"Wasn't splitting the Queens into two fronts a mistake?"
I received a report that an army was advancing from the Queen on the Daztorudia Continent side.
However, there was no movement from the Kasanagara Continent side.
Their intent was clear as day: concentrate all military power on one front and force a breakthrough.
"That said, if we'd left one side open, they would have charged straight through, wouldn't they?"
I answered with a wry smile.
The Divine Word Religion had teleportation circles set up all over the place.
Even if it took some time, they could move their army to either front.
And even that delay would still be faster than us dispatching forces for defense.
In the end, we had no choice but to station defensive units at both locations in advance.
"Then shouldn't we recall whichever Queen's front has fewer demands, starting now?"
"That's a thought too. But the moment we recall the Queen on the Kasanagara Continent side, an ambush force could come charging in."
I didn't think they'd have an ambush force at army scale hiding there, but that didn't mean a small elite strike team wasn't possible.
Especially since the Ancient Dragons on their side would be difficult to fight on equal terms with anything less than a Queen-class opponent.
"So the defending side is at a disadvantage?"
"Not exactly."
There were actually more advantages to being on the defensive than you'd think.
The attacker's advantage lay in being able to choose when and where to strike.
In other words, this initial choice was the attacker's first and last advantage.
Now that it was spent, only disadvantages remained.
I believed that even if the enemy wasted a Queen piece on this, they'd get change back.
"Well, the battle's only just begun. For our side, stalling for time alone brings us closer to the victory condition. Let's just play the nice, leisurely delaying game, shall we?"
The Great Ello Dungeon was vast.
Just traveling from the upper layers down to this deepest level took a considerable amount of time.
As for the vertical shafts that served as shortcuts, we'd already prepared countermeasures.
If they walked right into them, that was even better.
Take the normal route, and it would take that much longer. Try for a shortcut, and we'd nail them there.
Either way, it didn't matter.
"Even so, they've really gathered quite the force over there," Sophia said, her gaze fixed on something far away.
Rather than "fixed," I should say she was probably looking at it. Vampires had abilities that included things like clones, so she was likely observing the situation of
"They're running out of time too. They must be taking some serious risks."
I'd predicted their attack would come a bit later than this, but it was much earlier than expected.
They had to be pushing themselves hard.
Still, that was probably the right call for them.
The faster they moved, the better it was for them. Or rather, they were acting before the disadvantages caught up with them.
As time passed, people's confusion would only grow proportionally.
After all, every human on the planet had been forced to install the Taboo.
Just having Taboo installed was enough to breed revulsion.
And the mental pain of actually looking at the Taboo menu was immense.
That was why most people would avert their eyes and try not to look at it.
But even that couldn't last forever.
The compulsive urge emanating from Taboo—there was only so long anyone could resist it.
Eventually, whether they liked it or not, they'd have no choice but to look at the contents of Taboo.
And once they did, they'd be bombarded with the compulsions from Taboo alongside the guilt-provoking content.
Once that happened, the blades they turned toward us would start to waver.
Probably, the more time passed, the more supporters we'd gain.
Or else, suicides would increase.
And once that happened, the nations would descend into chaos, too preoccupied to fight.
The Pope must have wanted to act quickly and bring things to a short decisive battle before that happened.
With no time to think, he was still playing the optimal move.
As expected—or how should I put it—having him as an enemy was about as troublesome as it gets.
"Our victory condition is simply to stall for time. White is working inside here right now on the system collapse. Until that's complete, we hold this position to the death. Simple, right?"
As I said that, I pointed to the door behind me.
This was the deepest, innermost point of the Great Ello Dungeon's lowest layer.
The door towering there was the core of this world's system.
It was where
"On the other hand, the Pope and his people's victory condition is to reach this place before the system collapse begins, and have those with Ruler authority serve as keys to lock down the system collapse."
In other words, if they broke through, we lost.
"Though, depending on how the fight between White and Gyuurie turns out, the situation could shift. Either way, what we need to do doesn't change."
We believed in White's victory, and we would defend this position.
We'd do what we could.
It was that simple.
"Hmm..." Sophia began to mull something over.
"Got a question?"
"I'm fine with us, but what about Uncle
"I just told you..."
Had this girl not been listening?
"I'm not talking about the victory conditions—I mean what happens after this fight is over."
"After this fight is over?"
"Well, isn't Uncle Dustin's plan completely broken?"
"Ah."
That made sense once she said it. It was something I'd been thinking about too.
The Pope's objective was to stop us—to keep the system running as it had been.
Sariel was approaching her limit. His plan seemed to be to bring Gyuurie in as Sariel's successor, have Gyuurie release all the power she had, and push the energy to the required threshold.
But that was impossible.
Humanity's souls were also approaching their limit, just like Sariel's.
If Sariel hit her limit, so would humanity's souls.
When that happened, reincarnation would become impossible until humanity's souls recovered, and the world's population would continue to decline.
And as the population dropped, so would the amount of energy the system could reclaim.
Even if they kept the system running as normal, the decline was plain as day.
"Nine times out of ten, the Pope is hiding something from us."
"Hiding something?"
I nodded.
"There's no way that Pope hasn't noticed. Which means he's confident he can balance the books somehow."
That Pope, after all. There was no way that monster would deliberately walk down a path to destruction.
He was absolutely cooking up some plan.
"How?"
"Beats me. If I knew that, we wouldn't have to struggle."
I shrugged.
"But the fact that he's hiding it from us means it's something unfavorable to us."
Exactly. Him hiding it from us meant it was bad news for us.
It was virtually guaranteed to be something unpleasant.
"So we just smash the whole thing along with his plan, then?"
"Short version, yeah."
What the Pope was scheming—I had no idea.
But what we needed to do hadn't changed.
"Now then. Let's sit back and watch what humanity has to offer."