Chapter 4
The usually still water of the lake seemed to have grown a little restless.
Under a bright blue sky marched a large army which shook the earth and the water as rows upon rows of soldiers crossed the shoreline between the marshes and the forest. The solid ground was not very wide, so as a result the army marched in a few thin, long lines that changed in number as per the size of the creatures forming each division.
At the back of the column tirelessly walked the undead. Even if the low-level mob had proved next to worthless against the lizardmen, there were three thousand skeleton warriors and just as many zombies. But the Death Warrior and the Death Knight towering on the other undead would prove as difficult adversaries for the toadmen, at least according to the lizardmen chiefs who advised Cocytus.
There were a dozen lizardmen scouting ahead at the orders of Shasuryu Shasha, but the one man leading the advance was that one huge insect warrior. Holding in one of his four limbs a halberd as shiny as his blue-white body, the Guardian of the 5th Floor of Nazarick stood proudly, with the best lizardmen warriors right behind him. The flanks of the formation were covered by two groups of thirty level 35 insect warriors from Nazarick, direct servants of Cocytus himself.
His plan was simple: marching on the toadmen villages and use the undead to probe their tricks and fighting prowess. Even if the lizardmen considered themselves inferior to the toadmen who had previously defeated them, Cocytus thought the army would win without him and his selected few needing to fight.
First of all, the toadmen had not been informed of their arrival like the lizardmen, so they would be surprised and unprepared to properly defend themselves against unknown forces. Also, while the toadmen were incredibly fast and agile thanks to their hind limbs which could make them jump for several meters, their bodies were not in the slightest as thick as the lizardmen scales, so against the blades and claws of the undead heading for their houses they would be at a disadvantage.
On the other hand, they could and probably would try to cast spells. Compared to the lizardmen who mostly had warriors, the toadmen had large numbers of magic casters, at least according to the tales which had been passed down from the elders to the new generation of lizardmen who in turn reported it to Cocytus.
Also, it was likely that the quick toadmen would flee as soon as they spotted such a large enemy headed for their village.
If that was the case, Cocytus would be happier as he hoped all toadmen gathered together to try and stand against the power of Nazarick.
The toadmen survivors would be subjugated like the lizard had been, extending the influence of the Supreme Beings on the rest of the lake.
Lord Ainz had clearly stated he could not care any less about the POP monsters being cut down, since the numbers of those defending Nazarick would be replenished with zero cost. So Cocytus figured they were more expendable than the lizardmen themselves, especially because many of their most capable warriors had been killed in the recent war between Nazarick and the lizardmen. Other Guardians may have thought differently, but Cocytus had been tasked to rule the lizardmen and to make them flourish, not to lead them towards extinction, so he was certain this was the right choice.
Also, if the undead were all destroyed in the process, he would rejoice a bit for it meant there were worthy toadmen fighters he could personally challenge, or better yet have them fight against the strongest lizardmen warriors. Cocytus had brought along Zanberu Gugu, Zaryusu and Shasuryu Shasha who had been training in Nazarick under his surveillance, so he wanted to see how they would fare against the toadmen and check their improvement on the battlefield.
Not to mention they were chieftains and as such they had to report to the other lizardmen about the result of the campaign against their ancient foes who no lizardmen had never defeated.
That said, Cocytus was not going to underestimate his enemies yet again after the big surprise he had experienced in the conflict against the lizardmen. Which is why for the umpteenth time the leader of the Nazarick forces turned to the two people walking after him, making yet again the same request.
"TELL. ME. MORE. ABOUT. THESE. TOADMEN."
Most people would at least sigh, but after weeks spent together with the strong, honourable and reliable Cocytus, Shasuryu showed no signs of frustration. While Zenberu—
"—Oh, come on Cocytus, there is nothing more about them that we know of. How many times do I have to listen to the same old story 'The toadmen jump high and far, they gots many casters and have big villages on the northern lakeshore'?" And he let a big sigh out of his big jaws.
It didn't seem like Cocytus was going to reprimand him, but Shasuryu still punched him on the shoulder and hastened to speak.
"Please forgive him, Cocytus-sama. Zenberu still has to learn how to properly address you…Anyway, about the toadmen, I'm sorry to be unable to provide you with extra information, but we haven't really seen or heard about them in years. I'm sure our scouts will spot them or one of their villages pretty soon."
Not a second had passed since he last said it, that all of the lizardmen sent ahead came back in a hurry. Zaryusu kneeled before Cocytus and his companions imitated him while he spoke.
"Cocytus-sama, we have found them, or rather bumped into them. There were two toadmen who seemed to be hunting, or on patrol the area. I tried to capture them, but they immediately jumped away. I'm deeply sorry for—"
"—NO. NEED. TO. WORRY. ZARYUSU. I. AM. CURIOUS. ABOUT. OUR. FOES. BUT. I. PREFER. TO. HAVE. THEM. KNOW. WE. ARE. COMING. NOW. GET. UP. AND. GO. BACK. OUT. THERE. BE. EXTRA. CAREFUL. FROM. NOW. ON. IF. ATTACKED. RETREAT. IMMEDIATELY." Ordered Cocytus without stopping. He was setting up the speed of the army, so he would not disrupt the pace.
