Chapter 176: Madness of Mankind

To protect the Inhumans, the Demon Realm was evacuated while only the capital city is inhabited by the Inhumans.

With the use of many resources, a large space magic formation was set up so that the space within the capital was the size of a country capable of holding a few million people.

This place is still under development so the space still can't house all of the Inhumans in this world, but at least the citizens who swore allegiance to Eve can have a safe haven while my group provides a constant supply of food so hunger is not a problem.

There are thousands of entrances to the capital, but only one entrance is real while the rest are traps filled with evil spirits, biological weapons, nuclear explosives, and black blood so even a hero will die if he tries to infiltrate this place.

Basically, the entire Demon Kingdom is a labyrinth of death while the refuge for the Inhumans is in a city protected by several illusory barriers made by an expert in the noble art of hiding like a rat, System Goddess.

Although gathering all the Inhumans in one place is usually stupid as the enemy will have an easier target to find, the constant hunting of Inhumans makes it dangerous to have multiple bases to protect the Inhumans as if the humans use hostages then things will become troublesome.

In a helicopter, I headed to the border entrance of the Demon Kingdom.

To give the illusion that the Inhumans still inhabit the entire territory of the Demon Kingdom, I brought in millions of zombies that are being controlled by nanochips in their brains which act like normal citizens who farm the land and perform daily activities. In this way, the humans will attack the border cities while I continue rescuing Inhumans.

Beside me was Imerda who was dressed in a maid uniform. She constantly looked at the ground not daring to meet my eyes.

To say that she is afraid of me is an understatement, she could literally die of a heart attack if I play a little prank on her to scare her.

Seeing Looper being dissected as well as knowing that I have the same strength as the God Orthus made her fear me more than death itself.

Although Tsubaki isn't happy that I had mentally destroyed this girl, she doesn't pity Imerda as my pretty wife has adopted my belief that an enemy doesn't deserve mercy be it male, female, old man, or baby.

When the helicopter reached the edge of the border I saw a platoon of soldiers holding their weapons while aiming at a young woman holding a white flag, Shijou Yukiko, also known as 'Restaurant from another world'.

The woman looked emaciated, her pale skin and thin body showed signs of malnutrition, her lips were cracked showing dehydration while her eyes were surrounded by large black circles showing an advanced case of insomnia.

Just by looking at her, I could tell that Shijou is one step away from developing one of the paths of 'Madness', more specifically, 'Madness of Fear'.

Although Imerda has shown similar signs of post-traumatic stress, Shijou is in a completely impaired state of mind and I can even see suicidal tendencies in her look full of fear and despair.

Although my performance as Orthus must have been a traumatic event for her, this is strange, it seems that something happened with the Reincarnated.

The helicopter landed and I went down with Imerda.

Even though both women had been allies, the two didn't even look at each other as if they didn't know each other. Imerda is afraid of making me angry while Shijou looks around me paranoid as if she fears that her biggest nightmare is following me.

When I approached Shijou I smiled as if I met an old friend. – "Hello, it's good to see you again"

Shijou trembled slightly upon hearing my voice, but she calmed down a bit upon seeing that my expression was not hostile.

With a trembling voice, she expressed her greatest fear. – "I-Is that God here?"

"My lord is not here" – I spoke with longing and respect like a religious fanatic full of blind faith.

Shijou let out a deep sigh of relief as her legs weakened causing her to sit on the ground.

Since her clothes were torn and worn I could see part of her body and noticed a problem.

Not only was her body weak from malnutrition, but her skin also had multiple cut marks showing signs of multiple surgeries which makes no sense since 'The Fallen Goddess' can heal almost any wound.

I leaned down to meet her eyes and spoke with a combination of concern and suspicion. – "What happened to you? These injuries do not appear to have been caused by my lord."

Shijou started trembling and then hugged me as she started to cry like a girl who got lost in the forest for two days and finally found her parents.

I don't like how this is going, something very problematic must have happened with the Reincarnated.

After five minutes of crying, Shijou seemed to be about to pass out due to fatigue, but I need quick answers so I used acupuncture to suppress her ability to feel pain and then used [Human Transmutation] to heal her injuries and replenish her energy.

Shijou took a deep breath as her body regained its strength and looked at me with gratitude even though I am the traitor working for the deity who terrified her into madness.

"Tell me what happened" - I frowned.

Shijou began to tremble. – "Now I understand why you betrayed humanity… They are all monsters… They… They did that… They are monsters…"

It seems I was wrong.

She is terrified of Orthros, but there was something in the Human Empire that terrified her even more than the attack of the God Orthus.

I put my hands on her cheeks and used Tsubaki's soul frequency to calm the overwhelming fear choking Shijou's heart.

Shijou managed to calm down and with a lot of patience, I finally managed to understand the situation.

Shijou was traumatized to discover something that she and the other Reincarnates had forgotten due to her unrivaled skills, they are not invincible.

Looper's death was a heavy blow to the Reincarnated as he was the trump card that could ensure complete victory with his skill to go back in time.

Even if Looper did not die, the fact that the battle against Orthus was not prevented showed that Looper was no longer capable of going back in time.

This caused the three most unstable and conceited Reincarnates to have a mental breakdown.

'The Dual Wielding Black Knight', 'The Fallen Goddess' and 'God's Mistake' all went completely berserk and started acting erratically.

'The Undead King' and 'The One Called Slime' lack individuality so they continued to obey Kilt's orders even though it was obvious that he had gone mad.

Shijou was still traumatized by the fight so she stopped eating and sleeping as she locked herself in her restaurant refusing to go out to the outside world.

Two weeks ago Shijou was able to calm down a bit and went back to her room, but it was at that time that Anastasia Melokva, 'The Young Devil', entered her room and forced her to use her skill to escape.

