Chapter 286: There Was No Frontline

Southern Territory Liebus

Sapphire City

Sapphire City was far from the destruction that had struck Yuno City, Davenport and the coastline.

By the time Leviathan’s roar reached the southern territory, much of its destructive force had already weakened across the enormous distance. No windows exploded, buildings didn’t shake apart and the streets weren’t torn by the pressure wave.

But Sapphire City still heard it.

The horrifying roar rolled across the distant sky and reached the city like thunder from something far too enormous to exist. Conversations stopped almost simultaneously. People walking through the streets slowed before looking around in confusion, while others instinctively raised their heads toward the night sky.

For several seconds, the entire city seemed to hesitate.

Sapphire City was normally one of the busiest and wealthiest cities in the southern territory. Its commercial districts remained active well into the night, restaurants were crowded, stores were brightly illuminated and markets were filled with people finishing their shopping or simply enjoying the evening.

Tonight had been no different.

Until that sound reached them.

"What the hell was that?"

A man standing near one of the market stalls looked around nervously.

"I don’t know."

The shopkeeper beside him stepped away from his counter and stared toward the northern sky.

"That wasn’t thunder."

A customer slowly lowered the bag in his hand.

"Something’s wrong, right?"

Nobody answered him.

The roar had already faded into the distance, yet an uncomfortable silence remained behind. Hundreds of people stood throughout the market staring at one another, waiting for someone to explain what they had just heard.

Nothing happened.

A few nervous conversations gradually began again.

Then....

BOOOOM!

A building exploded.

The blast ripped through the commercial district without warning. Windows burst outward as flames and debris erupted into the street, throwing several nearby pedestrians from their feet.

Screams immediately replaced the silence.

"What happened?!"

"RUN!"

"GET AWAY FROM THERE!"

People scattered as smoke poured from the damaged building, but before the crowd could understand where they were supposed to run, several figures walked through the smoke.

They looked almost human from a distance.

They wore heavy black armor and carried swords, axes, spears and enormous hammers. Yet when the flames reflected across their faces, the terrified civilians finally noticed the crimson eyes glowing beneath their helmets.

Demons.

One of them moved first.

An office worker who had been returning home stood frozen in the middle of the street, unable to understand what he was seeing. The armored demon crossed the distance between them and drove its enormous sword through the man’s chest before he could even scream.

Blood struck the pavement.

The demon ripped its weapon free, and the man’s body collapsed.

For one terrible second, everyone stared.

Then Sapphire City erupted into absolute panic.

Hundreds of people began running at once. Shopping bags, phones and personal belongings were abandoned across the streets as parents grabbed their children and shopkeepers fled from their businesses. Cars stopped in the middle of intersections while frightened drivers desperately tried to turn around, only creating more congestion as people rushed between them.

The demons charged into the crowd.

Their weapons rose and fell without discrimination. Blades struck civilians who couldn’t escape quickly enough, while enormous hammers smashed into the pavement and sent people tumbling from the force of the impacts. Other demons tore through storefronts and vehicles as they spread farther into the commercial district.

There was no battlefield.

There were no soldiers waiting for them.

These were ordinary people who had been eating dinner, shopping, finishing work and returning home only moments earlier.

Now they were running for their lives.

The streets that had been filled with laughter and conversation became filled with screams. Smoke climbed between the brightly illuminated buildings while fires spread through damaged stores, and blood began staining roads that had been crowded with peaceful civilians only minutes earlier.

More demons poured through the burning streets.

"SLAUGHTER THEM!"

A sword tore through another fleeing civilian.

"FOR THE DEMON KING!"

An axe came down as its wielder laughed.

"FOR THE DEMON KING!"

The demons began chanting together as they advanced through the city.

"SLAUGHTER HUMANITY!"

"SLAUGHTER HUMANITY FOR THE SAKE OF THE DEMON KING!"

Their laughter mixed with the screams of the civilians.

