Chapter 168: The Cambions
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
What are cambions? Perhaps the Templar Cathedral have the most say in this matter.
“Those hybrid scums are born for destruction and conspiracies, they should all be dragged to the square and burned at the stake!”
Alright, I asked the wrong person, this generous and passionate pastor was obviously from the old-school “retro group”. Until modern centuries, for some reason the Templar Cathedral had undergone an internal reform, afterwards, whenever they were seen, the cambions would just be condemned to life imprisonment, instead of getting burned to death.
The steps of improvements taken by the Templar Cathedral were nothing better, but I have to say that this move was correct in a sense.
Just as the name implied, cambions were the descendants of devils and demons. Carrying miraculous power in their blood, along with ability to manipulate peculiar supernatural power, they were natural warlocks. Allegedly, half of the existing demon warlocks were cambions of mixed parentage in the under plane.
If the recessive blood of the other race was under control, they could be natural warlocks. However, if it went out of control and manifested traits of the devil, perhaps demi-devils or demi-demons best described these beings which were not supposed to live in the main plane.
Unlike the bloodline of upper plane (angels) which people embraced and yearned for, the cambions had always been a big trouble, not only did the sucking of blood and the inclination for chaos faction was in their blood, but the bigger trouble was, the ancestors of their bloodline had committed all sort of outrages in the under plane.
The angels resorted to orders and worshipped the Gods, their wills were not that strong to interfere with the lives of their descendants, and even then they were highly restrained. But in the eyes of the devils, their hybrid descendants were living treasures split off from their blood, the blood and strength derived from them were the best mark and linkage.
The cambions might be born kind, or a brave fighter, but with their devil ancestors whispering incessantly beside their ears, they would imperceptibly lean towards the chaos faction.
In the eyes of the devils, the descendants who carried their blood were but good seedlings on the battlefield. They would call upon the innate devil of the descendants through the blood, the moment they crowed over their growing strength, was the time they lose control of their demonic impulse, and grow into demi-devils, in the end, they had no choice but to return to the under plane, serving as the new backbone of the devils.
In the abyss of endless war, the “young men” whom they influenced, were undoubtedly the best pawns and war elites.
The world had given cambions the moniker of “mongrels fated to be corrupted”.
Amongst all the planes, the reputation of these half-castes had never been good as they had been mere pawns since hundred years ago. A cambion might be kind at first, and carried out good deeds for half of his previous life, he was praised by all the people. However, his soul might be manipulated when the crunch came.
Indeed, until here, the ins and outs of the matter were pretty clear now, meanwhile, Elisa brought back news from the abyss — the Mist descendant in the North was the lineal descendant of a devil mogul.
The Mist Kingdom was divided into several pieces, with East Mist and Sleuweir being the biggest, that cambion should reside in one of them. Previously, it was unknown as to which one was it. Therefore, I had no choice but to exercise vigilance further on Reyne and suspended her from her duties.
And now, it was obviously the royal member of Sleuweir, I had breathed a sigh of relief deep in my heart, despite that the situation was still unfavourable. And then, I kept my face straight again.
“Karwenz, what do you want!”
My roar echoed to the skies, even if Fismer Caso had twelve wings, but still, he would never escape from me, right now, he was impaled by a sacred sword on the wall, clutching his chest in disbelief.
“No, no, I can’t go back yet, I don’t want to go back! I’ve yet to relish the beauty of this world, too many beautiful women and delicious food in the main plane, I don’t want to go back yet! I’m not satisfied! I still want to be King, I don’t want to die!”
The scales all over his body was emitting an uncanny white aura, his red pupils were gaining slight sign of pale yellow, This, was the mark of the prime devil, Fismer had unknowingly transformed from cambions to half-devil.
The prime devil could prevail upon their descendants through the bloodline and the linkage of souls.
Perhaps in those simulated nightmares brought by the devil, Fismerr had fallen to the under plane for countless times, he had even harboured an illusion that he was part of the devils.
Looking at the pale yellow pupils which were utterly demonized, I knew he could be saved no more, the corrupted soul such as him had nowhere to go than the styx.
“Devil! The king…no, the puppet king was a devil!”
The royal guards had put down their weapons under the exclamation of the people, nobody was willing to fight for Fismer anymore, after all, the name of the devil had always been the common enemy of everyone.
“Answer me, Karwenz, what do you want!”
Fismer was dead, but I was still clutching his neck to interrogate, but the target I interrogated, was the person hiding behind him.
“Haha.”
Along with the familiar laughter, dark flames were being radiated from Fismer’s body. Sensing the rage within me, the will of devil lord had finally descended.
Along with that eerie laughter, suddenly, the sky was overcast by dark clouds, which had blotted out the sunlight, the rising sun could be seen no more, it seemed that even the Gods were getting sick of this sight.
This was not any magic, but just the influence of the descending will of devil prince towards the world. To witness such a wrath, I was a little surprised, Karwenz was much stronger than expected.
