Chapter 71

  Reinos the Vengeful Flame sat on a minotaur hide rug in his makeshift tent in the middle of his camp, staring at the two, strangely irregular but identical boxes Zeneth-Rakar had brought back from Orroth. He understood the plan Lord Hyde had come up with, he understood what he and his army was to do, he understood what the chances of success were, but he didn’t understand how a box the size of a crafter’s tool bag could aid anyone in battle. How the ice-demon had managed to sneak through the enemy camps and back was another question he had no answer to. Kralsen’s captains were rumoured to be rare and competent aura mages — a type of magic Reinos didn’t know much about — so he must have had some tricks he could employ for sneaking around. Not bad for an ice-demon. But these boxes? They didn’t seem to be able to hold Hell Mana, and despite what the human-turned-demon lord had claimed, he just didn’t see how these things could distract an army of minotaurs. Was he supposed to lob them at the enemy and hope they would bash at least a few of their ugly heads in? Or was this some other kind of Surface World trickery? Should he try to “switch them on” to see what would happen? The lord had neither instructed nor forbade him to do so. But did it even matter what the strange boxes did? What mattered was winning the upcoming battle at Orroth, and the Hellfire Lord had significantly changed what winning meant.

  Like most of his captains, he was disappointed that the plan didn’t involve killing or routing the entirety of the besieging minotaur armies as they had done at Garoshek, which would have been the kind of victory any demon would be happy to pursue. While he had no idea what the new lord of the Fourth Ring had meant when talking about “limited objectives” or “strategic flexibility” — things he as a general should know and hold dear, apparently — he had accepted that to achieve final victory over the invaders holding the gate and killing the minotaur king was the only way.

  Hellfire Lord Hyde’s approach to battle, unlike the deservedly slain Ugrathar’s, was undemonic. But the old and accepted way — levels against levels, numbers against numbers and the greed for EXP — had failed against the overwhelming forces the Third Ring had brought to bear. It would have failed at Garoshek, too, and Hyde had known it. Perhaps it would serve him well as a general to learn the Surface World way of waging war, especially if he was to become a capable and successful general — even if just to avoid a beating from Mother for embarrassing her.

  Mother. Hm. It was the biggest mystery as far as he was concerned; how had a human got the renowned and feared Riaret the Severing Strike to go along with a plan that prioritised something other than carnage and EXP gains. Either he didn’t know his own mother as well as he had thought, or Hellfire Lord Hyde had some secret and impressive ways to persuade even the most headstrong demons. It seemed the stories about the Blessed were at least in part true, and underestimating one of them would be a mistake.

  Reinos looked around; half of his army was just about finished to clear the area of the ever invasive, ever defensive trees of the Wilds, setting up the camp and getting ready for battle. They were close enough to the edge of Orroth’s crater to be able to reach it quickly when the time came, far enough to not have to worry about anything more than a few minotaur patrols or hunting parties venturing too far from the rest of their forces. The other half of his army was doing the same on the other side of the Path cutting through the Wilds, while the “civilian” residents of Garoshek had been left further back in their own camps outside of the Wilds and with the task of setting up obstacles and barricades along the Path to slow down potential pursuits by enemy forces. All according to Lord Hyde’s plans.

  ‘General!’ Krasharak’s voice pulled him back from his musings.

  ‘What is it?’ He stood and turned to face the former overseer of Garoshek as he approached.

  ‘Both camps will be ready in an hour,’ the captain reported as he came to a halt in front of him. ‘Nothing permanent, as you ordered; just large enough spaces for our soldiers to wait until the battle begins.’

  ‘Good.’ Reinos nodded and quickly confirmed the news with his captains in charge of the second camp, then he turned back to Krasharak. ‘The Hellfire Lord will give the order soon; it won’t be long now.’

  ‘We’ll be ready, general,’ he said, bowing his head slightly.

  Reinos had got to appreciate not only the now level 32 former overseer of Garoshek, but also Terolast, the former garrison commander now at level 30, and Altar-Nordok, also from the Garoshek garrison, at level 29. They had all turned out to be capable captains, which he was thankful for. Grashon, Zagrathar, Iskaret, Surtakhar and Vikaret would have been his first choices for captains, but all of them had stayed with the new lord for some reason, acting as his personal guards without being properly appointed as personal guards.

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  ‘Very good. Only one thing’s left to do; take one of these to Terolast in the other camp,’ he said, looking down at the boxes Hyde had sent him.

  ‘What are they?’ the captain asked, squinting at the strange objects.

  ‘Holographic projectors,’ Reinos said, shaking his head, wishing he had a better explanation to offer to his captain, who was staring at the boxes the same way he had been.

