Chapter 90 - Days Before the War

[13 Days Remaining]

My eyes instantly opened as I heard the rustling sounds of someone entering my tent. From the hastily-made cot I was lying on, I stood up halfway and turned my head.

“Efari,” I said, seeing the form of a tall woman with straw-colored hair and jet-black eyes being somewhat illuminated by the light of the lantern. It was her eyes that had told me who she was. It was unmistakable. They were a pair of dark eyes which could make you feel as if you were suffocating, as if you were smothered gently by the grasping darkness.

Her lips formed a small upward curve, a slight grin, which was seen even though half of her face was hidden by shadows—my tent was barely illuminated due to the dying glow of the lantern. That, and my human eyes were somewhat limited by the night. It was probably somewhat before dawn.

“Zakir,” she said in a voice that could make one feel as if only two lovers were alone in a crowded room. It was a seductive voice cloaked by the silk of sin, made ever the more tenuous by the dim glow of the lantern.

I merely looked at Efari, waiting for her words.

“Will you spend the night with me?” she asked in a tone I could not make out, even with my perceptiveness, if I may be so haughty as to call myself perceptive. It was somewhat strange. Efari was not usually so meek. Rather, she had a possessive and somewhat demanding quality.

I showed an indifferent smile toward this Efari. “Hungry for life essence?”

“No need,” she said with a grin that showed off the small points of her incisors. “I already ate a while ago.”

I didn't bother asking Efari who she had drained. It didn't matter much since it was not one of my soldiers. That, and I had not heard of any news of death, so Efari had most likely only somewhat drained the life essences of multiple people, not enough to kill them. I did, however, wondered how she drained her victims. Perhaps she had some way of draining them from afar or perhaps methods to make her victims forget.

I stopped wondering as Efari kept staring at me with her dark eyes. She was still waiting for my answer.

“Sure, why not. It isn't as if I need the sleep anyway.”

“Good, follow me outside then.” Efari abruptly turned around, not even looking back once as she exited the tent. Her words were a little surprising. I had thought we were going to exchange. It seems I was wrong. Her sly words and tone had led me to believe that.

I let out a small mental sigh. It was a good thing that there were no guards posted outside my tent. The central camp where I was straying at also did not have too many soldiers, most of them choosing to stay further away from the White Demon. Furthermore, the war meetings we had did not take place inside my tent. It took place inside a larger tent to encompass all the commanders, advisers, messengers, and mage captains.

I lifted the bed cover and silently got off my cot. The cot was not a luxurious one. It was plain, simple, and sturdy. It was a step above from the common soldiers who slept on the grounds of their tents with only some covering. Though I called it a step above, it was still not much of a step above.

I was half-naked but that state did not last for long after I dressed myself in a simple, black tunic, which hung on a wooden rack along with my enchanted black armor and winged helmet.

Usually, I would have slept fully-naked, but that would have been somewhat awkward for the people who frequently came into my tent to report to me in the middle of the nights and in the early mornings.

These days, however, there weren't many reports coming in since we had finished setting up all of our defenses. And though I say that, there were still a few riders, Air mages, and the very few mages that could teleport, delivering messages between the seven northern fronts.

I suppose it was the calm before the storm, or rather the war, in this case.

Outside my tent, Efari was waiting for me. She stood as still as a statue, which only made me think of a predator lying in wait for its prey.

“I much prefer you half-naked rather than fully dressed. But I suppose I can settle for this,” Efari commented casually.

She walked closer toward me, putting her bare arms around my neck. She was a tall woman, almost coming up to my height. And in that slim, black dress of hers, I could feel her body intimately pressed against mine, her curves blatantly touching my chest.

I could also smell something intoxicating with her body so close to my proximity. The smell was somewhat effective and sweet. Most likely a mating scent—this had become more apparent when the bond between Efari and I grew stronger. I could feel myself becoming a little dazed by the smell, though I did not show it and quickly suppressed that feeling.

“So,” I said, somewhat breaking our intimate silence. “Are we going to stay like this for the whole night?”

“Hah.” Efari looked up, letting out a small sigh. In a slightly bitter voice, the bitterness almost missed by me, she said, “How I wish we could stay like this forever, Zakir...” The small breath of her words touched my face.

The night was turning out to be an unusual one. Efari was staying from the confines of her usual personality. It bewildered me a little, seeing her so amiable and meek. She was almost like a true lover, rather than one who believed in the notion of me being the Deathwalker to her Goddess.

“Can you fly the both of us up into this night sky?” asked Efari.

I thought a little at that. It was not wise to show my dragon-form in the middle of a population of soldiers. That went against the dictations of logic.

Almost as if she knew what I was thinking of, Efari cut into my thoughts. “There is no need to worry, Zakir. I can mask your magic and our presences from all seeing eyes. Even those two dragons of yours.” Efari said those last four words in a somewhat emphasizing tone, her possessiveness coming out.

A white mist started coming out of Efari, and the small fog soon surrounded the both of us. Efari whispered softly, “only you can see this through our bond, dear Verath.”

Her ability and words surprised me. The fact that she was confident that none—not even the battalions of human mages and the two dragons—could see through this fog of her, led me to believe that Efari was truly powerful. A Matriarch Devourer she had called herself, though the devourers that had been with her when I had first met her had been weak.

I decided to play along with this monstrous female whose bared and soft arms were embraced around my neck.

