This was ludicrous.
As Princess Elisa slowly forced herself to change her mindset from looking for openings to observing all possible methods of retreat, her option of the Demon Lord Ashtaroth's fighting style slowly changed.
In the beginning, she could see one or two lines for him to escape and worked to close them off as best she could, but as the sparring continued, she became more and more adept at spotting these lines. It truly was as if this method of looking at the world was part of her nature, as it came to her easily, once she knew to try. At any moment, she would see phantom shapes, split second visions of how her target could attempt to flee from her.
And after three hours of attempting to trap her target, Elisa was starting to understand the monster she was up against.
Ashtaroth's style may have looked open and predictably flowing, but at any given time he had dozens of options to escape and counterattack. More than Elisa could possibly cut off. How in the world does one even begin to develop such a fighting style?
While Jeanne had been able to overwhelm him with pure speed and strength, getting small glancing blows on his body, Elisa didn't have the same level of physical abilities as a Champion… Not yet, anyways, and found even landing a single blow to be impossible.
"Do you want to continue?" Ashtaroth asked Elisa, who was panting as if she was about to fall down and die.
Unlike an hour ago, Elisa didn't waste her breath replying, just did her best to pull herself together and raise her blunted iron spear. She was deeply regretting using up so much of her magic energy on special attacks early on, back before she had started to get a full grasp of the Demon Lord's abilities, hoping to end this exercise quickly. She could have certainly used it to help steady her legs.
"Do your best!" Jeanne cheered for her from the sideline, along with many of the soldiers who were on break from their own training.
Elisa found this more embarrassing than supportive, but knew better to react to it, lest the Demon in front of her punish her for letting herself get distracted.
'Just one more time.' Elisa said to herself, doing her best to ignore the tiredness of her body and push forward.
Jeanne watched as her friend and her boss sparred with a feeling she wasn't used to.
Envy. How long had it been since the last time the Saintess had felt envy?
After she had first heard the voice of God, she had abandoned everything. Her hopes. Her dreams. Her family. Her feelings. Everything that had made her human, she had given it up to become the instrument of God's will.
She had never wanted for anything. She would look upon Lords who did nothing to receive their lands and titles, and she would not begrudge them for it. She would witness ladies dancing and falling in love, and she had never once wished that it was her. She knew countless soldiers who were permitted to return home to their families, while she was never allowed to look back at the life she had left behind.
She had played the part of the beautiful, noble and pure, holy woman of France, caring not for her own dignity, wellbeing or happiness, so long as she could save her country. For her people and her god, she had given up on having a future.
Behind her smiles, behind her kindness, behind her determination and holy mission, had been a heart that had turned to ice.
Ice that had melted when he had held her close. When he had whispered his kind words into her ears. When he had reached out to her and gave her a place to call home.
As she watched her Lord sparring with Elisa, Jeanne wished that it was her. That she was the one who was exchanging blows with the man, feeling his essence through the clashing of their weapons, and perhaps, letting her own feelings be known, feelings that she didn't really understand herself.
"So, this is where all of you are." Gottlieb said as he walked over towards Jeanne, one eye watching the match between their Lord and the young princess.
"Good afternoon to you too, Gottlieb." Jeanne replied with a friendly smile.
"I came all the way back from the forward base to give my report and what do I find? A tiny child in the Demon Lord's office who seems to be running the place and calls herself the Lord's mother." The dwarf said, sitting himself down beside the Saintess.
"You mean Nene? She's really cute, right?" Jeanne said, not addressing the oddity that was the new castle matriarch.
"I suppose this is just another thing that I am just going to have to get used to." Gottlieb sighed before looking away from the fighting and towards Jeanne. "How are you holding up? I heard about… you know."
"...I'm alright." Jeanne said. With Gottlieb helping to construct the forward base up until now, this was the first that they had seen each other since the reveal about Eligos.
The worming feeling of shame riggled inside of her at the reminder of what she had done. The consequences of her blind faith.
"I see." Gottlieb said, his voice saying that he knew damn well that she wasn't okay. "You know, when Eligos first showed up at our village, claiming to want peaceful coexistence… we believed him. ...No, 'I' believed him." The old dwarf said, as if he was in a confession booth, his hands clasped in front of him so hard that his bones were popping. "Our village had an old fable, a prophecy if you will, that some believed came from God. It told of a Demon Lord that would appear in these lands. A Demon Lord that would teach coexistence to all races and would lead our world into a golden age. I was raised up from a boy listening to such stories, and when Eligos came forward, I wanted to believe that it was our prophecies come true. ...Because of my foolishness, thousands of my people, people who looked to me for leadership, died. They died horrible and gruesome deaths."
