Chapter 655: Masters of the Past.
The Queen of The Amazons, Meya Neyku.
It was a peaceful day today; the weather was clear, and her people were laughing and happy.
Sitting on her golden throne, the woman, 190cm tall, wearing a white dress with gold accents, looked at this sight with her emerald green eyes with pride.
Her long black hair, styled in braids, fluttered in the wind showing off. Women looked at the sight of the Queen with passionate eyes and in awe.
So beautiful was the Queen of The Amazons.
Meya nodded in satisfaction. Her people were happy; her mother would be proud to know that she was performing her role as Queen so well.
Until suddenly, bangs began to be heard throughout the city.
In the face of such a rumble, it was as if a small-scale earthquake was happening. Everything began to shake and fall. Dishes broke, as well as glasses.
"What is this-." Before Meya could ask something, she heard:
"My Queen..."
She turned her face and saw the disheveled and exhausted appearance of her servant:
"Demons… Demons are invading!"
"What-"
BOOOOOOOOOOM.
An explosion was heard in the distance, causing everyone to focus on the noise.
And soon, they saw it, a 10-meter-tall Demon with red skin, four arms, and a body tainted by the putrid Miasma of the deepest Hell.
Faced with such a sight, the Queen of The Amazons, Meya, responded simply.
"Amazons! Prepare for battle!"
Following that statement, what happened was a spectacle of carnage. Her people died; some sacrificed themselves against the High-Level Demons, some died fighting, and some even died pointlessly.
And even though many proud Amazons fought to defend their home, their sacrifice was futile.
The reason?
The Demons kept coming, and that 10-meter-tall Demon with four arms was still standing there looking at all the Amazons' 'futile' efforts in obvious disdain.
It was apparent that the Demons' goal was not the annihilation of the Amazons because if it were, they would have already done that. Only she, the Queen of The Amazons, could fight against the High-Level Demon, and that was only because she was Blessed by all the Goddesses that made this hidden place.
Blessings that made her much stronger than an ordinary Mortal.
Despite the Blessings of Aphrodite no longer residing in her body, thus stripping her of her flawless beauty and the ability to sense emotions in others derived from the Blessing of Love,
She still had the Blessings of the other Goddesses, and with that Power, along with the Artifacts made by Hephaestus, it would be enough to kill the Demon she was facing.
Convinced that this was what was happening and fearing that more of her people would die in this war of attrition, she set out on her own using all the Artifacts Hephaestus had created that only the Queen's Bloodline could use, and the result...?
... She was wrong... Very wrong.
"So foolish, Queen of The Amazons. Just as our lord foresaw, the current generation is not used to war; you have grown soft."
"Have you not, Daughter of a rape?" The Demon displayed a shit-eating grin as he looked at Meya, who was lying on the ground, bleeding, and defeated.
Everything was a trap, a trap for her.
"Do not call me like that! I'm the Queen Meya Neyku-."
"The woman who was born from rape. A weak human was captured by the Queen when it came time to conceive an offspring, and he was used until a girl was born, and was then discarded along with all the male children of the woman who raped him once he had served his purpose."
"...." Meya gritted her teeth in pain and glared at the Demon.
"Oya? It seems like you already knew you were the daughter of some trash~." The Demon was really enjoying this.
"I think that knowledge comes with the family; tell me, when will the time come?"
"...."
"When will it be time for you, Meya, a woman from a family of rapists, to do the same as your mother did in the past?"
"Shut up!"
"Ironic. Women, who were once saved from being victims of men, ended up becoming the aggressors and doing the same."
"The proud Queen of the Amazons~ is nothing more than the fruit of a rather 'dignified' relationship indeed."
"The irony of this situation is delicious, hahahaha~."
"Shut up!!" Meya roared in rage, and with great willpower, she grabbed her sword and leapt toward the Demon.
But just as expected, she was brutally defeated.
"Don't get me wrong."
