308 Chapter 308 - Rummaging Through A Fallen City
Hestemia had truly fallen, not a single brick was left whole after the events of the wars. The bodies were piled up into peaks and burned to charr, and what remained of them became food for vultures and other scavengers. Surprisingly enough, however, the earth had already begun reclaiming the territory with moss growing on ruins and saplings sprouting out of empty eye sockets.
"Nothing…" Razor muttered, coming out to the light from the underground steps to a dungeon.
"Nothing on the surface either, nobody rather, just scavengers," Michael replied, getting down to the earth by undoing his magic.
"I didn't expect much, but seems like the dragons really did a number on this place," Razor added looking at a discolored dark rock near his feet. Kicking it, he expected it to take off, but instead, his feet went right through the thing and only left a crumble of dust behind. "Maybe a little much even."
After witnessing the act, Michael shifted his attention to Razor's face and slowly made his way closer.
"That's a dragon for you, if you're not careful they'll burn you till even your bones are dust," with that said, he offered a hand to Razor so the two could make their way to their next destination.
Scoffing out loud, Razor rolled his eyes before grabbing Michael's hand.
"I know, I was there when we took down some of those dragon nests before," he complained, but Michael wasn't keen on escalating the matter.
Thus taking yet another flight they began making their way to the Marquis kingdom. Even before they'd taken flight for Hestemia, the news of Human settlers returning to Marquis had reached far and wide, even to the numerous hidden villages of elves scarred through Feral lands. One such tribe that Marquis had tried to assimilate into one, had relayed that news to him, but that was all he got from them.
"The emperor's dead, and they still don't trust me," Michael complained, growing more frustrated the more he thought of it.
Hearing his words, Razor couldn't figure out why Michael was having such a hard time understanding their doubts. With a raised eyebrow, he let out a tired sight and began to explain.
"They don't want your help, in their eyes, you're the man who could've saved them from numerous wars against the emperor, but instead you joined him as his aid," as he was done with his explanation, Michael shot him a troubled gaze.
"The emperor promised not to touch my people in return for my loyalty, and did keep his word, so why do they not-"
"Because they don't care, Michael," frowning into a stern look, Razor gave him the truth as straight as it could get. "The moment you left their tribe you became an outsider, I used to feel the same about you; that you're a monster that needs to be tamed, not trusted."
Despite the crudeness of his words, Michael, to some degree understood what Razor meant. In fact, the revelation reminded him of someone, someone from the past who suffered the same fate because he kept quiet about the corrupt workings of the aristocrats, namely, the king of Marquis himself.
'Haruki, he was executed for a crime he didn't commit. I suppose I understand how it feels to be in his shoes now, not being appreciated by those you're trying to desperately help.' Connecting the dots, Michael couldn't help but feel a sense of comradery in the aspect of betrayal with the current demon lord of lust.
"And now…" Bringing his mind back to reality, Michael asked Razor yet another question. "Do you still feel I'm a monster?"
"Not you, I can't say the same about the other elven," Razor responded as truthfully as he could.
'I guess that's better than before at least.' Thought Michael as they continued on soaring through the skies.
By the time they reached Marquis, the seeds of doubts would've already scattered throughout Haruki's army. Serena would be suspicious of the goblin queen, Medusa of Merciella, and to top it off, Haruki and his party would be off into Feral lands with Greta apprehended and Riley hiding a fever.
Unaware of it all, Michael and Razor landed on the outskirts of the city. Coming from a desolate kingdom to a city bustling with people felt quite odd, especially considering the inhabitants were humans living under the reign of the same demon who'd ruined the other kingdom's cities.
"I'll snoop around the city through Realm tear," holding his hand forward, Razor opened up a Realm Tear portal for him to step in and sneak into the city.
"Fine, I'll try to find any monster tribes who could still be hiding in the forest," with plans to recruit as many people as possible, Michael let down his armor to appear as unthreatening as possible to whoever he finds.
Parting ways, the generals ventured off to do their individual duties. Unsure what they would find, they made sure to keep their guards up from the very start, and only approach someone when they were utterly sure about being able to recruit their help in their plans.
