Even outside the Demon Empire of Vidal, and the Birgitt and Hartner Duchies that were adjacent to the Farzon Duchy, there were those who sensed that the decisive battle against Alda was coming.

There were some such people in the city of Morksi, one of the commercial cities in the Alcrem Duchy.

“Maybe war really is coming soon after all. I almost never see Michael-san around anymore… I mean, Miles-san.”

“Yeah, Vandalieu Street is mighty quiet, too.”

Because the Alcrem Duchy was far from the Farzon Duchy, it had sent several thousand elite soldiers led by the Five Knights of Alcrem, along with supplies such as food and medicine, but it hadn’t done anything beyond that. There hadn’t been any forced conscription and such.

But the ‘Kiss’ Miles, the head of Starving Wolf Security, and the mascots of the new food cart king that succeeded Vandalieu… the ‘Food Cart Eggs,’ weren’t in the city. And the frequency of magical girl concerts had decreased, too.

“Really, I just want them to hurry up and end the war so they can come back,” said Edmond, the merchant who had once attempted to use Darcia for his own financial purposes, as he looked up at his newly-built store. “If they don’t, how will discussions proceed for me to open a branch in the Demon Empire of Vidal? And besides, I can’t stand not being able to eat their takoyaki.”

In truth, the war had already started, but Edmond and the other inhabitants of Morksi remained unaware of that.

Meanwhile, war had begun in the Farzon Duchy, too… the war they called the ‘holy war.’

“This stupid war should just be over already,” muttered Selen, the Dhampir girl who had been taken into the care of the Five-colored Blades.

After returning to the Farzon Duchy under the care of the Thundering Armaments led by Rembrand, she hadn’t seen Heinz and his companions a single time. She had only exchanged letters with them a single time via ships that sailed between the islands outside the Bahn Gaia continent.

And in the Farzon Duchy, she was worshipped as a holy lady of the Church of Alda.

Having been born as a Dhampir, Selen had lived a completely different life from ordinary children, but… she found her current environment to be the strangest of any that she had lived in so far.

She had been treated like a sheltered noble girl in the past. But she had never had people pray to her every time she did anything at all.

Since the sending of the Divine Message declaring the beginning of the holy war about a month ago, she had been made to do a variety of things. She had read out words from a pre-written letter on several occasions, and simply smiled and waved on others. And each time she did, people would look at her and press their palms together in prayer with tears running down their cheeks.

From how her parents had raised her while they were still alive, living in a remote place, she understood that she should be grateful that she could live freely in a safe place with everything she needed provided to her.

But she couldn’t rid herself of her bewilderment at everything – including this ‘holy war.’

Selen simply could not believe that it was necessary to fight against the Demon Empire of Vidal… against Vandalieu.

The one who killed Edgar-oniichan was that evil Demon King Guduranis, and the letter said that even Heinz-oniichan wouldn’t have been able to save him. And besides, that boy gave Edgar-oniichan’s body back to us.

Selen’s current feelings towards Vandalieu were complex.

And not only that – He didn’t do anything to us.

If Vandalieu had wanted to, he could have killed Selen and her guardians as they returned from Orbaume to the Farzon Duchy. He could probably even have made it look like an accident without leaving a shred of evidence to suggest that it wasn’t. But he hadn’t made a single move on them at all.

When she met Vandalieu face to face back then, she had felt rejection. Not hostility or malice. ‘I don’t have any intention of becoming closer to you, so don’t try to get closer to me.’ That was the stance that Vandalieu had taken.

So Selen believed that this ‘holy war’ could just be resolved by her and those around her not approaching Vandalieu.

Onii-chan’s letter said that the Demon King Guduranis’s soul resides in Vandalieu, so he could be taken over by the Demon King at any moment, and that’s why he needs to defeat him, but…

Was that really true?

The evil god known as Dark Avalon hadn’t been able to suppress the Demon King Guduranis’s soul, so it was possible that Vandalieu wouldn’t be able to do so, either.

