The Banquet of Blood (3)

The witches Kallen knew were monsters wearing human skin—betrayers of mankind who had sold their souls to demons.

And the situation was spiraling toward catastrophe.

Ellie, pressed close at Kallen's side as she watched every direction, suddenly spotted something and cried out.

"Captain! Behind you!"

When Lenart whipped her head around, another witch stood before her.

"Filthy heretics who slew Trasi. In the name of the Progenitor Ednair, you shall be punished this day."

The newly arrived witch glared at Lenart with bloodshot eyes, her voice droning with barely contained fury.

Kallen had already drawn his sword, stepping forward as if to shield Ellie, and asked without letting his guard drop, "Lena, what is this?"

"...The remnants of the Northern Witch Assembly."

Lenart let out a groan of sheer frustration.

"We should have burned every last one of them long ago...!"

The reputation of the Lenart Mercenary Corps had been built, at its foundation, upon the blood of wicked beings and abominations—and of all their prey, witches had been their favorite. Lenart, who had lost her younger brother to them, was far from alone; a good number of her members despised witches just as fiercely. The number ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠of witches the corps had impaled on stakes and burned was already well past several dozen.

They had hunted the witches so relentlessly that by the time Kallen joined, not even a shadow of one could be found anywhere in the north.

And now the enemies who had hidden themselves away, quietly honing the blade of vengeance, had finally bared their teeth.

The white-robed witches emerged one after another until there were thirteen of them, and before anyone could react, they formed a ring around the plaza. Pressing daggers delicately against their own throats, they began to chant in unison, like a choir.

With each fresh line of the vile incantation, a violent wind whipped around them, so fierce it was nearly impossible to keep one's eyes open.

When the ritual was complete, the witches drove their daggers into their own throats without a moment's hesitation.

Then, fountains of blood erupting from their necks, eyes bulging wide, they collapsed where they stood.

"What the—? They just slit their own..."

"...Wait."

Kallen stopped Ellie, whose face had gone slack with bewilderment, and his eyes flew wide open.

Before him unfolded a grotesque spectacle he had never once witnessed in his life.

The streams of blood pouring from the witches' convulsing corpses abruptly stopped mid-spray, then began to slither back the way they'd come, crawling upward through the empty air.

Gathering together into thick cords, they bored straight into the mound of corpses at the center of the plaza.

The writhing blood-vessels threaded the bodies together like needle and thread. The corpses of the estate's people—people who had most certainly been dead—stirred of their own accord, layering arms and legs over one another.

What finally emerged at the center of the plaza was a massive ring-shaped structure, built from the corpses themselves as its cornerstone and pillars.

"What... in the world...?"

"A rift is opening! Everyone, form ranks and brace for the shock!"

Lenart's sharp voice jolted Kallen out of his dazed muttering.

The moment her words left her mouth, the current of the air shifted, and the empty space at the heart of the structure began to saturate with spinning, kaleidoscopic light.

Then the furiously rotating radiance abruptly expanded, flooding outward to fill the space in every direction.

Before he knew it, Kallen could feel a pressure that made breathing itself a struggle, and a stench of sulfur that stung his nose.

And then, accompanied by a piercing shriek that threatened to split his eardrums, grotesque and horrifying abominations finally began to come pouring through the rift in swarming black masses.

"The legions of Hell!!"

Demons hung all over with bizarrely twisted horns and swollen, repulsive tentacles flicked their tongues as they charged at the mercenary corps without hesitation.

The witches had offered up their own lives and the people of Monastin as sacrifices, tearing open a passage into the Illusion Realm itself.

"Nobody breaks formation! Mages, to the center! Everyone else, hold the outer line!"

"If anyone's got holy water left, don't hoard it—pour it out! Dead men have no use for it!"

Violent collisions followed one after another, like waves crashing against waves.

The mercenary corps, briefly thrown into confusion by the unfolding chaos, quickly assembled into a solid battle line and threw themselves into the fight with seasoned ease.

And at the very front of it all, Kallen's exploits burned the brightest.

