A Dragon's Curiosity

“Annihilated? What do you mean? A single creature?”

The revelation shocked Nisha. Even for the Wilderness, it was rare to have a being powerful enough to kill a whole tribe of monsters, not to mention humans with a unified cultivation system and army.

Such an incident was no longer an incident but rather a dangerous spot, a forbidden region where a dreadful monster or beast took up residence.

Most normal citizens, and a lot of adventurers besides, believed that the zone known as the Wilderness had a collective hatred of humanity and banded together to wipe them out.

Instead, the creatures living there experienced plenty of strife between each other as well.

Territories were decided by bloody fights, and those who strayed from the border zones between the spheres of influence established by the ruling monsters and beasts usually ended up in a fatal encounter.

As a result, even monsters with limited critical judgement heeded their strong survival instinct and avoided the danger zones that appeared when a strong abomination disturbed the local bounds.

Further, a monster or beast, whether alone or in a group, strong enough to wipe out a professional army counting five thousand members was without a doubt more than just a simple danger zone and more like a calamity.

Nisha asked whether this was the work of a single being out of instinct. If it was just a large group of [Bloodthirsty Boars], [Armored War Eagles], or a similar group that razed the area, it could still be explained as a miniature monster wave.

Contrary to that, if a single creature attained enough power to wipe out an army on its own, it was not only human settlements that needed to fear the power of this abnormality.

With her experience from ruling over the [Dragon’s Den], the dragon judged it as an impossibility to fight against such an intruder.

Furthermore, if a large population of different tribes and domains claimed by monster groups vanished overnight, humanity would not profit either.

Rushing from all sides to reclaim the ownerless area, the power vacuum may as likely create a large-scale monster wave instead once a large group congregated and the monsters had insufficient space to settle down.

Nisha had to consider both perspectives as a beast living in a human capital for the time being.

Standing opposite of her, Galan appeared to be quite pleased when he saw the thoughts racing through the young mistress’ head.

The Dharnas house had too few heirs at present anyway, and there would be more than enough official and domestic positions for the young master and the young mistress to spread their wings; hence he appreciated that the girl took the time to think things through and induced a general idea from the sparse information he gave her.

As long as the young generation grew more excellent, the entire house would prosper.

“It does seem like the work of a single individual. From the way the bodies were left behind, the preliminary investigation implicated a possible culprit, too.

“It is not quite appropriate to speculate about the authenticity of this guess or make it public knowledge either.

“For the young mistress, though, I can make an exception.

“The five thousand bodies were arranged in neat rows according to their position in the military and their personal cultivation, ascending in rows and columns respectively.

“Furthermore, the cause of death is exactly identical in each instance, giving the investigators a strong clue.

“From the thorough understanding of the military structure and internal circumstances and the deep cut opening the deceased soldier’s throat from ear to ear in an eerie mock smile, the current assumption is that the troop ran into the [Smiling Devil] himself, and somehow incurred his wrath.”

Nisha was stumped. It turned out to be one of the rare occasions where the otherwise witty elf was left speechless.

At the beginning, she eagerly followed the explanation offered by Galan and even mentally praised herself for seeking him out.

Since the head butler had to manage all matters pertaining the Duke household, he surely had an ear right at the source when all the intelligence reports sent back from their informants went through his hands.

And then, the story took a sudden turn when the dignified Galan suddenly spoke of a legend, a myth told to small children to make sure they stay obedient, like a matter of fact and showed no signs of playing a prank on her.

“Excuse me, Uncle Galan, I’m not sure I’m following you there. When you say [Smiling Devil], do you mean the same one from the stories, or …?”

Her sentence trailed off there and the doubt on her face must have been strong enough to elicit a response as the old human allowed himself a chuckle.

“The young mistress is as sharp as always. You must have heard of the [Smiling Devil] before, correct?”

“You’re making fun of me, right? If you don’t want to tell me what’s going on, that’s fine too.”

Prepared to turn away and look for another source of information, the elf was ready to depart when the butler hurriedly stopped her.

“You misunderstood my intentions, young mistress. I am indeed speaking of that figure from the stories and do not intend to hold back any truths from you.

“Please, hear me out first and then make a judgement for yourself.”

Galan relaxed when he saw that Nisha stopped going outside and faced him with a slight doubt showing on her face. He had teased her with his words at first and slightly regretted it when the trust she had in the old man suffered as a result. Now he had to mend this defect to fulfil his duty as the assistant to the Duke.

“When most people speak of the [Smiling Devil], there are indeed many rumors and falsities mixed in with the genuine information.

“Scholars from the [Royal Academy] sought to eradicate the blemishes from the truth and perused records kept by the school and the [Adventurer’s Guild] to this end.

“They only found out that incidents like the five thousand perished soldiers this time have a long history dating as far back as the early period when the Leandar Kingdom was established, and pure rumors and scary stories even precede that time period.

“As a conclusion, the [Smiling Devil] has been ruled as either a beast that has a small population and passes down its hunting method each generation, or an ancient being that has persisted in resisting death for all this time. Remember, this means it has lived for more than several thousand turns and only occasionally showed itself as a hunter.

