"Helen. The Lord is requesting your presence." An old woman called, sounding a bit jealous. Helen didn't even look at her as she murmured a quiet "Alright". The hand that was currently being tugged and pulled by little giggling orphans was pulled away, ignoring the loud whines of said orphans.

She smiled slightly at the orphans before giving a nod to the matron, a kind middle-aged woman who'd been hired by the church to run the hospital. She'd done a wonderful job so far, treating the orphans as the children she never had, and would never have due to a grievous wound she received to her womb.

"Grow strong and healthy brats, so that one day, you will become amazing like me." She boasted. The children started yelling and boasting too, their innocence was so painfully obvious that Helen's heart couldn't help but twinge in pain at the thought of what was coming far too quickly.

War. The greatest war that this world would likely see for a long time, no matter the outcome.

As she left the orphanage, she could see the soldiers lining the streets, expressions filled with steel and murder in their eyes.

On the rooftops, she could faintly see the spy and ranger corps heading to their hidden taverns and gathering grounds. In the streets, merchants were trying to sell everything as quickly as they could, offering exceptional prices to the men and women heading towards what would either prove to the world the superiority of the Sacred Goddess, or the complete annihilation of mankind.

Helen knew that she too held the same eyes as those men and women. All the pain, injustice, discrimination, abuse, torture, and rape attempts she received from the elves guaranteed that no love was held between herself and that damnable race.

On an intellectual level, she knew elves and humans were extremely similar. In fact, they probably held the same ancestors. However, on an emotional level, she saw elves as nothing more than monsters that needed to be purged from the world. She wasn't the only one who held this train of thought.

As she quickly headed towards the nearest church, her head was so in the clouds that she ended up bumping against someone.

"Oh, my apologies... Lady Helen!?" The person she bumped, a large man that had two large axes strapped to his back.

"Hm. Gregor, yes? My sincere apologies, my head is a bit in the clouds today..." She murmured before quickly darting around him and speeding away.

Gregor scratched his head in confusion. The borderline legendary Helen Judas just bumped him and then immediately left? Apparently, the war seemed to be taking its toll even on the legendary figures of the Golden Republic before it even started.

Helen finally arrived at a church, a rather small one just recently established at the edges of Jade City. The priests there all quickly bowed slightly to her, and she nodded in return before quickly heading up to the innermost room of the church.

In that room were large Golden Republic banners hanging onto every wall, and in the center was a large, complicated rune that glowed a slight golden hue.

Heading over to this rune, she stood on top of it and whispered "The Lord's Realm."

Immediately, she felt the world shift, and the next instant, she reappeared over to the Sacred Palace, in the arrival room. She quickly sped out of there and over at the main area, where her Lord was sure to be hanging out at, as she always did.

Helen knew of her Lord's borderline obsession with all things shiny and expensive, thus, she wasn't surprised to see a number of extremely expensive-looking jewelry pieces lining the statues and walls, along with beautiful artworks decorating the more empty spots.

Hearing voices coming from the main hall, she fearlessly strode in, her steps filled with confidence gained by years upon years of hellish training and battles. With a sweep of eyes, she immediately determined the situation.

The Sacred Generals were all gathered on one side of the great hall, while Bishops were on the other. The Grand Council members were here too, their seats equal to those of both Bishops and the Sacred Generals, signifying that their positions were not any lower than theirs. Many of those on the Grand Council were old men and women who had lived through countless things, and thus, held the necessary experience to run a nation efficiently.

And of course, above everyone, staring down at the people that she had chosen to take under her wings, sat the highest power of the entire Golden Republic, the absolute Lord of mankind, the greatest hope for every abused orphan through the entire continent: The Sacred Light Goddess.

The Lord smiled widely upon seeing who just arrived, and with a beckon of her finger, she invited Helen at her special seat, designed to only be under that of the Lord. It was a clear declaration of Helen's status and the favor she was graced with, and Helen's heart swelled every time she sat on it.

She would rather die than disgrace the Lord who had allowed to rise to where she was today. Hence, with dignified and confident steps, she reached her special seat and plopped her sexy ass down on it, lazily swinging one leg over the other and crossing her arms in a posture that might or might not have been copied by the one the Lord usually held.

The Lord's smile only intensified upon seeing this, a trace of humor in her eyes. With a cough, she hid both away and turned back to her subjects.

"Well then. I'm sure everyone knows why we're gathered here today, I assume." With a sweep of her divine eyes, she watched as everyone nodded slightly.

"Good, in that case, what I'm about to announce will shock just about nobody. We're going to war." She declared, her tone filled with steel, but still with a hint of playfulness that unconsciously allowed the various elites gathered here to relax just a little.

She lightly waved her hand in the direction of the Sacred Generals. "Report the situation, please."

Coughing slightly, one of the generals stood up. "My Lord, the Sword Corp is ready for deployment at any time. Your will is my command." Having said that, he sat back down, and immediately, another general stood up.

