Outskirt of Olsylvia Academy, Alcott Valley outback center.
Bella went forward to hold Pamela who wanted to turn and leave. Before that, Pamela came down from the warhorse to scout out the situation. She did not manage to go back to her horse before she was held back by Bella. The soldiers who followed Pamela looked at each other in dismay; at that moment, they were at a loss in responding to the sudden situation.
In a normal situation, it was considered impolite if a person who did not give prior notice and grab another empire’s General. General Pamela’s military rank was higher by a few levels compared to Ingrid the Beautiful Dragon Knight, who she had met earlier. Although she was not the Duke of Manasvir Empire, Bella had an exclusive Duke lapel badge; it was already considered influential among the human race empires.
“Your Excellency the Duke, please … please kindly let go! We do not know each other and for you to do this, I will feel very confused.”
“I am the Duchess of the Gabriel Empire, Grand Duchess Bellina of Sarnia Duchy. Of course, you can also call me Bella, which is my nickname. Alright, now we can be considered to know each other! Is it possible to let me know your name?”
“Just call me Pamela. Duke Bella, could you kindly release your hand now.”
Pamela looked at Bella with a face full of smiles but her heart felt an indescribable sense of nervousness. She could not explain the cause of why she was feeling nervous. When Bella grabbed her, she thought of struggling free. She felt helpless as Bella’s strength was too great and she was held too firmly so she could only open her mouth to plead for Bella to let go of her.
In any case, Bella was a duchess and Pamela could not start a grudge by directly throwing her hands off. If that was the case, everybody would have no face. Considering that she needed to take care of the other’s identity and reputation, Pamela decided to negotiate with Bella but she did not realize that by doing this, it would be falling into Bella’s trap.
If Pamela had left forcefully, she would not have any more interaction with Bella in this lifetime. Pamela’s hesitation started the bond between Bella and her, it had also indirectly saved herself.
Pamela was wearing a light knight’s armor; this armor was only worn by knight when they were participating in general ceremonies. As this was a decorative armor that was used in ceremonies, the defense was not much and the style was exceptionally gorgeous. Thanks to this light armor, Bella was fortunately able to appreciate Pamela’s good figure.
The ceremonial armor that the knights used to attend a ceremony was differentiated by gender and this was different from the common standard knight armor. For example, this suit of ceremonial armor that Pamela was currently wearing, the lower half of the armor was a skirt and Pamela’s pair of legs, which was snow-white, was not covered and completely exposed in the air.
Pamela’s beautiful hair was scarlet, wavy and curly. Although she was wearing the knight helmet, her long hair was not covered up at all and draped over her shoulders. She was estimated to be around sixteen years old; her beautiful face held traces of youth and was different from Ingrid the Beauty Dragon Knight, who was more mature.
Pamela’s eyes color was a beautiful shade of scarlet and her gaze was different from Ingrid the Beauty Dragon Knight. Although both were female generals, Ingrid’s gaze was more firm and steady than Pamela. When she was facing Bella, Ingrid had seemed calm compared to Pamela. At least, she was different from Pamela who was feeling slightly nervous now.
“Pamela, I seemed to have heard about you from my good friend Jenny, you are Manasvir Empire’s…”
“Duchess Bella, can you please stop the conversation first, I don’t think we are familiar with each other yet!”
“Pamela, please call me Bella which is my nickname and don’t add on Duchess. Is it alright with you? If not I will shout Princess Pamela.”
Pamela did not expect that Bella would know her princess identity and for a moment she sunk into a state of bewilderment. Bella seized the opportunity to pull her to her side. When Pamela regained her senses, she was already at Bella’s side and her warhorse was very far away; she had fallen into the mode of “enforced dialogue”.
“How do you know about it, I don’t remember when I had ever told Jenny…”
“Secret, Princess Pamela. Can you lend me a few giant shields, my shields will soon be broken.”
“Don’t you have a lot of mercenaries and schoolmates over here, you could ask from them?
“No, I only like to ask you, is there a problem? I simply do not like to request help from guys; is this thinking very weird?”
