After some time, I have finally returned back home to Castle Fuerig. While I was in the Sunset Monster Mountain Range for about 4 months approximately, here nothing changed. Thought, it was understandable, as the perception of time from the Devil’s view of the point was drastically different from that of humans.
Now I finally had a chance to study magic more complexly. After I had reached Adept-ranked mastery over Norse Runes, more precisely Lightning Rune and Fire Rune, were two I have learned.
While I used until now the runes in a more crude way, meaning just conjuring Rune and throwing it around. Now I will try to mold the energy into shapes and objects. I had some simple ones, to the more complex ones like Lightning Dragon Spell.
Compared to complicated Norse Magic, Devil Magic was straightforward to learn and master even though this type of magic’s firepower was severely lacking. In Norse Magic, it was all about the spell construct that I was working with.
After I returned to Castle Fuerig, I took a good bath as the first thing I did. After finishing the bath, I needed to meet with General Borke Zagan to receive the report about what happened before I left for my training.
4 months was a short time for Devils, but I left many commands before leaving the Castle about what needed to be done.
As I returned to my study room, I already found General Borke Zagan waiting there for me as he bowed when I entered.
“My Lord.”
“General.”
We greeted each other as we sat down.
“So, you can start with your report.”
I said to him; afterward, I looked through the window of my study room.
“Cleaning process of the Army is done. We have found spies and other infiltrators from the Houses of Satans and killed them all. It created some minor holes in the chain of command, but that would be solved quickly.”
Reported General Borke Zagan quietly. I wasn’t that surprised; probably each army belonging to the 72 Pillars or Extra Demons is infiltrated by loyalists of the Four Satans. Probably some strong Houses like Bael or Agares already cleared their traitors. Before the war starts, it is an important thing to do.
“Good. Have you started the selection process for loyal soldiers to receive the [Devil Outer Body Tempering Method]?”
“Yes. With each one, we have signed the Geass Contract so there is no risk of betrayal, desertion, or selling the method to other Houses. Currently, more than 400,000 soldiers that fulfilled the criteria and signed the Geass Contract for life with House of Gremory.”
I was pretty satisfied hearing this. While the [Devil Outer Body Tempering Method] was a great invention, it was useless if I didn’t use it on my soldiers. That also brought up a possibility of leaking the [Devil Outer Body Tempering Method] to other Houses that I was not allied to, or even worse, to Four Satan Houses. While I wasn’t concerned about House of Lucifer and its Six Houses of Lucifer, right now was not the time.
Because of that, I ordered General Borke Zagan and other Generals on Ultimate-Class loyal to the House of Gremory to search for every spy and traitor in my Army and kill them without mercy. Afterward, they would be searching for suitable soldiers that would sign the Geass Contract with the House of Gremory, pledging their eternal loyalty to the House of Gremory, especially to me. Then I could give them safely the [Devil Outer Body Tempering Method] for training, as it would produce Middle-Class beings of power, in physique aspect rather easily and quickly.
“How is the current state of my Army and Legions?”
“Currently, the entire army has 3 million soldiers, divided into 15 Legions, with each of Generals commanding three Legions. Most of the soldiers are of Low-Class, while around 40% are of Middle-Class if we are making the ranking based on Demonic Energy. If we are talking about the physique aspect, the percentage is much lower, but with enough time and [Devil Outer Body Tempering Method] we could raise all of our soldiers into Middle-Class in the physique.”
I wasn’t surprised hearing this; most of the ordinary devil soldiers are not that strong. Only a few Houses have strong soldiers, like House of Lucifer, which has almost all soldiers of Middle-Class or House of Bael that is similar, or House of Agares. My aim was the same as them, to raise the quality of my soldiers.
“How long do you think it will take? War is coming, and if we have an army of Middle-Class beings in terms of physique, while half of them would also be Middle-Class in Demonic Energy, my Army would be exceptionally strong.”
Until the Great War was around 19 years, approximately, so I had enough time to see some results.
“Hard to say, if Your Lordship invests some Soul Coins into the training of the soldiers, it should be sometimes between 10 to 12 years before we train such an army.”
10 years or 12 years actually wasn’t a bad prediction. I had enough time before the Great War starts, so this time frame was acceptable, and maybe even good as there is still enough time even after the time frame is up to improve.
“Investing some Soul Coins isn’t that problem. With my current situation of the business in the Underworld, practically every house is buying weapons and armor from me, so Soul Coins are one of my last concerns. Use it well and speed up the training process.”
Currently, I owned practically the absolute majority of places where weapons and armor and other stuff for the army were manufactured. So everyone that was arming their forces was buying it from me, and coins were just flowing into my pocket. Even the quality of weapons produced by my factories increased, though not as good as mass-produced weapons like those by dwarves in Nidavelir, it was still far better compared to old devil ones.
