(-4) - Remnants of Erosion
"None?"
"Nope. They've already wiped away every trace and bolted."
"Another bust. Tracking magic doesn't work here either—what now, Klaus? We've got a fire going; might as well make a campfire out of it?"
Remilia Asephite quipped self-mockingly, leaving the ruined city behind.
"Even in the face of erosion, you still crack jokes like that?"
Sylvia pointed out her companion's flippant behavior with clear annoyance.
"How far has the erosion progressed?"
Klaus's question wasn't really seeking an answer.
"It's obvious even to the naked eye. Terminal stage already."
Sylvia scooped up a handful of sand and let it scatter in the wind. Klaus grimaced. That wasn't sand—it was unmistakably ground human bone dust.
The irreversible catastrophe had already passed. And at the center of that catastrophe was always Princess Estasha Latias de Kaizen.
"Baron Vanaport? So what are we really doing here?"
"I told you not to call me that."
"Hero Klaus Nestro Vanaport, sir."
"..."
Klaus unrolled the conditional activation scroll he'd received from the Shadow Citadel three days prior, confirming the details of their mission failure. He bit his lip hard and relayed the contents with no choice.
"Princess Estasha is now to be killed on sight, no negotiations."
"A royal decree?"
"A royal decree."
"Should've come sooner. The Emperor's so indecisive sometimes."
Remilia seemed relieved, inwardly delighted.
"Any other support?"
"Yeah. Thirty-one Shadow Citadel operatives."
"Not bad."
"Plus the Pope's personal knights and the Emperor's Imperial Guard."
"...What? Even the Verstaffen are coming?"
"Probably."
"No way—this one princess is that big a deal?"
This one princess. Klaus recalled the past two years spent chasing her. She wasn't as overwhelmingly powerful as the Empire's Verstaffen, the Holy Kingdom's Azerbayjan, or even Demon King Alzahab. In raw combat strength, she was likely weaker than the chattering Remilia beside him. But the orders to capture her alive had come a dozen times already, and now even the Emperor had turned his back.
Just how far ahead are you seeing, exactly?
"Klaus? There's a survivor here!"
"Terminal erosion and someone's alive? Don't give me that line then turn around and joke yourself, Sylvia!"
"Life signs in the city center underground. About two thousand of them. And one more at the main gate. Right nearby, actually."
"You sure?"
"Yes. Crystal clear."
* * *
The common belief was that once erosion reached its terminal stage, there was no turning back. They'd learned that the hard way from the two prior waves: Envy and Gluttony.
But even as Sloth's erosion rotted every plant and animal in the region, one wretched boy on the city's outskirts looked perfectly fine.
"Stay sharp. Could be a demonkin."
Klaus warned his companions. Recent Shadow Citadel intel confirmed demonkin were immune to erosion. Nations including the Empire were already attributing these global-scale erosions to the Demon King and preparing international alliances.
"Human for now. My rosary isn't reacting."
"Ugh, this is sketchy. Can't we just burn him? We've fallen for traps like this before."
"Remilia, full-body barrier spell, please. Least we can do is hear him out."
"Whatever. I'll cover from afar—you guys handle it."
Klaus confirmed the shimmering light barrier enveloping his body and approached the boy.
Age around twelve to fifteen. Wary of us, just like we are of him.
Encounters with unknowns always boiled down to an info war. Quickly gauge build, weapons, intent, gaze—prepare for anything.
The boy was short and gaunt, ribs starkly visible. His top was a haphazard wrap of animal hides; his one intact piece of clothing, shorts utterly unsuited to the weather. No weapons... but he cradled a live white pigeon tenderly in his arms.
"Are you the hero?"
Sylvia flinched at the boy's sudden question, ready to act, but Klaus held her back.
"Answer only what I ask. Think hard about your situation. Are you a resident of this city?"
"Yes."
"Where exactly?"
"You wouldn't know it even if I told you..."
Klaus drew his sword and pressed it to the boy's throat.
"Answer."
"...! Th-the... east gate intersection... next to the mill with the big waterwheel!"
"Sylvia, verify."
Sylvia closed her eyes, expanding her mana sense. Her magic meticulously mapped the city's terrain.
"Waterwheel, yeah—one at the east gate."
"Gates are sealed—why are you the only one wandering outside?"
"Well... there's a dog hole at the east gate, so I snuck out. To get bread from the angel first..."
"Angel?"
"Yeah! She said the hero was coming here!"
Klaus glanced at Sylvia, who gave a small nod.
"She comes every morning and—"
Sylvia's eyes resonated with mana.
"Guhk...! Kkh!"
Invisible hands seized the boy's throat. His feet slowly lifted off the ground as he writhed in agony.
"Blonde curly-haired woman, right?"
"Ugh...!"
"She's not human—she's a demonkin. The one who turned your village into this."
Sylvia withdrew her mana, and the boy collapsed limply to the ground.
"H-Heuk... *cough cough*..."
"Sylvia?"
"This kid... not a speck of demonic corruption. How...?"
Clutching his throat, the boy screamed at the hero's party in raw fury.
"So what if she's demonkin...! You... you weren't there when we needed you! When everyone in the village turned to stone, you didn't come save us! But the angel healed everyone!"
"What?"
"That's all? No grass grows on this cursed land anymore, so she brings bread from the neighboring village every dawn!"
The boy remembered.
When the erosion seed was discovered inside the city, the lord's first act was to seal the gates. By the time people realized, they were trapped inside walls meant to protect them from the outside.
The lord had fled. No escape from the erosion. Only a handful of strong ones scaled the 30-meter walls with sickles; the rest awaited death with open eyes.
Rotten grass pollen—not flowers—in the air. Livestock corpses left to rot. People knew eating them meant corruption, but they swallowed tears and did it anyway.
First, Grandma clutched her chest and fell. When she woke, her lower body was paralyzed. Then the jolly butcher collapsed. His soft belly turned to stone-hard rigidity.
One by one, people stopped moving. Fell asleep. And unnoticed, their breaths simply ceased.
The village fell into an eerie silence, as if this were the quietest death imaginable.
The boy pounded the innocent walls. Please, let us out!
Then a miracle. A hole punched through the supposedly unbreakable magic-treated walls.
[Want some bread?]
He first thought the strangely dressed woman was a witch. But tasting her bread and milk, he knew—even if she were, he couldn't resist.
[Take me to the sick.]
She claimed she could heal the villagers. Lies, surely—but the boy clung to the straw, leading her.
Then the miracle. Her transmutation circle dwarfed the walls. She inscribed 85,000 runes day and night. Golden mana heralded a new dawn for the city.
[This will be more precious than a loaf of bread. In our world, we call it mercy and hope.]
She gave him a white pigeon. Release it at noon from the city center, and the polluted land would purify, turning fertile again. A promise.
Hope. Hope for the villagers to live again. The pain of loss still overshadowed, but a spark of hope kindled in the boy's heart.
"How can people like you call yourselves heroes?!"
Instinct told him not to defy them, but he couldn't betray the grace that saved his village.
"What, still arguing? Why's it taking so long? The princess'll get even farther."
Remilia flew in, patience spent.
"Check the villagers first. Pursue the princess after."
"What? Wasn't it a royal decree? You get to pick and choose?"
"..."
Klaus eyed the fuming boy. He looked just like Klaus himself as a child.
[A nation exists because its people always look to tomorrow.]
So much to do, head spinning. The people suffered from the Demon King and erosion, yet the hero had to kill Princess Estasha.
What was right, what wrong? True, false? The harsh world offered no answers.