Its Paradox
The corruption of Its' mind falls into two cases. The first: Its, whose sanity is on the verge of collapse, attacks anyone he believes is the culprit dragging everyone around him into the loop. The second: Its, whose mind has already completely shattered, rendering conversation impossible as he moves only on instinct. Naturally, the second version is far easier to deal with. After all, wouldn't it be simpler to face a madman charging blindly than someone who still retains a shred of reason, capable of judgment, strategy, and unpredictable assaults?
"Three... no, just one? Are you the problem? Why am I here?"
This one is still in the first stage, his mind flickering in and out. Yet he hasn't deteriorated as much as I feared. Looking at his current state, one might call that nonsense, but... The more Its loses his mind, the less he speaks when encountering others. His will to escape is tied directly to his curiosity, and that curiosity wears away naturally the further he breaks. But look at him now.
"...If I kill you, can I get out?"
Though he has forgotten the one who trapped him in this endless trial, he still clings to his desire to escape. That means his mind hasn't completely gone yet. Of course, that raises another question.
"So how exactly are we supposed to kill that guy—"
The Blood Demon, who had been listening to my explanation, started to ask, but I tapped the glove he resided in to cut him off and continued. I was in the middle of a serious explanation, after all. He kept interrupting.
Anyway, this space itself is a kind of illusion formed from his own mindscape. Even if he dies here, he doesn't truly die—he simply returns to the starting point. However, the memory of that death remains and repeats. That is why he remembers every similar death inflicted upon him and slowly goes mad.
But what if he encounters a death unlike those ordinary ones?
If a new variable appears in the deaths he has repeated thousands of times in the same pattern, and he remembers every single one of them? Death itself is a massive stimulus no matter how many times one experiences it, and receiving that stimulus from a 'variable' that has never repeated before would be an even greater shock. What broke him was death, yet ironically, the only way to wake him is through death as well. Of course, this method won't work if his intellect has already been completely destroyed.
"...So in short, we have to kill that guy over and over again."
Right. He understood the point perfectly. Which means I have to do it too. Again and again, as many times as it takes. Kill him until he no longer sees me as an enemy.
Whoosh!
Before I could even finish speaking, an axe fell toward my head. I rolled out of the way, and in that moment Its changed the entire surroundings. The background he chose was a dense forest. Before we knew it, we had gone from the academy's front gate to the middle of the woods.
"As expected. I knew it would come to this."
What he wields is tangible illusion. If he wants something, he can manifest it in any form. And the battlefield Its prefers most is the forest. Spaces that seemed open are actually walled off by hidden illusions, while areas that looked like solid trees turn out to be gaps. Nothing visible can be trusted.
"Just sit back and watch."
Pop!
I burst a blood pack in midair and spread threads of blood in every direction. Through the dense web, the silhouettes of hidden walls glowed red. Spear in hand, I charged straight at the Its visible ahead and slashed.
Slash!
With the sound of flesh tearing, Its was cleanly bisected at the waist, upper and lower body separated.
"...What? Is it over already?"
The Blood Demon sounded doubtful, but I hadn't forgotten the most important rule.
Boom!
When Its dies, the loop resets from the very beginning.
"Aaaagh! What is this?!"
The sudden explosion made the Blood Demon flinch, but I had already prepared a layer of blood to block it.
"Those are clones made from illusion. They're rigged to explode when cut."
As if on cue, clones poured out from every direction.
"This is reality manipulation in its purest form."
Whoosh!
"Whoops."
Two clones lunged at me simultaneously, one aiming for my feet and the other for my head. I drove a blood blade into the belly of the one targeting my lower body, then spun around and severed the waist of the one going for my head. That was only the beginning of the endless wave.
"Haa..."
I scattered blood across the ground to form a thorny fence and wrapped a defensive membrane around myself. This should be enough to prevent fatal damage.
Boom! Boom!
Every time I smashed a clone's head with my spear, another explosion rang out. The blasts from my attacks triggered chain reactions among the surrounding clones, but—
"Hoho... You're still managing to block them quite well."
Thanks to the barrier I had spread in the direction of the explosions, everything was contained. The clones' patterns were monotonous, and since Its had to control so many illusions at once, fine-tuned manipulation was impossible for him. Besides—
Whoosh!
This time, mid and low.
I leapt into the air, dodged the sudden swords that materialized around me, then created footholds in the sky to escape. Even these supposedly surprise attacks were nothing new to me—I already knew every pattern.
Though, I didn't create those footholds myself. I can't make things that detailed...
"...This Seat merely lent a hand. Your methods were far too inefficient."
Wait, the Blood Demon can do that too? Then could he make guns as well? When I asked, he pondered for a moment before answering.
"You mean the weapon that princess used? Of course This Seat can create it—if you provide the blueprint."
Whoa. That's actually insane. Then why did I even bother learning spearmanship?
"Bah! If you only ever reach for the easy path, you will ruin everything in the end!"
...Depending on how it's used, this might actually be more versatile than Its' illusions.
"Whoops, another axe."
I dodged the axe flying toward my head and spoke leisurely, watching as the background gradually returned to the academy's front gate.
I knew it.
Its can only maintain three illusions at maximum capacity at once. This time, that meant background manipulation, clone summoning, and finally, freely switching between explosions on death and axe summons as the situation demanded.
"Normally, his strongest trick is using the environment itself, but..."
Since I had already connected thin threads across the entire space and mapped out every contour, he must have judged that altering the background would no longer work on me. So instead, what he created was—
"He's actually making that?"
The form of Laplace, whom we had already defeated once. I had heard that demon kings knew each other to some degree, but he actually went through with it. Just in case, I glanced around, but the clones that had been swarming to crush me had long since vanished.
"So he's copying Laplace's pattern..."
Right now, he would be hiding inside that fog, equipped with a rapier, Laplace's poisonous mist, and a hazmat suit for protection. Normally, illusions are far inferior to the originals, so mimicking a demon king is something reserved for the most desperate situations. It seems Its has chosen this poisonous fog as his final line of defense now that his other attacks have been blocked.
"That's the one we saw last time. Without the hazmat suit, are you planning to counter it with blood packs?"
Throwing a blood pack inside and bursting it would essentially turn it into a grenade. Not a bad idea, considering you're lobbing explosives into an unseeable smokescreen.
"It's not a terrible plan."
But there's a better way. I didn't connect the space with threads for nothing.
Snip... snip...
The threads I had stretched between spaces began snapping one by one, following his movements. The exact center of where the threads tilted or broke.
"Still, there's an even easier way to turn him into a pincushion."
This was the method to counter his imitation of Laplace—one that wouldn't work against the real Laplace's mist, which melts even blood threads.
"Pretty clever, right?"
I smiled at the impressed Blood Demon, formed a javelin of blood, and hurled it in the direction I suspected he was hiding.
Thud!
"Urgh!"
A faint groan echoed from within the fog.
"You hit him!"
Some might wonder why he couldn't just create more clones inside the fog to sever all the threads and cause confusion. The answer is simple: imitating Laplace requires an enormous amount of mental energy, so in that state, he can't even control a single clone.
"You're just saying that to brag, aren't you?"
The Blood Demon sounded exasperated. What? Can't I brag a little? I beat Laplace with a perfect no-hit run! Grinning at him, I created five more blood javelins behind me and threw them all at once before Its could react.
"Urrgh...!"
This time the groan was closer to a scream, and the fog began to thin. Good. Maintaining it must be getting difficult. I rolled my shoulders and hurled the spear I had been holding straight at the now-visible Its, aiming for the center of his forehead. A clean strike—the first satisfying kill of many.