Windows shattered as demons smashed their way into nearby buildings. Vehicles were overturned, storefronts were destroyed and flames spread from one structure to another while the armored invaders chased anyone unfortunate enough to remain in the streets.

"HAHAHAHAHA!"

"KEEP RUNNING!"

"THERE’S NOWHERE TO HIDE!"

One demon raised his blood-covered blade above his head.

"HAIL THE DEMON KING!"

The others answered while continuing their slaughter.

"HAIL THE DEMON KING!"

Sapphire City’s streets disappeared beneath smoke, fire and blood as the demons continued laughing.

Sapphire City hadn’t understood Leviathan’s distant roar.

Now they understood what had followed it.

But Sapphire City was only one part of the nightmare.

At almost the exact same moment, explosions were tearing through other cities across Liebus.

In Libral City, people were still standing outside restaurants and stores discussing the terrifying roar when demons crashed into one of the busiest intersections. Cars swerved into one another as civilians ran from the sudden attack, and within seconds, the peaceful district disappeared beneath screaming crowds and burning vehicles.

In Caldron City, the first emergency calls came from a residential district. Families looked through their windows after hearing explosions nearby, only to see armored figures moving between buildings below. Another blast struck farther down the street before people began desperately locking doors and pulling their children away from the windows.

Xenith City barely had time to react.

Police vehicles rushed toward the first reported attack when another explosion erupted several streets away. Then another followed from a completely different district. Civilians who had been running away from one attack suddenly found themselves turning around when demons appeared ahead of them as well.

Coral City was already fighting.

"GET INSIDE!"

Agency personnel shouted at civilians while exchanging attacks with demons in the middle of a crowded commercial street. Storefronts shattered around them as people crawled behind overturned vehicles, and every few seconds another group of demons emerged from an alley or descended onto a nearby rooftop.

Western Port had become even worse.

Workers abandoned containers and machinery as demons poured into the harbor. Warning sirens screamed throughout the port while burning vessels drifted beside the docks, and Agency combat units rushed between warehouses as they desperately tried to stop the attackers from reaching deeper into the city.

Then Starfall City reported contact.

An explosion illuminated the night.

People screamed.

Emergency lines immediately flooded with calls.

Another district was under attack.

Then another.

The invasion was moving too quickly for anyone to understand its full scale.

There wasn’t one frontline.

There wasn’t one city being invaded.

Liebus was being attacked everywhere.

Across the country, people who had been eating dinner, finishing work, shopping or putting their children to bed suddenly heard explosions outside their homes. Emergency sirens began sounding from city to city while frightened civilians flooded streets without knowing which direction was actually safe.

Every minute brought another fire.

Another attack.

Another emergency call.

Another city asking for help.

And all of those desperate reports were arriving at the same place.

________________________

Location: Liebus Agency

Place: Main Headquarters — Branch Command Room

Sara hurried through the headquarters toward the Branch Command Room.

The effects of Leviathan’s roar were still visible everywhere around her. Emergency lights flashed along the corridors, damaged ceiling panels hung loose overhead and personnel rushed past carrying weapons, medical equipment and communication devices. Every few seconds another combat unit disappeared through one of the deployment passages as the headquarters struggled to respond to attacks erupting across the country.

Sara reached the Branch Command Room and stepped through the doors.

The noise hit her immediately.

The chamber was enormous.

Sara entered from an elevated central platform overlooking the entire operations floor. Below her, hundreds of branch operators sat across descending rows of communication stations, each connected to different Agency branches throughout Liebus. Massive tactical screens covered the walls while a holographic map of the country dominated the center of the chamber.

Nearly every operator was talking at once.

"Coral Branch, repeat your casualty report!"

"Send Unit Twelve to the eastern district!"

"Western Port, do you copy?! Western Port!"

"Tell the civilians to remain underground!"

"We need another combat unit in Xenith!"

"Starfall Branch, hold your position! Reinforcements are being dispatched!"

Sara stopped at the center of the elevated platform.

From where she stood, she could see the entire room below her.

