Kanzaki Demon Lord, Retry! Volume 9

1. Auflage 2025
ISBN: 978-1-7183-6314-4
Verlag: J-Novel Club
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, Band 9, 250 Seiten

Reihe: Demon Lord, Retry!

Civil war in Holylight rages on. The Central nobles' faction grows ever more violent and savage in their march, while the militant nobles draw them out with false rumors of dwindling supplies.

Meanwhile, the Demon Lord holds a meeting with the Gorgon Trading Company, unintentionally entangling his own mess further. Despite his sincerest desire to stay far away from conflict, he winds up storming into Dona's stronghold to rescue the captive, tortured children called the Numbered.

The militant nobles launch their counterattack, and the Demon Lord begins his conquest!

Autoren/Hrsg.

Kanzaki, Kurone

Weitere Mitwirkende

Iino, Makoto

Seacord, Adam

Leseproben

Raise the Battle Flags

——Northern Holylight.

This place was a veritable terrain of trials. Unlike the arid wasteland that was Eastern Holylight, the northern region of the country was a place of volatile climate. Blazing heat assaulted the land one day and with a roaring blizzard the next. The very landscape was a relic of the Mythical Era in a way.

At the twilight of the ancient Mythical War, Gatekeeper had served as the last line of defense against the incoming Hellion army...until it, too, was trampled. After the fortress fell, Northern Holylight became the primary battleground where the human survivors, led by the Wise Angel, clashed with the King of Devils’ army. Light and darkness collided time after time until the very air was tarnished, every body of water evaporated, and the sky was eternally dimmed.

The Hellions and their brutal victories pushed the front line down to Eastern Holylight. Battle raged on until all that was left in the north were numerous craters and enormous chasms that cracked the earth so deeply they almost seemed bottomless. The humans managed to repair the fortress after the war, but two thousand years did nothing to improve the ruined climate of the north, its devastation a memorial to the massive scale of the ancient war.

And now, a Xenobian legion of five thousand strong had poured into that unforgiving land like a pack of hunting dogs.

“It’s getting mighty cold, Boss... The heat was just about killing us earlier,” one of them grumbled.

“That’s ‘General,’ to you, dimwit. You’ll address me by my sparkly new title.”

“Heh, that’s right. What do we do now, General?”

“We wait for butterflies... This place isn’t much of a hunting ground, anyway.” Zorm smirked. Before he’d taken on the mantle of general, he had served as Leon’s right-hand man.

In short, Zorm was a crass commander. He was a brutal mad dog that had no qualms about pillaging, razing, raping, kidnapping, or torturing civilians. Even during Zorm and his dogs’ current campaign, they had torn through town after town on their route, pilfering everything they could find, tearing jewelry off the dead, and having their turns with any young woman unfortunate enough to catch their eyes.

No doubt, this description would leave anyone in disbelief. How could a military act so cartoonishly savage? Fact, however, is sometimes stranger than fiction. Plenty of news stories in our world describe militant groups so morally bankrupt that they belong in the dark ages. Perhaps Zorm’s legion was not an outlier at all.

“Boss—I mean, General? Another village elder is here to see you,” said one of Zorm’s men.

“Take whatever he brought and kick him to the curb.”

“Yessir!”

Less prosperous towns and villages often cobbled together whatever supplies they could to offer armies marching their way through, begging for their settlement to be spared. The offering was a worthy investment for most villages, no matter how destitute, if it meant preventing these armored brutes from slaughtering their working population, defiling their women, and setting their homes ablaze.

Zorm’s henchmen muttered a kernel of truth for once: “These militant nobles are a heartless bunch. Aren’t they supposed to protect these poor bastards? Their precious tax dollars at work.” In part, commoners paid their taxes in hopes that they would be protected in times of need. Nobles who refused to provide that very protection to their people were breaking the contract, in a sense.

“Stupidity is human nature,” Zorm quipped. “They’re paying for a pipe dream. No army’s gonna protect peasants when their own asses are on fire.” The statement was ironic, since his legion was the one holding the torch that had started the blaze in the first place.

A cheer came from the front of their cavalcade, drawing their attention.

“Sounds like butterflies, Boss!”

Zorm cackled without noticing that his right-hand man had neglected to use his proper title again. “Butterflies” was code for the supplies that the Madam continually tried to send northward.

