Chapter 527: Milena's Fight

Milena hadn't expected things to move this fast—and Monica hadn't expected to lose this fast, either.

She'd poured all her effort into mastering charm, but that didn't mean she was actually helpless in a fight. All those demons she'd devoured over the years hadn't been for nothing.

Her ten-foot frame gave her real physical power, and she was no slouch with a blade either. Musclebound though the cambion had been, he had been tossed around like a toy in Monica's hands.

But against a heavily armored undead who charged faster than one could fly, Monica lasted all of two seconds.

The flaming longsword came at her from impossible angles. Milena's arms seemed to have no joints at all, and were whip-flexible in every direction.

After a few rapid strikes, both the blade in Monica's hand and the tail behind her had been sliced into ribbons. Then, her stomach was cut wide open.

It was only because she was so tall that the stroke hadn't beheaded her instead.

"Wait! Don't kill me, I'm still useful!"

Monica clutched her stomach, straining to heal the wound. Another strike like that, and it would all be over.

Milena rested the longsword against her throat. "Every devil says that."

"It's true. You want to reach Archduchess Sariel, but this territory isn't the only thing standing in your way! I can cut your travel time in half."

Milena had no way to judge whether Monica was telling the truth, so she simply tossed her the lie-detecting ring.

Monica's fingers were too large for the ring to fit properly, so she had to hold it clenched in her hand instead while repeating her claim.

To Milena's surprise, the oversized succubus turned out to be telling the truth.

Milena frowned. "Do all you devils only start telling the truth once you know you're about to die?"

Monica managed a wry smile. "This is Hell. If you tell the truth from the start, you'd be dead."

Milena didn't know how to argue with that. This kind of complicated reasoning was beyond her. She was still, after all, an undead barely a year old.

That said, since this succubus really did seem to have useful information, Milena decided to spare her for now. Whisperwood branches coiled around Monica's body, keeping her magic permanently suppressed, as the mop-up began.

If Monica had simply surrendered outright, her charm could have brought the fortress's devils back into the fold peacefully. But Milena didn't dare risk unleashing her abilities freely. Any devil freed from Monica's charm either fled outright or ended up killed by Milena instead.

That round of fighting cost her a few more of her own subordinates.

Of the original thirteen cambions, only five were still alive. The rest had all been converted into undead.

Still, the forces under Milena's command had grown considerably. The fortress's devils had left behind well over a thousand corpses, every one of which had been added to Milena's ranks as cannon fodder.

As her undead army swelled larger and larger, though, Milena found herself a little troubled.

She wasn't cut out for command.

If they'd all been high-ranking death knights, that wouldn't have been an issue. Milena had no trouble leading a cavalry charge. But most of what she had were low-grade cannon fodder like skeletons and zombies, and the only real order she knew how to give was, "Charge in and start biting."

A real necromancer would never throw away their undead creations so carelessly. Not every necromancer could casually conjure a soul from nothing with bare hands the way her father could.

And dragging along a horde of slow-moving undead would only slow her down. She could hardly march at a walking pace alongside a mob of skeletons and zombies.

So Milena turned to the badly wounded cambion and asked, "You seem pretty sharp. Want to become my follower?"

By that point, the cambion didn't have a single unbroken bone left in his body. Even so, at Milena's words he still forced himself upright and said, loudly, "I would be honored. Please, Mistress, let me be your servant! I swear my absolute loyalty—"

Before he could finish, the cambion saw Milena draw her longsword and raise it high overhead.

"Wait! Mistress, what are you doing?"

Milena said, "I'm going to turn you into a death knight. Don't worry, you won't lose your mind the way the zombies did. And... you'll probably come out stronger, too."

Any high-ranking undead knew how to convert a living creature into one of the undead: all it took was infusing dark magic into a living body. Simple in theory, but the results varied enormously depending on who exactly performed the conversion.

Black Rose was among the very best at it. Given unlimited resources, she could produce a death knight who was a born legend, exactly like Milena. Ambrose himself hadn't studied that particular art as deeply, but when it came to soul creation, no one could match him. Given enough time and resources, he too could probably have conjured a legendary-tier wraith from scratch.

But Ambrose and Black Rose were both members of the Elegiac Society, once-in-a-generation talents even among the undead. For an ordinary necromancer, producing even a single high-ranking undead was already enough to earn the title of "Master."

Milena herself wasn't especially skilled at undead conversion, but she had more than enough raw dark magic, plus a small mountain of expensive and precious accessories besides. Preserving the cambion's intelligence through the process wasn't especially difficult. As for his future growth potential... well, Milena hadn't chosen him for his combat prowess anyway. Keeping his mind intact was really all that mattered.

As the flaming sword rose overhead, the cambion threw up a hand in alarm. "Wait, Mistress! I'm happy being a cambion. Is turning me into an undead really necessary?"

Milena's blade paused mid-air. She looked the cambion straight in the eye. "Devils will never earn my trust. But given how hard you fought just now, I'll give you a choice. I can hand you some soul-coins and set you free. Or, I can turn you into a death knight myself, and you'll become my loyal servant for good."