  ‘What do they do? I don’t sense any Hell Mana.’

  Reinos sighed; the captain’s bafflement at the lord’s “gifts” matched his own, and it reinforced the idea in his mind that it would be wise to see what the boxes did — they were supposed to distract the enemy, but if he and his army didn’t know in advance what that distraction looked like, they could end up getting distracted themselves.

  ‘I don’t know, and so we’re going to try them out. Gather the soldiers!’ he instructed the captain.

  Krasharak nodded and rushed off to get this half of his army to assemble to witness whatever Surface World trickery Hyde was planning to unleash.

  ***

  With the campsite cleared and designated as a garrison, separating it from the Wilds, guarding against the wildlife was no longer necessary, which allowed Reinos to gather this half of his army — over one thousand soldiers. They stood still, surrounding Reinos’ tent, murmuring and waiting for their general to demonstrate whatever the boxes were supposed to do.

  Good thinking, Reinos. I should have remembered to tell you to test it. You remember the instructions, right? The Hellfire Lord’s voice came, sounding apologetic.

  Quite undemonic, but he was getting used to it.

  I remember.

  Great. Go for it!

  Under the curious gazes of his soldiers, and with Krasharak standing with him in the middle of their circle, he squatted next to one of the boxes and placed a finger on one of the small protrusions the lord had called “a button”, and he pressed it.

  The box began to emit a high-pitched hum, and tiny blue and green lights appeared on it. The six circles — each the size of his fist — which he had thought had been carved into the surface, opened, revealing round, glass orbs underneath. They were reminiscent of eyes, although what creature could have eyeballs this big, he didn’t know. The glass eyes began to glow, and a flashing green light next to each signalled that he could press the next button on the box.

  Reinos had tried to guess what he would see after pressing the button; fire, ice, some aura effect to confuse the enemy had been a few of the guesses he had made. A giant human appearing out of nowhere, three times the size of the largest fire demon he knew, was not one of Reinos’ guesses. The figure flickered into existence in a blink of an eye; it was almost translucent, almost glowing, something that almost existed but almost not. He only saw it from the corner of his eye as Krasharak jumped back, away from the apparition, reaching for his daggers. He blinked his surprise away and looked around; his soldiers were in a panicked uproar, yelling angrily, warriors drawing weapons, mages gathering Hell Mana. A single arrow, coming from somewhere in the crowd, flew right through the ghostly figure as if it wasn’t there.

  ‘Stand down! Stand down! Put your weapons away!’ he bellowed at his army.

  Krasharak and the other captains quickly followed his example and began to issue orders to put all weapons away and to calm down. Reinos backed away from the box and the Surface World giant it had released. He had no idea how it was doing this, but with a bit of distance it became clear that the eerily glowing image was of a human woman — whoever she was and however she had got into that box after growing so large, he couldn’t even guess. Her clothes were strange; some sort of fabric wrapped around her waist, reaching down only to her thighs, and a jacket that did a rather inadequate job hiding or protecting her breasts.

  The woman started to move and to talk. Her voice was coming from the box below her instead of her mouth, and Reinos didn’t understand her speech. She kept gesturing at images that kept appearing next to her, one after another.

  My Lord, is this thing dangerous? He sent a thought to the Hellfire Lord.

  Oh, so you managed. Great. No, it’s not dangerous. It’s a demo showing how to set the thing up in a conference room and how it connects to existing audio systems. I set the projection to maximum size and sound, but it’s just that: images and sounds. Nothing more. But I think it could distract the enemy in a crucial moment, at least for a short time. The answer came.

  Reinos didn’t understand most of what the lord had just said and he didn’t care: this was one of the strangest, most distracting things he had ever seen, and if his soldiers’ reactions, as well as his own, were any indication, a minotaur charge would crumble into a confused tumble in front of the giant human ghost.

  I’m beginning to believe the stories about the Surface World heroes racing through the Rings without anyone being able to stop them. If your people have things like this … Reinos said, but the Hellfire Lord stopped him.

  Don’t be too impressed! I don’t think anyone up there has anything like holographic projectors. Or my weapons.

  If you say so, Lord.

  I do, but let’s not waste time. We’re almost ready to begin the operation, and your mother is about to explode because my catapults are about to steal all the EXP, or so she says. Maybe she’s nervous, I don’t know.

  I doubt she’s nervous. Reinos said, almost chuckling to himself. Riaret the Severing Strike nervous? Unlikely. We’ll be ready shortly, my Lord.

  Good stuff. Over and out.

  Reinos the Vengeful Flame had known this wasn’t going to be an easy battle, but if nothing else, it was going to be interesting. And now he was ready for it.