The scouts nodded and went back to do their job while Cocytus happily shook his long tail.
Another. Chance. To. Prove. My. Worth. And. Show. The. Power. Of. Nazarick. We. Shall. Prevail!
Unsurprisingly, the toadmen proved to be cautious opponents. A number of scouts started looking after the great army while the rest of the closest village evacuated. They left behind nothing but their homes, made out of wood and mud lik high wall which encircled the abandoned village.
The same scene repeated itself for two villages beyond: the toadmen clearly preferred to leave their houses rather than fighting a mostly unknown foe overwhelmingly superior in numbers. But things changed in the largest toadmen village.
The villagers who had fled jumped inside the 10 m high wall of Shwag, the oldest settlement of the toadmen on the lake. Unlike most of the surroundings, the marsh was broken by an island of solid rock all covered in Duluk, strange vines with fat spiralling leaves that spilled water if one touched them.
Almost three thousand toadmen lived in there, while most other villages contained about half of it or even less. However, there was a total of twenty settlements, so a force of almost ten thousand fighters could be gathered by the Toadmen King.
King Heka received the leaders of the fugitives in his Hall of Stone, the only building in the city to be made out of rocks. Not entirely, because the vault was formed by wooden trunks held together with mud and vines, but the circular walls of the one-room palace were of solid stone slabs.
The King was slumped over something that looked more like a couch than a throne. On the soft cushions made out of some monsters' fur lay a monstrous toadman, twice as big as the average. His skin was of a green so dark it seemed black and had plenty of yellowish blisters all over his body, especially around his large blue eyes. Heka was busy sipping a cup of wild berry juice when the chiefs of the three southeastern-most villages showed up to him, bowing before the King.
"Well, well, halo bombastic fugitives! So so y'all decided to go down the pawth of shamelessness! How dare yew flee before those overgrown lizards? Our ancestors beat them to a pulp and now yew slip away from them like scared bunnies! Shame on yew!"
"M-my king, with all due respect, this is different… The lizardmen are a few, but they have come with new allies. There's thousands of undead and some strange monsters with them, we had no chance to defat them on our own! We are not cowards, milord, we want to fight, but we must do this together—"
"—Alright, alright, that's enough. I know that, I was just messing with you. I sent word to the other villages to send all warriors here. We'll take down the lizardmen, the undead and all the monsters they've brought with them!"
He stood up and raised his cup. At that, his guards and all the presents cheered to victory, some less enthusiastically than others, though.
But the King wasn't done yet.
"That won't be the end of it, though. Those stupid lizards think they can wreak havoc on our part of the lake after we let them a piece of it? Enough! After we defeat their army, we'll bring war to them. We'll cut those fools to pieces until the marshes will be full of their scales, and we'll enslave a few of theem lizards so they can serve us until the end of time. Then the Toadmen will be the only masters of the great lake!"
He fell back on his throne while everyone cheered.
Everyone but one. Her silence didn't go unseen nor unpunished as the king grabbed the leash by which she was bound to his throne. He pulled with most of his strength and the girl flew across the floor until she hit hard against the throne which was carved out of stone.
She yelped and Heka chuckled.
"No longer silent now, yew little bitch, are yew? Wot then, why didn't you rejoice at my bombastic declaration, hmm? Foolishness!"
"I-I'm sorry, king Heka. But why would the lizardmen come all the way here if they weren't sure to win?"
"Are you esstupid? Of course they underestimate us. Crahahaha, they no longer remember how much our ancestors pummelled them into di mud! But this time I won't let them get away with it or forget their place: beneath my feet, like yew!"
That said, he dropped his legs on the soft emerald body of the girl who trembled at the contact. Not because he'd kicked her, but because she hated him so much her skin crawled whenever he touched her.
Yet, she valued her tribe's survival more than her own and risked incurring the wrath of the king once more.
"King Heka, please listen to me. I agree that fighting here all together is for the best, but send all of the eggs to the farthest village—"
"—Are yew mad?! Have yew lost your goddamn mind?! Yew really think I would send the future generation of our kind to the remotest village? My goodness me of wild berry juice… to send all the eggs to a chief who would raise them kids and turn against me? I'm not esstupid like yew are, bombastic emerald fool! I won't get myself killed like your famlee did. Crahahaha, I still remember your foolish fada's face when I stormed this palace and killed him with his own spear. A powerful weapon and a crown are nothing if yew can't properly use them! Yew're like him, brainless... Now yew better shut your mouth before I give yew the most bombastic slap you've ever seen in this household!"
That said, he gulped down the rest of his cup. "Ahh, so juicy… Crahahaha, like dat ass! Yew know what, I think I know what to do until di enemy shows up. Everyone get out, warn me when those foolish lizards and their allies show up!"
And all obeyed King Heka, the mighty warrior who had overthrown a dinasty of over a hundred years and enslaved its last member.
It was nearly lunchtime by the time the enemy reached sight of Shwag. The powerful, deep voice of the Trumpeters on duty broke the air and everyone froze as they yelled.
"Raise the alarm!"
"Bring everybody to the wall!"
"Be ready to fight!"
"Get everyone who can bear a club or a hammer!"
