Looking back, there were many things he regretted. Even so, he did them, and if he had the chance… He didn't think he wouldn't do them again.
Fear, hatred, and uncertainty can drive someone to do irreparable things.
For example, becoming an Undead and betraying his entire race.
But no matter how much he was scolded for it, no matter how much any outsider might judge him… What did it matter? After all, his race was nearly extinct.
The reason? Monsters brought into this world by his race's ruler in a fit of egocentrism and brutal ambition, which ended in his death and the annihilation of his world dominion.
Logically speaking, purely in terms of numbers, regardless of whether the power of those monsters rivaled that of the strongest Dragon Lords below the Emperor and his son, even with casualties, the invaders should have been swiftly defeated.
But… That didn't happen.
They killed the Emperor, the Emperor's personal guards, and everyone who stood in their way.
Personally, Cure Elim, who had barely been born at the time, hadn't witnessed that event. He wasn't even alive then.
Even so, he heard the story from his kind, and considering the power with which they spoke of the Emperor, defeating him was… Simply unbelievable, in a bad way.
Fortunately, at that time, the monsters simply began massacring inferior species… Only to settle and protect one of the weakest races.
Humanity.
From there, the Slane Clan was born. Or perhaps they changed their name, or there was even a rebellion and a change of government. Cure Elim was never interested in going near that region.
He didn't know if those monsters were still there.
Returning to the story, Cure Elim didn't have a difficult childhood. His species only suffered enormous instability due to the loss of the Emperor, causing panic, fury, and wounded pride among other Dragon Lords. But the first… 100 years? They were peaceful, though tense.
And then…
They arrived.
The first monsters, that… Emperor's scum, didn't openly seek to wipe out the Dragons. Rather, after reflecting on it, he concluded that they must have been like cornered beasts. They simply killed the Emperor and his guards in self-defense, fled the hostile and unfamiliar place, and established their base. And certainly, they wiped out any Dragon Lord who came near.
But… The second wave. That was… Troublesome.
The Eight Kings of Greed. The name that resonated with power and fear throughout the world.
Even Cure Elim, who was technically immune to fear thanks to having sacrificed his nature and become an Undead, trembled at the name. At the memory.
The first wave was neutral, so to speak. But the second wave… It was a complete shift in how the entire world operated.
Dragons that lived for hundreds of years, if not millennia… All died in just decades. Those monsters were unstoppable. They slaughtered Dragon Lords as if it were second nature. They didn't defend themselves, they hunted them.
Cure Elim gritted his teeth, trying to push the memory of that time away.
Watching those monsters, tiny, barely bigger than a full-grown Dragon's finger, carrying off the corpses of powerful Dragon Lords as if they were picking apples.
The memory of their words made him shudder once more.
They didn't speak of how memorable the battle was, there was no hatred in their words, no anger, no actual thirst for blood.
They only spoke of materials… Levels… Experience…
They didn't treat them as opponents. They treated them with the coldness of a butcher to a pig.
'Do you think we can recreate Dragon Meat Steak?' 'Uh!' "I want a Dragon Eye necklace~ Those are like jewels~!" 'Well, it seems that no matter how many we kill, we don't gain any experience.' 'The materials are still there. And they're so weak compared to usual, it's almost cheating~' 'Should we catch one alive? That way its scales will grow back.'
Those words, so cold and mundane, as if they were speaking of mere products… They filled him with a mild panic.
It was ironic, since right now, Cure Elim was covered by meters of accumulated Zombies that he himself had created.
Living beings that he simply zombified for his own benefit. He wasn't so different from the Kings of Greed. At least on a very simplistic level.
Cure Elim didn't torture these people. He simply didn't see any enjoyment in their suffering, unless they deliberately tried to confront him. In that case, he could toy with them a little.
But all of this… He did it mainly out of fear. Fear of encountering those things again, and not having the power to even face them.
Was he pathetic? Perhaps. But he was strong. Even if he turned his back on his kind, abandoning his nature as a Dragon and becoming an Undead…
What was so terrible? He would die if he didn't.
Perhaps he was being too nihilistic, believing that what he did was the only thing he could do.
But it didn't matter. That had ceased to matter 200 years ago. There was no going back, and he had been safe and protected for so long.
And if one of those monsters found him? He would crush it.
He would use all his power, his corrupted Wild Magic, his impenetrable armor, his high-level spells.
