AN: Well here we go again, hope you're enjoying the ride as we race toward the conclusion. I AM starting a new job though, so update speed will slow down a bit. That said, I still plan to upload audio chapters every weekend, and you can still support the illustrations for the ebook compilation on patr30n at /GodRising. Or if you prefer, I will on the side, be working on my original piece at patr30n /tellingstories. Alternatively, invite code is on my discord and you can read everything there. Once this story is concluded, I'll be starting one more short project for it that'll only be available on YouTube since there is no video option on FFN. Stay tuned. :) Is all this a bit much? Maybe. But so what? Do you think I'd be capable of doing a 2 million word, 300+ chapter arc with a cast of characters roughly the size of Game of Thrones, if I weren't ALSO the sort of person who could go far enough to illustrate, voice, and learn how to do video compilations? No, I think not. And besides, aren't YOU worth going the extra mile to create something awesome for? :)
God Rising: The Cult of Ainz
Written by: AtheistBasementDragon
Edited by: The Usual Gang of Drunken Perverted Idiots
Chapter 160: Long Live the Queen
...Dungeon of the Elf King...
Ainz spoke briskly, crisply, and swiftly as he moved deeper into the underground base, it made him sound even more authoritative than he normally did, and Zesshi listened raptly. "This we may do, Zesshi, Queen of the elves, but first... you have an army to reclaim, before it is destroyed. I will have a gate opened for you, show the head of your father to the elven army at Fortress Alaf, and turn them on the Slane Theocracy's last remaining army in the North. You needn't pursue them, I have another ready to exterminate any who escape you, instead, make camp for the day and await a gate from me to bring you to Forton."
"It will be done, Your Majesty and... thank you for keeping your word with me, I will never forget it." Zesshi replied with a catch in her tone as she took the healing potion from Tefl at her left and drank it down.
Zesshi then turned to Tefl and asked her, "How come this healing potion does NOT taste like shit? It is actually quite tasty."
Tefl then answered, "It seems that this potion was made by the Bareare Family in Carne Village after the Sorcerer King made a casual comment about adding flavoring to potions to remove the horrible taste that they have always had."
And back in Nazarick, Demiurge, watching this on the Mirror of Remote Viewing, was once again exclaiming, "Hail, Lord Ainz, we can expect nothing less!"
The message cut off, and a few moments later, a gate opened. Zesshi stood up from where she sat and looked at her two advisors, "Wait here, and tell all others who enter, to wait as well, explain things if you like, but make them wait, I'll be back in a few hours, time to turn the world on its head again." She said with vigor and energy in her voice and an eager grin that was like a child getting a much longed for present.
She picked up the head of her father as her companions nodded and grinned with equal enthusiasm behind her. "As you like, my Queen." They replied proudly, and she stepped through the gate.
...Outside Fortress Alaf...
Zesshi found herself in the camp of the elven army, inside what she immediately knew was the tent of her father. The luxury allowed it to belong to no other. Too, there were familiar faces not far away. An old man was comforting two naked, weeping elf girls. And a few feet away sitting at a table drinking from a cup, the dark elf boy who made her eat dirt. "Sebas, good to see you." Zesshi said happily, before he could answer, she looked to the women. "Look at me." She ordered, and tight shut eyes slowly opened on her orders.
Zesshi held the severed head up and out away from her body, her arm straight and locked, it dangled and swayed from the hair held in her grip. "The nightmare is over. It is time for the elves to wake up from it and take back our place in the world." She said confidently as she tried to mimic the voice of the Sorcerer King, so that she'd sound like a proper monarch.
Ecstatic happiness filled their faces as the dangling head confirmed the words they heard.
"H-Hi, dirt eater lady." Mare said in his usual nervous little voice.
Zesshi let her arm fall as the dramatic moment was all but ruined by his casual nickname. She turned to face him, 'By god he's pretty.' She mentally sighed with anticipation for his adulthood, and let herself laugh a little at the nickname he'd given to her.