The King leaped out of his Hall of Stone, still hard, but ready to fight, with a huge metal spear in his hands. Pride swelled in his throat as the warriors did not even stop to ask questions, their feet splashing loud through the low waters as they jumped to their posts.
"The undead! Lots of undead in the water!" The Trumpeters cried again, only to be stopped by order of the king who didn't want panic to spread.
The toadmen's deep cries ribbited in alarm as word spread and the heavy warriors put away their spears, going for heavy clubs, militia and warriors were the next to fall in after the elites, followed by the younger and the much older ones as well.
The toadmen darted their eyes around with fear, looking over the placid lake as their King jumped on the wall.
He looked at the enemy and frowned. It could be seen and yet not. They were underwater, but the darkening in it proved there were thousands of them.
Damn them lizardmen, where did they get all those bombastic undead!…
He filled his wide cheeks with air and then let out loud words. "Let them come! We'll knock them all down until they break their bones and then we'll exterminate the lizardmen! Everyone who can fight, must fight!"
The toadmen capital was far more than a village now, despite most of them thinking of it as such, and to better aid the watery settlement's security and establish clear boundaries, many trees had been let grow together with the mud wall to make it sturdier. Also, the treetops held platforms that had been filled with caches of rocks or that could be thrown as crude missiles against those who attacked the walls. And of course up there were stationed the toadmen magic casters who started their rituals.
There was no single 'gate' as every toadman could simply jump over the wall and anything they wanted to haul could be taken up slowly.
My people are brave, we will defeat the undead, we will defeat the lizardmen, we will secure the Lake and claim our future… The King repeated it to himself. His heartbeat picked up a faster pace and he felt many large eyes focused upon him and him alone, seeking guidance, reassurance, and strength.
What else to say? It was an eternal question, something, anything to buck up their spirits in the decisive hour. Finally he hit upon something, his own words to reassure himself.
He held his great long spear overhead in both thick green webbed hands and shouted to them all, "We will defeat the undead! We will defeat the lizardmen! We will secure our future in this world! Nothing, not alive, not dead, not undead will bar our way through! This lake is ours! Let no one take it from us!"
Great ribbiting roars met his as clubs were briefly held aloft and shouts of defiance hurled toward the darkening waters. Some who carried wooden shields smacked their clubs in place for extra noise, but he cared nothing for noise, he was focused on the darkness in the once blue waters.
The first undead heads began to rise up, their twisted faces, some bearing little flesh and others fleshless, just naked white bone, stared through empty eyes at the living toadmen.
They were slowed still by the silt, the sound of splashing water picked up till the noise of droplets falling from their bodies were so numerous that it sounded like a roaring rain to the waiting toadmen defenders.
The undead knights spied the defenders in a great mass, howled their rage and hatred for the living, and then with their swords raised aloft as if they still remembered their warrior lives, they charged.
"Here they come! Hold your place, or lose everything!" Heka shouted the final order and raised his spear to swing it down and begin the fight in earnest.
The undead became so numerous that as the sun's ascent continued across the sky, its light glinting off the armor made the lake look invisible under the reflection of light off steel. The toadmen on the wall swung their clubs back and forth with desperate, wild abandon, smashing against steel helmets with wooden clubs, the finest of which had stones embedded in the middle of their heads.
Heka lost sight of the fighting in various places, remaining as he did at the center, his strongest warriors used all their martial arts to fend off the onslaught, and the mindless undead hacked at the barrier, splashing churned up mud and blood into a reddish-brown mix.
Everytime a toadman's foot was caught or a stray sword pierced an exposed belly, the undead swarmed and tore the living to shreds before the eyes of their very comrades.
The undead were strong and full of hate, devoid of weariness or fear, they would not stop, there was no pulling back for them, just a single charge of do or 'undie'.
Little by little, the undead began to scale the wall. More than once they were kicked far back into the waters by powerful toadmen legs. The undead fell in piles when a powerful blow sent them flying back like projectile weapons instead of enemies, but then they got back up. The platforms that served as throwing positions quickly ran out of rocks and as soon as it happened the news was spread across by the Trumpeters.
Then the toadmen druids unleashed their most powerful magic spell.
Suddenly, the lake started rippling around the undead. Twelve cones of mud, standing a little over 2 m high, with no arms, legs or heads, appeared and began to move. Although they had no feet, they moved nimbly across the marsh, almost gliding, advancing on the undead. As they'd gotten closer, they reached out some whiplike appendages, far longer than the mud creatures were tall, from about where the arms would have been on a person.
These were one of the toadmen's trump cards, the most powerful magic beings the druids could summon combining their powers: a dozen swamp elementals.
The summons plowed into the pack of undead, struck with their whiplike tentacles and yanked some of them off the ground. Of course, the undead fought back. Both sides were fearless in the fray, but gradually it became clear the swamp elementals had the advantage. It was a matter of imbalance in the individual potential. The power of their own magic casters was winning against the undead.
Seeing this restored the courage of the toadmen warriors, but not for long. As if they had been lurking in the water waiting for worthy foes, two huge undead monsters emerged and headed for the swamp elementals. While the low-tiered undead couldn't resist them, the Death Knight and the Death Warrior cut them to pieces so quickly that the elementals were almost wasted, having dealt few casualties to the seemingly endless stream of undead.
