Those Worse Than Monsters

All sorts of dreadful monsters exist in this world.

But there are times when you encounter a breed far worse than any of them.

I sat in the chair they had offered me and looked at the man seated across from me. Cold sweat sheathed his face, and he was wringing his hands in a helpless panic. There was only one reason he was acting this way: I was a mage.

After a leap no human should have been capable of, they had become utterly convinced I was a mage. They had bolted inside at once, shouting that a mage had arrived. At first the gang had come out looking confused, wondering what the commotion was about. Then I touched one of them, and a man died, and their attitude changed on the spot. The one playing the role of boss was summoned at once, and he bowed his head to the floor.

"Y-you've come to see the senior mage, is that right?"

He rubbed his hands together and forced a smile.

What did it even mean to be a mage? I had become one myself, and yet seeing people bow their heads like this left my thoughts in a tangle. The longer I kept my lips sealed, the paler the man grew. The fear of mages was a terror buried deep in the human heart. They wore the same human skin, and yet they were existences you could do ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠nothing about. A single gesture from them, and people died in pieces. Watch that happen even once, and a horror you could not put into words took root inside you.

"That's right. I heard there was a mage and his subordinate here. Doesn't look like there's anyone of the sort, though."

The moment I spoke, the man hastily wiped the sweat from his brow.

"I-I'm sorry. The mage visited a while back, but he hasn't come by since."

I looked down at him in silence. He was doing his best to talk, but the way he trembled told me everything I needed to know.

"Look me in the eye."

He had been trying to keep his head down. At the order, he flinched and lifted it. The eyes that met mine shook violently.

"There's a lie in what you just said."

"A l-lie? I swear to the heavens there isn't!"

I almost laughed in his face. A man too ashamed to even look up at the sky, swearing an oath to it.

Mages carry mana. Any place a mage stays for long leaves traces of it behind. Mages deliberately leave those traces in their own territory — a warning that says this place is mine, so don't make a scene, just go around. But there was not a shred of residual mana here. Which meant one thing: no mage had ever set foot in this place.

I smiled. The man forced a smile of his own.

I clamped my hand over his mouth before he could blink.

"Impersonating a mage is a grave crime."

I didn't actually know that for certain. I only knew that arrogant mages would never leave a human who had impersonated them alive. They would make sure the pretender died screaming. The man seemed well aware of that fact himself — his face had gone white as paper.

"I'll ask one last time. Has a senior mage ever actually been here?"

I loosened my grip. The man trembled from head to toe.

"The m-mage... the mage..."

His lips worked a few times before the truth finally came out.

"There... isn't one."

So there was no mage after all. They had been impersonating one while they prepared something. Finding out what that something was had been part of why I came here in the first place.

"I see."

I pressed down on his shoulder and rose from my seat.

"At least you won't die in agony."

Even if I hadn't caught him, some other mage would have spotted him eventually. So I gathered up the life flame burning inside his body.

The man crumpled without even realizing he was dead.

"B-boss!"

"The boss is dead!"

The ones watching from a distance screamed. I turned my gaze on them, and every last one of them froze. These were men who had committed murder in the bandit village and in countless other places besides. Leaving people like that alive was not something I could accept. Men who killed without batting an eye would only kill again.

"You told the truth, so I'll send you off without pain."

"Aaaaagh!"

"R-run!"

They knew well enough that fighting a mage was pointless. The bandits scattered as one and chose to flee. I watched them go, then stamped down hard on the ground. The muscles in my legs swelled with a violent surge of power.

A thunderous boom split the air as I launched myself forward and landed among the fleeing men. They didn't even seem to realize I had arrived at their backs. I pressed down on two pairs of shoulders and used the recoil to leap again. That alone was enough — both men met their deaths and crumpled where they stood.

Next. And the next. I cut down every last one who crossed my path. Some begged for their lives. Some drew their swords and charged. Some ran until they had nowhere left to go. Not one of them survived. Every single one of them met the same death. There was no discrimination in dying. It did not matter who was talented or who stood above the rest.

By the time the surroundings had fallen quiet, my Third Eye slowly swept the area. Several white lights flickered into view inside the building. A few of them had fled indoors while the others ran.

I started walking toward the building to hunt them down. It was a structure of stone and timber. I kicked the old wooden door open, and dust billowed into the air. The bandits were huddled inside, holding their breath.

The second floor?

I climbed the stairs. A flame wavered in the innermost room at the end of the hall. So they were all hiding in there. I silenced my footsteps and made my way toward it, slow and careful. The moment I was close enough to close the distance in a single stride —

I crushed the wooden hallway underfoot and launched myself forward, smashing through the door as I burst inside.