“Boss, how come rich nobles never seem to have a thought between their ears?”

“Heh! The hardest work they’ve ever done is move a fork and knife over their dinner plate. They think they can give one little word and their package will show up anywhere they want.”

By nature, nobles believed that everyone lived to serve them like their butlers and maids, that their staff would figure out a way to fulfill any impossible whim. In Zorm’s eyes, the Madam was the epitome of sheltered nobility.

“Give them a little chase. Just enough to spook them,” Zorm commanded.

“Heh heh heh... You betcha!” With the crack of a riding crop, his henchmen galloped away.

Zorm’s men had pulled off this operation many times before. A little chase to intimidate them and the coachmen would cut their cargo loose and run for their lives every time. By now, Zorm’s men were well accustomed to the game.

Soon, the brutes returned with a wagon packed full of goods, greeted by amused whistling from the soldiers who’d remained with the cavalcade. It was almost too easy.

“Boss, this one’s got bags full of gold coins and cases of fancy wine!”

“Fancy wine, huh? Apparently, the tycoon of the South mistook this war for a high society ball.” The men burst into laughter at his jab.

Like a sheep to slaughter bringing its own dagger, this foolish noblewoman continued to deliver her riches to them. As bizarre of a situation as it was, none of Zorm’s men questioned the pattern. It was all too common for the ignorant rich to demand the impossible, only for their staff to obediently try their best to comply, all the while muttering how impractical the demand was.

“If nothing else, they know when to run,” said Zorm’s henchman.

“I’d be running at the first sign of trouble too, if I had to answer to a noblewoman like that. No one could survive that long-term,” Zorm answered.

In a strange way, Zorm and his men sympathized with the coachmen. It would have been next to impossible for anyone to deliver their cargo past the armies currently swarming in the north. What chance did a fully loaded wagon have against soldiers on horseback? No coachman was stupid enough to risk their life for such a foolhardy demand. Zorm’s men had come to learn that a little bit of chase was more than enough to scare them away.

“Another village elder’s here, Boss. Want me to give him the usual?”

“No, bring him here... I want to ask him something,” Zorm commanded.

The elder was visibly shaking as he was brought before Zorm, fearfully holding out the leather sack containing every coin he could scrape together from his village. Seeing that all the coins were bronze, Zorm let out a grunt. Compared to the bags of gold coins he had just scored from the carriage, this was nothing but pocket change.

“Take it back, Gramps,” he said.

“P-Please... Our village has nothing more we can offer...” the elder stammered.

“Don’t get it twisted. But if you on offering me something... We’re looking for a site to set up camp.”

“W-We have no more than eighty in our village... We couldn’t possibly host this grand army,” said the elder.

Zorm hid his frustration well. While they had found the perfect location for catching butterflies, the volatile climate—from blistering heat to violent blizzards to torrential downpours—had taken its toll on even the brutes. Zorm desperately needed a place to set up camp and rest his men and horses if he wanted to settle down and relish his lucky streak with the Madam’s cargo.

“Isn’t there any other spot around here?” Zorm demanded.

“There is a fortress northwest of here, but it was abandoned years ago. Now it’s all but a ruin.”

“Fortress, huh? Take us there.”

“J-Just a moment! My old legs are too frail to take—”

“Shut up and walk!”

Forcing the elder to lead, Zorm’s military resumed their march, setting course northwest.

Zorm kept an eye out for an ambush, but his legion soon arrived at the fortress without any encounters with their enemy. The fortress had obviously been abandoned for decades, portions of weathered bastions and skeletons of structures the only remnants of its former glory.

“What the hell is this?” Zorm snarled.

“I-I was told that a gang of bandits once settled here...” the elder pleaded.

“There’s barely a roof to go over our heads! What a pile of shit!”

The elder hung his head, attempting to weather the storm of Zorm’s temper and entitlement. Apparently he expected the utmost hospitality after invading their land.

“I know you’re pissed, Boss. But the guys need to take a breather pretty soon,” his second suggested.

“Fine... Get them to clean up the place so it’s at least usable.”

“Yessir!”

At Zorm’s command, the legion of five thousand jumped to work. The legion cleared debris and patched up defenses. While his men worked for a whole night and day, Zorm remembered to post watchmen on the bastions, but there was not even a hint of enemy presence.

...