Shijou was too confused that she couldn't react in time when Kilt found them and knocked them unconscious.

When Shijou woke up she pretended to be unconscious while watching a scene from a movie not suitable for people with weak stomachs.

Roro Sendiger (Slime) and Don Will Dead (Skeleton) were on a dissection table. Both reincarnated were mutilated while their bodies and souls were used to strengthen Kilt.

The fact that Kilt was missing a soul fragment allowed him to absorb the souls of his teammates. Well, now I know that when I devour a soul I must do it completely or more Frankenstein's monsters will continue to appear.

Kilt now had the powers of three Reincarnated Ones and if it wasn't for his soul already at its limit, he would have absorbed 'God's Error' and 'The Young Devil'.

Although the manipulation of souls is a complex subject, this was possible since Paradise continues to send resources to humans and if that was not enough, a native hero of this world appeared ten days ago.

This hero had no combat abilities but possesses a rare healing ability that allows him to modify the bodies of organic entities.

That hero became the tool of the Human Empire to create new super soldiers since with his body modification ability combined with the healing ability of 'The Fallen Goddess' it was possible to do hundreds of experiments in a matter of days.

To all this, the constant invocation of heroes is added.

The naive and idiotic heroes were easily fooled into thinking that the Inhumans seek to eradicate humanity and then invade other worlds.

Heroes with higher judgment abilities were subjected to brainwashing experiments using the hero's abilities with healing abilities since he can apparently reprogram a person's memory and personality through neural modification.

For more than a week, Shijou and Anastasia were subjected to various experiments that destroyed their spirits and sanity.

Since some of the heroes gained innate mind control defense abilities, these two women could not be manipulated which instead of being a good thing only brought them suffering.

Kilt attempted to transform Shijou into a willless puppet that only follows orders while most of Anastasia's organs were replaced with machines to turn her into an android.

Yesterday at dawn there was another hero summon, but this time the hero turned out to be more cunning than other heroes and managed to fool the leaders of the Human Empire.

At night, that hero infiltrated the laboratories that were in the underground area of the palace and released various heroes and Inhumans who were used as experiments causing great chaos in the capital.

Shijou didn't know what happened next as she only focused on freeing Anastasia and then kept her in her space skill since the soldier girl has been unconscious, then she escaped with her space movement skill.

During the time she was used as a lab rat, she heard Kilt constantly freak out as he yelled Seiji's name, calling him a traitor for joining the Inhumans.

Shijou had no options and although she was terrified of Orthus, she had no other options since she couldn't hide forever within her skill, or hunger and thirst would kill her as her skill can't create food from anything.

That was how Shijou decided to come to the Demon Kingdom for help.

Although it was a tragic and cruel story, I smiled wryly at Imerda. – "Do you still think I am a monster?"

Imerda was pale as a sheet of paper, she had been horrified by Shijou's story. She even started looking at me with a bit of gratitude as if I had saved her from hell even though technically this is all my fault.

Ancestor Ichijo was right when he said that we system users create chaos and suffering around us.

The extreme methods used by the humans are causing even the heroes to rebel against them… This gives me a lot of ideas.

Although this information is valuable, there was something that made me worry.

The ritual to summon heroes needs the cooperation of the Great Witch or the Demon King to be effective.

Witch has stayed by my side while Hakuou has been dead for several days, but there was still another hero summon yesterday.

Humans have a way to keep summoning heroes without the need for Witch or Demon King which explains why humans have not chosen to invade the Demon Kingdom right away, they are preparing their military forces before striking a decisive blow.

"Do you know how the ritual to summon heroes is performed?" – I asked without expectations.

Shijou shook his head nervously. – "I don't know… But I heard 'God's Error' mention something about needing to capture more witches and entities with high magic power to feed the arcane magic generator…"

…That means that the witches who were hunted by humans are not necessarily dead as Witch thinks, but they were turned into batteries…

If Witch and Fleonell hear this, they will surely do something impulsive that puts them in danger...

"Tsubaki, let's keep this a secret" - I sighed internally.

"…" – Tsubaki sighed with concern.

She understands how dangerous this information is.

I stood up and gently carried Shijou like a princess.

The humans made a mistake, instead of transforming Shijou into a brainless transportation method, the correct method is to take advantage of her emotional fragility to make her obedient.

"Don't worry…" I smiled gently. – "Now you are safe"

Shijou trembled and clung to my clothes, the torture she was subjected to made her emotionally unstable so the slightest sign of safety will make her completely dependent.

"Let's go" - I made a gesture to Imerda.

Although she is not mentally broken like Shijou, this woman has understood one thing, now I am the only person who can protect her so even though she is still afraid of me, now she is even more afraid that I might abandon her.

I returned to the palace after making sure Shijou didn't have any kind of tracker or summoning artifact. I also used [Anti-Rasen] to seal her space skill after taking Anastasia out of the space restaurant.

When I saw Anastasia I wanted to sigh. Outside of her heart and brain, her entire body was replaced with robotic parts reminding me of the Terminator movie.

Chise will have a new friend...

Well, if she wants to stay like this that's fine, and if she wants to go back to being human I can easily rebuild her body so it doesn't matter.

I returned to the castle and summarized the situation to my harem, then began my preparations for my journey.

Since the human nations have become unstable due to the madness of the rulers who have become obsessed with power, it's my chance to incite civil wars for profit while pretending to be an honest businessman.

"Hey Listen! Don't forget to expand your harem! Don't be a fucking loser who misses out on lonely milfs and naive teens! Your mission in life is to seduce and steal beautiful women while pathetic men spend their time masturbating to cartoons!"

… Again, I feel like that was weirdly specific.