But the fragments of the soul of the Demon King Guduranis were supposed to be under the protection of Alda, the God of Law and Fate. Or at least, that was what Selen had been taught while she was growing up. So then, how had Guduranis been resurrected? Did that mean that even Alda had been unable to protect the seal?

The head of the Church had gone on about some god named Rodcorte, but Selen had never heard of such a god before. Where had this Rodcorte suddenly come from?

Was there really a point to this holy war declared by Alda?

“I wonder if Onii-chan and the others have read my letter?” Selen wondered.

She had written, ‘Let’s forget about this holy war and everything else. Let’s all go and live together on another continent or an island somewhere.’ Her distrust of Alda and the clergymen of the Church of Alda, and a belief she had about Vandalieu that she was certain about, had made her write these words.

She had the feeling that if Heinz and the others abandoned the holy war and disappeared from the Bahn Gaia continent, Vandalieu would not pursue them.

And although that belief of Selen’s was not entirely perfect, she was right.

If Heinz separated himself from Bellwood and lived a secluded life away from the Bahn Gaia continent… away from the nations within Vandalieu’s sphere of influence, Vandalieu would hesitate to pursue him. That was because his order of priorities would change.

At the very least, as long as Alda’s forces were still alive, they would always be an imminent threat, and he would prioritize dealing with them over a Heinz without Bellwood.

And after the holy war was over, he would likely be so swamped with dealing with the aftermath that he would be unable to go after Heinz.

Vandalieu was driven by vengeance, but he did not devote his entire life to it. To him, vengeance was one method by which he pursued his own happiness. If there was something that he needed to prioritize over vengeance, he would do so.

After that, things would depend on the situation… As long as Heinz and Delizah stayed quiet, it was possible that he would simply observe them for a hundred years or even a thousand, until they died of natural causes.

To Vandalieu, this would be even more tedious than becoming the leader of a holy war. Selen had unknowingly suggested to Heinz and his companions the option that Vandalieu most wished that they would not choose… though unfortunately for Selen, and fortunately for Vandalieu, it seemed that Heinz and his companions did not choose it.

Meanwhile, at the border between the Farzon Duchy and the Hartner Duchy, the representatives of each duchy’s army and the reinforcements who had been sent there were facing off, shouting at one another.

“We are on the side of justice! Disassemble your army and stand aside at once!”

“We refuse! We are doing what is right! Turn your army around and return to your own territories!”

“… This is a holy war?” said Pauvina.

“… Humans sure are carefree, aren’t they?” remarked Luvesfol.

Important-looking knights were shouting, their voices echoing over both armies – amplified by some special Skill they possessed, a spell, or a Magic Item prepared just for occasions such as these.

Pauvina and Luvesfol stared at them with exasperated looks on their faces. With them were Rapiéçage, who was munching on some nearby grass, and Yamata, who had started singing.

But for some reason, Reinhardt and his companions had a sparkle of wonder in their eyes.

“Pauvina-sama, Luves-san, this is tradition!”

“Pauvina-sama, this is an etiquette of war passed on over generations, before the Orbaume Kingdom was founded and we were just a gathering of smaller nations!”

“We battle by making demands and declaring an ultimatum. It is our way of telling the other nation, ‘We have done all we could to resolve things peacefully, and we have no choice but to enter war.’”

“The last time this took place was a hundred years ago, I guess? But that time, the demands were just repeated over and over, and in the meantime, the houses of the other dukes stepped in to arbitrate, so war between two dukes’ houses was averted.”

According to them, this scene was apparently almost an exact recreation of previous historical events.

Pauvina believed that history was important, too. She didn’t intend to make light of it. The royalty of multiple small nations had become dukes of the Orbaume Kingdom, causing actual large-scale military conflicts to no longer take place, and this was the rule of war that had made it happen.

She found it strange that there were rules in war at all, but other humans weren’t the only threat in this world – there were dangerous monsters. If there was too much war, causing a decrease in military strength on both sides, they would become unable to cull monsters. Monster numbers would increase, and the land that could be inhabited by humans would shrink. With that being the case, even the victor in a war would suffer losses.

This was likely a method devised to reduce the number of deaths. Pauvina did understand that much.

