Chapter 35: Volume 2 - CH 18

Kyle and the male demon were facing each other in an open space. It was a small walk away from the location Lieze and the others were fighting, which allowed them to go all out without having to worry about the others. Until they reached this place, Kyle always walked ahead, showing his back to the male demon quite openly. Surely, this was pure provocation that he could deal with whatever attack the male demon could attempt, but said demon showed no signs of attacking him, merely following after.

He sure is calm now, despite looking ready to jump at me the second he saw me before…

Kyle had planned to disrupt the demon’s focus, but this was a disappointment.

“Let me ask you before we start. Where is my horn?”

“I have it on me. If you defeat me, you can take it from my corpse.” Kyle blatantly answered.

“Then I’m relieved…Let’s start, shall we.”

With those words spoken, the battle began. The first one to move was Kyle. His only weapon was his sword, so when fighting a demon that could use long-distance magic, he had to get closer no matter what, or he wouldn’t be able to fight at all. Knowing that his own attack magic was pretty much useless, he instead used magic to buff himself, and slashed at the demon.

At the same time, the male demon—didn’t do anything. He simply stood still like it was nothing. Kyle thought it was weird, expecting the demon to attack with mana bullets, but he couldn’t exactly stop himself now, continuing to swing the sword. Right as the sword was about to connect, the male demon blocked it with his left arm. Kyle put more strength in his swing in hopes of cutting off the entire arm, but the sword stopped about half-way.

“What!?”

“At this distance, you won’t be able to dodge, yes?” The male demon showed a threatening and eerie grin, firing a mana bullet from his right arm right into Kyle’s flank.

“Guha!?” With a last second attempt, Kyle managed to twist his body and avoid lethal damage, but the impact he received made him feel like his heart would fly out of his mouth, as he was blown backwards.

“Oh? To think you would manage to evade that attack. I had planned to splatter your organs all over the wall, but…Whatever, that should have cost you two or three bones at least.” The male demon spoke with an odd tone of admiration in his voice.

“You were…waiting for my initial attack?” Kyle coughed, and somehow managed to get back into a fighting position.

“Not quite, it was an opening move in order to win…I have heard about you from her, and that I should drive you back like this.”

There, Kyle swallowed his breath. Just as the male demon stated, Kyle had used this exact counterattack against the female demon who attacked the Empire’s Embassy, and now that very method was used against him.

“How does it feel to get a good taste of your own medicine?” The male demon smiled, but Kyle could only grit his teeth. “Let alone against another demon, I don’t like the idea of starting the battle with an injury like this…but when I think of it as protection against a foolish human, it isn’t that big of a deal.”

“So the reason you intercepted it with your arm…was because you could protect yourself with mana.”

“Oh, I’m surprised you could tell. I know that your sword has equal strength to the Holy Sword…but if I protect myself with mana, you won’t be able to break through that.” He said, showing his left arm, seeing a faint glimmer from the mana enwrapping it.

It was something similar to the defence magic Kyle could use, but it had similar strength compared to a magic bullet, a type of magic special to demons.

“Of course, I don’t like the idea of getting hurt, but you are the one who cut off my horn, so I don’t assume I can come out of this fight unscathed.”

The wound reached deep enough to reveal the bone, and blood came gushing out of it. However, the demon’s facial color was the same as before, simply smiling with a certain determination found.

“So…I was the one who underestimated you…” Pressing his hand on his torso to suppress the pain, Kyle grit his teeth.

The opponent wasn’t letting down his guard, but rather was fully prepared to win no matter what. Kyle felt like punching himself for being so arrogant as to look down on the demon, thinking he had any right to provoke him. However, he could always reflect on it later. Right now, he should calm down and think of ways to win this fight.

Just as he said…that’s at least two or three bones broken…and my insides are killing me…

Everytime he moved, he felt pain rushing through his body. However, Kyle ignored that, and readied his sword. He did have recovery magic medicine, but he doubted that the demon would just let him drink that. On top of that, attempting to run would spell Kyle’s death, so he made up his mind.

