A Week after Hinotori’s fight in the North,
In the North of Larm, at the very top of one of its famous mountains, there was a specific area called the Wyvern’s Graveyard. It wasn’t necessarily a place where dead wyverns were buried. Simply a rumour that stated that it was the place that even wyverns went to die.
It was a place of death for sure. Infamous enough for it to be compared to the Demise Mountains and Winter Zone, but safe enough for some humans to have passed there and tell tales.
This was all due to the fact that the Wyvern’s Graveyard was home to some of the most ferocious monsters the North of Larm had to offer. Griffins, Manticores, of course wyverns and at a certain point in time, even giants.
The monsters fought against one another cruelly, creating an inhospitable environment where only B rank monsters and above could survive. And the one who lorded over all of this was Sora of the Ravaging Winds, the Tyrant of the North.
For this reason, Sora was the second most feared Tyrant in Larm after Goliath who had once before wiped out some armies of minor countries.
That same Sora soared through the sky, headed back to his home. As he passed by, he flew over the Wyvern Kaiser’s domain, but what he saw was unexpected. A drake skull, twice as large as his body laid on a broken terrain.
From the looks of things, there was a scrap and the wyvern kaiser lost, meaning, a new wyvern kaiser was around. That didn’t matter though.
The odd thing was the fact that the surroundings hadn’t regenerated from the fight. Even if the fight happened the day before, which he doubted, the terrain should have been restored to its original form.
‘That’s a first.’
He thought, but chose to ignore it.
Sora landed on his home turf with an army of griffins and manticores standing there, greeting him.
‘A king’s reception. Excellent.’
‘This is odd. What are all of them doing here?’
Of course, when the tyrant was returning, he’d expect a certain amount of his people there to welcome him, but the manticores were different. They were no rules that demanded their presence there, so he felt a bit suspicious.
One of the griffins moved forward. Nyxon, one of Sora’s named commanders. The griffon bowed to him.
“Lord Sora, welcome. We hope your trip was a pleasant one.”
Flashes of the trip played through his head. The Battle God’s decision pertaining to his question, Karon’s invitation to a union of forces, and that enemy. He could still remember that unusual enemy, with white skin and hair and eyes. Everything about them all came down to the colour white. He still wasn’t even sure about how he escaped that situation.
“It was… an interesting one.”
“Is that so? That is go-”
“We have a bad situation, tyrant.”
The one to cut in was another of Sora’s named commanders, Tylon.
“Now is not the time.”
Nyxon took back the conversation by silencing him. Then he faced the tyrant once more.
“I hope you enj-”
“It’s been a week. We don’t have anymore time.”
Tylon clearly didn’t see the reason for Nyxon’s current attitude. From the looks of things, something major must have happened. Now the question was how big was it that Nyxon was scared to inform Sora immediately.
“He must rest first.”
“Rest, will only cause us to lose.”
“Not here.”
“Yes. Here. My tyrant, w-”
“Tylon, do you wish to fight?”
‘How dare mere servants bicker like this in front of their leader? Is this the level of respect they have for you?’
‘Noisy.’
“Silence! Both of you.”
Sora’s enraged voice entered the ears of everyone in the area. They all wanted to look away, but there was something about the massive Tyrant that forced them to keep their eyes on him.
“Now, explain to me what the situation is, Tylon.”
“But you must rest.”
Nyxon interjected and was met with Sora’s cold glare.
“Who are you to tell me when and when not I rest? Do I have to remind you that I am your tyrant and you, my commander?”
Slowly, a blue aura engulfed the absurdly large Griffin as he intimidated his subordinate. Nyxon looked down in shamed and backed down.
Tylon, evidently pleased that his lord chose him, held his head up high and spoke.
“A week ago, some griffins encountered a group of creatures claiming they come from the West.”
‘They enter your domain without permission? How rude!’
‘How irritating.’
“The west? Minerva’s domain?”
He nodded to Sora’s question. Sora walked past him and both Nyxon and Tylon followed after. His destination was the massive rock that had been placed at a position that made him overlook all who gathered this location. It was treated as his personal throne.
“Yes, I believe so.”
Sora remembered the topic of conversation with Karon, Krull’s son. The war ogre looked impossibly enraged, like they had killed his family and stolen everything for him. He wanted the East and North to unite to fight against the West.
Of course, Sora had no reason to pick a fight with them at the time, so he turned them down.
“What sort of creatures?”
“Four humanoids: Two vampires, one lycanthrope and one demonkin.”
The one to speak was Nyxon. He was trying to enter Sora’s good graces once more.
“That’s an unusual combination.”
“Indeed. But they were apparently mighty. One of the vampires killed 2 wallcrawler wyverns by herself.”
“Wallcrawler wyverns? Ooh, scary.”
Sora mused and all the others who heard him laughed. This was due to the sort of reputation wallcrawler wyverns held as the weakest wyverns.
“If that is all you have to say, I should have just slept.”
Sora lied down and looked at both of his commanders with a lazy gaze. They looked at each other nervously before continuing.
“They came here hoping to meet you apparently.”
“And since you were absent, they met up with the cyclops and wyvern kings instead.”
