Divine Luck: SSS-Rank Battle Maid Harem

Considering the Hydra's powers, Zach was expecting to step into a fiery wasteland akin to the one the First Child created on the thirtieth floor. The Hydra had waited until it woke up and not done anything but fight Yanael lightheartedly in the Labyrinth, but once it was free, there should be no reason for it to hold back.

However, instead of fire and ash they expected, Zach, Yanael, and Mandra were instead greeted by a sight of ice and smoke. Before they could do anything, a bang rang out, and stone went flying in all directions.

Zach's barrier blocked the pebbles and stones that reached all the way to them.

They turned toward the source of the commotion and glimpsed the action through the smoke and shards and blocks of ice covering the buildings, or what remained of them.

The Hydra was on the ground, bleeding. A boulder of ice was pinching one of its wings to the ground. Its other wing was in tatters with large holes in it like a ripped sail.

Its heads were roaring, breathing fire and poison, and calling upon powerful winds.

Zach narrowed his eyes as he couldn't even begin to imagine who or what the Hydra was fighting against.

Everyone who knew about the Hydra except the Emperor should still be in the Labyrinth and on their way out.

But it wasn't the Emperor fighting the Hydra.

It was an army helmed by a mixed group of imperialists and Sesha. Zach recognized a few of them.

Oria Villesand, the Nilma Chief, and Yan. Together, the three of them led the troops around the Hydra, throwing what looked like rocks at its body and launching the same stuff at it from afar using catapults and trebuchets.

It was only a few seconds later that Zach realized that they were not rocks.

It was what had made that banging sound and launched stone at them earlier.

The army was launching explosives at the Hydra.

Zach did not think explosives would be powerful enough to do damage to a mythical creature like the Hydra, considering they were just consumable weapons. It would be like throwing a well-crafted sword at best. But a sword needed a swordsman to fulfill its purpose.

The explosives just needed to be near their target.

Zach was wrong.

There was a reason why the Imperial Family controlled the distribution of explosives in the Empire and why even the four ducal families only had access to a little.

It might just be one of the most dangerous substances in the Empire.

Each block of explosive material that was close enough to the Hydra tore chunks of flesh out of its body whenever they exploded. The chunks weren't large, but the explosives going up in clouds of smoke with sharp, banging puffs still got through the Hydra's hard scales with creepy ease.

Explosives were more destructive and powerful than Zach had imagined. But it was a good thing in this case since it meant the Hydra hadn't laid waste to the East. If anything, it looked like it was being beaten back by Yan, Oria, and the others.

"It hardly looks like we're needed," Zach said while making his way over to where Yan and the others would be in a few minutes. They had to stay moving unless they wanted to get caught by any of the seven heads wildly swinging around in a frenzy.

Yan's group was only a couple of dozen large. They were barely a speck compared to the large Hydra. But they were still a noticeable target, riding around the Hydra on their horses and throwing explosives at the Hydra. They had already had several close shaves and lost several good men and horses.

However, they had already blown through almost all of the explosives that Yan had managed to scrounge together for this operation, and the Hydra was nowhere close to falling. They had managed to injure it and draw its blood. But its blood was deadly, and a drop would kill them and their horses.

Yan gritted his teeth and gripped the reins to his horse until his fingers whitened. It was looking doomed. But they had stalled. They had bought time. He just hoped it was enough for everyone to finish evacuating and for reinforcements to make it in time.

He felt a sense of hopelessness wash through his icy veins as he saw the wounds on the Hydra regenerate, recover, and begin to fade.

As soon as Yan realized why the Emperor didn't put a stop to the fighting, interfere, or do anything about the Children because he wanted to unite both the Empire and the Sesha against a greater enemy, he had instantly looked for what that enemy could be.

He scrounged through records and asked whoever he could get a hold of. If it hadn't been for the Sesha's folktales and orally passed down knowledge, he wouldn't have figured it out in time. He wouldn't have realized that the greater enemy they needed to unite against was the Hydra, a being only recorded as a myth.

Thanks to that, he could look for helpful information and plan accordingly. He could gather the troops and supplies he would need to fight against the Hydra.

He had Oria, the Nilma Chief, Lahso, Garad, the Kanh chief, and several other chiefs and military officers. He had gathered the strongest still outside the Labyrinth and put together a unit to fight against the Hydra.

All of them knew that it was nothing more than a glorified suicide mission.

The Hydra was a being who tore the sky asunder, overturned mountains, and burned seas.

Fighting it with what they had was reckless and stupid.

But it had to be done.

Despite the war, there were many still living in the East. They needed to evacuate the people and get word to the rest of the Empire.

They weren't fighting the Hydra to defeat it. They were fighting it to save the lives of as many people as they could at the cost of their own.

Some made the sacrifice with bitter hearts. Others did it with hearts comforted by the knowledge that their loved ones would have a better chance at survival.

Why or how they did it didn't matter.

Their sacrifice was noble regardless.

But when the head with crazed eyes suddenly appeared right in front of them with its maw open wide and ready to swallow them all, they couldn't help but feel a twinge of regret and disappointment that this was how their lives ended.