Chapter 353: Alvey’s Story
"...I think I’m going to have to lose my next battle on purpose."
"I can help you out if you want. I have a few plastic explosives that would do wonders to your forces."
Arthur spoke as he walked into the room while combing his hair. He had changed his clothes to a plain grey turtleneck with a long black coat, similarly coloured trousers and sneakers.
He still had his left eye’s blue colour covered with a contact, and he planned to keep it on most of the time.
’At least until the other one changes colour. Which I’m guessing should not be too long from now.’
The boy’s ’Time Dreams’; dreams where he saw older versions of himself doing various things had increased in frequency ever since he acquired his Pseudo-authority.
Which was a lot considering it’s only been seven days since that happened.
’Is it really just ’Seven’? From the way Great Grandpa was acting, there might be some kind of Time Difference between Valmone and Hell.’
Arthur could attempt a synchronization with this world via his Pseudo-Authority, but he really didn’t want to risk it since that wasn’t something meant for ’Pseudo Authority’ wielders.
More importantly, his movements were a bit strained as the planet was still repulsing him a bit even though he had been registered by the Devour Class System.
’Maybe it’s the universe itself that’s doing that?’
Having met the consciousness of his home universe, Arthur was curious about how the consciousness of another Universe would be.
Would they be a ’No-Nonsense’ type like Hell, or one with a cherry personality—if it was possible for those 100% rational existences to be ’Cherry’.
While he was thinking all of this, McEnda was seriously drawing battle plans with the intention to lose; the complete opposite of what a General like him should be doing.
"This is bad..."
"What is?"
"I’ve been winning so much I don’t know how to lose."
"..."
"..."
Arthur and Alvey turned towards the man with blank eyes, with the boy regretting he even asked what was wrong in the first place.
"Are you bragging or something?"
"Huh? Oh, come to think of it, that does sound like I’m bragging."
McEnda seemed to finally understand how his words could have sounded to the other two, but he only shrugged his shoulders like he didn’t care too much.
"Ever since I was a kid, it’s been drilled into me that ’losing’ in anything was not an option."
"We’ve fought over a hundred times and if I recall correctly, you’ve lost 85% of those fights."
Alvey cut McEnda’s narration midway, causing the Archdemon’s brow to twitch repeatedly in annoyance.
"Irregulars like you don’t count."
"We’re in the same generation so, I’m pretty sure I do."
"You’re an exception."
Just as the two friends were about to begin bickering, Arthur cut in with a question directed to Alvey.
"I noticed something like ’Heir to McEnda Household’ on his status but didn’t see anything of the like on yours, why is that so?"
To Arthur, it was quite strange that Alvey wouldn’t be his house’s heir, considering he was pretty strong and one of the highest-ranked generals in the Army.
"There was nothing like that because I’m not part of any ’Household’. Legally, that is.
I was expelled when I was younger because I wasn’t born as a ’High’ Demon."
"Oof, sounds rough."
"It was, but since the only person who actually meant anything to me in that family was my mother who left alongside me, I didn’t care too much."
Most people would usually avoid talking about getting kicked out of their families, especially if they were Demon Nobles, but Alvey couldn’t really care less about that.
It was a famous story amongst the Demons of Gozon, about how his original Household had kicked out their golden goose.
As for his last name ’Sargon’, it was his Mother’s Maiden name.
She was from a bottom-rung Noble Family, but since the Gozon’s Military Society was largely Meritocratic, the man didn’t find too many issues when advancing in military rank.
Especially due to his friendship with McEnda, which in turn caused the attention of the Demon Rulers to be on him from a young age.
Most people who wanted to impede his path to promotion or throw the weight of their name around him were quickly taken care of.
As for the others, Alvey handled them and their Families personally.
"That’s quite the story."
"Is it really? I feel it’s quite common."
Alvey himself didn’t seem to feel anything was special about his case, but McEnda countered that statement very quickly.