The cambion knew he stood at a genuine crossroads.

The choice in front of him mattered: abandon his identity as a cambion and join the undead's ranks, or walk away with a fortune instead? He wasn't especially worried Milena would go back on her word. He'd watched her closely enough by now to know that she was far too proud to lie to him, and honestly not very good at lying to begin with.

But the cambion wasn't ready to decide just yet. He still didn't fully know what this undead noble was truly capable of... He looked out over the slaughterhouse of a battlefield around them. Well, fine. She'd already proven she was capable of plenty.

Just a short while ago, Milena had been fighting entirely alone against an entire devil horde, all of whom had turned on her at once under Monica's charm.

And yet she had simply summoned a towering blue tree and gone on a rampage. Her combat power was, frankly, terrifying. Short of an actual god, there was probably no one left who could match her.

"Still hesitating? Go ahead and leave, then."

Milena tossed down a handful of soul-coins. Devils survived on that kind of currency, and absorbing them should heal the cambion's wounds well enough. She'd just let him go, then.

Milena felt a flicker of disappointment. How was it that her own father could make practically anyone bend to his will without effort? Elven queens, goddesses of every stripe, savage kouto, greedy goblins—regardless of race or status, just a few words from him was all it took for them to hand over everything they had.

And here she couldn't even win over one measly cambion.

The frustration stung. She didn't even want to look at this devil anymore. One more second, and she might just run him through out of sheer irritation.

But just as Milena turned to walk away, the cambion spoke up again. "Honored Mistress, I'm not refusing your offer. But I promised to guide you to the Blood River, then to its namesake fortress via a hidden route. If you turn me into an undead now, I'm worried the connections I've already built might no longer be worth anything."

Milena turned back, surprised, and fixed her gaze on the cambion. "Are you serious?"

"Of course." The cambion held up the ring on his hand, still showing no glow whatsoever.

"I swear it on my soul. I'm sick of being a drifter. No matter how hard I try, I keep getting trampled underfoot like garbage the moment I run into a devil as powerful as this succubus. I refuse to accept that, and I won't spend my whole life as some spineless drifter. So I want your protection, Mistress—and in exchange, I'll clear every obstacle from your path with everything I have."

Milena's eyes lit up. "Not bad. I'll give you that chance."

The cambion pressed the soul-coins into his own chest. Roaring flame burst from his wounds as he greedily absorbed the soul energy, mending the damage to his body. Within moments, he was back on his feet, looking noticeably sturdier than before.

Milena exclaimed in surprise, "Devils are pretty convenient, actually. They're not that different from the undead."

The cambion was about to compliment her in return when Monica cut in with a sneer, "What a waste. His injuries didn't need anywhere near that many soul-coins. And honestly, that cambion's only got a bit of cunning going for him. His talent is mediocre at best, so most of that soul energy just went to waste. If you handed those coins to me instead, Mistress, I could generate far more value for you."

The cambion narrowed his eyes at Monica. The oversized succubus was already angling to steal his credit. Typical for a devil, really, to switch allegiances at the drop of a hat.

Still, this actually worked in the cambion's favor. It proved that Monica had genuinely submitted. At least until Milena ran into a devil more powerful than herself, Monica wouldn't dare betray her.

Rather than trade barbs with Monica, the cambion turned to Milena. "Mistress, since our succubus lady here is willing to help, perhaps we should adjust our plan. A succubus's abilities are extremely useful. Without proper defenses, even a devil far more powerful than her could be charmed.

"The nearby lords will have enchanted gear specifically built to resist her charm. But it seems your own power can neutralize that kind of protection outright, can't it?"

Before Milena could process what the cambion meant, Monica let out a shriek. "You little worm! Do you have any idea what you're doing?! Are you insane? Do you want to start a war?!"

The cambion sneered. "Look around you. The war's already started. Every devil that fled from here will spread word of your defeat, and the nearby lords will come tearing your corpse apart the moment they hear of it."

Monica had no rebuttal. That was the plain truth.

No devil would ever pass up a weakened neighbor. Within an hour or two, the other lords' armies would already be on their way.

The cambion dropped to his knees before Milena, his voice charged with excitement. "Mistress, raise your sword high and conquer this wasteland. This succubus will be the key to seizing this whole region quickly."

Milena felt a rush of excitement at that.

She was an undead born for war. Milena's very existence had been meant to help her mother tear down that vast empire. She should have been out on a battlefield somewhere, swinging her sword against the Holy Light itself, but fate never gave her the time to grow into that role. In the final battle that had come to pass, like every other legend of her generation, Milena had been swept away into another time and place by the power of the time dragon.

The helplessness she'd felt in that moment had stayed with her ever since.

Even after her mother later told her it had all been part of the plan—that Milena's sacrifice had drained the time dragon's power and laid the groundwork for their eventual victory—Milena still couldn't fully accept the outcome, deep down.

If she'd been born for war, how could she exist merely as something to be spent and discarded?

Fired up, she exclaimed, "Great. Then let's rally our forces and clear away every last obstacle between us and the Blood River!"

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