Chapter 34
Chapter 34
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 34
Chapter Title: Monster Legion
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Crossing the tallest mountain range and stepping into the frigid polar region, the Immortal Demon King finally reached the Arctic Citadel, venting her irritation the whole way.
Even for someone who had trained to her level, the journey to the North Pole was no easy feat.
"Grimudo. Most ancient one. What in the world are you doing in this icy wasteland of nothing but snow!"
Standing before the citadel made of ice, Harma El cried out in a wail.
It bore a faint resemblance—very faint—to the Dragon Fear once unleashed by her distant ancestor, the Fallen White Dragon. But faint or not, it was enough to reach Grimudo's ears.
Dark clouds blanketed the sky, blotting out the midnight sun and the auroras alike.
An eternal night, deep and dark, descended.
From that darkness emerged a shadow even deeper, a profound abyss of a figure. The Demon King, always shrouded in terrifying magic that obscured even his face.
The Primordial Demon King, whom all demons feared and revered in equal measure, revealed himself.
"Grimudo is no more. All that's here is a despairing scholar. Just Geliel."
"More of your nonsense? Geliel or Grimudo, if you're just going to hole up in a place like this, then help me instead! With you and me together, the demons could conquer the continent and establish a millennial empire!"
Demon Kings existed in every era. The Demon Kings of this age feared Grimudo, who had existed even before their own kind was born. They revered him as the Primordial Demon King, but Geliel himself no longer considered himself one.
With his white, beautiful hair and enchanting red eyes.
The Demon Empress, Harma El, was breathtakingly beautiful—so much so that anyone would be captivated—but Geliel, whose heart had long since died, felt nothing at the sight of her. He was a pioneer lost in utter despair.
"All demons have united under me. Soon, I will stand above all Demon Kings as the first emperor in demonic history. Primordial Demon King. You alone refuse to submit to me. Why? I can give you anything. I'll even hand over half the world I conquer!"
"Haha."
Naturally, Harma El's offer moved him not in the slightest. Grimudo sneered. Geliel sneered.
As a Demon King, as a scholar, he found Harma El laughable.
"Haha."
But that sneer held no mockery.
It was pure, like gazing upon an ignorant child.
As if he'd heard something amusing, the Demon King simply laughed. After a brief chuckle, he flicked one finger.
"Little one."
The glacier tilted. The earth convulsed.
A roar that shook the ground—if not the heavens—filled the air, piercing even to the skies. Compared to this thunderous din, Harma El's own Fear cry sounded like the chirp of a sparrow.
"Do you think so highly of yourself?"
Her face drained of color as she leaped from the quaking ice plain, hovering in the air to watch the churning earth below. Ice surged upward, blizzards whipped about. Something enormous was bursting through the ground to greet the world. Soon, her eyes met its massive orb.
"That ambition you harbor might seem grand enough to you."
A ninety-meter-wide eyeball, clad in thick armor-like plating, floated in the air, staring straight at her. Behind the eye, a tail of the same armored material trailed in segments.
Grimudo's words didn't even register. The sheer presence of that eye beast gripped Harma El completely.
"But in truth, it means nothing at all."
Whoosh.
The massive eye shifted its gaze from Harma El, turning toward the distance.
It locked onto an ice cliff towering as high and vast as Grimudo's Arctic Citadel itself, then began to glow in an instant. Beamore, the ray beast. One of Grimudo's monster legion.
That enormous eye itself served as a kind of organic lens, unleashing high-powered bio-thermal rays.
Grimudo's monster legion were byproducts born from his research into primordial cells. Unlike other species that evolved through natural processes, they lacked the ability to reproduce or evolve on their own, and like the primordial body, they possessed no intelligence.
Yet their lifespans stretched near eternity. His monster legion hadn't sprung up overnight.
They had simply accumulated over time, each one created bit by bit and never dying.
"Beamore. Show her."
Grimudo pointed at the cliff, commanding it to blast the obstruction from his view.
The giant eye beast eagerly obeyed. Subservient to Grimudo's psychic waves, it gathered energy into its eyeball. Its lens functioned as a bio-lens, glowing brighter and whiter.
Piiing.
A high-energy thermal ray reaching ten thousand degrees Celsius pierced the frigid air, striking the ice cliff dead-on. The ancient permafrost melted for the first time, boiled briefly, then vaporized. This spot in the frozen North Pole grew hotter than any desert, clashing hot and cold winds spawning thick steam everywhere.
The bubbling of boiling water. The melting of ice. The winds clashing against each other.
All those sounds tormented Harma El's ears, but she heard nothing.
What she saw was too shocking. A natural wall woven by the earth itself, vaster than any fortress wall, vanished without a trace under the relentless ten-thousand-degree ray.
Her own castle—no, any fortress or tower built by humans or demons alike—
would crumble like a mirage before that ray. If walls fared so poorly, what of flesh and blood? A million-strong army? Don't make me laugh.
If even a sliver of human skin or blood were exposed to that vast ray,
they might not die outright if lucky, but severe burns would render them combat-ineffective. And this was the North Pole! A place where heat struggled most—yet it took ages for the temperature to normalize.
Rumble rumble rumble!
Beamore dove back into the ice depths to recharge, to the primordial body's surface.
Beamore, or even the absent Hidra, were ultimately creations from Grimudo's primordial cell research. The primordial body's vast genome already contained traits for firing rays and metabolizing nuclear materials, allowing such monsters to be born.
The primordial body absorbed massive quantities of radioactive materials from deep within molten rock in the earth's crust, metabolizing them for energy to live. Beamore merely tapped into its origin like a straw, siphoning a bit of that power.