Cure Elim was confident he could win.
… He used to be confident…
The feeling from that time made him clench his teeth. Not with anger, but with… Insecurity… He wasn't particularly familiar with the energy of his kind. But he could still sense it, not only when enormous amounts of Wild Magic were unleashed, but when one of them died.
And the death of a Dragon Lord certainly unsettled him.
Because it meant only one thing.
A new wave was coming.
That's not to mention… That more died afterward. One, then two, almost one after the other…
Cure Elim trusted in his power. But he wasn't the strongest Dragon Lord of them all, really. And… if four Dragon Lords died… then there was no way to guarantee he wouldn't lose.
He swallowed at the thought…
No… He… He had an ace up his sleeve. Something those monsters had no way of countering. There was no way of knowing. He'd never tested it on one of them. But he clung to that thought.
It was all he had.
He used one of his spells to peer through the 'eyes' of his armor, scanning the horizon… In the direction from which the sensations of his comrades' deaths had come…
…Well, he wasn't going to go there openly…
"Cure Elim." A voice, however, made him tense up, quickly using the same spell to scan his surroundings in 360 degrees to detect the presence he hadn't even noticed.
And then… He hissed, unable to feel true nervousness.
"Tsaindorcus…" He muttered under his breath, looking at the prince, who hadn't even dared to leave his cave, and had only brought armor.
…
Ramposa wasn't particularly happy.
Even when his depression vanished thanks to a spell cast by a servant of Deorum Regnum, it always returned.
Because he couldn't stop thinking about what had happened. About what he had lost.
About what he had caused…
The memories of that explosion of flames in Katze, just as his best warrior, his… His friend, was about to fight, and surely lose, against the Paladin Titania…
It haunted him. But what haunted him even more was what happened afterward.
He never saw it, it was simply as if something had pulled him away from the flames and left him in a safe place.
But… Naturally, as king, he couldn't remain ignorant of what had happened.
His kingdom… Was literally incinerated in a single day.
His son Zanac, the missing Barbro… His wives…
His people…
All reduced to ashes scattered across a black wasteland, which was later infested by Demons…
To say it affected him would be an understatement.
He seemed to age years upon learning of it…
He simply… lost almost all will to live…
Few survived. People who were outside of Re-Estize, for starters.
His daughter's two guards, who were also saved along with him…
And speaking of her…
Renner… She was his one and only remaining pillar. She was the only reason he hadn't abandoned all desire to live.
She was all he had left.
He had no throne, no friends, no people… Even his family was nearly wiped out…
All he had left was Renner… His precious daughter…
How she survived all of that was a mystery.
Deorum Regnum revealed to him that Commander Achernar had been sent to search for survivors of Re-Estize after its incineration.
By sheer luck, he managed to find Renner, who had been kidnapped by Komodo forces for unknown reasons…
Just a second later… And who knows what would have become of his poor daughter…
And on top of that… Ramposa felt guilty. Unable to rule, unable to do anything… Both because of his age and his loss of will… He had to leave the mantle of any political responsibility he should have as king… Or rather, former king of Re-Estize, to Renner.
Honestly, if Ramposa could, he would give the title of queen to Renner immediately. He was no longer fit to rule… He just wanted… To stop causing trouble.
He caused the war with Deorum Regnum through his ineptitude… He allowed his kingdom to decline… He was the one who, through his weakness, sent his only friend to his death, who was saved by sheer luck by Titania at the time.
He was even willing to hand the throne to Barbro, who, although he loved him, was unfit to be king. He was easily influenced, arrogant, a puppet of the nobles.
Zanac was a much better option, not to mention Renner.
And technically, she was the one who wore the mantle of queen. If you can even call it that.
Ramposa would have truly loved to give the crown to Renner.
But… What for?
It was… A symbol of a dead country. She wouldn't be queen of anything. There were no people to rule, not even a city. It was a dead wasteland where not even Demons remained after the defeat of Komodo.
He was king of no one.
He sank into his sofa, staring at the food they had brought him…
To begin with, it was incredibly kind of Deorum Regnum, the nation they had declared war on, to grant Renner a high-ranking noble title, entrust her with a plot of land, and, by extension, cover the costs of maintaining Ramposa
He was ashamed.
But he had no other choice.
