Chapter 278: Moment of Victory
"No, no, no, no... what the hell am I doing in this place..."
Chloe remained huddled in a far corner of the enormous room, sitting on the freezing floor right behind one of the thick stone columns of the shattered throne room.
She hugged her legs to her chest, trembling from head to toe while her eyes stared into nothingness with pure panic.
"This cannot be happening... A demon king was just brutally massacred, a legendary demon queen just appeared in front of me, there are SS-rank humans walking around me as if nothing happened, and two of them were capable of killing one of the cruelest demon kings in existence... What kind of nightmare is this?!"
While Ryan and his group were gathered in the center of the room, conversing with total calmness about what had happened and celebrating the victory, Chloe could not help but maintain a sepulchral silence in her hiding place, murmuring frantic words in a voice almost inaudible to herself.
"If only I had known my life would end in such an absurd way, I would never have joined the order of the holy knights..." the girl lamented, feeling the urge to cry.
"I even... I never even got to have a single boyfriend in my entire life! And now I am trapped right in the middle of the most dangerous and monstrous creatures in the whole world... Without a doubt, I am going to die here today."
"Hey, and who are you supposed to be?"
"Ahhhh!"
Chloe’s sharp, ear-piercing scream echoed loudly throughout the spacious throne room, shattering the peace of the place.
Out of nowhere, and without having made the slightest noise while moving, one of Ophelia’s Infernal-rank demon soldiers was standing right in front of her, leaning in with curiosity. It was one of the twins in Ophelia’s service.
Seeing the demon’s face mere centimeters from hers, Chloe completely lost her breath and fell backward onto the floor, squeezing her eyes shut. Her face turned completely pale and blue from the impact of the scare.
"Hey, do not bother people, brother," the other Infernal-rank twin said, slowly walking toward the column. "Look what you did, you already scared her to death."
"No, I do not think she is dead... well, at least she is still breathing a little," the twin replied, lightly poking Chloe’s shoulder with the tip of his boot.
"Hey, you two, get over here right now!" Ophelia’s imposing voice ordered from the center of the room, cutting off her subordinates’ foolishness.
Both twins tensed instantly and obeyed their queen’s command without a word of complaint, giving a quick bow.
"Do not bother Ryan’s soldiers. Behave, will you?" Ophelia scolded them with her arms crossed.
"We are very sorry, lady Ophelia," the twin said, scratching the back of his neck. "It is just that we had not seen her around here before and I got very curious, mostly because she is wearing the official armor of the church’s holy knights."
"She is not a soldier in my army," Ryan intervened, taking calm steps toward one of the hall’s immense destroyed windows. "Well, she is actually just my prisoner."
"A prisoner, huh," Ophelia commented, letting out a soft laugh and walking toward the window to stand right beside him.
When Ryan peeked out the edge of the broken window, he observed the castle’s expansive outer courtyard.
Just outside the enormous stone fortress, stretching across the entire snowfield, absolutely all of his combined army was gathered. Hundreds of skilled elven archers, the imposing transformed beastmen, and the mass of Ophelia’s demonic soldiers occupied the main plaza.
And at the precise moment the troops noticed Ryan’s figure appearing high up in the castle window, alive and victorious, the crowd suddenly erupted.
A deafening and immense shout of glory echoed across the frozen plain. Pure euphoria and victory swept through the army’s ranks, raising their swords, bows, and axes to the sky in a sign of absolute triumph.
Ryan frowned slightly upon seeing hundreds of warriors cheering his name from below.
Each of the tactical squads had perfectly fulfilled their assigned part. Minutes earlier, Ophelia had confirmed to him that the dragoness Janina had finished wiping out Rigal’s reinforcement troops in the distant territory of the demon king Rohan, and Ivis had also confirmed via telepathy that she was already flying back.
"Honestly, I am not at all used to this kind of attention or cheering..." Ryan commented in a low voice, looking away from the crowd and taking a step back from the window.
"Come on, Ryan, this is your well-deserved moment of glory," Ophelia said with a wide, beautiful smile, looking at the jubilant army. "You should enjoy it much more after surviving such a battle. Do you not think so?"
The girls in his group were also looking at him with a smile.
’Yes, she might be partly right,’ Ryan thought to himself, letting out a heavy sigh and feeling the accumulated exhaustion in his body. ’Even so, I feel like I cannot afford the luxury of lowering my guard at all. I am absolutely sure that, after killing a demon king, the problems and threats from today onwards will be much more constant and dangerous.’
Ryan looked up at his female group members. Helen, Karol, Mirian, Beatrice, Alicia, and Irina were brimming with enormous energy, confidence, and vitality after achieving victory.
Then, breaking the freezing air, a strong gust of wind entered through one of the hall’s gigantic destroyed windows.
Ivis flew elegantly into the space, with only a pair of her immense dragon wings released on her back, while maintaining her usual human body shape.
But to the surprise of everyone present in the room, someone else was following closely behind her from the air.
The mysterious figure landed next to Ivis with flawless grace. She possessed exactly the same partial dragon transformation, but with a pair of majestic, immaculate wings of pure white.
Her physical appearance was simply dazzling. She had an unusual hair color: a deep black shade perfectly combined with white streaks that made it look like pure snow under the light, creating a visual contrast of overwhelming elegance.
Her eyes also possessed a hypnotic peculiarity; she suffered from marked heterochromia, having one bright silver eye and the other an extremely clear, crystalline blue.
And right in the center of her forehead protruded a single, sharp, glowing horn, the undeniable mark of a high-ranking dragon.
Everyone in the hall fell completely silent, marveling and on high alert at the beautiful but imposing newly arrived presence.
"But... who is she?" Ryan murmured, adjusting his stance in front of the mysterious dragoness.