Chapter 638: Intervention

Translator: imperfectluck  Editor: Kurisu

After a night of bitter battle, the elves finally made it to dawn of the next morning. However, the demons were different from the undead. Demons weren’t afraid of the sunlight. In fact, since the sunlight in the mortal plane was much gentler and soothing compared to sunlight in the Chaos Abyss, the demons instinctively felt delighted and excited.

Additionally, since both demons and elves had night vision natural talents, it was the same for both sides whether it was dark or light outside.

The sky was now bright. Yet, the battle at the Moonwheel Capital became even fiercer. The defending elven army which had battled through the entire night needed to rest, eat, and sleep, meaning that elven troops needed exchanging. High fatigue would also mean high combat losses. But the demons… since they were one-time sacrificial cannon fodder to begin with, these demon war slaves’ lives were each on countdown right from the time that they were conscripted. The demons were also almost limitless, so the Chaos Abyss didn’t value their lives at all.

The elves needed logistical backup support for food and supplies. However, the demons’ low-level cannon fodder no longer had any sense of logic or reason. They didn’t even feel the concept of hunger anymore. Even if they were starving, they could simply rely on their instincts and eat some dirt or tree bark. If a high-level demon became hungry or thirsty, that demon would just casually eat a companion or competitor demon.

“Nice, chicken-flavored.”

Fight a war of attrition with the Chaos Abyss demon army? Those muscleheads would have to first understand what attrition even was. Unless the demons were completely annihilated, no objective condition would ever possibly obstruct them.

The long first night had ended. All the forests outside the Moonwheel Capital had been trampled into corroded wasteland. The beautiful and solid outermost city wall was filled with dents and holes all over. There was a disgusting stench of blood and sulfur in the air that made elves want to vomit. The ground closest to the city wall was stained bright red with blood, and the stench of blood there was thick to the point of suffocating. Countless demon war slaves had ended their lives there.

The elves had also suffered serious losses. Their treants had suffered majorly. One of the elves’ aces, the silver elf knight squadron, had suffered 10% losses. Also, after the demon war slaves reached the city wall, the ordinary defending elf army had fought an even more vicious battle. The elves were either eaten alive or killed off by the demons’ self-destruction.

If the elves couldn’t win in melee, what about picking the demons off with ranged attacks? The elves indeed wanted to do this, and employed such a strategy, but it proved to be greatly ineffective.

The elves’ melee fighters were all focused on the Dexterity stat rather than Strength or Constitution. This meant the elven warriors were nothing more than third-rate at best for being tanks. However, the elves had always been proud of their ranger squadrons. Very few species had such well-organized ranger squadrons.

The elves naturally had high Dexterity stats and agility. Combined with their simple Nature Divine Arts, not only could they buff themselves and summon animal companions, their sharp arrows could suddenly ambush any enemy. This was the worst nightmare for anyone who invaded the rangers’ territory. The elven rangers were basically undefeatable in any forest or guerilla battle.

However, the elven rangers’ archery that they were so proud of met with the worst possible enemy of all.

Sharp arrows were indeed quite fatal to humans and other similarly sized creatures. Penetrating a single vital spot could cause death. However, just as how humans’ greatswords could only be considered toothpicks to the giants, unless the elves could discover a demon’s weak spot, the elven arrows would be nothing more than slightly painful porcupine pricks to the incredibly thick-skinned demons.

Where was a demon’s weak spot? That would be the greatest secret of any demon. Every demon had taken a different path of evolution. Every demon would have a different body structure. This naturally meant that the weak spot’s location would be different on every body. For instance, maybe a demon would have three hearts and two brains, but only one of these organs was the most important. The other ones were all capable of regenerating. Attacking any part other than the main part would be meaningless. Some demons would perhaps grow their most important organs in their feet, with the entire head and body being nothing more than a distraction, with the bottom of the feet being the only weak spot.

Dexterity-type elven warriors whose typical tactic relied on attacking the critical weak spot were almost perfectly countered by such an enemy with almost no weak spots to speak of. However, it just happened to be that elemental creatures, demons, undead, and other such creatures without completely physical bodies would all be similar. In this sort of situation, an elven warrior couldn’t even compare in physical effectiveness to an ordinary muscular bull.

Not only that, these demons and demonic beasts had all lost their sense of pain. They were also too large, big to the point where ordinary penetrative injuries would be ineffective against them. They were basically completely brainless and berserk. Even if their heads were pierced, they wouldn’t feel any fear. With all these factors, even if a demon was pierced with arrows all over, that would be unable to stop him.

