Unfortunately, I’m Not A Hero: 165

Unfortunately, I’m Not A Hero: 165

…

Commissioned by Shaderic

Wordcount: 2500

…

The eldritch creature that I had summoned put up a fight, but I’d been in tougher situations with less at my disposal.

“Don’t be fancy, just fire into the front of the mass.” I provided direction to the Amazons. Everyone else was attacking the main body created by my summon, while we held back the tide of half-living, half-mutated creatures it was spanning to overcome us. As usual, we just chucked whatever heavy object we had on hand at our enemies, which were plentiful in the ruined capital. “Hit them hard and keep hitting. Relocate if needed. No point in getting yourselves hurt.”

Ashe and A’Bel were proving to be a very effective team. The Hellhound was burning away the base of the building, while the Demon was hitting it from above. The mound of flesh encompassing the massive summoning complex was effectively burning at both ends because of the assault, and it was forced to defend. A’Bel was driven back time and time again by beams of unreality, while massive tendrils lashed out at Ashe, but they were skilled and tough warriors with more than a bit of healing at their disposal.

Ashe got smashed through a whole, fantasy skyscraper and barrelled out of it a moment later. The attack just pissed her off, and a moment later, the offending, giant limb was flying through the air and burning in hellish flame.

A’Bel, meanwhile, learned the patterns of her opponent, weaving through the purple beams that distorted reality in their wake, and found the limits of innumerable, massive eyes dotting the giant amalgam of flesh made of the Empire capital's population. Like an armored bird of prey, she streaked through the lines firing into the sky and scorching reality itself, while she used her demonic weapons to cut into the creature’s flesh wounds that never heal.

Reiser, the Apophis, Ur, and her lieutenants were finding a way inside through the sewers, and they were going to return to us if they couldn’t.

So, effectively, I was leading the distraction.

It brought back a lot memories.

Most of them unpleasant, but the current reality made everything easier to swallow.

“My Lord, we’re seeing enemy creatures coming forth from the flesh! They’re carving through our projectiles!”

“Bring everyone back. Standard formations. Groups of five.” The words were quick to leave my lips. This was a common tactic for untrained peasantry with spears, but it translated pretty well in the kind of combat I experienced against monsters. They usually didn’t hold formation, they just charged in, and they had enough strength to make formations not matter. So, instead, we kept our cohesion with clouds in eyesight of each other, ready to assist, and those clouds were made up of infantry that watched each other’s backs. “I want eyes on these enemies now.”

“Yes, my lord! Everyone, let’s move!”

My guard retinue nodded as one and began to escort me to one of our scouted vantage positions. The enemy attacked by sight, which is why we had Ashe burning up the base. Concealment was more important than cover due to the nature of the Eldrtich creature’s magic, even with my recent sacrifice of my newest ship to saturate the area with magics to suppress the enemy. Soon enough, I was looking over the battlefield with a pair of binoculars, while my guards scanned for any threats.

The new opponents weren’t as bad as I thought.

Just a bunch of Empire citizenry haphazardly wound together into three-meter tall piles of flesh with loads of legs and tendrils tipped with bone as limbs. The tendrils were fast, but not as fast as Harpy in a dive or any of the insect-based Kindred using all that they had. They were tough, some flying rubble crushing a body or two, but not harming the whole, but nowhere close to the hides of Manticores or Wyverns when your best weapons were steel, and they were in short supply.

My Amazons carved through them the moment they made contact, their enchanted weapons tearing through the enemy with ease, and their armor projecting barriers that forced blows to glance off… and even if they were hit, their endurance, resiliency, and toughness were all enhanced beyond their already superhuman limits.

