BXBX NOVEL Chapter 216: The Northern Front 5
Chapter 216: The Northern Front 5
After finishing the repairs on the most pressing parts of the fortress…
Woohyuk took only his existing party members and went to attack the empty nest.
The 50,000 troops being left at the fortress consisted of the imperial army soldiers that Tiberius gave to him and a few clan soldiers that he absorbed so far.
The command system for each group was well established, so there was no problem leaving them to Hugo to defend the fortress.
As they made their way through whipping winds and blizzard, Helena complained about the cold,
“It’s so cold! I think I’m going to freeze to death. If I could eat something sweet, I’d feel so much better…”
“Do you want to ride the golden mountain goat again, Helena? If you get on, I’ll give you a bag of chocolate balls,” Woohyuk responded.
“… I’ll think about it.”
There was no slope here, so it was unlikely that she would be stuck on a cliff or other high area riding a golden mountain goat.
As Helena was leaning towards accepting Woohyuk’s condition, Ibn Rusud spoke with eager, child-like anticipation,
“I wonder what precarious situation you’ll find yourself in this time, With of Annihilation. This is why you should act with humility normally…”
“Shut it. What the hell did I ever do wrong? You keep calling me the wicked Witch of Annihilation, but you’re the one who really enjoys sadistic things!” Helena said as she turned her head away from him with a frown.
It looks like her pride took a hit.
Woohyuk handed a bag of chocolate balls to resolve the situation.
“Alright. Eat this and feel better.”
“… I wasn’t offended by being denied something sweet. This is a matter of manners.”
Helena tried not to lose the moral upper hand, but she swiftly put a chocolate ball in her mouth with one hand.
Roan muttered in his mind when he saw this,
‘This little girl with a sweet tooth… If Master wasn’t here, I would have said something and taken you down the right path.’
Even though his seals were completely released, he couldn’t think of rebelling against Woohyuk.
Soon, almost arriving at the first major point, Woohyuk took out Lemegeton and summoned Amon.
“Use God’s Death over there.”
“… Okay.”
As one of the seven Demon Kings under his authority, even if only Amon was mobilized, one of the main strongholds of the Kazak tribe could easily be seized.
He wasn’t a 7th ranked Demon King for show.
Hwee-Ahahahahah!
A massive black hole formed a spiral above the fortress, and when everything was sucked in, the Kazak people inside the fortress opened the entrance and ran outside.
Woohyuk ordered Sieg and Bailey to quickly deal with them.
Slice!
Slice!
The blades wielded by the two minced the vicious-looking Kazaks into a pile of flesh.
They were skilled individuals who could use aura.
In addition, in the case of Bailey, due to him possessing the characteristic of Dark Knight Dora, he was able to raise his victims, either killed or subdued, and control them.
When he raised those he killed as undead, the Kazak retreated back in confusion.
However, it was impossible for them to return to the fortress again.
The inside of the fortress was already ruined by the spiral black hole.
In the end, the enemy chose to die with honor.
“Kyah-Ahh!”
They tried to create an opening and attack Woohyuk, who seemed like the leader.
Ahhhhhhhhh!
Verserios spewed black flames and cut off the Kazaks rushing towards its owner.
After this massacre, only three Kazak soldiers remained…
“Where are the Demon Kings?”
Woohyuk ordered his guards to arrest the three soldiers and then went into an interrogation.
“Keuk…!”
The Kazak soldier in the middle showed hostility towards Woohyuk.
Woohyuk, who saw his appearance, stabbed the hostile soldier’s toes with Verserios; spear tip.
Puk!
“Keuk…!”
A painful scream rang out in the blizzard.
Woohyuk waited for a while and then asked the middle Kazak soldier once more,
“Where are the Demon Kings?”
“… Ugh.”
The soldier still didn’t answer.
As Woohyuk nodded, Sieg took out a hot iron from a burning furnace.
Chee-Ee!
The hot iron touched the Kazak soldier’s thigh, leaving a scar of burnt flesh and blood.
However, the soldier resisted until the end, so Woohyuk swung Verserios and struck him in the neck, beheading him with one stroke.
Slice!
Dull-purplish-red blood was scattered over the white snow on the ground.
The Kazak soldier on the right, seeing the end of his colleague, lowered his head in defeat.
Woohyuk asked him the same question,
“Do you know?”
“… Kwah.”
It was a positive answer.
It seemed that the Kazak soldier decided that betraying the Demon Kings was nothing compared to betraying the whereabouts of the Queen of Thorns.
As the two Kazak soldiers gave out all the information they knew, Woohyuk nodded and called for Bailey.
“Kill both of them and raise them under your command.”
“Alright.”
Bailey stabbed the Kazak soldiers’ hearts with his black sword.
Sieg quietly observed what was happening and suddenly asked Woohyuk with a curious expression,
“But Lord, how do you understand the Kazak language?”
“I don’t understand it. However, the meaning was conveyed.”
It was one of the abilities he obtained after gradually using Verserios.
A type of sixth sense.
The Kazak language was not processed by the automatic translation system, so it wasn’t unnatural for Sieg to wonder.
“So, the Demon Kings moved to the Northwest of here… It seems that they already read our movements,” Sieg stated after hearing Woohyuk’s explanation of the Demon Kings’ position.
“Of course, it’s very likely that they already know of our movements. They knew from the beginning that I was going for them,” Woohyuk replied.
Attacking the empty nest was an ideal plan.
They just had to attack the nest, not capture all the Demon Kings. It was enough to make them wary.
Of course, there was a purpose to doing this.
The fact that he was trying to take advantage of an empty nest would attract their attention, making them focus on Woohyuk’s every movement.
“Anyway, it means that we can have an all-out war if they’re gathered together, right? From their point of view, they’ll think the odds are right.”
