245
I Killed the Demon King. It Was a Mistake
Chapter 245
Hundreds of waterfalls made of ash poured down from the sky. It looked like sand falling from hundreds of hourglasses. At this rate, they would clearly be swallowed by the ash, not even leaving bones behind.
"So-sorry! This wasn't what I meant to do...!"
"Keep your head down."
Caesar took a deep breath and created a canvas in his mind. A vast plain filled with blue grass spread across the white canvas like a watercolor painting. Following that came winds like children tickling the grass. This beautiful 'Clear Field' was filled with the peace that Caesar yearned for after the war.
Just by Caesar entering a state of concentration, a fresh and refreshing breeze brushed past their noses in the battlefield that was otherwise filled with acrid smells. Something caught Yan's eye.
'This is... The realm of Mental Imagery?'
It is the foundational stage toward becoming a Sword Master, and the realm where one can express oneself through the sword. It is the realm where one completely understands who they are and what image they truly desire, enabling them to paint their wishes through their aura. It is the realm that every technique-type knight dreams of, yet 99.9% of technique-type knights fail to reach this realm and thus cannot become Sword Masters. Even Mitchell only developed his unique technique 'Metamorphic Radiance' after reaching this realm...
'What happened during the past month?'
Caesar's Clear Field is not just a simple body strengthening technique. Like the Red Wing of the Redfield family, it is a weapon technique, aura manipulation technique, and foundation all in one. What picture should be painted to protect this beautiful plain that Caesar wants to create?
Caesar lifted Thunder as lightly as an artist lifting their brush. The direction was skyward. What he painted was a spear piercing through the sky. Caesar's aura flowed smoothly along Thunder's shallow groove like a river. The aura flowing along the groove awakened the quiet Thunder and created lightning.
Crack! Crack! Crack!
When Thunder was filled with resonance that stimulated human survival instinct, Caesar shot it toward the sky.
Clear Field Form 3
Dragon Rising.
As Thunder tore through the sky, an intense whirlwind formed, drawing up the ash like a magnet. While drawing up the ash, the whirlwind simultaneously formed a protective barrier that shielded Caesar's group who were in the center of the Dragon Rising. Just as the eye of a typhoon remains calm no matter how fierce the storm, not a single speck of ash entered where Yan and Agatha were.
Crack! Crack! Crack!
However, electricity discharged from the collision between the red lightning flowing from Thunder and the dry ash. Having completed its task, Thunder was drawn into the eye of the typhoon and settled in Caesar's hand. Caesar swung Thunder again. Like a maestro conducting an orchestra, he gathered the lightning into one and shot it toward a single point. Caesar had already determined where to send it.
Bang!
When the red lightning struck young Belial's body, he disappeared into dust. However, the ash gathered again to recreate young Belial. The ash that still filled the sky continued to fall like tears, as if reflecting Belial's sorrow. The overflowing ash spread beyond Luxhope and flowed into the sea. How much time had passed? When he saw that all the ash that had filled the sky had settled, Caesar released the Dragon Rising.
"...This is quite difficult."
Even though he had eaten the Millennium Ginseng, maintaining Dragon Rising for 10 minutes was indeed not easy. But his aura would be replenished soon. After all, one of the effects of Millennium Ginseng was increased aura regeneration ability.
"Brother, you've changed a lot in just a month."
Judging by Yan's expression, he seems quite surprised. Well, even Caesar hasn't adapted to this uncontrollable power yet. It wasn't simply because he ate the Millennium Ginseng, but because after developing 'Clear Field', Caesar's capacity itself had grown, making his realm of possibilities tremendously wider and higher.
"Quite a lot has happened."
Belial was still crying.
His tears fell in drops of black ash. Agatha examined Belial's condition.
"By the way, my magic seems to have worked, but why is he like this? Usually, they should be in a half-unconscious state, unable to escape from the dream."
"Belial is different from other devils."
"How is he different?"
"Belial was once a Disaster."
"Disaster? What's that?"
It was Yan who answered Agatha's question.