"A pleasure to see you, Mare, but you don't have to call me 'dirt eater lady', just call me by my name, it's Zesshi." She flashed a smile at him, and brushed her hair at the side of her face with her free hand.
Mare turned red with embarrassment. "O-OK then. Guess w-we're done here?" He asked Sebas.
"Yes, General Zetsumei can handle the rest from here." He said with a noble confidence and a look at the half elf that said he meant every word of it and expected nothing less.
"Yes, I can. The Elven Army will be... reevaluating our priorities." She said with a casual sort of flair to her tone, "I think our alliance with the Slane Theocracy needs to be drastically rethought."
She tapped her cheek three times with one finger. "OK, done thinking about it, alliance over, we're going to join the Sorcerous Kingdom, and when I'm crowned officially, I'll become His Majesty's vassal, after all his followers have done for my people, our loyalty to death is the least we can offer." She said, her voice going from a playful jest as if she had to think about the obvious, to one of iron resolve. Sebas nodded in approval.
"You two, stay in this tent, get dressed, and wait for me." Zesshi said, pointing at the two females that had been the elf king's concubines not but a short while ago.
They nodded with shining eyes, their lips moved as if to sing her praises, but no words could escape their tongues.
She didn't wait to see the others leave or the elf women dress, instead she drew herself up to her most imposing stature and walked out of the tent holding his head. When she was out, she held it aloft, "The king is dead! Long live the Queen!" She shouted it again, and again, and again, and again. For a moment. she envied the human woman who could cast her voice to all she wished, but her own thunder was not small. At first there was laughter as if someone was joking, but when she continued to shout and hold aloft the severed head of the face of the devil of their living hell... more and more came, and saw, and believed. Word spread like wildfire throughout the camp as the tens of thousands of elves in the army began to rush to where she stood. Some sensible fellow brought a crate and placed it in front of her for her to stand on, so that anyone and everyone could see the object of their hatred as well as the face and body of their savior.
She looked out over the sea of faces, she pointed to a nearby elf in armor, "You, go and free any remaining concubines and bring them here." Zesshi said sharply, he did not even nod, let alone salute, he turned and ran to carry out her orders.
She kept shouting the phrase over and over, until she stopped seeing her people drift in, and at last a number of elf women, her fathers 'playthings' all of them battered, bruised, barely able to stand, were helped to the fore. "I am Zesshi Zetsumei, daughter of the Elf King, and daughter of the human warrior woman that he kidnapped and raped so long ago. I was born from his atrocity! But I have also ended him! Therefore as princess of this kingdom and slayer of the monster, I claim his throne. Who accepts me as the rightful Queen, bend the knee. Who disputes my right to rule, step forward!"
She spoke with confidence and certainty, as if all that she'd said was indisputable, and as she held the head of the tyrant aloft, it was not. The army did not kneel as one, yet kneel they did, first one and then another, then two and three more, and that number grew until there was not one man or woman on their feet.
"The King is Dead!" Zesshi shouted.
"Long live the Queen!" The army echoed in enthusiasm. "Long live the Queen! Long live the Queen!"
...Inside Fortress Alaf...
The thunderous shouting of the elves did not confine itself to the camp, the voices of the thousands breached the walls of the fortress and carried all the way to where Leinas slept, she awoke with a start as the sound hit her ear and leapt from her bed. The covers flew off and she dashed out the door calling for her soldiers to raise the alarm, she had barely made it outside as the entire fortress awoke, when a calm and contented Aureole Omega greeted her.
"Something is happening!" Leinas said with alarm, only to freeze as Aureole Omega placed a confident hand on her shoulder and held her fast with impossible strength.
"It's alright, this was what I've been waiting for, Chindai's soldiers will be here soon, and we just got our other reinforcements anyway." The guardian said with a voice as sweet as honey.
"Other... reinforcements?" Leinas asked with her lips pursed, waiting for an explanation.
"The elves are on our side now." Aureole Omega said happily, "All has unfolded as our master wills it, when Chindai arrives, because of who he is, he will immediately attack, your army will follow suit, and the elves will do the same, beset on all sides... the Theocracy is finished." She pronounced it with the same confidence one might offer if they said the sun would rise in the morning.
