The Incubus and the Hero
“One, two… three.”
While strolling through Caulose with Iria trailing behind me, I noticed far more people than expected carrying demonic energy on their bodies.
Three just now, seven before that.
Most of them were in ragged clothes with deranged eyes, but the ones who looked normal weren’t merely carrying it—they were scattering the energy from their bodies. Those types even kept glancing at me.
They probably mistook me for one of their own since I possessed demonic energy too.
I briefly considered using them, but soon gave up on the idea.
Even if it was the same demonic energy, the subtle difference was obvious. Mine carried a clean feel, influenced by my main body, while theirs reeked of charred destruction, clearly tainted by the god of ruin, Cassius.
Approaching them clumsily would only cause problems, so finding another method seemed wiser.
Besides, I already had that method ready. No need to take unnecessary risks.
As I pondered my next moves, a skewer suddenly thrust itself in front of my face.
“Lord Cardnios, try this one.”
I frowned slightly at the grasshopper impaled on the stick.
Wondering if she was offering it because I seemed distracted, I glanced at Iria. Her face remained bright and innocently cute, showing not a single trace of negative emotion.
“Iria, isn’t this gross?”
“Huh? Why?”
Her pure, untainted confusion drew a dry laugh from me.
Don’t people usually find bugs repulsive?
I thought Direz was supposed to be the Kingdom of Flowers. Were they simply used to catching and eating pests?
Finding the cultural difference refreshing, I obediently pulled the skewer into my mouth.
It was crunchier than expected, with a savory, protein-rich taste. More edible than it looked.
“How is it?”
“It’s my first time trying it, but it’s tastier than I thought.”
I waited for Iria to take a bite before pulling another one off, then lost interest in her.
How should I proceed from here?
It would be best to locate that blond hero bastard before he killed the black mage.
While I was at it, I needed to make a move on the saintess I’d seen earlier too.
I had several plans, but without solid information they remained nothing but fantasies.
It would be nice to have a little more intel—
“Lord Cardnios?”
I’d been ignoring her, but it seemed women possessed a certain intuition for these things.
I reached out and stroked Iria’s head as she looked up at me with a pout, soothing her.
“Ah, there were so many fascinating things. My apologies.”
“No, I get surprised sometimes too.”
Though she hated being ignored, she clearly enjoyed having her head touched. Iria stuck close to my side and began explaining every single thing that caught her eye.
I let her words flow past me and sighed inwardly.
I knew far too little to act effectively. It looked like I’d have to use the method I’d already considered.
I didn’t want to since it wasn’t certain, but what choice did I have?
“Umm… Lord Cardnios. There’s really no need to come to a place like this…”
It was only natural for Iria to hesitate now that we’d stepped into the gold slum.
It hadn’t been long since her last careless visit to the slums ended in suffering, so her fear made sense.
“Ah, sorry, Iria. I sensed a suspicious presence that I couldn’t simply ignore.”
“Isn’t… it dangerous?”
I deliberately closed my mouth and stroked my chin.
Of course it was dangerous.
I had no intention of telling her the truth, though.
“Don’t worry. I’ll protect you.”
When I held out my hand reassuringly, Iria grabbed it tightly despite her trembling.
What an idiot. Still, this kind of behavior was adorable.
I pulled the back of her hand to my lips, kissed it, then led us deeper into the slums.
The further we went, the more frequently we encountered that reeking demonic energy, and the stares following us grew more numerous.
Iria must have felt it too; she pressed herself even tighter against me.
“Hmm… This should be about far enough, right?”
Hadn’t Mandolo warned me that three Experts ruled Caulose’s underworld?
As long as the plan went smoothly, I wouldn’t end up shouldering any grudges. It didn’t matter.
The fools seemed to have taken the bait I’d thrown. It was time to act.
I drew the large axe from my back, formed a sphere of demonic energy beside my head—its surface writhing with threatening thorns—and shouted.
“Hey, friends who’ve been following me. If you don’t come out now, I’ll split you in half.”
A brief silence followed. No commotion, no sign they would come out obediently.
I waited several minutes, but only received continued silence.