He was a senile old man, lacking willpower, who could only sit, staring at the ceiling or the window while reminiscing about the good times, barely savoring the good food they brought him, anxiously awaiting the return of Deorum Regnum's maid to cast a spell that, even if only for a time, would banish this sadness, this depression.
He gazed out the window…
He admired the beautiful and vibrant city of Deorum Regnum…
Cleaner, more prosperous, and happier than Re-Estize had ever been…
No… He was only degrading the memory of his own home…
But… Even in that depression, he felt happiness. He knew his daughter would live in a powerful nation, and being important, her future would be secure, which was his only light in all the darkness of what had happened during all this time.
But he… He…
Hm… He would be content to curl up in the darkness, waiting for his imminent death…
…
For the Ice Giants, Dragons weren't the worst thing that existed.
At one time, Giants and Dragons were equals in the food chain, absolute rivals fighting for world domination.
Legends and tales tell of how, long ago, the King of the Giants fought hand-to-hand against the Dragon Emperor.
Their battle shook the earth and shattered the sky.
The Dragon Emperor was strong, but faced with the overwhelming resistance of the Giants, even that power couldn't destroy the King so easily.
However, that battle ended in tragedy for one side: the King's death.
From then on, the Dragons' dominion was assured for who knows how long.
The Dragon Emperor and the rest of his race made sure to keep the Giants isolated in their subspecies, controlled, and weak.
And then, the Warrior Gods arrived.
They slew the Dragon Emperor.
It seemed like a golden opportunity for the Giants, but the Warrior Gods settled in and protected the humans. Those little snacks vaguely similar to Giants, but tiny…
And years later, the true Warrior Gods arrived.
But a Warrior God isn't necessarily on the side of the Giants.
That was clear from their first arrival.
The whole world formed rivers of blood. And although Giant blood also flowed into the forming ocean, the greatest number of deaths came from the Dragons.
In just a few years, the empire they built crumbled. Their numbers dwindled, they were hunted to near extinction before the Warrior Gods killed each other for reasons unknown.
One would think this could be the perfect opportunity for the Giants to rebuild their kingdom. But they were weakened by years of oppression and estrangement.
The Mountain Giants and the Ice Giants, who lived side by side, barely exchanged words. There was an internal conflict that a legendary ruler should have been able to resolve. But that ruler never came.
Forgotten techniques, lost weapons… And so, the Giants became a pale shadow of their former selves.
They could slay Dragons, yes, but not Dragon Lords.
And with the arrival of more unexplained Warrior Gods, each with their own distinct intentions, the Giants would need many centuries to recover.
The Warrior Gods usually left them alone, so at least they helped reduce the number of Dragons from time to time.
Until… Another Warrior God arrived, thrashed the Ice Giant King, and subjected the Ice Giants to eternal servitude…
That was the final tragedy of the once proud race. A fate to which all Giant subspecies would eventually befall at the hands of the Warrior Gods.
Even so, their culture did not die out. They were not decimated, nor forced to change their ways.
They became servants, but they were protected.
So much so, that even the Ice Dragons had been conquered by the Warrior Goddess.
The centuries-old enemies united under a conquering banner that forced them to work together.
At least they no longer killed each other. That was the silver lining.
Although… As the Giants gradually integrated into some cities of the realm of the Gods, Deorum Regnum, their legends also resonated.
Not as warnings, but as mere tales.
One of them spoke of a monster that tormented the Ice Giants until it was sealed and frozen in the heart of a mountain that no one remembers.
The monster, according to records, was brought by humans at their peak, as they displaced its habitat during their expansion.
That is why, in contempt, as an insult to the humans for having brought them such a monster, they named the creature what the humans themselves referred to as:
'Ningen'.
…
Global warming certainly existed.
Much more controlled, thanks to the power of magic and the Dragon Lords, than, for example, on Earth.
That is to say, it would take much more to begin to significantly increase the global temperature, even by one degree.
Like, for example, a series of nuclear explosions, followed not long after by the complete incineration of an entire country, and the conversion of what remained of that country into a brutal war zone where more explosions of immense power were carried out.
And although, in general, most beings on the planet wouldn't notice much of a difference, for now at least, there was one who did.
Deep in a cave, in the heart of a mountain…
A block of blue ice, whose depth was unfathomable unless it broke through to a wall, cracked gently.
A brutal force slowly forced the ancient ice to break apart little by little.
