Soon after that, things got too chaotic and people started shouting over each other, talking about what they had to do and the plans they needed to deploy, while also throwing accusations at one another over who was to blame for the kalla entering the town unnoticed and what not. Fortunately, I didn't need to deal with that for long, after the initial first wave of shock went away, captain Dunn asked Sir William Longspear if he could prepare a room for me to rest, something he either did because he saw how tired I was, or because he didn't trust me enough to let me return home and be so far away from him.

At that moment, basically, the whole castle had come back to life, maids and servants were running all around, with the Marquess' butler, who knew what was really happening, directing them to prepare something to give to the unexpected guests, and also getting them to get ready for what was going to happen at the morning. The butler had one of the maids lead me to one of the castle's many guest rooms, which was well furnished and decorated, it was the first time Dorian lay on a bed as comfortable as that.

As I lay there waiting for sleep to claim me, my mind started wandering around and I couldn't help but think about what happened that night, and of course that included the individual we killed. I tried my best to ignore that and just fell asleep, to run away from what I have been a part of, for as long as I could, but that didn't work, I wasn't able to fall asleep. It was then, and as I was trying to find any way out and away from the fiyavtic's lifeless eyes, that I remembered something I had put aside before; trying meditation as Dorian.

Meditation was one of the first steps an elf had to go through to do magic, and also something only elves were able to do, but previously, and in a moment of irritation, I started meditating as Zagmuz, which was something the demon prince already tried and failed in doing, and I still failed, except that I didn't fail entirely as there was what seemed to be a minor success and the side effect of that success was my body going to sleep much easier than trying to sleep normally.

So with newfound hope, I started meditating as Dorian to try and fall asleep as fast as possible, a small part of me was worried about how someone might be able to realize what I was doing, and how dangerous trying to meditate in an unfamiliar environment was. But I was also almost sure that no mana was being moved and that no one would be able to notice anything from me just lying there, so I threw those worries away and concentrated more on the task at hand.

Unfortunately, things didn't go as I had wished, no matter how much I tried to enter the special state of meditation, I wasn't able to. Not even the initial success where I could empty my mind and let everything disappear, like what happened with Zagmuz. It seemed that there was some kind of major differences between demons, humans and elves and that demons were closer to elves than humans were.

With the easiest way to sleep out, I had to sleep the old way, by forcing myself to. It was hard, and again I thought that it was almost impossible, but it seemed that even if my mind was a bit active my body needed rest. Dorian was already a weak human, and going through all that had happened that day only stressed my body more, so after a bit of turning and fighting with my thoughts, and with some help from me as Denethor, I was finally able to fall asleep, even though it felt light.

And I'm glad that I was able to do that when I did because not even 10 minutes after I finally fell into a slumber as Dorian, a change occurred on Zagmuz's side, something that I had already expected.

"Your Highness, wake up," said the voice of Gorduf, my butler was waking me up as gently as he could, most likely afraid of my wrath at being woken up at that late hour, and he had all the right to be, Zagmuz was usually quite grumpy when he woke up.

"What?" I shouted. Not trying even one bit to hold the irritation I was feeling back, Zagmuz would never have done that after all.

"Kildor is waiting for you outside... He said he needs to talk, and- and that it's urgent," mumbled Gorduf.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

It was then that I realised that he knew for sure what Kildor wanted to tell me, Gorduf was somehow of a coward, but what he was showing at that moment wasn't just fear of me, there was something else there, so I somehow guessed that they already had their discussion and came to me to tell me what they came up with.

"And why would I care," I growled as I slammed my hand on the bed.

"Something happened," Gorduf said softly, "His Majesty sent new orders, and that's what Kildor wants to talk to you about, and going against His Majesty isn't..."

He didn't have to finish what he wanted to say, just the mention of that Devil froze my blood and awakened a deep dread inside of me, one coming from the depths of Zagmuz's very person.

"His- His Majesty seemed angry," seeing that I still haven't reacted to the news, he added hurriedly.

"... Ask him to come in then..." I pushed that through my gritted teeth. I felt that I was being forced to make this decision, especially with how I was trying to do my best to waste as much time as I could, the humans now knew that the demons were coming, but they needed time to gather themselves and prepare for the coming war. We needed time that I could have been able to get if not for how the Demon King was a mental block that I couldn't just ignore.

Gorduf bowed and then went out of the tent as if he was running. Pulling myself to a sitting position and dropping my head back on the bed's headboard with my eyes closed, I sighed as I felt tired all over, emotionally and mentally more than physically. Things were starting to get to me. It had been less than a full day since I found myself in this weird situation in this alien world, and I already felt spent, that I needed some rest.

I wasn't going to get any though. As I lay there with all these thoughts going through my mind, I heard footsteps heading my way so I straightened up and looked at where the sound came from and was right in time to see Kildor coming in. The demon was in his armour already even though it was so late in the night, giving me an idea about what was going to happen next.

"Your Highness," he first gave a small nod before continuing when he saw no indications that I was going to return his greeting, "I'm sorry for disturbing your sleep, but His Majesty had given an order and we have to follow it."

"What order? What happened?" I could see that kildor was much less forceful than he was before. Most probably, he wasn't like that because he needed something from me or wanted my cooperation, no, it was most likely because he knew that he had fucked up and that if I knew what he had done wrong, I would use it against him, and he was trying to keep me from realizing what had happened for as long as possible. Probably so I don't use this as an excuse to ignore his orders or suggestions, which I was going to do.

"His Majesty is having us move right away, we will be moving for most of the day from now on, we will also try to keep our stops at a minimum, we need to make it to Border Town and start the invasion as soon as possible," he said seriously.

Knowing that he was trying to use my fear of the Demon King to steer me and stop me from asking any questions, I couldn't keep the anger that always seemed to be under the surface for Zagmuz from starting to boil. Yet I knew that exploding at him just like that wasn't the right way to go about this, so I asked again:

"Why did he suddenly have us do that, what happened?"

I could see Kildor freeze for a split second before continuing as if nothing was wrong:

"It seems that the humans found out about the invasion, so we need to move our plans forward."

I raised an eyebrow at his words, "how did that happen? I thought that everything was going alright without any problems, and now you tell me that the whole invasion has been compromised?"

Again, I watched as Kildor's expression shifted for a split second before he brought it under control and said:

"A kalla was discovered by the humans, which led to a series of events that ended in the invasion being found out."

I almost found it admirable how Kildor was able to act as if the kalla that was found wasn't the one that was under his control, as if he had nothing to do with it. But I kept all of that under wraps as I looked at him deeply for a bit before releasing all the anger that was just under the surface as I said in a slow tone:

"You are keeping something from me? You aren't telling me everything," my voice started rising as I held Kildor's eyes, "Do I need to remind you that I'm the commander here? I'm the one leading this army, so... You better tell me all you know about what happened, that's an order!"

I watched as Kildor's human-coloured face alternated between red and pale for a while before he finally started talking, telling me about what had happened, how the kalla in Border Town was found out somehow and how all that led to the invasion being found out by the humans in the end.

Seeing Kildor's frown and bitter face as he recounted all of that, I did the only thing that felt right to me at that moment, I looked at him mockingly and laughed as loud as I could, looking at him as if he was a piece of trash. I felt refreshed, both as Zagmuz and Alex.