"Alright, then what do we do?" Leinas asked bluntly, placing a hand over her sword hilt as if she were eager to draw it... which she was.
"Let's go up to the parapets and wait. The view will be spectacular, and I can prepare one of my dances to boost our army before it sally's out." Aureole Omega suggested with playful patience and a mischievous smile that curled up slightly more at one corner of her mouth.
"That is an excellent idea. It will be good to end this nonsense once and for all." She said optimistically, and they strode confidently to the top of the wall.
...Theocracy Camp outside of Fortress Alaf...
Zamma wasn't the most enthusiastic soldier in the world, he'd admit that to anyone who asked, but he was acceptably competent, which is why even if he wasn't the most attentive either, he hadn't dozed off or found someone else to cover for him so he could visit one of the camp whores. He did his job, took his pay, and was always content to just 'get by' while being reasonably responsible.
So while he was on shift that night, he heard the shouting from the elf camp. "What the hell is going on over there?" He asked the watch next to him.
"Hell if I know and damned if I care." The guard replied and took his wineskin out and drank from it. "All I know is that it is cold out here, this has lasted forever and gone nowhere. If the damned unchained slaves want to shout a little bit about queens and kings and fuck knows what else, let em, long as they shut up by the time I get a chance to sleep."
He yawned heavily and for awhile the two were quiet and listening to the growing shouting. They didn't think anything of it when Fortress Alaf raised the alarm for themselves, Zamma did have a brief moment of concern until his companion pointedly said, "They're just responding to those stupid subhumans gibbering over there. If the elves want to do something on their own, I say let em, saves us the trouble of dying." He yawned again, utterly bored and tired, a state that Zamma shared in both respects, and so they relaxed to wait out the end of their shift.
They were still waiting for the end, when the end came for them. They heard it long before they saw it, thunder, the thunder of four hundred thousand hooves on one hundred thousand horses, hundreds of Dark Dwarf Outriders atop great direwolves, all with magicine augmentations, were fast approaching.
Zamma swiftly lit the little pot holding the red burning oil, drew an arrow, dipped it, spun, and fired into the sky, alerting the entire camp to the danger as the inner guards saw the red arc in the sky. He lived long enough to hear the alarm bells and his comrades begin to run to order and rise to fight. His comrade... ran for his life. The howling dark elves cut them both down, but as he fell into the dirt and the undead horses began to trample him to death, one thought passed through his head before his skull was caved in, 'At least I was exceptional, just this once.'
The Theocracy command was alarmed beyond all measure, in all the time of this cursed siege, through all the horror, the repeated failed assaults and attempts to breach the wall, the red arrow had never gone up, not once had the fortress sallied out.
Yet now it was up and the sounds in the distance spoke of a large cavalry force.
Captain Shale was one of many that night to have shot up out of his bedroll, but he was one of the few that slept in full kit save for his helmet and boots. So he was ready quickly when the alarm went up. He was however, proud of the alacrity with which his fellow soldiers moved, not for nothing did the Slane Theocracy military gain a steadfast reputation for overwhelming military might. "Dark elves! It's dark elves!" Someone shouted somewhere, arrows flew into their massed ranks, here and there a human fell and cried out.
"Elves! Someone call for the elves!" Someone else shouted.
Captain Shale felt his body shake and sweat begin to pour down his face as that phrase gave him a moment's hope, until he saw the arrows come from the direction of the elven encampment.
"The elves are against us!" He shouted, as the man next to him fell with an elven arrow in his neck. The shouting intensified as eighty thousand Slane Theocracy soldiers rushed into their positions with halberds, spears, swords and bows, struggled to fight in the darkness. Only one blessing came to them from the enemy, and that was the dubious blessing of the use of fire arrows, flames rose up everywhere and gave the humans light by which to fight.