"...I'm sorry." Jeanne said, understanding how hollow her words sounded, but not knowing what else to say.
"You don't need to apologize. You and the Lord were our salvation." Gottlieb replied with a shake of the head. "At first I cursed myself, saying I was a fool for having faith in those old stories, for believing that a benevolent Demon Lord would come to our village. But look at us now." Gottlieb said, waving his arm about them. "Perhaps we were not wrong to believe that it was a prophecy from our God. And if Eligos had not attacked us, would Our Lord have ever come to our village in the first place? I believe that we were meant to end up here and that we were meant to help Lord Ashtaroth bring peace to this world. I have faith that our families did not die for no reason."
Jeanne listened in silence, rolling what Gottlieb was saying around in her head.
The voice that had been speaking to her before had not been the voice of god. But Jeanne had said herself that one does not need to be good to do God's work. Could it be that this had all been God's Will? Could it be that God was still watching over her and that it was his unseen hand that had secretly been guiding her to meet her new Lord, with Eligos being the unknowing tool? Could it be that this was God giving her her own chance at happiness?
Had God not abandoned her?
She had no proof. There was no evidence either for or against this. But… Jeanne found herself wanting to believe. She wanted to have Faith that things were meant to be.
"Thank you." Jeanne said, her hands tightening in front of her chest as she felt the glowing embers of her faith once again finding full.
"What are you thanking me for? I'm just a rambling old man." Gottlieb huffed with a smile before looking back to the field as Elisa once again fell to the ground.
Elisa was starting to have trouble even breathing. Her gasps for air were so loud that she barely heard the man in front of her repeating the now familiar phrase. "Do you want to continue?"
Elisa looked up at him, seeing the Demon Lord standing ready in front of her, his blunted swords at his side. The man was covered in sweat, his breathing heavy, but he was still in infinitely better shape than Elisa herself, even though he wasn't stronger or sturdier than she was.
Despite the flashy nature of his sword style, it was deceptively flowing, with not a single ounce of wasted energy. With the expert way that he paced himself out, his strength was lasting him far longer than Elisa's.
At this rate, it was hopeless. She would never beat him in a war of attrition and she couldn't find a way to box him in. Trying to catch him was like trying to catch the wind.
'One last shot.' Elisa said to herself as she pushed herself up. She would come at him one last time with everything she had and hope that it was enough. 'No! No hoping! It WILL be enough!'
Trying to psyche herself up for it, she dropped into a ready stance, gathering all of her strength and focus.
As Elisa gave a shout and rushed forward, the Demon Lord reacted. The pair clashed again and again until Elisa spotted an opening and tried to go in.
This would be it! This would be the thrust that reached him!
Ashtaroth's left hand sword came in, clashing with the tip of the spear in order to drive it off course. But Elisa's exhausted mind hardly registered it. It was too drunk on the image of the spear reaching its target.
Reality bent, the path the spear was taking was overwritten and the sword missed its parry, the spear's tip continuing towards its target. However, Ashtaroth's footing was already changed, his body shifting out of the range of the attack.
...No… She would reach him!
Space twisted. The attack moving to catch up to him, not letting him get away.
Time had been bought and the second sword came around, swiping down at the spear's shaft, knocking it off course.
SHE WOULD REACH!
The spear point was inches away from the Demon Lord's chest… when it was pushed to the side.
The spear had been boxed in by the two blades and its attempts to bend around the guards had resulted in it getting caught itself. Held between the twin sabers, it was moved to the side, allowing the Demon Lord to move it and once again land a blow on the Princess, who collapsed to the ground.
"Do you want to continue?" Shirou asked the young girl as she lay on the ground, gasping for air. But this time she didn't try to get up. She had expended what little strength and magic power she had left on that last attack.
"You're a monster." Elisa said in response to Shirou's question.
"You did well. I didn't expect you to get that close today. That final push of yours almost reached me." Shirou said as he looked to the side. "Can we get some water over here!?"
Eve and another maid brought the pair some water and towels. "As usual, you were amazing. Even a destined Hero couldn't match you." Eve complemented her Lord.