“A great look in your eyes, alright. During our great war against humanfolk three hundred years ago, I saw a lot of folks who had the same look…” The male demon gathered mana to create mana bullets, signaling that the true battle began now.

After that, the battle was all-too one sided. Normally, Kyle would have been able to somewhat hold his ground, but with his dull movement, he was pushed into the corner, and the same development from three days happened. The only difference is that this time Kyle was still pressed against the wall despite him going all out compared to before. He managed to close in on the demon at times, connecting his sword, but they were all weak and fragile, blocked off by the demon’s mana defence. That difference probably was born from the male demon actually going all out this time. He showed no opening, no moment that Kyle could use, simply attacking like a robot. Eventually, Kyle had his back to the wall.

“Urk…” Kyle’s expression distorted in agony.

“This is quite disappointing, I have to admit. Why don’t you make up your mind?”

“Sadly, I don’t plan on doing that. I really didn’t want to use this, but it can’t be helped…Don’t move!” Kyle took out a horn from his pocket, pointing the blade at it.

The moment the demon saw that horn, his facial color changed. The entire reason for this battle was to retrieve that horn, so naturally he would react that way.

“Wha…! You coward!” The demon howled while gritting his teeth.

“I don’t mind being called that by a demon…Oh, don’t move, you hear me? In this state, you might be able to attach it again, but most certainly not if it’s shattered, yes?” Kyle grinned like the devil himself, taking up the role of the villain.

Each step Kyle took forwards, the demon slowly traced backwards.

“It truly is something important to me…but I wouldn’t offer my own life for it.” While stepping backwards, he glared at Kyle with immense hatred and contempt.

Naturally, Kyle was very much aware of that. This was merely an act to bring the opponent exactly where he wanted him to. Finally, the demon reached the wall behind him. Seeing that, Kyle threw the horn high into the air.

“Hup!”

“Y-You bastard!” The demon screamed, his attention naturally fully focusing on the horn.

At the same time, Kyle pointed the sword at him, and started running. Sword or horn? The demon hesitated for a moment, but eventually decided to prioritize his own life, turning his attention back at Kyle. As they were too close, he couldn’t fight back, but he at least dodged the tip of the blade at the last moment. However, Kyle wasn’t hoping to land an attack with his sword, and rather aimed at the demon’s body in general. The two ended up entangled at the wall. That wall seemed to have been quite thin, breaking apart.

That moment, an intense heat assaulted the two, hot enough to make Kyle forget all about the pain. The place they arrived at was an underground forge, filled with several smithing tools. Deep in the back was a location that glowed in a strong, melting red light.

“Don’t tell me…!”

Realizing what that was, the demon froze up in an instant. As Kyle had known about this from the very beginning, he kept pressing forwards, and sent off a kick.

“Guha!”

The demon let out a scream, and was thrown into the location that had accumulated sheer amounts of lava.

Mithril is almost irrationally sturdy, and in order to temper it, you would need extremely high temperatures. Thus, Callan used the heat from raw lava to melt the mithril, thus being able to process it. For that, when they had once changed the terrain of this area, they created this underground forge by pulling the raw lava closer to the surface. In other words, this was a forge, a natural furnace using raw lava. Kyle learned about this when he asked Gazas who holed himself up here, around the time he looked around the area of the magic circle.

In order to push the demon down the lava pit, Kyle fired off another kick. However, the demon managed to hold his ground at the last second.

“Shi…!”

Before Kyle could finish cursing, the demon moved. He fired a mana bullet at Kyle’s feet, and after Kyle’s kick, he couldn’t recover quickly enough, eating it at full force. His sword was blown off, as he rolled along the ground.

“Guess I wasn’t pushing strong enough…” Kyle pressed his hand on his stomach to deal with the pain he suffered when kicking the demon, and groaned.

“I see…If a demon like me fell down that pit, there would be no saving me anymore…”

With the lava pit in front of the demon, even he started sweating from the sheer heat he was met with.

“So that was your hidden ace…It was close.”

