“Damn it!” Zaryusu and Shasuryu cursed in a moment of horror, and charged at once when the lizardmen looked behind them to see if their leaders were truly full of fear, only to see the opposite.

The effect of Heketi’s victory was short-lived. Seeing two more chiefs charge at the point of conflict returned spirit to the lizardmen, who made space enough for the brothers to charge up the path of the dead to face the Queen of the frogmen.

But then, quite to the shock of the lizardmen down below, they did the unthinkable.

They jumped inside the wall, avoiding the Queen entirely, and causing an uproar among their own ranks, “Will you let your chiefs take the city alone?!” Zaryusu roared in the moment of mutual horror from both sides as he and his brother resumed the battle as if they had breached the wall by themselves and had an army inside with them already.

The lizardmen of both tribes rushed forward after the pair, and Heketi came to her senses. She turned from the wall and leapt into the interior of the frogman settlement, and staring down the two brothers from her towering height she snapped her spear in front of herself again. It dripped with Kyuku Zuzu’s blood still, “One or two or ten of you animals, and I will win still!” She let out a harsh and rough ribbit, and Shasuryu looked up at the monster of a frogwoman, he found it hard to argue.

The fighting grew more vicious as the eldest of the frogmen tried to stem the lizardman tide, and strength began to fail the frogmen at long last.

A ruined section of wall that was nothing but vines that had not yet had wood added to it, gave way when the defenders died and the lizardmen cut their way inside.

The magic casters at the back unleashed the last spell volley in their arsenals, a string of well-timed magic arrows that struck a series of lizardmen in rapid succession, sending them tumbling backwards into the unstruck ones behind and buying a few more precious seconds of life.

With their last spells used, those least fit for battle beyond the very young and very old, charged at the breach with desperate courage fighting with whatever they could pick up, including the broken and fallen spears they had no real experience in using.

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Another gout of flame hit the wall at a gap and the oil soaked vines ignited, two frogmen defenders fell backward coated in fire while another segment of wall collapsed, and more lizardmen entered the breach.

‘How did it come to this?!’ Heketi cried and rushed the nearest of the two, the big sword wielder and the only one she saw using a weapon similar to the knights. He leveled the massive steel blade at her and began to batter at her spear.

‘Why can’t I cut it?’ He wondered as he fought the giant frogwoman, her powerful legs kept her able to press him back, and his brother jumped forward, flashing Frost Pain down at her exposed arm, she jerked her arm back and tried to backhand the lizardman immediately.

Zaryusu felt the blow, and it rocked him back on his heels until he used his tail to stop himself. The lizardmen were over the walls in several places, and atop the wall he saw the flash of white that could only be his beloved, leading the magic casters inward to aid in the fall.

The frogmen’s spirit began to break in places, outnumbered, exhausted, and out-equipped, they fled inward, their great hopping strides not half what they’d been before, where they would make their stand. Zaryusu was not sure, but Heketi was proving far more dangerous than he realized. [Icy Burst]. He bellowed out, it was his last use of the skill and he heard the frogwoman howl and thrust blind. It was the chance his brother needed, Shasuryu took it, consigning his pain to silence, he thrust his greatsword home at the source of the scream.

Zaryusu however, had a moment of horrified realization when he heard more than one spray of blood.

The freezing fog faded away to reveal a stark sight, the sword of Shasuryu Sasha had indeed found Heketi, but he had only severed a hand, while her long spearhead had buried itself in his open mouth and come out the back of his head.

“Two chiefs left!” Heketi bellowed at Zaryusu as her people fled to make their final stand near the clutch of eggs, she briefly forgot the curious red knight, and seeing that Zaryusu turned to let his eyes fall on Crusch Lulu, she ribbited with joy, yanked her spear back, and hefted it for the throw.

Zaryusu made the most powerful leap of his life, darting forward and sending Frost Pain into the body of the Queen of the frogmen.

Heketi stood still for a moment, willing her spear to leave her hand, but before it could, Zaryusu whispered, “Long live Ainz Ooal Gown…”

‘My turn.’ Shalltear thought, and faster than Heketi could have imagined, the red knight appeared before the Queen and reminded her of the unknown and the danger she represented. The lance came out and pierced the Queen’s body beside Frost Pain, and Heketi fell with a howl, slowly tumbling backward to land with a crash.

The lizardmen roared in triumph and began the rampage, the battle became a massacre, with lizardmen not discriminating between young or old, their spears found all bodies to be equal.

Heketi struggled to rise, but the lance had her pinned at the belly.

All she could do was scream when she saw the lizardmen reach the huts of the wounded frogmen, the screams of the dying wounded were louder than her own, but she redoubled her cries when she saw the lizardmen head for the egg chamber, “We surrender! We surrender everything! Mercy! Mercy!” The Queen yowled as frogmen became an endangered species.