Chapter 112
Chapter: 112
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>Translator: penny
>Chapter: 112
>Chapter Title: Monster Subjugation Unit (5)
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In the center of the imperial hospital, an extraordinarily bizarre sight was unfolding—one so rare it might never be seen again in one's lifetime.
"Where do you intend to go with this interference?! Do you vermin truly wish to die?!"
"Your pathetic tricks are useless, you vile scum!"
"Your feeble efforts won't work on us, you wretched cur!"
Asley Becher was raging furiously, shouting angrily and mocking on his own, thrashing about on the bed like a madman.
Masin, who had drawn his sword and was watching anxiously, asked Logan in a low voice.
"A demon... Your Highness?"
It wasn't unfounded. The face of Asley—or rather, whatever had borrowed Asley's form—was twisted in a fiendish grimace like that of a demon.
His eyes were bulging so wide that the whites had burst with blood vessels, turning a deep crimson.
It looked exactly like a vengeful demon that had just crawled up from the depths of hell.
But Logan, observing him intently with a serious gaze, shook his head.
"It's somehow different from a demon's demonic energy."
"What do you mean?"
"It feels more like another soul entirely. Almost as if multiple evil spirits are fighting inside that student's body."
Jonathan, who had been hiding behind the group and trembling, spoke up in a quavering voice.
"Then hurry and perform an exorcism..."
"We should. But they don't give off an especially malevolent vibe for evil spirits, so I'm not sure if holy power will affect them."
Amid their grave conversation, Seongjin alone was rolling his eyes while breaking into a cold sweat.
...Um, am I the only one who thinks that?
No matter how he looked at it, some of the evil spirits possessing Asley Becher seemed to be Herena, Gades, and those twins.
He had no idea how they ended up there, but was it really okay to just exorcise them like this?
"Graaaah!"
"Ughhh..."
Now Asley Becher was clutching his own throat, letting out groans.
His lips had turned blue, and his eyes were rolling back white—he looked on the verge of death at any moment.
Seongjin swallowed hard without realizing it.
'Whoa, that's brutal...'
It wasn't even a horror movie, but watching him go berserk alone sent chills down his spine.
The Demon King snorted in disbelief inside his head.
[Hah, and you're scared? You, an evil spirit possessed by Morres yourself?]
'...Shut up!'
Of course it felt ominous. These weren't opponents he could just punch!
Besides, it was unfair to lump them together. Even if he was an evil spirit, this one was officially sanctioned by the Holy Emperor!
"Y-Your Highness! Please hurry! He's really going to die at this rate!"
At Jonathan's tearful plea, Logan hardened his expression as if he'd made a decision.
He released his grip on Arjuna's hilt and slowly approached Asley Becher, extending a hand enveloped in sacred white light toward him.
"I'm not a formal exorcist knight, but I can at least mimic one to some degree. Brother Masin, just in case, could you request backup from an exorcist while I buy time?"
Masin nodded at his words and dashed out of the room.
Perhaps sensing something ominous, Asley Becher rolled only his eyes toward Logan while still gripping his throat.
"In the name of the Lord God, I command you: release him at once and return to whence you came."
"......"
Asley gazed silently at the holy power glowing brighter in Logan's hand, then suddenly tore his lips into a sneer, letting out a deep, mocking laugh. A strange yellow glint flickered in his bloodshot eyes.
"Kekekeke, fool! Your precious Lord God of this place has no name!"
But Logan didn't waver. He took another step forward and declared firmly.
"His authority is proof of His presence in the world—and that is His name!"
"Don't spout nonsense! The will of one without a name is empty, no different from nonexistence!"
"The Lord God's will manifests clearly through His proxy. Begone, pitiful lost evil spirit!"
"Grgh..."
Asley ground his teeth, glaring at Logan.
Seongjin watched their exchange with wide eyes.
The Holy Emperor had said the God of Delcross wasn't a personal deity—and He didn't even have a name?
He resolved, a bit late, that he really ought to read the preface of that theology primer sometime.
"I... I..."
Under Logan's unwavering demeanor, Asley Becher's momentum seemed to falter.
He released his throat and staggered back a step on the bed.
"I am no mere evil spirit! No paltry human soul! I am a demon!"
But even Seongjin doubted that claim.
The thing called itself a demon, yet it showed no sign of being threatened by the holy power intensifying in Logan's hand. It was a stark contrast to the Demon King, who would freak out at holy power.
That was likely why Logan was pressuring him strongly while keeping his distance and observing, without pouring out his holy power all at once.
"In the authority of the Lord God, I command you: vanish from this place, evil spirit."
"I'm not an evil spiiiirit!"
For a split second, Asley let out a bloodcurdling scream.
A fierce roar erupted, sending a shockwave blasting through the room. The bedsheets fluttered wildly, windows flew open with a bang and rattled. Jonathan yelped in terror and tumbled backward.
Whatever had provoked it so, Asley glared at the group with furious eyes and spat out his words like venom.
"This body is the great Demon King who encompasses all the demonic realms! The Dream Demon King, destined one day to star in a grand tale!"
"......"
"No matter how desperately you try to erase me, I will not be confined to such a petty phantom as an 'evil spirit'!"
In that instant, Seongjin flashed back to a memory.
The Dream Demon King aspiring to become the villain of a story.
And the masked puppeteer who had calmly recounted that tale.
[What? Dream Demon King?]
Seongjin wasn't the only one to react. The Demon King bellowed in outrage.