“Urk…”

Kyle seemingly got injured on his leg as well, as he was unable to fully stand up, simply trying to take his distance from the demon who slowly approached him. However, he soon reached his limit, namely the final line before Kyle would end up in the lava pit himself.

“Human, you did well. Your strength is something even I have to admire. In our battle with humanfolk three hundred years ago, I never encountered someone quite so obstinate like you. However, even so, there’s an impregnable difference in strength between humanfolk and demons. Repent on your curse of being born a human, and die.”

The demon set another foot ahead in order to push Kyle down the lava pit—when Kyle grinned.

“…Not exactly. I know a lot about demons. Especially about how pushing you down the pit wouldn’t be that easy!” Kyle said, and then pushed his own arm into the lava pit behind him.

“Wha!?”

The demon was shocked. Even more so because Kyle pulled out a chain that had been hiding inside the lava. Kyle used that as a whip, hitting the demon with it. Naturally, the demon attempted to evade that whiplash attack, but his legs wouldn’t listen to him, and he couldn’t move.

“Gyaaa!”

The chain clung to his body like a whip, and being met with the initial pain of the whip, as well as the intense heat from the chain made the demon scream in agony. Following that, Kyle put all his strength into his arms to tighten up the chains even further, restraining the demon’s freedom. Following that, he picked up his sword, pointing the tip at the demon’s throat.

“No matter how much you may focus, once you’re certain of your victory, you let down your guard…Ouch, maybe that was too much after all.”

He only touched the lava for a brief moment, but without the strong fire and heat resistance the dragon leather armor possessed, Kyle would have most likely lost his arm all-together. However, thanks to that, his surprise attack succeeded.

“I knew that, in this situation, you would try to push me into the lava. I was a bit worried because of our positions, but I’m glad everything worked out.

He used the strong adhesive in Gou’s workshop, putting it on the floor before the battle started. Although quite some time passed since he put it there, it was more than enough to seal the demon’s movement for a much needed moment.

“Urk! Don’t think you can best me with just this……What?!” The demon struggled to break free, but to no avail.

Finally, he realized that the chain restraining him…was made of mithril.

“Impossible…a mithril chain?”

He had never seen a chain made out of the scarce and equally difficult to temper mithril.

“Not to mention that this is pure mithril, so you’re not going to break it that easily. Even if you’re a demon, that is. I went out of my way to make this just for you.” Kyle showed a bitter smile at all the work he had put into this.

Originally, his plan had been to corner the demon at a different location, using another separate mithril chain. Just to make sure, he also put another chain at a location he might end up if cornered, inside the lava, but that seemingly helped a great lot.

“I’m glad I forced Gazas through making two of these, really…”

Kyle originally requested Gazas to make three of these, but that might have ended up with Gazas working himself to death, so he gave up on that. Even so, it helped Kyle in reaching his goal of not defeating the demon, but rather rendering him powerless so that he could squeeze all the information he wanted out of him. That was the main reason he had Gazas make these chains in the first place.

“Quite the eloquent and roundabout trap, but…Whatever. Now, I’ll have you tell me everything you know.” Kyle pushed down the demon, making him lie down next to the lava.

No matter what the demon may attempt, a single push was all it took for him to end up in lava.

“What do you want to know…”

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However, brought to the brink of death, riddled with shame, the demon still had his final trump card left.

To think I would have to use that now of all times…

In order to use that, he needed to buy time, so an interrogation like this was the perfect opportunity. No matter what he may tell Kyle, if he killed him in the end, then nothing would matter, so he sincerely answered the questions Kyle had for him.

“First, how many of your demons are currently inside humanfolk territory?”

“…Under the orders of the current Demon Lord-sama, it is just us two.”

“So you are special…Then, next question. Is the current demon lord really aspiring for peace?”

“Yes, we were ordered to not anger humanfolk during our mission.”

“And you have no problem with that?”

“Of course I do. Our mission this time was a demand pressed onto us by the pro-war faction, not something the Demon Lord-sama agreed with.”

