The Devil"s Evolution Catalog Chapter 147: Visitation Part 2
As the Medusas were a female only race and had to rely on kidnapping males of other races to reproduce, their relationship with the other races were at best, rocky. Even the similarly all-female harpies had an adversarial relationship with them seeing as they were both in the same industry. Naturally, these harpies had a bad relationship with the other races as well.
The moment our entourage arrived at the medusa"s nest, the patrolling medusas immediately took up defensive stances. Their snake hair puffed up in alarm with every tiny snake revealing their razor sharp fangs.
"It"s Habona! Quick, inform the two leaders, Habona is here!"
One of the medusas who obviously recognized Habona immediately commanded her companion to call for reinforcements. Against a four-star like Habona, they were clearly outmatched.
"That"s right, hurry up and call them, make sure to summon Harlow at the same time." Habona gave the medusa who recognized her an emotionless stare before nonchalantly declaring, "Don"t worry, I won"t pull any tricks, I"ll just wait here quietly."
"..." It was then that the medusa warrior finally remembered that Habona was Harlow"s older sister and that Harlow was actually the vice-leader"s husband...heavens, she was actually alive to see the day that one of their race would have a husband. That was...just fantastic, unbelievably fantastic!
Having realized that, she knew that Habona wouldn"t do anything rash - thinking back on her anxious reaction - she immediately blushed in embarra.s.sment. She wanted to invite the werewolf into their nest but couldn"t find the words to do so.
A short while later, Majosha and Manasha slithered into view with the demonic werewolf, Harlow, in tow.
Having not seen them for a while, the lovebirds" relationship seemed to have gotten even closer. The pair were basically joined at the hip now. Even while they were walking towards us, their arms were entwined with each other.
By the way, don"t you know that public displays of affection are the leading cause of death for single men?
"Big Sis!"
Harlow tugged on Majosha and quickened his pace while calling out to his sister. Majosha averted her eyes shyly and joined in as well, "How are you doing, sister?"
Looks like Harlow did a good job of teaching his wife, at least he wasn"t a disgrace in this aspect.
"Mhm." Habona nodded her head nonchalantly with a slight aura of superiority. Truth be told, the two races still had nothing much in common except for Harlow. Out of respect for this husband, the medusas would no longer lay their hands on males from the demonic werewolf clan. To the werewolves, this was naturally good news; though it seemed to Habona that she had sacrificed her little brother in order to achieve this. Thus, she still didn"t take to this sister-in-law of hers; yet, seeing as her brother truly loved her, she chose not to say anything more.
Manasha glanced at Habona and the pair nodded toward each other as a greeting of sorts.
"Master Mo Ke, I haven"t seen you in a month, how have you been?" How she treated Habona was one matter, while how she treated me was another. Her face wasn"t as icy cold as before, and while she wasn"t smiling, at the very least she took the initiative to greet me.
"I"m fine, I guess." I smiled wryly. I briefly recounted my experience in the Western Human Realms and also informed them that it was merely an accident that I was summoned.
"Amazing, I want to see the outside world as well!" Based on that exclamation, one could clearly see her interest in my one month trip in the Western Human Realms. While the human world was dangerous to creatures of the darkness like us, human civilization had its unique points that attracted everyone.
"Sis, we…"
"Mhm, I know." Manasha interrupted Majosha and turned towards me: "Master Mo Ke, I"m aware of the purpose for your visit today, it"s to recruit us into your army isn"t it?"
"That"s right, I"m forming an army to attack the prison exit. Mo En has already joined under my banner and the demonic werewolves expressed their willingness as well. As long as you join us, our chances will be higher."
"How much confidence do you have in this operation?"
"I"m not sure, I do not wish to make any reckless guess about something I have no information on. But there"s one thing you can be sure of, and that"s the fact that I don"t plan on seeking my own death."
"No one has ever succeeded in breaking out of this prison since time immemorial...we...alright, I understand." Manasha gave it some thought before relenting under the pleading gaze of her sister. She nodded at Majosha before turning to me once more: "My sister and I are willing to join your army but I can"t be sure of the clan"s wishes, I will have to ask my other kin."
"Then how do you plan on persuading them?"
"Persuading them…" Manasha raised her head and stared at the maze ceiling for a second before answering: "I plan to tell them that there"s an endless supply of men to kidnap in the outside world…"
"..." Is it truly alright to use such a matter as bait?
However, I couldn"t find any trace of levity in her eyes as she said that. This goes to show how much they needed a male counterpart; to the extent where it had begun to significantly affect their reproduction rate. This prison really was lacking in everything except undead…
Thus, the negotiation with the medusas went unexpectedly smoothly, without us even having to step into their nest.
With our business concluded, Manasha invited us in for a tour of their nest, which I swiftly agreed to seeing as this matter had intrigued me for a while now.
Their nest was basically the same as Mo En"s, though it wasn"t as large; this was probably because their clan wasn"t as large as his. However, their criss-crossing tunnels still fascinated me. I wonder how much souls they paid to dig out this much real estate.
A day later, we set off for the Numila Blaze"s territory.