***
Far away from the infiltration by the generals, Riley was huddled up in a corner of the carriage trying to make sure nobody would notice the feverish rise in temperature of her body. Her mind was brewing a mild headache, and her body was slowly being drained of all energy. Yet not wanting to be put on the sidelines again, she kept her lips shut and pretended as if nothing was happening.
"We're here," said the demonic coach-girl looking into the carriage through the sliding window. "The tribes should be just ahead, going on foot would be our best option to not spook them immediately."
Nodding at her, Haruki opened the door to his side and slipped right out. Holding the door open for the others, he quickly emptied his own carriage while watching the coachmen helping others out of the other carriages as well. Once battalions of soldiers were all down on their feet, Haruki gathered them all up into small groups with different individual tasks.
Some had to set up a temporary base, some were trusted with surveillance and the remaining were to help Haruki intercept the tribes directly.
"If we mask ourselves as monsters like kobolds and even goblins…" While relaying the plan, Haruki remembered that a majority of the army was in fact goblins. "Never mind, we just have to pretend to be monsters and mask our base with foliage and illusion magic."
Turning to Asmodia, Haruki relayed her task with a glance. Knowing he wanted her to take care of the illusion part, Asmodia quickly got up to the task. Then there was Maria, the strategist who was supposed to be familiar with the tribes in Feral Lands and their inner workings. However, after what Greta had done to her, she didn't exactly seem too enthusiastic to put herself in any kind of risky situation.
"Maria, you're going to lead the kidnapping strategy and prove yourself worthy enough to keep around," Haruki ordered.
"Wh-what?! Kidnapping what if I can't pull it off?!" Maria squealed in terror.
"If that happens, I'll personally take over and you'll be discarded," wanting to take as many live hostages as possible, Haruki didn't want to resort to direct violence just yet. "And don't worry, I'll provide you with everything you need before that happens."
'Discarded?!' Gritting her teeth, Maria was already freaking out.
"But master…" Jumping in on the conversation, the girl whom Haruki had made in charge of the soldiers presented a question. "Won't the tribes notice their people missing?"
"And why not just poison them like you said you would before?!" Maria added, shuddering at the very thought of intercepting a tribe of feral monsters.
Propping himself up, Haruki glanced between the two before replying.
"First, we want them to notice so they're busy fighting each other and we can continue kidnapping more and more of their kind," pausing to make sure they understood his explanation, Haruki continued after a few seconds. "Second, infertility from the poison can be a real issue. It doesn't affect us demons since we can't have children at all, but for other species, it can be quite detrimental."
'Besides, I don't want to take my army against the tribes just yet since they can easily outnumber us. Even if I do manage to win, which I possibly can, losing soldiers while trying to recruit soldiers would be an idiotic thing, and we'd end up with the same number of soldiers or perhpas even less than we started.' Haruki reasoned in his own mind.
"And we're doing this whole thing to gather more species under our banner, remember? What's the point in getting them to join if they all end up dying and can't multiply because of the poison?" Taking Haruki's points, Athena explained them further.
With no flaws left to point out, Maria was forced to shut her mouth and just do as she was told. In her mind, she didn't have any other choice, when in reality, Haruki wasn't going to discard her just yet, at least not after failing at a single mission.
"Now that everything's set," looking around at his soldiers doing all the work to set up the camps, and Asmodia masking it under an illusion of invisibility, Haruki announced to everyone. "It's time to kidnap some tribesmen and tribeswomen and pit these idiotic tribes against each other!"
Setting everything in motion, all he had to do now was to watch how effectively Maria could strategize and capture as many monsters from each tribe as possible. As long as he could get as many prisoners as possible without having to resort to violence, he didn't really care what measures she used.
'If this plan goes wrong, then we can wipe the memories of the prisoners and kill off the remaining tribesmen and women. Even still I'd prefer keeping the chances of someone escaping with a grudge as low as possible.' Haruki pondered, making use of his strong judgment instead of just a fist of iron.
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