"My Lord, the Archer Corp is ready for deployment at any time. Your will is my command." Repeating his predecessor, he sat back down. The various corps then stood up, reporting their readiness.

Helen watched all of this with slight boredom. She never did understand the need for all of these formalities, but when she asked her Lord, she'd just smiled and said, "It makes them feel important, and gives them a sense of rhythm. You'll understand eventually."

She yet had to do so.

Finally, the last general stood up, a grimace on his slightly aged face. "My Lord, I fear the Mage Corp should not be deployment for yet another couple years. Our mages are all still very inexperienced, and I fear that thrusting them into the war like this will not help at all, and they might even be a detriment." He bowed but didn't sit down, awaiting the Lord's judgment with a hitched breath.

Contrary to the man's expectation, but not at all to those of Helen, the Lord merely laughed slightly. "As expected. We cannot expect to obtain powerful mages that easily. No worries, the priests should be able to handle all the magic required until the mages can be deployed. We might suffer a bit in the civilian matters because of this, though. Are there any problems with that?" She asked, glancing over to the Grand Council members.

They all shook their heads, as the elected Council Head, or more commonly called President, stood up. "No, my Lord. Our bureaucrats have successfully taken a lot of the load that the priests had carried up until now. The only department that desperately needs the priests is the law department, due to a lack of solid lawyers."

The president only held a little more power than the other council members, but the biggest privilege of becoming the president was the ability to directly speak for the council. This became especially prestigious during meetings of the Grand Council with the Lord, as there was no human alive who didn't wish to be able to speak with their Goddess.

The Lord nodded with a smile, glancing over at the Head Bishop. The man quickly nodded, "We will immediately begin training a number of lawyers according to the law code you have written, My Lord."

"Perfect." Clapping her hands together, Helen watched as her Lord waved a giant hologram into existence in the middle of the meeting area, allowing everyone to easily look at it.

"These are the plans drafted up by the Sacred Generals. I have personally gone over all of them and improved them slightly, but I will still admit that many of them were incredibly well-thought out. My praises to all of you." She said. The generals all either smiled or beamed, clearly overjoyed.

Helen, however, immediately noticed the moment that her Lord finished speaking, her whole posture changed. She immediately recognized the change, having seen it herself a couple of times. It reminded her of that time she had seen the true wrath of Her Lord falling upon the four Royal Mages that had threatened her while she had still been but a mere weakling.

"This will not be a pretty war. Blood will flow from both sides, and mountains of corpses will be formed. However, thanks to my priests, any fatal injury should be easily treatable once off the battlefield, and any non-fatal one should be easily patched up during the fighting. Thus, I'm expecting far more casualties on the enemy side."

Her lord's eyes were closed now as her mouth spoke words of death and steel in her honey-like voice. Everyone in the room unconsciously straightened under the unseen but easily felt pressure emanating from their glorious Lord.

The Lord's eyes shot back open, and immediately, the hologram that had still been fuzzy and unrecognizable changed into a giant map. In the center of it stood the area that Jade City occupied, including the various outposts. Their area was golden, while red signified all the enemies, which basically meant everyone else.

"This war will have two stages, I expect. The first will be the Blitz, in which we should easily be able to trample everything under the might of our forces. We currently have hundreds of temples already pre-built, their runes are already written down. I have already initiated a connection between my Divine Realm and them, and it would take but a moment to finalize it. Thus, we must gain as much land as possible as fast as possible."

The generals nodded. That had been their plan as well, while the bishops already looked pain at the prospect of the mountains of paperwork they'd soon be swamped in. The Grand Councilmen looked thoughtful.

The President stood up. "My Lord, what will be the occupation policy of the land we take?"

Sacred Light's smile sent pleasant shivers down everyone's back, including Helen. "Naturally, we will colonize everything. The prior residents will be completely and utterly purged from this world, their land and wealth seized. Thanks to the War temples, the countryside will be perfectly safe for our settlers to move into, and Helen here will make sure any and all beasts deemed too dangerous to be kept alive meet their rightful end."

All eyes in the room shifted to Helen, who maintained her lazy expression. "Naturally, My Lord. I shall accomplish my duty to perfection. Will I be doing it alone or will there be support?"

Her Lord looked slightly rueful as she sighed. "I'm afraid I'll need you to do this alone, Helen, at least during the Blitz phase. All our forces will be focused on complete offense, and I need someone who can quickly take care of everything before heading back to the frontline in an instant."

Helen nodded, having expected the answer. Currently, they boasted a population of 120.000 people, but compared to the millions of elves and beastmen, they were extremely under-populated. Thus, every single life was extremely valuable, and only she held the capability to act on both the homefront and battlefront.

The eyes in the room shifted back to the Lord as she continued. "Anyways, the goal of the Blitz is to reach all the way to the elven capital and capture it. It's an extremely important city for three reasons. One, it is the main trade hub of the entire continent, and if we can capture it, we'll be able to choke our enemies' trade to death. Second, it will be an immense moral blow to the elven people. Third, it will be amazing propaganda for our own. Luckily, all the elven and beastmen forces are currently focused on the demon armies, thus, we won't meet much resistance."