“But is there really a point to doing this now?” she asked.

What Pauvina couldn’t understand was whether there was a point in doing this in this situation. After all, this was no small skirmish. It was an all-out war between the Farzon Duchy and every other duchy.

“Ah… Well… No,” Reinhardt admitted, unable to come up with a response to that.

It was the ‘Knight of a Thousand Blades’ Baldiria, who had been sent as reinforcements from the Alcrem Duchy, who offered a potential answer. “If I had to argue a point for doing this, I would say that it is to create the possibility that the war is finished in the Holy Nation of Amid before the war here begins.”

“And even if they are told that it is a holy war, ordered by the gods themselves by Divine Message, and they have been given the gods’ divine protections, that does not suddenly give them experience in actual war… The generals in the Farzon Duchy likely had no choice but to fall back on old traditions,” said Juliana, who in her previous life had been the younger sister of Duke Alcrem and a leader of an order of knights. “Once they began that tradition, the Hartner Duchy’s army could not simply ignore it, so they responded as tradition demands. I believe that what we are seeing is the result.”

Juliana had been pseudo-reincarnated as a half-Minotaur and was, on paper, Vandalieu’s familiar. Thus, she had been sent here as reinforcements from the Demon Empire of Vidal like Pauvina, rather than dispatched by the Alcrem house.

And her beloved mount was one of Vandalieu’s split entities – a Demon King Familiar – which made an unconvincing neighing noise. It looked like a horse, at least, though it and the similar mounts of Juliana’s sisters were all enormous, to match the size of their two-meter-tall bodies.

“Van, how are things elsewhere?” asked Pauvina.

“Over on the Birgitt Duchy’s side, things are the same as they are here. No signs of the enemy in the Sauron Duchy, though we’re staying vigilant as we keep an eye on things. The same goes for Talosheim and the other nations inside the Boundary Mountain Range,” reported the Demon King Familiar. “The battle has only begun in the Mirg shield-nation and on the Farzon Duchy Sea.”

On the Farzon Duchy Sea, the sea south of the Bahn Gaia continent, a fierce battle was taking place.

“Fire your arrows and your offensive spells! Wind up those ballistae! Keep pressing the attack!”

“Underwater troops whose magic is about to wear off, change with the next group of soldiers! Hurry up and treat your wounds and reapply your spells!”

The Farzon Duchy’s prided navy had produced great results against pirates and sea monsters in the past.

But Duke Farzon was not so blinded by faith that he would attempt something as reckless as sending that army across the sea against the Demon Empire of Vidal like lambs to the slaughter.

At the same time, he was not foolish enough to try and use his navy on land. And so, he had made them patrol the Farzon Duchy Sea to be prepared in the event that they were attacked from the sea by the Demon Empire of Vidal.

And attacked they were.

Two Krakens screeched as they flew across the sky like the wind from the horizon.

These two were Tama and Gyoku, who had undone their ‘Shrink’ Skill. They had both increased their Ranks and become Rank 12 Abyss Cookraken.

This was the result of using the advanced ‘Cooking’ Skill from their work with the food carts to eat parts of Vandalieu while steadily increasing their Levels after their food carts were closed.

“Impossible! How are Krakens flying?!”

It was because they had acquired the “Air-running’ and ‘High-speed Travel’ Skills. Tama and Gyoku used their twelve legs skillfully to fly in the air more freely than any bird.

They were able to make sudden stops, move vertically, and change directions in an instant with complete freedom. Thus, even the sailors and knights who could fly using wind-attribute magic and Magic Items were unable to keep up with them.

“Damn it, nothing’s landing!”

Tama and Gyoku were dealing with the long-ranged attacks flexibly. The archers and mages of the navy compensated for their ships swaying with the waves as they aimed, keeping their attacks highly accurate, but their arrows and offensive spells were struck down by their tentacles, landing in the sea and creating waves that shook the ships more violently.

This was the result of the time they had spent using individual legs for different technical cooking processes simultaneously. Their Title of the ‘Food Cart Eggs’ wasn’t for nothing.