"Cough." She spat blood onto the ground as she glared at the Demon with her emerald eyes.
"I don't particularly care what your people do or that you are hypocrites. For me, teasing you is just secondary, part of the entertainment."
A Lesser Demon approached Meya and put his hand on her armor.
"Fool, touching my armor will make you vanish-." Meya opened her eyes wide when she saw the Demon tearing her armor and leaving her in only her underwear.
"Impossible..."
"So foolish, Meya... The Artifacts you are so proud of are just toys for Hephaestus. He purposely made something for Mortals to use, and unlike a Divine Artifact, this armor lacks durability."
"Exposed to a Miasma as dense as mine, you unknowingly weakened the properties of your proud Artifacts."
The Lesser Demon approached the four-armed Demon, giving him Meya's armor, her sword, and her shield.
"... But there is a secret in this Artifact that only the First Queen of The Amazons knew, a secret that she wanted not to be passed on to the next generation." Then, taking the small object in his massive hands, the Demon's four red eyes flashed, and a beam of red energy shot out of them toward the armor.
'Tsk, he made a Bloodline rune. Clever, but easy to change, I just have to add my Soul Essence, and the rune will recognize me, not this useless woman.'
"This armor, despite being weak, is unique. Hephaestus is the God of Forges. His pride would not allow him to do something half-assed or bad. And that's what he did in this armor."
"He created something unique."
"An armor capable of absorbing and transforming Energy according to the user's will."
A red glow so blinding that it seemed to blind everyone around temporarily was seen, and seconds later, everyone saw the same armor wholly repaired and completely black with red Runes and Miasma oozing from the edges.
"..." Meya opened her eyes wide.
"An armor specially made for The First Queen, a woman the Goddess directly blessed. By receiving so many Blessings, she became something similar to a Demigoddess."
"A Mortal Artifact with the characteristics of a Divine Artifact, something only the Forge God could make." The armor started to grow in size; the Miasma began to grow to a level that if Maya didn't have the Blessings of The Sacred Fire of Hestia, she would have already died.
"Perfect~." The Demon smiled in satisfaction when he saw the armor and the giant sword floating in the air.
"... Y-You... From the beginning, you wanted it."
"Yeah, I wanted your armor, sword, and shield. Or rather, I wanted Callisto's armor set, a Masterpiece created by a God for a Mortal, an armor capable of changing with the Energy used. It will be useful to me."
"... Even the name... How much do you know about our Race?"
"I know enough. I have no interest in your little Race of rapists. Even the term 'Human' is better than you guys; I'm glad you don't see yourself as Human because that's not what you are."
"Don't get me wrong, what you do is splendid! We have an entirely separate Hell for men and women who commit these acts. Normally, these Demons are insignificant and weak, but you and your entire Bloodline would be good commanders of that specific Hell, something My King would be very pleased with." Disdain was practically a familiar voice for the Demon now. Obviously, he was disgusted with the woman and all her people.
"My Lord, My Lord."
"Hmm?" The Greater Demon looked at his servant.
"Can I taste it?"
"...." The Greater Demon looked at Meya, who shuddered at his gaze and unconsciously covered her body; even though her whole body was full of wounds, her beauty was still there.
"A horde of hungry Demons will rape the daughter born of a rapist… How ironic."
"Why not? Go ahead; my work here is done."
The Greater Demon's response filled Meya's heart with despair.
"Hehehehe~." The Lesser Demons looked at her with obvious lust.
"N-No, please don't do this to me!"
"..." The Greater Demon raised his hand enough for the Lesser Demons to stop.
The Greater Demon looked at the woman with disbelieving eyes.
"Whoaa, shouldn't you be a Proud Queen? Why are you crying?"
"I've only been the Queen for a short time! And I don't deserve to be deflowered like this!"
"… I am a Demon. We are creatures of sin. Yet even I am not that hypocritical." He rolled his eyes in disdain and exasperation.
