Right now, Ryu was running quite literally, for his life. By some fluke, in the battle Ryu had in the last chamber, Ryu manged to kill Kadal and as such enraged Segrad, who was now chasing after him. The only things preventing the worst for Ryu have been the previously activated large obstacles that littered the route back and stalled Segred from getting his hands on Ryu.

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Running as nimbly as he could and taking every possible shortcut, Ryu finally reached the ground floor of the tower base. Without any hesitation, he runs down the hall and out the main doorway.

Getting out, Ryu did not stop. Instead he ran towards the edge of the plaza running eastwards and hid behind some large ruins.

Slumping down to catch his breath, his eyes quickly darted around in hopes to find some weapons. His carbine had been lost in the last exchange and his short sword felt inadequate to deal with the gorilla size Segred.

However, in what was most mostly a minute after Ryu got out, Segred came blasting out of the ruins of central tower. Using his ram charge, he had destroyed what was the only standing remains of the towers entrance. And loudly landed on the plaza.

Ryu quickly held his breath, not to let the demon know of his position. He frantically tried to slow his heart down as it had threatened to jump out of him after Segred loud entrance.

Taking deep breaths to calm himself, Ryu sneakily tries looks over the ruins to confirm Segred’s position and present condition.

The demon stood right at the middle of the plaza. It stood there scrutinizing the surrounding ruins with its eyes as it tries to find Ryu. It slowly swayed and paced across slightly trying to glimse around some of the debris.

As Ryu slipped back down and fervently tried to think of what he could do, he gets noisily interrupted.

{ Boom . Boom } x3

Loud explosions echoed in 3 waves.

Ryu immediately got back up. To his surprise he finds that the area where the demon had stood, had been bombarded.

He finds himself pleasantly shocked and unbelievingly darted his eyes in the opposite direction to the explosion. Ryu finds that several soldiers are charge towards the plaza from the direction of a tower. It is the only standing tower of the north wall. And on the tower, 10 field cannons are aimed and getting armed to fire another round of cannon fire.

The sights of them, cause Ryu to blank out. It takes a while to process what he is seeing. In the dead of night, under the luminescence of a full moon, Ryu slumps down on to the ground, tears running down and a weird smile let loose on his face.

Ryu has all of the energy and tension within him let loose. Feeling as though the battle was over.

A surreal feeling of – being alive – was born within Ryu’s heart and mind.

Pain quick rose from Ryu’s right arm. It is only now that he notices that his arm is dislocated. It is likely from the time he slammed into the column back in the depths of the training labyrinth. The adrenalin from the fight had distorted his sense of pain and only when the tension seep away did he notice it.

Both crying and laughing, Ryu waves his left arm to get the attention of the troops. He really wanted to scream for joy though no voice came from him.

That was until…

{GRRAAAAW!}

A furious roar is hollered and a black silhouette jumps towards the middle of the rushing troops.

Instinctively, most of the troops dodge the oncoming silhouette.

Ryu, still slumped on the floor is shocked beyond his mental limits. There, infront of him stood, the last remaining demon, Segred.

This was the only thing that came to mind.

Segred had entered a frenzied state. His eyes had gone completely red. From the previous bombardment, it seems that he had lost an arm, blood furiously gushing from the severed stump.

Ryu screams in his mind, unable to accept the reality he faces.

The soldiers who were equally bewildered by the abrupt charge, recover quickly as they scatter and surround Segred. In volleys of threes and fours, the soldiers fire off at the demon.

However, contrary to expectations, the bullets simply bounce off the demon’s skin. It had turned slightly crimson, unlike the dust color from before.

Not giving up several of the solders continue to fire aiming at the face. Two from among the group rush in with a bayonet charge.

The frenzying Segred using his only remaining arm crushes one of the solders. The other soldier takes the opportunity when Segred releases a roar to shove the rifle with bayonet it into the demon’s mouth and scurry away. The rifle and bayonet jam the large jaws of the demon, with the bayonet especially lodged deep into the back of the mouth.

Thereafter, in quick succession another barrage of cannon fire lands on and around it.

The solders slowly expand the encirclement staying on alert for any further sudden movements. A pair of soldiers from the group upon sighting Ryu in among the ruins, rush to where he was, still slumped on the floor. His disheveled appearance caused them to have expression of concern and worry.

After several rounds of cannon fire landed upon and around area, a huge plume of dust and debris bellowed from it. The area turned awry quite as everyone remained on alert. Just as two soldiers step forward to investigate, Segred releases another loud roar.

With the roar, the dust cloud scatters away, to reveal a Segred in an extremely sad state. It is now armless and its skin and return to the normal tan colouring.

It looked as if the last loud roar was a roar screaming in defiance to its circumstance.

Due to the series of bombardment, Segred had regained consciousness as its eyes have also become clearer.

It slowly fell down on to its knees. It falls face first on to the broken plaza floor.

As blood continues to gush out from his sever wounds, pools of blood form around Segred. Panting heavily, he releases low groans trying to remain defiant.

The soldiers trying not to lose focus, start closing in slowly, muzzles aimed at Segred.

Just as Segred focus starts to darken, it casts a glace to its right. There Ryu comes into view.

Seeing Ryu with soldiers on his sides, Segred has an unwillingness to surrender, but with his grave injuries, was there anything he could do?

A last thought occurs to Segred as he drew his last breath with what was a solemn smile on its lips.