Thus began a gruesome brawl. In this battle, unlike the one up till now, numerous toadmen lost their lives as the skeletons and zombies now climbed up the wall more easily thanks to the growing mountains of corpses.
Heka fought on, never leaving his position, while the warrior elites did the same and the others switched out. Some fighting for an hour or more before drawing back for a brief rest, serving in rotations on the wall.
The screaming of his people suddenly went up in horror just out of the king's view together with a terrifying roar. The king knew what it was. 'A breach. At least partial… Part of the wall gave way.'
It became a brutal fight as warriors who had not gotten a complete break, jumped from where they sat and lept high through the air to fall on the undead, the weight of their bodies, clubs, and gravity coming down hard on the first undead to enter the breach and for the present, stopping the advance.
'How much longer…?' Heka asked as he smashed the end of his spear into the head of another undead, his weapon crunching into an unguarded skull, dropping the undead where it stood.
Another simply took his place. His warriors were growing weary. 'I wonder if they've run out of martial arts yet… if they haven't, they will soon.'
More shouting, more screams… this within view, Heka saw out of the corner of his eye where the huge undead with the shield successfully pulled a few defenders down into the undead dominated side and reached the top of the wall. "Fill the breach!" He cried, but it was a needless order, another weary group of toadmen pushed off with their mighty legs and soared to land atop the undead, swinging their clubs with wild desperation.
The thick knot of his elites at a break in the wall were lightly reinforced as the eldest of the elder toadmen charged in to support their sons and grandsons. Strictly speaking, expendables. The young were vital and the old threw themselves into the fray to protect the future, a gift from the past to those who wanted to forge ahead into the future.
Elder toadmen died screaming as swords and bony hands tore into the toadmen's thick muscles And yet for all the bloody stinking horror, Heka could only feel pride in their courage as the elders threw their lives away without fear for the pain they were enduring to buy their young even one more minute of life.
If I had sent the eggs away like that fallen princess wanted, everyone would be fleeing right now… as usual, I took the right call.
The stink of blood was thick in his nostrils and the blue water began to turn an almost violet shade as it was blended with the churned up silt and blood of toadmen that had fallen to the front of the wall.
One of the greatest champions of his elites yelped in sudden horror and he cast a brief glance at Heka as an undead climbing up from below grabbed at his vine armor and yanked. He began to fall and the undead with it. His hand thrust out and grasped him from the back, for just an instant he hung there, suspended between the throng aching to tear him apart, and the safety of the King he was protecting. Two swords pierced his vocal sac as he had fallen too low, and blood began to pump out, he felt him go limp in his hands and he almost let go.
No! He was a great warrior! Heka told himself and yanked the dead body backward. He fell to the other side of the wall, an armored corpse whose fears and hopes were over with the moment of his passing. He couldn't float in the low waters, but the ripples echoed out from his body as if he might still stir to rejoin the fight.
The noise and the screams of the living and the undead continued unabated, but even while his people began to weaken, the undead never tired. Never feared. Never stopped to relentlessly fight unless they were killed. From where he stood, the King could see another breach begin to open up due to the Death Warrior. But he also saw movement in the water.
"Hold on! Hold on! Just a little bit more! We've almost won!" He screamed the admonition to his weary people. Most couldn't see the reinforcements, fighting was now on the ground since some undead had broken through in places and were running among the interior huts of the settlement, tearing into anyone living that had not made an escape or rejoined the fight.
Screams of the dying were behind him, before him and on either side of him. But Heka swung his spear again and put down another undead.
He never knew who the first of them was whose courage fled, but somewhere along the wall, it happened. He caught sight of one of his own not running, but leaping wildly away, using his comrades to buy him time to save his own life.
Heka cursed the nameless one. He hurled his hatred at the one he counted as a coward who left his brothers to die, and yet he was not the last.
"Just a little more! Will you leave your bombastic King to die?" He admonished his soldiers, and though some said "Yes…" as they hopped and fled into the distance with not even a weapon to burden their escape, others continued with desperate courage.
It was then that he saw it. More bodies began to emerge from the waters. But those were not skeletons or zombies. A roaring ribbit of reinforcements hit the air, the undead had no sense of strategy and left nothing to guard their flanks, nor did they keep order and maintain the pressure on the walls. Instead they charged the nearest targets which bought the toadmen on the wall a moment to breath.
The toadmen reinforcements hopped onto the attackers with wild frenzied killing intent, though they mostly had only crude clubs rather than ones prepared for military use, they nonetheless had 'something'.
They hit hard and drew pressure from the wall, the undead on even ground seemed initially to still have the advantage, but the toadmen were fresh and nimble, leaping all over the area, splashing into waters or luring the undead into deeper areas where they could be isolated and killed.
A useless effort when the numbers of undead were many, but reduced by hours of fighting, they were more manageable for the fresh forces.
"We're reinforced! Attack! Attack! Attack!" Heka called for his weary warriors to sally forth and strike, and those who remained, followed their King as he jumped off the wall as high and far as he could, his spear held aloft like a god of war, aiming for the one he had acknowledged as the most dangerous.