[Yi Seongjin! Is that bastard the one from that puppet show you mentioned?]
'Huh? I don't know... Hey, hey! Wait a sec!'
Before Seongjin could stop him, the Demon King's presence vanished from his mind with a pop.
And in the next moment.
Asley Becher twitched and jerked, his movements growing even more grotesque.
"Ughhhh..."
Now he was grabbing his own collar with one hand and yanking his hair with the other, shaking them desperately.
"Is that you, you bastard? Did you dare launch that pathetic attack at me?"
"And what's this one? Why is a demon wrapped in a holy barrier?"
"Oh yeah, you punk! Let's settle this today!"
"Ah, it's you? You've dwindled so much I almost didn't recognize you! How dare a half-dead thing pop up out of nowhere!"
"What, you little shit? You know me? What the hell are you?"
Ah, now another voice had joined the babble pouring from Asley's mouth.
They'd even split into clear factions and were brawling among themselves.
"Yay! Go get 'em, our Red!"
"Woo! You can do it, Red!"
"Who's Red?!?!"
It was utter, unrepeatable chaos.
Fortunately, the pandemonium didn't last long.
Seongjin tilted his head, wondering if the room temperature had suddenly dropped a bit.
[...Hiiik!]
The Demon King fled back into Seongjin's mind, quaking in terror at whatever he'd seen. He was trembling so badly he could barely speak—somehow familiar. No way?
Logan seemed to sense the odd aura too. He looked up and murmured suspiciously.
"...Where is this sacred energy suddenly coming from?"
Asley Becher noticed the change as well.
He stopped his muttering and stared blankly into empty space. For the first time, fear filled his hugely widened eyes.
"You... you!"
Cough.
In that instant, Asley vomited blood and collapsed to the floor.
* * *
*Cough, cough.*
In a dark basement, a man hunched over and hacked up blood. Tiny droplets splattered the floor, carrying a metallic tang.
"...This is self-destruction at its finest."
The girl watching him crawl on the floor sneered.
She appeared no older than ten, with long golden hair tied into adorable twin tails.
Yet her expression was eerily emotionless and grim, like gazing upon ancient sedimentary layers piled beyond measure.
Romain, the half-masked man, writhed on the floor for a while before his coughing subsided. He wiped the blood trickling from his mouth and smiled.
"I'm fine. I took a hit, but that's because I'm still not used to this technique."
"Technique?"
"Yes. A secret art of a certain clan that extracts souls to create terminals."
It was a secret technique of the Cornsheim clan, renowned for their mastery over souls.
They severed unnecessary portions of the soul to form terminals, channeling through them to preserve the individual's ego.
It was the reason that clan, which could easily dissolve into a hive mind like swarming beasts, managed to live as humans.
What had possessed Asley Becher and died was merely a tiny shard of soul that Romain had crudely mimicked from that clan.
Hah. The girl let out a hollow laugh.
"No wonder it thrashed around like a fool unlike you—it wasn't even a proper soul fragment."
"Well, not quite. It was still a part of me, however crude. A reminder that I was once that emotional in my youth."
Romain shrugged.
"Of course, it wasn't enough to fool Delcross's guardian. I tried diverting attention a bit, but the moment he realized the channel wasn't linked to my main body, he smashed the terminal without a word."
"To think of deceiving him... bold or reckless, I'm not sure which."
The girl shook her head.
The Holy Emperor of Delcross.
She still couldn't comprehend how such a being had arisen among humans.
Just as she thought she'd nearly infested the continent, he appeared out of nowhere in the capital, swept away all her forces single-handedly, and became Holy Emperor.
From then until now, over a considerable span, he'd successfully held all of Delcross under his sway. Something no previous guardian could have dreamed of.
Under his protection, demonkin couldn't even approach Delcross. No wonder she, even in a human girl's body, hadn't dared enter the capital and was skulking around the outskirts, biding her time.
Among her few allies, Romain was the only one who could freely come and go from the capital.
She distrusted his inscrutable nature but had no other options.
"He's utterly impenetrable. For now, our only hope is that Prince Leonard pulls his weight at the imperial birthday banquet. If he could truly seduce a princess, that would be ideal."
Romain brushed the dirt from his soiled robe hem as if it were nothing.
He'd been unable to hide his rage for a while after months of effort went to waste in an instant, but now he seemed composed.
"True. But was it necessary to infiltrate the palace using that half-bloomed final seed?"
The girl's question was valid.
If left as an egg, Asley Becher might have eventually flowered. Even in his botched bloom, he could have been a useful card in future plans if simply left alone.
But Romain shook his head.
"The Gray Plague plan was already exposed to the Holy Emperor. We can't revive a failed scheme now. At the very least, there was someone I could confirm with my own eyes while he still held influence."
The 3rd Prince, Mores.
Romain had just verified the existence of the prince the Holy Emperor had kept hidden in the palace. An unwitting, confident smile crept beneath his half-mask.
The girl watched him for a moment, then stepped forward and gently cupped his chin with both hands.
"What did you see? You look so assured—it's pleasing."
"That's an honor."
"Your voice is most satisfying to hear as well. Come, tell me more, Romain."
The girl's tiny cherry lips exhaled a sweet breath.
"Surely you can tell me at least? Where is the labyrinth? Where is your true body now?"
But Romain lightly brushed off her [Charm] and smiled.
"That can wait until our conversation progresses further, O Lord of [Greed]."