“Melee oriented, and tough, but they’re not terrifying. Still, no reason to risk anything.” These new opponents would’ve carved through my first army with ease, but not one I had now. Investment, training, and careful strategy development turned Amazons into incredible soldiers and warriors. They followed orders, were disciplined, and can be counted on to hold against desperate odds, but they were also all individual skilled, had innate talent, and naturally gifted physically. Without training, wielding only second-hand weapons with steel points, and no armor, they were capable of tearing through Kindred bogged down by regular human infantry. Now? They ground through the opposition. “Have the two backmost lines assist the front. Get our Wyvern reserves to start firebombing, but keep the Harpies and the crew aboard and focus on repairs. Oh, and get an update from the sappers.”

“Yes, my lord!”

I nodded at the words.

Once, whenever I was looked up to or asked for orders, I had to swallow my nerves and stop myself from twitching.

Every affirmative I heard with my name at the end, before Roseanne came along to rescue me, came with the knowledge that I sent hundred to die.

Now, the title felt like something that I could earn, not something I abused, and that the right orders would keep my people safe.

It was a nice change.

…

The sound of explosives going off was followed by the creaking, thunderous noise of an immense crystal skyscraper falling towards my foe of the day. Many of the eyes of the complex of flesh focused on the falling structure that covered it in its shadow, and from them came a barrage of firepower that should’ve blasted the building apart with ease. However, that attack that carved through a mountain range with ease was being suppressed now, and so it was forced to use hastily-grown tendrils to bat the falling skyscraper aside.

Many of the tendrils broke and ruptured, spreading blood upon the streets, and giant fragments of hastily-formed bone.

However, it succeeded, and the falling building did not fall upon the creature.

Still, the work of my sappers wasn’t wasted.

Once they were just forced to dig trenches, prepare pitfalls, and suspend logs that would fall and crush the enemy, but now they were using explosives to collapse Empire structures on Eldritch creatures.

They were capable of a lot of things now, but what mattered more than a trap was the who, when, where, and why of the trap.

Just placing one down didn’t matter much.

Traps needed to be placed carefully, but they needed to also be substantial in their application. A hundred pitfalls in the right spot. A dozen ambushes in a route going off at once. A series of blockades coming up and isolating a whole contingent of troops. Quantity and quality aren’t mutually exclusive. You had to aim for the right amount of both at the right place and right time.

Beginner stuff, which most people saw through and didn’t fall for twice, but I wasn’t exactly dealing with someone who was well-versed in strategy.

So, I could get away with using my entire repertoire.

“My Lord?”

“Have the sappers start doing the same with the other buildings. It’d be a waste to not use them.” The Empire was coming back here eventually, but I didn’t see a reason why I shouldn’t mess it up a bit. It's unlikely that I’m getting reparations for all my years spent as a slave soldier, and I had good reason to use them, so why not? “Let’s lighten the load for our friends at the front.”

“Yes, my Lord!”

Things moved to do as I commanded, while the battle continued.

The battle was going on for a pretty long time, but I had the numbers to switch out troops, and let them recuperate. Not only that, but I was still capable of keeping my focus for long periods of time. Attrition was my specialty after all, so there I could keep an eye on things.

I gave commands, I iterated on previous plans, and gave orders based on the situation, while keeping my people alive and my pursuing my objective.

It was far from easy, I was worried about my soldiers, but it was better than leaving things up to chance.

I felt a sudden tap on my shoulder, before a sudden screech came forth from the amalgam, and its minions turned into goop.

The guard who tapped me pointed at the sky and I came to realize what I was looking at and sighed.

“Have someone get the sappers to come back to the ship and help fix it up. The strike team did their job.” I stretched and reached out. My coat and sword were with me in moments, and my guards formed up at my sides. “Have the frontline go forward and clear the area. Ashe burns anything even vaguely threatening, and get A’Bel over here.”

I wanted to collapse a few more skyscrapers of the Empire, but it seems like that wasn’t allowed.

I was going to reenter the place where I came into this world, and speak to the creature I brought in.

Honestly, this felt like a decent way to end my little relationship with the Empire.

They lose everything, their capital gets wrecked by an Eldritch creature, and most of the capitol’s citizenry gets turned into meat sludge bereft of will for the last few weeks of their lives.

