Chapter 2

The Fortress of the Western Reach was no more. In its place stood the Bastion of the Eastern March.

The Demon lord sat upon the central throne, her chin resting in her palm, bored. Below her, the high-ranking demons bickered and squabbled with the pettiness of human nobles.

"Absolutely not!"

A towering demon with massive, feathered wings slammed his hand onto the war table. "I insist on pressing the attack East! The Western Region of the Morris Empire has been crippled. Including their Archduke, they have only three Ninth-Rank combatants left alive. As long as Her Majesty leads us, we can devour the Western Region entirely before reinforcements from the other empires arrive. From there, we can march straight on the Morris Capital or swing south into Thebes!"

"And then what? You’ll be crushed in a pincer attack between two Great Empires. No matter how strong Her Majesty is, do you expect him to split himself in two to save your hide?"

The speaker was a demon with the alluring form of a human woman, save for the curling ram horns atop her head and a slender tail ending in a heart shape. She sneered at the winged demon.

"Listen to me. We fortify this position. We strengthen our defenses. With Her Majesty holding this fortress, not even the Lord of Light could breach it! Let the humans break their heads against our walls until they bleed dry. Then, we launch a surprise counter-attack to encircle them. We can bleed both empires dry and slowly cannibalize their territories piece by piece!"

"I stand by my original proposal—the Morris Empire is a rotting carcass, hardly a threat. The main force must move South immediately!"

This voice belonged to a massive, green-skinned figure with protruding tusks—Grand Duke Gruen. "We must raze the minor human cities to the south and carve a bloody path into the Empire of Thebes."

"To what end, Gruen?" the female demon, Lilith, retorted with a scoff. "You intend to fight the Thebes Imperial Army and the Church’s Crusaders head-on, while exposing our flank to the Morris Empire? Shall I do the math for you? How many Ninth-Rank knights do they have? And how many do we have?"

"I do not need your arithmetic, Lilith; I know the odds better than you!" Gruen ignored the Succubus’s mockery. "My goal has never changed. Invading Thebes is not recklessness; it is a necessity. We must strike the Wall of Despair from the rear. Only when that wall falls can we break the stalemate that has trapped us for ten thousand years!"

"Enough!"

The Demon lord’s voice cut through the noise, silencing the hall.

"So," she mused, "we have the Orc Grand Duke Gruen’s radical plan, the Winged Grand Duke Cossette’s compromise, and the Succubus Grand Duke Lilith’s conservative strategy. Let us vote. The plan with the most support will be executed."

The nine Demon Grand Dukes present exchanged glances. Slowly, they nodded.

Hands were raised.

Three votes for the East. Three votes for Defense. Three votes for the South.

It was a perfect deadlock. As one, all nine Dukes turned their eyes toward the throne.

"Your Majesty," Cossette said heavily, "even with your strength included, our total power is only slightly superior to the Morris Empire. This raid caught them off guard, giving us a lead, but that advantage is slim. I beg you to consider cautiously."

"Your Majesty," Lilith said through gritted teeth, "this is not ten thousand years ago. We are no longer the scourge that forced the entire continent of Rodinia to unite. Before you awakened, we couldn't even defeat the Morris Empire—the weakest of the human nations! This very city we sit in blocked us for five thousand years!"

"Your Majesty," Gruen said calmly, his eyes burning with fanaticism, "you are the strongest Demon lord in five millennia. If we cannot breach the Wall of Despair and reconnect with the Abyss, our race will continue to wither. Eventually, we will be wiped from the face of Rodinia."

"Hmph..."

She looked down at them—the only nine Grand Dukes of the Demon Race. The only nine Ninth-Rank warriors they possessed.

Suddenly, she wanted to laugh.

She wanted to laugh at her past self. How stupid she had been, believing the propaganda that the Demon Race was the ultimate threat to humanity. She had been played like a fiddle by those nobles, rushing headlong to the Northwest border to 'save the world,' only to find... this.

