Brigadier of the 7th Corps, Ike--

　It was a familiar name until a few days ago, but now the word 'journey' has disappeared from the brigade commander and has been replaced with 'vice'.

　My subordinates call me Deputy Commander, but what I do is not much different from what I did before.

　It's only that I can now sit next to Cephiro at the regularly held corps meetings.
　The only other thing that has changed is that the other brigade leaders have come to respect me.

　The werewolf brigade's bayou, which was previously filled with hostility, now seems to have come to appreciate my abilities.

　Even when passing each other in the corridors of Cephiro's castle, Barenzele, he began to give way.

　The habits of the demon race are more ingrained to the core.
　Behind those eyes, you can see the ambition of "I'll overtake you one day".
　That glint in their eyes is not unpleasant.
　I understood and desired that the demon race was like that.
　Besides, the competitive spirit of a guy can be beneficial to an organization.

''I'm not going to lose to that guy! And if you do your best, it will result in the benefit of the 7th Corps.

　Now that I've been promoted to deputy commander, the other brigade leaders are not only my rivals, but also my subordinates.

　If I can get them to work well and help the Demon King's Army, that's one step closer to my dream.

　The world where demons and humans coexist, that's the world I'm aiming for.
　In order to achieve this goal, I have to fight the humans first.

　In order to create a world where humans and demons can coexist, the demons must rule this continent.

　If they didn't unify this world while Dairokten-sama was still in his position as the Demon King, that dream would not come true.

　If another Demon King ruled the world, the humans would be slaughtered or used as slaves.

　Or if the humans defeated the demons, the demons would all be killed.

　In order to achieve the Republic of Demons and Humans, I must unify this world while Dairokuten-sama is still alive and well and I still have time left in my life.

　Sometimes it's easy to forget when I'm wearing this deformed mask and robe, but I myself was a human inside.

　I can't live for hundreds of years.
　Considering the lifespan of a human being, I don't think that much time is prepared for that long.
　I don't have the time to take things for granted.

(We need to kick it off as soon as possible.)

　As I'm thinking about this, I hear a tap on the office door.
　This tapping is Giron.
　If it's Sati, she would tap more quietly.

　When I allowed him to enter the room with the magic of 《Release (Unlotku)》, Jiron entered the room in a great hurry.

''Sir!　Sir!　Mr. Ike!　It's a big deal!

　What could possibly go wrong?
　This man is a small-minded person, and even the slightest thing could cause him to change his expression.
　It's impossible to grasp the seriousness of the situation from the expression on his face.

What are you so upset about?

　I pour a glass of water from the jug to calm Jiron's mind.
　Jiron drank it all at once and wiped his mouth with the sleeve of his clothes, "Phew!

　And then, after a breath, he gave a serious report.

I'm sure you'll be able to find out more about this.
We talked about that earlier.
But I think we've got it all figured out.

　Well, no wonder the guy in Giron is so spooked.
　I'm convinced.

'Your husband isn't surprised?
Yeah, I'm not surprised.

　This information came from a previous visit to the market with Sati.
　At that time, the information was not yet definitive.
　It was said that Rosalia and the nations were in a dispute over terms and conditions.

　Perhaps, but after that, the complete beating of Rosalia's troops had contributed to the formation of this alliance.

　I knew this would happen, but I didn't dare to tell Jiron about it.

　As I've said many times before, this little orc is a petulant little man.

　If the humans knew they were going to attack us as one, this man, this man, might become insomniac and interfere with our business.

　He is the chief strategist of our brigade, which is by no means a very competent one, but we cannot afford to have his work efficiency reduced any further.

　Hence, I kept my mouth shut, but since it was overheard, I had no choice.
　I decided to be honest and talk about our future prospects.

''We knew beforehand that the Alliance of the Lords would be formed. There's no need to panic.''
'What?　Did your husband anticipate this?
Well.
That's great. How so?
It's a preliminary information gathering. And a hunch.

　The Demon King's Army has already taken control of half of the country called Rosalia.
　They have cornered this country, which is known as a power on the continent, to this point.
　And he also successfully defeated the last rebellion of Rosalia's army the other day.
　The formation of the League of Lords was entirely predictable.

　The League of Lords is a pact made in the ancient past between humans.

　It is the wisdom that the humans have devised to counter the powerful forces of the Demon King's Army that are sometimes united.

　In essence, it was an agreement that when the Demon King's army was deemed too powerful for a single country to handle, the nations gathered on this continent would unite to fight together.

　In the past, this pact had been concluded three times, but each time the Demon King's army, which had been invading at an unprecedented rate, had been repelled.

　Will this time be the same?
　When you see the way Giron and others are frightened, you think, yes, they will.
　It's not a good idea to assume that it's because of this man's petulance.

　In fact, as mentioned earlier, the Demon King's Army has been defeated three times by this "League of Kings".

　What happens twice will happen three times.
　Third time is the charm.
　There's a saying, "Third time is a charm.

　This is the fourth time that the League of Lords has been established, so if all goes well, they should lose this time too.

　It was not surprising that Giron was frightened.

'Sir, what shall we do?　If they don't, a huge army of humans will attack here, right?

He's going to attack us.

　I say as if it were someone else's problem.

Are you okay with this? This time, the humans that are coming this time are even more numerous than last time. There could be thousands of them.

''I wonder how many thousands it will take. At the very least ten thousand, if the humans gathered their full strength, they would probably be attacked by hundreds of thousands of soldiers. The last time the Demon King's army was cornered in the east, they were also killed by their overwhelming numbers.

..........

