The unpleasant smell of burnt, undead flesh felt like it would be a permanent stain on my life by the time the victorious army emerged from deeper within the city.
They had a vaguely disappointed air about them, which I supposed I could understand. As far as I could tell, the capital city’s entire supply of souls had ended up inside of Reliana. That meant the ’brave’ soldiers of the demonic army, hyped as they were to slaughter some mortals and claim souls, were left with nothing to do as their general dueled and tried to recruit the enemy.
I couldn’t find it in me to pity them, but I did feel thankful as they effortlessly extinguished the burning remains of the dead. With the way clear, I could finally hop off the balcony and join their procession towards the camp. Naturally, Mia joined me, and the rest of the surviving recruits slowly trickled out of the house.
The demons did nothing to stop us. We got a few odd looks, but that was the extent of it. It was when we made it back into the camp that something unexpected happened.
<table border="1" class="chapter-table" style="border-collapse: collapse">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="width: 99.043%">
<p>Alert!</p>
<p>You have a new Merit added to your service record:</p>
<p>Berlis Invasion Survivor (Radiant Merit x1)</p>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
The notification allowed a small part of me to relax, but I was mostly still on edge. It wasn’t like the invasion was really over. I still had to turn over the stuff from the vault to Mercutio and see if he noticed anything. Honestly, I didn’t think I would rest easy until I went through a portal and visited the Abyss for the first time.
Maybe not even then.
We were the first group of mortals to make it back to camp. In fact, I strongly suspected we would be the only group to make it back to camp. Even if the assassination attempt from the mutated recruit was a personal threat to me, the fire it started had done a lot to neutralize the undead near us. That, combined with the exceptional abilities of myself and Mia, had saved us from the massacre. The other groups likely weren’t so lucky.
At least I was treated to an amusing sight when we approached Mercutio’s mobile home. The demon stood in front of it, face carefully blank, as a seething demoness paced next to him. I recognized her immediately as the wyvern rider. She actually stopped pacing and brightened up when she spotted us.
"Thank the Abyss," she breathed wearily, then grimaced when she got a closer look at our actual numbers. "I thought for sure this idiot had fed his entire allotment of recruits to the undead."
"I could not have known they would encounter such a threat," Mercutio assured her drolly. The only break in his mask was a small tightening of his eyes when they landed on me. "They should have been perfectly safe."
"For the last time, risk assessment and deployment are under our purview, not logistics." The demoness whose name I still didn’t know rounded on Mercutio with a hiss before managing to calm herself. "Did we gain anything from this whole disaster, or did you just waste a bunch of lives?"
I chose that moment to step forward, though it wasn’t in an effort to save Mercutio’s hide. "We have completed our assignment," I declared, holding up the dimensional bag for Mercutio to claim.
He stared at me for a long moment before he accepted it, his eyes suspicious. But, just like I was hoping, he made no move to frisk me or threaten me into giving up anything I might have swiped from the vault. After all, if he tried, I was fairly certain the demoness would object, out of sheer spite if nothing else.
"Excellent. I commend you on performing your task. I will analyze these samples quickly so we may decide whether this world is worthy of our rule."
The second half of his little speech was clearly aimed at the demoness, who nodded reluctantly, giving him leave to retreat to his home.
"Now, let us go home. There is nothing for us here."
He ripped open a portal, just like he did at the start of the invasion. Beyond, the sight of a grand street stretched into the distance. Demons lined the edges of it, cheering for their returning army.
The legion surged forward. They blocked my view as they paraded through the portal. We recruits edged closer, looking for a chance to insert ourselves into the stream of soldiers.
But before we could join the throng, I heard an odiously familiar throat-clearing behind us. It was with great reluctance that the surviving mortal recruits turned to face our current commanding officer.
"Excellent, you are all here, and right next to my path home."
Mercutio’s voice was smug. My nerves clenched when I realized he was backed by a host of knights in full plate armor. I couldn’t see their faces through their helmets, but their stillness as they all stood behind him was unnatural. That, and their ebony armor etched with golden runes, were enough to unnerve me.
"Your first return to the Abyss after being made a recruit is always special," Mercutio opined, stroking his chin absently. "This is typically reserved for your commander, but it so happens that you are under my command until you find your way back. How... fortuitous, don’t you think? Now, assemble yourselves into proper ranks, and kneel."
Slowly, hesitantly, we complied. There was nothing we could do to oppose him. My eyes strayed to the departing army only to see the last demons already passing through. The portal beckoned like a promise of safety, yet I knew I wouldn’t make it, even if I made a run for it.
As we knelt, the knights spread out. They stalked between our rows until every recruit had a knight hovering over their shoulders.
Every recruit except me.
A shiver ran down my spine.
"Good. Good. Now, look up. This isn’t something you get to see very often, even as part of the legion."
I obeyed, curiosity winning over the need to keep Mercutio in my sights.
At first, I had no idea what he was referring to. The sky was as corrupted by demonic mana as when the general claimed the world in the name of the Abyss. Then I spotted the lines of magic, slowly branching out over the sky from five separate points.
I couldn’t hold in my gasp when space itself shattered, revealing swirling red and black chaos beyond. A single hand, so large I couldn’t even estimate its size, was slowly reaching out from beyond the rift.
The hand was clad in a black gauntlet with red runic accents. Its sharp, metallic claws tore reality apart wherever they passed. As titanic as it seemed at first sight, the hand grew bigger as it drew closer. Swiftly, it blotted out the sky above us.
Then, as if the hand’s owner had curled their fingers, a sudden tremor rocked the entire world. My insides twisted in response. The hand was squeezing, pulling, and there was no denying its might.
"Glorious, isn’t it, to see a world claimed? For a worthless piece of land like this one, to be made useful after all." Mercutio looked at our pale, horrified faces, and scoffed. "No matter. You were granted a great privilege, but that’s not why we’re here today. Let us proceed."
He lifted his hand, and the sound of swords leaving their scabbards rasped all around me. I tried to move, to run, to do anything, but mana erupted out of Mercutio and froze us all in place. I was locked with my eyes on Mia’s, both of us beyond fear and incapable of releasing even a peep.
Then Mercutio’s hand fell, and I stared blankly as my friend was reduced to ash alongside every other recruit.
His hold over me vanished, and I collapsed forward onto my hands with a strangled gasp.
"Shocking, I know," Mercutio laughed, kneeling right next to my panting form. "You just wouldn’t die, would you? Couldn’t do me this one favor?" His voice turned into an angry hiss as he gripped my jaw and forced me to look him in the eye. "Parading in front of me with your smirks, and your looks, and that sword you don’t deserve."
I considered trying to spit in his face, but I just felt... tired. All that struggle, all that killing, all that guilt. For what?
The pressure of his fingers digging into my face increased, making my skull ache.
"Well, at least I get this. Remember it. Remember it well. Because it’s nowhere near how much you deserve to suffer."
He flexed his hand, and my world exploded into pain as his fingers easily dug past skin, flesh, and bone, pulping everything in their way. It was mercifully short. One moment I was wishing I was dead, and the next, with one final shot of pain, I was.
My soul peeled away as my body dissolved into ash, and I was pulled from the crumbling world, out into a dark infinity.