Los Valaris, once called Santiago City, Chile, South America.
"Fire King Elson. The Great Demon General Valar has decreed that you shall not continue your attack. Surrender at once and prepare to be punished!"
"Fire King Elson, know your place! You are no match for the ultra powerful Demon General Valar, much less Demon King Toxxan. Get your whole army to surrender now, and we will grant you mercy by killing you all quickly!"
"Fire King Elson you dumb f**k. Just die now! The more trouble you create, the more we will suffer when you eventually die later!"
Shouts of anger from the humans atop the parapets of Los Valaris rang out across the battlefield.
Elson Noctis stood on a massive rock a few hundred meters from the city's high walls, flanked by six fellow awakened. Their bodies dripped with blood. Some their own, but mostly that of demons. Their hair was matted and disheveled, yet their backs remained straight, their eyes cold and unshaken, like overlords gazing down upon their subjects.
A suffocating killing intent rolled off them in waves like the sea during a thunderstorm.
All around them lay the mangled remains of countless demons. They had slaughtered an entire army just to reach shouting distance of Los Valaris.
But to their surprise, there were no demons waiting on the walls.
Instead, they saw hundreds of men dressed in the purple and black of the Demon Army, clamoring and cursing at them.
Those bastards were actually fighting for the enemy!
Elson Noctis looked at the human traitors and gave them an arrogant sneer. A deep aura of disdain emanated from him.
"You traitors of humanity are worse than shit on the ground. Shit is at least still useful. It nourishes the plants which feed the beasts we eat. But you are worth less than shit. You are not only useless to humanity, you are harmful!
Billions of human beings died, and we all mourn for their passing. We pray that they will be accepted by God in heaven.
But you… you will live out the rest of your miserable lives as demon slaves, and then continue on to hell to suffer for your actions.
You pathetic pieces of less than shit, you have nothing to look forward to in this life, and nothing to look forward to in the afterlife. You will die as you lived. Miserably!
I spit on you!"
Puih!
Elson spat a dark globule of blood onto the cracked earth and then let his face twist in contempt as the droplet sizzled where it hit.
His men standing behind him gave cold chuckles of approval at his words.
Elson continued to sneer at the traitors. The ugly expressions on their faces were enjoyable to look at, but in truth Elson was beyond pissed.
Not because those men betrayed humanity, but because he still had to dirty his hands later to kill them.
F**k! Your daddy just took a bath for the first time this morning in weeks!
Now I have to take another bath again later to wash the blood of these scum off my hands! Do you think shampoo is easy to come by? Damn it!
On a serious note, Elson was actually well and truly worried.
How did the demons know that they were attacking that day?
The human army had pounded the remaining demon forces, those too slow to retreat behind the cursed elemental shield of Great General Valar, and had reduced them to smoldering ruin with their new Hammer of Aegis Heavy Artillery (HAHA).
The ground had trembled for hours and the air was thick with the stench of scorched flesh. Even now, the acrid smoke still stung his nostrils and coated his tongue with a bitter taste.
Afterward, he had ordered the HAHA Battalion to continue their useless shelling against the unbreakable shield for days before feigning withdrawal, just to sell the image of a frustrated commander beaten into retreat.
All of it had been for this moment: to return unseen and launch a full powered attack on the elemental shield using the only method which had proven to be mildly effective in the hope of destroying the shield in one fell swoop.
Fire Magic.
Elson and the six men with him were the only Fire Mages in the entire human army.
Even though the number of awakened capable of wielding elemental magic had been on the rise in recent years, there were only a small number who had managed to upgrade their strength into fighting level.
And even then, barely so.
Elson was far and away the strongest fire mage among them at Peak C Rank. The rest were Peak to Middle D Rank. With their combined strength, Elson had estimated that they would be able to destroy the demon shield if they gave everything they had in one, decisive blow.
Alas, they had encountered an ambush as they sneaked towards Los Valaris, and had to spend the majority of their mana just to clear out a small portion of the demon army ambushing them.
Their sneak attack had nearly failed, and they were surrounded.
There were no more doubts about it.
They would die that day!
As much as Elson tried to psyche himself into thinking that they would survive, even to the point of humming the song "I will survive" to himself, deep within him, he knew that they were doomed.
And with their deaths, will go the final hope of humanity wiping out the Demon Horde.
At least in the next few decades until the next batch of fire mages manage to increase their strength.
Pure fire energy gathered on his palms and slowly thickened into a compressed ball of flames. A deep heat spread out from him as Elson prepared the most powerful twin fireballs he had ever made.
Sparks danced up his arms like living embers as the orb slowly expanded in size, a swirling core of molten flame pulsing like a living heart.
Behind him, Elson could sense the other six fire mages doing the same thing.
They were in range.
They could try to destroy the shield in one, all out attack which would leave them drained and vulnerable.
If they succeeded, the human army would surge forward and level the city with their advanced weaponry.
If not… then may God bless the next generation with stronger fire mana.
Elson knew their remaining strength was likely not enough to break the shield. But so what? They had to try. Even if there was only a 0.1 percent chance of success, they had to take it.
Humanity had sacrificed too much for them to gain the power they now wielded.
How many had died to gather the resources needed for their training? How many had starved so they could eat their fill and grow stronger? How many mothers and fathers had watched their children die chasing new ways to evolve their power… all so that Elson and the others could progress smoothly?
After accepting so much sacrifice, how could Elson do anything but give everything he had for even the faintest sliver of hope?
Looking up at the jeering traitors on the walls of Los Valaris and the demons inching back in fear of the fire gathering in his hands, Elson could only laugh bitterly in his heart.
They thought he would try to kill the demons and flee. Cowards. Their minds could not even comprehend self-sacrifice for the sake of humanity's future.
Those kinds of people, even if they were ten times stronger, Elson disdained to have them as his comrades! They were not even worthy to become his enemies!
"This is my final moment." Elson realized.