Chapter 747 Welcome To Hell
( On the other side of the portal )When humans and elves saw the landscape of hell for the first time ever , the blood flowing in their veins became a bit cold as the terrain of hell was basically bone chilling.
The air seemed to be heavier than the middle realm and there was no visible sun in the area.
Although the space was enclosed , the solid ceiling was atleast 12-14 kms above ground which made the opening massive , however the most scary part about hell was the lack of natural vegetation as there were no signs of green plants growing for hundreds of miles in all directions.
This was a completely different environment for the greenery loving humans and elves which spooked them a little.
However the most spooky part was the already prepared humongous war camps run by greater and winged demons , as Rudra's forces recieved a grand welcome to hell by the already waiting Hades army.
On Rudra's instructions the demon army was spread so thin across multiple small camps that on one glance none of the humans could figure out the exact number of the demon forces amongst their own ranks.
This was a deliberate illusion to make it look like Hades's own forces were extremely large and had no need for the support of petty humans and to intimidate and instill confidence amongst the newcomers.
There were 5 major camps , commanded by the five commanders , and the portals that Rudra opened already distributed the army in a way that every portal took the army to their designated camp.
As the men walked into their camps , they were tapped on the shoulder by elder witches as regardless of the initial color of their armour and boots it now got converted into a dark black color to signify the army they belonged to.
' Black ' was the color of death which is why it was chosen as standard bearer for the army , and in the red hellscape it was the only color that had a darker contrast to the sand.
Everyone except those in Rudra's camp came face to face with various strong greater demons , as looking at the 12 feet tall and super muscular demons with horns adorning their head many elves and smaller humans felt intimidated.
The winged demons were about 6-7 feet tall and also super muscular with a huge wingspan of about their total height. They could be seen plated in black armour as they roamed the skies above the camp transporting supplies and weapons.
The various commanders started to quickly initialise the newbies in their camps as small individual speeches and warplan explanation broke down on all four camp sites except Rudra's.
Rudra's camp only consisted of men who he had weathered many wars with. Wether it be the elves or the men from Hazelgroove Empire or his own elites , there was no need for him to to treat them like newbies when they were the only ones who were not going to get any rest whatsoever.
The current temporary camp was prone to a massive attack by Lucifer and Rudra had no doubt in his mind that the presence of the intruding army would have already alarmed the death lord.
Should they remain in the open plains for more than 3 weeks , in Rudra's estimation it would be enough time for Lucifer to mobilize a strike on this defenseless camp which was why it was a matter of utmost importance to capture the first ' town of gates ' as soon as possible.
Currently the army was camping at the edge of the barrenlands and the nearest village was the outermost Eastern village of hell called the village of no return.
It was a myth that those who ventured into these barrenlands alone would never return alive , and that was most likely a true myth since Rudra himself had checked the terrain through god's eye and there was no vegetation , water source or creatures living in the barrens for over 100-120 killometers.
What the army of death needed to do at the moment was to quickly capture the two villages leading to the ' Town Of Gates ' and then capture the town of gates without damaging the integral structure of the town.
The town of gates was a well defended town that could easily house 10-15 million inhabitants. Although not big enough to house the entire army ,it could atleast provide a defensive wall against an enemy attack and a base for operations.
While the other commanders beat the humans in their army into shape in the next 2 weeks , making them familiar with the demon legion and war tactics it was Rudra's task to take down two villages and one town on his own to provide the army of death with a base of operations.
Rudra had volunteered for this critical task as he trusted noone but his own skills to get it done in time.
Logically the easiest way to wipe entire villages was for Rudra to rely on the might of his full army and storm the small establishments without mercy .
This strategy was especially effective for small villages which barely had a wooden fence around their boundries and could be wiped in a matter of minutes with a full army. However Rudra chose not to do so.
Using his god's eyes he could see that both the villages as well as the town had a lot of tier 3 and 4 warriors posted within them which were not present during the last time Rudra had scanned the area a few months ago
Not just in the eastern front, they were posted on the outermost villages of all fronts as Lucifer seemed to fortify all sides not knowing which one the enemy would chose to attack from.
There were 3 tier 4 combatants posted in the village of no return and 6 posted in the village after that , while there were 12 posted in the town of gates .
This was unbelievable security for border towns and the presence of such powerful men made the wave tactics useless in attacking the establishments.
Although Rudra would be able to kill them , quite comfortably at that , there was no gaurantee that they would not launch a grand move before death costing Rudra a significant portion of his army.
For this reason , Rudra chose to only take 30 tier 4 elites with him on the hunt as being a tier 4 existence themselves should push come to shove they were all equipped with enough methods to protect themselves against even a peak tier 4 attack.
Plus a smaller group would have a stealth advantage that a bigger group would not which would save precious movement time and salvage the element of surprise.
As Rudra scanned the area more he saw the hiding scouts in the sandpits outside the village of no return as he chuckled and unsheathed grim reaper to launch strikes from a distance of 55 kms away to roll the heads of the 12 different scouts clean.
However just as he was doing this , he felt a heavy presence eyeing him as cold sweat trickled from his back at that moment.
' LUCIFER ' Rudra knew at that instant that the fallen angel had found the presence of Hades 's camp for sure now as Rudra stared directly at where he felt his eye to be as a wide grin was plastered on his face.
Rudra mouthed the words ' I'm coming for you ' to the eye as he did not back off from his pressure this time around.
Although Rudra could detect his presence he could do nothing about it prying on the secrets of the Hades camp. But thankfully there was someone stronger present beside him who could!
The god of death was furious by the intrusion as he shouted with power " BEGONE "
Black smoke rose from the ground and created a acidic mist cloud around Lucifer's eye until it was eaten away and dismantled.
Rudra looked towards the very central building of the camp , the massive looking death palace as he felt reassured by the god's presence.
For once , he was not the one having the biggest burden of the lot , nor was he the strongest fighter in the group.
He only needed to work his part faithfully and for that he was ready ! Rounding up the Elders and the core tier 4 members he selected for this expedition Rudra gave the order to move out in 15 minutes.
There was no rest for the elite warriors , as from the very first day , glory and lives of demons were theirs to claim.
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( Meanwhile Lucifer)
Lucifer was seething after looking at the size of Hades's army. Although he did not have a clear idea about the total number it was atleast well over a 100 million by his estimations.
Most of the forces even comprised of humans which was not something Lucifer had expected. After the demons diary was destroyed , Lucifer thought Hades would not be able to amass enough forces to launch a credible attack in the short term but it seemed like he was able to rally puny humans in large numbers for some reason.
Lucifer had an inkling that the reason why he was able to rally humans was because of the one puny human shakuni who had been a thorn by his side since the start and this made his blood boil unlike no other.
Never had a mortal been this big of a menace to a god and today he even had the audacity to look him in the eye and mouth the words ' I am coming for you '
A mortal coming for a god?
Ridiculous!
Only an ugly death awaited Rudra, as he had irked the wrath of Lucifer.
/// Next bonus chapter for GT is at 2200 tickets , we are very close, let's try and get it by tommorow you all ///