Earth’s Doom Starts with… Me?

"Well, that was a great show and all, but won't the next person come up?" I leaned back on my seat on the ground and looked over the busy crowd.

"Me!"

"Ah, me too!"

"Count me in, lady assistant!"

In a flash, elves of various ages and builds and weapons gathered around me. It was almost hard to believe how reluctant they were just a few seconds ago. Morale sure was an important thing to always be kept in mind.

I sighed and groaned, "Jeanne, would you please help me organize this mess?"

Alongside with a soft, happy chuckle, a blonde general in a neat ponytail came up to us, "sure. I can handle a few soldiers."

"Great. Thank god you're here." I grinned while giving her leg a hug.

--------

As the sun was starting to make our shadows smaller, so was the pile of stuff that was once over 5 meters tall. The more it was starting to disperse, the more soldiers gathered around us, all with happy faces having received their gift.

It didn't really surprise me that a small part of them, who wasn't willing to serve Firiell at the start, was now willingly throwing away their lives for a simple pan or a double bed. I mean, people fight for different reasons, right? I've seen kids murder a soldier just for half a piece of stale bread. And I had also killed people and risked my life for less.

"Are we done yet?" General Zhang pouted while he sat beside me and leaned his head on my shoulder.

"No." I replied flatly, already giving up on shaking him off since a while ago. There were just a couple of elves left to admit, and then we should be good to go.

"Are we done yet?" He repeated, ticking me off.

"I said no."

"… Are we done—"

"Shut up." I replied while stuffing his face with a donut.

"Mmm. I like this." He mumbled while he continued munching on the chocolate donut.

"Uh-huh, eat up. We gotta go soon if we wanna reach the minotaur's kingdom by nighttime." I said as I ate another piece of chocolate donut.

While we organized the newly-built army of elves, we took turns to eat, so we could set off right after lunchtime. There was no time to dilly-dally, and training the elves would've taken too much time, so we figured that we might as well just wing it.

The strategy wasn't very complex, at all. The orcs would be the tankers, and just swarm the minotaurs. Orcs loved to fight in groups, so if they all ganged up on a single minotaur, plus with the elves' help, they should be fine.

In fact, we had decided to separate the fighters into small groups of 30, with 20 orcs and 10 elves. The rangers would be comprised of elves only, since the orcs weren't so reliable with long-ranged weapons. And then for the scouts, whoever was left could join that side.

After all, their purpose was only to distract the minotaurs while we, the main team, infiltrated the main village. And by 'main team', I basically meant myself and general Zhang. And big brother Luke, of course. Now that my mana was jacked up, I could summon him anytime I wanted.

"Chae, we're done here." Jeanne said as she approached me who was casually munching on my donut.

"Great," I threw the rest of the donut into my mouth at once and spoke with a full mouth, "we go now?"

"We go now," general Emilio responded, "prepare your weapons."

"Wait a minute. Let's not forget about one crucial thing." I grinned and stood up, leaving general Zhang alone on the floor.

"What is it?" General Emilio raised an eyebrow in question.

"The healers. Let's fish them out. Hmm, the reward will be…" I put a finger to my lips while looking up, thinking of something good, "… A house, for the best healer that performs tonight." I stated with a smirk.

-------

"Whoa, can't believe that healing magic is so powerful in this world…" I exclaimed while I moved my fingers repeatedly, admiring the handiwork of an elf healer. My broken fingers that were swollen and blue were now healthy again, as if the injury was never there to begin with. Maybe I should look for a skill book with healing magic in them?

"It's partly because they're talented," Jeanne explained while she checked her own wounds that were now completely healed, "the only one who can heal this fast is probably only Hayun. Wow, if they all work together, we might have a chance against the minotaurs…"

"Not might, but of course we have," I chuckled, "we won't be playing fair, Jeanne. Since when was playing fair rewarded?"

"Ooh~ What do you have in mind this time, little cub?" General Zhang butted in our conversation.

"Just a little tricky-trick to counter their trap," I smirked, "ah, I can't wait for this to be done. How much longer do we have?"

"Not long. Thankfully, with this wagon and their horses, it took us faster than last time. The sun is just about to set." Jeanne answered as she uncovered our wagon's curtain a little bit, taking a look at our surroundings.

"Hmm, I could get used to this alliance." I spoke as I leaned back into the wooden wagon's wall.

Surprisingly, the elves had a large number of horses, complete with wagons. I guess although they lacked modern inventions such as pans, stoves, and such, they had an abundance of natural, organic stuff, like livestock and wooden or clay objects. Huh, probably Erenduill was too focused on connecting with nature, that he only managed to prosper one aspect.