Now that she was the Demon lord, she knew the absurd truth. The terrifying Demon Race had only nine Generals. Sure, in a one-on-one duel, a Demon Grand Duke might slightly edge out a human of the same rank, but they could never handle two at once.

Meanwhile, the "weak" Morris Empire had over a dozen Ninth-Rank powerhouses. The mighty Empire of Thebes had more than twenty!

The only reason demons still existed was that the humans were too busy fighting each other to finish the job.

"I..."

She looked at the expectant gazes of the three faction leaders. The Demon lord made her choice.

"The Auxiliary Army will attack East, feigning a direct assault on the Morris Capital. The Main Force will gather and march South. We strike the Wall of Despair."

"What?!"

"Th-this..."

Cossette and Lilith stared in shock, disbelief written on their faces. Only Gruen’s eyes lit up as he bowed low. "Your subordinate obeys!"

"Wait!" Lilith cried out. "Your Majesty! Have you truly not considered the disparity in power? Let alone how the few of us are supposed to fight the twenty-eight Ninth-Rankers of Thebes... they have a Saint! The Power of the Demon lord makes you far stronger than a Ninth-Rank, but against a true Saint Realm entity..."

"Unless..." Cossette’s eyes widened with hope. "Have you broken through?"

"No."

She shook her head, crushing their sudden hope. "I have not broken through."

"The barrier between the Ninth Rank and the Saint Realm is too formidable. Even though the Power of the Demon lord has reconstructed me from soul to flesh, it was not enough to push me into the Saint Realm."

She raised her hand, examining it.

It was a slender, delicate hand, reconstructed by dark power. The skin was pale and flawless, like the finest jade from the Balan Empire. Her fingers were long and elegant, more pristine than those of noble ladies who had never lifted anything heavier than a tea cup, let alone a sword.

She lowered her gaze.

Her view of her lap was almost entirely obstructed by the voluptuous swell of her chest. Even sitting down, she could only see a fraction of her thighs.

A lock of raven-black hair fell across her vision, blurring her sight and her thoughts, dragging her memory back to the past...

She, Chris, used to be a human knight.

A man.

As a commoner, he had no surname. But he had been lucky; his younger sister possessed magical talent, which bought him the opportunity to train as a knight.

At sixteen, he officially became a First-Rank Knight and entered the Thebes Imperial Royal Knight Academy.

At nineteen, he became a Second-Rank Knight.

Regrettably, by the time he came of age and graduated at twenty, he had failed to break through to the Third Rank. Had he succeeded, he would have secured a reserve spot in the Imperial Royal Knights—the Order of the Sky Eagle.

Instead, he was deceived by the Empire, sent to the border, betrayed, and left to die.

His original body had long since been burned to ash. It was accurate to say that Chris was dead.

Yes, the human knight Chris was dead. All that remained was the Demon lord—Clyris.

"We have no choice... Cossette, Lilith!"

She clenched that delicate, jade-like hand into a fist. Her voice rang with the clashing of steel.

There were three proposals on the table, but for the Demon Race, there was only one path.

"The power I inherited is not merely that of the previous King, but a fragment of the Ancient Demon lords of old. Yet, even this accumulation failed to push me into the Saint Realm. By the next millennium, the inheritance will likely decay below the Ninth Rank. I am, in all likelihood, the strongest Demon lord you will ever have again!"

"If we do not break the Wall of Despair and restore the connection to the Abyss now, the only thing waiting for you is extinction!"

Cossette and Lilith stared at her, stunned. They had no idea the lineage of the Demon lord was decaying so rapidly.

Silence descended upon the hall. No one offered another counter-proposal.

After a final tactical discussion, the orders were set.

The weakest among them—Will, the Blood Demon Grand Duke, and Allen, the Shadow Demon Grand Duke—would lead a portion of the mid-rank demons and all the low-rank fodder to the East to draw the enemy's gaze.

Meanwhile, Clyris would lead the remaining seven Grand Dukes, all High-Rank demons, and the elite Mid-Rank forces to the South.

They would shatter the Wall of Despair, or they would die trying.