The Rise Of A Porter

Chapter 260 - Surrender Or Die (2)

What takes positive cultures centuries to evolve can be savaged in moments. Let it monuments or knowledge. Anything can be destroyed. The children a species raises with love can be murdered in an instant. What war ravages takes so very long to heal from, longer than multiple lifetimes.

That's what the nagas did to the people who lived in the city that was taken over by the monsters. They were all high and mighty but never thought that karma would someday come and bite them in the butt. This time karma came in form of Arnold and his army. 

Through a mystical portal, Arnold emerged like an angel of war. Behind him was his army of thousands of soldiers, ready to kill or be killed. But they didn't need to do much. The hounds Arnold had left behind had already thrown the monsters in disarray. But his sudden appearance along with his army made the nagas question reality. They didn't know about the blinded their queen had committed and were surprised to see the humans attacking them. That too when they barely managed to kill the mysterious dog-like creatures, death itself came knocking on their door. 

Still, they refused to give up. They were courageous. Wanting to defend their land from the invaders till their last breath. A foolish attempt but an attempt none the less. 

Courage was a trait Arnold respected a lot. No matter whether it came from a friend or a foe. Sadly, naga's courage was misplaced. Initially, there were 3500 nagas in the city but Arnold's hounds managed to render a couple of hundred of them useless by either killing them or tearing their limbs apart. On Arnold's commands, the hounds minimised the killings as their master had planned on turning the nagas into meat shield for the human warriors. 

Thus, it was 3300 of the nagas against ten thousand human warriors. The odds for the nagas to win were non-existent. Arnold gave them a warning to surrender but nagas being the prideful race that they were, refused to do so. The warriors were itching for Arnold to give them the command to kill the slithering bastards. But no order came out of Arnold's mouth. 

Instead, he summoned his most war-crazed summons: Dread, Asterios and Bad-Breath. All three of them were as strong as Kolt if not stronger. Even so, only three of them wouldn't be enough to take down 3300 nagas. They were strong but as strong as Scylla. She was the only one who could've taken on the entire naga population by herself. But Arnold wasn't going to summon his pet for such a trivial task. 

"Dread, Asterios, and BB. Come here." He ordered the summons to line in front of him, "Consider this a test. You have to minimize bloodshed but crush their will power to fight back. In short, crush them mentally, not physically. I know this might be a bit difficult for you to accomplish. Thus, I'm giving you a hand."

Saying so Arnold placed his hands over them one after another. The soldiers who had never seen Arnold's ability to enhance his summons and weapons didn't know what was going on but Nicole, Nina, and Johnny knew exactly what Arnold was doing. 

___

You are using [ENHANCEMENT] on lv. 98 Undead <Asterios>

ENHANCING...

ENHANCING...

ENHANCING...

[ENHANCEMENT] SUCCESSFUL!

All attributes have been increased!

HP : 15000/15000

STRENGTH (STR) : 156

STAMINA (STA) : 140

INTELLIGENCE (INT) : 88

AGILITY (AGI) : 99

ACCURACY (ACC) : 99

EVADE (EVD) : 102

BUFF : Level and rank of <Undead> increased.

LEVEL : 121

RANK : Cosmic C

Bonus effect :

DEFENSE (DEF) increased by : 10%

HP increased by : 15%

Duration : Temporary buff. Lasts for 1 hour.

___

The effect of enhancement on Dread and Bad-Breath was more or less the same. Dread too got to Cosmic Rank C while Bad-Breath only achieved the cosmic Rank D. Sadly none of their effects was permanent but Arnold understood it. The more his rank would increase, the harder it was getting to obtain permanent enhancement of his summons. If not, even he thought that would be kind of overpowered. 

'Imagine having demigod like summons... Who knows what on earth would they be able to do?' Arnold mumbled and unleashed the three on the nagas while sending in some reinforcements in form of golems and hounds to help them a bit. 

The nagas fought bravely. Alleiah even managed to destroy Bad-Breath with help of a few others, but the rest wrecked hell on them. By the time Arnold ordered the summons to stop, around two-thirds of the city was in shambles. Dread and Asterios had trampled over the city like it was made by origami. Only enough buildings were left for human occupation. The nagas fought and were defeated and humiliated. 

The nagas never imagined that someone like Arnold could summon monstrous beings like Asterios and Dread. Nor had they thought that anyone would attack them from within the city itself and had focused solely on protecting the perimeter outside the city by setting up traps to help them in time of crisis. Yet, their impenetrable fortress ended up being an imagination, as not only did Arnold penetrate the city, but he also defeated the occupants. 

"O great one!" Alleiah called out to Arnold, all smugness of her tone was long gone, "Take my head if I have displeased you in any way, but please forgive the rest of my people. They are innocent. It is I who angered you. Not them. Kill me but please have mercy on the rest."

Alleiah being the queen of the nagas, offered her head to Arnold as 'compensation' for the way the nagas in her court behaved with the humans. But Arnold refused. The nagas thought they were all gonna die but to their surprise, Arnold called his summons back. 

"I won't be taking anyone's head." Arnold's firm voice boomed through the naga city, "I came here in peace, yet you despicable beings betrayed my trust. It a naive mistake on my part. A mistake that I would fix now."

He continued, "At every level society, from the personal to the international scale, treaties are a falsehood where a power imbalance exists. The meeting with you taught me this. I don't need to make a treaty with weaklings like you. Thus, because of monsters like you true peace cannot exist, only more and less violent forms of wars. You took me as a fool. But you were wrong and I'm going to make sure that you atone for your crimes against me."

Arnold then looked towards the scared monsters who were cautiously looking back at him. Their eyes filled reflecting the defeat they were feeling now. They now knew they had put their hands in a Hornet's nest. that they played a gamble and lost. None of them said a word but kept staring at Arnold. Waiting for his verdict. 

"Starting now, you're all my slaves. I don't care whether you are willing or not. You don't have an option. Either you turn into a slave or die. The choice is yours." Saying so, Arnold sat on a chair and waited for the queen's reply. 

"We'll do as you please, master." Alleiah replied in a low voice.