Ch 9: All for the Empire

In the Demon king castle, every one is in an uproar. The guards assigned to monitor the Dungeon prison do routine head counts of the prisoners on a daily basis. Every one was supposed to be accounted for. However, when they reached Prince Hadan's cell, The guards found it empty. The metallic bars of the cell doors were not bent or cut in anyway, and there were no tunnels dug inside the cell, so the guards were perplexed as to how the prince manage to escape.

One of the Kobold guards had to muster up the courage to inform the king of what happened, so he marched to the thrown room to deliver the bad news.

King Hadora: "So, you say my son escaped his confinements without using brute force. Did the prince met with anyone before his escape?"

Kobold guard: "The log said her majesty, Princess Nadira did, but it was just for a short talk before she was seen retiring to her room for the night, my King."

King Hadora: "Is that so. Well, have her report to me this instance. I wish to know what she and her brother talked about."

Kobold guard: "I-I already had the foresight to do so. However, when my fellow guard reached her chambers, the princess was also nowhere to be found."

King Hadora: "What did you say?"

The guard shuddered upon hearing the king's deep rumbling voice as he asked his question. The guard forced to swallow the lump in his throat and said that the princess is probably just somewhere else in the castle.

King Hadora: "Form multiple search parties and find both my children. Weather they be found together or apart, they must not be allowed to do as they please."

The demonic king ordered the Kobold guard. Meanwhile, in the farthest south side of the nameless forest, the figure of prince Hadan and princess Nadira can be seen travelling on foot to an unknown destination. Prince Hadan carrying his sister in his arms like the princess that she is.

Princess Nadira: "Apologies, dear brother. the mana drain from the the teleportation stone proved to be a great strain for my body."

The Princess said as her golden eye averted the face of her older brother who is carrying her like she is his new bride.

Prince Hadan: "It is no burden to me, dear sister. You have truly grown for you to be able to use a raw teleportation crystal in that manner. Still, if that damned Hero of Light had not destroyed our teleportation device research facility, we would be able to use this power to our heart's content."

Princess Nadira: "Yes. and if only father kept the primary dimensional weapon within the castle walls, then we would have conquered not only this world, but many others at this point."

Hadan and Nadira continued to discuss the unfortunate event of their teleportation and dimensional magical weapons being destroyed, not knowing that the dimensional weapon was kept in the castle, but was destroyed by someone else.

After a few more minutes of walking they finally reached their destination. Now they stood before a vast ruined city, swallowed by tall trees and blanketed by vegetations.

Prince Hadan finally let his sister down after she said she has the energy to walk again. They then proceeded to go even deeper in to the ruins. The pair did meet with appositions along the way, like powerful monsters, and traps, yet they were no match for the demonic prince.

Princess Nadira. :"We are here, dear brother. Our "benefactor" said to meet him in the center of the ruins besides the dead power core of the city of Hades"

Nadira said as they stopped near a man made crystal pillar that the princess referred to as the city's dead power core.

Prince Hadan: "So, where is this "benefactor" of ours?"

"Right here, demon prince."

The prince and princess quickly turned towards the voice they heard. What they found was a person completely clad in a dark hood and robe. The dark figure's voice sounds raspy and weak, yet clear and crisp at the same time.

Prince Hadan: "So, it truly is you. The person to which the knowledge of teleportation and dimensional travel came from. I was there when you handed the magical texts over to my father. You are allied with my father through all these years. Why have you reached out to my sister and I this time?"

Hooded stranger: "Your father broke our agreement when he signed a peace treaty with the humans. I cannot trust him any longer. You and your sister on the other hand still have the hate towards humans burning inside you. A hate almost as fierce as mine. That hatred is what we need to restart a war."

After saying that, the hooded stranger reached in his breast pocket to pull out something. Hadan placed his hand on his sword, ready for an attack, but what the stranger pulled out was not a weapon, but a talisman like object with a teleportation crystal on it's center, and two greyish dark seed as big as a walnut.

Princess Nadira: "I-is that a teleportation talisman? I though they were all destroyed?"

