Chapter 37
Dakan Plains.
The plain northwest of the Lionel Kingdom had once been a pastoral world where grazing livestock nibbled at the grass, breezes stirred, streams flowed, and insects hopped through the fields.
But that former scenery had long since become nothing more than a memory. Now, it had been reduced to a battlefield where death and destruction raged unchecked.
Tens of thousands of human and demon corpses lay piled across the green plain. The bleating of livestock had been replaced by the groans of those facing death, and the insects flying through the air were nothing but flies swarming over corpses.
The earth had been gouged out by the destruction wrought by explosive magic, and the blood that spilled had become rivers and formed pools.
Gami, a special staff officer in the Demon King's army, walked through the battlefield, a garden of hell, accompanied by only a few guards.
Though he leaned on a staff, his steps were light, and he seemed to bounce along as he walked.
"Good, good."
Seeing the corpses piled everywhere, Gami nodded in satisfaction.
"Let them die, let them kill. That is a soldier's true calling."
Gazing upon death and lamentation as though drinking them in, the misshapen dragon's eyes shone with vitality. He even seemed to have grown younger.
In the highest of spirits, as though he might break into song at any moment, Gami arrived at a particularly gruesome part of the battlefield.
It was a huge crater.
The destruction must have been tremendous. A massive, bowl-shaped crater had formed in the middle of the plain, altering the terrain itself.
The crater was filled with even more corpses. Bodies lay piled and scattered about like a garden of hell.
"Heh heh, this is awful. It's like minced meat made from corpses."
Gami's words made his escorting guards grimace, but they were an accurate description.
The demon corpses had their arms and necks severed, and some had been split cleanly in two from the head down, not merely cut apart at the torso.
The human corpses were even worse. Whatever force had been brought to bear on them, they had been torn apart, crushed, and twisted to pieces. It was as though a child who knew no restraint had played with them and left them scattered everywhere.
"Heh heh, the smell is awful too. It's enough to make your nose wrinkle."
As they descended into the crater, the stench of entrails mingled with the smell of blood, enough to make even soldiers accustomed to battle grimace.
At the bottom of the crater, a giant lay sprawled out.
It was Galios.
The man who enjoyed a reputation as the strongest in the Demon King's army now lay unconscious, his limbs splayed and his face turned skyward.
His powerful limbs had been burned black, the claws on his left hand had been blasted away, and a broken spear still pierced his right thigh.
Worst of all was his chest. The enormous breastplate, too large for an ordinary demon even to wear, had been split diagonally across, leaving a massive wound.
Seeing Galios lying there, Gami cast his gaze up and down, then suddenly raised his eyebrows and placed one short hand against his chest.
"Ah, Lord Galios, to think you should die in a place like this. All your many military achievements are now nothing but dust. You could not fulfill Demon King-sama's cherished ambition, and we demons have not a shred of hope left. All that remains is to follow after Your Excellency in death. Oh, why did you have to die? With Your Excellency gone, we no longer have a great tree to rely on. All we can do is lament Your Excellency's death, mourn your passing, and your death..."
Gami sang the word death over and over.
As Galios lay there listening, his eyes suddenly flew open. His upper body rose, and he shouted in a voice that seemed capable of splitting the sky.
"Shut up! Who the hell's gonna die?!"
The roar was loud enough to echo across the entire battlefield. The escorting guards nearly reeled from the sheer volume, but Gami, who had taken the shout full in the face, merely blinked in surprise and, without a hint of embarrassment, continued.
"Ah, Your Excellency. You were still alive, then?"
"Of course I am! Who the hell's gonna die?!"
"This Gami can scarcely contain his tears upon learning of Your Excellency's survival."
"Then shed at least one tear when you say things like that!"
Though Galios's voice crashed down like thunder, Gami ignored it as though it were no concern of his and looked around.
"So, since you were lying collapsed in a place like this... um, surely not... could it be... did you lose?"
"Who lost?! I'll mess you up!"
"Then where is the prince's corpse? Surely you didn't smash him to pieces?"
