The Demon Gate Opens
“You’re really good at drawing, huh?”
One day, someone suddenly spoke to me.
They must have come over after seeing the picture I was working on.
That day I was sitting alone in the club room, idly sketching.
For someone worn down by life, those quiet hours were my only real joy.
The university I had clawed my way into was already overflowing with fresh anxieties and hardships.
Maybe I had simply become one more foolish commoner played by Korea’s infamous entrance-exam system.
Behind the parents who had sworn that life would be guaranteed once I got in, only one question kept circling in my head:
So where did my life go?
Zero social skills. Even the club I had finally joined showed no progress at all.
And then that person walked up to me.
In my drawing stood a young noblewoman gripping a greatsword.
They looked at it with genuine interest.
“You like sword-wielding ladies too?”
“…Yeah.”
That single shared interest turned them into my friend—
and completely rewrote my life.
“As a descendant of Lumenhart, you must be able to wield light magic.”
That single sentence forced her to grow up in an extremely harsh environment.
Make even the slightest mistake and she was beaten.
Show even the slightest defiance and she was beaten.
Cry even a little and she was beaten.
Smile even a little and she was still beaten.
The Lumenhart family, which tolerated no error whatsoever, felt nothing but disgust that their sole heir was Erika.
And so the corporal punishment they inflicted on her was always rationalized.
As if fate itself were mocking her, her magical aptitude was pitifully faint.
That only drove them to corner her more mercilessly, and she had no choice but to endure it.
She was not striving to become the greatest light mage and earn their recognition.
She simply did not want to die.
She wanted to live.
Raised under constant surveillance, she had no escape.
That was how she was shaped into the person she is now.
“Something like that…”
Marie and I brought Erika back to the academy’s central garden.
“Creating a mistake just so you can scold someone is not right, I say.”
“Exactly! It’s a form of bullying…!”
Once we learned the full story behind the missing textbook, both of us were furious.
“…But please don’t worry. We found the book…!”
“That is not the problem!”
My voice rose before I could stop it.
“I-I’m sorry….”
This girl is far too simple.
Is that really what you think the issue is?
Don’t you realize there’s something wrong with a family that deliberately makes you “lose” something just so they have an excuse to punish you?
“…….”
Marie had been quiet, then finally spoke.
“Franc, do you know?”
“Hm?”
“About my former family.”
Come to think of it, Marie still carried the surname Robert rather than Albert.
I had never heard the story of the girl who grew up in Saint-Victor.
“My family was terribly strict as well.”
“Not quite as bad as Erika’s, but it was still precarious. We were a house on the verge of collapse.”
“I was the only child left, so they pushed me hard—I had to succeed no matter what.”
“In the end the house fell, and the one who approached me when I was left alone was the man who is now my father.”
Marie continued with a gentle smile.
“I still remember the day Franc greeted me with ‘Commoner!’ Do you remember it too?”
It was startlingly specific. So that was the background she carried.
It was not the story of the current Francoise, yet I could still empathize to a degree.
I had grown up being beaten as well.
Miss even a single question on exam day and I was thoroughly torn apart; I even attended late-night cram schools no child that age should have endured.
The reason I ran so hard without complaint was not for my parents’ sake.
Mostly I just did not want to be hit or yelled at.
And the goal of getting into an S-tier university so I could cut every last one of them off grew enormous.
Even the university life that followed completely fell apart.
I had to repeat the same grind all over again.
Life outside the palm of the parents I had cut off was still pure hell.
Part-time jobs by day, credit-chasing by night—life hit me with a brutal reality check.
My only real joy then was drawing.
Doodling on workbooks or whatever scrap of paper was nearby had somehow improved my skill without my noticing.
Thanks to the friend who recognized that talent, I became the art designer, and for the first time I began doing work I could truly call my own.
“…Yes, something like that did happen. Ohoho.”
Listening to Marie’s story, I had drifted into old memories for a moment.
What was the point of clinging to the past?
Right now I had to protect this peaceful life with Marie.
And I found myself wanting to save the pitiful Erika standing before us.
A good idea struck me.
“Erika, do you commute from home?”
“Y-yes.”
“Hmm~ Excellent. Then you shall live with us!”
“Yes! Let’s live together!”
“?!”
Marie nodded in agreement as well.
Erika stared at me with a startled face.
“I shall speak with Papa properly. Once the matter is settled I will inform you, so pack your things and come, I say.”
“B-but my family might strongly oppose it….”
