After defeating Mera’s spawn, Goh left Doc in charge of the soldiers from Diablo’s fiefdom, and this makeshift regiment swept across the outermost reaches of Human Kingdom territory, attacking every village in their path. For the Demonkin Nation, the aim of this incursion was to teach the new queen of the Human Kingdom, Lilith, a lesson, but for Doc, the operation was merely a way of restocking his supply of human test subjects for his grisly experiments. However, a constantly recurring issue hampered the raiding party in their objectives.
“Who would have fathomed that we would find no people in any of these villages?” Doc sighed as he led his company of soldiers to their next destination. “This goes beyond what I failed to anticipate.”
It went without saying that Doc’s troops had zero chance of finding any villagers, because every resident in the danger zone adjacent to the Demonkin Nation border had been evacuated to safety in advance, with most now residing in the city at the foot of the Great Tower. While these villagers were technically refugees living in shelters, their new lives weren’t anywhere near as miserable as that sounded. They were well provisioned with food and clothing, had been given fully furnished housing completely free of charge, were able to take in the sights of Tower City and mingle affably with its people, and on top of all of that, they had been allowed to bring their livestock with them to be looked after by the fairy maids. Of course, the villagers had needed to leave their arable farms behind, but Light’s team had promised them that magic would be used to keep the crops in their current state, or perhaps even better.
The only problem with this arrangement was that the younger villagers had become totally enthralled with city life after tasting it for the first time in their lives, and the beauty of the fairy maids was the added bonus that tipped the scales. As such, more than a few of the younger folk had started demanding that they settle in Tower City permanently, rather than live out the rest of their lives in “some backwater village.” Light’s team had no choice but to let the village heads deal with the issue.
Of course, Doc’s army had no way of knowing exactly why they were only coming across ghost towns, and this led to most of the demon raiders growing impatient as they wondered how much time they were going to waste on this futile endeavor. And if it wasn’t enough that the lack of victims to assault meant the commandos were left unable to satisfy their more wanton appetites, there was also no money, valuables, or even edible food to pillage from the abandoned villages. In their view, there was basically no point in moving aimlessly around the border region if the rewards weren’t there. Doc wasn’t immune to these mounting frustrations either, since he had yet to acquire more human lab animals.
Perhaps we should give up on attacking villages and end this excursion, thought Doc. I have my other assignment involving Diablo’s soldiers to complete, after all.
This extra assignment was to brainwash the soldiers into assassinating Diablo on their return to their fiefdom, leaving Voros—the one who’d ordered the hit—free to seize the domain for himself.
It appears I have failed to obtain any fresh human specimens for my experiments, but perhaps I can take some of these demons to be my test subjects when I’ve brainwashed them all, thought Doc. I am sure Voros will gladly let me have a few as compensation for my good-faith labors.
While Doc was busily mentally working out his endgame, the exhausted demon troops trudged along behind the Master, none of them aware of the hellish fate that awaited them once they were done with this mission. And Doc was very close to wrapping up the campaign prematurely when scouts spotted three figures on the distant horizon.
Have we finally found some fresh humans? Doc wondered excitedly. He peered at the would-be targets, and his joy at finding out they were human was so complete, he totally failed to notice anything amiss about their sudden appearance in the middle of nowhere. One of the figures appeared to be a boy of about twelve or thirteen who was wearing a dark, hooded cloak and carrying a simple staff.
The second figure seemed to be a maid who was standing quite close to the boy, but not close enough to step on his shadow. Her attractive, womanly figure blew anything the Demonkin Nation had to offer out of the water. Not only was her bust large and shapely, her slender yet well-proportioned legs seemed to stretch down endlessly from her billowing mid-thigh skirt. In fact, this maid was so physically desirable, any male employer would have had trouble keeping his hands off her.
The final figure in the trio appeared to be a petite girl who was wearing a hooded cloak with cat ears attached to the top of it, as well as an oversized beltlike collar around her neck. This girl was shorter and nowhere near as well-endowed as the maid, but her comeliness rivaled hers to the point where, once her body matured and she became a full-grown woman, she would be a breathtaking stunner, guaranteed. Although it must be said that quite a few would probably prefer the cat-hooded girl as she was now over the maid.
None of the trio made any attempt to move from where they were, despite the large band of dangerous-looking bandits that had just wandered into view. Doc and his troops ignored this suspicious behavior, however, and welcoming this long-awaited opportunity for action, they charged excitedly at their new targets.