77. Plan VS Improvisation
77. Plan VS Improvisation
-Kwagang!
A deluge of light beams rained down upon the slums.
The mana explosions that erupted from each impact site — descending like meteors — carried enough force that a direct hit against an unarmored body would guarantee fatal wounds.
'These aren't just mana explosions. She's amplifying their power by letting attacks that possess genuine mass fall freely under gravity.'
To drive an attack into an enemy with such precision — not one aimed in real time, but one that reached its target zone minutes after being launched — that was the feat she was pulling off.
The sheer absurdity of pulling that off intentionally would be obvious even to someone with no grasp of strategy.
'But what's even more troublesome than the meteors is the trap synergy. They're time-delayed activations, not remotely controlled, so predicting their trigger timing from this side isn't exactly easy either.'
Of course, even if the traps had been laid covertly, she could sense their mana and pinpoint their locations through instinct alone. But if she focused only on those locations, sooner or later one of the meteors dropping onto her head would strike true.
A strategy that cornered you not with instantaneous attacks, but with delayed strikes whose timing you could never foresee.......
Was it even sane to claim you could read an opponent's every move upon first encounter and land time-delayed attacks with pinpoint accuracy?
"You — are you a prophet?"
By the time that conjecture crystallized, she had already been pushed all the way back to the plaza.
Marilyn began comparing the so-called prophet race she had encountered at some point in the past with the rival now standing before her.
"Yes, as you say... I am an astrologer who reads the movement of the stars to see the future."
Because her focus lay on prophecy, the power she wielded was not threatening in itself.
Her years of life matched her outward appearance, so her accumulated experience would not surpass the limits of a human who had lived mere decades.
But the danger of this opponent lay not in raw power but in unpredictability — as proven by the fact that she herself had been pushed this far without managing any meaningful counterattack.
"That is why I foresaw that you would come to this place, and why I have come to exclude you from his side."
Though she required preparation, conversely, once that preparation was complete, she was an existence capable of relentlessly pressing even an overwhelmingly powerful foe.
And that preparation was not merely the traps she had laid after arriving here beforehand — it was continuing in full swing even now, in the midst of their standoff.
"Did you come all this way to stop it — because you read a future in which I would steal your companion away?"
The mana emanating from the crystal ball clutched in her hand.
No doubt it was being generated because she was using her unique arts to craft meteors in the upper atmosphere even as they spoke.
"The Frenzied Clown, Mephisto Rage."
Just as she was pondering how to counter that, the identity spilled from the lips of the woman glaring at her.
She was startled for a moment, but the shock lasted only an instant.
No matter how skilled she was at disguising herself, her opponent was a prophet.
To read the future, one must be able to read the past that serves as its foundation — so discerning the true identity of a disguised opponent would be a simple matter.
"I find you pitiable."
But the words that followed were something she had never anticipated.
And the pitying expression cast alongside them showed that this statement was no mere pretense.
"Pity — directed at me?"
"Yes. Though you are a member of the Demon Lord Army, having crossed countless dimensions to commit invasion and destruction....... Your purpose was neither destruction nor plunder, but solely to delight your lord."
The very concept of sin was something humans had created to protect society — but what use was there in quibbling over human rules in a crumbling world?
If one must judge, the first consideration should be whether the subject poses a threat to oneself.
In that sense, the being before her was, at least so long as she did not interfere with her, someone she could declare unequivocally "harmless" to humanity.
"...If — if by the smallest chance, he had chosen you."
And so Airi could not help but pity her.
Because she had lived through a measureless eternity in the void, she could even respect the feelings that had led this demon to hold the one remaining in her memories so specially dear.
"You might not have been able to give him up, but perhaps you could have accepted his choosing you. After all, he too has been starved for human connection ever since arriving in this world, and thus has a tendency to respond sensitively to affection directed his way."
Even if the man she desired to make her companion held such a woman in his heart, she might have resented it — yet somewhere deep down, she might have acknowledged it.
If only that meeting had been pure — simply one between a man and a woman.
"But now that I have faced you directly, I understand. You truly must not be allowed to remain at his side."
"Ahaha~ My, my, what a greedy little thing you are. If you know what happened between him and me, then surely you must have read that he harbors lingering attachment to me as well......."
"You — you were planning to die together with Hyosung, weren't you?"
-Drop.
At those words, the Demon of Frenzy fell silent.
Even through that silence, she could feel the remnants of mana thickening in the sky above, but Marilyn paid it no mind and chose to continue their dialogue.
