Plant the Spawn, Deogandai!

It was night.

The stars were hidden by clouds, and even the moonlight only reached the ground dimly.

The growls of beasts that usually echoed through the Ranrananga Mountains were absent; the only sound to be heard was the pitter-patter of raindrops striking the Kirkree leaves.

......Into the stillness of those mountains, a purple light suddenly burst forth!

It lasted only an instant, and covered only a tiny patch of the vast mountainside.

Had anyone been watching closely from the watchtowers of the fortress city of Liheid, which kept a constant glare on Ranrananga, they might have seen a patch of the mountainside flicker.

But because it was the middle of the night, not a single human noticed.

“Kukuku...... Kukukukuku......”

Now, that purple light.

Its true nature: the light given off by teleportation magic, which demons mainly used to travel.

After the light subsided, the one standing there was...... his shoulders shaking as he laughed softly, a pale-skinned man.

A lanky, tall man with the left half of his face hidden by long hair.

......It was the Demon Lord's Army's middle-ranked commander, Deogandai the Puppeteer!

Deogandai noticed the droplets pitter-pattering against his shoulders, opened his palm toward the sky, and confirmed that a light rain was falling.

“Well, well! How very convenient!”

Deogandai said this with a cheerful laugh, then plonked the bag he'd been carrying down on the ground.

And what he drew forth from it was a small wooden box.

“Now~! Gwow up nice and heawthy~! Parasitic Mushroom-chan~!”

Speaking in an eerily high-pitched voice, Deogandai grabbed the contents of the wooden box with tweezers and began planting them firmly at the roots of the Kirkree trees all around him.

Parasitic Mushroom.

It was a type of mushroom found only in a very limited, narrow region of the “Fantasy Continent” Nijial.

Do not dismiss it as a mere mushroom.

Any human infected by its spores would have their brain taken over by the Parasitic Mushroom, turn into a monster, and come to attack and devour their own kind!

It was a truly terrifying mushroom, so much so that, mushroom or not, the Parasitic Mushroom had been classified as a monster, but after much research, Deogandai had succeeded in cultivating it artificially!

“Right...... this should be enough for this spot......”

Deogandai had planted those dangerous mushrooms all over the place.

Incidentally, Deogandai's groundwork had confirmed that this spot was one the adventurers based in the fortress city of Liheid passed through often.

......If I've written this much, you've surely figured it out.

This is Deogandai's attack on the fortress city of Liheid.

It is one of his operations, aimed at infesting the adventurers with mushrooms and whittling down their fighting strength!

His battle, has already begun......!

“With this, my Parasitic Mushroom-chans will sprout by tomorrow morning, and around noon they'll spread their caps and begin releasing spores......! Without even knowing it, the humans will be infected by those spores, and in a few days...... Kukuku!”

Imagining the gruesome results that would arise from this operation, Deogandai couldn't help but let a smile slip!

“Kukuku...... Kukakakaka! ......Kukakakaka, gah!!?”

But it seemed he had laughed too hard.

Just as he arched his body while laughing, his lower back went gukiri!

Then came the searing pain!!

“O, ow-ow! OW-OW-OW-OOOOOOOW!!”

No matter how much more robust a demon's body is compared to a human's, the work of bending over for a long time while carrying a wooden box filled with heavy spawn is extremely grueling!

It's murder on the lower back!!

If even a demon ends up like this, it goes without saying for humans!

Everyone, be careful too!

Take care, of your lower backs!!

“A...... aaa, aaaaa......!”

Deogandai rolled around writhing on the ground for a while, but he was, after all, a demon with a robust body.

After a few minutes, he recovered and stood up, his face twisted.

“Curse you, humans......!”

It was not humans that had wrecked his back.

It was a false accusation.

To begin with.

To begin with, he was supposed to be the Demon Lord's Army's ‘middle-ranked commander’.

Why was someone like him performing such tedious preliminary work?

Shouldn't he just let his subordinates do it?

It was a point the Demon Lord's Army's executives had raised many times before.

But to this reasonable point, Deogandai's answer was always ‘No’.

“My monsters include many that are extremely difficult to handle. They are by no means things that can be left to others.”

Deogandai's knowledge of monsters was incredibly deep; one could say he was one of the world's leading monster scholars and biologists.

When a specialist said such a thing, the executives had no choice but to back off with an “Oh...... is that so......?”

And so, although he held the post of middle-ranked commander, the only subordinates Deogandai used were assistants like Longinus, who handled the paperwork.

The fighting was left entirely to the monsters he prepared.

By the Demon Lord's Army's definition, the monsters its members controlled all counted as part of the Demon Lord's Army, so true, you can't say Deogandai isn't a middle-ranked commander in command of the Demon Lord's Army.

You can't say, he isn't, but......

“But even so, you know? Why not take on a few more subordinates and have them help with the work?”

That was the common view of the higher-ups of the Demon Lord's Army, regarding Deogandai.

No matter how often they said it, he wouldn't listen, for no other reason than that he fundamentally did not trust others.

It would be unbearable if he had subordinates and they stole the credit for his achievements.

Since Deogandai thought of such things first and foremost, he always handled his assigned missions alone.

He believed without a doubt that this would lead to results demonstrating his own excellence.

He failed to notice that he was receiving a negative evaluation: ‘despite being in the position of middle-ranked commander, has difficulty building interpersonal relationships’.

“Now then, time to move to another point.”

Having recovered from the pain in his back, Deogandai stood up and muttered.

He intended to set Parasitic Mushrooms all over Ranrananga.

There was still plenty of work ahead.

“Kukuku, you humans...... tremble with fear as your beloved neighbors turn into monsters!!”

While saying something villain-ish, Deogandai grabbed the heavy bag.

It was a bag packed tight with Parasitic Mushroom spawn.

Carefully putting the bag on his back so as not to hurt his lower back again, he vanished into the darkness of the night.

There's no shaking the feeling that he's a bit of a letdown, but given that he's gotten results until now, there's no doubt Deogandai is capable.

Setting aside his gag-like antics, this Parasitic Mushroom operation is pretty vile, too.

At this rate, the fortress city of Liheid is in danger!

Help us! Hero Torch-kun!