“That so? What a sha. I really was looking forward to working with you. In that case, please hand over the kitten.”
Julian’s expression was still light-hearted. I looked at the kitten and it gave adorable eyes, as if begging not to let it go.
‘Mother, I don’t want to go with this idiot~ nya~’
It really was begging .
“I suppose I shall be taking those two vampires you have in your possession as well. The lady will surely be thrilled to have Rori back in her keep.”
‘Is this guy… threatening ?’
He took another sip of his tea, but his calmness suggested danger. I could sense at any mont, he was ready to just jump up and kill , yet here I was. I had to make so sort of decision before he did anything. If he took Ulva back, she’d just end up dead.
“C-Could you give a d-”
“You have 5 minutes. No more, no less. Make your choice.”
He gave an absurd ti limit.
“Oi, oi. 5 minutes is too small for a decision this big!”
“3 minutes.”
“Stop shaving off ti!”
“1 minute.”
“…!!!”
He really was not in the mood to listen to . My eyes went back to the kitten, then I focused on the other minds.
‘What do you guys think?’
‘Well, I don’t like the idea of becoming the demon lord since it’s basically announcing to the world “Free Tori for murder. Kill one, get four free!”.’
‘Y-Yes. But, b-being the d-demon lord m-ans, we o-only have one side to f-f-fear from. I-Isn’t it easier to protect from one en-enemy instead of two?’
‘Reasonable point, but why should we take on such a risk? At least, when we’re not being a demon lord, we don’t face open antagonism from the humans. We’d be a side quest and nobody ever takes side quests seriously.’
‘True, but there’s so retards who wouldn’t mind going all out on us.’
‘I-In that scenario, h-having demons as our al-allies greatly bolsters our d-defences, doesn’t it?’
‘Oh, co on you guys! Demon lord? Really? What makes you think what happened to the last demon lord won’t happen to us?’
‘True. This hero killed the demon lord even though he let peace reign instead of violence. Goes to show that those at the top of the human society don’t want a peaceful demon lord.’
‘Seriously? I was thinking that we could simply keep doing what the old demon lord was doing so we could live in peace while still preparing for the worst.’
‘N-No, that c-can’t work. I-If the h-humans wanted peace, t-they would have l-left the demon lord alone.’
‘Unless…’
‘They have a way to wipe out the demons?’
‘Or at least a great majority of them.’
Well, that would make a certain level of sense. Why start a war when there was absolutely no need to? Either the humans for so reason needed a war – which sounds very stupid, or they were planning to completely kill off any and all demons.
‘So why not do that when they entered the demon lord’s territory to kill him?’
‘M-Maybe i-it’s a magic sp-spell with a l-limited range?’
‘Limited range? A spell big enough to wipe out about 100 million people. How big do you think it would be?’
‘Hmmm, i-if anything, i-it should be about as big as one of the s-sides of Larm. M-Maybe they want to bring the d-demons into Larm and’
‘Kill them with this attack?’
‘Hence, killing us all.’
‘Jesus, talk about heartless. In that case, I guess the best choice now is to…’
“I humbly choose to beco the demon lord.”
The council had spoken and our decision was final.
“Is that so? Excellent then. I shall be monitoring both you and the child’s growth starting today!”
He stood up and made a grand gesture.
“The birth of the true Monster Queen begins now! My lady, please bear witness to this!”
A shout to a particular lady he had been ntioning since last night. I had an idea as to who he was referring to.
“Well, since we’re done here, I’ll be heading out now.”
I had other things to attend to. For instance, the incomplete eting I held last night. On my way out, Julian stepped in front of .
“Where do you think you’re going to?”
“I don’t know for you, but I have responsibilities… and friends.”
“What was that?”
“I’m busy. Can we take up this demon lord talk at a later date?”
The administration of over a thousand monsters was by no ans an easy feat, yet I jumped into the fray. I couldn’t suddenly just quit to beco the demon lord.
“No, no. You are clearly misunderstanding sothing.”
“What am I misunderstanding? I’ll beco the next demon lord, take the throne for a few years, then give it up to the kitten when it’s of age. As easy as ABC.”
I grumbled, however he face-pald and looked at as if I was so kind of idiot.
“You really think becoming a demon lord is that easy?”
Julian now wore an exhausted look.
“There’s a lot of factors at play. First of all, you are simply a demon lord candidate in this ga my lady has created. You will have to undertake a series of scenarios and only after completing them and beating the other candidates will you beco a demon lord.”
‘Wait, there’s others!?’
“Secondly, what’s this nonsense about years? That child needs no more than six months to beco the strongest demon lord in history. I shall take care of the child’s training till I see them as fit.”
He clarified any misunderstanding I could have had about my current situation. It didn’t make feel any better though. In fact, I was starting to realise that I willingly signed up to fight against other people strong enough to beco a demon lord.
‘We…’
‘Are…’
‘S-So…’
‘Dead.’
I took a mont to think about it, then shrugged.
“Well, whatever. I’ll think up sothing later today. I have to talk to the others.”
With that, I stord out of the room, the kitten flying by my side and Athyst trying her hardest to beco my ride no matter how much I refused her.
