--Oliver's pov--

During all the trip back to Hoss, Mark and David continued their shounen-like farce, both I and Erian were quite irritated by it, but for different reasons. It irked me how they recklessly sought the impossible without wanting to realize their powerlessness. But it was none of my business, they could throw away their lives if they wanted, I, instead, would be realistic and adapt myself to the world's madness, as we humans were supposed to.

But regardless of how fool they were, I couldn't help but be sorry for them. After all, if I thought there was a chance for them to change the world I would be cheering for them.

After I returned to my room in the citadel the first thing I did was look at myself in the mirror. It was a mirror similar to the ones back in our world, something that with Vos' technology could only be created with the help of magic, it was something I had to request to Alua personally.

The image of a pretty boy entered my eyes, he was slim and a bit short, his hairs were slightly long, he had a feminine appearance and he would have looked very good in a female dress, I liked that image a lot, and I also hated it.

My physic was now quite robust and my muscles were firm thanks to the continuous training, but it was barely noticeable, my image still looked like a girl.

I was born in the wrong body, the body of a male, and on top of that, didn't even look like one even though I had a dick, I was truly as wrong as I could be.

I wanted to adapt to the world around me, to find finally harmony with it, but it was hard, and David's words didn't help.

His words continued to return in my head and torment me.

I learned long ago that you will only get hurt if you try to challenge those who have more power than you and David planned to do exactly that, he had to, if he wanted to realize his dreams.

He would be destroyed sooner or later, that was for sure, that's what I was repeating to myself.

Hoss didn't allow the use of demonic magic, and the flesh attribute, the attribute that could change people's bodies, was also composed of the demonic attribute. I was still out of the norm even here, and on top of that, when Jane died, I felt satisfied for an instant, like justice was finally made, but she was a teammate, it wasn't right to have such emotion towards her death.

I needed to discipline myself.

I sat on my knees, closed my eyes, and started repeating words in my head.

'You are Oliver, a male, and you can't be happy about a comrade's death. You are Oliver, a male, and you can't be happy about a comrade's death. You are Oliver, a male, and you can't be happy about a comrade's death....'

I started repeating those words in my head, but then...

'We can only become stronger than anyone..... and one day, change the world.'

Those words popped up in my head again and with them the image of David, fierce and indomitable, like a god of war that didn't fear anything and anybody, and didn't let others tell him what to do or who to be.

He felt painfully fascinating.

--Alua's pov--

After knocking, I entered Ron's office, he wasn't reading documents this time, there was nothing on the desk, only a golden figurine representing Esha, I probably interrupted his prayers.

“Reporting: I finished talking with Zaven's hero, it seems he acted of his own, he wanted to impress the agentes. His mental condition is shaky, he can be brought to our side, but I exclude he will be able to cooperate with the other heroes, especially David. Having the agentes also play a part should also help.......if they are going to continue serving the empire.”

Ron looked at me with an expressionless face and said:

“Impossible, not only they failed in killing the saintess, but they also let a hero die, an agens must remedy such a blunder with his life. We will not use them, but we can keep him separate from the other heroes, he wouldn't fit after he killed one of them, and David might even try to kill him again. Speaking of him, keep your eyes on him, he already demonstrated to be too unpredictable.”

“Of course.”

“No more failure will be allowed, by the way, has he ever mentioned Kaguya again?”

Previously I noticed the strange habit of David of talking to an imaginary friend called Kaguya. The first time I noticed him doing it was a night months ago when he accidentally met Erian and mistook her for someone else. I initially thought that Kaguya might be a spy from the Heian kingdom, but after a thorough inspection we found two spies, and none of them knew anything about anyone with that name. Then, one night I heard him speaking with Kaguya again, but he was completely alone.

“Yes, one time in Shoxon, he was in overflow and ended up hurting himself, but before I had to heal him, Erian did. He didn't say anything interesting, but he now seems determined to fight in the war, he seems to also have convinced Mark.”

Ron remained silent for a few seconds.

“It's a good thing he convinced the party leader to fight, but I don't want him to have any influence on him, I will shortly send a message to Eshanor asking permission to eliminate him.”

This damn Eshian wanted to eliminate David, the most capable Hero of Hoss, probably he wanted to give an advantage to Mark. I also heard he fought with him, this prideful bastard probably doesn't know how to lose.