Because of this, the navy’s sailors were unable to land any attacks on Tama and Gyoku… though even if they did, they were unlikely to inflict significant damage against these Rank 12 monsters who possessed a high Level in the ‘Rapid Regeneration’ Skill.

The Farzon Duchy’s navy prided itself on being one of the most skilled human armies. Each marine was as capable as a knight, and each knight had strength equivalent to that of a C-class adventurer. They were likely capable of dealing with any ordinary threat from the sea.

But against these Rank 12 monsters – creatures that were a step away from being as powerful as evil gods and demigods – they were powerless common soldiers at the mercy of the monstrosities they faced. The Farzon Duchy’s navy was being sliced up like ingredients to be arranged on a platter.

And Tama and Gyoku were not their only enemies.

While the Farzon Duchy’s navy was distracted by the enormous threats above the sea, they were assaulted from the ocean beneath their ships by armed Merfolk and marine monsters.

“Go! We shall claim vengeance!”

“Cool the heads of these overjoyed Alda worshipers in the waters of the sea!”

“Now is the time for our renewed attack! We must avenge our clan!”

Indeed, these Merfolk were those who worshiped Marisjafar, the Righteous Evil God of the Crimson Sea. At the request of Duke Farzon, many of their brethren had been slain by the Five-colored Blades and other adventurers, forcing the survivors to flee their homeland and escape to Gartland.

“Don’t overdo it, Bastian. The same goes for the rest of you!” Doraneza warned her warriors.

She was their chief, armed with a trident that shone with the colors of the rainbow… or rather, that was the form that her transformation equipment took.

“But Princess!” one warrior began in protest.

“After their deaths, they will join us as companions. Try to keep their corpses intact! Think of the troubles of those who will have to sew them back up!” Doraneza added.

“I see, that’s what you meant. Understood!” the warrior said.

The Merfolk’s morale burned even stronger. If the Farzon Duchy’s navy were to hear this conversation, their morale would have plummeted, but…

Tama screeched, and a tentacle smashed one of their ships. The navy had bigger things to worry about.

The remaining warships moved to attempt to rescue their allies and back each other up. But Doraneza, wearing her transformation equipment, raised her trident-shaped staff to cast a spell that manipulated the waves to toss their ships about, skilfully hindering their coordination and making it impossible for them to restore their formations.

The mages tried to oppose Doraneza’s spell with sheer force of numbers, but this didn’t go as they intended, as Tama and Gyoku smacked down any offensive spell they cast.

The word that ran through the minds of the warships’ captains was not ‘retreat,’ but ‘surrender.’

The direction in which the battles of the army of the Holy Nation of Amid and the Farzon Duchy’s navy were headed was already clear. Observing these battles through the eyes of the Demon King Familiar placed in each location was Vandalieu, sitting in the royal castle in Talosheim.

And at the same time, Alda, the God of Law and Fate, was also watching through the eyes of his worshipers.

It was unavoidable that the Crusader Army of the Holy Nation of Amid would contain a large number of traitors and those who worshiped the great gods who had joined Vida’s side, and Alda had predicted that this would be the case. However, by leaving these traitors in the army, he had also expected that Vandalieu and his allies would become unable to conduct indiscriminate long-ranged attacks against the Crusader Army.

Alda had believed that Vandalieu would hesitate to conduct bombardments from the sky using Cuatro, self-destructive attacks by Demon King Familiars, or long-ranged beams of light, for fear of hitting worshipers of gods like Peria and Botin.

And he was right, but… there were more traitors than Alda had anticipated, and the Crusader Army was in a disadvantageous position.

And although he still had the trump cards prepared by Eileek and his subordinates, Alda saw that chances were slim even if those trump cards were deployed.

“As expected… If I do not do this, I cannot even create an opening for Heinz to infiltrate Talosheim, the place where Vandalieu dwells within the Boundary Mountain Range,” he murmured.

Alda was making a significant misunderstanding.

He believed that to Vandalieu, the Orbaume Kingdom was a nation that Vandalieu would not hesitate to discard and abandon in the end. He believed that he would not place himself or the Demon Empire of Vidal at risk to help them.