***
Julian looked at Hinotori’s figure slowly disappear down the hallway. He had his hands folded behind his back as he stood at the door. Once Hinotori completely vanished from his view, he let out a sigh.
He raised his head to sky, hoping to receive a sign from his goddess. There was no sign, which ant he was most likely on the right path. Though, he didn’t expect to receive that ssage from her.
His goddess rarely ever changed her mind about a situation as that would imply that she was making a mistake. Yet, for the first ti in seemingly forever, she altered her own deal. Clearly there was sothing special about the Queen of monsters.
Julian’s mind could only go back to a few centuries, back to that one particular being. It was uncanny how Hinotori looked exactly like that person.
‘What was her na again? Aur? Aura? Auram? Well, whatever. That child died. This one is probably a descendant.’
He cleared his throat, then that was when he saw both sticks looking at him with nacing glares. They clearly weren’t fans of his presence and he himself was not too pleased with how they were looking at him.
“Weaklings should not be giving their superiors such disgusting glares. Bow.”
He commanded and both of them fell to the ground. He glared at them with his one eye then pointed his finger towards them. Blood shot out, penetrating the trees and making them scream out in pain.
“Guards of a queen should not be this weak. I shall rectify this.”
With that statent, he looked outside the window. The monsters Hinotori was taking care of were training, however in Julian’s eyes, they weren’t putting in their best effort. He couldn’t stand idly while watching their disgraceful actions.
A scowl ford on his face as his eyes turned bloodshot. With quick steps, he hurried out the room, leaving the shrivelled up treants on the ground, screaming in pain.
***
Oki and Taiku were overlooking the goblin’s performance. They had grown substantially and if they were going just by the system, the average goblin’s level was now 18. They were all very close to evolving and all it took was hunting their own food.
Oki had to admit that forging this relationship with Hinotori was possibly the best thing the goblins could have ever done. The night of the speech when Hinotori spouted her raw feelings, Oki felt stupid.
He was going to take his anger out on soone who was hurting just as much as he was. That night, he couldn’t even look Hinotori in the eye, but he promised to make it up to her. He would grow strong as one of her chosen Captains.
The goblins all collapsed after having their strict three-hour practice. A satisfied smile spread across Oki’s face, then he turned to Taiku. They now had to go check on the hob-goblins whose main job was to hunt bigger prey than horned or fanged rabbits. Fla deer was a bit much for newly hatched hob-goblins, so they settled for Night Vipers, White Epoxes, Toxic Vamprees and the much bigger Black Waynes.
The older hob-goblins would go on raids with Oki, Taiku and Nuke to hunt for Fla deers and Silver Boars for a while before they were allowed to go hunting by themselves. In organised parties of course. One of the key traits the goblins had learned to increase the chances of success and survival, was grouping up mbers.
This was one particular skill they would never forget and had beco their basis for practically everything they did.
Still, it was odd that they were taking so long. 3 hours was more than enough ti to get one flaming deer for the older hob-goblins.
“In that case, let us go with the new guys. We might find the forr party with them.”
They weren’t worried, since as the captains, they received an alert whenever soone died. Of course, they hadn’t experienced this themselves, but it was sothing Hinotori’s blessing upon them had inford them.
They could rest assure knowing that the other party mbers were probably still looking for food.
“Yes. We’ll just catch one first, then punish them for not trying hard enough. Haha.”
Taiku made a joke and turned around to grab the hob-goblins, when a heavy pressure bore down on them, making them freeze like statues.
An intense killing intent that Oki had never experienced ever in his life before. Even the troll from the fight against the East couldn’t ever make him tremble, yet this made him pause completely. It was like his body just shut off.
Walking towards them was a monster, releasing a killing intent so grand, the world around him practically turned red. The monster’s blood red eyes glared at them with malicious intent.
The goblins all passed out where they were, so of them even foaming at the mouth. Oki’s mind imdiately went back to last night.
The monstrosity that completely overwheld all of the participants in the eting had showed his face once more. He believed Hinotori defeated it so it had cald down, but it was clearly out for more blood today.
He wanted to grab his mallet, but his body ignored any commands he sent towards. He couldn’t even blink.
However, Taiku on the other hand, freed himself from the current predicant.
“A captain of Hinotori should not be paralysed by an intruder, wouldn’t you say, Oki?”
At Taiku’s words, Oki’s body was freed. He wrapped his fingers around his mallet at lightning-fast speed, then faced the incoming foe, both of their sides touching and a confident grin on their faces.
“Indeed! I was rely trying to analyse the situation.”
In truth, Taiku used his skills [Commander’s Heart] and [Hypnosis] to put a charm on himself that protected him from most status effects. It took a while to activate due to the sheer intensity of the blood lust directed at him, but he got there. Then he directly casted it on Oki, breaking the trance.
In the current mont, the only thing saving the unconscious goblins from death was Taiku’s [Commander’s Heart] and it was bearing a heavy weight on him.
Now, both of them faced the monstrosity coming their way. Clearly, they were very nervous but they refused to show a cowardly side before their subordinates.
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