Chapter 1173: Sigrald

As we continued the battle with Onslaught, Maleficent and Persona came to back us up.

「Black Lightning Princess-dono! What is this monster?」

「Onslaught. He’s some kinda weirdo.」

「Hehehe! Aw, that stings, but I guess it’s true! Besides, calling me a monster is pretty harsh, Prince!」

「!」

Maleficent flinched at this statement, which was pretty unusual. Well, only a slight reaction though.

「…Who are you?」

「Someone in a similar situation to you! Only you awakened your inner factor, and I had the factors injected into me!」

「Another one of that lab’s guinea pigs, huh?」

「And that’s not all! I was born in Sophiard too! Well, I guess there’s a big difference between royalty and some criminal from the slums!」

Much to our surprise, Maleficent and Onslaught shared the same home country! To think they would meet here, so many years after the country’s fall…

「Why do you serve Raydoss?」

「Hehehe! Raydoss bound me with a contract and turned me into their slave! Would you let me off the hook if I said that?」

「I’m afraid not. In the first place, fiends can’t be bound by a slave contract.」

「Really?」

「Yes, really. The evil energy within their bodies always ends up distorting the contract. It might work for a short period of time, but not several years.」

「I see.」

While fiends can be dominated by more powerful fiends, it seems impossible to bind them with slave contracts like Onslaught claimed.

「I’m just using Raydoss! This land is our sanctuary!」

Onslaught shouted this while wriggling all of his tentacles. His expression contained a crazy amount of joy.

「Can you feel the breath of the Evil God?! No other god will ever grant true salvation! Only the Evil God gave me power and solace! The land of Raydoss, where the Evil God’s body sleeps, is truly our sacred ground! And, Saintess! You should be capable of calling the Evil God into your body! Rejoice, for once you do, I’ll take you as my partner! We will transform this land into a wicked sanctuary together! Heheheheh!」

Huh? Taking Fran… as his partner?

『GNRRRGHH!』

（Master?）

Unforgivable! You disgusting tentacle freak! There’s no way you’ll marry a beauty like Fran! I wouldn’t let you lay a finger on her even if you were a hot dude!

This guy really knows how to get on my nerves!

Now I can sympathize with Maleficent’s anger when Persona got taken away.

『I’m gonna teach this creepy tentacle pervert how to shut up! Let’s hurry up and beat the crap out of him!』

（Nn!）

But that’s exactly why I shouldn’t jump in without thinking. Doing so would only put Fran at a disadvantage.

Calm down, me! I can’t allow myself to lose my cool at such an important movement!

Fran gently stroked my blade as I was trembling with anger. She looked strangely gentle, or rather, happy.

（Master, thank you.）

『Huh? For what?』

（For getting angry for me.）

Fran smiled and nodded at me, before reading my blade.

「Onslaught, you’re going down!」

『Yeah!』

「Hehehehe! The Saintess and Prince at the same time! This might mean trouble, so I won’t hold back either! Come forth, pig!」

Pig? Is he going to summon an orc fiend to assist him?

However, the figure who crawled out of Onslaught’s body wasn’t an orc. A humanoid undead? But…

『What the hell is that?』

「Metallic?」

「Woof.」

The creature was about two meters tall. At first I recognized him as an obese, heavily armored man, but realized my mistake upon closer inspection. His entire right arm was metallic, and his fleshy left arm had metal parts embedded all over.

Moreover, he had a giant iron mask-like thing attached to his head.

And he’s emitting evil energy quite similar in wavelength to Onslaught’s.

Was this undead somehow fused with evil energy and one of Raydoss’s relics?

「Buhahaha! So this is what an undead body feels like! Simply wonderful!」

「Pig! Feast on them!」

「How insolent you are to your former master, fiendmancer Onslaught! I shall obey you, but only for this moment!」

Onslaught’s former master?

My doubt was cleared up immediately afterwards. The undead boldly proclaimed his identity.

「Lower your heads, inferior beings of Kranzel! I am the South Conquest Duke, Sigrald! Offer yourselves up as my sustenance!」

Huh? South Conquest Duke? He’s really the South Conquest Duke?

If he’s undead, doesn’t that mean someone already killed him? Moreover, it seems like he’s being controlled by Onslaught!

Now both the West and South Conquest Duke somehow died without us knowing it!

『Wait a minute, are we sure he’s the real deal?』

I activated appraisal, but it didn’t work properly. Might be due to his relic, or maybe the cloak of evil energy around him.

All I could see was the name. This undead is, without a doubt, Sigrald. Now the only question is if he’s disguising his name… Wait, actually, I don’t even know if that’s the South Conquest Duke’s real name.

Whatever, there’s no point for further conjecture. I’ll just temporarily call him the South Conquest Duke for now. Either way, he’s pretty damn strong.

「Black Lightning Princess-dono. May I leave Onslaught to you?」

「Are you okay fighting?」

Maleficent has triggered Divine Sword Release multiple times today, so he should be quite exhausted. Perhaps that’s why they chose now to launch their attack. Can he even fight while protecting Persona in his current state?

Maleficent nodded without taking his eyes off the South Conquest Duke.

「The South Conquest Duke and his predecessors are the mortal enemies of Sophiard, directly responsible for my nation’s destruction… I can no longer run. Furthermore, I can sense something swirling within the undead duke, the grudges of my former people…」

It seems the South Conquest Duke had used the grudges of Sophiard citizens to turn himself into an undead. The very same people who his predecessors annihilated.

I guess there’s no turning back now. Not sure if Maleficent really has the right to complain about genocides, but that’s not something I want to say to his face.

「Master, we’ll take Onslaught.」

『Alright!』

「Heheheheh! I’ll tear you apart limb from limb, until you cry for mercy!」

「You won’t get the chance!」