Book 5: Chapter 21

The mysterious castle was appearing in various places of the Dark Continent.

Following the Lulugal Forest occupied fort attack, numerous reports like that were brought to the Demon King Castle.

All of them had the point that it immediately vanished after its appearance, and it closely resembled the situation of the time of the Lulugal occupied fort attack.

Due to that, the Four Cardinal Generals returned to their respective headquarters and imposed emergency orders.

One of the Eastern Army’s occupied bases was annihilated. For Vermudol, this was extremely regretful.

Certainly, he had placed importance on the west and the Western Army as anti-Hero military bases. But, there was no changing the fact that the Eastern Army was a part of the Demon King Army.

Their organization should have been prepared enough to fight satisfactorily at the critical moment.

And how did that turn out.

They were toyed with by something that was said to be a mysterious castle that could freely appear in various places of the Dark Continent.

And then, what came out from that castle were unknown powerful Mazoku.

Anything and everything about this was unforeseen, but there was one thing that was clear.

「The enemy’s objective is without a doubt me.」

「Yes.」

Next to Vermudol who sat in the Demon King Castle’s throne, Ichika nodded.

Nino, who stood on the opposite side as if to sandwich Vermudol in between them, remained silent.

The war potential that was currently in the Demon King Castle Throne Room was Vermudol, Ichika, Nino, and some Magic Operated Armors.

Gordy was being vigilant of the airspace around the Demon King Castle, and Rokuna, just in case, was attached to the defense of the underground large magic formation.

Everyone else such as Orel and Aulokk were also out as security throughout the town of Arkverm.

「I don’t know how much information the opponent has about us, but I can see through how much war potential they have. It isn’t all that much. I am positive of that.」

「Why?」

Vermudol made a thin smile at Nino who seemed to have a bit of an interest.

「It’s simple. A castle that is able to freely appear anywhere. Despite possessing something as great as this, they didn’t attack Arkverm from the beginning.」

「……Nino doesn’t get it.」

Vermudol made a wry smile at Nino who intensified her displeased-looking expression even more.

「If the enemy possessed plenty of war potential, things would advance faster if they just appeared in the skies of Arkverm from the beginning. If they were to dispatch a huge army all at once at us while we weren’t on guard, the Central Army would have fallen into a state of confusion with just that.」

There would have been no need to expressly appear in various places of the Dark Continent. And there wouldn’t have been even a need to attack a single garrison of the Eastern Army.

「But if they’re targeting you, Demon King-sama, it would be possible to gather all armies right away to protect you, you know?」

It actually was possible to do that, and if they were to protect Vermudol, that would be the correct thing to do.

「Yeah, it’s exactly as you say. But, I won’t choose that. No, I can’t choose that.」

「Why?」

「That is the sly part of the enemy. Most likely, they have read my personality to a certain extent.」

Seeing Nino express a question mark, Vermudol tapped on the throne’s armrest.

「In other words, it’s this.」

「This……the chair?」

Seeing Nino tilt her head, Vermudol said “that’s not it” and waved his hand.

「Ahー……In other words. This is a tactic that takes into account the fact that I am the king.」

This time, the enemy had cut up their most likely scarce war potential, and expressly attacked an occupied base of the Eastern Army. It was easy to guess the reason why they did this.

「They went and expressly declared “we’ll attack even places other than the Demon King Castle”. They’re doing this knowing that I am managing the Zadark Kingdom earnestly, and that I intend on protecting it.」

He didn’t know if it was a coincident or not, but the fact that they attacked not a town but an occupied fort was also effective.

It had shown verification that at the very least, something on the scale of a small force would be unable to compete with them. Even how they purposely let a portion of the soldiers escape was done with the intent to have them make a report about their strength.

They had challenged them with the prediction that Vermudol would most likely not abandon his own subordinates.

And that was correct.

Vermudol was not cold hearted enough to abandon those that followed him. He had no intention of becoming a Demon King that only keep his power as a mere ostentation like Demon King Gramfia had done in the past.

He would develop the Zadark Kingdom, and bring about peace to all of the Mazoku he cherished.

He believed that that was the mission he needed to carry out.

That is why he couldn’t forgive this situation.

「I don’t know who they are or where they’re from, but they’ve done it now. Moreover, it was at this time where the sightseeing plans were at the final stages, you know? It’s not like they calculated that far, it’s a pretty big deal.」

Vermudol made a stifled laughter.