“To that effect, several scholars turned insane from their research and concocted different theories about an immortal species of predators hiding in the Wilderness and rearing humans for their own enjoyment and had to leave the academy as a result, but the general consensus on the situation is that the [Smiling Devil] is either bound by several restrictions that weaken depending on time or other factors or that the reason for the dead bodies is a danger zone that occurs randomly on the continent, since there are also records of the same incident taking place in other kingdoms beside Leandar.”

During Galan’s detailed report, Nisha memorized all the small pieces of information and formed her own mental picture of the mysterious being that killed all those people over the span of the entire continent.

Compared to the scholars that turned insane out of fear, she was not all that scared. If the beast or creature behind these incidents did not have a strong drive to massacre by actively going into human settlements or if it refrained from showing itself, there was a good chance that the theory of restrictions binding its actions were true in some form.

All in all, the dragon found no reason to be afraid of a phantom, especially not when it appeared rarely enough to be ruled out as a threat by the kingdom and guild enough so that they allowed the [Smiling Devil] to continue to exist as a mere bedtime story for naughty children.

“Now, it is quite rare to have an entire contingent of armed soldiers wiped out, but there are precedents. Even if there is not an eight out ten chance for the [Smiling Devil] to be the responsible party, it should at least reach five out of ten.”

Galan led his young mistress to one of the drawing rooms; standing around all the time in the front hall was not suitable for a discussion, especially not when it involved secret talks about the big powers in the capital.

Everything so far fell under the category of speculating, especially since there was no clear information on the [Smiling Devil] that could be verified or claimed as credible.

He had more to say, but Nisha asked him a question first that derailed the topic a tiny amount.

“I see. I still don’t understand why there is such an uproar, however. It is indeed regrettable to lose five thousand soldiers in one go, yet this amount is not befitting of the urgency that follows with the return of their bodies and the rumors going around. I think the legion sent by the Terus empire already has close to one hundred thousand soldiers—and that is only a single division of their entire forces; —five thousand really is too little for this entire turmoil. What else is there going on?”

Just by going with the sparse information revealed by the old human combined with her own understanding of the tension between the local forces at court and their combined effort to deal with the outsiders like the Terus Empire’s legion, the dragon adjusted her picture of Thurgau.

She also recalled the [Navis Terram] where she practiced her new sword styles earlier in the day. Though the wooden structure did not look as imposing and grand when it stood next to the city walls, she had overheard the Lance Corporal and Knife Leader dealing with matters of provision and resources before. That was how she knew that this deployment of their legion was not the entirety of their forces and they had about one hundred thousand common soldiers dispatched for the mission.

Even though the Empire had a higher standing since they were not among the ranks of kingdoms, it should not be to the point that they can field twenty times the armed forces compared to Leandar.

“You are correct as usual, young mistress.

“The truth is, as a whole Leandar is indeed able to field similar numbers; and a loss of five thousand soldiers generally is not that bad if it is in the course of action or to defend against an invasion of the Wilderness.

“The core of the matter this time is that the several factions at the royal court,” he could have just said the other Dukes …, “coordinated their troops to put up a show of force.

“As an example, the city guard in addition to the royal forces alone should be able to field one million soldiers. With their blood and sweat, Thurgau is nearly impossible to take down without heavy casualties.

“Now, take this number and consider how many soldiers are at each aura rank. The majority that make a living as a professional fighter will be in the late first-ranks or early second-ranks.

“Late second rank already means a fairly good pay in the army.

“As for those who break through to the third rank, those count as superior troops and maybe a third can make it to the late third-rank, with no barrier blocking their progress.

“Out of these three hundred thousand, maybe one out of ten can break the great barrier between the third and fourth rank, you can’t cultivate blindly and advance so far without sufficient talent and hard work.

“Hence, knights are only appointed when they achieve the fourth aura rank.”

Galan slipped in his words and began to lecture the elf instead of explaining the rumors to her, but Nisha did not mind the distraction.

As a result of living in the Wilderness for more than ten turns of her life and only recently coming to the royal capital, her common sense was sorely lacking but this knowledge she heard right now could remedy this lack.

“Even then, early fourth-ranks do not count much in the army either. They are at a point where they make up the elite troops of the kingdom, yet it does not reach the point where their cultivation can make them ignore numbers.

“Therefore, only peak fourth-rank aura cultivators can enter the officer and expert ranks.

“To keep using the numbers from before, less than half of the thirty thousand elites can reach the peak of the fourth rank.

“From then, the barrier separating them again is not as harsh as the great divide they needed to surmount previously, so the ten thousand peak elites might give birth to two thousand fifth-ranked superior officers. Those men and women have the true say in the army and the half of them that reaches the peak of their fifth rank can already speak in front of the royal court without worry.

“The sixth aura rank is another small barrier, so only three or four hundred can break through and become powerhouses in the army. Out of a million soldiers, only about one hundred can achieve the peak of the sixth rank and these experts decide the fate of the entire army.

“And for the seventh rank … it’s even harsher than the great divide between the third and fourth aura rank. One million soldiers might not give birth to even one.

“The five thousand soldiers lost this time? Not a single one was below the fourth rank and the show of force turned into a burial ceremony for the brightest and greatest talents of their armies.”