Threads of magic formed near the back of my shoulders with a simple will as I drew upon my pool of magic. The magic lasted only an instant—a bare second—before two enormous wings sprouted out from behind my back. These black, leathery wings spanned more than eleven feet and if I chose to, the pair of wings could have entirely envelop a human, squeezing the life out of the person. Death would have come in a mere half a step for my chosen victim.

I put an arm around Efari's waist, and jumped upward from the ground. With my strength, her weight only felt like a pebble in my palm. And even as I flew with an unmatched speed compared to the Air mages, the white fog Efari surrounded us with followed easily, always surrounding the two of us.

As we shot upward toward the sky with the wind rushing around our ears, the night clouds become closer, and the air became a little colder. Both of us were not bothered by such things. We were monsters in our own rights, different from the humans below us.

Efari let out a crystal clear laugh, which resounded in the air around us. It was the first time I ever heard her laugh so clearly. It made her seem as if she was a normal woman.

The forms of the twin moons were clear and sharp above us, their moonlights shining upon us, and everywhere else. The light did not discriminate, merely shining wherever it could reach with an almost omnipresence reach.

“This makes me feel like a young and naive fool again,” Efari said with a laugh.

“How old are you now, then?” I said, making my voice sound amused. I knew she was three hundred and twenty seven years old since Efari herself had told me, but I decided to ask again anyway.

“You should never ask for a woman's age, Zakir. We do not like to be reminded of it,”—Efari formed a sly grin—“especially a Matriarch Devourer such as I.”

With her dusky eyes, which somehow seemed lighter at this moment, or perhaps it was just the light from the night sky, or perhaps it was just my imagination, Efari said, “You are much older than me though, Zakir.”

What exactly did she mean by that? I was surprised, almost enough to have dropped her. I wouldn't have been surprised if Efari survived, though. She was a mysterious creature.

“What exactly do you mean by that, Efari?” I asked.

She let go of an arm which had been embracing my neck, and put a finger to her lips. “It's a secret, Zakir.”

At that, I merely replied with an “I see,” while Efari nestled herself closer into my embrace.

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[13 Days Remaining]

The morning consisted of brief short meetings with messengers and a longer meeting as to what our future plans would be. It was simply an uneventful one, especially since we had already somewhat decided on how we would attack the enemy forces.

Afternoon came and I got atop my horse, deciding to greet the Mage Captains. All of the battalions of mages that had been assigned to me were together in a smaller section of the camp. In total, there had been about 400 mages assigned to me in addition to the healer mages and other miscellaneous mages.

In other words, King Balan had assigned twenty battalions to the army I led. The other eighty battalions, however, were spread out in the other six fronts.

Each battalion consisted of twenty mages, including a Mage Captain and all of them were powerful in their own rights, each having graduated from the Mage Academy and each having been trained extensively.

They wielded staffs and shortswords made from the same material that had gone into my enchanted black longsword. It was a material newly discovered that slightly improved the effectiveness of your magic.

The twenty battalions I had were—

Six Earth Mage Battalions, Eight Fire Mage Battalions, Two Air Mage Battalions, and Two Water Mage Battalions.

To get a sense of the scale, there were a little over 400 mages in my army while there were over 1600 mages, including the overall leaders of the Mage Battalions, that were with King Balan and spread out over the other six fronts. But that was just the mages that were controlled directly by the king. It was still not counting the mages each Baron and a few major nobles had under their control.

The damage done to the land with the presence of that many mages would be unimaginable. They would wreak havoc from the heavens. Huge rains of fireball would fall onto the land, burning everything into ashes. And that was just the mages that had better affinities with fire magic. There could also be the mages that could control derivatives of the four common magic affinities and the mages born with unique talents.

Lightning mages, wood mages, ice mages (a derivative of water magic affinity,) and all types of other mages could be seen among the armies also.

This was the reason why mages were precious and coveted by every kingdom—the scale of damage a mage could carry out on a battlefield was simply awe-inspiring. Though that awe-inspiring, for the victims, it would only be as if Lady Death had reaped them with a swift slash of her scythe, returning the victims back into her embrace.

With the twenty Mage Captains of various magic affinities lined up before me, I gave them a salute, to which they return even more steadfastly.

“I shall be relying upon all of you in the upcoming battle,” I said.

“We shall serve our utmost best for the glorious Shail Kingdom and its ruler, King Balan the Prosperous. The Falinor invaders shall know true fear!” the most senior Mage Captain, a fire mage, shouted with a crisp and clear voice.

“Hail to King Balan vis Shail the Prosperous, Protectorate of All Five Regions,” the other Mage Captains shouted, taking up the call.

I only nodded at that. Their devotion to the king was to be expected. They were, after all, retained personally by King Balan and served directly in the central region, unless called to quell troubles in the other four regions.

Within these twenty battalions of mages in my army, there were a few derivative mages mixed among them. For example, there was a lightning mage known as Blue Fire serving under one of the Fire Mage Battalion. He would be considered a Fire Mage, for all extents and purposes, even though he specialized in lightning.

I left the mage section of the camp after the simple greeting then. I had only visited to promote a sense of camaraderie and unity. The visit was merely that. It wasn't as if I felt a kinship or a desire to make friends with these mages. I was only carrying out my duty as the general to the best of my ability.

This was how I would continue holding my lie as the abnormal young general known as the White Demon. It was a facade I would continue until I returned back to the dragon lands.