"Please don't do this to me! Just kill me!"
"This is an ironic response. Isn't this the same thing your people have been doing culturally for hundreds of years? Why do you fear the same act? Is this act not sacred to you?"
'... this is not something sacred; this is just something to propagate our kind,' she thought in shame but didn't speak out loud because she knew she would suffer retaliation from the Demon.
As a Young Queen, she attempted to change the 'hunting' days of the Amazons, the days when women would go out into the Mortal World in search of men, most often fishermen, to use to propagate their Race.
For her, this was a very barbaric attitude, but the culture was so ingrained that she could do nothing, not to mention that the older Amazons were very much in favor of this act itself.
Also, despite not liking this act and seeing it as barbaric, she was still indifferent to it. She didn't care about Beings other than her people, a mentality that her mother, the previous Queen, instilled in her.
The current Queen's loyalty to her people was undying, just as the people's loyalty to the Queen was.
"…Oh, I understand. You are the ones, right? The Beings who like to do all kinds of evil to other Beings but never thought that something like this could happen to you... Seriously, all your people would make good Demons of Hypocrisy."
"It is not true? Scathach Scarlett?" The moment he spoke, three women appeared with a flash of Lightning.
"Ironic, a Demon talking about doing evil to others."
"Hey, we live in a brutal society. We know that what we do to other Beings, one day, can be done to us too. Most demons are hypocritical, selfish, lustful, and thirsty for power, but... Aren't all Races like that?"
"Look at the Humans and Gods, particularly the Olympians and the Norse. They are the perfect example." He pointed at Meya on the ground, "Look at her Race; she is a perfect example."
"A Demon with a conscience, that's new." A white-haired woman spoke.
"Agnes Snow, most High-Level Demons like me have conscience and principles, you know?" His smile grew
"As does Lilith's former General, who is in that little Girl Band. Or wait, should I say Progenitor's Harem?"
The three women narrowed their eyes for only one reason. He didn't mention Lilith's 'Race', or even stating something that sounded like Vlad's servant or even Vlad's Wife.
He mentioned a 'group', and even quoted Progenitor's Harem as if he knew something else, something that should have been secret.
"Fufufu~, you guys should cover your tracks more; Scathach Scarlett herself, a woman not interested in many things, visiting the Leader of the Youkai, new Faction."
"Annasthashia Fulger herself, the Fastest Living Mortal currently roaming England, a place we know has a The Land of The Faeries there."
"Not to mention the Fulgers are said to be descended from a Great Spirit of Lightning."
"…Interesting, you seem to know a lot about everyone and everything," Natashia spoke.
"I like to read. Books tell the history of the world. They are a source of wisdom; even if I'm not as old as you are, I like to brag that I know many things."
"..." Scathach opened her eyes wide when she heard the Demon's sentence, and soon her gaze changed; she wasn't looking at someone 'unknown' anymore.
'Impossible... It's impossible for you to be him; he wouldn't fall to become a Demon.'
"A Demon who likes to read... Okay, that's the biggest oddity I've ever seen in my life." Agnes rolled her eyes.
"Hey, don't discriminate against Demons so much. Some Demons just want to sleep; look at the Sin of Sloth; she is a perfect example."
"It's impossible to do that when most of you are like that." Agnes pointed to the Lesser Demon, who was looking at them lustfully.
"Fair enough. Well, I'm not an extremist Race advocate, so fuck it." He snorted.
"..." The grip on Scathach's Spear grew even stronger when she heard the frivolous conversation; now, that particular thought couldn't get out of her head anymore.
"That earlier sentence about books... That irritating frivolity... Don't tell me. Is that you, Merlin?"
"…Aya…?" The Demon smiled widely, a satisfied smile, and he looked at Scathach as if he had seen an old friend:
"I thought you wouldn't recognize me, Scathach Scarlett... After all, I've changed quite a bit..."
.....