"When a devil loses their mind and goes berserk, they become a disaster. In that state, they can't be called living beings anymore, they become more like a natural disaster."
Yan's manner of speaking was quite stiff. Well, from Yan's perspective, he had no desire to respect or treat Agatha comfortably. Although Agatha was a Demon King who was friendly to humans, a demon race was still a demon race.
When looking at Agatha, the faces of the demon race who killed Yan's family would be the first to come to mind. The only reason Yan wasn't hostile towards Agatha was partly due to the situation, but mainly because he trusted Caesar, who trusted Agatha.
"Going Berserker? But wasn't he able to communicate until just now?"
"That's what's strange. Usually, when one becomes a disaster, they become monsters who can't communicate and only engage in mindless destruction."
When Agatha and Yan sent questioning looks, Caesar opened his mouth.
"I don't know the exact details either. It's only known that Belial became a devil that could be controlled to some extent after becoming a disaster. It's a special case."
Of course, Caesar knew why Belial had become a disaster and then turned into an ordinary devil. The reason Belial became a rational devil was because of the 'King of Niflheim.'
He has the ability to unconditionally control devils.
Although called a disaster, since disasters are fundamentally devils, just one word from him saying 'be quiet' would turn them from a disaster into an ordinary devil. Of course, as a consequence, Belial became unable to feel emotions other than faint anger, but still.
"Belial is both a living devil and identical to a rampaging disaster. What the Demon King did was no different from stimulating a calmed storm."
Agatha's tail drooped.
"...I'm sorry. I must have cast the spell too hastily."
Yan found it strange to see Agatha sincerely apologizing. According to Yan's common sense, it was unthinkable for a demon race, let alone a Demon King, to apologize to humans.
'Is Caesar really a doppelganger?'
If Caesar were a doppelganger, Agatha's apology wouldn't be to a human but to a demon race.
"No, more importantly, can you break the nightmare?"
"...I already have."
Caesar calmly recalled strategies for dealing with Belial.
In the Valent Saga, when Belial receives a mental attack and transforms into that child-like state, all of Belial's attack patterns that Caesar knew would disappear and change to random patterns. In such cases, it's one of two outcomes.
Either it becomes really easy to deal with them, or it becomes really difficult.
Soon, the ashes began to move. Rather than being guided by the wind, the ashes gathered in various places like flowing rivers, and began to shape certain forms.
"...This is."
"They're children?"
The children made of ashes numbered over 100 when roughly counted. It didn't stop there; a huge fence was erected around them. It was smooth and tall, impossible for children to climb over, with sharp barbed wire on top. The children made of ashes laughed cheerfully inside the fence, playing tag and building castles with ashes. When a playground appeared next, they rode the slides and seesaws.
"...What is this now?"
To Yan's dazed question, Agatha answered.
"It must be Belial's past."
"Belial's past?"
"Yes. And probably the most terrible one."
"...It doesn't look terrible at all."
It was rather peaceful, like Yan's childhood village.
"Usually, despair comes when you're at your happiest."
Rumble, rumble!
In the distance, the ashes gathered and formed what looked like a school building. The main entrance was dark and sinister, like the mouth of a monster. Researchers in gowns began taking the playing children one by one from inside the building.
The children were gently led by their hands and were sucked into the building.
-Waaaaaaaaah!
-Sister!
Belial's crying grew louder.
Agatha furrowed her brows.
"Caesar, what should we do now?"
Caesar didn't know the answer either. Although Caesar had seen Belial go berserk several times, he had never seen this pattern before. It seemed that, as Agatha said, content related to Belial's past was about to unfold...
'I don't even know Belial's past.'
Belial never deliberately revealed their weaknesses or tried to deceive. They were like a chess piece that simply acted and moved according to the king's orders. That's why he doesn't know how he became a devil or how he went berserk.
However...
"...Wait a moment."
Although it was difficult to distinguish shadows in the ash-made forms, Caesar felt like he had seen that school-like building somewhere before.
"Where have I seen that before?"
