“…Your Majesty, are you confident in your ability to repulse the Quagoa?”
“If they are only of the calibre that we saw in Feoh Raiđō, then it should be child’s play.”
Mm, Gondo nodded from the side.
“Of course, that is before the Quagoa break into the city. It is very difficult to eliminate only the enemy during a chaotic melee. I trust you wouldn’t want to stand by and let the fighting spill over into the Dwarven city? So I think that right now, your one little door is your last chance, right?”
A bitter expression came over the commander-in-chief’s face—
“—How much longer do you have? How many more days can the gate hold out?”
Ainz’s repeated hammering on the point seemed to have made up the commander-in-chief’s mind for him.
“…I understand. Your Majesty, I pray you will lend us your nation’s strength.”
“Commander-in-chief!”
Another soldier called out in a panicked voice, and the commander-in-chief glared sharply at him.
Then, the commander-in-chief apologized briefly to Ainz before taking the other man some distance away, so he could not hear.
Then, they talked.
He could hear fragments of conversation, like “this is bad”, “un—”, “Quagoa”, “we still”, “danger before us”, “in any case” and so on.
The general idea seemed to be that it would be hard for them to deal with the Quagoa on their own, so they should take advantage of this opportunity and gamble on it.
It would seem the time had come for one last push.
Infusing strength into his voice, Ainz called out:
“Don’t you think it’s about time to decide your future plans now?”
3
There were eight clans of Quagoa living in the Azellisia Mountain Range.
They were the Pu Rimidol clan, the Pu Randel clan, the Pu Surix clan, the Po Ram clan, the Po Shyunem clan, the Po Gusua clan, the Zu Aygen clan and the Zu Riyushuk clan.
The children of Pu — the hero of old — formed three clans that took his name, and they feuded with the clans which named themselves Po and Zu. There were slight differences between each individual clan, but on the whole each was composed of 10’000 Quagoa, for a total of 80’000 Quagoa distributed throughout the Azellisia Mountain Range.
Now, if someone wanted to know if the Quagoa people were strong, the answer was that they were not.
Even if one clan had 10’000 members, the Quagoa had little in the way of technology or civilization, and ranked among the lesser races of the mountains. They were little more than prey for the strong.
Now, if one asked who the greatest enemy of the Quagoa race was, the answer would be the fellow clans of their race. No, sometimes even the people of their own clans could become their enemies. Other monsters viewed the Quagoa as little more than food. They did not hate the Quagoa, nor did they compete with them. However, their fellow Quagoa thought differently.
That was due to the way in which the Quagoa grew.
The ores and rocks which the Quagoa ate at a young age determined their abilities later in life. In other words, they had to compete with their own people for rare ores and metals to strengthen their bloodline. Thus, their fellow clans were their enemies, but it was only natural that the nearby foe was more troublesome than a distant one.
Similarly, the Dwarves who contended with them for ores were also their enemies, but it was more likely that the dwarves would chase them away with their lightning-enchanted weapons.
However, at some point, a hero of legends — one who surpassed Pu, the hero of old — was born.
He was the Lord of the Clans, Pe Riyuro.
His might far surpassed that of the Blue and Red Quagoa. His overwhelming power allowed him to unite the clans.
Riyuro’s revolution did not stop there.
After discovering an abandoned dwarven city, he gathered the clans there and formed monster-fighting units, using Dwarven prisoners to develop agriculture and animal husbandry.
That was not all. Usually, when a new clan leader was born, he would exterminate the bloodline of the previous clan leader. This was the commonly-accepted means by which power was exchanged within the Quagoa people. However, Riyuro did not do that. Instead, he chose to let the leaders of the various clans rule themselves. However, Riyuro ordered all the ores to be brought to him. Those who obeyed Riyuro and performed well would be given rare ores, regardless of their status.
For instance, those clans that defeated monster invasions would be known as brave, while those clans that found more gold or precious stones would gain favor and more members. He would reward them for their work with the appropriate ores.
Their competition against their lord turned into competition with each other, and the Lord’s seat was secure.
He had done all these things which no Quagoa had even dreamed of to expand his influence and to set into motion a certain plan.
That plan was to attack the Dwarven city.
The clans gathered their best warriors in response to their Lord’s summons. They sent 2’000 people per clan, for a total fighting strength of 16’000.
This was an army never before seen in history. However, even with that much manpower, a direct attack across the suspension bridge would lead to horrendous casualties. Not only would that defeat the purpose of gathering such numbers, but it ran the risk of being defeated without being able to bring down the fortress.
Thus, Riyuro ordered them to find a way around the fortress.
Although several of the scouting teams did not come back, they managed to find a route to bypass the Great Rift in the end. After that, his troops divided themselves up into three to carry out their tasks.
One group was assigned to find and capture fleeing Dwarves. This task was divided among many smaller squads.
One group was designated as the main force. They were to conquer and loot the Dwarven city. If the elite group took too long in bringing down the fortress, they would step in to help.
The last group was filled with elite Quagoa, who would bring down the Dwarven fortress. This group would move ahead of the main force, bring down the fortress and they might be used to conquer the city as well.
The third group, the vanguard, was led by a Quagoa called Yozu.
He was one of Riyuro’s top men, an exceptional Red Quagoa. His mind was sharp, he was a capable fighter, and he was one of the top candidates for the spot of leader within his own clan.
Even so, it was not easy for someone like him to command his mixed battle group.
After all, the elites from the various clans held deep-seated grudges against each other. However, Yozu could even managed to make use of that.
By fanning the flames of competition between the clans, he brought down the fortress.
Their victory was assured by taking the flanking route and then the fortress, but even then, nobody could doubt his extraordinary command ability.
In truth, nobody else among the Quagoa could match his skill as a commander.
And now, the Quagoa were preparing to checkmate the Dwarves.
The first Quagoa among the vanguard who attacked the fortress were assault troops composed of the best of the best. These Quagoa clawed savagely at the hateful gate, but they could not break through.
One more step. Just one step closer, and they could break through that door and trample their hated enemies, the Dwarves. One more step, and they could take this entire domain for their own. They would be ranked first for their achievements, and as their reward, they would receive enough ore to make their heads spin.