“That’s what I think as well since, ultimately, Aleister is behind the Demon King Alliance.”
Aleister was a troublesome thorn in Woohyuk’s side in many ways.
When Woohyuk and his party were talking about Aleister, a ferocious cry came from afar.
“Kyah-Ahhhhhhhhh!”
It was a flock of black crows.
It was said that Lilith’s followers resided in this area.
“Is it a witch? I don’t think Alice would raise anything like that…”
“We won’t know until we check. Brynhildr, take care of them.”
“Please leave it to me.”
Dogfighting was the exclusive specialty of Brynhildr, a Valkyrie.
She flapped her white wings, flew towards the oncoming flock, and struck all the black crows down in an instant. Seeing this unfold, Sieg mentioned,
“My wife seems to be the most beautiful when fighting in the sky. It feels like I’m seeing a graceful swan.”
“… It must be great to be married to such a strong and pretty woman. I’m just a playing thing when someone gets bored.”
“Have you already eaten all the chocolate balls, Helena? If you eat so many sweets, you’ll gain a lot of weight,” Woohyuk mentioned offhandedly.
“I’m referring to you, you unrefined man. If you make fun of a woman’s weight, don’t you know it’s sexual harassment?”
Woohyuk and his party relaxedly waited for Brynhildr.
After a while, Brynhildr grabbed a stunned, live black crow, and brought it to the group.
“I kept this one alive just in case. The other person is probably still watching us from afar.”
“That’s probably the case. Amon, find out who the black crow shares its vision with.”
“… Okay.”
The 7th ranked Demon King could do that easily.
Amon looked into the black crow’s red eyes and gritted his teeth.
“It’s relaying its vision to Aleister. He told the crow to try and find the Holy Lady of Prophecy.”
“Where is he now?”
“Seeing that he’s beside Alice the Queen of Thorns, it looks like the eastern region.”
At least he wasn’t with the Demon King Alliance.
Woohyuk nodded and filled the fortress he just took over with undead forces.
“Aleister is up to something, but it would be better to aim for the Demon King Alliance for now.”
Besides, now was a great opportunity to fill several empty seats in Lemegeton, as the Demon Kings were gathered together.
As Woohyuk led his party and headed northwest, numerous swarms of bats appeared in the air.
“What is it this time? Shall we go and subdue them?” Brynhildr asked.
“They are on our side, Brynhildr. They are vampires, the true rulers of the night.”
Woohyuk had previously ordered Hong Yuri to bring reinforcements.
Seeing that they arrived earlier than expected, it seems that they didn’t face any hardships on the way.
After waiting for a while, Hong Yuri showed up in front of them with the vampires in tow.
“Nice to see you again, Woohyuk. You don’t seem to have many forces with you?”
“If I summon them all, I’ll have much more than your side, so don’t worry.”
“Yes, yes. The blizzard is no joke. If I were a human, I would have died from freezing.”
Hong Yuri chatted joyfully as if it was nice to meet Woohyuk after a long time away from each other.
Her chatter went into one ear and out the other before he asked,
“How far have you developed? How far can you wield the Power of Blood?”
“Quite a lot. The great thing about being a vampire is that the more blood I absorb, the faster I develop. I can now control the Blood Vortex ability quite well.”
Her title was the Blood Queen, but it didn’t make sense to possess this title if she had was at the same level as the other vampires.
After hearing her explanation, Woohyuk summoned Astaroth,
“Hand over the power of Nosferatu to Hong Yuri.”
“… Master, are you serious? That’s my main skill.”
“You’ll get another skill later anyway.”
When Woohyuk met him in the past, Astaroth didn’t attack with blood or strengthen his weapons using the power of blood.
In other words, Astaroth replaced his main skill with better skills.
As Woohyuk ordered, Astaroth sighed and laid his hand on Hong Yuri’s exposed shoulder.
Afterward, bloody energy was transmitted to Hong Yuri, and blood cells bloomed in the air.
“Kyah!”
The skill wasn’t a big deal to Woohyuk, but it would help Hong Yuri in many ways.
Hong Yuri was excited and tried to manipulate the newly gained blood power from one place to another.
“Wow! It’s so cute! This skill will be quite useful when taking care of a large swarm of mediocre enemies.”
“Since you’re the Blood Queen, you’ll be able to use the skill better than Astaroth.”
He hadn’t mentioned it to her yet, but he was thinking of using Hong Yuri appropriately when invading the eastern areas later on.
Soon afterward, when she summoned back her blood skill, Woohyuk set off for his next destination.
“But why can’t I see any Demon Kings here in the western region? You mentioned a Demon King Alliance, so I was firmly prepared for a battle.”
“We’ve found that they’re all gathered in the direction we are going now. It’s definitely an unexpected move by them.”
“Ugh. So, you’re going to fight them all at the same time?”
Hong Yuri had not yet had the experience of fighting head-on with a Demon King.
As she anxiously asked, Woohyuk replied in a calming voice,
“Even if you can’t fight the Demon Kings we’ll face right now, you’re more than capable of taking on Amii or Volak. You can easily defeat Dantalion right now.”
“Oh, aren’t they the ones who invaded the Rhine Kingdom last time? It’s amazing to know that I’ve grown that much.”
“Don’t be complacent. I developed enough to seal Amon, the 7th ranked Demon King.”
“… Chet.”
Hong Yuri frowned and stuck out her tongue.
Right as their conversation was concluding, the sky suddenly turned black, revealing an abyss gap in the sky.
Woohyuk’s party stopped moving and immediately got into battle positions.
“It looks like they’ve decided to make the first move.”
The armies of the Demon King Alliance was about to be summoned onto the battlefield.