Hearing Darwin's words, Descartes froze in place.
"But why?"
"With a four-sided siege, couldn't we guarantee that every single demon of Tartaros is annihilated right here?"
Descartes felt quite dejected that the tactic he had carefully devised was not adopted.
"It takes too much time!"
"And it would cause the army to waste unnecessary energy!"
Darwin gave two reasons that Descartes could not refute. Immediately after, he reached out and patted his grandson on the shoulder: "Don't overthink it. We'll just fight our way through like this!"
"I... alright then..."
When it came to experience dealing with dark guilds, Descartes knew he was far inferior to Darwin. He stopped dwelling on it and adjusted his state, preparing for battle.
Soon, at Darwin's command, the army finally blew the horn of war!
As the two forces clashed, the first obstacle the human army encountered was the "siege." The "city" here was none other than the Tartaros stronghold—Alegria!
Alegria was not a mountain in the traditional sense; its true form was a square island capable of flight. When in the air, it could generate inward gravity on all six sides—top, bottom, left, right, front, and back. If someone were to stand on its bottom or sides at that time, they would be "walking upside down" or "walking vertically" due to this gravitational pull.
But currently, Alegria was not airborne. Since it was sitting on the ground, the bottom was blocked, and the inward gravity on the four sides had not manifested, making it impossible for people to walk on them. Thus, this square island became a solid fortress with its own built-in walls.
Even more terrifying was the scale. Alegria was an island where the length and width of each side exceeded one thousand meters. In other words, when it turned into a fortress, it possessed city walls over a thousand meters high!!
What kind of concept was that? The walls of Crocus, the capital of the Kingdom of Fiore, were only a few dozen meters high. The height of the wall before them was hundreds of times that of an ordinary wall in this world! One could guess even with their toes that even the most well-trained magic soldiers could never conduct a siege in a normal fashion!
Consequently, when the Magic Council's army finally reached the foot of Alegria, they were stunned on the spot, staring up at the sky and shrinking back in hesitation.
"Lord guild master, what should we do now?" a unit leader from the Council asked Darwin for instructions.
Darwin didn't answer but instead asked: "What do you think?"
"Huh? You're asking for my opinion??" The unit leader was stunned, staring with wide eyes and a face full of confusion as if he had heard something unbelievable.
It took quite a while for him to snap out of it and organize his thoughts. "Normally, our army would have to treat this like a 'siege battle,' putting soldiers specialized in Earth and Rock Magic at the very front to use their magic to build stone ladders so the following troops can scale the wall! But doing that would not only severely consume time and energy, but the army would also come under enemy attack during the climb, so..."
"So what?"
The unit leader answered loudly: "So I do not recommend that method! As for how to actually take the city... your subordinate truly cannot think of a way!"
Darwin nodded and pointed at the wall in front of them: "Look closely!"
Look closely? Look at what??
The unit leader followed Darwin's finger, squinting his eyes. Only then did he notice that inside the walls, countless demons were poking their heads out, preparing to launch an attack! Like soldiers guarding a city, they leaned out from openings in the wall. From such a height, their attacks would naturally be unstoppable.
The demons only needed to wait for the magic soldiers to climb the ladders and then launch continuous downward attacks to easily stall their advance. Before the Council's army could even set foot on the "city," they would be battered and exhausted by the pincer attack from the front and above!
"Sir, what do we do now?"
"Don't panic!" Darwin's face showed no trace of worry; he had clearly expected this.
"Every side of Alegria can serve as 'ground.' Within these grounds, there are caves; the demons usually enter and exit their lair through these holes. Now, though the bottom is sealed, the caves on the four sides are still there. It's better if the demons pop out from the side windows—it saves us the effort of scaling the wall! Pass down the order: have the soldiers using Earth and Rock Magic create shields to block attacks from the top of the wall, and simultaneously concentrate our forces to attack the demon soldiers emerging from the wall! We'll fight our way through those windows and strike straight at the heart of the enemy!!"
Ohhh!!! So there was a way like that!!
Although the demons were stronger individually, they were few in number and low in intelligence. Plus, with too many caves serving as entrances, they were destined to be unable to resist the Magic Council's onslaught for long. Once they were unable to continue their defense, the army could drive straight in through the windows!
Thinking of this, the unit leader's spirits soared with excitement.
"Yes, sir!!"
Just then, two voices rang out—
"No need for all that trouble, right?" "If the path is blocked, isn't it better to just open it with magic?!"
Gildarts and Serena jumped forward simultaneously, taking their stances. In the next instant, a surging magic power, as vast as the mountains and seas, erupted from their bodies!!
"Crash!!"
"Cavern Dragon's Earth Collapse!!!"
Under the shocked gazes of the magic soldiers, two spells blasted toward the fortress. The Crash Magic and Cavern Dragon Slayer Magic struck together; instantly, white light flared, the earth shook, and dust billowed! The demon soldiers poking out from the fortress became restless, shouting and screaming.
After a long while, the air settled, and everyone fixed their eyes forward.
The wall on the left had been sliced into countless square rocks that littered the ground, leaving a massive hole nearly three hundred meters wide. While the wall on the right wasn't as neatly cut as the left, the crater blown into it was even larger and wider!
"So... so powerful..."
"What kind of terrifying destructive power is that?!"
"I know them! They're the 'Seven Kin of the Holy Knights' who often appear in the magic newspapers! They're the 'super-popular team' of the magic world right now!"
"The Seven Kin?! I thought that was just hype from the Royal Family and the Academy?"
"To be honest, until today, I also thought they were just a bunch of guys who relied on their looks and had no real skill... uh, except for that guy named Bluenote."
"I had no idea they really possessed such frightening power..."
These magic soldiers were the most elite units of the Council, usually considering themselves "golden children" in the eyes of other wizards. But at this moment, facing true monsters, their only reaction was to be so shocked that they couldn't even close their mouths.