He tried to landed on the Death Knight to smack his head clean off his neck, but the undead covered himself with his giant shield. Still, the King put all of its strength into the blow, sending the Death Knight backwards.
Inspired, the toadmen bellowed with desperately renewed vigor and followed suit, abandoning the walls and closing in on the undead from all sides, entangled and insensible among one another, the undead began to fall like flies.
From there, the noise and undead screams of hate began to diminish, thousands reduced to mere hundreds, hundreds to dozens, and at long last… There were only those two, the Death Knight and the Death Warrior. The druids tried to take them down with magic, the warriors with martial arts, but they just wouldn't go down. While the toadmen who died by the hands of the Death Knight stood up again and had to be killed by their former companions.
The Death Warrior who knew only to tear at flesh charged Heka who managed to thrust his spear home, catching the helmeted head through the eye socket and yanking back so hard that his head was torn free and sent sailing high overhead to land somewhere within their settlement.
The undead body fell with a splash into the waters and for a moment the whole of the remaining toadmen army was utterly silent.
Then the Death Knight bellowed and cut through the warriors as it approached the Toadmen King who croaked: "Cast a bombastic spell, yew useless druids!"
As if waiting for such words, six Swamp Elementals appeared and surrounded the undead from all sides. They tried to kill him, but his defence was unparalleled. He cut off their tentacles, then the elementals themselves and the toadmen who assaulted him. Until—
—The King rained down on him, striking through his helmet and his skull. The Death Knight shook and then crumbled.
It was over, the King raised his spear overhead, and as if that were some signal on which they had all been waiting, they held their clubs up and shouted a victory roar.
"Heka! Heka! Heka!" They chanted their King's name like a war cry and he, towering over them as a hero, he pretended to receive their cheers as usual. But even in his pride he knew there was little to celebrate, at his back he could see that the blue waters had been stained with blood so copiously that they were nearly violet, an ugly bruise-like shade.
How many… how many remain alive…? He had no answer and his heart was filled with a dread he could not escape.
Heka was back in his Hall of Stone, the privilege of leadership, his favourite slave still bound to his throne, though she had clearly struggled to set herself free. That managed to cheer him up.
"Crahahaha, useless cunt, yew can't even run off while I saved our people taking down countless undead and the two most monstrous among them! Tell me again who's the rightful leader!" And he laughed at her.
Survivors who fled the undead were starting to return, retrieved by fast hoppers who shouted their victory over the undead for all the wetlands to hear.
They would trickle in, weary and hungry, over the course of hours yet, but Heka focused on the matter at hand. With most of the chiefs dead, he still had to take stock of the situation as a whole.
"So how bad was it?" He asked in the bluntest possible terms, the water around him rippled, his body shook with the aftermath of battle still leaving its mark on him. The same was true of the other toadmen who sat arrayed in front of him.
Ripples of water from post-battle shivering drew no comment, not even from the hardest of the surviving toadmen. The malice and hatred of the undead could shake even the bravest to their core.
"About five thousand." The answer came, and disbelieving relief filled his body. It was far less than he thought, though it was a brutal loss.
"… We've never suffered losses like that, but it's survivable."
The toadman's throat bulged out with deep, gasping breaths, "No, my King. Five thousand are still alive. Our dead… We can't count them yet…"
Heka barely heard him, the words were an echo in his mind, his shaking intensified, nor was he alone, if anyone was saying anything, nobody heard it. The final cost of fending off the dead… 'How can so many die in one fight…? It just doesn't seem possible. Will the bombastic spirit realm ever glut itself enough?'
"How many eggs do we have… between all tribes?" He asked another young advisor.
"Not that many, perhaps two thousand…"
"How many fertile females, besides this bitch?" Heka asked while yanking her by the leash.
"Across all tribes, before this fight we had maybe over five thousand, after, we think there are two thousand, probably a little less, but we haven't divided the count between male and female yet." The advisor explained.
"… Withdraw all females from the fighting, we will add any older males to the numbers. For our attack on the lizardmen, if we wipe them out, then we have years to recoup our losses and a whole lake to spread out over." He gave the order, and there was a decisive and hopeful nod.
"How many wounded?"
"There are two thousand wounded who have yet to be attended to, they have mostly belly wounds, though they have been packed with pain killing moss and all injuries temporarily treated. The casters need all day to replenish their supply. I took the liberty of asking and they say they can heal one thousand in a week.".
"So two weeks… will they survive that long with those wounds?"
Every life is suddenly far more valuable… He thought, knowing full well that hundreds more could die of their wounds before all was said and done no matter the best efforts of his healers.
"Most, yes. A few hundred may die and some show evidence of rot beginning. We will amputate, cauterize, and otherwise stave off death as long as we can to allow the healers time to work… but I fear some of them are so scarred mentally, that they will never fight again." The advisor said as truthfully as he could, and all their eyes went down to the waters around themselves.
"Is it bad enough that we must use fire…?" Heka shuddered, nor was he alone in that. Fire was the greatest fear of all toadmen.
"It is, my King. It is. Fire or death…" Silence followed the answer.
"How could this have happened… how? So many undead, I've never seen anything like it…"
"Well, I had never seen a single one!"
Heka had an answer to that matter at least.