"Let's stop in a bit. We'll station the scouts somewhere around here." General Emilio stated with a stern face.

"Good idea." I happily agreed with him.

"The command will be… Kill every non-ally you see." General Emilio said as he stood up.

'Knock, knock!'

Jeanne knocked on the wall surrounding us, signaling for the wagon to stop. Upon halting, all of us hopped down and gathered everyone together.

'Boom!'

General Emilio launched a blue smoke signal into the air, and the elves and orcs immediately dispersed into groups.

Earlier, we had all agreed that shouting commands on the battlefield would be ineffective, especially since there were thousands of soldiers, and we were in an open space. So, we made use of signals. Plain and simple.

The blue signal was for 'get into groups and get into positions', while the yellow signal meant 'enemies spotted', and lastly, the red signal meant 'need help urgently'. We didn't have a retreat signal, precisely because we weren't going to retreat under any circumstances.

Because, if we fail this mission, then there would be no coming back. All three races, humans, elves, and orcs, would all be doomed… Well, honestly, my party could still retreat if we wanted to. I had this mentalist skill, anyway. I could just shoot some messages at them. Although I doubted anyone would ditch the mission, especially general Emilio, Jeanne, and Firiell.

"I think the scouts should be on their way to their position already. Shall we continue?" I tilted my head at general Emilio.

"Yes. By foot. Get the horses back to the village," he commanded, "advance in formation."

"Yes sir~" I hummed as I stretched my legs that had been inactive while we rode the wagon.

From this point on, we were in the minotaur's territory. There might be some patrolling, or there might not be, we never knew. We only knew that it was not wise to risk giving up our horses and supplies.

As we ventured deeper into the minotaur's territory, we started to disperse more and more. I and general Zhang, though, separated from the group to go on our very own sneaky-sneaky mission.

'Boom!'

Another blue signal went up in the sky as I watched the smoke slowly wafted in the air.

"That must be the signal for the rangers to take positions." I remarked while the both of us sat comfortably on a tree branch that was quite close to the maze wall. Not the front wall, though, we decided to sneak up from the side. Didn't take us long to circle around since we got the trusty Timmy.

"Yup~ Aww, I was really enjoying our time together. But oh well, it's killing time now~" General Zhang hummed with joy.

"… You realize we're still going inside together, right?"

"A killing spree date? I'm down." He grinned.

"Once we get home, I'm booking a psychiatrist for you."

I flew my gaze over the horizon, and saw that the rangers were already moving into different positions in squads of 30. From this far, I realized that our troops were actually small in size compared to the massive maze structure in front of us.

"C'mon, eel. We need to get going." I hopped down from the tree branch and opened my inventory to take out the summoning scrolls.

"Now? But we're not moving until the fighters get into position, right?" General Zhang asked, but he followed me down the tree, regardless.

"Nah, I'm gonna do my own thing," I laughed, "well, are you coming?"

"Of course~"

With a smile, I looked over at the blue screen that was floating in front of my face.

[Would you like to use the item 'Low-grade Summoning Scroll: Fox Spirit'?]

'Poof!'

Upon clicking, we were instantly surrounded by 20 white foxes who floated around playfully. Surprisingly, each one of them was at least half the size of a normal human.

'Yip, yip!'

"Hehe." I couldn't help but let out a small giggle when they excitedly jumped around, flailing their teal-tinted tails. Their crystal blue eyes followed our movements where ever we walked, blinking every few seconds in anticipation.

"Wow, little cub. Since when were you able to summon spirits?" General Zhang questioned with an obviously shocked look on his face.

"As you've said, a man has his own secrets, right?" I tilted my head upon hearing his question.

"But you're—never mind. Who says it applies to men only?" He chuckled with amusement.

"Exactly," I grinned in approval, "alright, foxes! Let's play a little game. You guys love games, right?"

'Yip, yip!'

Immediately after hearing the word 'play', they got all excited and jumped as high as the trees around us. Splendid.

"Listen up, then. The rule is very simple," I started explaining, "you see that maze over there?" I pointed at the minotaur's maze.

'Yip!'

"Good. Now, let's play hide-and-seek. You know that game, right? You got 30 minutes to get inside that maze, and find 2 people. They're humans, 2 males. Understand?" I smirked, "on the count of three, go through the main entrance. Remember to explore eeeevery nook and cranny, and do it fast, because you only have 30 minutes."

'Yip, yip!'

"Alright. Three… Two… One…"

I raised my arm and shouted,

"go!"