“With due respect, I don't think it is necessary-”

“It isn't up to you to decide, and to me neither, my superiors will.”

Silence fell between us. After a few seconds, Ron restarted to talk.

“Also, you will have to guard the saintess until the war is about to end, as a casus belli for this war we will use the murder of Jane, but Erian's death will still come in handy later, I'll tell you when is the time to stop protecting her.”

“Got it.”

“That's all, you can go now.”

I saluted him with a hand behind my back and the other hand stretched towards the ceiling with my palm open, the military salute of the empire, which eventually had been adopted by Hoss too.

I then walked out of the room and sighed as I walked towards the training room. I couldn't stand the fact that a fanatic of the empire was ordering me around, but then, after I thought about the upcoming war a smile appeared on my face. We would have the advantage in this war, and other than raking up achievements, if we won the whole war we would gain a strategic importance that the empire would have to respect. It was unlikely we would become independent from them, they wouldn't let us, and without someone as strong as Horus we couldn't do anything about it, but we would probably gain some freedom and recognition, maybe we they would even start treating us as real allies.

It was a huge chance even for me, if the hero squad performed well I could stop being just a contracted adventurer and earn a noble title. If I did I would never have to be looked down upon again by Eshians or noble Hossians, I would also have to stop accepting everything that was asked of me. Now that I worked directly for an agens no one dared to use their power on me, but when I started working for the citadel I had to comply with every extra request that was given to me, be it go buy stuff in the slums for them, go take back lent money from those that refused to pay, or offer my body.

I only had to keep the heroes from doing reckless actions and then maybe kill one or two of them, nothing difficult since the heroes were still quite weak.

I walked to the training room while humming a cheerful tune.

--Belisar's pov.--

In front of me there were 5 chieftain trolls and a troll king, they were four meters tall, their long, hairy arms that reached the ground were holding small trees, using them as clubs, their teeth and horns were as sharp as blades, and their skin was harder than steel, yet they were trembling in fear.

I continued to walk towards them, the blood of their tribesman now was all over my green skin and stored inside Muramasa, my blade, a blade that once belonged to Shinichi Bunkanohito, the founder of the Heian kingdom and comrade of Claire, the hero of humanity. This sword was inherited by Zaven's champion since the Triumph, and now it belonged to me, Belisar Redfang, the current champion.

Today was a really bad day for me, I just discovered that our precious hero was stolen away by two agentes that infiltrated our servitude. That just added to the current troubles I had with the hollows. I started interacting with them and promoting them to the council thinking they would help us in the future warfare, but now they refused to help us directly, offering help just with information gathering and scouting.

Now Myrine was also refusing to send us reinforcements for dealing with the hollows, and, after we had to contact one by one every country in the league, we gathered an underwhelming quantity of reinforcements.

This was as bad as it could go, I didn't care anymore about who was the one getting destroyed, I would have liked to see both Zaven and Hoss burn to the ground, I hoped that was what the hollows would have done. But like this Hoss and the empire would win easily, and I couldn't even bring the brat hero to the Dark Fortress to try turning him into a demon king.

I mean, it wasn't proven that the heroes that went there automatically turned into demon kings, but the only two that did it then turned into calamities that devastated the empire and the central continent, so why couldn't it happen a third time with the northern continent?

But now I didn't even have the chance to try, that was too bad.

I launched myself towards the trolls, my orcish muscles swelled and blood came out of Muramasa, enveloping it and creating a bigger blade made of blood.

I began with the leftmost troll, it tried to hit me, but I dodged, then, I cut its neck with a single slash.

Then two trolls at the same time swung at me, I cut their clubs by elongating my blade and their attacks didn't reach me, then I cut their necks at the same time.

I approached the last three trolls, they remained on the defensive, I thrust towards one of the chieftains, I wounded it on the shoulder, and the other two attacked me.

I blocked their attack by forming a shield with the blood, for good measure I also created a small blood shield under my light armour, on my shoulder, guarding the heart.

The clubs broke through the blood shield, but their strike was slowed enough for me to back away, then I attacked the wounded troll, this time I went all out and ran over him, cutting him in half and exposing myself towards an attack from the king and the chieftain, I wasn't worried about their attacks though.

I ignored the two trolls and reinforced the small blood shield on my heart.

As I was expecting as the trolls' clubs clashed on the arm I raised to protect my head, an arrow was shot towards me from behind, the shield absorbed enough to save my life.