Something was awakening from its slumber, from its prison.
And it was hungry.
…
"So the Minotaur Kingdom is seeking an economic alliance practically identical to the one they used to have with Baharuth." Superbia hummed, reading the document on her throne.
Naturally, thanks to the envoy the Supremes had appointed to the Minotaur Kingdom, they were on good terms, and trade was open with that nation.
It was astonishing to see they had developed such curious technology.
Nothing of real use to Titania, but being able to buy refrigerators, which kept raw meat from spoiling for much longer without spending Titania's resources, was an interesting perk.
Of course, no being on Titania needed that in the slightest.
Most of those who needed sustenance could eat plants or meat on the spot, or be fed in some other way. Or simply be ignored, as was the case with Superbia, who simply wore a Ring of Sustenance, and when she needed to eat, she fed on some Titanian POP moths long enough to go longer without food.
But for the non-Titanian inhabitants of Deorum Regnum, Beastmen, humans, elves, and others, such an invention was a marvel.
And although they generally maintained a fairly temperate climate thanks to the simple [Control Weather] spell, fans were still used for cooling.
But an official economic alliance was a different matter.
It meant that Deorum Regnum would have to export much more to the Minotaur Kingdom.
They had some interesting inventions, she'd grant them that.
But handing over Deorum Regnum's goods to a nation that barely had any influence from the Supremes, and worse, that also traded with the Argland Council, was… hardly tempting.
After all, Deorum Regnum would almost certainly be forced to trade some military equipment, however mediocre the Minotaurs' equipment was at best.
It didn't matter if they had Automatons; they were still far inferior to a Faerie soldier.
In other words, they would be giving more than they received. And the Minotaurs would surely look askance if they demanded more in exchange for equipment.
Likewise, the possibility of the Minotaurs reselling said equipment to the Argland Council, and thus strengthening the enemies of the Supremes… was foolish, to say the least.
But rejecting the alliance would also bring its own set of problems.
While Deorum Regnum didn't rely on international trade, they certainly needed some population and a variety of goods.
Cutting ties with the Theocracy and Argland caused a relative problem, though they obviously wouldn't work alongside enemies.
The Holy Kingdom and the Draconic Kingdom were still there, but both nations had too many problems to afford large-scale trade.
On one hand, the Draconic Kingdom had been ravaged by Beastmen hordes for decades, losing a large part of its population…
And on the other, the Holy Kingdom had been destroyed by Queen Dont's summoning.
Baharuth would have been a good trading partner, if Deorum Regnum hadn't been built upon its ruins. Re-Estize had high agricultural production, but they were incinerated to ashes by the Outer God summoned by the Supreme Ones.
In other words, the only economically viable area lay to the west, toward the Minotaur Kingdom, the Karsanas Alliance, and the lands beyond that Deorum Regnum had yet to explore.
The passage to the south was blocked by the Theocracy, to the north by the Council, and to the east lay the infernal wasteland that was Re-Estize, in other words, inconvenient for travel.
Technically, Deorum Regnum could claim the territory. But they didn't even have enough people to populate the land they already possessed.
Fairies had a slower reproductive rate than humans, and humans took a long time to mature.
The Beastmen were still mostly divided within their former 'kingdom,' which was now… Well, basically a colony of Deorum Regnum, since they couldn't unify with that territory due to other nations standing in the way.
In other words, they only had the Minotaur Kingdom as an active trading partner, soon to be Karsanas, but it was the same in terms of neutrality with Argland.
The Marble Queen glanced at the report a few more times before concluding that… The best course of action for her Ladies' realm would be to accept.
Encouraging trade between nations would enhance Deorum Regnum's image and open more diplomatic channels between the neutral and pro-Supreme states.
Likewise, it would allow Deorum Regnum to send units to explore more areas of this world without needing to hide it.
It would also open a supply route of some kind in case a war broke out.
These were unstable times, though that was the plan after all.
Hmm… And speaking of exploration…
She remembered Supreme Black Abyss mentioning something about wanting to visit a pole someday…
She mentally manifested a map…
Yes… If they navigated the waters of Argland, they could travel far north… And eventually, they would reach the North Pole.
And thus, they would fulfill a wish of the Supreme.
She hummed, making sure to prepare for a safe passage. After all, the Supreme wanted to see a native penguin.
.
.
.