"Kyaaah!"

"Eek—!"

There were women in the room. The scent of face powder hung thick in the air — cosmetics and medicines they had been using. Red lighting. A decadent chamber. One look was enough to know exactly what this room was used for.

I took my time looking them over, and then my eyes met one figure in particular. Someone hiding among the women, a cloth pulled over their head. Instinct spoke. This one was not in the same position as the rest of them.

The instant I threw myself at him, a flash of violet ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠light burst from inside his coat and swallowed my vision.

A deafening blast hurled me down the hallway I had just crossed. I slammed into the far wall and stuck there. The mana coating my body meant the impact itself wasn't that severe — but I had still been thrown that far. That was not human strength.

A Magic Tool.

The evidence Melon had mentioned of a mage's subordinate. So it had actually been here.

I was brushing the dust from my shoulder when something shifted inside the room. A moment later, something forced its way out through the shattered door. It was a colossal arm made of bone. Strips of muscle clung to it here and there, but the thing looked unfinished. It was the size of a mid-class monster or larger, and an ominous feeling rolled off it in waves.

Was this why they had been collecting corpses?

It's a Magic Tool, no question. But it doesn't look anything like magic. What the hell is that thing?

I didn't know. What I did know was that it meant me harm.

The giant bone hand smashed the hallway to pieces as it came charging in. I threw myself toward the stairs, and the bone hand punched through the wall and lodged there. I used the opening to lift my head. The one who had used the Magic Tool a moment ago — I had to kill him if I wanted that thing to stop.

Fleeing footsteps echoed through the smoke. There had to be another way out. I chased him at once, racing through the first floor. The bone hand came after me, collapsing the hallway as it followed. It was as heavy as it was huge, and the entire building was coming down around it.

A shatter of glass rang out from above.

That way?

I spun toward the sound. A wall stood in front of me — a wall with no window. It didn't matter. I gathered mana into my arm. The moment the surging power sank into the muscle, I put everything I had into the punch.

The wall of stone and timber tore free in a single piece. Far ahead, I felt the cloth-covered man glance back this way.

"Hah. You're not a mage — you're a monster."

Bewilderment leaked through the cloth. Sorry, but I am a mage. I'm just an apprentice who doesn't know any spells yet.

The bone hand smashed through the building wall and burst out after me. I dodged the incoming sweep and kicked off the ground. The man immediately sprinted for the center of the village. The distance closed in an instant. No matter how fast he ran, those were still human legs. There was no world in which he escaped me.

"Hey, you mage bastard! You killed a whole bunch of my boys!"

Only a few strides left. He hoisted something over his head and shouted. Violet light flashed from it — a Magic Tool, no question.

"Let's see you die the same way!"

And then the distance between us vanished in a single heartbeat. A leap like a beast's — the result of detonating every drop of mana I had stored in my legs.

"Huh?"

By the time that dazed sound left him, it was already too late. My hand closed over his face.

His body met death and tumbled across the ground. At the same time, the Magic Tool slipped from his hand and hit the dirt with a metallic clink.

He had a Magic Tool on him — so this one had been the real boss all along? The leader I'd killed earlier might have been nothing but a figurehead. If a mage showed up, he would have pinned the crime on the other man and run.

He changed tactics because I killed everyone without asking a single question.

Cunning bastard. Still, that settled it. All that was left was to inspect the Magic Tool.

A chilling wind brushed my back. At the same time, a thick stench of blood tickled my nose. I turned my head. Flesh was gathering around the bone hand — the flesh of the bandits whose lives I had just taken. Even the one lying at my feet was coming apart, his flesh peeling away and being drawn toward the bone hand.

So this was what the bandit boss had meant.

I immediately lifted my foot and smashed the skull-shaped Magic Tool. Shattered fragments scattered across the ground. The magic should dispel now. That was what I thought as I looked back — but the bone hand was still gathering flesh. There was more muscle than bone on it now, and I could feel a weight far greater than before rolling off the thing.

"Damn it."

A Magic Tool that kept working even after you broke it was a different problem entirely. I couldn't just leave it and walk away, either. Left alone, it would overrun every village in the area.

It's growing by eating flesh.

I was certain it would hit the nearby villages. There was no doubt in ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠my mind.

Having swallowed every last scrap of flesh, the muscle-bound hand slammed its palm into the ground and heaved itself upright. A tongue sprouted from its wrist, and fangs gleamed along the new mouth. The thing turned a chilling, naked hostility on me.

I looked at it and cracked the knuckles of my gauntleted hand. No choice, then.

I would take it down here.