One week into the war for Larm, the state of things had remained somewhat neutral and unchanging for both sides. The West had managed to keep the powerful North at bay, not letting the opponents cross even an inch into their border. The [Fenrir Alliance] and [Goblin Army], normally inconceivable, had performed a spectacular feat of halting the enemy's encroachment. Truly, Julian's training regimen was displaying excellent results.
However, one week into the war, it would appear the Alliance of the North and East were ready to take the West seriously. Surprisingly, soldiers of the East had managed to show up. The original plan the West's general had in mind was for the South to stall the East while the West defeated the North. With the South's tyrant, Zana, using her powerful magic, halting an army shouldn't have been a huge problem. With this, the West could finish off the North and then aid the South to annihilate the East. Fate clearly wasn't in the favour of the West's general.
No matter, this was simply a nuisance. He had summoned the [Bug Army] and the [Shadow Ops] to stealthily slow down the encroachment from the East. The [Bug Army] had a collection of 10 generals, serving under one queen. The queen's whereabouts remained unknown to this date, but the generals had agreed to ally the West per their queen's command. Giant Spiders, Giant Centipedes, Toxic Bee Swarms, Giant Iron Beetles and Erosive Termites were what comprised the [Bug Army] present in the West. The other factions were in other portions of the forest and had yet to be given any particular orders. The [Shadow Ops] were an elite group of shadow rats, stealthy goblinoids and a few of Hinotori's Shadow demons that had been aiding in information collection and the sorts. Usually, they weren't meant for such confrontations, but even they were trained enough to keep themselves alive.
With their help, the West's general was focusing entirely on the North and what kinds of moves its leader would make. With his unique skill [Devil's Tactician] given to him some days after his queen started evolving, his view of the entire battlefield completely changed. This particular skill converted the entire battlefield into a game of chess for him that allowed him to strategically move about points, while also allowing him to get somewhat of an idea of what his opponents are doing. Of course, this skill had an extremely worrying flaw that could make it useless in most situations and that was, the user wouldn't be able to see some of the opponent's chess pieces.
To solve this issue, the user needed information on the user. Any information he could acquire would be converted and if relevant to the on-going battle, would reveal a hidden chess piece on the opponent's side. Right now, as things were, the King, one knight and two rooks were missing from his opponent's side. That was the reason he hadn't ordered for the West to invade, but to keep everything at bay.
Even more infuriating was the fact that the queen had been making several moves on the board, yet he couldn't quite get how the queen was playing. It was almost as if the opponent had multiple queens on the board and it was extremely tricky to manipulate. According to the information he received, half of the North was keeping the South at bay, which meant only half of the North was what the West was wasting resources on. Now that the East had arrived, he had the [Bug Army] and [Shadow Ops] there, but they were at best a temporary solution. Eventually, he would need to have them retire. The only problem was that the cyclopes, orcs and kobolds would most likely lose if they were to go up against the East. Sure, the cyclopes were strong, but their terrible stamina would make them fail in the face of the brute unwavering stamina of both the Trolls and Ogres. The orcs and kobolds were also weaker than their opponents and would at best serve as shield for the cyclopes.
But then, it was surprising the North hadn't attempted an aerial attack yet. And according to reports from the goblin captains and what he saw, the two unimaginably huge giants from before weren't present. Even if not those two in particular, he doubted the North didn't have any more of those giants there.
Something wasn't adding up and he couldn't put his hand on what exactly it was the North was up to.
"In the first place, how do they have so many forces? Lady Hinotori took away their cyclopes and the captains defeated quite a number of opponents. How can there be enough that he's holding back quite a few of them?"
Reiman muttered to himself while looking at the sheets on his table.
"General! I've come with the daily report of Keimen.", a shadow rat materialised behind Reiman on his knee and bowing down.
"How are the preparations going?", Reiman decided to ask about the only thing of value on that city.
"We're ready to launch at any point."
"Good. We'll wait for a good opportunity to do that then. What about the humans that go to the dungeon?"