Typically in such a situation, the elves would use their enchanted moonlight arrows and explosive arrows which would be greatly effective. However, the enchanted moonlight arrows and alchemical explosive arrows were incredibly precious combat resources. It would be such a waste to use them against ordinary demons.

In the end, the ranger squadrons that the elves were so proud of were forced to become nothing more than spectators in the battle. In fact, in order to avoid wasting precious ordinary arrows, another limited resource, the ranger commander even forbade the rangers from casually shooting arrows as they pleased.

The elves suffered far too serious losses in melee, and their archers were greatly ineffective. In the end, the moon elves could only helplessly use their mages to support them.

On the first night, in only a single night, the elves were forced to use their mages and mana batteries. Numerous fireballs exploded on the city walls. Countless blizzards AOE’d the demons into oblivion. In just a single night’s bitter battle, elves used up more than 20% of the elven mage towers’ mana storage!

This wasn’t because the elves were forced to the brink already. This only meant that their typical fighting forces were far too ineffective against the demons’ cannon fodder. The endless amount of demons in the first demon wave forced the elves into a battle of attrition, the worst situation possible.

Right now, the area between the first and second city wall was filled with wailing and pitiful scenes.

Injured elven soldiers were constantly being carried down on stretchers from the first outermost city wall. Those who had lost a hand or foot were already lucky to have survived. Elven healers were doing their very best to prevent the seriously injured from dying. Blood, sweat, and sulfur mixed their stenches together everywhere. The smell was disgusting to the point of elves wanting to vomit. However, at this time, even the formerly most clean freak Superior Elves no longer had the time to be disgusted by this.

Elven Empress Afina watched all of this with eyes filled with pity and sadness. Her main retainers around her also remained silent.

None of them had thought that the first city wall would almost have been lost in only a single night. Back when the moon elves designed the Moonwheel Capital, they had thought of some human mega empire as the hypothetical enemy, and designed their first city wall to be one of the sturdiest in order to buy enough time to wait for other elves’ reinforcements. Yet, the first city wall seemed so flimsy in front of the demon wave.

The thunder defense magic formations on the city wall… The energy for these defense spells had been entirely used up already.

The several hundred year old magical vines that were supposed to strangle all invaders to death… The demons had finished devouring all the vines.

The powerful elven mage towers and ranger squadron that could provide ranged attack support… They had used up too much mana and arrows, and needed to stop to rest and resupply.

The war treants planted next to the city wall… The demons indicated that they were quite open to having the occasional vegetarian meal.

The elven earth mages’ continuous repairing of the city wall… Their repairing speed couldn’t keep up with the demons’ destructive speed. Quite a few earth mages had already been forced to retreat after using up all their mana.

Aerial support from the horned eagles, giant eagles, and pegasus knights… In front of all the countless demon cannon fodder, they were no different from ground forces. Some demon war slave would even occasionally jump high up into the air and kill two aerial troops by self-destructing.

Even the best-designed defense spell or mechanism would have its limits. The demons didn’t even need to think of ideas on how to break past any defenses. A vast amount of cannon fodder was more than sufficient for autoattacking past everything. The elves of this generation finally understood why their own ancestors had always stated that the first demon wave was undefeatable.

Individually, the berserk demon war slaves wouldn’t be weak at all. Even if they had lost all sense of logic and reason, they obtained even stronger power in exchange. However, such a warrior would have plenty of weaknesses. As long as there was enough time and space, even a Silver rank warrior would be able to defeat a demon war slave in one-on-one combat. However, since these berserk demons were almost limitless in number, and they could only attack without even thinking about retreating, it was only natural that the demon war slaves all became harvesters of flesh and blood…

“The city wall being broken through is only a matter of time…”

Everyone had such a suspicion. However, not a single elf dared to say this out loud. It seemed as if no matter what ace the elves brought out, the demons could simply counter the ace by using a sufficient amount of cannon fodder.

“When will our reinforcements arrive…” Empress Afina muttered in a bit of a daze. However, nobody dared to answer her, because all of the elves’ reinforcements had arrived already. The only “reinforcements” still on the way had an impressively awkward identity for the Moonwheel Capital Elven Empire…

In the end, the silver elf knight general who had the most special status forced himself to respond helplessly. “Your Majesty, their last message to us stated that they would arrive by evening two days from now at the very earliest…”

“Didn’t they say that they could arrive this afternoon!? Could, could it be that those bastards are taking advantage of the situation even more to threaten us? Those bastards, we’ve already agreed to their shameless conditions! What else do they want! Could it… could it be that they still intend on raising their price!? Those shameless, underhanded bastards…”

Afina was still considered young for an elf. However, she was from a regal bloodline, and she was also outstanding at politics, which earned her a great reputation. However, her current hysterical behavior was somewhat ruining her previous image.