If I've seen it anywhere, it must be in the Valent Saga. Moreover, there was a feeling of revulsion welling up from deep in my chest. Caesar's instincts were repulsed by that building. Then, Caesar's eyes caught the sign at the building's main entrance.
[Blue Orphanage]
Goosebumps rose on Caesar's back and his hair stood on end.
"Caesar, do you know what that place is?"
"...I do."
How could I not know? This is the setting for the most sinister and horrific episode in the Valent Saga. After all the young children were taken by the teachers, finally, one researcher grabbed Belial's wrist and dragged him away. Though Belial struggled with all his might not wanting to go, the researcher paid no attention and took him away. When Belial entered the building, it collapsed and the ashes began to clump together again.
Hissssss.
Snakes as thick as an adult's waist flickered their tongues and glared at Caesar's group.
"What are these now?"
"Failed experiments."
"Failed experiments?"
The snakes all rushed at Agatha at once.
"What?! Suddenly!"
Agatha used charm magic.
The snakes affected by Agatha's charm magic began biting each other and causing chaos. It seemed that as long as something had will, it would respond to Agatha's magic.
"Caesar, you're not just going to stand there, right?"
"Of course not."
Caesar looked at the ashes scattered everywhere.
"First we need to sweep away all these ashes."
"Sweep them away? Where to?"
Caesar pointed to the beach.
"If Belial's ashes scatter in water, they can't be used. Let's dump all the ashes into the beach so the waves can wash them away."
Agatha recalled Belial's weakness that Caesar had mentioned. Come to think of it, hadn't he said that Belial couldn't be killed, but could be sealed by submerging him in the beach?
"If that's the case, leave it to me."
Agatha waved her hand. The snakes under Agatha's charm magic all stopped fighting at once and rushed toward the beach. The sight of thousands of snakes throwing themselves into the beach was quite spectacular.
Hisssssss!
Being ash snakes covered in intense heat, they released steam as soon as they entered the beach. But no matter how hot they were, they couldn't evaporate the entire ocean. The snakes dissolved into ash and disappeared as they were swept away by the waves.
Yan wasn't idle either.
Whoosh!
When Yan swung his sword once, the ashes fell into the beach in clumps as if being swept by a broom. But the amount rising was more than the waves could wash away, and it filled up under the dock. Yan went directly to the dock and sent the piled-up ashes out to sea.
"I'll release the ashes into the sea, brother, keep watch for Belial."
Sure enough, young Belial appeared. Belial was tied up tightly by his arms and legs to a bed, with his back exposed.
-No! Aaah! It hurts!
The researchers smiled while holding huge syringes and looking at Belial.
-This is all for the sake of the nation.
Snakes crawled around near Belial. Unlike the snakes that had appeared before, these ones had arms and legs. And those arms and legs were those of children. They rushed toward Caesar. Caesar wielded Thunder.
The wind wrapped in Thunder tore all the ash monsters to pieces. Caesar raised wind and slowly approached Belial. The researcher stuck the syringe into Belial's spine.
-That's right, good.
Belial screamed and trembled.
Caesar saw the mark embedded in the researcher's forearm.
[Laboratory 666]
Laboratory 666 was the Kingdom of Dior's secret devil research facility, a group of mad researchers. Throughout the Kingdom of Dior, there were quite a few orphanages supported by the Dior royal family, and facilities like this Laboratory 666 existed in their basements. The purpose of these guys' research was weaponizing devils. These lunatics thought they could mass-produce devils as their own soldiers by controlling them.
-Aaaaaaaah!
Horns suddenly grew from Belial's head. Dark smiles spread across the researchers' faces.
-It worked! devilification successful!
-No snake scales either!
-What was this test subject's name again?
The researchers went mad with excitement, frantically writing research results and taking pictures. That's when fire broke out from Belial's body. The fire made of ash instantly devoured the bed and heated up the chains binding Belial's body. Belial screamed and shook his whole body, and soon another horn grew.
The researchers began to panic.
-Two horns?
-This wasn't in the plan?