I’d given them a chance and a warning. From here on, whatever happened was their own fault.
I hurled the writhing demonic energy spheres toward the places where I sensed their presence.
Thud. Thud. “Aaaargh!”
At the scream, Iria’s body flinched. I gently stroked the back of her hand, then strode toward the source of the sound.
There, two shabby thugs lay writhing. Their limbs had turned pitch-black and were rotting from demonic energy contamination.
“I told you to come out nicely, friends.”
“Grrrrk.”
“Hmm?”
Why were they in such terrible condition?
The beast-like sounds they made suggested they weren’t in good shape at all.
It didn’t seem to be from the demonic energy I’d thrown. Was the problem the energy already clinging to them?
I wrapped my hand in demonic energy and patted their bodies as if dusting off dirt, knocking the contamination away.
Cassius’s demonic energy scattered like ash.
“Grr… Uhh, kugh?!”
Once the clinging energy vanished, clarity returned to their eyes. Only then did they seem to feel the pain, and the thugs began screaming loudly.
The immediate proper reaction after removing the energy suggested it had been tampering with their minds.
I ignored the other thug and approached the one who was clearly different—the one still crouched and scattering demonic energy from his body.
“Friend, why were you following me?”
“Ugh… What are you talking about?”
The obvious lie made me chuckle.
Could he really not read the situation?
Well, it couldn’t be helped. I hadn’t wanted to show this side “yet” in front of Iria.
“Aww, friend. Looks like you don’t need your limbs, huh?”
I raised the axe and severed one of his perfectly healthy hands.
As the hand rolled across the ground, I covered his mouth before he could scream and brought my face close to his.
“Now, where else don’t you need?”
“Kugh, I can’t speak! Even if I wanted to, I can’t!”
“Aww, that’s not true. You can do it. Try harder.”
When I cut halfway up his forearm, the trembling I felt from behind grew stronger.
It was definitely a stomach-turning sight. That was why I’d planned to use it later.
Leaving things like this wasn’t good, so I pulled Iria over and made her bury her face in my chest.
While gently patting her back, I pressed the axe against the guy’s other arm and asked again.
“Now, do you feel like answering?”
“Ah, I underst— kuegh?!”
Before he could finish, black demonic energy surged violently from all seven of his orifices.
The opponent wasn’t a complete fool. It seemed he’d implanted a self-destruct function that triggered if he was captured.
The demonic energy that shot upward enveloped his entire body and began devouring it with gruesome crunching sounds.
The momentum was so vicious that Iria might get caught in it. I had to hold her and retreat several steps.
“Iria, it looks like black mages are running wild in Caulose.”
“…Yes, it… it does seem that way.”
“For now, I should take you to the upper district… no, to the cathedral. You don’t mind, do you?”
“…Umm, no.”
Iria’s role was sufficient at this point.
Having seen it with her own eyes, she would testify at the cathedral on her own.
All I had to do was naturally insert myself into the situation.
Since I’d achieved an ideal result, I should give her a reward.
I stroked the head of Iria, who was still trembling and clinging tightly to my chest.
Her trembling gradually subsided. I lifted her cheeks and examined her face.
Her eyes were slightly wet, and her lips still trembled.
“Were you scared?”
“…Yes.”
“I’m sorry.”
Chu.
I kissed her still-trembling lips once.
Chu.
Then once on her straight, elegant nose.
“Still scared?”
Whether shame and joy had overtaken her fear, Iria’s face flushed red as she shook her head from side to side.
A faint trace of aphrodisiac energy seemed to be circulating through her body. I stroked her squirming cheek once, slipped my hand under her knees, lifted her up, and kissed her lips once more.
“Sorry. You saw something ugly.”
“Ah, uhh… N-no, it’s not.”
“Then I’ll run a little faster, so hold on tight.”
Kyros and Maria, who had been listening to the minstrels’ heroic tales in the square, both flinched at the same time.
“Kyros, this…”
“Haa…”
Kyros thought his luck today was terrible and gathered the holy knights who had been waiting nearby.