“Just the descending will is enough to change the weather? I’m afraid this is already a God-level existence”.
In my perspective, Karwenz’s prowess had gone beyond imagination, and would not be inferior to any God-level people in Chaos faction.
“Roland, I never thought we would meet this soon. How dare you ask me what I want?”
Fismer’s body started to burn, albeit demonized, his body still couldn’t bear the tremendous power of the devil prince.
Nevertheless, Fismer’s distorted face had given a familiar expression. That was a mischievous prank with innocence.
“Since you are so sincere in asking, I shall tell you benevolently…oh wait. Did you really think I’m actually benevolent? Really wanna know? You guess.”
“Guess your sister!” [1]
“Haha, isn’t your sister mine too? Unfortunately, I would prefer an adorable sister to a brother…and if I answer you so easily, how disgraceful is that! And I’m a devil prince, if that is known by the rest, how could I be the leader! Let’s be like always, leave the good play behind, the puzzle is meant to be solved in the very end…”
Burning vigorously in the demonic flame, the remaining body of Fismer turned to ashes, leaving a message behind.
“Roland, we will meet again very soon. Whoops, should I start calling you brother? Seems that I still can’t do that in your face. Ah, the time has come…I’ll forget about this time, the sacred war had just begun. We have a lot of chances to play together, slowly.”
Following the dissipating ashes, Fismer’s ghost could be seen. As the devil mogul who had spoken his heart lost his medium of communication, everything quieted down again, and the dark clouds started to disperse, the sunlight shined in again, the peace was restored.
“Damn it!”
Breaking the ground with my heavy fist, however, my unreasoning anger was meant to not receiving an answer.
——————————
When the war in the north had just begun, the civil war of Xiluo had finally reached its end.
The winner? There was no winner, although the crown faction who had always been in the middle, suddenly chose to side with Omar, the situation of this war remained miserable.
Miserable, was the best word to describe it, because in this situation, if both sides continued fighting with all their power, in the end, it would be a mutual destruction, and there’s certainly no winner.
No matter what was the ending, both side would suffer severe casualties, the war between undeads always went to the extent of obliterating the souls of each other. After losing myriads of its cadres, Xiluo Empire was bound to be reduced from a super kingdom to just another strong country.
Nevertheless, with the sudden arrival of a small troop of knights in the battlefield to ambush the headquarters of the Council of Dark Night, the scales were leaning towards victory.
That wasn’t because of how incredible they were, but now, the rising flag of Mist now represented this man, and those red hounds were fighting as well, just for their owner — Emperor Yongye.
At first, fellow undead warlords took them as the fake ones, as the history had indicated that the Red Hound Army had miraculously disappeared during the civil war. With the presence of the dreadful and gigantic black hounds amongst the skeleton knights however, all the doubts were now meaningless.
“The Demonic Spatial Hellhound, Bastian is back, only his lordship could ride on it!”
There were even conspiracy theorists, speaking as they had seen through everything.
“All of these was the conspiracy of that person, Omar, Lionheart, Ah DangCarnivore, Gria was once the retainers of his lordship, it must be he who urged the second senator to break the seal, and relied on his capability to stir up the civil war. The crown faction retrieved the crown when the time called for it. There’s only one truth, and this must be the plot!”
Alright, not to discuss further on how these theorists could classify everything as part of the conspiracy, the emergence of the red hounds were undoubtedly a big deal, for after all, the return of Emperor Yongye had spread like wildfire, and if he really had returned, perhaps everyone should reconsider whom to side with.
The only demigod-level undead emperor in recent history, if this banner hadn’t instilled enough fear, he actually carried the dazzling ring of the mightiest necromancer of the time, nothing was more concrete than this.
There was an upper limit to the power of a necromancer or lich, perhaps to compute the combat power of a necromancer, one must take account of his or her undeads warriors, the limit of the Red Hounds of Emperor Yongye was never known, as they were never defeated, in other words, nobody had known how far the power of Emperor Yongye could go.
The truth was, “the infallible Diffindor” was one of the trump cards that had been hidden by Roland. Keeping it secret deliberately, Roland had only used it twice, and the opponents who had seen it were dead.
The standard tactics of the necromancers were to use his very best undead warriors as the bodyguards as well as the vanguards in battle, diverting attention from their enemies. And then, they would cast the most powerful magic to blast the entire battlefield, seeking to end everything in one blow.
Emperor Yongye was doing likewise. With the Red Hound being the bodyguard as well as vanguard, and with “Ice Aeon” being the most powerful and victory-decisive magic, that would be unstoppable for one.
There weren’t a lot of semi-god sorcerers, and the ones who could manipulate such level of destructive forbidden curses, could be counted on just five fingers, but to cast the forbidden curse was like throwing vegetables, regardless of its consequences and damage towards himself, there was none other than Emperor Yongye, even after all these years.