I smiled and then sent a blade of blood flying towards the direction the arrow came from.

Probably it was just another assassin from one of Zaven's nobles, trying to eliminate me just for stopping me from repaying them for what they did to me. Too bad the strongest man, or perhaps high-orc, in Zaven was me.

I then quickly finished the two trolls and went to check the spot from which the arrow came, I found a corpse, holding a bow. I couldn't find traces of anybody else, it seems it was the work of a single noble, usually, when it was the city council trying to kill me, they sent entire teams. I reduced it to a mass of flesh, but my wrath still wasn't subdued.

Lately, my demonic attribute didn't let me be, I had to continuously unleash my stress on something, it seems that war or not my hour wasn't too far away.

Too bad it's not like I cared anyway, I just wanted to see some more mayhem before I went out.

I looked in the direction of Hoss, I wondered if that hero was still recoverable, maybe I could still make him escape from Hoss' camp if they brought him with them in the war and bring him to the fortress. Well, trying didn't cost anything, did it? It's not like I had anything to lose anyway.

Right now I was the husk of what I was, and I knew it but didn't mind it, it was much better than suffering. I paid the price of war, losing everything, and now all I could do was try to have as much fun as I could before I died while doing some reckoning while I was at it, the only ones I was sorry for were the children, they were the only ones I didn't want to get caught up in this chaos.

Well, too bad there was only so much I could do for them, now let the madness envelope this cursed land.

--David's pov--

I and the rest of the hero party were waiting in a room inside the middle wall of Hoss, we were all dressed up in precious ornamental armours and had swords made of a precious metal similar to gold, and we all had floral tiaras on our heads.

The armours were engraved with the symbols of a sun, the symbol of Horus, and the church of Esha, the tiaras too were symbols of Esha, the goddess of fertility.

I could hear a thunderous voice resound from above me.

“And thus, we cannot forgive the blasphemous acts of Zaven, who killed in cold blood one of the holy heroes, and decided to wage war on the impious.”

The voice paused for a few seconds.

“And to avenge the sacred act of avenging our mourned hero Jane, we can count on the support from the Holy Empire of Esha, its hero, Mark, and our heroes, Oliver and David, and also Erian, the Saintess of the church of Esha. Please holy heroes step up.”

It was the signal for us to come out, we climbed the stairs.

We got on the top of the wall and saw the population of Hoss looking at the two giant illusions projected on the sides of the wall, we were the ones shown in those illusions.

The announcer passed the magical tool in his hands to Mark, and Mark brought the tool near to its mouth.

“Dear citizens of Hoss, I am Mark, the leader of the hero party and hero of the empire, we will fight for the goddess and the populace of these lands, don't have fear, victory will be on our side.”

After Mark finished his short speech, which was made loud enough for the people below us to hear by the tool, we brought our left hands behind our backs and raised our rights in the air with our palms open, then we launched four balls of holy mana. The raw masses of holy mana exploded in the air, scattering the golden mana in the surrounding, I could hear faint cheering from below.

The announcer took back the tool and restarted to talk.

“And as our first act against Zaven, we will now execute the impious heretics that killed the hero Jane.”

Not far away from us, the two people that attacked us in the dungeon were tied up, gagged, and blindfolded right on the edge of the wall, many magical tools were implanted on their bodies, draining away every bit of magical energy, and a rope was tied around their necks.

I went behind the tank and mark went behind the archer, the city kindly offered us their souls.

On Shoxon I decided to listen to what Jane told me, I decided I had to accept the parts of my humanity I needed, but that was it, I still had to discard all the rest, all that I didn't need, and today I would work on my pity.

Mark looked hesitantly at me, I looked at him with a firm glare, and nodded, he nodded back.

We kicked the two assassins down the wall.

The two warriors fell, and the long rope stopped their fall and broke their neck right away.

I didn't feel much after it, if anything, I was glad I eliminated some madness from this world, that was all I needed to do.

I looked at my teammates, Oliver was impassible, Mark had a bitter but firm expression, while Erian seemed just sad.

Again, I felt an uncomfortable feeling while looking at her sad face, but I could do nothing about it, I was doing the right thing.

