Attrition

Faced with the live demonstration of their chieftain's fate, even these habitually reckless hezrous finally halted their advance, lingering outside the minefield. These aggressively bellicose, simpleminded brutes did not fear death, but they treasured the rare opportunity to enter the Material Plane—hezrous reveled in the exquisite thrill that destruction and slaughter brought them. Little did they expect that the aerial bombardment was by no means static; the haven they thought they had found could face thunderous strikes at any moment. Behind the Imperial Wall, the artillery corps of the Cinder Empire promptly adjusted their elevation angles, blanketing the coordinates of the hezrou legion within their targeting arc. “Boom!” “Boom! Boom!” The earth shook as gunfire filled the sky. Shrapnel shimmering with dazzling golden radiance sprayed in every direction, cutting down dozens of hezrous on the spot. “Aargh—filthy Material Plane vermin!” The hezrous wailed and roared in fury, yet were powerless to fight back, leaving them seething with stifling indignity. Ahead of them lay the lethal minefield; behind them pressed the inexorable tide of dretches. They had nowhere left to hide. Worse still, the shells raining from the sky this time were far more terrifying. Every fragment of shrapnel radiated a golden light—these shells had been quenched in holy water, infused with radiant power. “This sickening stench—” “Damn it, it's holy water!” Shrapnel soaked in holy water effortlessly slashed through the hezrous' armored hide, and sacred detonations engulfed their hulking, grotesque demonic forms. Whoosh— Bursts of solar brilliance bloomed in midair, giving this bombardment a distinctly sacred aura. This batch of munitions had been developed jointly by the Department of Technology and the empire's specially retained cleric, Ingrid. Tailored specifically against fiends, they were designated the “Exorcism” series. After only a few rounds of bombardment, the ferocious hezrou legion suffered grievous losses, with less than half of the demons managing to retreat into the surging demonic horde. Leo looked up at the dense web of firepower in the sky, then glanced down at the mine-riddled, peril-strewn expanse, consumed by sudden fury. Half a day had already passed, yet he had failed to advance the battle lines by even an inch! To transport such vast masses of demons was an enormous drain even on the Abyss, and on Jelrazak himself. If he could not destroy the empire quickly... His own fate would be dire. The Cinder Empire's strategy of attrition—blanketing firepower backed by minefields—was indeed effective, but their opponent was the demons of the Abyss! He could rely entirely on the overwhelming numbers of dretches to force a path through the minefield and ultimately breach the imperial defenses. With this in mind, Leo Bosque raised his whip and unfurled the broad, muscular wings on his back, roaring at the lesser demons. “Charge!” “Crush the enemy before you!” Ripples of scorching heat expanded rapidly from Leo as the terrifying pressure of a high-tier demon was fully unleashed, sending shivers through every lesser demon. Driven by the instinctual urge to submit, the dretches marched under the fierce artillery fire. Like a tireless wave, they surged toward the minefield in wave after wave. “Awooogh—” Piercing, clamorous shrieks echoed from the demonic tide, dripping with pure hatred for all living things. When countless demons screeched at once, even the mightiest beings would shudder. Unfortunately for them, no enemies stood before them. Awaiting these demons were only dense detonations. “Boom!” The arcs of artillery crisscrossed high overhead, weaving an impenetrable net of fire. Shell after shell exploded among the demonic throng, instantly reducing thousands upon thousands of dretches to dust. Yet this time, under Leo's control, the dretches grew completely fearless of death. They turned a blind eye to the explosions beside them and the shattered corpses of their kin. As long as they possessed a single breath, they pressed forward tirelessly and without cease. There was even a dretch whose right arm and feet had both been sliced away by shrapnel. Using its single remaining arm, it dragged its torso slowly across the scorched earth, still struggling forward toward the north—until flying shrapnel severed its head. Even for those dretches that managed to make it past the artillery barrage, their fate was no better—it was often even more gruesome. “Boom!” The moment a dretch stepped onto that patch of ground, the mine beneath its feet detonated violently, sending soil flying. In the violent blast, the dretch was hurled several meters into the air before crashing down, leaving behind only a mangled, blackened corpse. As the battle dragged on, more and more dretches braved death to step into the minefield, only to be blown to bits in short order. Some demons even triggered cluster munitions, dragging hundreds of surrounding dretches down with them to their deaths. Clang, clang, clang... The muffled pounding of hooves and the grating sound of metal armor rang out as knight-like demons breached the artillery blockade, galloping across the wasteland. These monsters possessed the powerful bodies of horses, topped with sickly human arms and faces. Their upper torsos bore pale flesh weeping with agonizing pus, and thick horns jutted from their foreheads. They wore intricate suits of blackened full plate armor, with tufts of short, coarse hair bristling through the gaps in the plate. —These were armanites, demonic heavy cavalry who charged enemy lines driven by uncontrollable bloodlust and fury, frequently thundering across wastelands to bring death to every living thing in sight. The commander of the armanites led a host of his kind darting across the battlefield, evading one explosion after another. They were fortunate; they galloped for hundreds of meters without triggering a single mine. “Charge—” “Kill, kill them!” The armanite furiously swung his flail, eager to display his martial prowess upon the battlefield—yet the commander failed to notice the impending danger. Snap— A tripwire concealed within the weeds suddenly pulled taut. Charging at high speed, the armanite failed to notice it entirely and tripped straight to the ground. “Damn it!” It rolled several times, churning up clouds of dust from the earth. Immediately afterward, however, the armanite felt cold metal against its torso, and its expression warped in instant horror. “Boom!” Accompanied by an earth-shaking blast, the armanite was blown in half on the spot. Its human upper half and equine lower half were both scorched to cinders, flying in opposite directions. Immediately after, surrounding mines were set off in chain reactions, and the armanites following behind were engulfed in flames, leaving behind only scorched, blackened ground. “Awooogh—” High in the sky, quasits flapped their wings, flying desperately toward the Imperial Wall and gathering into dark clouds like an aerial demonic tide. To evade the crisscrossing artillery fire below, they ascended hundreds of meters into the air, attempting to bypass this impenetrable defense line from above. Yet behind the Imperial Wall, the antiaircraft gunners stroked the cold twin barrels—nearly four meters long—of their flak cannons, hitting the firing mechanisms with eager grins. “Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!” A crisp, rapid staccato distinctly different from the earlier heavy shelling sounded. Shells trailed brilliant streaks of flame as they surged toward the sky, followed by even more dazzling explosions. The tracers of this barrage were far denser than those of the heavy artillery, orchestrating a symphony of death in the upper skies. In an instant, countless quasits were swallowed by flames, and blackened, unrecognizable bodies plummeted from above. Throughout the day, such scenes played out countless times; any demon attempting to force its way into the imperial defensive perimeter invariably met a miserable end. “Boom!” “Boom! Boom! Boom!” The relentless artillery fire continued without a moment's pause, as munitions accumulated by the empire over years were dumped entirely onto the demons. Under this state of total national mobilization, nearly all imperial factories worked day and night producing ammunition. These supplies were ferried south by train in an endless stream, providing robust logistical backing for the Imperial Wall. By the time the sun set and dusk descended, the wasteland was scarred and devastated, covered everywhere in scorched earth and bomb craters. In the zones of heaviest bombardment, hills had been leveled flat, and demon corpses carpeted the ground, stacked several layers deep into a new layer of “soil.” From dawn till dusk, beneath the empire's ferocious barrage, the demon army had spent an entire day without breaching the imperial defenses. In the night, beams of light cut across the sky, weaving a dense web that illuminated the ground as bright as day. —Yet this was merely probing between both sides. The empire was testing the power of its weapons, while Leo Bosque was using his cheapest demons to deplete the empire's munitions. “You will all be destroyed in the end...” In the darkness, surrounded by swarms of demons, Leo gazed toward the brilliantly lit Imperial Wall in the distance, his face twisted and chaotic fire burning in his eyes. For demons transformed by Jerlazax, hatred was the very source of their power. And this former Grand Duke of Bosque had spent over a decade obsessed with destroying the empire and slaying the red dragon day in and day out. Now, that hatred had reached its absolute zenith, etched deeply into his very marrow. Suddenly, an unsteady quasit flapped its wings, wobbling into his line of sight. Leo's face darkened with irritation. Reaching out, he seized the quasit by the skull. Veins bulged along his muscular arm as his five crimson fingers gradually tightened their grip. “Awooogh—” The quasit let out an agonized whimper, but under the oppressive dominance of a high-tier demon, it dared not offer even the slightest struggle. “Pop!” The little demon's head burst apart, splashing viscous brain matter and purplish-black blood everywhere. Only then did the rage on Leo's face ease slightly. He licked the blood from the corner of his lips and carelessly cast aside the quasit's carcass. Nearby quasits swarmed in eagerly, tearing into the remains and devouring them whole. To demons, the flesh and blood of their kin were just as sweet—if not more enticing. Looking down at this bloody, chaotic scene, Leo's expression twisted into a savage grin, and he chuckled darkly. “Heheheh... Just you wait, Cassius. This will be your fate too.” In the dark of night, the eyes of hundreds of thousands of demons gleamed with eerie light, their discordant, ear-splitting howls echoing across the wasteland.