There was no corpse of the prince nearby, nor any trace of him.
"Oh, he's over there."
Galios pointed toward the sky with a finger blown off his left hand.
The severed finger had flown over the rim of the bowl-shaped crater and pointed toward the human main camp positioned on the hill.
"I blasted him over there with my final strike."
In the direction it pointed, tents in the camp had collapsed, and soldiers were gathering and making a commotion.
"You sent him flying that far? I knew you were strong, but good heavens."
"I took a pretty serious beating myself, though."
"And did you kill him?"
"Who knows? I felt the impact, but there was no way to confirm his death. Still, he should be dead."
"Well, naturally."
Even if he had somehow survived, there was no way he could have come through it in one piece.
"Was he a tough opponent?"
"Hm? Oh, yeah, I suppose. Look what he did to my weapon."
Galios showed him the club in his right hand.
It was a colossal club, little more than a lump of metal. No one but Galios could even wield it, and even a demon renowned for strength would need three people just to carry it.
The club had crossed countless battlefields, split rocks, and pierced the earth. Now, however, it had been cleanly severed through the middle, leaving only half its original length. The cut surface gleamed like a mirror, and its edge looked sharp enough to slice a finger at a touch.
Galios threw away his longtime companion and tore off his split breastplate with brute force.
Beneath the armor, a massive gash ran across his chest and reached down to his waist.
Pink flesh showed through the gash, with even the bone visible, yet Galios did not show the slightest sign of pain or discomfort.
It was a mortal wound for an ordinary demon, but Galios rose without paying it any heed. He pulled the spear from his leg and roughly wiped the wound with a scrap of cloth. The bleeding had already stopped.
"Ngh!"
He clenched his teeth and grunted. His muscles swelled, the flesh around the wounds bulged, and the huge gash across his chest closed up. The bleeding from his fingers stopped as well, and the wound in his pierced leg sealed shut.
The soldiers around them were astonished by his vitality.
"As expected of Your Excellency Galios. You truly are immortal. It reminds me of the time you fought Demon King-sama."
"Yeah. I nearly died for real that time."
"Only someone like Your Excellency could survive a fight with Demon King-sama."
"That's what I wanted to ask you, Gami. Did that prince really kill Big Brother?"
Galios voiced his doubt.
"The humans claim that the prince defeated Demon King-sama. Does that not sit well with you?"
"No, he was strong. Plain and simple, he was strong. Probably stronger than Gare. But somehow, I just can't believe someone at that level could kill Big Brother."
Galios tilted his massive head.
"I cannot say. I can answer questions about the movements of a battlefield, but individual valor and contests of strength are not my area of expertise."
Gami gestured to his own infirm body as if to make his point.
"Still, there are such things as compatibility, maneuvering, and subtle nuances in a fight, aren't there?"
"Yeah. Well, he's dead anyway, so I guess it doesn't matter."
Galios immediately dismissed the question he had raised himself and settled the matter.
"So, what am I supposed to do next? I got to fight the prince, so I'll listen to what you say for now. That was the deal, after all."
"Then I would like you to execute Barbaru of the Third Army, who styles himself the Demon King."
Gami finally stated his true objective.
"So the Third Army's soldiers will join us if we do that? Is it really going to work?"
"With Your Excellency's strength, the soldiers will follow you."
"I'm telling you now, I have no intention of taking weaklings as comrades."
Galios was selfish. Whether enemy or ally, he chose only those he liked.
"We are merely incorporating them into Rovaine's army, so there is no need for concern. In any case, we must first clash with them and absorb the weaker among them."
"So, starting with the Third Army. Got it. Where is Barbaru's army again?"
"To the east. In a country called the Hameil Kingdom."
Gami took out a map and pointed to the location of the Third Army. Just below it was a region labeled Kashu.
"Then let's mow down the humans along the way and march on."
"Yes. Let us unleash destruction and slaughter and march onward without end."
Gami and Galios, the two warped dragons, laughed.