From then on, the name of the sacred mountain of Chocoboro would be written on numerous occasions in history.

For ungodly mankind, true peace was too far away, and their arms were too short to grab a hold of this truth. As a result, mankind couldn’t help but continue writing down the history of conflict for eternity. The weak people who had no choice but to be born into that sorrowful history. The place where such people ended up was the sacred mountain of Chocoboro.

A sacred place that welcomed those who were being chased and protected them from those who were pursuing them. Strangely enough, however, none of those who were protected decided to stay on this land, they all eventually departed once again with eyes filled with hope. As if in chorus, they all said the same thing. ‘The popotan flowers, blooming all over the place, had soothed me and warmly sent me off’.

◇ ◇ ◇

The hillside overlooking the sacred mountain of Chocoboro. An independent battalion of the Purin Kingdom’s army, dispatched to clear the area of any hindrances, was stationed there.

It was surrounded by a simple fence, with guards standing here and there to monitor the surroundings. And then, most of the soldiers were eating, drinking, and making merry around the fire in small groups. The Purinism priests accompanying them were also in the same state. They might seem too lax, but perhaps that was inevitable.The forces resisting them in the sacred mountain were already no more. It was safe to say that the mission was mostly accomplished. And this place was within kingdom territory. There was simply no way that there would be any forces that could threaten the power of a battalion. Demon warfare, which was not their forte, was worthy of consideration, but currently they could expect magical support from the Purinism Priests accompanying them. It could be said that there would not be any problems at all.

The time was dusk, where the sun was setting. Around the time when the fires that illuminated the darkness were beginning to stand out. As though drowning out the laughter that rose here and there, a gust of wind blew through the air. The fires and laughter all disappeared at once, as the world took a sudden turn.

The fires were all extinguished at once by coincidence. Could such a coincidence ever happen? Surely it was not impossible. It would not be surprising at all if they started to laugh at this astonishing coincidence and started to make merry again. However, no one was able to even let out a voice.

An atmosphere that seemed as though weighing heavily on them dominated the area. They couldn’t understand what was going, but their instincts were telling them. That something horrible was about to happen. Then, it was unknown who started it first, but everyone looked up at the sky. The sky that was beginning to dim. They were certainly there. Three shadows that were the source of the fear–. 「O fools who oppressed my friend…, and the innocent. Feel free to accept — this retribution.」

The voice they could somehow hear even though it was said from somewhere far away. As if to prove that it was not an auditory hallucination, an unusual phenomenon happened. Light overflowed from the ground in the area that lightly encompassed the military base. It was a phenomenon beyond their comprehension. Due to that, they couldn’t come up with a way to deal with the situation. In the first place, they couldn’t even think clearly due to fear.

However, even if they did somehow manage to figure out what it was, there was unlikely anything they could do about it. This was undoubtedly the seventh-order magic ‘Combustion’ that they were familiar with. However, this power was simply so powerful that they didn’t even have the will to try invoking seventh-order magic ‘Magic Isolation’ or sixth-order magic ‘Dispel Magic’ to deal with it. Right now, the only thing they all knew was that what the voice had just stated was about to happen. And that it would be a calamity they could never resist.

「O God….」There was already nothing else they could do. All they could do now was pray to God. Praying for their salvation. However, what was brought upon those who sought salvation was heartless words from the dominator of the place.

「Embrace that ugly, twisted faith and go–.」

And then the world was bathed in light. 「Go to hell and pray there for eternity…」

Everything that existed there vanished. The light born from the ground turned into a huge tower of light. The light pierced through the heavens, as if raising an angry fist to the unreasonable world.

This phenomenon that was beyond human understanding. In addition to the perpetrators themselves, there were others who witnessed it. It was the patrol squad that was fortunate enough not to get involved in this phenomenon. They were all frozen in place, a short distance from the base, unable to move in fear. Unable to even move their gazes, all they could do was burn this phenomenon into their eyes. This state continued until the three shadows that had caused it flew away. After that, this matter was brought to the attention of the upper echelons of the Purin Kingdom by the patrol squad.

「The emergence of the Demon Lord.」

The upper echelons of the Purin Kingdom immediately began to move and reorganize their forces. Leaving only enough personnel to maintain a minimum level of defense and security, the armies that had been deployed to various places were all summoned back to the headquarters. It was clear that the intention was to perfectly ensure the safety of the capital. However, the purpose of reorganizing the army was not limited only for defense. A new independent battalion for anti-demon warfare was organized from the summoned back army. In fact, this might have been the main purpose of this reorganization. As there was also the figure of the hero, who was called back urgently, among them. The movements of the Purin Kingdom up to this point. In order to perform them in the quickest manner possible, magic tools for information transmission were utilized. As a result, it could be said that the reorganization order was carried out more swiftly than ever before. However, at the same time problems also popped out.

There was no lock on the human’s mouth. Rumors of the emergence of the Demon Lord quickly spread throughout the kingdom, causing people to tremble in fear.

Year 5964 of the creation calendar, early winter, the world began to move drastically.