Chapter 97: 97. News of The Six Demon Generals
They camped at the formation boundary that night.
Far enough that the mana fluctuation pull from it was manageable, close enough that Owen’s Mana Sense could monitor it’s manifestation rate. Elder Moss built a fire pit and The group arranged itself around it.
Owen sat against a rock and ran his ultra regeneration skill and said very little.
Six Demon Generals remain active and their Locations unknown.
Azmireth’s last words echoed: Vorthraxx has been building his own kingdom for a thousand years and he is nearly done.
A thousand years of sealed isolation but with contact to the outside world, while Owen had been a dragon for less than a year.
He didn’t share these thoughts with the group.
---
Marak arrived at dawn.
Twelve warriors, no weapons raised. He stopped at the camp’s edge and looked at the clearing where Azmireth had been. The blackened ground.
"She’s dead?" Marak said.
"Yes."
Sothing loosened in the clan-chief’s expression—a tension held long enough to beco invisible until it was gone. He had been working for a demon for months whether he had understood it or not.
"The settlent..." Owen said. "...have the shamans been recalled?"
"Last night. The contamination clears faster than the you suggested. Within a week it would be negligible."
Alfred handed him tea. Marak took it.
"Your warriors?"
"Responding well. Vorak is angry, mostly at himself. He knew sothing was wrong months ago."
"It’s not his fault" Owen said. "The miasma makes using judgnt feel unnecessary."
Marak looked at his cup. "The Pride-Mother. I need to speak with her. Formally. The three clans need a council and I need to be the one calling it."
"Ask Leah..." Owen said.
Leah, listening from three ters away, looked up from the fire. "She’ll hear you. But She won’t make it comfortable."
"I’m not looking for comfort, young fang" Marak said.
"Then you’ll be fine." Leah said.
Marak nodded. He looked at the formation. "When it opens—"
"We’ll go in..." Owen said. "...When I’m recovered and the continental situation is resolved."
"And after?"
"After, we leave." Owen said. "The Auric Savanna has everything it needs. The contamination clears. The shamans restore what was lost. You call the council. The three clans run the continent the way they have for centuries, without a demon’s interference."
Marak was quiet.
"There are other demons that Azmireth ntion. Six demon generals" Owen said. "Their Locations are unknown. But they’re embedded—each in a position serving Vorthraxx’s access to sothing he needs."
"The sealing of the demon continent is truly failing" Elder Moss said from the fire. His clear eyes were on the formation. "I can’t imagine what other things they might be doing within other continents, the human continent, our beastfolk continent, the Elves and Dwarves continent"
"We have broken their operation twice. Defeated One" Yuki said. "But if there’s another general still on the human continent—"
"Helena," Odessa said imdiately. She was already reaching for her communication device. "Agent Ridge. If there’s a demon general in the human continent and she’s building cases against Eckstein’s network—"
"She could walk directly into one," Alfred said.
"Make the call," Owen said.
Odessa moved away from the fire, voice dropping into the quick register she used for urgent information.
---
The call took twenty minutes.
Odessa ca back with the expression of soone who had delivered news that landed badly.
"She’s pulling teams off active arrest operations until she can assess each target," Odessa said. "Seventy-two hours of work suspended. She’s not happy."
"Better than walking into a demon Unprepared" Yuki said.
"That’s what I told her. She agreed. But She’s still not happy." Odessa sat. "She’s flagging it to Association upper tier. Which goes one of two ways—either they mobilize properly or soone in the upper tier is compromised and it goes nowhere."
"Eckstein’s client list included senior Association officials," Leah said.
"She knows," Odessa said. "She’s sending the flag to three people simultaneously from three relay points so no single interception kills it. She said she’s been doing this long enough to know how information gets buried."
Alfred made a sound close to approval.
Owen looked at the fire and ran the numbers quietly. Six generals. One down. The human continent had at least one. Four locations unaccounted for.
There were other continents. Territories he hadn’t considered yet because the imdiate troubles had kept him focused.
"He’s not planning gradual escalation," Owen said.
The group looked at him.
"Vorthraxx," Owen said. "The generals embedded across multiple territories. He’s not building toward a slow war. He’s building toward a single coordinated mont. Sothing simultaneous across multiple locations that he can trigger when the seal breaks fully."
"And we don’t even know When the seal breaking fully" Yuki added.
Owen thought about what Vorthraxx had said. It’s been a millennium. Father’s seal weakens.
"Yeah..." Owen said honestly. "Dominus didn’t give
the tiline. The seal’s degradation wasn’t predictable when he cast it."
"But it’s degrading," Alfred said. "Azmireth crossed the sealed boundary the will made. Demons reached the human continent. The seal is perable enough for passage. Two seals breaking at once, Vorthraxx’s seal and the demon continent’s seal"
Elder Moss spoke from his side of the fire. He had been quiet for a long ti, the specific quiet of soone thinking rather than waiting. "The Rembering," he said. "The fragnt inside it. If it is what you believe—a piece of the Dragon King’s power—what does acquiring it do for you?"
