"Sir," one lieutenant said carefully, "the Fallen Heroes are... they’re not reliable. They attack anything that moves. Last deployment in the Eastern Campaign, they killed forty-seven of our own soldiers before we contained them. The Church Council nearly court-martialed you for using them."

"I know," Elric said. "But circumstances have changed. We’re facing demon lord, not regular enemies. The Fallen Heroes were created specifically to fight supernatural threats beyond normal human capacity. This is exactly the situation they were designed for."

He walked to a covered area at the command post’s rear, where fifty large cages had been positioned under heavy canvas, guarded by twenty soldiers wearing blessed armor.

"Remove the covering," Elric ordered.

The guards pulled away the canvas, revealing the cages. 𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

Inside each cage stood a figure that had once been human.

Now they were something else.

The creatures in the cages looked human at first glance—two arms, two legs, humanoid form.

But closer inspection revealed the horror.

Their skin was corpse-white, completely bloodless, as if all their blood had been drained and replaced with something else. The skin had a waxy, unnatural sheen like preserved flesh.

Their eyes glowed with faint divine light—not the healthy golden glow of true heroes, but sickly yellow-white luminescence like infected wounds.

Heavy iron chains wrapped around their necks, wrists, and ankles—blessed chains inscribed with holy symbols that suppressed their power and prevented them from breaking free.

They stood motionless in their cages, not breathing, not moving, their glowing eyes staring at nothing.

They were alive. But not living.

"The Fallen Heroes," Elric said, his voice carrying equal parts disgust and grim necessity. "Fifty of them. The Church’s most shameful secret. The price of trying to create heroes artificially rather than waiting for divine summons."

He gestured toward the caged figures.

"When the first true heroes were summoned seventy years ago, the Church’s scholars became obsessed with understanding how divine summoning worked. If we could replicate the process, we could create unlimited heroes. We’d never need to pray and hope for divine intervention again."

One of the younger officers looked ill. "They tried to create artificial heroes?"

"They tried to create artificial heroes," Elric confirmed. "The experiments began forty-three years ago. The theory was that hero power resided in the cellular structure—something physical that could be extracted and implanted into willing subjects. So they took cells from dead heroes, from heroes who’d completed their service and returned to their original worlds, from heroes who’d fallen in battle."

He paused, his expression showing shame for his civilization’s actions.

"They implanted those hero cells into volunteers. Soldiers who wanted to become heroes. Priests who believed they were serving the Light’s will. Even criminals who were promised freedom in exchange for participating in the experiments."

"What happened?" the lieutenant asked, though his expression suggested he already knew the answer would be horrific.

"Ninety-eight percent died," Elric said flatly. "The hero cells rejected their bodies. Or their bodies rejected the cells. Either way, the results were catastrophic. Subjects’ bodies broke down at cellular level. They died screaming as their flesh dissolved, their organs failed, their bones shattered from the inside."

"Light above..."

"The two percent who survived the implantation didn’t fare much better. The hero cells took root, but imperfectly. The subjects gained supernatural power—strength, speed, durability beyond normal humans. Some even manifested pale imitations of hero abilities. But the cost was their humanity."

Elric gestured toward the caged figures.

"They lost all higher intelligence. Memory, personality, judgment, emotion—gone. What remained were essentially biological weapons. Creatures driven by base instinct to kill anything they perceive as threat. They can’t distinguish friend from foe. Can’t follow complex orders. Can’t be reasoned with."

"Then how do you control them?"

"We don’t," Elric admitted. "We restrain them with blessed chains that suppress their power. We point them at the enemy and release them. They kill everything in their path until we recapture them or they’re destroyed. That’s why I call them Fallen Heroes—they have fragments of hero power, but they fell from humanity to become monsters."

He looked at the fifty caged abominations with visible disgust.

"I brought them to this campaign as absolute last resort. If the settlement had demon lord support beyond what regular forces and true heroes could handle, I’d release the Fallen Heroes to overwhelm through sheer numbers and artificial hero power."

"You’re using them now," the lieutenant observed.

"Yes. Because Demon Lord Seraphina is about to kill my heroes. And I can’t allow that." Elric’s voice hardened with command authority. "The true heroes are irreplaceable. Gattychan, Seraphelle, Mikazelle, Rindelle—they’re divinely summoned, properly trained, valuable beyond measure. The Fallen Heroes are failed experiments. Expendable weapons. I’ll sacrifice fifty Fallen Heroes to save four true heroes without hesitation."

He turned to the guards.

"Remove the blessed chains from twenty Fallen Heroes. Point them toward the field where the demon lord presence is manifesting. Release them. Let them engage Seraphina and provide support to our true heroes."

"What about the other thirty, sir?"

Elric looked toward Third Line, where settlement defenders were still fighting desperately.

"Send thirty to the main battlefield. Release them in sectors where settlement resistance is strongest. Let them break the defenders’ lines. End this siege tonight rather than letting it drag into tomorrow."

"Sir, the Fallen Heroes will kill our own soldiers too—"

"I know," Elric said coldly. "Calculate acceptable casualties. Position our forces to minimize friendly fire. But I’d rather lose a hundred soldiers to Fallen Hero collateral damage than lose this entire army to demon lord assault or prolonged siege warfare. Make the deployment."

The guards began opening cages with professional caution, weapons ready to respond if the Fallen Heroes attacked before chains could be removed.

The first cage opened.

The Fallen Hero inside—a creature that had once been a soldier named Marcus, though he no longer remembered that name or anything else about his previous humanity—stood motionless as guards removed the blessed chains from his neck.

The moment the chains came off, the change was immediate.