Chapter 287: Ominous Movement

“With this, everything is prepared.” Axel finally heaved a sigh of relief.

After spending 10 straight hours building, the “backbone” of the bulwark was finally done. The semi-perpetual barrier would prevent the enemies from invading. Over, or underground doesn’t matter.

Of course, all they made was the framework.

Without people to man the defensive fortifications, it’d all be for naught.

In short, it was finally time.

“Master.”

“Oh, just in time.”

Fenrir appeared right beside him the next moment, almost as if she had been measuring her timing to show up.

“And? What’s up?” Axel quickly asked. “You wouldn’t leave those guys without reason, would you?”

The task she was given was to watch over the demons and ensure they don’t do anything “drastic.” Furthermore, she was also tasked with finding all the demons in there as much as possible.

Now that she’s here, then it could only be that she had found all the demons already, or…

“Master, reporting. The demons are on the move. They seem to be in a hurry now that the Queen is siding with us.”

Axel raised a brow, frowning. “Already?”

He did predict they would make their moves, but not this fast. A full-on offensive was something he estimated would come the next day at the earliest, not just half a day after one of them was captured!

“Isn’t it too fast?”

“Yes, I think so too.”

If they were rushing so much that they couldn’t wait until tomorrow, then…

“I guess they’re planning to get rid of Queen Sharika tonight.” Axel whispered with a grim expression, watching as the sun began to set along the horizon.

“That means we have to stop them before things get out of hand.”

Without delay, Axel called to all the girls. Since their construction was done, they were idling around. Thus, Axel’s call to arms came at the perfect timing.

Within the next minute, the girls gathered at the top of the central building, standing before Axel.

“Alright, that’s everyone, right?” He asked after confirming that everyone was present.

Arianne, Eve, Maria, Cherry, Beatrix, Ria, Nina, Rosaria, and Mimika. Adding in Fenrir, there were ten of them altogether. Axel didn’t waste time explaining the situation, making the girls turn serious.

“Then we shouldn’t dally! Let’s go, husband!”

“I shall lead the attack as the vanguard, Sir Axel. Just give the command!”

“This… is getting dangerous. We should hurry, My King.”

Ria, Arianne, and Eve chimed in, making Axel smile thinly.

“Good! Then without wasting time, let’s head out!”

And just like that, all of them moved toward the southern end. To the section where the “city” holding 150 thousand people was located.

With their speed—Rosaria and Mimika being carried like princesses by Fenrir and Arianne respectively—they arrived at their destination in less than a minute.

The place they landed at was the peculiar watchtower that Eve erected near there. A good place to give them a vantage point, evaluating the surroundings before going in. As soon as they landed, Fenrir’s nose twitched as she turned to the right, pointing a finger down.

“The demons are right there, gathered together inside that shelter. They numbered exactly 4,592 members when I counted.” Fenrir explained. “I even checked their roster and confirmed the numbers, so there shouldn’t be any mistakes.”

Axel placed a hand to his chin, glancing down at where Fenrir’s finger pointed. He saw the shelter she was talking about—which looked more like a stadium by its shape and size—and frowned.

“So about five thousand demons infiltrating a group of 150 thousand… That’s fewer than I expected.”

Of course, Fenrir didn’t miss what he was insinuating, and appended to her explanation.

“These guys, although most of them are weaklings like that one during the day, there are about a hundred of them that are pretty decent. Those demons alone should be enough to wipe the entire settlement unchallenged.”

“That’s messed up…” Eve frowned as she finished setting up her rifle.

Of course, it wasn’t the usual Hecate either, but a modified one. Something that the dwarves made just for her out of pretty expensive and powerful materials.

Her gun lacked firepower against powerful beings, after all.

That was painfully proven in the fight against Fafnir and Bellachrona. But now, her bullets could be supplemented by her own mana.

Meaning, her damage output could now scale along with her mana quantity… which was currently significantly high. Enough to deal heavy damage to even the near-invulnerable Fafnir in battle mode, in fact.

After she peered through her scope, she began mumbling to herself for a while, then nodded.

“I’ve confirmed. There’s really 4,592 of them present. Among them, roughly 128 have strength comparable to our standard Valkyrie Knights.”

“That much?” Axel gasped. “Damn. Then if we didn’t come here, this place would be doomed, for sure.”

Beatrix sighed, nodding along. “No doubt about that.”

About half a minute later, everyone was done with their preparations.

Their formation was already pre-determined even before they arrived. With Eve staying in the tower, providing vision and support fire. The witches—Ria, Nina, Rosaria, and Mimika—were backing her up, just in case she was attacked.

It’s not that Axel was being overprotective, assigning four guards to Eve. Rather, it was a simple decision based on their skills.

Witches are good at one-against-many battles because they wouldn’t need to mind who they hit. But in a chaotic battlefield where allies, enemies, and others were gathered, using AOE skills was risky. They could end up dragging innocent civilians or allies into their curses.

Of course, Ria and Nina were different from normal witches, as they could use spells thanks to sharing Axel’s mana pool. Thus, they should also be able to attack using spells instead of curses.

Thus, technically, only Rosaria and Mimika were useless this time.

The rest was the group who would charge in. To be specific, Fenrir and Arianne at the vanguard, Axel and Beatrix in the middle, and Maria and Cherry as support at the back.

“They’re moving.”

Eve’s words came, alerting everyone.

Her scope, able to see through even the inside of a building—like X-Ray—quickly picked up on the presence of a single, leader-like figure coming onto the stage.

“Then… Operation start!”

Axel whispered, signaling everyone to move.

Fenrir quickly opened a rift to the front door of the giant stadium. A shortcut, allowing them to travel the distance quickly and silently.

Without delay, Arianne jumped in, followed by Fenrir. The two fearlessly charged ahead, not even waiting for Axel and the rest to come to their side first.

By the door, two men stood. Both holding long, three-pronged spears as their weapons. Seeing the two girls rush in, they quickly pointed their weapons at them and shouted.

“STOP! You can’t go any fur—!”

“For the peace of the kingdom!” But Arianne didn’t really care.

She roared toward the two guards at the door, her lips curling into a vicious smile.

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