"There are still some idiot Nobles who still judge their children based on their race ’Breed’ or what skills they awaken without giving them time to develop their real talents.
Most of them either don’t get much attention, or get kicked out like you so that part is quite common.
But them becoming Demon Generals who conquered 2 High-level Worlds before 50? That’s not something you see even once in a blue moon."
Hearing that Alvey already led invasions into two other High-Level worlds and had succeeded in conquering them was quite a surprise for Arthur, as the strength levels of beings in High-Level worlds were nothing to joke with.
They mostly had better energy quality, advanced magic and other energy proficiency, advanced societies, powerful naturally occurring artifacts and so on, making the task of subjugating its inhabitants quite difficult.
"They were both newly evolved worlds, and their inhabitants hadn’t had time to adapt to the new changes yet."
"Still doesn’t change the fact that they were High-Level Worlds.
You netted Gozon two High-Level worlds we could groom to maturity."
The way McEnda spoke made Arthur feel like he was talking about planets like cows to be fattened before being devoured.
It made him wonder just exactly why it was that Gozon invaded other worlds in the first place.
But from McEnda’s reply to his earlier inquiry, he knew he wasn’t gonna be getting the answer to that question anytime soon.
It also seemed that the Aramisians were equally clueless about this.
"Arthur."
"Yeah?"
Alvey’s call snapped the boy out of his thoughts, and when he looked up, Arthur saw the man wear an even more serious face as he asked.
"I’d be honest with you; your strength is probably one of the highest among the Legendary Realm existences on this planet.
"One of? I’d like to see who it is that can beat me in the same realm."
Arthur knew better than anyone how ridiculous his power was, especially since he held a Pseudo-Authority. So, if there was a Legendary Realm existence out there in Aramis that could beat him then he wanted to know who that person was.
This attitude of his made McEnda take note to do everything he could to prevent Arthur from meeting a certain Brigadier General serving under him.
’She’s definitely gonna ask him for a fight...and that’s not gonna end well since she usually doesn’t care where the fight starts.’
The collateral damage to the surroundings from two Legendary Realm existences fighting without care was enough to destroy an area large enough that you could break it off from the continent and it’d form a massive island.
McEnda didn’t want that kind of damage being done inside any of the Military Cities he controlled.
"Irregulars exist, Arthur. But that’s not the main issue here.
What is, is the fact that I want you to join Gozon’s side of this war."
The man did not sugarcoat his intentions and straight up told Arthur what he wanted.
As for Arthur, he knew how much of a valuable combat resource he was, so he decided to leverage that.
"Even if I join you, it’d only be tentatively."
"Tentatively?"
"Indeed. I’d like to check out the other side of things first."
"Hmm..."
Alvey placed his hand on his chin and seemingly pondered on Arthur’s words, but the man’s thoughts were not as they appeared to be.
’This is gonna be easier than I expected. I’d have more of a reason to get him to go to the Duskhand Bastille.
We don’t have any of such facilities on Aramis so as far as this planet is concerned, the Aramisians are the nastier bunch.’
"Okay, I agree.
You can join us Tentatively. I’d allow you to act at your discretion, so you can see the ’other side of things’ as you call it."
He pulled out three papers from the bunch of files in front of him and separated them from each other, he then proceeded to drop a pen from a height atop the table and push the paper the pen ’happened to’ land on towards Arthur.
When McEnda saw the content of it, his brow twitched lightly and Arthur noticed it in the corner of his eyes.
’There’s something fishy going on here.’
Though Arthur thought that, he saw no reason not to go along with it so he acted like he didn’t notice a thing.
"I’d give you some time to adapt to this world’s forces. When you do, you can go out to see things from the Aramisians’ side.
While you’re at it, I’d like you to handle that Outpost for me."
Arthur looked down on the paper as he nodded to Alvey’s words, reading through the contents.
The title was naturally the ’Duskhand Bastille’.