"She's gotten closer than she had any right to get after just one day. I thought I would have to eventually let her get a hit on me when we were done with her training, but now… I'm wondering if she will actually be able to reach me in three days." Shirou said as he watched Elisa get helped to a bench by Jeanne, the Saintess giving her words of encouragement. "The style of fighting I use was developed over thousands of battles against a spear wielding hero with a reality distorting ability similar to her own. You could say that it was a style born in order to fight against people like her, a style meant to escape the inescapable. Yet she almost reached me."
"...Are you sure it is a good idea to train her like this?" Eve said, still worried. "By her nature as a Hero, she will someday desire to kill you."
"Maybe. But if so, then by my nature as a Demon Lord, I will someday need to be stopped, for the good of the people." Shirou countered. "If we really are slaves to our nature, then I'll be glad for people like her and Toshizou. They will keep me in check, if I ever start to stray down a dark path."
"You would never…" Eve said softly.
"In my experience, there is no such thing as inevitable, unconquerable, invincible or incorruptible. Anything is possible. So it is best to be prepared for every possibility." Shirou said with a shrug.
'You're wrong my Master, because there is one thing that is for sure. I will always be loyal to you.' Eve said inside of her heart as Shirou wiped the sweat off his face, her hand going to the necklace around her neck.
"Milord!" A dozen children and young adults, dwarves, humans and demons alike, shouted as they ran up, led by the Four Seasons, in order to greet their Demon Lord.
"It is good to see you are all well. Has your morning classes ended already? Tell me, what did you learn today?" Shirou asked the children with a small smile, getting several answers thrown at him. Each of them wanted to proudly tell how they were learning how to write their own names.
Eve smiled to herself as she watched the scene. He might not act much like a Demon Lord, but he certainly inspired loyalty.
"This isn't a scene I thought I would ever see." Elisa laughed tiredly to herself after dunking her face into a bucket of water in a very unladylike manner that left her usual nanny-caretaker weeping. "They really do love him around here, huh?"
A Demon Lord surrounded by a group of smiling children? What was the world coming to?
"The Demon Lord has never been one who rules from afar. He's often gone to the refugee camps to help with construction and hand out food and clothes. So the children around the castle have seen him alot." Jeanne said with a smile of her own. "He used to say that it was important to win the hearts and minds of the children, before they can become fixated in their ways like adults are."
"You are quite popular with them yourself, Ms. Guard Captain." Gottlieb pointed out with a smirk before his face turned more serious. "But don't let this display fool you. There are plenty who hate our Lord. His policies have not been kind to those who made use of slave labor, or the Guilds. The Adventurers' and Craftsmen's Guilds in particular are not fond of our Lord."
"What?" Elisa said, confused. "I can understand why the Adventurers' Guild would have a problem with a Demon Lord, but why the Craftsmen's Guild?"
"It's because the Demon Lord was going to have none of their shit." Gottlieb said with a pleased grunt. "Normally speaking, the Guilds cut deals with the local government in order to make it impossible to work unless you are a part of the Guild. Then they take ridiculous 30% cuts of all profits made by the businesses and pay 10% of it to the local government as bribe money to continue the laws. Through this, the Guilds can create a complete monopoly and enforce any kinds of policies that they like on the businesses. Lord Ashtaroth cracked down hard on the Craftsmen's Guild when they refused membership to refugees from my village, because they didn't want to have to compete with Dwarves. Now, the Guilds are almost completely destroyed and the town runs on a competitive market system."
"...Oh, that's right." Elisa said, remembering that she had heard something to that effect once. About the Demon Lord driving the Guilds out of his lands and the Guild representatives attempting to appeal to the King for help.
Back then, before she had actually met the Demon Lord, she thought it was him oppressing the human merchants. She'd never realized the Guilds were so corrupt. 30% cuts? When they didn't do any work at all? And these Guilds were spread all across the country. Did the Nobles really work with something so questionable just to earn money themselves?
"As for the Adventurers' Guild, they have even more of a problem with Our Lord, since the jobs of the Adventurers are threatened by him." Jeanne said with a smile. "Most jobs that Adventurers take are jobs to protect people, deal with bandits, hunt wild monsters that threaten the local population, or investigate crimes, all for large sums of money. But the Demon Lord has his army help with all of these matters. He says 'safety and justice shouldn't be privileges of the rich'. It has made it almost impossible for the Adventurers to find work here."
Elisa shifted uncomfortably. She'd heard a lot of stories from his instructors' adventuring days, but she never stopped to think about it. Most of an Adventurer's money did come from protecting people, hunting monsters and bringing criminals to justice. It hadn't really occurred to her that it should have been the government handling such jobs.
