The royal castle fell.
Although no particular announcement was made, all the people in the royal capital were aware of it.
In the castle, where the sound of battle had long since ceased, the banner of a rose painted with fresh blood was raised, and the undead strode along the walkways on the castle walls.
Finally, a large army from neighboring territories began to arrive on the scene, but all was already over.
Seeing the banner raised in the royal castle, the knights stopped their steps on the street.
There was no way they could retake the castle against a monster that had defeated the country’s most powerful knights and even the most powerful fighter, the Commander of the First Order.
There were no undead posted on the city walls to watch over them, but even so, they did not set foot inside the royal capital out of fear of what might happen.
＊ ＊ ＊
“Ah… ah… ah, ah… ah, ah…”
In front of the castle, an execution platform was set up, where a slow process of execution was going on.
A broken groan that couldn’t even be described as a scream flowed intermittently.
Lawrence was hanging on the crucifixion stand.
What used to be Lawrence was hanging.
The upper half of his body still retained its original shape.
The lower half, however, had been replaced by a bloated, pulsating mass of flesh three times the size of Lawrence’s original body.
Several zombies swarmed over the execution platform. They devoured Lawrence’s body with a voracious appetite. With each bite, Lawrence groaned.
With his tongue pulled out and his throat crushed, he could no longer speak.
Lawrence was devoured by the zombies, but he did not die.
Before the damage exceeds his capacity, his companion, a lich, healed him.
However, it was not magic for human beings.
“≪Corpse Repair≫”
As the lich used his magic, one of the zombies that had been serving as the “executioner” fell into the mass of flesh in Lawrence’s lower body.
The zombie fused directly into the mass of flesh, and Lawrence’s body, which had been injured as a result of the exchange, recovered. A replacement zombie rose to the execution platform.
The lower half of his body was, so to speak, a fuel depot. It supplied the material to regenerate the upper body and the nourishment to keep Lawrence from dying.
Lawrence, whose life had been sustained by the jointing of corpses, was now more like a fresh golem made of corpses than a member of the human race.
But as his life had not yet ended, his soul had not left his body, and he had not lost his human consciousness.
His head was bound and secured to a crucifix, and he was made to face straight ahead.
Beyond that was a large mirror that the skeletons were holding as an offering. It was brought out from inside the castle
Through this mirror, which was illuminated by magic lights at night, Lawrence was able to continue to see his own deformed form.
Proof of defeat. The end of the once glorious Commander of the First Order.
A space for spectators was set up in front of the execution platform.
There were no citizens there, simply because they were too afraid of the undead to approach.
On the road leading to the square, if only from the shadows of its buildings, there were those who could see Lawrence.
There were a few here and there who vomited and swooned from the horror and sickening sight of the undead.
Some kneeled and prayed to God in despair.
And there were those who laughed … There were the citizens who were disgusted by the end of the Knight Commander who betrayed the former King Elbert.
“Kill me……h-e… Kill m-e…”
＊ ＊ ＊
On the other side of the wall, Hilbert was suffering the same thing.
“Goo… Uh, bah, ah…”
Enduring the pain of being eaten from the guts and vomiting blood from the back of his throat, Hilbert still desperately stared ahead.
In the mirror, he saw the king in a hideous, unbearable state. He should not have been the king to show such a thing to his people. It was the king’s role to correct himself and to serve as a banner for his people, no matter the situation.
Hilbert knew that there was no way to save himself, and that death was his only release.
But even so, someone might come to save him. If so, he would have to speak with that hero as a king.
This thought alone kept Hilbert sane.
… He did not know that René had seen through his thoughts and was preparing for the next method he would be subjected to.
＊ ＊ ＊
The people of the royal city began to flee, at first in small groups, and then in large caravans.
The undead were all holed up in the castle, so they could escape if they wanted to.
Some loaded their belongings on wagons, some pulled carts, some carried on their backs, and some carried only themselves.
The reinforcements that were assembling were simply guiding the refugees.
From the balcony of the royal castle, René watched the scene of the evacuation, which resembled an ant march.
“Run away.”
René muttered to herself.
“Even if I kill you someday, even if I destroy you eventually, I’m not in the mood for that right now. Fear and flee. Rest in this short-lived nightmare.”
Some of them must have exulted in the coup and some of them must have been eager to execute René. She could have killed them all. Shooting «Calamity Flash» from there into the ranks of the refugees would probably result in the deaths of 100 people or more.
But for now, she was full of it when she destroyed a country. People who lost their country were thrust into the midst of chaos. Everyone would suffer and some would die. That was enough for the time being.
Too many atrocities in a row and … her heart would fray. So that was all for now.