It was a warped way of laughing, and it was clear that Vermudol’s heart was filled with rage.

「……However, the problem is the enemy’s movements from here on out.」

Hearing Ichika’s words, Vermudol erased his expression and nodded.

Certainly, it was exactly as she said.

The fact that Vermudol had seen through the fact that they were aiming for him, as long as the enemy wasn’t extremely foolish, that should have been within their calculations.

How they would move after that was what had become important.

「Reporting! The enemy castle has appeared at the foot of the south’s Voltek Mountain!」

「Reporting! The enemy castle at the foot of the south’s Voltek Mountain has vanished!」

The continuously coming reports told of how the enemy’s castle appeared and vanished at every place.

It had a chaotic feeling with just that, but thanks to the practical use of the Eastern Army’s drawn up map, they didn’t have much trouble having a grasp of the situation. Even now, the Magic Operated Armors were hurriedly organizing the enemy castle’s appearance information on the desk that would brought in into Throne Room.

「If we could reduce the communication relay time, we’d be able to progress more appropriately……」

「Are you talking about the long distance communication that you mentioned before?」

Vermudol nodded to Ichika, and then breathed a sigh.

Report messengers that were sent out during an emergency would need to be sent out every time the situation changed. Once the report was received, they would be sent back dispatched with the instructions on how to deal with the situation, and yet another messenger would have to be sent to someone higher in the ranks.

But, since the messenger would have travelling time, there would be a time lag between the time the situation occurred and the time the report was completed. That is why the information would end up having complications no matter what.

In the case of the Mazoku, they could use Transfer Magic and were able to send the messengers in a short amount of time.

That being said, Mazoku that possess the Transfer technical skill were limited, and even their individual magical power wasn’t infinite. When the opponent is someone who could start a disturbance like this one, since there was a need to continuously send messengers, there would be a shortage of personnel.

If there was a magic where one could send only their voice to the other party, this sort of problem could be resolved, but it seemed that something that convenient didn’t exist.

Before, when the idea was experimented with Wind Magic as a test, it turned into an outrageous situation where everyone that was on the path to the other party could hear the voice. On top of that, the surprised voices of those that heard the voice would be added, and when it eventually reached the ears of Raktor who was the other party in the experiment, it had turned into noise that was on a level that caused murderous impulses to rise within him.

In other words, there was no other method other than sending out messengers at present.

「Well, there’s no use in pining for something we don’t have. More importantly, there is no way this will all end with just this sort of disturbance.」

「It will be about how they attack with what kind of timing.」

「That’s how it is.」

The point is that that time will be final decisive battle for the opponent.

With the current disturbance strategy, the objective was probably to tie the Four Cardinal Generals down to their respective posts by attacking various places of the Dark Continent and announcing it, and that would prevent them from gathering their war potential in the Demon King Castle.

In actuality, they had already arrived in the east. He didn’t know about their present state in detail, but under Fainell’s command, the elites of the Eastern Army were putting the preparations to sortie in order at this time.

In that case, the remaining regions should also be making some sort of movements.

「Reporting!」

As if to interrupt Vermudol’s thoughts as he was thinking that, a messenger rushed in into the Throne Room.

「The enemy castle has appeared in the vicinity of the southern town of Elgrad!」

「Hou.」

Hearing that, Vermudol raised a cheerful voice.

The south──Vermudol knew who was there right now.

If he was there, the town of Elgrad wouldn’t be destroyed.

「Reporting! The enemy has appeared from the enemy castle that appeared in the vicinity of the southern town of Elgrad! The enemy castle has also vanished!」

A newly arrived messenger announced the appearance of the enemy that appeared in the vicinity of the town of Elgrad.

The enemy was a single man wearing red full bodied armor.

「Single? That is also quite strange……」

Putting aside a small fort, to come out alone to the town of Elgrad where the alert level was raised to the max, that was just mad.

To do something like that, they would have to be someone like Raktor.

He didn’t know if the enemy just had that much confidence or not, but there was one fact that became clear.

「……As I thought, the enemy is small in number……huh.」

「Reporting!」

Immediately after Vermudol muttered that, the next messenger barged into the Throne Room.

That messenger announced that the enemy castle had appeared in the western coast.