"...Who can say? I can't tell you with certainty. Funnily enough, I can't even gauge how I'll act myself."
"What kind of nonsense is that......."
"Demons are beings faithful to their desires, you see. Once I've obtained what I want... after that, I simply do whatever my heart fancies."
True to her words, even she did not know what would come next.
Had the woman not barged in, she could only dimly guess that she would have shared as much carnal desire with him as possible, whatever events might follow.
"Even if what results from following your whims is ruin — can you accept that?"
"Whatever the outcome, the final moment will be bliss."
Even if what awaited at the end was the extreme choice the woman spoke of, the mana she wielded possessed the effect of numbing the reason of those intoxicated by it.
The pleasure born from it was more stimulating and addictive than any drug.
An end met while lost in such rapture could never be an unhappy one.
"Wouldn't that be the better outcome anyway? In a world fated to end soon, no matter how desperately you cling to life, demon and human alike will only live on equally in despair."
Better a finale steeped in ecstasy than the torture of false hope.......
Some would surely call that the ideal way to live in a world on the brink of extinction.
In truth, had the Empire not developed the technology to mass-produce saviors called Heroes, this world was so saturated with despair that most people would have dreamed only of a peaceful death.
"...I've heard enough."
But she was the last successor of the Haven Clan.
One who bore a mission to preserve the future from destruction could never possibly sympathize with such an absurd opinion.
"As I thought — you must be eliminated here."
The man she hoped would fulfill that mission.
She could not allow him to be toyed with by that demon's scheming any longer.
"...You speak with a great deal of confidence."
And the loathing was entirely mutual.
After all, one capable of prophecies so perfect they cornered even her could not possibly have failed to foresee this world's mortality.
It was not difficult to predict that a person living with such a future in view would grow obsessed with a single human being — precisely to shift that burden of responsibility onto him.
"Though I may be the weakest of the Demon Lord Army's Four Heavenly Kings, I am still a body with enough strength to protect myself......."
Yes — the one before her surely intended to push him down a thorn-filled path.
That was a purpose she could never coexist with.
Preaching survival by emphasizing a hope that could not exist was, to a demon who had lived her entire life under the hope-torture that her lord would return, an act worthy of condemning as a sin.
"...I'm sorry, but you've already fallen into my trap."
So for his sake, she had to eliminate this woman first and then think.
Just as she moved to pounce with that thought — a sense of wrongness from beneath her feet made her expression freeze into a grimace.
-Jjeojeong, jjeojeok!!!
Sharp crystalline formations erupted upward, leaving not even a gap to place her feet.
She twisted her body to evade the attacks as much as possible, but it was impossible to dodge them all.
Fabric and flesh alike were torn away.
The traps she had spent hours crafting after arriving here had succeeded in reaching even a being counted among the ranks of Transcendents.
'Do not let your guard down, Airi. The opponent may claim to be the weakest, but she is still a supreme executive of the Demon Lord Army. Do not drag this out — you must finish it here!'
That fleeting opening was the very condition needed to land a decisive blow.
-Kwagagang, kwang!
The meteor shower that broke through the atmosphere pummeled the crystalline forest bursting from the plaza, and the crystal shards that splintered and scattered in all directions expanded the mana sealed within them, triggering chain explosions.
Each individual blast might be weak, but they would be enough to instill reflexive wariness in the opponent.
'Even if she can change the future on a whim, once a threat to her own safety is perceived, even those whims will inevitably tend in a limited direction.'
Yes — what was needed was not reliance on prophecy alone, but a plan that could minimize the variables that might slip free of prophecy.
Even if the attacks did not land directly, so long as the result was herding the opponent into the designated position, from there it was a matter of guiding the enemy to move as one willed.
Laying down fire as if indiscriminately — yet focusing on the outer edges, not the entire area.
Gradually narrowing the evasion zones with the cascading meteor shower, then driving a decisive blow into the stable position the enemy unconsciously sought out.
-Kwaaaaang!
The moment the meteor carrying that decisive, overwhelming power hammered the target point.
As crystal shards and dust scattered in all directions amidst the storm it generated, Airi's expression crumpled sharply as she watched the scene.
'I had hoped to end it with that.......'
-Step, step.
Quiet footfalls.
As if to prove it was no illusion, the opponent parted the dust cloud and began closing the distance, a relaxed smile on her lips.
As if to demonstrate that though she had been caught in the impact, her body remained intact enough to move freely, without a single serious wound.
"Fufu, I was lucky. I dodged the direct hit."
Luck? That was nonsense.