Operators shouted into headsets while rapidly switching between channels. Some had several displays open simultaneously, showing burning streets, damaged buildings and Agency personnel already fighting demons. Warning notifications appeared so quickly across the massive screens that several were replaced by newer alerts before anyone could properly examine them.

One operator suddenly raised his voice.

"SAPPHIRE CITY HAS CONFIRMED DEMONIC CONTACT!"

Another immediately shouted from several rows away.

"Chief! Coral Branch is requesting immediate reinforcement!"

A third operator turned around.

"We’ve lost communication with Western Port Unit Six!"

Sara’s eyes moved across the room.

This wasn’t preparation anymore.

The invasion had already begun.

She stepped toward the railing overlooking the operators.

"Monday!"

The Agency AI immediately responded through the command room speakers.

"Yes, Chief."

"Report!"

"Preliminary acoustic analysis has been completed. The event was not an explosion or conventional weapon. It was a creature’s roar."

Sara’s expression changed.

"A roar did all of this?"

"Confirmed. Estimated origin is the Davenport coastal region near Yuno City."

Another warning sounded before Sara could respond.

A new section of the enormous map turned red.

Then another.

Then three more almost simultaneously.

Monday continued.

"Libral City has confirmed demonic engagement. Caldron City is reporting multiple hostile groups. Xenith City combat units have entered battle."

Another red marker appeared.

"Coral City is under attack."

Another followed.

"Western Port has confirmed demonic forces."

Then Sapphire City turned red.

"Sapphire City has confirmed widespread civilian casualties."

Another operator shouted from below.

"STARFALL CITY IS REQUESTING REINFORCEMENTS!"

Sara stared down at the operations floor.

Hundreds of voices continued beneath her while the map of Liebus became increasingly covered in red.

"Shit."

The word had barely left her mouth when one of the operators below turned toward the elevated platform.

"Chief! Libral Branch is requesting permission to deploy their reserve units!"

Before Sara could answer, another voice came from the opposite side of the enormous room.

"Western Port just lost two surveillance sectors!"

"Chief! Civilian sightings are spreading across Xenith!"

"Coral Branch reports attacks from three directions!"

The voices overlapped until Sara could barely distinguish one report from another.

Below her, hundreds of branch operators were speaking simultaneously with Agency divisions scattered across the country. Some were shouting into their headsets while others rapidly switched communication channels, and every few seconds another warning appeared across the enormous screens surrounding the chamber.

Sara stepped toward the command table positioned at the center of the elevated platform and slammed both hands against it.

"SHIT!"

For barely a second, several of the nearest operators looked up.

"They’ve already spread this far?"

Sara’s eyes raced across the tactical map.

She had expected the demons to attack Lumimme City. The Agency’s primary underground headquarters was located here, and if their objective was to cripple the organization protecting Liebus, concentrating their forces against the capital should have been the obvious strategy.

Instead, the opposite was happening.

The demons were spreading.

Why?

Another district turned red.

Sara stared at it.

What are you trying to do?

The Demon King wasn’t stupid enough to scatter his army without a reason. Every city he attacked forced Sara to divide her own forces, but doing so also divided his. There had to be something else behind the pattern.

An alarm interrupted her thoughts.

One of the operators suddenly stood.

"Chief! Starfall has made contact!"

Sara immediately raised her head.

Another operator shouted from below.

"More demons entering Libral!"

"Western Port is requesting reinforcements!"

"Chief, Coral’s eastern defensive line is collapsing!"

Sara straightened, forcing the question back down where it couldn’t slow her hands.

Later. Figure out the why later.

"Do not authorize Libral’s entire reserve," she said, her voice cutting cleanly through the noise.

The nearest operator looked up. "Chief?"

"Release thirty percent. Keep the rest inside their defensive perimeter until we know whether this is their main attack or a diversion." If this really was designed to stretch her thin, she wasn’t going to hand over everything just because they asked for it.

"Understood!"

She turned toward Western Port’s section of the map.

"Don’t waste personnel trying to recover those surveillance sectors. Pull nearby traffic cameras, drones, and satellite coverage into the same network. If one system goes blind, I want three others watching that ground instead."