Pamela’s full name was Manas Pamela and Bella’s roommate, Manas Elaine together with tomorrow’s business transaction partner, President Manas Isaman of Euphemia Imperial Academy’s student union, were all princesses of Manasvir Empire. Of course, Bella did not hear about this information from Jenny who was the daughter of Manasvir Empire’s richest individual. Jenny was just the daughter of the richest individual and would not be familiar with members of the royal family of the Manasvir Empire.
The thing that had betrayed Pamela’s identity was her ring that belonged exclusively to the family members of her royal family. The shape of the ring was normal, it was worn on the index finger and it would appear unremarkable, almost no one would know that this ring, which was far from being gorgeous, would be proof of the royal family in the Manavsir Empire among the five big empires in the human race.
All along, Bella would carefully observed beautiful girls. She had seen this unremarkable ring on President Isaman and Elaine. Therefore, Bella’s bold guess was that this ring was the article that marked a member of the Manasvir Empire royal family and at least all princesses would have it. This was the same characteristic with the Promise Dagger which symbolized the Octavia Empire, and was carried by Felia, her substitute.
Pamela had not known that Bella had guessed it when she and Bella had a round of conversation; Bella relied on her many years of accumulated experience in hitting on girls and easily fished a large number of secrets from Pamela. Pamela was the most doted on princess of the king of Manasvir Empire; Elaine and Isaman were her elder sisters in the name.
Pamela was just a nominal student at Olsylvia Academy and from young, she liked to read all kinds of military books thus she did not appear in the school. Her originally intended to enroll in Olivia Wizard Academy as that academy was famous for cultivating various kinds of talents and her lifelong dream of being a general could only be cultivated there.
However, the King of the Manasvir Empire insisted on enrolling her into Euphemia Imperial Academy. The King had pampered Pamela too much. Additionally, his thinking was conservative and he subjectively believed that girls should not brandish swords and play with spears.
Also, he had no people in Olivia Wizard Academy so what if Pamela was bullied over there? Olivia Wizard Academy’s students always had crooks mixed in with the honest folks. She was better off in Euphemia Imperial Academy and he also felt reassured that with the academy’s Student Union president, Isaman, who was her sister, that at least Pamela would not be bullied inside.
Of course, Pamela was not happy but the King’s order was difficult disobey so she could only go to Euphemia Imperial Academy to report and be there in the name. Maybe the Manasvir Empire’s King had known the dissatisfaction in Pamela’s heart and decreed that she was to defend the outside of Alcott Valley as the commander-in-chief of the Security Regiment which specialized in taking responsibility for the safety of Simon Quarry. This was considered to have fulfill her dream.
This military post was a position with practically no obligations as the location of Olsylvia Academy was in the central district of the human continent area. This was the district that was most impossible to be involved in the fire of war. Being a general in the garrison over here had the same nature as being a nominal local official.
“Bella, since the few of you are my schoolmates, please come to my army camp to be a visitor. I’ve had no visitors for a long while.”
Bella and the few people had agreed to Pamela’s invitation, it just so happened that Bella wanted to use the excuse of renting shields from Pamela. She needed rest as the attack from the rock puppets had caused both hands, which were supporting the shield, to feel slightly numb. If she did not rest, she was afraid that her hand would be injured and at night she could not use her hands to take liberties.
As Bella and the beautiful girls followed General Pamela’s army of light cavalry and walked off, the mercenaries who were watching had also gone back to clean the battlefield. After all, life had to go on. It was just good to just look at beautiful girls; killing monsters honestly to earn money was the correct path.
After the students of Olsylvia Academy had sent the squad away, they had also gone back to school. Bella and the few people had killed more than half of the rock puppets over here. The rest of the monsters had not “refreshed” and they did not want to stay here to “fight over monsters” with the mercenaries thus they could only return the next time.
Nobody noticed that those rock puppets’ corpses that had been blown apart by Bella and others with those mysterious stones, had inexplicably disappeared. Those fragments had secretly moved to the surroundings of the Simon Quarry and ahuge mutation was silently brewing.