“Samson, go to the church and gather the others. Mardam, head to the lord’s castle and request assistance from the army. Everyone else, arm yourselves and assemble here.”
After issuing the orders, the two borrowed a nearby building to equip themselves.
Wearing the standard holy knight armor, Kyros held in his right hand the snake-entwined short spear Subtle Coordinator and equipped the fish-decorated mirror shield Spring of Mercy on his left gauntlet, pouring holy power into them.
His holy relics glowed with a bright azure light upon receiving the divine energy.
A glance to the side showed Maria, also in standard holy knight armor, infusing her own relics with holy power.
The mace shaped like a lamp holding the sun’s fire, Grace of Accounting, in her left hand and the large gate-shaped tower shield decorated with three fierce dog heads, Blind Guardian, in her right hand both emitted a crimson glow as they accepted Maria’s holy power.
While waiting in the square for the reinforcements he had called, Kyros flinched when he saw a figure approaching alongside the holy knights from afar.
Pale skin, lips with a bluish tint, decadent handsome features, and shoulder-length hair. A height a full head taller than the holy knights and that distinctive, crude large battle axe.
It was an appearance impossible to mistake even if one tried.
“Uh, um. Cardnios, was it? Why are you here?”
Before Cardnios could speak, Samson—who had gone to the church to request support—answered first.
“Ah, he came to the church to request protection for his lover, so I brought him along.”
Strength surged into Kyros’s fist.
With superhuman self-control, he barely stopped himself from punching Samson and turned his gaze to Cardnios.
“From what I can see, you appear to be at the Expert rank. Why aren’t you protecting her yourself?”
“Ah, that’s because—”
Samson interrupted again at Kyros’s question.
Words like “shut up” nearly rose to Kyros’s throat, but Samson, seemingly unaware, laughed heartily and continued.
“He said that since he discovered them, he intends to finish the job with his own hands. It’s truly wonderful that an Expert-rank fighter is offering help like this.”
“Yes… truly… a wonderful thing.”
“Well, if I join in, the high priest can stay at his post. That way Iria will be safe, so it’s beneficial for me too, Sir Samson.”
“Ahaha, how humble. Isn’t all of this the goddess’s grace?”
Realizing that leaving things like this might cause an incident, Maria pulled Kyros back and asked instead.
“Mr. Cardnios? You said you just discovered them. What exactly do you mean?”
“Ah, it’s nothing special, Saintess Maria. There were quite a few people in Caulose giving off a bothersome burnt smell. While chasing them, I found one leaking demonic energy all over the place. When I tried to interrogate him because it was suspicious, he vomited demonic energy from all seven orifices and self-destructed. At first glance, it was clearly part of some conspiracy.”
Maria’s expression grew serious as she listened to Cardnios.
“Demonic energy with the properties of fire and ash—it really is the evil god Cassius’s power. You’re saying there were that many people in this city carrying remnants of such demonic energy?”
“You didn’t know?”
“Yes, embarrassingly enough. Could you show me?”
“Well, it’s not difficult.”
With those words, Cardnios strode off somewhere, grabbed the neck of one ragged, glassy-eyed man, and dragged him back.
“Let go! Let me go! Aaaargh!!”
“Hey, quiet down for a second.”
He shook the rampaging man a few times like handling a cat to calm him, then created a glove of black demonic energy on his fingertips and patted the man’s head.
“Uh, um? What? Let go! Who the hell are you?!”
Clarity returned to the man’s previously dazed eyes. Seeing him protest without rampaging like before, Maria frowned deeply.
“…The evil god’s demonic energy was definitely felt just now. It was real.”
“Yes. As you can see, it looked like the energy was tampering with his head to search for something… whoops.”
Before Cardnios could finish speaking, the particularly ragged people around them suddenly had pitch-black light enter their eyes. They all turned their heads at once.
“Hi, hiiik? What is this… kuhk!”
“Hey, it’s noisy. Shut up. Saintess, it seems the main target is over there, right?”
“Haa… It does. And it’s a familiar demonic energy.”
Maria rubbed her forehead as if suffering from a headache, then shouted loudly.
