Reincarnated into a Game As the Hero’s Friend

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3rd POV

It had been 2 days since the kingdom army had been taking an offensive stance. Just like before, one part of the army killed demons while Beliulace was away. As soon as Beliulace got closer, they retreated.

There was one time when Beliulace decided to head toward the kingdom’s encampment instead but the encampment was fully prepared for a long-range battle to the point that there were soldiers who threw stones at him. Beliulace’s movements were hindered and the 1st division took that chance to head toward the gate of the Great Temple causing Beliulace to have no choice but to chase the 1st division.

Due to this strategy, the kingdom army had never truly faced Beliulace and his elite subordinates. Therefore, despite the war raging fiercely with casualties piling up, both sides had not suffered any considerable decrease in their fighting force.

On the third day, the kingdom army completely shut themselves in their camp. The demon army waited for any movement from the kingdom army but to no avail. What the kingdom army did that day was only to secretly hunt the respawned demons in the forest.

On the fourth day, the kingdom army started to move again. They attacked the demons and then retreated when Beliulace came closer like what they had done in the first 3 days. Nothing changed even on the fifth day.

On this day, the third wave of supplies came from the capital. With that supplies and the supplies the kingdom army had received from the surrounding noble territories, the kingdom army can finally stop worrying about the supplies, albeit only temporarily.

On the sixth day, the kingdom army once again shut themselves in their camp.

On this day, a heated discussion arose in the kingdom army’s military council. Some nobles pushed for the army to keep fighting on this day but Duke Grunding shut them off by saying that he will advise the King to punish anyone that disobeyed his orders.

In the meantime, some nobles along with the Zeavert army were in the midst of a group battle training using the respawned demons in the forest as their opponent. This training was completely voluntary.

Later, Welner said, “It’s fine if you think of me as a rival but you need to be sly enough to steal your rival’s technique, you know.”

On the seventh day, the kingdom army returned to the frontline. On this day, the demon army suffered a heavy loss for the first time. The cause was Beliulace’s absence from the frontline.

Perhaps, Beliulace was thinking that it would be useless even if he went to the frontline, but his decision spelled a disaster for the demon army. As soon as the kingdom army realized that the demon commander was absent, the entire army immediately rushed to attack and successfully dealt a devastating blow to the demon army.

This was where Marquis Norporth showed his excellence in war tactics. He ordered the 2 young and valiant nobles, Viscount Krank and Viscount Mittag, who due to their achievements in the Hildea Plain battle were finally allowed to lead their own army, to attack a group of the demon army from the front and in the meantime ordered another troop to move in order to isolate that group off from its army. After that, the Marquis’s elite troops rushed to the isolated group and killed them. All these steps were done skillfully under the Marquis’s order to the point that Grand Duke Seyfart sighed in amazement.

On the eighth day, Beliulace returned to the frontline and the kingdom army returned to using their old tactic. This made Beliulace’s frustration reach its peak.

***

The night of the eighth day…

Beliulace chewed his food without hiding his furious expression. Perhaps being intimidated by his expression, other demons didn’t dare to approach him.

Beliulace was truly frustrated. The thing that displeased him the most was the absence of the Lizard Magician, Gareth.

Beliulace had never been good at using his head. After all, the most important thing for demons is strength, not the brain. As such, he left the duty to form all plans regarding the attack on the Great Temple to Gareth.

All this time, Gareth’s plan had never gone wrong. All villages and towns he encountered on his way had been easily destroyed just like Gareth said. As such, Beliulace held complete trust in Gareth.

Gareth’s plan only started to go awry when Beliulace reached the Great Temple. At that time, Beliulace thought that his army would be able to conquer the Great Temple even without his help as such he didn’t participate in the battle. However, that decision allowed the hero along with the people in the Great Temple to shut themselves in the temple.

The walls of the Great Temple were reinforced with the same strengthening magic that troubled the demon army in the era of the ancient kingdom and even with all his power, it would take Beliulace 10 years to destroy one of those walls. This was where Beliulace miscalculated.

In the era of the Ancient Magic Kingdom, the Great Temple was akin to a fortress. The strengthening magic cast on its walls was able to withstand the attacks of ancient demons as such the Great Temple had been treated as special. In this era, the people with priest-related [Skill] would be able to earn the god’s protection no matter where they were, so the temple was nothing but the center of faith.

In any case, when the first attack to conquer the Great Temple had failed, Gareth, who ordered his subordinates to infiltrate the temple to gather information, told Beliulace that he had a plan to lure the hero out.

Gareth also claimed that his plan would make another demon commander, Dreax, owe him a favor. Adding to that, Beliulace’s army had just been attacked by the kingdom army from the rear at that time so Believe decided to approve Gareth’s plan.

