such skeleton. As she quietly slipped through its open rib cage, Elisabeth spoke. "The front lines are no place for us. Our task lies in the shadows." Meanwhile, demon grandchildren with misshapen wings flew over the main drag. Weaving over the labyrinthine streets, they made for the Three Kings of the Forest like arrows. The air crackled with the sound of their bizarre laughter. However, one sweep of the Three Kings' tails was enough to crush them all like flies. They were outmatched, plain and simple. Elisabeth's thoughts turned as she watched their entrails soar through the air. The gulf in strength and size is simply too vast... Weapons designed to kill people are meaningless against the Three Kings. However, not even an army of summoned beasts would be equal to the task. There are scant few who could mount a resistance against a weapon capable of leveling a nation. The Three Kings of the Forest mowed down everything in their path as they made their advance. Behind them, the beastfolk and human soldiers trampled over the broken corpses of demi-humans, mixed-race people, and buildings. Their armor clanked, and their disorderly footsteps shook the ground as their chaotic advance continued. By and large, the invasion was a complete rout. Cries of successful conquest rose up from the various demon research facilities that had been set up in the underground shelters. Although there were still some areas left to subdue, it had all gone so anticlimactically it hardly even felt like a victory. The conference had taken place just a few short hours ago. Now the dragon bone settlement was a living hellscape. Once the Three Kings of the Forest got moving, the situation developed at a breakneck pace. It was like a boulder rolling down a hill. With no way to stop the Three Kings' march, the smaller beings had no choice but to fall in line so as not to be left behind. However, things ended up going surprisingly smoothly. Maclaeus was able to quickly identify the best course of action, and the paladins and Royal Knights both went along with it. They had already known that a battle with the mixed-race people was imminent, so for them, it was just a matter of assembling as much of their army as possible and using the castle's mages to teleport it so they could join up with the beastfolk. Meanwhile, the beastfolk's decision pulled double duty by forcibly removing the demi-human dignitaries from play. In short, the conference had also served as a trap. As for Vyadryavka, his forces were a hodgepodge consisting of the private armies of the late Dynast and other high-ranking members of the imperial family. The rest of the imperial family's soldiers were assigned to stand guard over the demi-human officials. Then Vyadryavka used the majority of the mage blood the beastfolk had painstakingly collected over generations to teleport both the army and the Three Kings of the Forest as close to the settlement as possible. It was a drastic move, but it got the job done. Once they got close, the mixed-race people sensed their presence, but by then, they had no time to flee. It was like trying to take cover from a tsunami or volcanic eruption with no advance warning. As it turned out, trying to escape a calamity was easier said than done. And that was truly the term that described what struck the pureblood settlement. The demi-human lands were home to golden sand, harsh winds, burning liquids, and myriad minerals mass-produced in the Dragons' Graveyard. Of the various graveyards, the pureblood settlement was located in the one with the least raw mineral ore and where the dragon bones were all largely in their original states. As a result, the bleached bone surrounding the settlement cloaked it in the constant reek of death. Despite that, though, the townscape itself was fairly posh. Its sandstone houses were decorated with jewel-and-metal charms, hand-sewn sunshades, and various succulents. There was also a temple deep within the settlement, albeit a fair shake smaller than the real one, and the path leading to it was dyed vermilion. They had done their best to leave the dragon bones as is and work around them, so the paths were intricate and winding, but all in all, the settlement was laid out in much the same way as the demi-human first sector. Due to the increased population from those of mixed race, it was almost like a small nation. Now, though, most of it had been obliterated. The Three Kings' march was destruction incarnateâ€”a wave of pure, unbridled chaos. Everything they touched got demolished and consumed in their unforgiving wake. Against them, the very concept of order shattered and fell. Seeing them in action made Elisabeth keenly aware of why they had so obstinately refused to take the stage up until then. They were simply too powerful. 'Twould make a right mess of things, having power incarnate dictating national policy. That was probably why they had refrained from acting during the end of days, too. If they had made an appearance back then, it would have slowly but surely shifted the world's power balance toward the three of them. They were creatures of a bygone era, and they respected modern society too much to let that happen. That was why they only acted through the imperial family and stuck largely to their role as spectators. Even as more and more of the world's power balance shifted toward the humans, the Three Kings of the Forest had remained steadfast in their nonintervention. And if natural selection had slowly taken its course, they would probably have stayed that way. But then their beloved children were destroyed by an act that fell outside of that natural course. And what's more, a brother of the fallen shed tears and lifeblood to make a desperate plea to them. "Please grant us your