That misunderstanding was because he was so intent on viewing Vandalieu as being no different from Guduranis… He had already strongly convinced himself that Vandalieu was utterly evil.

Vandalieu was evil. And because he was evil, he would eventually discard those who worshiped him. After all, if that weren’t the case, then Vandalieu would not be evil.

Vandalieu had to be evil, so he had to behave in an evil manner until the very end.

Alda believed this, despite having witnessed Vandalieu defend the illusion of Darcia from Heinz’s sword inside the Dungeon of Trials that he had created. Alda believed this, despite knowing that it was not Heinz, but Vandalieu, who had minimized loss of life during the battle against the resurrected Guduranis that had taken place several months ago. And perhaps most damningly, Alda believed this despite the fact that it was he who was currently discarding his own worshipers without a second thought.

Alda did not understand anything.

“This is the last resort. It will temporarily strengthen Vandalieu, but… this is for the sake of defeating him,” Alda said to himself.

He held several fragments of Guduranis’s soul in his right hand, and in his left were the seals that had been placed upon gods.

Vandalieu suddenly sensed the presence of death in every location at once.

And at the same time, those who happened to look up at the sky saw that something was coming down from it.

“What… is that?!”

At first, they looked like nothing more than black shadows, but they soon revealed their terrifying forms.

On the battlefield where the army of the Demon Empire of Vidal was clashing with that of the Holy Nation of Amid, an enormous, sinister-looking boar-like creature with twisted horns and tusks let out a squealing bellow. It was accompanied by an Elder Dragon with a storm raging around its body as it screamed curses at its enemies: “I HATE THEM! I HATE THEEEM! AAAAGH! DEATH TO ALDA’S HOUNDS! DESTRUCTION UPON THEM! IF ONLY A SINGLE ARROW CAN STRIKE THEM, MAY MY BODY BECOME ITS ARROWHEAD!”

In the sky above the Farzon Duchy’s navy, an enormous sphere made entirely of lips and tentacles descended, accompanied by some kind of hideous-sounding roar.

And in the skies above Orbaume, an enormous, twisted spiral shell larger than the castle, covered in countless protuberances, appeared with a hysterical, creepy laughter that made one want to cover their ears.

An evil god whose fury and hatred was clear even despite its grotesque form appeared over the boundary between the Hartner Duchy and the Farzon Duchy. “Those accursed champions! Where are they?! I shall slaughter all seven of them!” it roared.

In the skies over the Birgitt Duchy, an enormous lion appeared. “My children! Please… Please, hurry up and kill me…! I cannot restrain it!” it pleaded, begging to be killed.

Similarly enormous, sinister beings appeared over the Jahan Duchy, the Alcrem Duchy, and the Sauron Duchy, as well as the Demon Continent and Gartland – which shouldn’t have even become battlefields in this war.

These were the evil gods that remained from the Demon King’s army, and gods and demigods belonging to Vida’s faction, who had been sealed away during the battle that took place a hundred thousand years ago. Alda had removed the seals on the fragments of the soul of the Demon King Guduranis and implanted these unsealed fragments within them.

• Name: Tama, Gyoku
• Rank: 12
• Race: Abyss Cookraken
• Title: Food Cart Eggs
• Level: 38
• Passive skills:
  • Dark Vision
  • Ink Secretion: Level 4
  • Desiccation Resistance: Level 4
  • Fire Attribute Resistance: Level 4
  • Strengthened Attribute Values: Guided: Level 6
  • Camouflage
  • Air-Running
  • Strengthened Attribute Values: Vandalieu: Level 5
  • Rapid Regeneration: Level 7
  • Enhanced Body Part: Tentacles: Level 10
• Active skills:
  • High-speed Swimming: Level 7
  • Monstrous Strength: Level 2
  • Cooking: Level 8
  • Luminescence: Level 3
  • Shrink: Level 5
  • Aura of Fear: Level 8
  • Surpass Limits: Level 5
  • Unarmed Fighting Technique: Level 7
  • Whip Technique: Level 7
  • High-speed Travel: Level 5
  • Parallel Thought Processing: Level 3
• Unique skills:
  • Vandalieu’s Divine Protection

Monster explanation (Written by Luciliano):

Abyss Cookraken

A species that Kraken can become by increasing their Rank after acquiring the ‘Cooking’ Skill at a high Level. From that and repeatedly consuming Master’s flesh and blood, these two transformed from Deep Cookraken to what they are now. Kraken that live in the deep sea, a territory that is unknown to humans. And although their race name contains ‘Abyss,’ they are perfectly capable of being in sunlight, selling the yakisoba, takoyaki and surumeika that they have made.

