On the morning of the second day after their victory, not everyone was basking in joy.
Everyone threw themselves into postwar reconstruction. The streets were full of busy figures hauling lumber, repairing roofs, and clearing rubble.
Yet the change in everyone's spirits was unmistakable. It was the energy of people who had survived a catastrophe and now brimmed with hope.
The atmosphere in the temporary command center at the Lord's Manor remained somber.
Varg, Elder Matthew, Freya, and Bishop Paul-all the senior leaders were present.
Ansu sat at the head of the table, listening to the collected intelligence from his time away as he leafed through the files.
First, within the first year of his departure, the vast Novalon Empire had effectively disintegrated.
The old political joke from the Mutual Aid Tavern-"What? Where's the Novalon Empire? I can't find it on the map..." -had actually come true.
After Duke Berry captured the capital, the imperial family was deposed, the pope was placed under house arrest, and the original alliance of nobles fractured as well.
The nobles busied themselves with negotiations and dividing the spoils, while Duke Berry, their commander, became the de facto ruler with the largest army.
Duke Berry had intended to take over the entire realm and establish a new empire.
But at that very moment, news arrived from afar: the Demons had assembled a massive army and launched a full-scale invasion of the continent.
Wherever Balks went, cities and small nations fell one after another.
The Demons' invasion was divided into northern and southern fronts.
On the northern front, the Demon Army occupied vast stretches of the continent's north and west.
Their first conquest was the Iron Hill Kingdom, the dwarven nation in the northwest renowned for its smithing. It was also Professor Duncan's homeland.
Balks absorbed