“…They said that the change in the Elemental Tide affected their airships, and that their mages and equipment all needed time to adjust. Our mages agreed that this is absolutely necessary. Last night, several of our mage towers suffered permanent damage, and two of our elven mages died…”

The elves naturally also knew the potential consequences of forcefully ordering mages to cast spells without adjusting to the new high magic environment first. However, the elves had still given such a cruel order last night because they knew that losing the first city wall on the very first night would deal the elven army too serious a blow for their morale to recover from.

Perhaps it was because outsiders were present, or perhaps it was because Afina’s hysterical screams had managed to help her vent some of the incredible pressure on her right now, but Afina indeed managed to calm down quite a bit.

“…Please request that they hurry to come reinforce us as quickly as possible. We… we will continue making concessions… They need to hurry and arrive one day quicker… no, even half a day quicker.”

Afina’s heavy words were filled with unwillingness. Not a single elf had expected the current situation. However, vicious reality had struck a heavy blow to the elves’ confidence. Before the battle started, the elves had been mysteriously confident that “we’ll definitely be able to defeat the demon wave, and maybe even counterattack, invading the Chaos Abyss itself”, but that confidence had completely evaporated by now.

“We… we’re unable to stop the demon wave by ourselves…”

Fine, she was finally admitting that she couldn’t handle the situation.

Actually, due to the lack of balance in information throughout the land, this type of seemingly inconceivable confidence was quite commonplace. Even if information on an enemy’s army sounded amazing, people would think of it as nothing more than embellished rumors. Meanwhile, even if the whole world told someone that their fighting force sucked, that person might still think that their force was the best.

Sometimes, it was because of spies doing a good job at giving misleading information. Sometimes, it was because the leaders lied to the people in order to give their people confidence. And sometimes, even the leaders believed such ridiculous things.

“Even if the enemy is indeed stronger than us, our warriors aren’t to be trifled with. We can probably win!”

In fact, such foolish overconfidence was commonplace on countless battlefields, and it would typically take only a single battle for this mysterious confidence to completely vanish.

Afina’s being willing to make “concessions” at this point was the equivalent of letting the Northlands Elven Empire have whatever they wanted. At the very least, it was certain that the Moonwheel Capital Elven Empire would no longer even be able to compete for proper status.

“Your Majesty!”

“Your Majesty! Think about our ancestors’ dreams and the Elven Gods’ ambitions! They wouldn’t want to see this!”

“No, Your Majesty, this can’t be done!”

Afina’s retainers started expressing their loyalty, and some of the high-ranked elves even glared angrily at their empress as if they were witnessing a disobedient child trying to sell off their own property… But actually, the majority of elves present here was absolutely delighted inside that somebody else was finally willing to take the blame.

To these elves, it didn’t matter too much, as they would simply have to support a different empress. This result would be far more preferable to death from the demon wave. Furthermore, since Afina had voluntarily brought it up herself, there was a 99% probability that she would become a sacrifice of this generation.

Actually, since Afina had already agreed to let her people immigrate in return for the Northlands Elven Empire’s assistance, she was already destined to become the greatest criminal of the Moonwheel Capital Elven Empire.

“No, our people finally managed to break free from their restraints. We don’t need to lower our heads to, or beg from remnants of the previous generation!” a booming voice interrupted the elves’ discussion suddenly. The elves looked in the direction it came from, only to see a hazy silver-robed figure clad in an aura of light. It was obvious from his holy appearance that this was an Elven God who had descended, either in an incarnation or his true body.

Around the Elven God, various dimensional portals from the upper planes opened up as his God Envoys, elven heroic spirits, divine beasts with starlight around their bodies, and so on arrived.

The Elven Gods had begun intervening…

Meanwhile, Harloys and I were casually discussing the elves’ current combat situation.

“With the Elven Gods around, the elves probably won’t die off that quickly, right? I think they should at least be able to survive until we get there,” Harloys commented.

“…I’m more worried that the Elven Gods will intervene. That will probably make the elves die even quicker. Just think about it. Can Donatis still slack off if the Elven Gods intervene? And if Donatis gets involved, there’s a more than 70% chance that the elves will die even quicker.”

Just as Roland surmised, right when the Elven God appeared in front of Afina and the other elves, the statue-like black giant suddenly stood up and picked up his black obsidian sword covered in divine blood. Donatis finally had some prey worthy of being hunted by him.

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