William realized, after the demoness was gone, that he hadn’t actually gotten to ask any important questions. Things that he personally had interest in, yes. However, he hadn’t asked further questions about the mysterious scroll, and some clarification of how it was supposed to be used would probably be important in the future. He also hadn’t asked about more details concerning the upcoming invasion, but perhaps that wouldn’t have been answered anyway. Hopefully, everything relevant had been given to him. Either way, it wasn’t going to be exact.

Over the course of time, William had gathered a good amount of influence. He had a good amount of contacts in different countries, and was one of the more respected members of the Ostana Wizard’s Guild. Though, William had to admit that was partly because most of the rising stars in the preceding generation had been killed in the last war with the Demon King. He wasn’t sure how he would compare to the best of them, but he didn’t have to. However, at his current state, just declaring that a reliable contact had brought information about an upcoming invasion by a demon lord might not be enough to get the proper response. William needed more authority, and he had been preparing for that. Not that he wanted to have authority, but he needed it. More importantly, the Ostana Wizard’s Guild had been without an archmage for too long.

William, by himself, didn’t have the confidence or influence to become the Archmage. However, almost nobody would ever have that. However, just because he didn’t have that much direct influence didn’t mean he didn’t have it at all. William had his contacts, many of whom were powerful. In addition to that, he was close to Marius, who himself had influence and would use it to help him. There were others that would lend their power and supporters to him as well. William just couldn’t claim to have achieved this by himself, and he wouldn’t want to. Of course, having connections wasn’t good enough to be appointed Archmage. One first had to show mastery of various facets of magic and knowledge, and then receive the approval of the leading members of the Guild.

William hadn’t just studied every field just because he was interested in them, but also for such a possibility in the future. If there were someone else that was qualified to be Archmage, and willing to listen to his advice, William wouldn’t have considered taking the position himself. Marius was the right type, but because of his status as a noble and various other things taking up his time, he couldn’t afford to spend enough time just studying. Plus, he didn’t have a previous lifetime of experiences to build off of. Lila was certainly able in the area of executing magic, but didn’t have the right temperament to be an Archmage, both in personality and technical knowledge required. There wasn’t anyone else in his generation that William would want in the position, and those in the older generation were either unqualified or much too old, though William would certainly want some of them as advisors if he managed to obtain Archmage status.

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

Thus, William started what would likely be a long process of testing, and talking. There would be a lot of talking, but fortunately William wasn’t alone on that front. If he had to get by on just his own charismatic skills, he would be hopeless. There would doubtless be some opposition, but not necessarily competition. There were others with the necessary connections to get support for becoming Archmage, of course, but William hadn’t seen anyone who had the necessary skills. Regardless, once the thoughts of appointing an Archmage entered people’s minds, William thought there would likely be one appointed, if anyone was qualified. In the chance that someone else managed to take the position, William hoped they would take his information seriously. If even William himself were unqualified, he could only hope his current sway was enough to get the armies of Ostana to act.

-----

William’s mind was filled with apprehension about the actions of the demoness. Though he thought she was being honest and helpful, he didn’t think she was a good person. She had uncaringly admitted to experimentation that William would consider gruesome, though of course he had come up with the idea as well. She had also been involved with Chris’ creation in some manner as well, though William wasn’t sure in what capacity. Then there were her parting words, which indicated that they would be meeting again soon, at least much sooner than the ten years between their previous two meetings. In addition, it was for some kind of study, of William probably. He couldn’t say he wasn’t interested in whatever her insights would be. Would it be safe to meet her again? William wasn’t sure about that, but he knew he would anyway. William wasn’t going to be careless with his life, but since it was his second one, he wasn’t going to treat it as the absolutely most important thing.

The most important thing was, of course, the upcoming Demon King. In relation to that, an invasion by a demon lord was also important. Thus, William had already discussed with Lila and Marius about it. Marius had a copy of the relevant information, and would be working on countermeasures. At the very least, William wanted scout to watch for signs of change, but they couldn’t safely enter demon lands, so information on the demon’s movements were hard to get. However, it would be good to have some forewarning in case the estimated timeframe vastly changed. According to the information received, the demon lord would likely only have a “small” army. That is, one that a single country could face off against. Unfortunately, that meant Ostana would likely be the country that had to deal with it, and likely alone. They were the country that was closest to the demon lands, with their northern border touching on the area that neither humans or demons inhabited. It was possible other countries would send aid, but it wouldn’t be like the advent of the Demon King, where all human countries would mobilize all their forces to combat the threat. William hoped they would be able to make sufficient preparations. In fact, he was confident they could, if they actually started soon. If everything went wrong, far, far worse than any realistic expectations, and Ostana was somehow destroyed, well, that would be that. However, the information about the Demon King destroying souls, and thus somehow reducing the number of wizards, was already distributed to various places. The future was probably as secure as William could get it. Though, he was actually quite optimistic, he just couldn’t help thinking about the very worst case scenarios.