“I see…Then, the next question, and the most important one. Think about it before you answer.”

That one question he couldn’t afford anybody else to hear. Kyle went out of this way to ask that, so he couldn’t waste this chance.

“Do you know a demon with black wings growing from their back…a hornless demon who might become the next demon lord?”

“Hornless…you say?” He looked at Kyle in disbelief.

“Yeah, at the very least, they weren’t growing back then, so there’s a good chance they might be broken even now.”

“Impossible, a hornless demon can never become the demon lord. Not to mention that I never heard of someone with black wings skilled enough to become the next demon lord.”

Those who can move up to become the Demon Lord have to possess raw strength that can satisfy all of the demonfolk. Though the idea of bloodlines exists, the demons operate on a creed of true strength above everything.

“I see…So you don’t know anybody like that. I was hoping I might be able to defeat them before they rise to power, but…I guess it was futile.” Kyle let out a sigh.

The male demon was confused as to what Kyle was talking about, but didn’t bother much with it, as a being in liquid shape approached Kyle from behind—A technique the male demon called Invisible Assassin. This was the male demon’s final trump card. Using mana it could create an impromptu magical entity, controlling it at its wish. The order of this fake living being was simple—a self-explosion. It was like a living bomb. Even more terrifying is that it was invisible, unable to be seen easily.

It may be slow, but its main strength wasn’t speed, but rather the applicability for a trap, surprising the enemy. With the target having its back to it, even more so. It had stayed in the corner of the arena right when the battle started, but now it finally reached Kyle.

Made it in time…

Having succeeded in stalling time, the male demon was delighted. With its immense power, and because Kyle was already heavily injured, it should be enough to finish him off in a single hit. However…right as the Invisible Assassin was about to cling to Kyle’s back—he simply slashed his word behind his back without looking, splitting the liquid entity in two.

“Wha…”

“You were looking too much. And the second it was about to jump at me, you grinned. With all that, you were basically telling me to slash at it.” Kyle calmly explained his reasoning.

“You probably also used this to cause the slaughter at the Galgan Empire’s Embassy, right? I think that it depends on the way you use it, but that’s also the problem. Once it gets sliced in half, it’s useless. I think it was called [Invisible Assassin] or something?”

“…H-How do you know about that?”

When it comes to the abilities, the male demon could see Kyle guessing it with just that. However, he should not know the technique’s name.

“I’ve been endlessly thinking about methods on how to kill you bastards in masses…even when I was asleep. This much I had to do if I wanted to fight back…Right, Ganias?”

With that, the demon looked shocked to the point he might have his heart leap out of his chest.

“H-How…do you know about my name? …Just who are you?” Ganias felt something other than sheer strength from the human in front of him, as his eyes opened even further.

And then, he felt a certain emotion. To him, to a demon, it was something he should never feel towards a human—Fear. Seeing that expression on Ganias’ face, Kyle finally realized something.

“Ahhh…Now that makes sense. This sense of discomfort I had with you two…You’re strong, but not scary at all. This bottomless wear I felt towards the demons back then…I don’t feel anything from you. That aided in me letting down my guard…No, I guess that’s just an excuse.” Kyle let out a sigh.

When fighting the demons back then, Kyle felt this odd fanatic, even frantic emotion coming from the entire demon race. Yet, he felt nothing of that sort now. The one who brought the demons to such a state most likely was the new demon lord who will arrive in three years. And now, Kyle needed information about this demon lord as desperately as water to survive.

“I was hoping that you right now might be able to tell me something, but…I guess not. Now that I figured that out, I have no more need for you. Farewell, Ganias.”

“W-Wait! Just who are—”

Kyle didn’t mind those final words, and heartlessly pushed Ganias into the lava.

“Gyaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!?” He screamed from the top of his lungs.

Kyle called out to him.

“You may have killed countless of my comrades, but I am thankful to you in a way. You taught me about the Demon Lord’s castle, and so much more. Without you, that final suicide attack surely would have worked. However, no matter how much we tortured you, you wouldn’t tell us anything about the Demon Lord at the time.”