"Drak’thar restarts...." Owen said. "...The kingdom of Dragons becos more than an empty dinsion." He paused. "And my own growth accelerates. Each fragnt of Dominus’s power that integrates pushes my developnt forward in ways I can’t predict until it happens."
"aning you will beco harder to kill," Leah said.
"aning I beco closer to what I need to be when Vorthraxx’s seal breaks," Owen said.
The fire crackled. The formation behind them pulsed with its slow, enormous rhythm.
"Then recover quickly," Elder Moss said. "And go in ready."
---
Sael arrived on the second day with Forty warriors. And both senior delegates.
The Dusk Claw delegation arrived four hours later. Their clan-chief, Kerra, ca with fewer warriors and had clearly traveled through the night. She looked at the crystallized grass, the blackened clearing, Owen recovering at the camp’s edge. Her expression showed that she had been briefed of what had happened.
Marak t them both at the settlent’s outer boundary.
Owen did not attend the opening formalities. But Leah did, positioned at Sael’s left shoulder.
The council convened in the settlent’s central hall. The sa hall where Owen had fought Azmireth two days ago. Shamans had cleaned it. The cracked stone was repaired. It slled like incense and old stone instead of void erosion.
Owen sat outside with Alfred and Odessa.
"You should go in..." Odessa said.
"My presence might change what gets said," Owen said.
"Leah’s in there."
"Leah belongs in there."
Alfred poured tea while They waited.
Four hours later.
Leah ca out first and walked directly to Owen.
"Done!" she said.
"How bad?"
"Marak presented everything. The demon contact, the contamination, the compromised warriors, the border closures. No omissions." She sat. "My mother let him finish before she responded."
"That’s unusual?"
"For this scale, yes." Leah’s tail moved. "She either processed the anger already or she was very controlled. Probably both. She docunted every agreent violation, accepted his acknowledgnt of each, then moved imdiately to rediation rather than punishnt."
"Smart move" Owen said.
"She wanted resolution, not a censure process that gave aggrieved warriors a reason to resist." Leah looked at the hall entrance. "Kerra was harder. The Dusk Claw lost two traders to the closures. One dead. One still unaccounted for. She needed sothing concrete."
"What did Marak offer?"
"Full Dusk Claw access to Ironmane dical and shamanic resources for a year. Joint border patrols until trust rebuilds. His personal guarantee to find the missing trader."
"And Kerra accepted?"
"After negotiating two additional concessions." Leah almost smiled. "She knew a prolonged inter-clan crisis benefited no one. She extracted maximum value while Marak was motivated to give it."
"Good leadership..." Alfred said.
"The best kind," Leah agreed. "The three clans share the contamination rediation. Marak calls a second session in thirty days to review progress."
Owen nodded. Clean. Fast. Self-sustaining.
"And the demon general threat?" he asked. "The other six?"
"Elder Thorn’s network sends word to every shaman on the continent tonight. The suppression patterns. The absence signature demons use." Leah paused. "My mother is also sending diplomatic runners to the elven and dwarven continent. If six generals are embedded across the world’s continents, the other peoples need the sa information."
Owen looked at her. "That was your suggestion."
"I raised it. My mother agreed imdiately." She shrugged. "The beastfolk continent is not the whole world."
Sael erged from the hall.
She crossed the open ground with the sa directness she applied to everything and looked at Owen with those amber eyes. The look contained exactly what it needed to contain.
"The continent will manage," she said.
"I know," Owen said.
"The formation." She looked east.
"Soon," Owen said.
Sael absorbed this without visible reaction. "Then you will probably be leaving soon."
"Yeah"
She looked at Leah.
Leah t her mother’s gaze and held it.
Owen watched the conversation happen in the space between them—the dense communication of two people who knew each other completely enough that words were optional. He saw Sael’s expression move through several positions: the refusal, the knowledge that refusal was wrong, the arrival at acceptance. Not because it was easy. Because it was accurate.
"Co back safe, okay?" Sael said to Leah.
"I will... Mother" Leah said.
Sael nodded. Then she looked at Owen.
"Bring her back safe, or else!" she said as she grabbed Owen’s groin with her sharp paws
"Ow ow—i will, I swear!" Owen said.
Sael held his gaze for one more second. Then released her grip and walked back to her delegation.
Leah watched her go.
Marak erged from the hall with Kerra beside him. They were already talking about the patrol routes, about supplies, about the practical work of rebuilding what the contamination had damaged. Two clan-chiefs moving forward because moving forward was the only direction that made sense.
Alfred brought fresh tea. The camp settled into the specific quiet of people waiting for sothing that was both dreaded and necessary.
Owen checked his mana. Eighty-seven percent. The void erosion really took its toll on him.
Two days until the formation opened.
Two days until he entered whatever was inside with everything riding on what he found and whether he could survive what ca after.
And beside him, Leah sat with her hand near his, not quite touching, ready to move when the mont ca.
The continent behind them would rebuild. The shamans would work. The clans would hold.
And ahead of them, the formation waited.
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