–I wonder if they would be more scared of me if they thought I was ‘capricious and my behavior was hard to read’ or something like that?
A little bit stronger, René thought.
Besides, killing isn’t always revenge. Making them regret and giving them time to despair was also revenge.
So that was all for now.
“Well.”
René left the balcony and entered the castle. Right there was the audience chamber.
The audience chamber was covered with human bones.
These were the undead soldiers used in the battle of the royal capital.
The ones that were not being used were returned to mere corpses for the time being, since leaving them out would eat up magic power.
Only the elite ghouls knelt quietly around the throne to greet René.
René jumped onto the throne and sat down, gazing out at the disastrous and desolate landscape.
A hall filled with dirty bones. The walls that used to be pure white were painted with red roses, covered with cursed blood.
“Where shall we destroy next?”
＊ ＊ ＊
The Adventurers’ Guild of Saktamburg, the capital of the Federation of Gireshtal, was the “Northwest Regional Headquarters” that controlled the Guilds of not only the entire huge Federation, but also those of neighboring nations.
In a building larger than the royal castle of Ciel-Terra, the Adventurers’ Guild not only managed adventurers and their quests, but also carried out administrative work and made ‘policy decisions’ on a scale comparable to that of a country’s government.
A place near the top floor of such a building.
The Guild’s senior officials were gathered in a conference room where it would have been appropriate to welcome foreign heads of state and hold a summit meeting.
They were seated at a round table, and in their hands, magically transcribed documents were being handed out.
One of the sheets was a Named Wanted Handbook created by the Adventurers’ Guild branch in Ciel-Terra.
It depicted a picture of a beautiful girl with her eyes silently closed in prayer, holding her own head like an offering.
The discussion item on the agenda was the designation of Named Monsters for a wide area.
Normally, Named Monsters were individually designated by the guilds in the area of activity, but if they were too powerful or moved from place to place, or if their influence was extensive, they would be assessed by the headquarters and given a wide-area designation.
“Isn’t the equivalent of a 7th class Great cheap for a monster that has destroyed a country?”
A man on the Named Monster Selection Committee said impatiently.
To this the chairman replied.
“It is a provisional designation. We will need to investigate further.”
“We can’t just issue designations of the 8th class Hero and the 9th class Braver so quickly.”
“That’s right. If we call it a 7th class Great, at least the average people won’t go near it.”
“So it’s an annotation?”
“That’s right.”
Several of them groaned at the arrangement.
The existence of a powerful monster often came to light suddenly, but it was often because people missed the process of the monster’s growth and only recognized it when it reached a staggering level.
In contrast, this case was truly a newborn monster with extraordinary power.
It was too narrative, including the circumstances leading up to its birth.
But stories are good because they are enjoyed as stories, not because they are elevated to the stage of real tragedy.
“But this is … negligence, isn’t it? They haven’t notified us for a month after the local designation was issued.”
When someone said that, everyone’s eyes focused on one of the people seated at the round table.
He was an elderly man with an egg-like form and an obese figure. He was the former Guildmaster of Ciel-Terra. He had come to the Northwest Regional Headquarters to report.
Originally, a report on a named incident, no matter how small, would be submitted to the higher headquarters. The purpose was to examine the case closely to see if a wide-area designation was necessary or if there was any information of note mixed in. But there was no such report.
The Guildmaster of Ciel-Terra, scratching his head where only a few gray hairs remained, explained in his defense.
“I think you should complain to the administration in charge. Thanks to their reluctance to give us information, we couldn’t say whether it was there or not.”
“If I wanted to complain, the people involved are no longer with us.”
“What a messy legacy they left for us…”
Everyone was disgusted with the last king of Ciel-Terra, who was the cause of the creation of the powerful named monster.
If there was a strong monster there, it would not necessarily be a business opportunity for the Adventurers’ Guild…
In some cases, there would be more work to be done to ensure the safety of the adventurers who were members of the Guild. Especially if dealing with a major monster that would require a wide-area named designation.
“Let’s take a decision. To designate the mutant Dullahan Lord or Lich Lord confirmed in the Kingdom of Ciel-Terra as a 7th class Great Threat, with the name “Princess Rose of Hellrage”.”
““No objection.””
Thus, the designation of a Named was unanimously decided upon.
However, they would soon come to learn.
That even the designation of the 7th class Great level as a wide-area Named Monster was a too tame measure.
Named monster “Rose Princess of Hellrage”. Eventually, she would take the world by storm…
“Now for the next report. The frequency of Sea Serpent appearances in the South Seas in the area where the Callisto Mechanized Pirates are active…”
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