　Jiron's face paled and he was speechless.
　Incidentally, the size of my brigade is about six hundred people.
　The number was increased because I was promoted to deputy commander.

　They absorbed Jace's army that betrayed us the other day and were replenished with new demons and demonkind.

　Although this Ivalice city is a solid fortified city, it still wouldn't be able to stand up to violence in numbers.

　--I'm sure you'll be able to find a way to make it work.

　It's a good idea to have the experience of going through many battlefields and the ultimate weapon that was acquired the other day.

　And then there are the friends who fought through the war with me.
　I'm not going to be afraid of any large army as long as I have these things.

Well... well...

　When I divulged that, I decided to consider the mass production of that final weapon, the flintlock gun.

　The other day, I gave Cephiro a flintlock gun.

　It was that mad alchemist. He may have disassembled and disassembled it, and may have at least set an eye on a mass production system by now.

　If they succeeded in mass production of the flamethrower, the war situation would change dramatically.

　With just a single battle, they could demoralize the enemy and put an end to this pointless war.

　With that in mind, he headed to his boss, Cephiro.


†


　Commander of the 7th Legion Legion, the Witch of the Black Peril, Sephiro.
　Her residence is located in the territory of the Demon King's Army.

　A sorceress would almost forget about it since she could transfer to it in an instant, but it was a strange feeling to go back and forth between places hundreds of kilometers away.

　However, that advantage could also turn into a disadvantage.

　The woman named Sephiro was a prankster, often for no reason, calling me up and using me as a test subject or going on and on about trivial things.

　I guess she takes advantage of me because I'm a decent person, but after all, she's taken care of me since I was a child, so I can't be insulated from her.

　This time, after listening to the meaningless stories peculiar to women, she finally got down to business.

As it turns out, we can't mass-produce flintlocklock guns," he said.

　That was the conclusion she came to.

'Can't even the Commander of the Quicksilver have it?

　Sephiro nodded in frustration.

I've tried to make a few similar ones. But a counterfeit is just that, a counterfeit. All it takes is one bullet and the bottom falls out.

　As she says this, she places the chunk of metal stuffed in the bottom of the flintlock gun on the desk.
　I gaze at the object.

'What's this?'

I don't know. If only I knew how to make it. We could mass-produce these iron tubes, too.

..........

　I'm silent.
　Because the object on the desk was a familiar one.
　This is just a screw, right?
　It's a T-shaped metal rod with spiral lines in it.　　　
　--I see, there are no screws in this world.

　I have memories of a previous life where screws are commonplace, so I never paid attention to them, but if you think about it, showing a screw to someone who has no knowledge of them and asking them to make one would be baffling.

　However, if you are good with your hands, you may be able to carve out a screw one by one.

　However, it would be impossible to mass-produce them if they had to be cut one by one by hand.

　A few screws a day would be the limit.
　It would be impossible to have all of them.
　It would be more efficient to still mass produce the bowguns.
　Should we change our policy and give up the production of flintlocks?

　--No, it's too early to give up.

　After all, with a powerful weapon like a flame-locked gun, we will be able to advance our war effort in the future.

　I'm not going to say that I don't want to see blood spilled, but even so, the sooner we end the war, the less blood will be spilled.

　That's what I thought, and I made a proposal to the Commander.

''-- Commander, what if I told you that I have an idea about the way this metal is mass produced?　

　Cephiro looks surprised.
　He must have a feeling of "no way".

"What is impossible for a mistress to do, you can do?

'No, well, I just have an idea of how to do that. But I'd like your permission to run the army for it.

What do you mean?

'He's top-notch when it comes to magic, but I wouldn't say he's top-notch when it comes to machines. The Commander is.

　In case you're wondering, I've added the word 'super' to lift it up, but when it comes to machines, there are plenty of people above you.

　For example, the famous 'dwarves' in the fantasy world.

''I'm going to discuss it with the Dwarf King and ask for his cooperation.

　Hearing those words, Cephiro seemed to be convinced along with a surprised expression.

''........Günther, King of the Dwarves?''　

　Cephiro mentions his name.
　I think he understands my intentions with that word.

"Indeed, it would be easy for that thing to make this one.

Yeah, I think.

　You're right, you can't just show it to him, but I have knowledge of my previous life.
　If you tell him about it, he can easily recreate it for you.

　Günther, King of the Dwarves.
　He is the king of the sub-human dwarves, familiar from the fantasy world.
　The dwarves had a country in the west of this continent, but that country is no longer here.
　They were destroyed by humans.
　Since then, the dwarves have become a wandering people, wandering from place to place.

　Die Menschen haben den Zwergenkönig gefangen genommen, um zu verhindern, dass sich das Zwergenvolk wieder erhebt.
　Die List ist nicht die Hinrichtung, sondern die Inhaftierung.

　Sollte er hingerichtet werden, könnte dies der Katalysator für einen Massenaufstand von Zwergen in jeder Region sein.
　Wenn Sie sie am Leben lassen, können sie im Notfall als Geiseln benutzt werden.

　In gewisser Weise mögen Menschen listiger sein als die Dämonen.

　Ich verstehe beide Gefühle, und ich werde weder das eine noch das andere verteidigen, aber manchmal kann ein Mensch teuflische Dinge tun.

　Das möchte ich nicht vergessen.
　Für die Menschen und Dämonen sind sie Monster!
　Ich wollte kein Dämon sein, nur ein "Herz", wenn ich verflucht war.

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Der mächtigste Zauberer der Armee des Dämonenkönigs war ein Mensch, das Cover der Buchausgabe Band 2.