"Yes, Chief!"

Her attention shifted to Coral.

"Coral is being hit from three directions?"

"Confirmed!"

"Are they converging toward the center?"

The operator checked the feed. "No, Chief. Two groups are moving through commercial districts. The third’s approaching the eastern residential sector."

Sara’s jaw tightened.

"Then don’t chase them. Establish evacuation corridors between the residential districts and the nearest shelters. Combat units hold the corridors and let the demons come to us. We are not scattering our people across an entire city hunting for scraps."

"Understood!"

Another alarm rose over the others.

"Chief! Videos are already online!"

Her head snapped toward the voice. "How many?"

"Too many! The roar, damaged buildings, demons in the streets civilian uploads everywhere. There’s footage of something enormous offshore too."

Sara’s jaw clenched. They were already losing the one front she couldn’t reinforce with soldiers.

"Cyber Division."

Several technicians turned toward the platform.

"Don’t take it down. Bury it."

One of them hesitated. "Chief?"

"If thousands of real videos vanish at once, people will know someone made them disappear.

Leave the genuine footage exactly where it is." Her eyes were already moving to the next screen.

"Flood the space around it instead, AI-generated attacks, edited clips, old disaster footage, fake sightings, contradictory locations. Make every real upload compete with twenty convincing fakes."

"Yes, Chief!"

"And don’t give them one explanation. Give them ten. Gas explosion. Movie promotion. AI hoax. Military exercise. Earthquake footage. Whatever fits the frame. I don’t need anyone to believe a single story. I need them arguing about which one is real."

"Understood!"

She touched the device near her ear. "Monday."

"Yes, Chief."

"Don’t cut power citywide. Divide every affected city into sectors keep hospitals, shelters, emergency routes, and Agency infrastructure running. Shut down the public districts where demons are active and kill civilian transmission around the confirmed combat zones. Nothing more."

"Selective infrastructure isolation is possible."

"Do it. I don’t want civilians trapped in the dark while something’s hunting them."

"Understood. Beginning sector isolation."

One by one, the tactical display shifted not whole cities vanishing into black, but individual districts dimming while hospitals and evacuation routes stayed lit like small islands inside the dark.

The reports didn’t stop.

"New contact south of Sapphire!"

"Western Port is requesting reinforcements!"

"Starfall’s evacuation is at forty percent!"

"How long can Western Port’s line hold?" Sara asked.

The operator listened to his headset.

"Estimated twenty minutes."

"Then they don’t need reinforcement yet. Put Mobile Group Two on standby between Western Port and Coral. Whichever line breaks first gets them."

"Understood!"

"Prioritize Starfall’s evacuation routes," she added. "Don’t chase kills."

"Yes, Chief!"

Sara remained on the platform as the orders rippled outward, reserves held back instead of spent all at once, mobile units positioned to reinforce whichever line cracked first, hospitals lit while combat zones went dark, real footage buried under a flood of noise instead of erased.

The map was still covered in red. People were still dying somewhere beneath every one of those markers. Cities were still burning.

But the Agency had stopped reacting blindly to each new alarm.

She slowly exhaled, and only then did she notice her own hand had drifted up toward her mouth without her permission, her teeth pressed against the edge of her thumbnail. She lowered it deliberately, forcing her fingers flat against the command table instead.

They had known the demons were coming tonight. Every branch had been placed on alert. Combat divisions had been armed and ready for deployment. Erza herself had taken command of their forces before any of this began.

They had prepared for war.

And still, one single roar had thrown entire regions into chaos before the country even had time to flinch.

Sara looked down at the operators still shouting beneath her, then back up at the map glowing red across half the country.

Her fingers tightened slowly against the edge of the table.

They’re spreading us out for a reason.

I still don’t know what they’re really after.

Sara stared at the red markers multiplying across Liebus.

And beneath that thought came another, quieter one she refused to let reach her voice.

How many people are going to die before I figure it out?

To Be Continued...