“Is there anyone who would dare defy the will of House Albert?”
I asked with full charisma.
We were the family that managed the nation’s finances. Who would dare raise an objection against us?
“Th-that’s…”
“Ohoho, then it is settled~”
“B-but is someone like me really all right? I… I don’t know….”
Marie gently wrapped the flustered Erika in a firm hug.
“Whenever things are hard, it’s all right to cry, Erika.”
“Eh? E-eh? I… I…”
“…….”
Marie said nothing more; she simply held Erika.
In that moment tears began to roll one after another from Erika’s eyes.
“Waaah…”
“I… I really had it so hard. I… I wanted to live happily too….”
Watching her cry made my own eyes sting a little.
“Do not worry. Marie and I are here for you now!”
“Hic… yes….”
It was a relief to see her heart finally loosen.
I had no idea how House Lumenhart would react, but one way or another I would protect Erika from that family.
And then, suddenly—
Scarlet, resting against my back, began to resonate.
“!”
“Stranger. The time has come.”
“What? Time? What do you mean?”
“‘They’ are coming. Welcome them, Francoise Albert de Valois.”
“Welcome them? What on earth…?!”
Rumble-rumble-rumble—
The instant Scarlet finished speaking, the ground began to shake.
No—the earth itself was trembling under an overwhelming surge of power.
Students nearby screamed and fled.
Then cracks spider-webbed across the empty air above the central garden, shattering completely until a vast rift tore open.
Crash!
Whoooooosh—
“Th-this is…!”
This was bad.
A Demon Realm gate.
Beyond the fissure lay a place that looked exactly like the Demon Realm, and through the cracks monsters began pouring out.
“Marie! Run!”
I raised Scarlet and took a defensive stance.
“No. I’ll help you, Franc!”
“I-I’ll help too!”
Monsters charged straight toward us.
These beasts had a different form from the ones I had seen before.
Humanoid soldiers—exactly the Karzen I had designed.
“Everyone, step back for a moment!”
Erika took a prayer-like stance and spread both arms wide.
A dazzling flash of light crashed down from the heavens.
⟨ Astral Fall ⟩
The Karzen collapsed in heaps beneath the radiance.
“Erika, that was incredible!”
But we were still outnumbered.
I leapt forward at once and swung Scarlet.
“Hah!”
The greatsword cut a clean, merciless arc; every Karzen in its path was cleaved cleanly in two.
Marie tore up the garden’s stone paving and hurled the slabs at the remaining soldiers, burying them and rendering them combat-incapable.
I cut them down one after another.
Scarlet answered my swings as though it were thoroughly enjoying itself.
At this rate we had a real chance.
But how were we supposed to close that Demon Realm gate?
Student council members arrived on the scene next.
James ran toward us and called out,
“Francoise, Marie, Erika! Are you all right?”
“We are fine! First we must stop the monsters!”
Charles’s mouth hung open.
Kael looked as though he could not believe what he was seeing.
“Th-that’s… a Demon Realm gate!”
“Unbelievable. The demons are already on the move.”
James raised his wand.
“I have already requested military support. We must hold until they arrive.”
“My, this is my first real battle~”
“…What a nuisance.”
Serena and Lilia joined the fray as well.
Charles and Kael’s combined skill whipped up a flaming tornado that roasted the Karzen.
Serena swept the front lines with controlled water, while Lilia’s plant-summoning magic bound the soldiers’ limbs tight.
James, like Marie, was an earth mage.
Under his command, rock golems formed and swelled our ranks.
With this much firepower, wiping out the monsters was only a matter of time.
Or so I thought—
until the rift began to widen further.
An enormous shockwave erupted, flinging everyone away.
BOOOOM
“Ghk!”
The pressure was crushing.
Everything was blasted outward in every direction.
I drove Scarlet into the ground to anchor myself and shouted toward Marie.
“Marie! Take my hand!”
“Franc!”
I poured every ounce of strength into withstanding the wind pressure.
Aside from Marie and me, everyone else had been knocked out of the fight.
“Erika!”
I called to the fallen girl, but there was no answer.
Damn—she had fainted.
After the massive wave subsided, something of colossal stature stepped out of the rift.
Thud— Thud—
Each step carried an overwhelming presence.
Its entire body was black, a violet core at the center of its chest from which vein-like tendrils spread outward.
A black horned helmet crowned its head, and a single purple eye burned within.
Ah. That one.
One of the 72 Demon Gods.
Bathin.