That’s right, in the past timeline, Kyle and his group, after many sacrifices, managed to capture Ganias after their battle. They managed to torture him until he would eventually give them his name, but his mouth was shut close whenever they asked something about the Demon Lord. Cruelly enough, Kyle continued to speak calmly as Ganias was screaming in agony, continuing to melt alive. If he was human, he probably would have died quite some time ago, but the strong vitality and mana demons possess act as a defense mechanism, leaving him still alive. However, it was only a matter of time, and all he could do was suffer in agony.

“As a token of gratitude, let me teach you something great. In order to temper raw mithril, it’ll take a full day with the heat of lava. So, since these chains have been in the lava for half a day…if you bear with this another half of a day, you might be saved.” Kyle explained with no emotion his voice, as Ganias grew more and more quiet. “If that is too much…then it can’t be helped. Suffer for the rest of your life, and die.”

Kyle didn’t know if it was in response to his words, but Ganias let out another scream that couldn’t be deciphered, and sunk into the lava. Even though he indirectly avenged the deaths of his allies, he could not see them smiling at him right now.

“So your last moments…aren’t all that different from before.”

***

Seeing the approaching blade in front of her, Yuriga subconsciously closed her eyes, but no matter how long she waited, no pain arrived.

“For my first try-out with this sword…that sure was disappointing.”

Instead, she heard such a displeased voice. When she opened her eyes, she saw a liquid entity cut in half, collapsed on the ground.

“This is…Ganias-sama’s Invisible……Don’t tell me.” Yuriga realized what this meant.

“Seems like you recognize this. It seemed to try and attack you, but what’s this thing?” Seran asked, glaring down at the melting liquid that looked like it was convulsing.

“This was most likely a trap. It probably was ordered to attack me if I passed through this passage.”

“So basically…you were betrayed?” Lieze’s expression filled with anger as she ran towards them.

Leaving alone a trap, even killing one’s allies was something unforgivable to her, surely.

“That’s what this is, yeah. I would report everything that has happened to the Demon Lord-sama. If the demons learned that his horn had been cut-off by a human, it would be over for him after all…”

If Yuriga died here, he could push it all onto the humanfolk’s fault.

“So he’s just silencing you.” Urza came running as well, showing a disgruntled expression.

“Now I’m in your debt…” Yuriga looked at Seran, showing a complicated expression.

“Then, I wouldn’t mind if you’d let me embrace you for a night…Gah!”

Lieze rammed her elbow into Seran’s flank, shutting him up. Seeing that, Yuriga showed a faint smile.

“We probably won’t ever meet again, but…I shall remember your names.” She said, and now disappeared in the shadows for good.

After she had fully disappeared, the three finally sighed in relief.

“That was a narrow victory, alright.” Seran said, to which Lieze nodded.

“You’re right. I don’t know if we could win a second time.”

This time, their strategy was based on Yuriga’s weakness, but this weakness would one day be conquered by her.

“Losing her first real battle…She’s going to get even stronger.” Urza agreed.

“…Well, it should be fine. She’s a demon, and will return to the demon territory now. You probably won’t meet again.”

“That’s right, as long as we don’t go over there either.”

Seran and Lieze both laughed.

“Now I just have a really bad feeling…”

“Don’t think too deeply about it. Things happen as the world intends it.” Shildonia walked next to Urza, simply nodding along.

“Still, I’m quite surprised. Knowing you, Seran, I thought you were going to cut her down for good.”

“You can say that again, I was panicking for a second.”

Lieze and Urza commented, but Seran answered indifferently.

“That was your fight. You decided to let her go, so I wouldn’t intervene.”

“Yeah…Thanks for believing in us.”

“I know that watching may have been a bit rough…but it was reassuring, so thank you.”

Lieze and Urza both smiled, to which Seran looked away and waved his hand, probably embarrassed.

Definitely can’t tell them that I was actually aiming to kill that demon, but changed my target after feeling a weird presence…

Attacking her after that would have been questionable even for Seran, so he lost his chance.

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