More than ten fallen kingdoms had witnessed the strength and slyness of this tactics. Should one not break the seal of Red Hounds before Emperor Yongye completed his forbidden-taboo casting, it was feared that even entire cities and armies would fall into an everlasting slumber.
In those years, the Yongye’s army wasn’t even required to attack the castle, once Emperor Yongye started to wield the curse, the fate of the war was pretty much sealed, and the aftermath of it would include dozens field operations in which the survivors attempted to launch insane attacks upon the defending undeads.
To fight an attrition war with the endless undead army, was none other than a time limited combat where death awaited… Those formidable armies with profound history had always fallen under the hands of skeleton soldiers due to exhaustion, and this cunning combination of tactics was indeed the best example.
Some cadres in the Council of Dark Night were the main forces of Yongye’s army in the past, would they not know the habits of Emperor Yongye to give full consideration before making any move?
“The decisive battle should not be avoided without having more than 60% chances of victory. Victory or defeat should already be decided before the war begun, and then, the enemies would be wiped out aggrievedly.”
This battle style of this emperor had always been such dreadful. The moment Red Hounds charged into the battlefield, was the time Emperor Yongye was going to harvest the victory of war with his own hands.
The fellow undead warlords had always derived pleasure from seeing how their enemies vanished, but to stand in front of the emperor, who was probably in the preparation of forbidden curse…
“I’m having a little stomachache, I must answer the call of nature now.”
Hey hey, you were skeleton sorcerer, since when did you had a stomach.
“My wife is about to give birth, I’ve to go back now.”
A death knight had said so, it was a short sentence, but carried a big hidden message, the spectators were startled.
“My lover is about to give birth too, I also want to go back.”
Alright, another death knight was getting shameless too, but afterwards, the two who should fight each other had given a look of Freemasonry.
“How could you be so shameless?”
“I’m learning that from you.”
Alright, the situation was clear without needing any more explanation.
In the end, feeling the heat of Emperor Yongye again, the influence which was established by the Council of Dark Night after toils and moils, was completely extinguished. When the Red Hounds had reached the headquarters, it was an empty building.
The civil war of Xiluo Empire had come to an end, the news about the second consuls, Feyman fleeing far with most of the armies from the undead plane, had very soon reached the ears of the whole world.
——————————
Just when Roland was getting so bogged down on the chaotic scene before him, in another plane, there was somebody laughing gleefully…
“What I did? Hehe, I did nothing, I was just playing. Fismer is my descendant, of course, he’s a cambion. Sigh, thought he would be a good part, to think that he would become like this after just a few rounds of game. Mortals, so fragile.”
The laughing young man was rather handsome, and his laughter was natural too, but to behave like so in a situation like this, that was certainly abnormal.
“Ha, to think the expression of a brother at that time, I had no words. Guess? I myself haven’t figured out the answer, how would you guess it?”
He was lying on the void, and the void had nothing at all, the only thing which caught the eyes, was the huge chess board, with all his chess (pawn) above it, that was quite a spotlight.
The chess was lives, which were all souls wailing in agony, and amongst them, with the power which could match the legends, they were probably the very heroes in the secular world.
And opposite him across the chessboard, there sat nobody, but the chess pieces were moving on their own.
“Northland? The Mist Country? Conspiracy? Nothing to do with me! I’m just looking forward to some happy games. My fellow cuties, show me what you got, don’t disappoint me like Fismer. Hope so.”
Perhaps, due to his willfulness, Karwenz could be promoted to his level in such a brief time.
No goods, no bads, everything was whether fun or not fun. Should the mood be good, he would put down a few chess pieces, and dispatch several cadres of his to rebuild the Mist Kingdom, should the mood be bad, he would flip the table and do nothing, in a sense, this trait of Karwenz was, in fact, the nature of Chaos.
“The flawless Chaos devil”, “the blue-eyed boy of the Chaos”, “the loved child of the Goddess of Chaos(whoever dared to call him so had been dead for long)”, all of these were the monikers gained by the Karwenz in the under plane.
Doing things in a capricious style, yet able to smile like an innocent kid when creating disasters of which even the devils couldn’t bear the sight, this son of the abyss who was completely in-character for Chaos, had made tremendous feats in just three hundred years. Stepping over countless corpses, he ascended to the highest sanctuary.
He had now earned an, even more, resound name — the supreme ruler of the Chaos, the 14th existence of God level in Chaos faction.
Roland’s prophecy was absolutely wrong, to think that even Karwenz didn’t know what he would do next.
And now, Karwenz listened to the commands of no one except the Goddess of Chaos who was asleep, when the will to play surged within him, there was no one who could stop his game.
“This time, brother is playing with me, what a pleasure. Haha, defeating brother in a strategic game, this has been one of my dreams. Brother, you are a good guesser, so guess what’s my next step, even I haven’t thought of it.” (to be continued…)
TL Note
1. In chinese, “your sister – 你妹” is rude way of retorting one’s sentence which you consider silly, done by appending sister behind the key word said by that person.