Of course, this was possible only because the primordial body recognized Beamore—made from its own cells—as part of itself.
"How do you like Beamore's ray? If this ray scorched not the North Pole, but lands where people live—would your words still hold meaning then?"
Harma El finally understood why Grimudo had mocked her.
But her pride forbade submission. She deliberately bellowed.
"It's just a big, lumbering brute at best. It might work against armies, but against me? I could slay it with ease."
"Is that so?"
For a split second, a smile flashed across his shadow-shrouded face.
"Then let me show you one more."
And in that moment, Harma El's world stopped.
Her vision flickered, her senses died entirely. Smell, hearing—every sense vanished as if severed.
Paralysis? No, not quite. Her body itself was frozen solid, immobile.
"Grraaah..."
Yet her magic didn't fade. Mana Aura surged from within, taking the form of the Fallen White Dragon. A strangled shout burst from her rigid lips, and a draconic aura twin to Ardaine's own—yet twisted and pale—erupted.
"I am... Harma El! You can't handle me with tricks like this!"
With a sound like eggshell cracking, stone shards flew everywhere. Only then did her senses and vision return. Surveying her surroundings, Harma El realized what had befallen her.
'Petrification...!'
"Petrifying beast, Cockatrice."
Grimudo laughed as he confirmed it.
"Someone of your caliber can't be petrified forever, but how many powerhouses like you exist in this world? Still convinced your ambitions are so grand?"
Turning, Harma El finally faced it: a massive lizard with a chicken's head. Its baleful eyes glared at her, making her flinch.
Compared to Beamore, its size was minuscule—barely a dozen meters tall. Yet its breath spewed deadly venom, and its eyes fired petrifying rays.
Overall, it was a far more terrifying monster against powerhouses like Harma El.
Above all, it moved with blinding speed and agility, unlike the ponderous Beamore—the level of threat was entirely different. It was potent against swarms of weaklings or elite few alike, with few bad matchups. Its strategic value went without saying.
'If Grimudo had meant to kill me, I'd be long dead...'
Even someone like Harma El had been petrified, however briefly, unable to move a muscle.
Had Grimudo seized that moment for even a single strike, she'd be gone. Trembling, Harma El noticed her body shaking.
'Trembling? Me? No, that's...'
Just two monsters had terrified her to her core.
She couldn't even fathom what else—or how much more—he possessed.
Harma El shrank back unwittingly. At least one thing was clear.
He could achieve what she dreamed of with a mere finger snap.
"Why...?"
Deep down, she'd hoped to oust Grimudo and claim the title of paramount Demon King among demons.
But she'd never succeed, not in eternity. Realizing this, Harma El grew despondent.
"Why possess such power... such forces... yet cower here?"
"Because I know it all means nothing."
Grimudo answered.
"Like the elves of Elvenhome gone mad. Learn too much, and that's what happens. Nothing in this world holds value to me anymore."
Even so, being alone here grew boring. He'd toyed with Harma El using two monsters out of sheer ennui.
Stroking the crest of the approaching Cockatrice as it poked its head out, Grimudo chuckled.
"Now that you understand, be off. Unless you want to endure more of my cute little pranks."
"...One request. Do you know of the Hero Party?"
"Of course. They were guests here before you."
To him, they weren't even worth calling enemies.
Just troublesome visitors who'd caused a minor ruckus before fleeing.
"They came here? Why let them live?"
"I didn't let them live. They left alive."
He still remembered. The miracle that priest had used to block him.
All the starlight of the night sky connected, forming an axe embracing the Milky Way that smote down upon him.
Miracle: Night the Milky Way Bleeds. He didn't know what the priest had expended to invoke it,
but it must have cost something immense, truly colossal. It wasn't something a human could wield. Nor could it be granted without the bestower's lofty stature, no matter the sacrifice.
"If you're asking about them, one word: Without that priest, they couldn't have even stood before me."
Not powerful, per se—but different. When their authority clashed with his, the power gap didn't matter; theirs took precedence. Grimudo had never experienced anything so alien.
That was why he'd deemed their escape—despite him unleashing his full might—well-earned.
"The priest...?"
"No clue if that priest's still with them. If so, I'd like a chat this time."
Which one did he mean? Saint Araidel? Or Archbishop Rueheim?
Harma El didn't even know Kyle's name. She'd received reports, sure, but dismissed them long ago for lack of interest. Whichever Grimudo fancied meeting, it wasn't her concern.
"Then will you join me? I've located the Hero Party."
"Gladly. It's been ages since I last ventured out."
She'd only suggested it offhand, never expecting instant agreement—even Harma El was surprised.
Whether sincere or not, the Primordial Demon King vanished into the dark clouds, tossing her an orb. The Immortal Demon King caught it gingerly, her expression hardening.
As a distant scion of dragons, she could tell. The magic sealed within was of the highest order.
But of course. Demonkind's progenitor had learned magic from dragons—a gift of pure benevolence, unbidden.
Grimudo, however, had traded his own scholarship for draconic magic. Naturally, the dragons had no choice but to reveal far more to him.
Charity allows scraps; trade demands equivalence.
"Shatter this orb when you find them. I'll head there at once."
'Not bad if he helps...'
Whichever priest it was, kill the rest and leave him—that was fine.
If Grimudo lent aid, it was pure profit for Harma El.
'My pride stings.'
She'd gained, no doubt, but humiliation made her bite her lip.
Yet she couldn't even vent her frustration. In this brief encounter, she'd vividly felt it: Grimudo's power was beyond measure.
Between the paramount Demon King and herself
lay a gulf she'd never dreamed possible.
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