In a room at the top of one imposing tower of the demonkin citadel were five figures looking down upon the land. Two of them were Isiurem Sicer and the black robed man whom Sile met before starting the siege. They were standing looking towards the battlefield while the other three were kneeling behind them, yet they exuded a sinister and powerful intimidating aura. They were clearly elites upon the demonkin ranks.

“Milord, they haven’t shown the slightest interest in advancing. They clearly know that operating a barrier of such magnitude should be very costly, and they employ tactics in order to force us to have it fully activated almost all the time. Even if we have it fully activated, then they will use focus attacks on the weak points, upon operating the energy of the barrier to reinforce that point, then they will disperse their attacks and attack the weak points created by the ripples of focusing the energy of the barrier.” One of the kneeling demonkins said with a stern voice full of hatred. “For some reason they seem to have a method to continuously assault us with elemental magic.”

“Greater elemental stones,” Said the standing black robed man next to Isiurem with a calm tone, “Although highly valuable, they are not that rare in the Holy Empire of Ivalice, it seems that she made some preparations.”

The greater elemental stones are a type of mineral that have absorbed elemental essences for thousands or even tens of thousands of years. When it is set up in some specialized spell circles, it can release the accumulated elemental essences and reinvigorate those who were continuously using them. In other words, it allows wizards to fire spells almost nonstop, only taking short breaks to recuperate their spent energy.

“We have mobilized thirty percent of the squad in charge of refining the demon salve from the prisoners, at this rate we would have to mobilize a bit more of them, or use the demon salve…” Other of the kneeling demonkin said.

The demon salve is something that few demonkins versed in magic know how to refine. It absorbs the life force of a living being into a viscous ectoplasm that contains pure demonic energy. Although refining demon salve from living beings doesn’t kill them right away, it greatly reduces its lifespan and harms the soul. However, repeated refining from a single individual is obviously lethal.

“Preposterous! Simply preposterous.” Rebuked Isiurem in a very mad tone, “She thinks she can just stand at the door of the citadel and do as she pleases from a safe spot? I’ll teach her that there’s no such a thing as a safe spot!”

Isiurem stared towards the horizon where he could see the warfare unfolding, he squinted his eyes and recollected his thoughts, “Send a one million men battalion as vanguard. Drive them near the walls and then crush them with the archers stationed there.” Isiurem’s tone was completely somber and full of hatred, “We have enough prisoners, there’s no need to leave any of them alive.”

“Yes, milord.” The trio of kneeling demonkins said in unison and then blended with the shadows, disappearing in an instant from the room.

The two remaining figures stood shoulder to shoulder in silence for a long while. “Remember the true purpose of the troops stationed here, now that the citadel has been discovered you cannot afford to have heavy casualties until we reach the next step of the plan, or else...” The black robed man next to Isiurem warned him, a hint of a threatening tone in his voice.

Isiurem formed a fist with his right hand and clenched it tightly, “Sir Jad, rest assured that I would not allow this incident to scale to something bigger, I will carry our Master’s designs on schedule.”

“Excellent.” Jad revealed a supercilious smile, “I’ll be busy finishing the preparations to open the Infernal Gate, don’t disappoint me, or more specifically, don’t disappoint Master… Nosgoth…” Jad walked slowly towards the exit of the room while muttering the last words in a barely audible tone, then he let out a sinister laugh.

*Bang*

Isiurem punched heavily a nearby wall, making the whole tower tremble, “I will tear you to pieces one of this days, Jad, just you wait!” He said while gnashing his teeth in anger.

After finishing the preparations, the three demonkins returned to the room of the tower in which Isiurem was to report that they finished the preparations. Twenty units composed of fifty thousand demonkins each were ready to battle.

Isiurem issued the final order and the gates were opened, revealing an astonishing and threatening number of soldiers that were flooding out from the citadel like water from a broken dam.

Many of the soldiers from the human side felt their scalp tingling upon witnessing such scene. Each time they thought that they were badly outnumbered, even more and more people poured out from the gates.

However, it was at this moment that and instinct deeply engraved in the souls of each soldiers flared up replacing the fear they should be feeling upon being outnumbered 5:1, hatred. Demonic and half-demonic species are the natural enemy of the humanity and vice-versa. The world is so big, yet it isn’t big enough to have humans and demons in it at the same time!

They were told and they were already aware of what kind of enemy they were facing, however, they didn’t had the chance to see it clearly before because the archers on the wall were clearly far away. Now that they could see the enemy more clearly, even if they were badly outnumbered, they had the urge to rip them to shreds!

Obviously they were not the only ones, the demonkins were laughing and looking at the human army with disdain, as if they were wolves that are about to be released in midst a flock of sheep.

Both armies stared at the other and each one set up their formations. The human army ceased with the long distance attack strategy and all the wizards were clearly focusing on quickly recovering in order to be ready for combat. The sound of war horns and war bugles suddenly filled the air.

“Surround them and spare none. Kill them all!” Frantic war cries were heard from the demonkin side as wave after wave of demonkins started to madly rush towards the human army.

“Cease fire and hold your grounds!” Generals from the human army started to give orders as the army grouped tightly together.

The demonkins continued their rush, their speed was quite something to behold. They reached the five hundred meter mark and now were in the range of the marksman from the human army. Strangely enough, no single arrow was fired.

“Hold!” Upon seeing that the hands of some bowmen were itching to fire the arrows, the higher ups had to remind again and again everybody to just wait patiently.

The demonkins had used some deflective magic in order to receive the rain of arrows and minimize the damage on the first lines, upon seeing that no arrow came, they just laughed with even more disdain and a thick killing intent overflowed from their eyes.