Dungeon of Pride, Laplace



"How can that be? After greetings isn't it proper that we have a discussion? Haa!... you have guests who came from far away wouldn't you even ask them for a glass of water" Simon shook his head and spoke in a manner that suggested he was exhausted from his travel.

Seeing him like that, Annette who was beside him couldn't help but cover her mouth and restrain her laugh. Simon was deliberately acting like a rascal to annoy them.

"Whistle~ I heard the Queen of Harpies was quite a stunner but seeing you all cover and shield her like that I guess the rumours were false. Haa… what a disappointment, truly you cannot trust the rumours".

"You!!"

Hearing the demon's mannerless and vulgar way of speaking towards their queen, the high levelled harpies flew into a rage. However, before they could point their weapons at the demon, the queen of harpies herself stepped forward.

"You must be the demon of the east" Melinda stepped out of the encirclement of her subordinates and faced the demon.

"You heard about me?" Simon arched his brows and asked in interest.

"Of course, there isn't any being in this forest who hasn't heard about you, the demon who resides in the eastern region of the forest".

"Is that so..".

"May I ask to what do I owe the pleasure for the demon of the east greeting us in person?" Melinda smiled appearing extremely coquettish and provocative.

"I came to see you, I heard a lot about the queen of harpies and wanted to see you with my own eyes"

Seeing the harpy queen go silent, Simon teased "Why? Isn't this a good time?"

"Hm? Of course not. The demon of the east came to see me in person, I'm overjoyed. Why don't we go somewhere else and discuss in person… just the two of us"

Melinda said with a flushed face, her words were laced with double meaning and the way she moved her hands around her ample breasts, she was extremely thought provoking.

Simon who was cautious of her eyes was looking at her body. As a man, there was no way he wasn't affected; however, speaking of beauties he had quite a few around him. As such, this level of temptation wasn't enough to make him lose his mind over it.

"That's a good idea but I'm not interested in a sultry woman. Why don't we have a discussion here instead of somewhere else?".

Melinda's brows twitched, clearly affected by that remark. Nevertheless, her composure didn't break as she pointed at the demon and asked— "What is it that you want to discuss with me?".

"It's simple, a little informant told me that you have the intention to join the Ogre King's alliance?".

The moment Simon mentioned that, the faces of all the harpies including the queen changed drastically.

The fact that they accepted the invitation for an alliance from the ogre king should be an extremely secretive dealing. Even in their clan, only a few harpies which included her personal guards were aware of it, so how did the demon come to know of it?

What's more, this was an alliance to siege the demon's dungeon making the proceeding interaction awkward.

Melinda bit her thumb, while pondering in her head.

'Could it be that Gil-Garna betrayed me? No that can't be true, there is no benefit for him in it when he himself suggested this alliance. Then could it be there is a mole among my subordinates?'.

Melinda turned to face her personal guards only to deny that possibility too. All her subordinates were loyal to their bones, there was no way they would betray her. Which mean that the information leaked from the Ogres side.

'Seriously, that fellow can't even control the mouth of his own subordinates allowing the information to leak to the enemy. Now that it has come to this I have no choice but to switch sides'.

Melinda was a cautious and calculating woman who saw her own benefit first. She wouldn't hesitate even for a second to abandon the boat if it ever showed signs of sinking.

"Haah, I don't know how you heard of that, but what do you want from me? If you want I can reject the alliance"

When Melinda said that, her subordinates looked like they had something to say. However, she shut their mouth with the gesture of her hand and continued—"So what will it be demon?".

Simon had a smile on his face enjoying the reaction of the harpies and their queen. He could guess their line of thinking but no matter how hard they thought, they would never be able to guess that the information did not leak from any side, instead it was something that was gathered by the Revenant Crows, a technology that wasn't from this world.

He guessed that the Queen of Harpies would think about changing sides after learning about her character from the Ancient Titan Treant; however, even he was taken by surprise from her quick decision.

'So her exhaustion is that severe huh?' there couldn't be any other explanation than this.

The Revenant crows were swarming in the territory of the harpies. Of course, Simon overheard the talks the harpies were having. The queen of the harpies was trying to avoid a confrontation with him in her severely exhausted state after activating the Evil Eyes.

Simon couldn't have come at a better time.

"Of course, the harpies not joining the alliance of the ogre king is a good thing. However, that is not why I'm here".

"Then why are you here?" Melinda had a bad premonition and it was further proven true when she saw the demon flashing a wicked smile.

"Didn't I tell you already, I came here for you".

"Presumptuous, know your place demon" The harpy subordinates were finally unable to endure it and unsheathed their weapons. Being high levelled harpies, of course they had their own armours and weapons.

"So mister Demon Noble should I assume that you are here for no good reason?" Melinda asked her voice cold, a formless pressure that could only come from someone in the Catastrophe class descended onto the place.

"Think whatever you want to think"

Simon replied unfazed. He and his party immediately got into a formation.

Hmph… Melinda snorted, now that it has come to this, a clash was unavoidable.

"My queen, please wait. Allow us to fight with them" her personal guards insisted.

Melinda looked at them and then at the demon and his subordinates before shaking her head.

"The enemy is not someone that you guys can handle alone".

"But… if you activate"…

"There is no other choice" Saying that, Melinda who had her eyes closed up until this moment, finally opened them.

Immediately, the sky turned dark and a weird chill settled onto the place. It was as if a dangerous beast who had been sleeping all this time, suddenly woke up.

The moment Melinda opened her eyes, the entire aura around her changed. The air of temptation that she naturally exuded, tripled or even quadrupled and her power level skyrocketed.

With the opening of her eyelids, her eyes finally came into view.

One could only describe her eyes with the expression weird. Even Simon did not have such strange eyes.

The reason for saying it strange was because she had four different pupils in each eye for a total of eight. It looked so mismatched and odd that one's very skin would tingle just by looking at it.

However, one would only have the luxury to have any opinion about those eyes once they survived them. All who that dared to directly gaze into Melinda's eyes faced demise without any exception. Hence only a few people knew how strange her eyes were.

"Make sure you never gaze at her eyes when you fight her" Simon heeded Aldebaran's words and shifted his gaze towards her shadow.

"Charge"

The harpies shouted. Now that their queen had opened their eyes, they needed to end this fight as soon as possible. A couple of harpies rushed towards the demon. However, a warhorse with a menacing look and flaming body blocked their path.

"Dammit, go around it" The other harpies tried to manoeuvre around the warhorse but soon found themselves getting tangled and caught in something.

"What's this I can't move" The harpies who suddenly found themselves unable to move, noticed an invisible web all around the mountaintop.

"What?!" before they could realise where the web came from, one of the subordinates of the demon came rushing at them swinging her big golden bastard sword at them.

BANG… the Harpies that were hit felt a bone crushing impact and were sent crashing into the mountaintop with just one swing.

"There are invisible web lines around them, attack from the distance".

The harpies immediately realised that the enemy had already laid traps around them and changed into long distance attack.

They were called the incarnation of wild winds for no reason, each of the harpies when they spread their wings wide and flapped them, they generated a berserk amount of razor sharp winds that destroyed the invisible web lines.

That was not all, the harpies that were sent crashing down by Bianca, rose back to their feet after using a skill called [Feather Heal].

"It's not going to be easy"

Simon already knew that. Even if their queen was severely exhausted, the harpies were still one of the king clans of the western region of the ghastly winding forest. They were adept in fighting in the sky and their developed wings and razor sharp talons were a mark of that.