On the outskirts of Olsylvia Academy, surroundings of Alcott Valley, garrison base camp of Simon Quarry in Manasvir Empire.
Bella, Kriss, Ariel, and Ivy rushed back with Pamela’s cavalry. From very far away, Bella had seen the army camp with tight security. The surface area of the army camp was huge; this place ten thousand people was stationed here. If this place was not big enough, it was inexcusable.
“Pamela, your soldiers are pretty good, all of them should have come from the battlefield!”
“Bella, all these are new soldiers, my old man would not dispatch veterans from the battlefield for me who is an amateur and still learning military affairs! Your eyesight isn’t very good!”
“Is it, then it’s true… true that I do not have good eyesight!”
The army horse that Bella was riding followed with Pamela’s mount closely. President Ivy was seated behind her and on the other side of her mount was Kriss and Ariel. Both of them were riding together on a horse. Before that, Kriss and Ariel were always fighting over the chance to ride the same horse as Bella. For the purpose of harmony of the harem, Bella had to choose President Ivy and put up with her for a while.
At first, President Ivy did not agree; due to her profession, she disliked close relations with people. As Bella had promised to give her a few cute dolls, this ice-cold beautiful female assassin agreed to Bella’s invitation of riding together in the end.
Bella swept her eyes over the soldiers of the Manasvir Empire standing on two sides of the avenue who were welcoming them. On the surface she had no expression, but in reality, Bella suspected that the soldiers had some issues. Based on Pamela’s sayings, these soldiers should be new; they should not have such a strong aura of death.
In the past, Bella had gone onto a real battlefield; the human soldiers who had attacked her and killed thousand of Ocras, those soldiers who had killed people before would have the aura of death. This group of new soldiers also had the aura and this was illogic.
Soldiers of the Manasvir Empire were standing on the roadside, with standard military posture and their backs upright. Those eyes eyed on Pamela and the others covetously. In their gazes, Bella could not see a trace of respect for Pamela. No matter how good a soldier was, the soldier at the very least would have respect for their general. It was a big problem if these soldiers did not have any.
Bella’s hand consciously pressed the storage rings on her right hand and this was a sign that she was about to draw out her weapon. Kriss and Ariel, being Bella’s awesome teammates, had also quickly discovered the problem over here. These two girls had gone through the mutiny of Sack Reed and were considered to be veterans of the battlefield.
Kriss’ hands did the same action as Bella, her left hand was on the back of her right hand. Her weapon was taken out from the sword space so there was no need for any storage rings. She did that to trick other people and let them think that her weapon was taken out from a storage ring.
From the beginning, Ariel had worn the big cloak,.Bella temporarily could not see her obvious abnormality, but her little hand that was previously exposed hand had been pulled back into the big cloak and it was unknown what she was “fiddling with secretly”. Ariel’s magic attack was instant and if she ran into a sudden attack, she could react quickly.
President Ivy was seated behind Bella and she could clearly feel Bella’s nervousness. Ivy did not ask; she was a high-end assassin and from her sharp observation skills, she realized the problem with this road. Many people were lying in wait in the forests on both sides of the road. These people had a secret line of sight and there was almost no murderous intent leaking.
But when the sneak attackers’ line of sight was on Pamela, their aura held obvious fluctuations. In that short duration, Ivy caught them. As Ivy thought about this, she crossed her arms over her chest. She had already prepared two concealed weapons in secret when no one noticed. Because her hands were in her embrace, the outsiders did not notice that she was already in battle preparation mode.
Besides Bella and the others who had noticed the peculiarity, Pamela and the two thousand cavalry that she had led had actually not realized anything. Pamela was gratified that her soldiers would form a welcome squadron along the way. Her soldiers were mostly new and those with a little experience in combat were transferred to Simon Quarry to stand guard.
Although Pamela did not remember when she said she would be back, and that she did not ask for a welcome squadron, Pamela did not think deeply about all these abnormalities as she was in a state of happiness.