With a wave of her hand, the golden area on the hologram shifted, swiftly expanding in all directions. Considering it's relative closeness to the ocean, a giant pocked would be formed, encircling a giant area of both elven and beastmen territory. Thanks to the war temples, reinforcements would be completely cut off, and the large pocket would easily be overrun. Then, the human forces would swiftly rush to secure the most fertile lands and most productive mines of the Elven kingdom, which were all around the elven capital. After that area had fallen, the capital would be next, and then the surrounding areas would be further occupied.

By the end of it all, the entire western side of the continent would be occupied, forming a huge, somewhat straight line dividing the continent into east and west. Considering the demons were the ones who originally held the most lands in the east, their territories would remain mostly untouched. Thus, it would be unlikely for them to immediately attack the humans. Rather, they would seize the occasion and shatter the elven and beastman army, which would have nowhere to retreat.

The Beastmen kingdom would have a lot of its land seized, but it would still retain a large portion in the east. Out of all of them, the elves would be the ones who would suffer the most, with almost no land remaining if everything went according to plan.

Having shown everything, the Lord's eyes turned back to those of her followers, who did not dare to meet her gaze. "This will be a massive amount of land to hold, probably far more than we reasonably could. However, thanks to the war temples that will be deployed in every strategic location, we will be able to hold onto it. The army will at this point make use of the teleportation ability of the temples to fight off attacks at the new borders, focusing completely on defense for an indeterminate amount of time as our people settle into the lands and the purge of elves and beastmen alike is carried out by our elites, just like they once did to us."

Her words caused a frenzy of discussion amongst everyone present, and the Lord did nothing to stop it. Finally, the President once more stood up.

"My Lord, how should we carry out the resettlement of the population? It would require almost 80% of Jade City's citizens to be moved out to begin proper colonization..." The President trailed off.

"Naturally, we will encourage them with the promise of land, glory, and wealth. Money and supplies will be funded to all of those who wish to re-settle, and I will personally ask my dear followers to do sacrifice a little bit for the future of our nation, and for a glorious future for their children." The Lord smiled, eyes gleaming.

"That will be the second phase of the war: the Colonization. Our army will focus completely on defense, aided by our war temples, and they will allow for our civilians to settle down onto the newly acquired lands. I will not tell you all what comes after the second phase, for even I cannot predict that far." Helen listened attentively as the Lord finished outlying the plan. She smiled somewhat cruelly at the thought of a good old purge for the enemies of her Lord.

An hour later, all of it filled with boring talk about details and civilian plans, the Lord made the final announcement for the meeting.

"My cute little followers, I am glad to announce that a proper commander has been found for the Holy Warriors," Sacred said. Everyone fell silent as they awaited her next words.

"I announce... Helen Judas as the new Holy Champion."

Helen shot to her feet, eyes gleaming with happiness and secretly dancing in happiness in the safety of her mind. She'd expected this, and yet, hearing it with her own ears only made it all the more special.

Everyone present, excluding Sacred Light and Helen, began clapping. After a little, the Lord waved for everyone to stop.

"Helen, my dear, you will probably have the hardest job of everyone here. Thus, it is only reasonable that you have authority to do as you wish. Sacred Generals, should Helen command you to do something, I expect you to obey it perfectly. Am I understood?" She glanced at the generals, who all quickly nodded complacently. If the Lord says to jump off a bridge, you don't ask why. You jump off the fucking bridge. And if she orders you to obey someone, you god damn obey that person.

"Dear, your job will be though. You will need to coordinate the Holy Warriors with the regular troops and use them to secure key positions. I will give you the plans later, but they are but mere plans. Should the situation call for it, you may discard them. The only absolute requirement this campaign has, and I'm looking at you too, generals, is that everything gold on this map should be ours by winter at most. Am I clear?"

Determined nods were all the answer Sacred needed. Before dismissing everyone, her last words were "By week's end, everything, and I do mean everything, will need to be ready. Prepare well, for I cannot interfere in the war until the big guy shows up."

As everyone left the Sacred Palace, swiftly heading out to begin last-minute preparations, Sacred Light watched with a dark gleam in her eyes.

"Little God Tree, you truly are a foolish thing. To choose to go into hibernation at such a time... I wonder what's wrong with its brain, if it even has one."

Her eyes turned inward, gleefully observing the towering gold, silver, and rainbow balls of light that rested inside her soul. "90% completion for all of my domains... By the time the little tree comes out and notices what has happened, everything should be ready."

Sacred smiled cruelly. Her words were big, her plans were bigger, but her ambition was the sky. The moment everything fell into place, this entire continent would fall into the palm of her hand, and after that... Well, the world wasn't such a big place after one became a true god, was it?