What is a ruler?
There were probably as many answers to this question as there were people. The simple would say it was a king. The greedy would say it was money. The wise would say it was the natural law of the world. A clergyman would say it was their god, while a philosopher would say to seek the answer within. A practical man would say his wife, while a man who believed in nothing would say no such thing existed.
But if all of those people were asked if they would then bend the knee before that which they had named, their answers might be more uncertain.
By contrast, all knew that there were some powers before whom no sane man would not kneel.
The demon lords. The apex entities of monsterkind, of whom only four were known to exist. Transcendent beings who would warp the laws of nature with a single gesture. Those who struck fear into the hearts of kings, no matter how great their kingdoms, robbing them of sleep well into the night.
There were too many tales of the demon lords to count. Villages, towns, even entire countries were left destroyed in their wake. Entire races wiped out. Clashes against the gods on equal footing. Would a human ever be able to oppose such a being?
No, for it was impossible. Yet, there were those who insisted on trying. That, after all, was why nations existed in this world, as well as races of all colors and creeds—and why there was not one demon lord, but four.
Recalling what had happened to the last person he’d seen ask a demon lord why that was the case, K’rik the lizardman shivered atop the back of his kelpie mount. After all, there was no telling if he would meet the same fate one day.
K’rik was currently bound for the Dungeon of the Sea God’s Daughters off the coast of the human city of Lucaris, at the command of his lord. Recently, he and his compatriots had been patrolling the area, attacking human adventurers and searching their belongings, but unfortunately, they had not yet managed to find their objective.
They were all starting to doubt they would ever find what their lord sought at all, but voicing any such suspicions would only get them reduced to cinders. K’rik and his compatriots truly had it rough.
K’rik and his unit were of a branch of the lizardman race that resembled sea serpents, and they were well adapted to the ocean. Given that he had been appointed captain of his unit, each of whom had been given their own kelpie mount, it was clear that their lord had...perhaps not high, but reasonable expectations of them.
However, for as much as strength determined authority in the world of monsters, being told to continue an indefinite, possibly pointless search would wear on anyone. Still, with little choice otherwise, K’rik’s unit had been working for a month now, to no avail.
It wouldn’t be long before their superior—or perhaps their lord herself—would show up and kill a number of them in a tantrum. The thought of it had put a significant damper on K’rik’s mood over the past several days.
“Any sign?” K’rik asked his subordinates. They were on the lookout for any ships approaching the Dungeon of the Sea God’s Daughters from Lucaris.
All three of the other lizardmen shook their heads glumly. As K’rik looked up to the sky, he knew that his own expression was a mirror of theirs—just as he knew that he couldn’t bring himself to give the order to return for the day empty-handed.
“I see,” he said regretfully. “I suppose there’s not much to be done, given the lack of ships lately.”
One of his subordinates timidly raised a hand. “Um...”
While lizardmen were capable of using human language, they were currently communicating using their race’s native tongue, meaning certain sounds were spoken at a register only they could perceive. It allowed them to hear each other clearly across significant stretches of open ocean. His people’s branch of the lizardman family, in particular, were noted for their proficiency with such communication, which was why they had been given this duty.
K’rik turned to his subordinate and nodded, granting them permission to speak.
“While we saw no sign of the large ship that regularly carries adventurers from the city, I did spot one medium-sized vessel. But it fled quickly before I could approach it, so I was unable to count its passengers. It could have simply been a scout ship.”
A scout ship. In other words, the humans might have come to confirm the recent attacks K’rik’s unit had made on ships in the area. Not so surprising, given that they’d been at it for a month already. If it had been humans stirring up trouble near K’rik’s home, his people would have taken similar measures.
However, there was also the possibility that it had been a transport vessel to convey adventurers to the dungeon. If that was the case, then the boat was of great interest to their mission: stealing a particular item from delving adventurers. Strictly speaking, they had a second objective beyond that, but that was predicated on seizing possession of this item.
“A mid-sized vessel...” K’rik mused. “It wouldn’t be able to carry many adventurers, then. The regular ship would be more efficient for our purposes—it carries over twenty.”
“That’s true, sir, but we haven’t seen spine nor scale of it recently. Perhaps we should target this mid-sized vessel, I think. It should return in the evening, and it’s not as if our goal is to kill them...”
Ordinarily, when the forces of a demon lord encountered humans, it would immediately result in a fight to the death. However, on this occasion, K’rik’s unit had a different objective—one that would not be furthered by pointless slaughter. In fact, it would be actively detrimental to their goal, as leaving as many adventurers as possible alive to delve the dungeon again would increase their chances of finding what they needed.
In any case, K’rik and his compatriots were a new addition to the demon lord’s army. Until only a few years prior, they had been living quiet lives like any other dragonfolk. Then, the nearby human populations had begun to attack them, with the justification that they were simply protecting themselves against dangerous nonhumans. Thus, K’rik’s clan had gone to the nearest demon lord for protection, and they had ended up in her service as a result.
For K’rik, as the clan’s chieftain, that meant occasionally venturing out into the world to fulfill his new liege lord’s orders. He was still plagued with guilt over drawing his people into such a circumstance, but there really had been no other choice at the time.
And while his new mistress could seem quite severe, she was quite mild-mannered compared to the other demon lords and tended to treat her subordinates fairly. She also harbored no particularly strong antipathy toward humans, which was why she had allowed the relatively nonlethal methods K’rik’s unit were using.
Of course, none of that mattered when she became angry, and predicting her temper was impossible. Deep down, K’rik was terrified of her—not out of a sense of self-preservation, but out of the fear that she might wipe out his people in a tantrum. Demon lords, after all, were easily capable of such things.
K’rik breathed another sigh before replying to his subordinate. “All right. We’ll try waiting until evening. If they don’t have what we need, we’ll set them free when we’re done.”
Just as his subordinates were nodding their acknowledgment, an unfamiliar voice spoke up from behind him.
“I’m afraid I can’t have that.”