It was a desperate and chaotic melee as the dark elf infantry closed in hatefully on the Theocracy's left flank, while dark elven cavalry rode through the right and began to circle and fire arrows into the formation of humans who could not move. Shields went up with discipline as hard as the armor itself and most of the arrows began to bounce away. The right was stabilizing as more and more poured into position and held their shields up to cover their brothers and sisters in arms.
The center went back and forth as dwarven Outriders on enormous direwolves began to tear into the ranks with heavy weapons and limbs that Theocracy weapons could not wound.
The left too, began to stabilize for a time, and human mages began to cast light enchantments to give them light to see by everywhere, at last allowing order to form on the battlefield.
For a time, Captain Shale thought all was going to be well, 'Treacherous subhuman animals... they're all going to die, I'm going to kill them myself...' he thought as he shoved his sword into a dark elf throat and drew it out, he smashed a face with a shield bash and held his position in line while the man next to him stabbed down into the dark elf's belly.
The fortress however, was not idle, their gate opened and out of it began to march rank after rank with a horrifying banner at the front. They marched in a steady unbroken rhythm that held as they stretched their line out long over the left flank, someone, somewhere behind where Shale was fighting, was calling ranks back to receive an envelopment.
He never knew who, because a dark elf smiling with unrestrained joy did the unthinkable. He charged his horse directly toward the massed ranks and jumped off, landing atop the shields overhead, Shale saw him draw two swords in mid air, he landed violently hard on the man just behind where Captain Shale was standing and collapsed the man to the ground. With howling laughter he shoved his sword into Shale's back before he could turn in response, and had just as quickly killed the man in front of where he'd landed, who had no time to lower his shield. This single dark elf with phenomenal armor was tearing into the formation around him in a whirlwind of death, those humans who tried to respond found that he avoided them as easily as a fly dodged a casual back handed wave. Still they might have brought him down, but as Captain Shale lay there bleeding to death, he saw two women, one a southern elf, one clearly a dark elf, come flying overhead behind him and with banshee howls open the breach. It wouldn't last long, but it didn't need to. Dark elves began to pour in, their undead horses fearing no pain or wounds, and the line began to give, though Shale's eyes closed before it could fall.
Viktin hated soldiering, but conscription was not without its benefits, regular meals, clothing for free, a place to sleep, even healing for minor wounds, but he hated the fighting. For the longest time of this war however, he'd counted it a blessing of the gods that he'd been on standby, besieging a fortress that seemingly did not wish to engage any more than he did. Now he found himself desperately swinging his halberd, the elf in front of him fell, his confidence grew, but he was no more relieved, he could see the number growing, arrows kept falling, two bounced off his breastplate. The idiot officer behind them was shouting orders, 'Like we can hear you, twit, get up here and fight and stop pretending to be useful from a place of safety!' He thought to himself as he stabbed another elf.
The line kept stretching though, he kept having to step to one side as the ranks began to spread thin as those who could hear orders, conveyed them to those who couldn't. Finally he was far from his original position, and he knew why, as orcs began to charge while dual wielding axes. They hacked his halberd off at the wooden shaft, he dropped it and drew his sword and unslung his shield from his back. Viktin fought with the courage of a trapped rat. Nobody would sing songs of his courage, that was sure, but he fought nonetheless and followed every measure of his training, and as a result he put down two orcs before the ax of the third took him in the groin and he fell screaming to the blood soaked ground that had quickly become mud. His screaming did not last as the orc that hit him brought his other ax down on Viktin's face and cut off his screams forever.
Leinas Rockbruise gave her orders smoothly and crisply, their magic casters were dueling those of the Theocracy, neutralizing that threat at least, but it was rapidly becoming clear who was going to win this fight. Predictably, the Slane Theocracy was trying to extend their lines to fend her off, but she just kept going and when they had thinned themselves out, only then did she call for the charge. Aureole Omega ran with her, and that was when she had the first real indication that the maiden was even stronger than Leinas had first believed... chiefly because she stopped a sword with one hand, bent it, then grabbed the one holding it, and flung him by his arm as if he were a mere weapon himself. She flung him like a flail, his screaming body whirling around as she waded into the fray, sending men flying as the rest of the fortress cut down their enemies as if they were but paper tigers.