The barrage had been designed to tighten the encirclement and control the opponent's movements, guiding her into a position where a tremendous blow could be landed.
Minimizing that damage meant she had deliberately taken the attack "with her own body" and broken out of its radius before it fully hit.
When protecting one's own life, any attack that triggered a sense of danger was something you instinctively dodged — yet she had momentarily exercised the wit to take it head-on.
Even if she had lived through eternities in the void, was that accumulated experience still not meaningless before such a being?
-Jjeojeok!
But this side had also accounted for the "what-if" of the first trap being broken, and had designed delayed traps to trigger along the path she expected the opponent to take.
An unexpected strike thrust into the gap while the enemy was too overwhelmed dodging the barrage to react — that would be more than enough to land a decisive blow against a lightly armored opponent.
"Why the long face?"
That attack — by a single step.
It missed entirely, simply because the opponent had shifted her body a single step to the side.
"Wh-what......."
"Oh my~ Why are you so flustered? I merely moved because I felt like moving this way. Surely that grand prophecy of yours didn't fail to grasp even this much, did it?"
-Kwaang!!
Immediately after, a falling meteor crashed behind her.
But this time, there wasn't even a motion of evasion.
She had simply quickened her pace a little — and even that had been executed with no warning signs whatsoever, in an entirely "abrupt" fashion.
"As it happens, the future is ultimately founded upon the past."
Even after that, the Demon of Frenzy swayed and weaved through the traps she had laid as if they were nothing, steadily closing the distance.
Her movements were utterly erratic, and her face didn't even show confidence at having thwarted the opponent's predictions.
Simply as her mood took her.
True to a race that lived by desire — she merely smiled leisurely, as if moving however her heart pleased.
"Which means that grand prophecy of yours is ultimately based on information accumulated in the past....... If you had truly foreseen everything, you could have killed me instantly from the start without dragging this out. The very fact that you resorted to such a cumbersome strategy proves your prophecy is not perfect."
-Kureung, kung!
She glided gracefully through the pandemonium of the battlefield as if dancing.
Having evaded every attack descending from sky and earth alike, she had at some point produced an instrument, poised to direct a performance aimed squarely at her opponent.
"But oh dear, what to do? When I get serious about anything, I'm the type who doesn't even know how I'll move myself, you see."
To Airi, the spectacle was nothing short of appalling.
No matter how much a Transcendent's whims could change the future — whims were not something you could willfully generate.
Even if you defined your own actions as whim, so long as they were "intentional," the God of Destruction who observed this planet would incorporate even that into the scope of prediction and derive an accurate future.
Even if a whim occurred, its foreshocks could be confirmed from close range — so she had believed that by facing the opponent directly, she could read those movements as well.
'But that only applies to ordinary Transcendents....... It means absolutely nothing when it comes to this demon.'
Yes — her opponent was a demon with madness as her source.
Madness meant that even she herself was not aware of her own actions, so if she deliberately submerged herself in it, every action would inevitably become improvisation.
Whims that did not stop at just one but came in succession — eruptive tendencies whose timing and location could never be predicted.......
To a prophet who factored even one or two whims into the scope of her plans, this was an existence that could only be called her "natural enemy."
"Well then, it seems you've shown me most of the show you prepared. Now it's my turn to perform."
-Tzitzitzik!
"A requiem should be more than sufficient as a theme song for you, wouldn't you agree!?"
A string plucked roughly by her fingers.
The sound waves born from that shrieking noise, amplified by mana, began to shoot forward.
-Peo-eong!!! Peo-eong!!!!
Successive explosions of sound.
As the attacks shot out in all directions and the ruins at every point of impact were pulverized, Airi's body, caught in the storm, was sent tumbling into the collapsed rubble.
'I dodged the direct hit, but with this, every plan I've built so far has been rendered meaningless.'
Her body ached, but she could not stop. The priority was to hide herself in the surrounding dust cloud and put distance between herself and the enemy.
At least she now knew that facing this opponent head-on was hopeless — she would have to conceal herself somewhere safe and revise her strategy.
"Kuh-heuk!!"
But her opponent had no intention of granting her such leeway.
The demon, having instinctively followed the path to where she would flee, was already gripping the prophet's throat with her bare hand, poised to lift her body off the ground.
"Puheu, hahahahahaha~!"
Without the slightest shred of seriousness.
Wearing a smile worthy of the epithet, Demon of Frenzy.
"Peekaboo~♡"
The moment she felt a chill run down her spine at that smile.
-Kwaang!!
Before she could even react, her body was hurled at full force and mercilessly smashed against the wall of the ruins.