Hooded stranger: "I was able to save one before the research facility was destroyed. And these seeds, I'm sure doesn't need any explanation."

Prince Hadan: "Yes, those are seed armors. I need not anymore of those. All I need is the one that rest upon my skin currently. The talisman on the other hand, I will take whole heartedly."

Hadan said, declining the offer of a new armor, but agreeing to take the teleportation talisman.

Hooded stranger: "Oh, my prince, these are no ordinary seed armors. I can guarantee that these are at least five times more powerful than the one you wear right now. These are all gifts for both of you, to insure a... Smooth transition of power, hehehe."

The stranger then handed the prince a seed and the talisman while the princess also received a seed . After inspecting the armor seed, the prince then un-equip his armor. The armor worn by the prince retracted itself into a hole in the middle of the prince's chest. Once the armor is gone, the prince wore nothing but a tight fitting underwear on his crotch area, exposing his chiseled body to the stranger and his sister. The latter looked away with her face flushed red.

Hadan then removed the old seed inserted within him and placed the new one inside the hole on his chest. And after uttering the word "form" a new demonic armor started to wrap around his body. Said armor is more menacing than the first one, colored dark violet with a very toothy monster face that covered the torso of the prince, and a dark crimson cape on it's back. The prince then absorbed the talisman inside his armor to prevent anyone from taking it from him.

Hooded stranger: "You look amazing, my prince. Now, are you ready for a hostile take over?"

Prince Hadan: "Yes. For my people and my empire, I will crush the humans with this power."

Princess Nadira: "Y-yes. This is all for the empire."

The princess said in reply to her brother's words. Her hand still holding the seed, seemingly unwilling to use it. The hooded stranger grinning from ear to ear as he bare witness to the chaos he has just unleashed.

Selk's POV.

All I can see is white. I haven't been in this realm in a while. This pure white void is the dream realm, a pocket dimension within the realm of the Gods. This is the place where we meet the familiars of our Gods for either power trainings or information gathering. Or at least in my case, I meet my God directly since Lord Gore doesn't have any familiars.

Gore Traveegal: "Long time no see, Selk. Or should I call you Henry."

The God of flesh, Gore Traveegal greeted me. My response however was to give him an emotionless stare.

Gore Traveegal: "Wahh? W-why are you looking at me like that? P-please stop looking at me with those cold eyes. You're starting to scare me."

Selk: "Scaring you? Good! Have you Gods forgotten our deal? I said I wanted to be informed of how my sister is doing. Yet, you haven't summoned me in this realm for over a year."

I told Gore Traveegal off for not informing me of how my little sister is doing currently.

Gore Traveegal: "I-I'm sorry. Us Gods have been very busy after the war was over. I had to re-tally up all living creatures to verify if there are any endangered species that needs monitoring. And since I don't have any familiar, I had to do it all on my own."

Selk: "I-is that so. Well, I get it. I guess there's no helping it. Sorry I got angry. So, how's my little sister doing now?"

I asked after apologizing to lord Gore Traveegal, as I understood that tallying up hundreds of billions of creatures would be a daunting task.

Gore Traveegal: "Oh, she's doing great. She's actually pregnant right now. She's two months into her pregnancy as we speak. You're gonna be an uncle, Henry"

Selk: "Wow. I can't believe my sister and her husband are finally going to have a baby. Thank you, Lord Gore. Please keep me informed as much as you can about her, okay."

Gore Traveegal: "No problem, Henry. However, that's not the only reason why I called you here. I heard you finally told Melva about what you did to end the war. I can't believe she figured it out. You really dropped the ball on that Darkbellied Hell Viper thing."

Selk: "Oh, come on, Lord Gore. That monster was the only thing I could construct that was scary enough to chase my escorts away, but safe enough to make sure no one got hurt. Besides, I'm sure she reached that conclusion only because of that damned recorder crystal. If I ever find out who sold that crystal to her, I'm going to fuse acid cobras on his flesh and watch them melt him away."

I had a scary thought as I voice out my frustration to lord Gore. It was a good thing the only thing Vina requested of me was to be her date on our birth day. If she forced me to become her lover, I Don't know what I would have done.

