When Zhang Nu finished off Gaim and Du Mingfeng, the allied tribal army of the Ironblooded Heroes Guild and the berserker army of Berserk Beast City both became leaderless mobs.
Adding in the resistance from the elves, they had no way to interfere with the Demon King's subordinates and could only watch as the draconian priests cast his spells.
The armies of Darkness Valley were brought over one group at a time.
The Demon King's most elite army was quickly assembled and readied for combat!
The draconians and elves worked together and crushed the Ironblooded Heroes and the Berserk Beast City army, who could only retreat without being able to fight back!
[You've slain a tiger-kin warrior. Gold +20!]
[You've slain an orc warrior. Gold +25!]
[You've slain an orc berserker. Gold +80!]
[You've slain an orc warrior. Gold +25!]
[You've slain an orc high berserker. Gold +800!]
[...]
[You've slain a level 2 Hero. Soul +1!]
[You've slain a level 1 Hero. Soul +1!]
[You've slain a level 1 Hero. Soul +1!]
[You've slain a level 2 Hero. Soul +1!]
[...]
The player menu was constantly refreshed with new messages.
The Demon King army was fiercer the longer it fought, with no mercy whatsoever.
The Ironblooded Heroes and the Berserk Beast City army completely collapsed!
As the bloodbath went on, just the gold income from that reached an amazing number.
This battle continued for over an hour. The Ironblooded Heroes and the Berserk Beast City army were completely annihilated. The numbers wiped out by the Demon King army reached up to around 10,000.
One could say that this is the biggest battle to have happened since the Demo King's descent. Truly, the battlefield was made into a hell of mountains of corpses and rivers of blood.
When the citizens of Giantree City witnessed the battle, they were deeply struck with shock and awe!
Nothing establishes the Demon King's might better than this bloody battlefield.
By now, the battle has reached the conclusion. The two enemy armies were basically completely destroyed. All that's left is some cleaning up.
Zhang Nu took a look.
His gold gains here reached over 280 thousand!
This is despite the fact that a small portion of the enemies were killed by the elven army.
Since those elves aren't the Demon King's subordinates yet, their kills aren't considered the Demon King's kills. Otherwise, the total income could definitely have reached 300 thousand!
As expected.
For Demon Kings, killing, battles, destruction, and conquest are the quickest ways to gain money and power.
Even for Zhang Nu, 280 thousand gold is no small number. It's more than enough to raise a great and powerful army, greatly increasing his power!
"Very good!"
"Let's consider this gold as part of the tab that Giantree City still owes me!"
Zhang Nu originally extorted 5 million continental gold from Giantree City. Converted to game gold, that's more around 500 thousand. Giantree City had only paid 2 million, and the remaining 3 million originally went up in smoke after the First Elder's death.
Now though.
Killing those guys had basically given him pretty much the equivalent of what was owed.
This battle was enormous, so casualties were unavoidable. That said, the casualties are only equivalent to around 10-20 thousand gold, completely insignificant compared to the gains.
Besides which.
Aside from the gold, Zhang Nu had also killed a great number of Heroes.
Du Mingfeng was a level 3 Hero. The chiefs and leaders of the 8 great tribes were all level 2 Elites. The rest of them are mostly just random level 1 Heroes though.
In total, he got 51 Souls from this battle.
1 level 3. 9 level 2s. 41 level 1s.
Sacrificing them can probably net him around 400 or so Points. That's still a few hundred short from the thousand mark.
What a pity.
If only there were a bit more Heroes.
However, there really are no more Heroes to be found in Giantree City now.
When Zhang Nu's previous raid on Giantree City destroyed the headquarters of the Heros Guild and Ironblooded Heroes, he had already pretty much taken out the vast majority of all the Heroes in Giantree City.
The ones that he killed today were all from the Ironblooded Heroes' vassel tribes.
While one can't say definitively that all the Heroes within the area have been killed, there's definitely very few, if any level 2 Heroes left. The rest are all merely level 1 n00bs.
Zhang Nu is a bit depressed by that.
For a Demon King, Heroes are important resources too.
At times, a thorough purge may not necessarily be a good thing.
It's like how one shouldn't take everything when harvesting veggies. One should always give it the time and space to grow back.