The forces of the Slane Theocracy began to waver, the return fire of their magic casters was wearing out, the buff provided by Aureole Omega had significantly boosted their forces, and as a result they were far and away the better force even if they were outnumbered.
Zesshi was overjoyed as she led her army straight into the flank of the nation that had betrayed her, her black and white hair flew behind her as if it were a battle standard all its own, and she reaped a harvest of death with her scythe, she felt more like a farmer harvesting wheat than she felt like a soldier taking lives. She quickly created a breach, and elves poured in to fill the gap, all the way to the rear of the position.
The left flank caved completely, those on the left closed in to encircle the front, those who had already enveloped the left, began to charge into the rear themselves, the front began to fall, the cavalry breach widened, the screaming of war cries became screams of terror. The right flank was the last to cave, but seeing their brethren run, the spirit of fear took them as well. A trickle of soldiers cast aside their shields and ran, the trickle became a flood, and the cavalry of wolves and undead horses ripped into the ranks ever harder. The demihumans Leinas had brought with her were having a field day and with all Theocracy discipline lost, those few commanders still living took to horse themselves. The camp was being overrun and the rising sun greeted a day in which no Theocracy soldier was alive within ten miles of Fortress Alaf, as the various armies halted their actions and began to take an accounting of prisoners.
The great flags of the commanders went up like the sun, and they began to close in on the one carried by the general of the Sorcerer King's army, Leinas Rockbruise, there in the center of the former encampment. As they stepped over the dead and their soldiers worked, they came together. "Chindai Khan, I presume?" Leinas asked.
"I am." The slender, muscular dark elf said happily, seemingly undisturbed by his mud and blood covered body. He stuck his hand out and Leinas grasped his forearm, he did the same with her and they clasped tight. After a brief shake, they released the grip.
He gestured behind him, "These are my wives, Khava, and Ryla." The two women inclined their heads politely, Leinas was struck with surprise at seeing the southern elf woman among the dark elves, let alone seeing her as the wife of the Khan of the plains, but Khava politely ignored the slight widening of Leinas's eyes which gave that away.
"And you would be... Zesshi Zetsumei?" Leinas asked, as the half elf approached and jabbed the butt of her scythe into the dirt and stuck her hand out, which Leinas gratefully took.
"I am. And unless you didn't hear the shouting from last night, I'm the new Queen of the Elven Kingdom. The Elf King is dead. His army is my army, his nation is my nation, and his people, my people." Zesshi said proudly.
"They fight well. I wish not to insult, but I have not heard of such skill from your people before." Chindai said formally.
Zesshi shook her head and smiled wryly, "Before they had nothing worth fighting for, now they do." She replied simply as she clapped her hands together.
"Yes, that makes sense, a life despised is a life half ended already, their spirits restored, so also is their strength." Khava said sagely, "I was once a slave among the Theocracy ilk, slew my master then and escaped, I made my way north, and found myself a husband of merit, but I am a fortunate one, I saw the broken lives of my fellow elves, restoring their souls to themselves, their pride and dignity, will make them vigorous again, as they should be."
"It is a heavy thing, to suffer so, and we will lift that burden from our cousins of the south." Ryla said fiercely and held fast to her sword, her fingers tightening audibly on the hilt.
"How many do you think survived?" Aureole Omega asked thoughtfully as she surveyed the battlefield.
"Less than half." Leinas guessed as she looked at the stream of bodies away from the 'piles' of bodies where the lines had been.
"Many less, are my thoughts, but it does not matter." Chindai said with a grin, "If they wish to die weary, so be it."
Aureole Omega tittered, "They needn't be pursued, they run to slaughter when they run South, as most of them are likely to do, don't worry, you won't see those men again, now, give your soldiers a rest, let's open up the food stores and feast, day after tomorrow we march for C'teon and then Kami Miyako."
"I can't wait." Zesshi replied happily, "I want to pay a visit to an old friend."