‘They couldn’t even show the tiniest amount of respect by waiting for you before going to others?’
‘Shut up.’
“And what is the issue here?”
Meeting the kings of North was no big deal. It didn’t really affect Sora in anyway since no matter what, the North was still under his rule.
“They have formed an alliance with the West to usurp you.”
‘The insolence!’
‘Shut. Up.’
“What?”
Visible shock showed itself on Sora’s face as his feathers stood up.
“Yes. The cyclops king, as you know, never liked us. And the wyverns… they lost two of their kings and the kaiser since they didn’t agree to their proposal.”
“I am sure they came here to either kill you or declare war on the North.”
‘Impudent ants dare attempt such a sacrilege? Is this the kind of respect you want everyone to show you?’
‘Shut up!’
“Is this mere speculation?”
“The wyverns and cyclopes have been seen interacting on friendlier terms in the past week since their appearance.”
“They even attempted to get the manticore king on their side.”
At the mention of the manticore king, the dark brown furred beast stepped forward with a confident gaze.
“I rejected them because I know who the true king of the North is.”
‘That’s a good one. You should name him.’
‘What are you?’
‘Hahahaha! We are Sora!’
Beyond that, Sora got no response from the mysterious voice that had been bothering him since a few days ago.
“Tyrant?”
Sora stood up and growled while looking towards the West.
“I rejected the East’s proposal to join forces and crush the West. Not as a kind gesture or anything, but simply as an act of mercy.”
He jumped down from his throne and moved forward.
“Have I not been a good, wise king to all of you? Have I not allowed you to dream of one day acquiring my seat though it is impossible? For years, your attempts at betraying me amused me, but since you never did something as dishonourable as teaming up behind my back, I have ignored you.”
The manticores and some griffins felt his gaze on them. The North was known as the most violent portion of Larm due to the fact that the creatures were always competing for rule over it.
They were all mighty creatures, easily B and A ranks by human standards, so they all carried a belief that they could one day sit on Sora’s throne as Tyrant. However, it had not once crossed their minds in that the 50 years Sora ruled as a Tyrant, no one, absolutely no one, has been able to do this.
For the first time in 50 years, Sora of the Ravaging Winds, was annoyed beyond belief.
“I allowed you to form your small groups to attack me. And now, you collude with your enemies to attack me? Is that how greedy you are?”
‘Greed is disgusting.’
‘Greed… is… disgusting…?’
“Now… now I am enraged. We shall crush the West, but first, the traitors in the North. Smoke them out. I will wipe their existences off of Larm. Then, the East and North will crush the West.”
Some might find this decree contradictory to his motives. Why team up with one enemy to beat another enemy if doing such a thing disgusted him so much?
Simply because the current Sora didn’t identify any group or person as an enemy. What were ants before a Tyrant such as himself?
____________________
The West, Hinotori’s Mansion
It had been exactly one week and five days since Hinotori’s evolution had begun, yet there had been no sign of her waking up anytime soon.
The creatures in the West were excited once they heard she was undergoing an evolution. That meant she was simply acquiring more power. With the disappearance of Goliath, they found a new protector who was much more intimate with them.
Reiman, as her general, was in charge of the domestic issues. However, he passed that off onto the other captains whom he trusted.
First of all, constructions for the orc houses were complete and the earlier parties had already arrived. Some were still on their way due to an unfortunate surprise attack from rabid tunnellers that ended up crossing paths with their tunnels.
Those who had arrived were pleased with the houses and even decided to help make it more welcoming for the late party.
Second, combat training and troop development had been left to the goblin captains Oki, Taiku and the new monstrosity, Julian the vampire. The latter was… extreme, to say the least, but his methods were coldly efficient. All the goblins in the training program had evolved into hob-goblins already and those that were hob-goblins had evolved into something else. The captains for instance, had become something else.
Oki, who was blessed by a demi-god of fire, had evolved into a Fire Oni Berserker. Red skin, large bulging muscles and an overall bigger physique. His hair was still black, but was also easily combustible depending on his emotions. Personality-wise, he was still the same – easily excitable and battle driven. As an addition, he received Bio-Armour – a loincloth – and weapon – Explosion Mallet.
Taiku evolved into Grey Kuri King. Grey skin, comparable to the average human in size, monstrous facial features, tiny black horns on the head and a frighteningly calming voice. Personality-wise, he was more malicious, a natural trait of his new race, but he still retained his loyalty to Hinotori and his friends. He even received a blessing from the god of madness.
Yuuna, the old wench, had for reasons unknown to everyone, evolved into a Dark Mountain Fairy. With this evolution, she had received seductive features, a voluptuous shape and easily one of the prettiest faces in Larm. She possessed fairy wings and a single horn on her head. Personality-wise, she was livelier than before.
Nukeme, the pervert, had evolved into a Spiked Troll Assassin. Out of everyone’s transformations, his was the most confusing. It was the first time anyone had seen a troll smaller than a human yet larger than a hob-goblin. He had spikes sticking out of his back that could be used as daggers for any occasion and his stealth was far better as compared to when he was a hob-goblin. Personality-wise, he hadn’t changed in the slightest… unfortunately.