In the entire Prison of the Dead, the number of people I knew weren"t that many. Unless something else happened along the way, this trip to Numila"s was most likely to be our last visitation. It was my hope that the entire harpy clan would join us given their vast numbers. In fact, their numbers were most likely on par with Mo En"s.
The last time I approached her, she didn"t accept my offer though she didn"t reject too strongly either. She seemed to be hesitant about something and that something was an opportunity I planned to capitalize on.
"So, Harlow, are you planning to follow us?:
I glanced at Majosha whose eyes sparkled from the mere thought of travelling. As she stood there looking at her husband, her tail discreetly tugged at his claws as if to remind him to accept the offer.
Yet the moment we told him of our destination, his face immediately paled. Had it not been for the fact that I knew the backstory surrounding this sordid affair, I would"ve thought that he saw a ghost or something. Even his words became garbled as he struggled to reply:
"I...that...I...I"ll pa.s.s on...that, hah...haha…"
Seeing his disgraceful display, Habona glared at the werewolf as if to say: "Spineless thing, stand aside and don"t embarra.s.s this sister of yours any further."
Harlow shrunk even further at his sister"s glare. By now, he seemed more like a bullied wife with that pitiful look on his face; a look that everyone found comical, especially Mimiya who doubled over in laughter before falling down with legs thrashing in the air as she giggled.
"Hahahaha, what a silly potato!"
That bout of laughing made the traumatized werewolf feel even more awkward as he stood there under our withering gazes.
Truth be told, his fear of the harpies was to be expected seeing as those bird demons were famous rifle cleaners. Back when he was still a captive of those lascivious bird women, his rifle had been thoroughly cleaned out by them to the point where his entire self had gone limp when we tried to rescue him.
I truly had to hand it to his mental fort.i.tude for being able to interact so normally with Majosha right now. After all, the medusas were known for their exceptionally long rifle cleaning sessions...in fact, I wouldn"t be surprised if his rifle broke down one day.
However, that"s enough nonsense for now. Having said our goodbyes to the medusas and Harlow, we made our way towards Numila"s territory.
With Habona leading the way, we saved a great deal of time by avoiding any unnecessary detours. Along the way, we slaughtered a large number of patrols and rapidly refilled our food supplies.
A few days later, we finally arrived in the territory of the harpies.
Just as we reached the borders of her nest, wave after wave of ruffling feathers echoed in our ears. Looking up, I saw a flock of nearly a hundred harpies closing in on us with claws readied.
"We"re here to see Numila, we have no hostile intentions…" Yet, just as those words left my mouth, the closest harpy dove in at us for an attack.
Seeing as they had no intention of listening, I had no choice but to order my devils to take up a defensive position for now and not attack.
For this trip, I brought along a large number of my named subordinates along with 20 of my strongest guardsmen. It was the shields of these guardsmen that firmly rebuffed the first volley of dives from the harpies without any casualties. Thanks to my timely command and the aid of Habona, Mimiya and Violet Snow, their first wave of attacks ended in failure.
Having failed in their first attempt, the harpies swiftly took to the air with a resounding whoosh, hovering several meters above us as they looked for another opportunity to strike. Amongst the ma.s.s of flapping feathers, I noticed a couple of shrinking silhouettes in the sky. These were probably messenger harpies on the way back to report this situation.
This mustn"t continue on any longer...we"re here to invite Numila to join our alliance not pick a fight with the harpies.
I turned to the towering werewolf beside me and anxiously asked: " Habona, do you have any method to stop their attacks without harming them?"
Being a veteran of the prison for many years, she immediately gave me an answer: "Of course, just give up all the males in our team."
...wasn"t that just a bad idea? If anyone dared to say otherwise, I"ll make sure their heads have a long chat with the corner of my grimoire!
"How about a different solution?"
"Sure."
She leaped into the air and swung her claws at one of the harpies who was diving at us. Both parties ended up missing each other, but just as I thought it was over, she swiped out once more with her claws and swatted the harpy down onto the ground. Making use of the reaction force, she leaped up even higher and in a logic-defying display of acrobatics, swatted a second harpy down onto the floor….followed by a third one…
So the new method was just to beat them up? As long as we don"t kill them it"s fine?
*bang* Another harpy crashed into the floor followed swiftly by another. Each of them had been temporarily knocked out of commission, though none of them had been severely injured.
...looks like this is the best solution we have for now.
However, with some lingering doubts in my heart about her discretion, I couldn"t help but yell a reminder at her: "Be careful! Make sure not to kill any of them!"
"Don"t worry."
"Everyone! Form a defensive circle and fend off the attacks. Just leave the harpies to Habona, all we have to do is make sure no one gets caught."
Only after half of their flock had been swatted down did those more bird than human harpies finally learn their lesson. They began to spread out more and avoided cl.u.s.tering together so that Habona couldn"t use them as a springboard.
She returned to the ground once more and thumbed her nose at the weaklings.
How much cooler could you get big sister!
Footnotes:
Credits:
Special thanks to Steve Granger, Kaung Thant Win Naing, and Antoine Thompson!!