I thought about the war that was about to come, I would probably have to do this thing many more times, and it would be in a much more chaotic environment. There would be spells, swords, tactics, and blood, I was a little excited, actually. I knew war was terrible, but I still couldn't help but wonder how a war in this world would be, especially with those hollows involved in this.

The thing that worried me the most was the side I was fighting for, I hated Hoss and the Empire, and if possible I would have liked to get away from them. After studying some history, I noticed that the empire wanted to centralize all the power to itself, I had to read through some of the lies they come out with but it was easy to see if you had some brain. I would like to get away from them after or at the end of the war, after all, I was at risk since I showed to be difficult to control.

But before that, I had to make use of this occasion and get stronger, and this war was the perfect chance to do so, I was sorry for Zaven, since they were at a disadvantage and civilians could end up dying, but if I wanted to avenge them, someday I needed to do this.

I lost myself in the fantasies about how strong I could get.

--Erian's pov--

After the declaration in the central wall, I went back to the citadel, I passed through the citadel and went in the western part of the citadel, and entered the citadel's graveyard right under the western internal wall.

Around me I could see the rest places of the high nobility, as the costume of the Esha believers, the tombs were flowerbeds dedicated each one to one family.

The dead were buried with earth magic, to not ruin the flowers, with just a shroud covering them, so that they could nurture the flowers above them.

Each flowerbed had a statue of Esha on a pillar at its centre, on the pillar were inscribed all the names of the people buried there.

The statues were all plated in precious metals and represented the goddess adorned in jewels, crowns, and pretty clothes smiling gently while laying some kind of weapon to the ground, or looking sternly in front of her, sometimes, a composed Horus was by her side, clad in his armour.

I walked forward without giving them a glance. I arrived in the most ancient part of the graveyard, right under the wall. Here there were only common flowers arranged in a simple fashion, and the statue at its centre was a simple stone statue of a crying Esha wearing a simple dress, with no column under it.

This place was where the soldiers that died during the great war against the Dark Lord died, it couldn't be assigned to any family in particular, so it was left unchanged since back then. Technically, it wasn't used anymore, but I knew that it was where the unwanted bastards and inconvenient lovers were buried. It was a place no one ever mentioned except the maids and servants, but the flowers and the statue were still taken care of.

No one ever came here, and those who did it usually did it at night, it was my favourite place in the city and I always came here when I wanted some time alone.

I knelt in front of the statue and started to pray. I prayed for all those buried in this flowerbed, then for those that were going to die in the war, as I did I reaffirmed my will of saving everyone I could before I was kil-........get rid of.

Since the day I tried to actively oppose Horus' regime, I knew that day would come, and it was now closer than ever, actually, I probably should have already die-........ have my flame extinguished, yes, instead of Jane. At least now I had the chance to save someone else during the war.

I knew there was nothing that could save me now, so I at least prayed to Esha to give me the strength to face that moment with my head up high.

I then thought of David, I thought about praying for him, I usually also prayed for him in particular, but why should I do it now? In a way he still resembled me, we both didn't like this world made of blood and violence and wanted to change it, but his foolishness made him lose sight of what was important to him.

If he continued the way he did he would do nothing but generate more violence, that was all that violence could accomplish, after all, he embraced the disgusting side of man and became selfish, uncaring, and full of himself like everyone else. He couldn't accomplish anything useful like this, he would just make things worse.

Still, I felt a sense of compassion towards him, I couldn't help but feel pity for what he had become, a part of me wanted him to snap out of it and learn to like people again and don't fear them anymore. After all, now I understood why he was always cold and distant with everyone, he was like me, too afraid to show his fear, so he wore a facade, and while in my case it was the facade of the gentle and caring healer, in his it was the cold-blooded general.

Both facades had some truth in them, but they were actually ideal images of ourselves modified and taken to unrealistic extremes.

I wanted to always care for anybody and always be there for anyone, and he wanted to always be strong and strong-willed so that others could trample him down.

He felt very pitiful, just like me, he almost seemed cute, in a way.

I shook my head, he was on the wrong path, and he didn't want to stray away from it, I shouldn't think about him.

Then what he did to Mark returned to my memory. He influenced him to participate in the war, but he seemed serious about relying on him, I wondered if this would be a good thing for David.

I sighed, I guess everyone had the chance to be a better person if they could find the strength to.

I dedicated a prayer to David.

David's state

mana 634 ki 605

David's affinities

fire

72 dark 92 demonic 112 hellflame 85