"There's been a good stream of them. A few of them died, but not so much as to scare a lot of adventurers off. In fact, there's been more news about the dungeon. Most humans are oblivious to the events in Larm."
Of course they were. Unlike in human society where such major events were spread, the monsters in Larm were considered an unreasonable bunch of thoughtless creatures. The concept of war supposedly didn't exist amongst the monsters of Larm. Except for the East that had humanoid monsters.
"What about any news on invading humans?", the second most important thing about Keimen was the fact that it was an info hub for low-lives and criminals. Ever since the kingdom lost its prestige, the crime world had managed to sink its claws fairly deep into it.
"The new city lord is taking drastic actions to rid the city of crime. I'm afraid I only got information from less than reliable sources this time."
"Tch. Tell me regardless. Maybe we can make something of it."
"According to him, there are human soldiers already in the North."
"What?"
"Yeah. He said there was recently a huge secret deal an emissary of a certain kingdom made with 'The Circle'. Rumours have it that it was a crate of [Portal Rings]."
"Hm? How does he know that they are in the North then?"
"He simply surmised that if all nations were itching to get their hands on Larm, it was a race to see who acquired it first. However, there'd been an international treaty sent out to everyone by the Holy Mexar Empire, forcing them to agree to not steal resources. They most likely teleported to the Demise Mountains in order to get close enough that no one would figure out that they had made any moves or something like that."
Reiman held his chin, thinking over what he just heard. At first glance, it made some sort of sense. If others saw them marching, it was over for them. But if they somehow ended up in Larm and back without moving through the lands, no one would know that they even took resources in the first place.
But when Reiman thought about it, the more stupid and less convincing this was. The pieces fit in almost too conveniently and there was no way that the Holy Mexar Empire that was powerful enough to force all countries to not do such things wouldn't have any means to identify any countries disobeying. In the very first place, the Holy Mexar Empire was strong enough to issue a command to all other nations. There was no way a fit king would come up with something so stupid.
"Keep tabs on that particular person who gave you this information and tell the others to keep a close eye on the new city lord. If he catches even a sniff of what we're doing, eliminate him."
"Yes sir.", with that, the shadow rat disappeared.
'Grimm, can you hear me?', sending a telepathic message via the system, Reiman asked.
'Yeah!' The reply came almost immediately with a high pitch.
'Uh… I've got a job for you.', worried by the odd sound Grimm produced, Reiman was hesitant about his plan now.
'Oh, s-sure. W-w-what is it?', his nervousness was far too obvious. Grimm clearly didn't want to partake in the fight.
'I need you to investigate something for me.'
'Huh? Investigation? In a war?'
'Yeah. You'll have to head out of Larm though.'
'Seriously!? When do I go~?', an excited response! Reiman felt somewhat offended, but now wasn't the time.
'Yeah. I need you to check up on a certain crime syndicate and what they've been up to off late.'
________________________
TAIKU POV
"Don't give up, soldiers! Your strength is far beyond what the enemies can ever be prepared for!", Taiku roared loudly, using his skills [Commander's Heart] and [Hypnosis] to power up his subordinates.
Over the course of the past week of fighting, Taiku had resigned himself from direct confrontation. It was difficult to do, but he was able to do that to focus on what he actually could do.
As far back as Taiku could remember, he wasn't particularly special at anything. Back when he was a goblin, he was as common as goblins came. Hungry, lustful and always scared. If he had to point out something that mad him different from the others, it was the fact that he had no interest in superstition as most of them did.
'I won't believe in something I can't see, hear or touch' was the sort of thing he used to say. This made him unpopular with the older generation of goblins, but strangely enough, the younger ones flocked towards him. Till date, he didn't know why, but they all inadvertently made him their leader without his permission. Of course, this wasn't official, but everyone would ask him before doing anything and it got to a point, everyone in his tribe believed him like mindless sheep.