"They were human skeletons and came from the south with the lizardmen, but where did they find them I do not know. Who practices the abominable art of necromancy…?" Heka asked the true question and nobody answered.
"Where are the lizardmen that have been sighted? And the monsters with them? Did they run?"
"They were hiding somewhere in the forest last time I checked. They're probably running away right now."
Heka clenched his fists so tight they turned white.
"How soon can we be ready to move on the lizardmen?" Heka asked the next most important question and the toadmen looked around at one another with uncertain eyes.
"My King… the warriors are exhausted, even if we rest all day and all night… their fighting spirits need time to mend, we need to recover, they need to recover. Can we let them rest for a week? it will do them good to see about another thousand swell their ranks?"
Heka shook his head.
"No, we can't, there is simply no way we can let the bombastic lizardmen have a week to operate freely, they know we are weakened. Do you really think they won't come back?" Heka pressed the point home.
The weight of his argument stilled their tongues, they looked up at their towering King and sought a counter to his words, but found none. The same toadman spoke again, "If we allow for the minimum amount of rest, we can attack tomorrow morning if we allow for the remainder of the day to rest and a full night's sleep with good meals as well."
"Then we will do that, set the non-combatants to all essential tasks, including the females we aren't sending back to the fight, the warriors we are keeping will rest for the remainder of the day, feast to the dead tonight, and tomorrow we will wipe out the lizardmen, any slaves we take, we can no longer keep, we are too few, we will slaughter them after they surrender. We cannot share any part of this lake with the two legged animals anymore."
"Yes, my King." His advisors stood and left.
He felt like the worst had passed and relaxed a little. Until a moment later the screaming began afresh.
"What bombastic nightmare is this?!" Heka shouted and snatched up his spear, forcing himself, weary as he was, first to rush out of the hut to find his people screaming in alarm. It can't be more undead! It can't be!'
It wasn't. Everyone seemed fine, but the cause of their screaming quickly became obvious. Just beyond the breaches in the walls, a thing he'd only ever heard stories about, but seen just a few weeks ago, dominated the water.
Is that ice?! Again?! Heka wondered as he looked at the still white ground that had once been the ebbing flow of water. The red bloody surface had become red stained and still, while the rest was either dirty or as white as the purest and most perfect of clouds.
Several of his people were howling and screaming, "I'm stuck! I'm stuck! Please… I'm stuck! Comrades! Help me!" Cries of fear and pain were rampant, and before the cries could rise higher he understood just why.
The ones working deeper… the water froze around them!
Heka pointed his spear toward the area beyond the damaged wall. "If you're not stuck, go help the others, when someone unsticks you, go aid them in helping others! Use rocks, spears, anything!" He shouted and rushed out, his powerful leaps carrying him over the wall to find that at least a dozen of his own were flailing about, waist high or worse in the now solid surface of the lake. They pounded with their fists and ignored the breaking of their fingers.
Heka didn't blame them, toadmen did not fare well in the ice. Around him, to their credit, the toadmen were following his commands, clubs swung down hard to crack at the ice, while others chipped at the ice with knives, and enterprising souls rushed out to take up swords that were piled high from the undead, and applied those to the task of freeing their brethren.
There was no way for Heka to tell how many were trapped in the ice, but there were many, and the cruel cold which would have melted on its own eventually, began to take its toll on those who had the misfortune to be standing in it at the time.
Heka brought his spear down and smashed through, freeing one of his followers in a single blow. His heavy infantry were doing the same, but others of more common strength struggled at their task. Sometimes the scream changed its tune, going to a higher octave when a blow missed the ice and struck flesh instead, adding to the total tally of the wounded that was already too much for Heka to truly grasp.
But thanks to steady order and quick actions, one became two, then became five, then ten, and the numbers of those helping free the remainder became sufficient that the whole tribe was set completely free of the dreadful substance in a few minutes.
The luckiest toadmen had only mild burns from the freezing around their ankles, and though they were in pain, they could still move and work, albeit with some wincing.
Others however, had more serious burns all over most of their body, and they were left groaning and in pain, a few unfortunates had hands and feet both frozen into place when picking something out of the water.
Worse yet, when the last tally was told, six more had died, they had been frozen at the head, breaking the surface of the water when the freeze hit. Frozen where they were, their brain could not take the change, and their struggling ceased long before anyone could see they were in danger, leaving them mere frozen corpses waiting to be released.
"What are those…?" Somebody asked.
Sweating, Heka mounted the wall and stood above the center where he had fought before and looked off into the distance over the now solid white waters.
Over the distant waters, he could have sworn his eyes beheld 'dots'.
Oh hell no man, what the fuck! That is why the waters were frozen. So that time?… Could it have been the lizardmen who were enslaved by the one who sent the undead?… Well, that whoever did it, can now walk here…
The dread of that understanding sent Heka into a desperate tailspin of thinking.
We've been getting evacuees all day, can they find the strength to run again? How long before those 'dots' get here? What about our young…? Heka acutely felt the lack of options open to his in the present moment.
If they fled, survival was uncertain. If they remained, survival was uncertain. If they fought, survival was uncertain. Fight, don't fight, maybe we can surrender. The lizardmen couldn't possibly have done this all by themselves, so that means some other enemy has, perhaps I can persuade them to spare us… Heka clung to that thought, they were far away at least, giving them some time to rest.