He had long since surpassed even Lenart, once the strongest fighter in the entire corps.

With every aura-laden strike Kallen landed, demons shrieked in agony and were hurled back to the hell that spawned them.

"Kallen! Watch out!"

Kallen, weaving nimbly between tentacles and fangs, flung himself backward at Ellie's cry.

A gust of wind split the air, and a rusted, enormous greatsword grazed past the bridge of his nose. A hideous demon—unusually massive, with a crown of horns sprouting from its forehead—blocked his path, chuckling.

Even at a glance, it was clear this one stood on an entirely different tier from the lesser demons around it.

Thinking of all the blood and flesh the thing must have devoured to grow to such a size, Kallen felt his stomach twist.

Wrinkling his nose against the stench of entrails spilling in strings from the demon's slit belly, he charged straight at it.

"Kiiiek!!"

Before a single exchange could even be made, Kallen's sword aura punched through its throat. With a scream like a pig at slaughter, the demon's body scattered into ash.

Without pausing to rest, Kallen drove straight into the demon horde in search of his next prey.

Only after swinging his sword and repeating the same grisly work countless times did his gaze finally drift back toward the main body of the corps.

The sinister presence that had blanketed the area was no longer anywhere to be felt.

While Kallen had been carving through the battlefield, it seemed the main force had held firm as an unyielding shield, turning back the onrushing demons.

"...Whew."

He was just letting out the breath he'd been holding, trying to ease the tension from his body, when someone came running up and slapped him hard on the back.

"Are you insane? Who told you to charge out front all by yourself!"

Ellie had appeared beside him before he noticed, glaring at him as if she wanted to swallow him whole.

"What happens if something goes wrong out there? Are you trying to make a widow of me before we've even had our wedding?"

"Lena's the one who said I fight better on my own. She said having me close just gets in the way."

Unlike the anxious Ellie, Kallen simply shrugged with perfect calm.

He had just come through a ferocious battle, yet not a single drop of blood stained Ellie's body.

All throughout, even while he'd been tearing the battlefield apart alone, Kallen had never once permitted an enemy to come anywhere near her.

His vow to become the knight who protected Ellie was still unbroken.

"S-still...!"

"You two are having a lovers' quarrel in the middle of all this?"

Lenart's voice suddenly cut into the middle of their back-and-forth.

She walked over wearing a slightly weary expression and gave Kallen and Ellie each a light thump on the back.

"Anyone hurt?"

"Fit as a fiddle. You, Lena?"

"Same here."

Lenart shrugged as if it were nothing.

"We won. A few of the girls took some pretty bad wounds, but... considering it was a surprise attack, we held up admirably."

Lenart gestured behind them, forcing her voice bright as if to clear the heavy air.

The rift, which had swollen wide enough to swallow the entire plaza, had already shriveled to a fraction of its size.

With every summoned demon sent back where it came from, it would soon seal itself completely and vanish without a trace.

"Filthy vermin, the lot of them. I never dreamed they'd attack like this. I never imagined they'd offer up their own lives as sacrifice just to crack open a rift..."

Lenart spat on the ground as she spoke.

Death was the punishment witches feared above all else.

Having pawned their souls to demons, even in death an eternity of torment in Hell awaited them.

So great was their terror of dying that rumor told of a witch somewhere on the continent who had replaced her entire body with an ageless porcelain doll.

Which was why even Lenart had failed to foresee today's turn of events.

"Your part in this was huge. If it hadn't been for you, at least half the corps would be dead right now."

Lenart wore an expression of genuine approval, then gently ruffled Kallen's hair.

"This was your first time facing demons directly—not those wretched demonic humans, but real demons, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠right? And you did splendidly. You didn't get crushed by their mana, you didn't fear them..."

"Like I'd be scared of a few overgrown lizards..."

Still being treated like a kid brother, Kallen grumbled in a voice of mild dissatisfaction—

—then, before long, added in a somewhat sheepish tone, "But that's all thanks to Lena teaching me so well."

"Oh, now he knows how to say sweet things."

"Ah, quit it—!"

"..."