“Pamela, how many people do you have in your army camp? There is a great number of soldiers lined up here.”
“Bella, this is not a military secret so why are you asking so mysteriously? My army camp has four thousand people staying behind, I took two thousand light cavalry to look for you and the rest of the six thousand were stationed at Simon Quarry.”
When Bella was asking she had lowered her voice down, she already knew the answer after getting Pamela’s reply. Bella, being a Demon King, could perceive the approximate number of humans in a certain region. Minusing the two thousand light cavalry that Pamela was bringing back, the army camp surprisingly actually had about four thousand life reflections.
The two thousand people was definitely problematic as Pamela had transferred six thousand people to Simon Quarry so there should only be four thousand people over here. Now adding on the light cavalry that Pamela had brought back, there were six thousand people. The extra two thousand people definitely spelled trouble.
At the thought of this, Bella quickly motioned for Pamela to stop as perhaps there would be a mutiny. In her past life, Bella was familiar with all kinds of history books and she had read many examples of this type of military coup. Currently, Bella, Pamela, and the others were close; this could prevent the risk of the beautiful girls being captured when they encountered a sneak attack.
“Why, Bella, I thought you wanted to go to my army camp to visit and also borrow a few shields!”
“Wait, Pamela, stand nearer to me. Can you first send a person to go back to the army camp and verify the number of people inside!”
When Pamela’s light cavalry stopped, the soldiers who were lined up became unstable. A few of them had fierce gazes and glared at Bella, it seemed that they were unhappy with the actions of this gold-haired beautiful knight. When Bella saw all this, she was even more convinced that the army camp had a problem.
“General Pamela, you are back? You also brought with you a few visitors. Please go back to the camp, we have already arranged a banquet.”
“Captain Lauren, thank you for your hard work, then we…”
Bella was climbed down from the horse before Pamela. She walked to the front of Pamela and stopped her from coming down the horse. After that, she walked to the officer. This little officer also had a problem.
“Oh, your grace, the duchess, hello, you are….”
“You are not the person himself at all…”
Bella quickly took out her sword from her storage rings and stabbed it into Captain Laurent’s chest. This unprepared attack stunned Pamela who was behind Bella. Even a duchess was guilty when killing a soldier from the empire who was on active duty without a reason. Punished lightly, her rank could be lowered; if not, her title could be stripped away. As a duchess, Bella had no reason to do this.
Before Pamela reacted, a more shocking matter happened. Captain Laurent, who had been stabbed in the chest by Bella, did not die and stood there without collapsing. Immediately after that, countless arrows were shot out from the undergrowth of two sides of the roads.
The archers who had sneak attacked were obviously veterans. They had especially shot the small cracks in the helmets of the light cavalry who were on the horses. These people who were new soldiers did not manage to react and were shot to death.
Those sneak attackers who could accurately aim and shoot through the cavalry helmets and kill them, even in the Kristoff Empire which was the empire of archers, were considered the cream of the crop.
“Enemy attack, quickly withdraw!”
“Stop, you are attacking your allies! I…”
The light cavalry who was ambushed was a mess. The allied soldiers who were standing at the two sides of the road instantly turned into their enemies. They carried pikes and hurled them out directly and accurately, piercing the legs of the horses that the cavalry was on.
Because of speed, the horses of the cavalry relied mainly on lightweight and portable equipment for the armor. The horses were not equipped with leg armor plating like the heavy cavalry. If the legs were pierced by the pikes, the results were obvious. Many light cavalry soldiers did not manage to react and fell off the horse because of the warhorse’s overturning. The unlucky ones were crushed to death by the warhorses.
“Hmph, this haughty female duke. Later on, I will capture you alive to the army camp, strip you and let you be the sex slave of the army. Not just you, all of you can’t run away!”
Captain Laurent’s facial features had twisted until he did not look look human. Regarding this change, Bella was not nervous and her look instead had turned gloomy. Did the human not know how precious life was? He actually wanted the Demon King to become his sex slave. His courage was laudable, but it was a pity, he got the wrong opponent.