From these unexpected transformations, it was evident that everyone was pretty excited for their future possibilities. Evolving into stronger races than ever, they could all become insanely strong and life would be better than before for them.
Thirdly, food gathering was dealt with by the Wolves – Fafnir alliance and Hinotori’s wolves – and dryads separately. Wolves were in charge of meat and dryads were in charge of fruits. The storehouse had been filled up and even more storehouses were being built. Some dryads weren’t so pleased with the idea of Hinotori cutting down trees to build houses, but even they understood what kind of situation they were in.
Fourthly, information collection and reach expansion was left to Nukeme, shadow rats and some of Nukeme’s handpicked goblinoids (goblins and hob-goblins in general). They’re feet were firmly rooted in the nearby human cities and villages, but progression into the North and East was still stalled for some reason.
After all of these, there were more personal issues regarding Hinotori’s life, but Reiman couldn’t help but try to fix them.
First of which was the dungeon. Reiman had found out what Hinotori was doing, but since she was unconscious, her true goal wouldn’t be so easy to complete. For this reason, he started luring humans into the dungeon.
The first party that came, he allowed them to return with a few scratches and some rocks he found on the ground. They were excited by this, so went back to spread the great news. Two days ago, about 10 parties came together.
Their goal was to find a way to determine the monster concentration in the area. Their levels, attributes and weaknesses. Scouting the terrain, seeing if they could use it to their advantage, basically trying to capture a portion of Larm for themselves.
Shiroi almost ripped the entire party to shreds, but Reiman rather had her cause a bit of a distraction with her weakest yet fastest wolves. They just needed to be seen, but escape before being killed. It worked and Reiman estimated that by the next week, they would have returned to start monopolising the dungeon under a banner.
He couldn’t really alter what the dungeon looked, but it was better to have more people coming there in his opinion.
Next issue was the problem pertaining to all the females vying for the position of Hinotori’s lover. In his opinion, it was a stupid argument, but it provided entertainment to the others and they couldn’t help but get distracted whenever a fight started out of the blue.
What was more absurd was the fact that Zana, a tyrant, refused to return home because she was scared someone would make a move behind her back. The tension was insane and every night in the mesh hall was a bloody battle.
Reiman had tried telling them that Hinotori didn’t care for such things, but then some would feel hurt. Then he tried saying Hinotori liked them equally and some got offended by that. Told them that she wouldn’t like the fact that they argue over her, but then they would get into an argument over who started it all.
It was an annoying situation and he regretted getting involved at all.
Exhausted, the rat man fell down onto his nest made of minerals he had been picking up. One could call it a guilty pleasure of his to collect such minerals. It was one of the things both he and Arisu shared in common.
Just then, a rat man popped up in his chambers.
“General! We have bad news!”
Reiman jumped right back up and faced the rat man with all seriousness a general was supposed to have.
“A wyvern just came in from the North carrying this note from the cyclops king.”
Reiman took the piece of paper from his subordinate. It was large, about half his size and handwriting was terrible. Even worse, it was written in the demon language.
He could feel a vein bulge when he looked at it as he didn’t understand demon language.
“What the hell is this?”
“The cyclops king’s letter.”
Reiman wasn’t sure whether to beat the rat man for his stupid response or if to sigh at his naivety.
“I mean, why hasn’t it been translated for me? We have a team for these kinds of things.”
Nukeme had suggested the use of coded language when such matters were concerned. Different intelligence units would be stationed at certain points and learn the languages and customs of those areas. Then when sending a message, it would be converted into the coded language so only those under Nukeme and Reiman could understand it.
“Oh yeah, they did.”
The rat man responded to Reiman’s question and both stood, staring at each other. After a silent minute or two, Reiman’s patience was nearing its limits.
“Well?”
“Oh-oh you wanted me to say it to you?”
“Yes… first time, huh?”
“Sorry. The message says “For the past four days, the griffins and manticores have been attacking us with the intention to wipe us out. The wyverns are weakened without their kaiser and two kings and a combined assault by Manticores and Griffins who have the aerial advantage is too much for the cyclopes. We request back up if you truly say you wish to be allies with us.””
‘A combined assault? In the North? Since when do members of different races team up there?’
“Is that all?”
Reiman felt like something was missing, but the rat man shook his head.
“This is the exact message, word for word.”
Reiman scratched his neck and went back to his pile of treasures while thinking.
‘An assault on the cyclopes by the manticores and griffins? Why them in particular? They have no connection to each other. This letter doesn’t contain any more information, but Griffins and manticores teaming up? They are too proud to do something like that… wait. Why am I even looking for the cause? Isn’t this a beneficial situation rather? We’ll just use this to our advantage.’
“You, send a message to Tsuna, Yuuna, Dervy and Yennifer. Ask if they can create portals that can lost long enough to send an army through.”
“Yes sir, but… can I ask why?”
The rat man curiously asked and shuddered once he saw Reiman’s terrifying smirk.
“We are finally going to conquer the North! Also, summon Nukeme and his assassin unit. I have a job for them.”
<A/N: Dervy and Yennifer are two dark elves that joined the group some chapters back.>