Beside Lenart, who was playfully mussing Kallen's hair into a complete mess, a murderous gaze had quietly made itself felt.

Only then did Lenart notice Ellie glaring at her hard enough to kill, and she withdrew her hand with a slightly sheepish look.

"Ahem... Anyway, good work, you two. We'll be moving out as soon as the site's cleaned up, so don't relax too much."

With a couple of ostentatious throat-clears, she smoothed the situation over, rather belatedly.

"If we linger here too long, we'll be next. Of all things, it had to be the spawn of pestilence that came crawling out... ugh..."

The ground the demons had trampled still pulsed with poison miasma and putrid stench.

If they hadn't dispatched the invaders and sealed the rift early, the land would have kept withering until it became a Grim World—so blighted that no living thing could ever grow there again.

"If it's cleanup you need, I could—"

"That's quite enough. It's a mercy if you just stay out of the way."

Kallen, who had risen to join in, was pressed firmly back down by Lenart's hand on his head.

"You two just rest here. I'll call you when we're ready."

"Hold on—"

"Sigh... poor old Lord Alanda... may he rest in a better place..."

Making the sign of the cross, Lenart walked away, muttering to herself without paying Kallen's protests the slightest heed.

Kallen grumbled ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠halfheartedly for a moment, but ended up breaking into a chuckle.

He was not a man who failed to recognize that beneath the mischievous surface, this was Lenart's way of caring for them.

"You heard the lady, Ellie. Sit down and... what are you doing?"

He was just turning toward Ellie beside him.

"..."

Ellie, giving no answer, stood bolt upright, her gaze locked on something in the distance.

He followed her line of sight, but all Kallen could see was the rift losing its strength and slowly closing.

"Ellie?"

"H-huh?"

Only when he waved his arm in front of her did the focus return to Ellie's eyes. Belatedly registering Kallen staring at her in puzzlement, she offered an embarrassed excuse.

"It's nothing... I just thought I saw something big over that way."

"What? Did you have another one of your dreams just now?"

"N-no, I didn't! I'm telling you, I actually saw something...!"

"Honestly... what could you possibly see when there's nothing there..."

And just as Kallen, teasing Ellie as he always did, let his gaze drift casually back toward the rift—

"Hm...?"

The surface of the fading rift rippled—faintly, but unmistakably.

The instant he saw it, an indescribable, uncanny sense of wrongness flooded Kallen's mind.

Without thinking, he turned his head, scanning his surroundings in urgent haste.

What met his eyes a moment later was Lenart, walking toward the main body of the corps with the rift at her back, trading jokes with the members.

Despite the utterly relaxed scene, his instincts were screaming danger without pause. As if he had come face to face with a wild beast empty-handed in the mountains, sweat was pouring down his entire body like rain.

And just as his thoughts, whirling furiously this way and that, finally landed on a single point—

Kallen's eyes went wide, and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠he hurled himself at Ellie beside him with a great roar.

"LENA!! GET DOWN!!"

—KWAAANG!

In the same instant that Kallen, arms wrapped around Ellie, hit the ground rolling, a shockwave sharp as a blade erupted in every direction from the rift's center, annihilating everything in its path.

The castle walls and stone buildings that ringed the plaza crumbled entirely, sending clouds of pale dust billowing high into the air.

"Ugh... what the hell..."

Struggling upright, Kallen checked downward first of all.

Ellie lay unconscious in his arms, breathing shallowly. She had only been knocked out by the shock, and thankfully, nothing else seemed to be wrong.

"Whew..."

Only then did Kallen allow himself a small measure of relief, staggering to his feet.

As he warily took stock of the situation, the sound of someone coughing suddenly reached his ears.

"...Kgh!"

"Lena? You okay?"

At the sound of Lenart, who seemed unharmed as expected, Kallen's chest loosened with relief, and he was just about to start toward her—

—when he saw something, and froze stock-still on the spot.

"Wh...at...?"

As the thick dust settled, what it revealed was Lenart—nothing left of her but her upper body, collapsed on the ground, vomiting blood.

"Le...na...?"