Only that way will one be able to guarantee continuous harvests.
Thankfully, the Chaos Forest spans over 5 million square kilometers. There are still plenty of cities like Giantree City around, so even if there's no more to be harvested here, he could just switch locations and keep on harvesting.
Besides that, there are also 5 skill stones and various equipment from the Heroes.
Of them, the skill stone that dropped from Du Mingfeng is pretty good.
[Skill Stone: Magic Seal]. C Rank. Costs 35 MP. One can enchant one's weapon with the sealing effect, which applies magic seal to enemies on attack. Effect duration depends on the user and target's respective power.
This skill is quite useful, so Zhang Nu used it for himself right away.
As for the remaining 4 skill stones, they're not all that useful to him personally, but it would also be a shame to just throw them away. Thus, he just stored them with a mind to use them for trade or as rewards.
As dusk came, the battle of Giantree City finally came to an end.
However this is not the end of Giantree City's trials.
The Demon King and the vast majority of his elite army have all appeared in the center of Giantree City. Once again, the saying about how what is easy to invite in isn't so easy to get to leave.
Without the help of Darkness Valley this time, it would have been very difficult for the elves alone to defeat the traitor army and the elites of Berserk Beast City.
While they used the Demon King's power to deal with their traitors and invaders, is this not still a risky act akin to "provoking the tiger to chase away the wolf"?
After all, a "tiger" is even worse than a "wolf".
If the Demon King and his subordinates were to start rampaging, then Giantree City would definitely face a disaster that would destroy them.
Nancilia brought several of the elven leaders before the Demon King. Then, this future Elf Queen did not hesitate before taking a knee and kneeling down.
"Thank you, your majesty the Demon King!"
"In thanks for saving Giantree City and us elves, I bring my people, my elves, to join your majesty!"
When the thousands of elves present saw this scene, they all reacted with alarm. Her ladyship the city lord actually lowered herself and kneeled?
Elves are a race with great pride!
At that moment, murmurs started breaking out. Emotions ran high. There were many elves who weren't willing to accept this. They even wanted to stand and publicly object.
This made the atmosphere that had finally calmed down grow tense again.
The slightest accident could light a spark, and the result of that would be utter destruction.
Several elven elders saw this, and stepped forth as well.
They followed behind their city lord and also took a knee, "Giantree City will follow your majesty the Demon King. We simply request that your majesty treat the elves with kindness!"
The Demon King nodded with satisfaction, "My promise will stand eternally. So long as you follow me loyally, then Giantree City will always remain the home of the elves!"
"Thank you, your majesty!"
The other elves aren't fools.
The elven elders have good eyes.
After seeing the Demon King show his King's Sanctum, they knew that Giantree City must not, nor can they, resist this great being!
Giantree City is merely one of many cities within the enormous Chaos Forest.
Their branch of elves have also long since declined.
At this point, pledging themselves to a great king of dragons isn't actually something completely unacceptable. After all, the other party is a true king!
The Demon King nodded. However his gaze swept across the area.
The other elves are currently still standing.
At this moment, the one armed elven Third Elder yelled out, "What are you standing about for? His majesty the Demon King saved the city lord, saved Giantree City. He's the savior of us elves, so are we going to return his grace with betrayal?"
"Giantree City is already gravely hurt!"
"Berserk Beast City is also looking our way with greed!"
"For Giantree City, for our people, we must follow his majesty the Demon King... Kneel already!"
When they heard that, the elves lowered their weapons.
Finally, the thousands of elves there all kneel in submission.
At the same time, Zhang Nu got the message.
[You've conquered Giantree City].
[Gained "Shining Mithril Treasure Chest"!]
Zhang Nu was naturally overjoyed.
This really is a benchmark of his Demon King enterprise.
Everything before was but minor gains. This is what true conquest is!
This elven city with 300 years of history, the tens of thousands of elves living here, the hundreds of thousands of regular residents, and the magnificent and rich forest city.
From now on, it has become one of the Demon King's territories!
Zhang Nu has gained the highest level and biggest reward chest that he has gotten thus far.
Even the sum of all the reward chests he has gained would likely be nowhere near the value of this one!
He didn't hesitate and opened it up right away!