His perspective of the world didn't change one bit. Gods didn't exist, everyone else simply worked hard in particular areas to get to their level. To prove his claims, Taiku worked hard. He always admired Gorm of the Ooo who had occasionally visited his tribe. Because of his admiration, he tried learning the sword. If he could become just as good if not better with the sword as Gorm was, wouldn't that be evidence that gods didn't exist? For this one reason, he worked hard on his swordsmanship to the point he got an evolution.
When he evolved, he didn't get a blessing from any higher being. That only further solidified his belief in the false existence that is 'God'. Still, that was the least important part about his evolution. He always heard stories of how the 'gods' gave goblins who evolved special abilities. After evolution, Taiku didn't feel anything different about himself. He wasn't nearly as good as Gorm with a sword and he wasn't stronger than Oki. Nukeme had better assassination ability and both Tsuna and Yuuna could use magic. Out of everyone, he was the least impressive. Somehow, this was starting to break his belief.
It wasn't until he met Hinotori that his belief was completely shattered. If there was such a thing as God-given talent, she was the embodiment of it. Her growth was absurdly fast and the sorts of skills she possessed were so out of the world, Taiku couldn't believe that only one being could have that many. She even managed to share skills with others. A child, yet so wise and far more mature than Taiku could ever be. She transformed the impossible to possible. The perfect proof of the existence of 'God'.
The existence that was Hinotori was an absolute contradiction to all of Taiku's beliefs, yet he could never get angry that she existed. If anything, he was grateful that such a being had chosen to gift him. Of course, Taiku still believed that hard work was crucial, but he now had a new belief.
In the face of someone with God-given talent, hard work would always fall short. It was best to give up and pray for God-given talent. This new perspective was unbelievably difficult for Taiku to accept, but he eventually did the moment his 'God' blessed him with a talent.
"The opponent is so weak they stumble and kneel before you in the face of your might! Now charge!", after issuing this, all the opponents in his view went on their knees, completely unable to move. The goblinoids closed in the gap and cut open the bowels of their kneeling opponents or creating insertions that would eventually kill them.
"Hahaha! I wish I got such a unique skill like yours.", Oki landed next to Taiku and patted him on the shoulder.
"I'm sure you do. [Devil's Advocate] is possibly the best skill I could have ever gotten."
Just like he said, [Devil's Advocate] was a skill that matched perfectly with Taiku. As a person that liked to oppose general beliefs, this skill allowed him to argue against this particular belief. For example, the belief that the creatures of the North could easily trample on the creatures of the West was easily reversed by this skill. With this skill, Taiku had singlehandedly managed the border at Reiman's request.
"However, the skill doesn't work on some of them, which doesn't make any sense.", Taiku pointed out an inconsistency in his new unique skill.
"Isn't that just because some of them can't hear you?"
"No. I'm still not sure how my skill works, but I've confirmed that my target doesn't need to hear my voice in order for this work. There's something different about those that can move."
Oki just shrugged at Taiku's foreboding tone.
"Have you noticed any oddities amongst them?"
"I'm not sure. I just smash em up."
Taiku scratched the bridge of his nose and waved Oki off. The oni jumped off, leaving a blazing trail behind him as he went to traumatise his opponents.
'What about you guys? Is there anything weird?', Taiku sent a telepathic message to the other captains that were present.
'Nope.'
'None here.'
'I don't get experience points for some of them, but I think that's because Lady Hinotori's blessing has been on-and-off ever since she started evolving.', Nukeme, who was a surprising voice, pointed out. Taiku's eyes widened as he thought back to the previous weeks and what happened when he fought the North.
'Don't think too much about it. I'm sure there's nothing particularly special about them.'
As much as Nukeme tried to take Taiku's head off it, he simply couldn't try to find something odd about it.
<A/N: Honestly, it took me a while to start writing this chapter. Not because I had a block or anything, but I was binging some shows and completely forgot I write! I think the binge was a blessing though, because the moment i sat down to write, the feelings i used to get when I first started writing came back to me. So many interesting ideas for this arc and the future ones. I hope I don't lose interest or that something else comes up and makes writing feel like a chore in the future again! With that said, I missed christmas, so I guess happy boxing day!>
