Chapter 12 – Return On Investment

Kairon headed with purpose to his morning council meeting. When he saw Vorathrex, he gave the big demon a wave.

In return, not only did Kairon get a grunt but also something that almost resembled a smile. Is he warming up to me? Probably just the triple food rations I’ve been giving him.

“Good morning! Can you tell how far the humans are?”

Vorathrex tilted his head back and sniffed. “They are closer, but each day their pace slows. A week remains. Maybe more.”

Kairon’s eyes widened. “Really? That’s great news! I thought they would be here sooner. Something must have slowed them down.”

Vorathrex crossed his arms. “We still aren’t ready. When are the training grounds going to be prepared?”

Kairon grinned sheepishly. “About that. Have a seat, my friend. We need to talk.”

The big demon frowned, but sat against the spawning stones. Kairon did the same, sitting across from him. “So, we have a bit of an issue.”

“Yeah. These warriors may be from my world, but they learn slow.”

“Well yes. There is that. But…” Kairon sighed loudly. “Vorathrex, I’ll be honest with you. You’ve been working hard to train our budding army of… Eleven wrath imps now with today’s recruit. For that, you deserve my candor.”

He grunted.

“By the end of tomorrow, we will have the stone and timber to make our next building.” Vorathrex’s mouth tightened, catching the word building, not training grounds. Seeing the look on his face, Kairon continued quickly. “Unfortunately, we are out of gold. And buildings need gold, you see.”

Vorathrex just stared flatly.

“With no one but angry humans to trade with…” Kairon shrugged. “My hands.” He coughed, correcting himself. “My claws are tied.”

There was a tense beat. “You knew this and still made the feeding pit?”

Kairon breathed in, hissing as the air slid between his fangs. “Ah, you caught that. Yes. I did. I thought if I told you at that time…” He trailed off. “Well, I didn’t think you would react well. And given how hard you were working at training the imps, I saw no reason to impede that.”

Vorathrex pointed with one of his big meaty arms. “See that.” Kairon looked over, finding the gathered wrath imp squad, half holding spears and half holding broken wooden shafts, training for the day.

“Yes.”

“How do you expect me to defeat a human army without real warriors? They need real training and more time. And battle experience.”

Kairon sighed. “Yes and, let us not forget that we can only house three more. So even if the humans do take ten more days to get here, we’ll actually only have twenty wrath imps at most.”

Vorathrex laughed harshly. “You see? How are we to survive? Demons are strong, but I smell many humans. Too many. I’ll be back in the demonic plane soon and you’ll be dead.”

“Yes. Which I gather will be quite unpleasant for both of us,” replied Kairon. The city lord took a careful breath, voice dropping to a conspiratorial tone. “You know… Vorathrex. What if we built a wall instead?”

“Would that really help?”

“If used properly. I know that war is your thing and all but… I expect our human friends are going to find our environment less than hospitable. And I myself have a few ideas in mind. If I could give you a wall, a strong wall, and a way to break the morale of the humans and… trim the fat of their numbers, shall we say. Do you think that you and twenty wrath imps could consume the rest of the humans? Or at least, could you consume enough of them to scare the rest away?”

The giant cocked his head. “Thirty wrath imps would be better… Maybe it’s possible if the humans were scared. But humans fight in formations. Ones that are hard to break.”

Kairon waved his hand. “Yes, yes. I think we can deal with that.”

“And this wall. It does not require gold?” asked the larger demon.

“Actually, it does. A good measure of it too. As, again, does the camp we need to get more wrath imps next week. To do both, we need more gold than we have had since I founded this settlement.”

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The frustration was evident on the giant demon’s face. Two giant, meaty fists pounded the hellscape ground, dirt and sand exploding outwards.

Kairon winced. He really does not want to go back home.

“You know… Vorathrex, a thought did cross my mind.”

The big demon looked up suspiciously.