The Lizard Magician, Gareth, advised Beliulace to buy some time by making the battle against the kingdom army into a drawn-out battle until Gareth secured the hero’s weakness. After that Gareth left the Veritza Fortress along with Dreax’s men that were temporarily active in the capital of Weiss Kingdom.

(T/L: I don’t know if this was a typo since Weis in Japanese only has one letter difference from Bain. It can also be a new kingdom with the name Weiss.)

However, since Gareth had left, Beliulace had not received any update from him. Moreover, all these days the kingdom army immediately ran away when he came close, causing Beliulace to be roaming futilely on the battlefield.

As he gnawed on the body of Alligator Warrior, Beliulace felt that he could no longer contain his irritation. In human terms, it could be said that Beliulace was stressed out.

To demons, even the corpses of their comrades were food. However, by actually eating them, it could also be said that the current Beliulace was reduced to having no other choice but to eat the corpses of his men.

“Damn it”

Beliulace muttered. The reptilian demons that walked on their 2 legs around him lowered their heads. Their expressions didn’t change but inside, they were all frightened.

His subordinates’ ‘weak’ attitude further poked down on Beliulace’s nerves. At this time, Beliulace had no one to advise him as such he made a decision based on his emotions.

“I can’t take it anymore. Gather everyone!”

Beliulace’s shout gathered all of his subordinates. They looked frightened and that caused Beliulace to almost lose his temper but he barely managed to suppress it.

“Humans won’t be able to fight for 3 days straight. They don’t have enough stamina.”

As the kingdom army had been fighting for 2 days and took a day’s rest 2 times now, Beliulace was confident that humans would take a rest again tomorrow. Beliulace would never think this confidence of his spawned due to the fact that he looked down on humans.

“Tomorrow, we will lead the way to that damned building humans call the Great Temple. You all must follow!”

The demons responded to Beliulace’s order with cheering. The sounds of cheering in the middle of the night were quite eerie.

***

As he had declared, Beliulace led his army to the Great Temple in the early morning the next day. The army was full of reptiles such as crocodiles, lizards, and snakes who were all big enough to swallow a human head.

They kicked up clouds of dust as they rushed to the Great Temple. Yet, the temple stayed quiet.

Kriek

When Beliulace arrived in front of the Great Temple, the temple gate opened.

Beliulace was surprised. He saw a short hooded figure inviting him into the temple and laughed. The human inside must think they won’t be able to win. That was what he thought as he ran to the temple, leaving his army outside. Beliulace almost hit his head on the low gate ceiling but he knew it was going to be troublesome if he destroyed it here so he lowered his head.

Perhaps because of the cloud of dust, Beliulace was the only person that noticed that hooded figure.

Beliulace only focused on his front and the hooded man was far smaller than him as such he did not notice when he passed the hooded man, the hooded man threw something in the direction outside of the gate.

Thump

The container of anti-demon medicine broke as it hit the floor, causing the medicine inside it to spread.

Due to his huge body, when Beliulace ran, he created a considerable amount of gap with the rest of his army. The anti-demon medicine spread in that gap and caused an invisible wall that made the rest of the Beliulace army hesitate to proceed. For a brief moment, the demon army came to a halt.

The next moment, countless arrows and magics rained down on Beliulace.

With a roar, Beliulace flung all the arrows and resisted the magics with his body. In the meantime, the temple’s gate was shut. Now, Belulace was trapped in the temple, alone.

“Caught you.”

“!”

Beliulace swung down his massive sword in the direction of that voice but his sword was repelled. Beliulace was astonished.

Behind the closed gate, Beliulace heard the scream of his subordinates alongside the sounds of arrows and magic. He turned back and saw a man holding a gigantic sword, standing with his back to the gate and smiling condescendingly at him.

“I’ve been pretty frustrated too so let’s do it with a bang!”

It was Luguentz. The man next to Luguentz took off his robe with an annoyed look and then smiled.

“Big Bro Mazell, if we lose after all of this, we won’t be able to face Big Bro Welner.”

“I know.”

It was the [Hero] Mazell that repelled Beliulace’s sword. On his right was Elrich. Laura, who persuaded the people that it is safest beside the hero, stood on his left.

Facing Mazell, Beliulace felt an unknown emotion raging inside of him. His face twitched slightly, a behavior unfit for his position as the demon commander. Unable to accept the fact that his sword was repelled by a mere human, Beliulace roared and rushed to Mazell.

Mazell narrowed his eyes. He readjusted the grip of his sword, then calmly and softly declared.

“Demon commander, this is your end.”