They possess the ‘Camouflage’ Skill that allows them to change the color of their body surface and blend in with their surroundings, as well as the ‘Shrink’ Skill that allows them to become almost the same size as they were when they were Little Kraken. Thus, one might consider them to be suited for more discrete strategies, but their true specialty is trampling the enemy with their sheer, overwhelming mass.

I am sure that those who are attacked by them will have their minds paralyzed by fear when they see them fly like the wind over the ocean, their bodies that are larger than ships rise at tremendous speeds from the water’s surface, or their eerie forms luminescing with white light in the dark.

Of course, they normally spend their time running their food cart in the city of Morksi in the Alcrem Duchy. They use ‘Shrink’ to cook their food. They are something like idols among the townspeople, and because they are familiars of Master, the ‘Food Cart King,’ they are fondly referred to as the ‘Food Cart Eggs.’

Of course, the Title originates from Tama and Gyoku’s sphere-shaped bodies.

• Name: Vigaro
• Rank: 14
• Race: Ghoul Astral Tyrant Emperor
• Age: 177 years old
• Title: Death Axe King, Ghoul Commander
• Level: 60
• Job: Death Demon Group Commander
• Job level: 98
• Job history: Apprentice Warrior, Warrior, Axeman, Axe Master, Magic Axe User, Great Axe Master, Berserker, Demon Warrior, Dark Axeman, Spirit Demon Fighter, Shield User, Dark Demon Axe Conqueror, Great Dark Demon Axe Conqueror, Transcendent Axe Conqueror
•  Passive skills:
  • Dark Vision
  • Transcendent Strength: Level 1 (Awakened from Monstrous Strength!)
  • Pain Resistance: Level 10
  • Paralyzing Venom Secretion (Claws): Level 10 (LEVEL UP!)
  • Enlarged Attribute Values when equipped with an Axe: Very Large (LEVEL UP!)
  • Magic Resistance: Level 7 (LEVEL UP!)
  • Super Endless Sexual Stamina: Level 1 (Awakened from Endless Sexual Stamina!)
  • Great Slaughter Healing: Level 1 (Awakened from Slaughter Healing!)
  • Physical Resistance: Level 4 (LEVEL UP!)
  • Mental Fortitude: Level 2 (LEVEL UP!)
  • Self-Enhancement: Guidance: Level 8 (LEVEL UP!)
  • Strengthen Followers: Level 5 (LEVEL UP!)
• Active skills:
  • Death Lion Axe Technique: Level 8 (LEVEL UP!)
  • Death Lion Fighting Technique: Level 1 (Awakened from Unarmed Fighting Technique!)
  • Commanding: Level 8 (LEVEL UP!)
  • Coordination: Level 10
  • Deforestation: Level 6
  • Dismantling: Level 5 (LEVEL UP!)
  • Spirit Shield Technique: Level 1 (Awakened from Shield Technique!)
  • Transcend Limits: Level 8 (LEVEL UP!)
  • Transcend Limits – Magic Axe: Level 7 (LEVEL UP!)
  • Parallel Thought Processing: Level 8 (LEVEL UP!)
  • Spirit Form: Level 10 (LEVEL UP!)
  • Materialization: Level 10 (LEVEL UP!)
  • High-speed Thought Processing: Level 1
  • Familiar Spirit Demonfall: Level 5 (LEVEL UP!)
• Unique skills:
  • Zozogante’s Divine Protection
  • Garess’s Divine Protection
  • Vandalieu’s Divine Protection
  • Vida’s Divine Protection

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep