Vol. 13 - Chapter 767 - Doubtful Days (2): Doubtful Days (2)

The main question that arose between Allen and his party was 'when they should launch their attack?'.

Shea's expressions were calm as she posed the question. She perhaps had decided to take over the role of common intermediary, allowing the rest of their party members to judge the situation and articulate their answer through her argument.

(It's a trap, no doubt. And even if we try to launch raids now, there's just too many things that we don't know. Well, it's not surprising Keel and Merus would object against leaving Lupto in the den of enemies for so long. And here, the sacred beast stone situation is still unresolved. I don't know how long it will take to deal with it. We also have a mountain of stuff to do......)

Allen went over the situation inside his mind, in parallel to the conversation.

He had explored the world, had brought together over tens of peoples to form a party. But they're not monoliths by any means, each had their own ideology. Even his summoned beasts—S-rank in particular had some who wouldn't listen to his commands.

Keel, who walked on the path of virtuousness, seemed to have wanted to take it slow, and cautiously. However, Merus wanted nothing more than to rush for his twin sister's rescue immediately.

Allen lowered his gaze, took out his grimoire, and then checked at the sacred beast stone he had stored earlier. What should have been a beautiful, aquamarine crystal wrapped in soft glimmering light was corrupted by pitch black hue—It was the one containing the soul of one of Demon King's army executives, Virdiga.

«Virdiga's soul has rejected the procedure. Negotiation with the soul for the role of S-rank Bug summoned beast...»

(Oh? It was 'under talks' a while ago, and now it has progressed to 'negotiation'. The gods should be in no less shamble, and Lupto had been kidnapped too, I really can't thank Aula and other angels enough.)

The log column had a new entry added by the Lupto's subordinate angels. The archangels were tackling even his grimoire situation despite being swamped with the other tasks.

He had heard from Merus that Lupto alongside Aula and other Archangels had been administrating his grimoire. Though, even in absence of archangel's assistance, the grimoire still had some of its functions like skill level up, something like auto-pilot.

Cecil was usually the one to peer at his grimorie, but the role was currently taken by Sophie and Shea, who had flanked Allen from both sides. Sophie spoke up when she glanced at grimoire.

"...It seems there's still quite a bit of time required before Virdiga can be added to summoned beast's list. I presume you prefer us to become further strong, and then target the Demon King's army. Is it, Allen-sama?"

"That's the gist. Cecil is still training in the territory of Space-Time God. It doesn't seem like she will acquire ancient magic in a day or two."

After chasing away the Demon King's army from territory of Space-Time God, though there was quite damage done by Ordo, Allen had asked Space-Time God Desperado to look after Cecil's safety. He also left his messes to summon them if required, regardless of Cecile acquiring ancient magic or not.

(And I also need Cecile to inform whenever she's done.)

"......There are quite a few party members who have yet to hit level 9 in skill."

"You have a point. We had been played like fiddle by Bask, but we could have pressed on if only our skill level wasn't low."

"Hmm? So we're not going anywhere until we raise our skills huh?"

Soon, the other party members had begun to join in conversations while Allen led conversation with Shea.

Dogora, his arms crossed, nodded in agreement on their insufficient strength remark. Keel's voice went an octave higher.

They'd a reason for it. With job level still stuck at LV8, some party members had yet to acquire all of their available skills, which had them lagging at the tail end of the party. Skill Level 9 was a significant power up, allowing them to acquire two skills at once.

"There's training of skills, then there's also Kurena. You've yet to master the secret technique and ultimate technique of Sword God Swordmanship..."

"Hmm? That one is a bit difficult..."

When she heard herself being mentioned, Kurena cleared she had been working hard, scrunching up her nose, then picked up the golden glass which had fruit water and focused on drinking it as if to dodge the conversation.

(Whether its Sword God Swordmanship, or Armament Gods, each has 'secret technique' and 'ultimate technique' that were the core part of divine techniques. If she starts now, maybe she can still master it within the timeframe.)

Allen was hoping to learn from Kurena when she masters the two divine techniques. But as Kurena mentioned, there were some complications that made the progress slow.

"Magic God has the trick to use magic circle and simplify the mana circulation. However the other Armament Gods doesn't have anything similar. Here, everything revolves around «Intuition»."

"But I just don't quite understand that Intuition thing."

(I see. I guess, this is just the difference between the learning curve of skills, which can't be acquired just by watching here in Divine Realm. So she actually had a reason why she is slow in learning the skill. It's almost like dabbling on what exactly is a skill.)

Back at the academy, Kurena had taken quite a few hours to learn the skill «Slash» when Deburg took position of foreign lecturer. Meanwhile, even though Keel and Cecil had been quite helped by the advice of the said major department when they learned «Heal» and «Fireball» respectively, they'd already been learning it before attending the academy.

Dogora, too, was quite slow in learning the axe skill. It wasn't until they'd come to Divine Realm that it turned out there was a reason by learning speed.

In the Human Realm, learning had relied on rule of thumb, instead of being taught about the essence of gods. The reason why using magic was easier was because of Magic God.

While spells also relied on user's high intelligence, Magic God had setup a mechanism that helped converting mana into magic—the aria, and the geometrical magic circle like pattern

Unfortunately, there was no such trick to learn the teaching of Sword God and Armament Gods. You'd require more than just guts and spirit, and in fact, the angels were training in the Martial Hall because it was expected of them to learn the «Sword God Swordmanship».

It was a skill that was not taught back at the surface. «Sword God Swordmanship» relied on the foundation of mana (spiritual power) application, ignoring the flow of the flower. The central focus of this sword style was to learn how to activate the skill. But, that's where everything hinges on. —"Learn through your Intution." Sword God had only imparted this one line to Kurena, so there were also doubt if he truly wanted her to teach her.

(I really must discuss the situation here onwards with Sword God. I wonder how long Cecil is going to take in learning ancient magic...)

His eyes landed on Helmios, standing across the table. Then to Admiral Galra, then Beast Prince Zeu.

"And, also Helmios-san."

"Hmm? What? I know. I need to further master my divine technique."

"I am counting on you to do that, in fact. I was hoping to hold a joint mock drill between my Allen's Army, Hero's army, and Golem Squad of Admiral Galara."

"Ah, that makes sense. The generals must be informed about instructions to lead the squad, and the practice is also important."

"We also need to have everyone, who has yet to, go through job transfer quickly. Oh, and the weapons are must. I think we might have to go through another campaign of Earth Labyrinth."

As of now, both Brave, and Admiral Galara had agreed to led the attack against Demon King's army ten days later.

After rescuing the devotee who had turned to the faith of Evil God, who had then taken refuge on the Heave User floating island that Demon King's army had once used, Allen could now mobilise an army consisting of 20,000 personnel. There had been many races now part of said vast army, including humans, of course, dragonkin, dark elves, beastkin, merfolks, dwarves, birdkin and elves.

Hero Helmion had the support of Giamut Empire, while Admiral Galara had the assistance of Bowkis Empire, allowing both to deploy an army of 10,000 personnel each.

"10 days huh... we're cutting it very close."

"...That's, definitely the case."

Admiral Galara was a man to reckon for his commandership, too. He murmured his thought, while folding his arms. Keel nodded in agreement.

Keel had taken command of the Allen Army during S-rank dungeon exploration while Allen and the rest of members had invaded Prostea Empire. There were a lot of tasks to handle—like job transfer of soldiers, maintenance of weapons, sketching out a strategy—and he could tell it would easily take up tens of their days.

"We need to inform the leaders of Five Continental Alliance about our strategy as well. We require their cooperation for resources too."

"Hey, wait a minute. The scope is expanding too much. What if demons got a whiff of your plan?"

"This is more the time to inform Allen's Army ASAP. If that's what they're going to hear, then let them hear this first. No need to stifle everything outright."

Keel emphasised the information warfare that had begun already.

"Sophie, Luck, and Roselina. Take the party members and visit the Divine Arena. I want all of you to work at skill leveling. Merus, your task is to make God's Grace in the Martial Hall. We need them to be distributed among army and party members."

Roselina could buff the status, Sophie had cooldown reset skills, and Luck had skills to extend the effect of skills. Every single of the abilities could easily turn the tide of battle so it was a must they improvise those skills.

"A-Alright..."

"That's a good point..."

Luck and Sophie's response lacked motivation, but Rosenlina had different expectations.

"Of course. I must increase my skill level or I can't have new songs to sing."

A grin tucked on her lips as she thought of bringing Kurena and other to her training, and chugged down the fruit wine.

(Roselina seems alright, now it's about Sophie and Luck. Well, I guess we all are thinking the same things. Oh, I must speak with Abigail-san later.)

Allen's gaze then slid toward the chief of dragonkin protectors, Abigail.

"Hmm? If there's something I can do, please do not hesitate."

"Thank you. Heavenly King owes us a favour for today's incident. The Heavenly Sandal Kingdom must be hoping for all the dragonkin to be here. But I would like you to leave the minimum dragonkin required to deal with the aftermath at the kingdom, and command the rest to hunt spirit stones back at the Forest of Primordial Beasts.

"Collecting the spirit stones, is it? Understood. I will have the whole army devoted to the said cause."

Once he had received Abigail's words, Allen shifted his gaze back to Merus. Merus was almost one point away from exploding like a volcano from the rage when he heard about spirit stone collection.

«You seriously are expecting me to do the farmwork in this situation?!»

"I do. The onus is on us to make sure the survivability of our comrades and army as much possible. I, too, am going to train my creation skills. I must make you stronger. It's your power that Lupto had left."

«Lupto has...»

Allen must level up his «Creation» skill to strengthen Leon and Merus, as well as acquire new equipment. The «Creation» skill was the key to unlocking more potential of «Angel» and «God» category summoned beasts, and for Merus and Leon, a restriction off from them means they would be granted new weapons or equipment.

Allen had set his goal to level up the creation skill to its maximum level in the next ten days. That said, while he was going to do that, he would also require Merus for his ability «Angel's Halo» that allowed him to use summoner's skill.

"We're far from prepared to wage a war against the Demon King's army. That's why, we must make sure to get stronger. Oh, and in the meantime, Haw and Tsubamen will help us in scouting."

«If we can certainly save Lupto after the scouting, then I guess we can focus on that plan.»

"Obviously. As long as we can retrieve Lupto back, the demon's raid would turn into complete failure. I will make adjustments to the strategy immediately."

Allen carefully chose his words as he addressed his comrades, taking precaution in mind in case the strategy required an abrupt change. In the meantime, he let them know Bird A and Bird E summoned beasts would be scoring places to look for Demon King's army's castle.

Amidst all the discussion, Luck seemed as if lost in thought, and opened his mouth to say something, though he hesistated. Allen could see his train of thought, and addressed the situation by himself.

"This is the final battle. There'll be no do-over."

"Mhm? You're right."

"Eh?"

Dogora and Kurena appeared confused by the exchange.

"These ten days may turned out to be the last ten days of life. You should spent some time with your family and important people."

"Are you sure? Y-you don't really mind if I return to village for a day?"

Seeing Luck's expression who had been longing to meet his family, Keel, too, figured his thoughts. They're waging a war against Demon King's army. There's no way the outcome will end with bells and whistle. Keel, who had a little sister he cherished so much, knew to be prepared very well against uncertain scenarios.

As the realisation sunk in, the air ran thick with nervousness.

Allen didn't tried to ask who would be joining the battle, or who would not. He believed in his comrades, that they would join the war regardless to save Lupto.

«I see. The final farewell, huh. I am sorry... no, thank you very much.»

At last, Merus's rage subsided slowly as he let the reasoning behind Allen's decision soak in. He understood the implication as well. The sacrifice may pile a heap in this war. The demons wouldn't take the raid laying down. Even if they're deploying the army, the influence it would ultimately have on each nation was something unavoidable.

In a war where these ten days might become someone's last moment with their lover, Merus worded his gratitude for everyone's participation, for they're all in it to save his sister after all.