Chapter 312: The Kingdom Beneath the Mountain

"So you want us to take our fight to the... dwarf kingdom?" Mark said, raising an eyebrow.

"Exactly," Focalors replied, settling down onto one of the spider eggs. "The stage is set and ready for the show. All that’s missing is you."

Alice and Aria exchanged a confused glance, since none of it made any sense to either of them.

"Wait a second," Aria cut in, stepping forward with a frown. "The dwarf kingdom? That’s impossible."

"Aria’s right," Alice added. "As far as I know, the last recorded contact with them was about two hundred years ago, maybe more... After that, nothing."

Her expression grew more serious.

"No one ever heard from them again, so logically everyone assumed they’d gone extinct."

Mark turned to Focalors, waiting for an explanation.

"Ah, right... about that," the demon replied with a careless wave of the hand. "We also thought we’d killed them all."

"But...?"

"But recently, while wandering around looking for something interesting to do, I stumbled across their hideout by chance," Focalors went on. "It was hidden deep within the Great Eastern Range, completely cut off from the rest of the world."

Focalors paused briefly, as if reliving the moment.

"And let me tell you, what I found in there left me... quite intrigued."

"What did you find?"

"Objects that, quite frankly, I had no idea how to make sense of," Focalors said, its tone taking on a note of genuine fascination. "The dwarves had thrived far more than I ever would have imagined."

Focalors tilted its orb slightly, as if trying to find the best way to describe what it had seen.

"For instance, they didn’t need candles or torches to light their tunnels. They’d placed small round crystals all over the place, and each one gave off a steady white light."

Its tone grew a touch more puzzled.

"And the strange thing is that light didn’t come from fire. It didn’t burn, didn’t consume anything, and of course, it didn’t produce any smoke either."

"..."

"And from what little I managed to piece together, those crystals ran on elemental stones the dwarves mined directly from deep within the range."

Alice frowned and decided to speak up.

"That doesn’t make any sense," she said skeptically. "If it produces light without fire, it should be magic... but magic needs a caster or some kind of source to keep it running. It can’t just sit there and work on its own."

"Wait, there’s more," Focalors said, clearly savoring her confusion. "I saw metal boxes that heated food without a single flame, and they also had devices capable of taking dirty water and returning it completely clean."

The orb tilted from side to side.

"And it all ran on those same stones they mine from the mountain. Not to mention it wasn’t just a handful of devices, since practically the entire kingdom runs that way."

A silence settled in as the others processed all that.

"That’s hard to believe..." Aria murmured, crossing her arms. "Although, thinking about it, it kind of makes sense. Dwarves have always had a reputation for being a brilliant race, skilled builders."

She shrugged.

"I guess, cooped up all this time, they didn’t have anything better to do than start inventing things."

Mark, on the other hand, stayed quiet. And as he listened to Focalors’s account, something started clicking into place in his head.

The pieces were all there; it was just that no one else seemed able to see what they actually meant.

To Alice, Aria, and even Focalors itself, all of it was nothing more than a collection of strange tools defying explanation.

But Mark, coming from another world, could form a pretty clear picture of the situation.

The dwarves had managed to develop something resembling the technology of his own world, adapted to the rules of this one.

Instead of relying on electricity or fuel, they’d found a way to harness the energy stored in those magical stones from the mountain range to power their inventions.

’Incredible...’ Mark thought, genuinely impressed. ’This is definitely one of the things I never imagined running into out here.’

"Anyway, back to the matter at hand," Focalors said, pulling him out of his thoughts. "Over the past few weeks I’ve kept the dwarves under constant pressure, wearing down their defenses and their numbers. Softening them up, so to speak, for the main course."

Mark immediately understood where this was going.

"I see where you’re going with this," he said, bringing a hand to his chin. "You want me to show up right when the dwarves are at their limit, with nothing left to keep fighting off the half-human army’s attacks."

He narrowed his eyes.

"So we can then stage our little fight right in front of everyone... that way I don’t just gain control over whichever half-humans witness the battle, but I also get the dwarves to see me as their savior."

Focalors went still for a moment.

"...Well, I didn’t even have to explain it to you," it said, the cloud of smoke over its head rippling with what looked like admiration. "Seems my lady wasn’t wrong about you at all."

Mark didn’t respond to that, since a thought had already started forming in his head.

As much as he disliked Mary’s subordinates, as insufferable as every single one of them turned out to be, there was one thing he couldn’t deny them.

They were monstrously efficient.

Rudolf, Angelica, and now Focalors. All of them with meticulous plans, flawless execution, and a knack for manipulation that bordered on unsettling.

’With subordinates like these, I genuinely can’t wrap my head around how they managed to beat her three hundred years ago...’ Mark thought, remembering Mary — or rather, the Demon Lord.

"Sooooo is it decided? You like the plan?" Focalors said, cutting back into his thoughts, clearly eager.

Mark thought it over for another moment, then nodded.

"Yeah, we’ll do it your way."

"Splendid!" Focalors exclaimed, clapping its hands. "In that case, I’ll be waiting for you there. Don’t take too long, alright? The show can’t start without its leading man."

It hopped down off the egg it had been sitting on.

"Although, with your new acquisition, you shouldn’t need more than a day to fly in."

And with that, a thick mist began wrapping around its form, rising up from the ground, gradually swallowing it whole.

But just before it vanished completely, it paused.

"Ah, almost forgot," it said, its tone brightening. "My lady asked me to tell you that, once all this is over, she has a little gift prepared for you."

It let out a soft laugh.

"Though I’m afraid I can’t tell you much about that... after all, it’s a surprise she’s been putting together for you for quite some time now."

And with those final words, the mist swallowed it entirely, and Focalors vanished without a trace, as if it had never been there at all.

The cavern fell silent.

Mark stared at the spot where it had been standing, and after a moment, let out a long sigh.

"That guy really is a box of surprises..."

"I’d say he’s more like a pretty annoying guy," Aria remarked, watching the last of the smoke fade away.

"And probably the least sane of any of the Demon Lord’s subordinates we’ve run into," Alice added.

Bayle, who had stayed quiet until then, lifted his head.

"If he’s our ally now... does that mean I can’t eat him, Master?"

"I’m afraid not..."

"What a shame," Bayle replied with a sigh.