"Does the Nobility not usually take care of such issues?" Elisa asked.
"Rarely. It is more cost effective for them to leave things to the Adventurers' Guild, and those who can't afford to pay don't have the resources to cause trouble either. The Nobility only gets involved if it is close to home or a high profile case." Gottlieb explained. "Same goes for all forms of justice. If you aren't at least in the upper middle-class, you can forget about seeking justice for the courts in most cities, but that isn't so here."
Of course, those who had been in the upper-class to begin with didn't like these changes, and did their best to convince everyone that Ashtaroth couldn't be trusted. Many people agreed with them, fearing the title of Demon Lord without understanding anything about the politics or economics going on.
Honestly, they probably would have had more problems with extremists, if it weren't for the fact that you would have to be out of your mind to try to stand against a Demon Lord.
"No! Absolutely not!" Eve shouted, drawing the attention of the three back to the maid, the Demon Lord and the group of children. In the Demon Lord's hands was a very… interesting item.
"Come on Eve, the children put a lot of work into it. What's the harm? You had said we needed one." Shirou said slightly amused as he looked over the gift the children had made for him. It was an inexpertly put together banner that some of the children had put together for him out of some pieces of cloth they had stitched together.
But where most banners would have a symbol representing the Lord's army, the banner that the children had made instead depicted a plate of cookies.
"Master, with all due respect, you need to think about your image. What are people going to think if you go into battle with… that?" Eve said, pointing to the banner.
"I'm sure that the evil doers of the world will tremble in fear." Shirou said, unable to stop himself from chuckling, as the children laughed along with him. "You aren't really going to tell these children that you don't like it, are you?"
"Please big sister." One of the children said, trying to plead with the maid with puppy dog eyes.
Eve had a certain level of resilience against the look, due to living with Jeanne and the Four Seasons, but the lone child was soon reinforced by dozens of others and her resistance was quickly getting overwhelmed.
"I am sorry My Lord, but the maid is right." Jeanne said, butting in on the situation as she walked up to them. Eve was surprised at receiving help from the Saint. "After all, a Lord does not carry their own banner into the battle. That is the job of the Flag Carrier, so I'll be taking that."
Eve's face fell as she realized that Jeanne was not the reinforcements she had been hoping for, with the girl taking the banner from Shirou in order to hold it high, rather than hide it from sight.
"Are you really going to be walking around with that goofy flag?" Elisa asked the Saint with a puzzled look.
"Why not? It is a symbol of the people's trust in the Demon Lord, so there is nothing to be ashamed of. There could be no better flag." Jeanne said, her voice and smile too sincere.
"Please tell me this is a bad dream." Eve whimpered as the children laughed.
But the laughter came to a stop as something jumped over a nearby building and slammed into the earth in the middle of the training grounds.
Instantly, Shirou was on guard in front of the children, with Jeanne standing next to him, her sword in one hand and the banner in the other. The both of them were ready to fight as the children screamed in shock.
But as the dust settled, they saw Toshizou standing there. The man was covered in sweat and was gasping for breath as if he was on the verge of passing out.
"Toshizou?" Shirou said, surprised that the man looked in such bad shape. As a Champion, he should have been able to run for hours before being reduced to such a state.
"My Lord." Toshizou said as soon as he saw Shirou. His voice was strong and clear as he delivered his report, even though he looked as though he was going to die. "The forest. Eligos was spreading an undead plague in the forest. Infected monsters are flying over the mountains as we speak."
Shirou's eyes widened as he heard the man's words, and as the Samurai collapsed from exhaustion, Shirou was already barking orders to all of the servicemen around him, ordering all hands on deck, to start moving people into the underground mines and to send word to every single village to evacuate immediately.
Before five minutes had passed, Shirou and Jeanne were already on their way to secure the border villages.
Toshizou had brought them a warning. Now, everything was a race against the clock.
Getting lazy and haven't been writing much.
Adventurers Guilds, when you really think about it, are pretty damn evil things.
They are basically a PMC. One that bribes the government into not having a proper police force so that they can in turn charge people protection money and collect and buy/sell rare materials. And if you want to work in their town, you have to pay them a cut of whatever you get.
They are like the Mafia, only given government approval.
Honestly, most fantasy guilds are like really cartoonishly evil Unions, where you have to be a part of the Union in order to get a job, but the Union is allowed to be as racist as they want, deny you entry if you don't have connections, demand bribes from you, set whatever prices they want, take ridiculous cuts out of your pay check, and get you fired if you step out of line.