Meanwhile, I get to rule over a province with lots of people who care about me, which was becoming an economic powerhouse, and which the Demon Lord had little real power over.

Yep.

Definitely a halfway decent end to my relationship with the Empire.

…

The halls of the summoning center/cathedral were less than ideal for my mental recovery, so I let myself loose once I realized that it was giving me a bad time.

“Alright, guys, looks like the insides weren’t ruined. We’re stealing everything in here that’s not nailed down.”

“Yes, my lord!”

There was a whole chorus of excited cries, while the monsters started getting at everything they could reach. Portrait frames decorated with gold and jewels, finely carved furniture, books, and vases were pounced on by the Amazons. Despite coming from a tribal world, or perhaps because of it, they had a keen eye for treasure and keeping everything in one piece. Some of them even started going for the curtains and the long rug, because textiles of the size and length in massive structures like this were pretty expensive.

Anyway, the noise of things getting stolen and taken off to my ship allowed me to walk through the place with a lighter heart.

Nothing like a bit of petty robbery to assuage the soul.

“Ashe, do you think you can burn this place down after we’re done?”

“I will be of trying my best, Chieftain!”

“Mhmm, thanks.”

“Are you not going to ask me, Master?”

“I want it to burn forever, if possible.”

“Ah, then Ashe is the correct choice.”

I recalled walking away from the summoning circle surrounded by priests and priestesses. No, cardinals and bishops, until I reached the popes. Even though their names were gone, I could still clearly recall their faces, while I felt ludicrously happy at having the chance to be a hero. Though I lost my whole family in the process, I was happy.

Though I couldn’t recall any faces from my previous life, I could recall theirs, as they stopped smiling and looked at me like a stain on their lives.

I was in better company nowadays.

A Hellhound, Demon, and several Amazons all armed to the teeth.

Man, I sure am lucky.

Eventually, we reached the center of the place, and found where the battle took place.

I recalled it being a place of wonder. Floating crystal chandeliers, stained glass that moved and shifted into different scenes. People in white robes casually flying, while carrying books around. Hundreds of people all watching me and applauding at my arrival, while some even cried when I arrived.

I felt like a hero born into a new world.

Now, I walked back to a ruin, flanked by the Empire’s nightmares, and with a bit of a reputation of my own.

Thankfully, the summoning room was wrecked.

Cracks in reality itself were scattered along the walls, flesh of abominable monsters from between the stars tried to surge through them, but were bound back by Reiser and the Apophis’s magics. More than a few Amazons were being looked after and cared for, while some were bound up in bags that would keep their bodies pristine, until we can offer them the chance to return.

The crystal chandeliers were broken and in pieces, along with the magical stained glass.

The massive summoning circle that was layered across the floor, capable of stealing thousands for other worlds every day, or one from a vast distance… was ruined to the point of being unrecognizable. Whole sections were erased from existence, while great gashes were all over the façade, and even with my little knowledge of magic… I knew that it was beyond recovery.

Any attempt to make another one will be a national undertaking of immense scale.

Something that I and Roseanne can crack down on and locate with relative ease, even before the resources required to power it were taken into consideration.

I walked towards Ur and took note of a body bag beside her, and Ur held Reiser’s sword in her free hand.

Ur looked my way and I nodded at her, and a moment later Reiser’s body was being moved to join the rest.

If she chose to come back, then that’ll be that for our past.

A clean slate in exchange for dying to fight against the creature I summoned to kill the Empire.

And, I suppose, helping wreck the place that brought me here.

I took a moment to enjoy seeing the place that stole me from my past life being utterly ruined for a moment… before returning to my job.

Dealing with the weapon of mass destruction I unleashed. She was bound in innumerable bindings of holy magic composed by a Pharaoh and a Human Hero.

I raised my hand towards her.

“Yo.”
She flinched.

Damn, I’m not that scary, y’know?