Ryu, watching the complete defeat of Segred, finally had his heart calms down. The continuous thumping left him in pain as both fear and adrenaline course through within him keeping him high paced to keep up with most of the situation.

Ryu silently questions in his thoughts. He had been through a roller coaster of emotions and tension throughout the entire battle and only has one thought running through his head right now, sleep. He felt as though he needed to take rest as soon as possible, to take it all in.

Ryu, couldn’t help but question, was he in another world, or was this hell?

With the ringing of the bell once again, there at the dead of night, the first battle comes to an end.

[ANNOUNCEMENT: God Game Mission 01 – Has now been completed. Congratulations to Player!]

The autonomous female voice is heard. It seriously sounded like an in game message.

[All objectives cleared. All monster and demon corpses will vanish after an hours’ time.

Player’s reward is loot from the corpses of monsters and demon. Happy hunting. Until next time]

The announcement ends. This officially is the end of the horrid battle.

Ryu gets dragged up to stand on his two feet, and is escorted to the tower by the two soldiers near him.

Arriving at the base of the tower, a soldier rushes up to Ryu.

It was Kuroz, who upon seeing Ryu’s arrival at towers base, ran up to greet him. The wide smile Kuroz had upon Ryu return, quickly turned sour as the first thing Kuroz saw was the dislocated arm. His expression quickly turned pale as he caught signs of discoloring on the arm and Ryu’s pale facial complexion. Giving an exaggerated bow and apology, he immediate had one of the soldiers attend Ryu, to help set his arm back into position.

Ryu who was taken aback by the theatrics of Kuroz, let loose a howl as his arm was forcibly push back into position. It was important to note that the pain from the arm had numbed by the time Ryu got to the tower’s base. The unexpected aid that Ryu could not react to at first caused him mind numbing pain as he slightly glared at Kuroz reproachfully.

Kuroz who was oblivious to the glare from Ryu, directed him to enter the tower and into the command center temporarily setup. Arriving in the room, he directed Ryu to a seat and presented the current situational report to Ryu.

Ryu is first briefed about Tolle, who had been rescued from the storehouse and was currently recuperating. It seems that the Tolle only had a bad cut across this chest and abdomen and also suffered a concussion from when the demon pummeled him. Ryu is relieved upon hearing Tolle survived and would recover without complications. Ryu did not inquire how this was confirmed.

However, good news ends there. Kuroz, as acting head of troops, informs Ryu of the damages. Precisely, the absolute degradation of the forts northern wall and defenses, as well as the catastrophic circumstances within the fort premises and that the count of all surviving forces.

In total, only 200 battle ready mixed troops and 113 injured had survived the ordeal. The rest of the force had been completely annihilated. Also they have only 5% of the supplies left after much of it was destroyed and lost in the chaos and mayhem on the battlefield.

Kuroz, also elaborates that originally after Ryu had led the 02 demons into central tower, the re-grouped forces amounted to 376. They had then engaged the remaining monsters and as a result, lost 176 personnel. This included some of those who were previously injured.

Ryu notices the tattered state of the tower, inside and out, as standing proof of an extremely harsh battle.

Ryu’s mood turns ever more glum at these details. The battle really had become a nightmare and may possible become a trauma for him.

What he had learned was that demons are extremely terrifying. Only 06… no, 04 demons, decimated the majority of the garrison and fort. The last two only focused on Ryu.

Noticing Ryu’s deteriorating mood, Kuroz summarizes the details to that extent, deciding to give more information after Ryu refreshes from a good night’s sleep.

As Ryu was silently brooding over what he heard, oblivious to Kuroz’s intentions, AI interjects into his thoughts.

[Master: This one would like to recommend master to rest as soon as possible. Fatigue levels are extremely high and turning unconscious would not be advisable. Before master retires, this one recommends that some assisting forces be summoned to help deal with the situation. Master can summon 140 units and some supplies without losing conscious. Should a draft of recommend force be presented?]

At AI’s message Ryu readily agrees and with its support he summons 30 medical units, including 10 doctors, 30 logistical troops, 30 engineers and 30 soldiers. Ryu considers it highly unlikely any threats will show up so soon. However, from this experience it is learned that caution is always better.

After summoning units, Ryu also summon few immediately necessary supplies and ordered the units to clear out the fort grounds.

Ryu also ordered for looting from demon corpses. Anything that had plausible value, demon meat and bones. All of it was to be gathered and that 60 minutes was their limit. After that, they were to gather the remains of the fallen. He also ordered them to focus more on the higher level demons and monsters. He then left command to Kuroz, ordering him not to be excessive and properly allow for rest and recuperation of all the survivors and then retired.

It was now one, at midnight. The battle that had started at eight in the evening continued till past midnight. The thunderstorm that had started with the battle, had died down as Zesta and her groups were subdued. The weather now was clear skies and a full moon.

With passing thoughts on the hectic day, Ryu lays down on a futon in a room adjacent to the temporary command room in the tower to sleep. Ryu’s face was not content, but more anguish and fear as he had recalled flashes from the horrid battle. Cursing at the gods as he closed his eyes to sleep, it was a few hours before Ryu fell into a slumber as the remaining tension and energy left him.

This was how Ryu's first day in another world ended. A Pyrrhic victory and bad aftertaste from his first battle.

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Title of Chapter 09 - Pyrrhic Victory