Selk: "Anyway, since I agreed to her whim, she promised that she wouldn't tell a soul of what I've done. Same thing goes for Allice, Lira, and Sarah, so There's no problem of the kingdom finding out my true power."

Gore Traveegal: "Well, that's good. But, I just want to make sure that you have no plans of informing them of how to use the All Seeing Eye magic, right?"

Lord Gore asked me with a serious tone.

Selk: "Absolutely not! That magic is too dangerous in the wrong hands. I even burned the parchment I wrote the plans of it on and scattered the ashes. I will never use that power again."

The All Seeing Eye magic is the magic I created to find the Dimension Hopping Weapon. It's done by creating thousands of satellite made by fusing dragon flesh, Faroza Bats' ears, Giant Mantis Shrimps' eyes, and Suvara Moths' antennae.

It took me a month a create and launch all the All Seeing Eye satellites in to this planet's orbit. Once that was done, the satellites would recognize unusual energy patterns like the dimensional rift made by testing the Demon Kingdom's weapon.

Once the satellites recognized the signal, and pinpointed the location, they will then send the information out to a biological super computer that I made by fusing brains and body parts of creatures that can receive and analyze those signals and turn them into a projected three dimensional image.

I pretty much made the first satellite network system in this planet using animal parts constructed by flesh magic. All in all, it took me four months to make all the bio equipment, and another three months to find the signal of the dimensional weapon.

In truth though, If I explained howI made the All Seeing Eye, the other six heroes would probably be able to make their own versions with enough time. Now that's a scary thought.

Gore Traveegal: "You made a really scary thing using the knowledge I gave you regarding all living creatures' abilities. You even asked me for the location of certain rare monsters that you'll need and hunted them down on your own in order to get their powers. You're a real monster, Henry."

Lord Gore said to me as he denied my humanity.

Selk: "It had to be done. You said it yourself, if we didn't win this war, the demons would have taken over multiple dimensions, and you Gods would have been killed by the Dark God that was backing the demons. If I didn't become a monster that time, it would have been over for all of us."

Gore Traveegal: "I know, and we thank you for that. But one more question still remains a mystery to me. I know you already destroyed the super computer, but why haven't you destroyed the satellites yet? I can still feel them in orbit."

Selk: "I'm still using them to absorb the evil miasma that's preventing you Gods from observing this planet. It might take around five to ten more months before Goddess Zhitarine can monitor this world completely again."

I said to Lord Gore, explaining why I can't destroy the satellites yet.

Gore Traveegal: "I see... Well, that's all I wanted to say for now. I'll see you next week. Good luck with your entrance exam and be safe, Henry."

Selk: "Thank you, Lord Gore. See you next week then."

And with that, I woke up after talking to Lord Gore. It appears I woke up first since Allice is still asleep. I woke Allice up and asked her to get dress. It would appear that Attendants are allowed to accompany us students on the first day of school, so Allice and I will be going together to the opening ceremony and the entrance examination.

Allice: "I Thought you're already accepted as a student here, Dr. Selk? Why do you still need to go through an entrance exam?"

Selk: "Well, the entrance exam is actually more of a ranking exam. This exam will tell show who should be put on the top rank sections right down to the bottom sections."

I told Allice as I put on my tie.

Selk: "Oh, and I'm sorry I haven't taught you any healing or flesh magics yet. But once all of the activities of this day is done, we will start with your flesh and healing magic training, okay."

Allice: "R-really, Dr. Selk? Oh, thank the Gods. I promise to follow all your instructions to the letter."

Allice said as she hugged me tightly. Once we were done getting dressed we headed straight to the university's large assembly hall. on the way we met Vina, Lira, and Sarah who accompanied us towards the assembly hall.

Before we could get there though, we met one more familiar face. It was Vina who noticed Gilbert Alvar (formerly Park, San Gyun) first and greeted him. Yet, instead of greeting Vina and the rest of us back, he pulled out the sword resting on his left hip and said.

"Selcurial Malferd Shroudder, I challenge you to a dual."