of the time before we could even be spotted. The scouts were also more plentiful, as so many of them from both sides had always been concentrated here to fight the eternal information war near the borders. We killed plenty of them, hopefully only those of Edengar, and the platoons chasing after us could only just barely keep up with the information that managed to make it through our web of murder. I believed they might’ve even reduced the number of scouts sent after us at some point, because of how many we were able to spot and kill. It would be very bad for them if they ran out, for we were far from their only enemies here.
Finally, we reached a major clash of the two powers that controlled these borders. I saw the flag of our nominal allies and the various races that made up their armies, including a few dwarves and harpies.
Whew. Wasn’t sure if I should cut the chapter off here, but it’s what I got for now. Will continue in the next one. This is already plenty long and so much shit has happened. I had a blast writing it, but not sure how confident I am that it’s good. Really not my usual genre.
The scene that amuses me the most is how Haell had almost been cornered by a bunch of random no-names. Not that I name all the major threats here, because what the fuck is Haell supposed to do, Ask? In the middle of combat?
“Oh, hi! I’m SHANKYOUINTHEGUTS.”
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