strength," he begged. "Please, bless us with your compassion." So now they were making a once-in-a-lifetime march. The colossal hawk flapped its wings, shattering the bones that surrounded the settlement. The white deer hooves trampled houses and people alike. And the ancient wolf's fangs mowed down the survivors. Their foes tried to resist with all manner of weapons and magic, but the Three Kings' sheer power crushed them one and all. Many of the corpses they left in their wake were reduced to little more than piles of blood and viscera. For others, nothing remained but a single arm or leg. Several times now, Elisabeth had tried to look up at the Three Kings as they conducted their brutal savageries. Even so, she had yet to grasp their full forms. There were countless bits and fragments burned into her retinasâ€”sleek fur, majestic wings, an array of udders, limbs that stretched into the sky, and bestial eyes that looked like full moonsâ€”but she couldn't reconcile them into cohesive wholes. Her brain simply refused to comprehend the Three Kings. All she could tell was that they were mighty, they were beautiful, and they were terrifying. They, too, were beings that superseded human comprehension. Their march, in comparison, almost called to mind a paradeâ€”it was lavish and majestic and overwhelming. It was like something that would be thrown to celebrate a king's return. Everything about it was so ludicrously beyond the scope the smaller beings operated at. A dispassionate thought crossed Elisabeth's mind. This is no battle. The beastfolk were done grieving. This was their anger given form. Your deeds are as haughty as they are heinous, the Three Kings howled. As such, it falls on us to lop off your sinful heads. It falls on us to spill rivers of your blood, stack mountains of your corpses, and reduce you all to ash. Ironically, it was the same message as the mixed-race proclamation. For in the end, that was what revenge boiled down to. The rebel army had been well prepared to defend themselves, even against a fairly sizable force. However, they hadn't planned for the Three Kings' march. Not even the humans and beastfolk had. As such, the frontal assault served as a surprise attack as well, and the one-sided domination continued. As Elisabeth dashed deeper into the hellscape, her gaze lingered for a moment. She saw Lute standing between two leveled buildings. The copper-furred wolfman was barking orders at his subordinates to look for someone. Their eyes met. She nodded at him, leaving the rest in his hands. Amid the fire and ash and smoke, Lute straightened his back and gave her a deep bow. Elisabeth set off again. Most of the mixed-race people will die here and now. The traitorous demi-humans as well. That was why the Peace Brigadeâ€”her subordinatesâ€”were in charge of a different mission than the rest of the army. Their task was to locate and protect Satisbarina's son, and they had official approval from the Three Kings of the Forest to do so. The Three Kings were kings before they were beasts, and they knew full well the ripple effect that breaking an oath with a prisoner of war could have on society. However, there was still no guarantee their mission would end in success. For one, the late Dynast Valisisa's private army was out for blood, and there was a genuine risk they would end up slaughtering the hostage residents along with their foes. Almost all the civilians killed by swords had been downed by their hands. Such was the depth of their rage and sorrow and such was the scale of their loss. And with how chaotic things were, there was no stopping them. Any attempt to control the soldiers scattered across the settlement would be an uphill battle at best. Off in the distance, young children could be heard screaming. As Elisabeth charged on, her expression unchanging, her thoughts turned once more. Did Satisbarina know this would happen? There was but one answer. She did. She might have seemed a dullard, but she was sharp as a knife, and it was difficult to imagine her harboring any naive illusions about how things would play out. She must have foreseen the tragedy that awaited, yet even so, she had taken the best option available to her and gambled everything on saving her son. For the sake of her love, she was willing to let everyone else die. And Elisabeth was the one who'd taken advantage of that fact. This particular hell had the two Suffering Women to thank for its creation. From beside Elisabeth, an easygoing voice cut through her reverie. "You know, my precious, you get hung up over the oddest things. I can't imagine the screams rest easy in your ears, but it's a little late for that, no? If anything, you should consider them a badge of honor. Of all the tragedies you've caused as the Torture Princess, at least this one might pave the way for a brighter future." "Silence, Vlad. I know not if you're trying to praise me or get a rise out of me, but in either case, I don't care for it one bit." "Oh, I don't doubt it. And if I'm being quite honest, my aim lay with both in equal measure! Your reactions are so adorable; I really just can't get enough of them." Elisabeth gave Vlad's response a sharp click of the tongue. Oddly, Vlad replied with a smile. There was something really quite unsettling about it, but before Elisabeth had a chance to figure out what seemed so off, a scream cut through the air, and the wall to their left came crumbling down. Elisabeth raced on, dodging the rain of debris and kicking chunks of rubble aside. Suddenly, she noticed a dark figure the size of a calf running alongside her in the sandy cloud. There could be little doubt that he was enjoying the tragedy more than anyone else. The Kaiser spoke, laughing all the while in a voice that sounded almost human.