He looked over his shoulder, "Withdraw to warmth! Eat! Rest! All non-fighters who are uninjured set to rebuild the defenses!"
Behind him, he could hear his people flopping down in various places, it wouldn't be perfect, but it would be something, in the meantime his non-combatants went about the process of rebuilding the walls where the undead breached it before, running fresh vines back and forth between trees to create the barriers again.
There was little else to be done and, to his pride, his people were doing all that they could.
So Heka stood on the wall, and waited.
"To the wall!" Heka yelled after he'd given his people all the rest that they could, lizardmen and some monsters were now clearly visible. His forces still weary and worn down, the mana of his casters was still too low, but his forces obeyed their heroic King to the fullest of their ability.
They went to the wall and made ready, some bearing swords taken from the undead, but most stuck with the familiar weapons.
"Lizardmen! Those are really lizardmen!" One of his warriors shouted in utter disbelief he bounced up and down, restraining the urge to leap toward the invaders and attack.
"They are… they must be behind this somehow…" Heka muttered, but at their center there was one huge blueish figure who was obviously not a lizardman. An insect warrior who exuded power.
That must be the responsible… the one responsible for all our calamities… that one must die… Heka vowed, but aware of his delicate circumstances, when they came within shouting distance, he tried to negotiate with the stranger.
"Stop there!" Heka called out, "I'm willing to negotiate!"
The ranks of the insect monsters orderly stopped as soon as their leader raised a hand.
The warriors at Heka's back and at his side were staring up at him. He glanced down at them, he knew that they knew what he knew. We are not in a position of strength…
Many were dead, many more were wounded, their eggs were vulnerable, everyone was needed at the wall. The lizardmen and their master will not show mercy to us… not now…'
SO. YOU. ARE. WILLING. TO NEGOTIATE. NOW?… HOW. SILLY. FIRST. YOU. MUST. KNOW. DEFEAT. Cocytus thought.
"THAT. IS. NICE." He shouted back at the Toadmen King, "BUT. I. DO. NOT." And he pointed his halberd toward the wall. "GO. CRUSH. THEM. BUT. LEAVE. A. FEW. ALIVE. AS. A. TRIBUTE. TO. OUR. LORD."
His insect warriors rushed forward while the Lizardmen watched.
Even from where they stood, it was obvious that the glorious days of yesterday or earlier were gone. The toadmen were weakened, weary, some of those on the wall still had obvious wounds on their bodies. They leaned on spears rather than standing proudly at the ready, as the big one did.
The weary warriors of the toadmen were heavy-limbed and slow, but they had the high ground on the walls, and whether Zaryusu wanted to admit it or not, he was compelled to acknowledge that they were brave, even fearless. The sound of voices activating martial arts was punctuated by the cries of slaughterers and the slaughtered, the shouts loud and ferocious.
The toadmen were simply blown away by the insect warriors, but their dead were replaced by other brave fighters.
The big one holding the centre managed to repel the wave of attacks and launched a taunt.
"Behold the chiefs of the lizardmen! They hide while your King stands with you! Will you let him die here, protecting your own young from cowards?!"
Invigorated by his projected voice, the toadmen struggled on, the bodies of the defeated falling before the walls, but none of the insect warriors.
The Toadmen King managed to hold his ground, but even he could not land a good blow on the strong new foes. The insect warriors were over the walls in several places and the toadmen's spirit began to break in places, outnumbered, exhausted, and out-equipped, they fled inward, their great hopping strides not half what they'd been before, where they would make their stand.
After a while, Heka realised it was a lost cause.
At least I want to take some lizardmen to hell with me.
"King Heka challenges the lizardmen!" He bellowed instantly before a sudden leap which sent him beyond the lines of the insect monsters. His massive and powerful legs carroed him to soar over the battle area like a bird in flight.
Zaryusu, Shasuryu and Zenberu looked at Cocytus who simply nodded and pointed at the warrior holding Frost Pain. He smiled and prepared to fight.
The Toadman King let out a harsh and rough ribbit and Shasuryu looked up at the huge creature his brother was now running at.
Heka cried and rushed the lizardman who dodged and flashed Frost Pain down at his exposed arm. He jerked it back and tried to backhand the lizardman immediately.
Zaryusu felt the blow and it rocked him back on his heels until he used his tail to stop himself.
Zaryusu was not sure why, but Heka was proving far more dangerous than he realized, so he used his trump card. "[Icy Burst]" He bellowed out.
The toadman howled in pain. That was the chance he needed, so he took it and thrust his magic weapon home at the source of the scream, but somehow Heka managed to parry it once through the cold fog.
But not twice. Zaryusu darted to the left forward and sent Frost Pain into the body of the King of the Toadmen. Heka fell with a howl, slowly tumbling backward to land with a crash.
The lizardmen roared in triumph as their champion had defeated the enemy leader while the insect monsters had already turned the battle into a massacre. Heka struggled to rise, but he knew he was done for. He knew his people was done for.
"I surrender! I surrender everything! Mercy! Mercy!" The King yowled as toadmen became an endangered species.
Then Cocytus gave a mental order. His minions immediately ceased the slaughter and went back to him.
Thank goodness… I was afraid they wouldn't stop… Heka thought.
Cocytus approached the fallen king, took out a scroll and healed him.
"He is your Master now." Zaryusu said, "Surrender to Lord Cocytus, Fifth Floor Guardian of the Great Tomb of Nazarick, servant to the God of Death Ainz Ooal Gown."
Heka, his pain and wounds taken away, rolled over to his belly and then up to all fours, as much as he could, and kept his head low to the ground. This bombastic insect and the foolish lizards will pay for this, he hopefully thought while saying: "King Heka of the Toadmen Tribes surrenders to Lord Cocytus and Ainz Ooal Gown. You are strong, and we submit… do what you will with my people … but let me live… I will be useful…".
Had I known what I was facing I would have fled or surrendered immediately… now look at me, all my work, all my plan now I will grind away our days in service to a bombastic monster…
Heka cursed repeatedly, but he did it all in the quietness of his mind and said nothing of the sort to the new king of the lake.
The lizardmen raised up a cheer that was the counter to his despair. "Long live Cocytus! Long live Ainz Ooal Gown…"
And he raised his halberd aloft, calling for silence. "The lake now belongs to Ainz Ooal Gown and will be part of the Sorcerer Kingdom."
"And… what will you do with me… your slave?" Heka asked.
"—Please wait!"
A female jumped over and kneeled before Cocytus. Her emerald skin was stunning, especially if compared to most toadmen who were moss green and covered in all kinds of blisters.
"I am Princess Draya Vasil. I beg of you, kill this evil toadman! He is a rebel! He revolted against my father who was the rightful king, killed all of my family except me, who was enslaved and bound until a few minutes ago. Please put an end to his evil reign ! He deserves no mercy!"
Now. That. Is. A. Problem. This. One. Is. A. Nice. Specimen. I. Wanted. To. Show. Him. To. My. Masters. However…
Heka growled at Draya. "Yew betta shut yo—"
"—I. WILL. TAKE. HIM. AWAY. AND. MAKE. SURE. HE. NEVER. COMES. BACK. YOU. WILL. BE. QUEEN. IF. YOU. SWEAR. FEALTY. IS. THAT. ACCEPTABLE?"
She grinned. "Absolutely. Thank you, Lord Cocytus. I swear to serve you and Ainz Ooal Gown."
"Das Nonsense! Let go of me! Take your bombastic hands off me!"
Yelled the fallen king as Cocytus' minions took hold of him.
Then he sent one last warning to his former slave: "Yew'll lead our tribe to extinction! Yew'll regret this! I am the one true king!"
She did not reply. Words could not convey the grin on her face as she saw him dragged away after all the pained he'd caused her.
A few hours later Cocytus' company returned to the lizardmen town and from there he returned to Nazarick after meeting with Mare.
Then the 5th Floor Guardian presented Heka to his masters.
The toadman champion on his knees looked around the Throne Room with boggling eyes. Wot is dis bombastic place? Who are these two? A skeleton and a demon? Dis is gonna end bad…
Ainz could barely think for a moment about the huge toadman who would prove unreliable, given his treasonous past, but Cocytus went on as if nothing were the matter. He drew the spear out of his pocket dimension and held it horizontally before the Supreme Beings as he pointed out the little rune on the hilt and another, different, on the wooden shaft.
"AS THE TOADMEN REVEALED THIS SPEAR IS THEIR TRIBAL TREASURE. IT GRANTS THE USER ENDLESS STAMINA. INDEED THIS ONE KEPT ON FIGHTING TIRELESSLY. I HAD THE NEW QUEEN QUESTIONED ABOUT THIS SPEAR. SHE REVEALED IT TO BE RUNECRFT FROM THE DWARVES WHO DWELL ON THE MOUNTAINS. THE SHAFT IS CRAFTED WITH A RUNE OF RESISTANCE WHICH IS WHY IT DID NOT BREAK DESPITE THE HEAVY USE. SHE KNEW VERY LITTLE ABOUT THIS, THOUGH. TRADING BETWEEN THE TOADMEN AND THE DWARVES HAS STOPPED MANY YEARS AGO."
Ainz nodded, trying and failing to ignore the heavily breathing toadman.
"I see, I see." He said.
"Congratulations on your victory against the toadmen, Cocytus. This one can be handed to Demiurge, I'm sure he'll love it", suggested Oshikuru.
Heka frowned. I have a bad feeling about this, but it can only get worse if I try to run away. Damn these monsters…
"Agreed. Also, I propose an investigation into the matter, from what we know, the dwarves trade in this and they are the only ones who can make runecraft. As soon as our plans for the Empire and the Kingdom succeed, I would like to personally venture there to find out more. It should help with my… our concerns over resources if we can find truly cost free enchanting. In YGGDRASIL, that was the case for runecraft."
Then the Supreme Leader stood up.
"Well done, Cocytus. I will entrust you to rule the whole area of the lake and to find out something more about the Dwarves. As a reward, you may keep this spear."
"YOUR. KINDNESS. IS. TOO. GREAT. AINZ-SAMA. I WILL KEEP ON. SERVING. YOU. WITH. THE. UTMOST. LOYALTY."