Better to Just Kill Them
I should just kill them after all.
With his hands finally free, Laward cast a stun spell into the empty air.
The recoil sent him lurching upward like a fish hooked on a line, and he immediately cast the spell again on the shackles.
Crack!
The shackles shattered in an instant, and he was free.
“You idiot…! You’ll fall if you do that!”
Just as the man said, Laward plummeted along with the chain.
Then—
Snatch—
Laward seized the chain mid-fall and whirled it around.
“What are you trying to…?”
He flung the chain like a lasso.
Clang!
The chain wrapped tight around the bars of the cage holding the horned man, then clanged once more as it locked firm.
Laward gripped the chain and hung there.
“This… actually works…?”
“This works?”
Laward was just as surprised as anyone.
Only for a moment, though. He climbed the chain and clung to the cage.
Now he could see the horned man up close.
Nothing but a single iron bar separated them.
“I’ve seen them in the scriptures.”
Laward stared straight at the horns as he spoke.
“You’re a demonkin.”
“Tch.”
The horned man clicked his tongue at Laward’s reaction.
“So what if I am? This place is full of demonkin. You’re the first human who’s ever set foot down here.”
“Why is a demonkin locked up by the Death God Cult? Weren’t you all on good terms?”
“Don’t make me laugh.”
The man clicked his tongue again.
“Only the idiots cozy up to those bastards. We’re not like them.”
“Hmm. So that’s why you’re locked up?”
“Isn’t it obvious? We…”
He was still speaking when—
Clang! Clang!
The countless demonkin in the neighboring cages began rattling their bars, filling the air with noise.
“Over here! Right here!”
“Hey, human! Save me!”
“Me?”
Laward pointed at his own face with the hand that wasn’t gripping the bars.
“There aren’t any other humans here, are there?! Yes, you!”
“These bastards start talking down to me the second they see me.”
Just as Laward’s old slum personality was about to surface, the demonkin quickly changed their tune.
“I-if you save us, we’ll repay you! W-we will!”
“Please, just get us out of here!”
Faced with the prisoners’ desperate cries, Laward turned back to the man in the cage with a look of pure bewilderment.
“What.”
“You want me to save you too?”
“Th-that would be nice.”
“Hmm. All right. What’s down below?”
“The ground.”
“So there is a ground. That’s a relief.”
“You did all that without even knowing? What the hell is going on inside that head of yours…?”
“If there’s a ground, I just keep going down, right?”
“Hmph. You think it’s that simple? How exactly do you plan on getting down?”
“I’ll figure something out. Hey—have you seen my sword?”
“Sword? What sword?”
“A sword called Holiday.”
“What good does a name do me? At least describe what it looks like.”
“It’s a long sword without a crossguard.”
“You should’ve said that from the start.”
“Yes or no. Just answer. Don’t piss me off.”
“That one… I’ve seen it. The one who dragged you here took the sword with him.”
“Whew. Thank goodness.”
“What the hell is…?”
“It means I didn’t just lose it without noticing. First things first—I need to find my sword.”
“Shouldn’t escaping come first?”
“I’m not leaving without it.”
Laward stated it flatly, then wound the chain he’d used earlier tightly around his fist.
Whoosh!
Another throw.
This time he hooked it onto the cage of the prisoner next to them, linking the two cages together.
And then—
“You, what are you—?”
BOOM!
Laward tore the horned man’s cage free from the cliff face and, with one hand, lifted the entire thing.
Prison and prisoner, all at once.
“This human… what kind of strength…?”
Ignoring the muttered astonishment, Laward connected the two cages and dropped one of them downward.
Clang!
The two cages hung linked together like a string of sausages.
The lower cage—the one holding the horned man—swung like a pendulum.
“If I just keep connecting them like this, it’ll work, right?”
“Is this bastard a genius or a complete idiot…?”
Laward continued linking the prisoners’ cages one by one until the chain of them reached all the way to the ground.
Every time he moved to join the next cage, the cheers of the demonkin prisoners grew louder.
And when the ground finally came into view—
Laward landed lightly on the stone floor.
Then he looked up at the long chain of cages stretching from the cliff face all the way down.
“Looking at it from down here, it really is high.”
He let out a breath, and the prisoners’ voices rose again.
“We—we made it! We’re down!”
“Finally…!”
A chaotic mix of voices poured out—every one of them shouting thanks and encouragement at Laward.
“Hey, human.”
From the lowest cage, the horned man called out to him.
“What now?”
“Huh?”
“Getting down is all well and good, but how exactly do you plan on rescuing us looking like this?”
He had a point.
Laward had climbed down using the cages, but the prisoners themselves were still trapped, unable to move an inch.
“It would’ve been far more convenient if you’d freed us first and then linked the cages…”
“I never planned on saving you.”
“What?”
The horned man at the bottom—and every other prisoner—stared blankly at Laward through the bars.
“When did I ever say I was going to save you?”
“W-what are you talking about? When we asked you to save us, you broke the chains and set this whole thing up…!”
The prisoners hanging in a vertical line began pleading with one voice.
“I never said I’d save you. You just assumed it on your own—why are you blaming me?”
“Y-you only care about saving yourself…!”
“I told you I saw it in the scriptures. All of you.”
Laward’s golden eyes swept over them, sharp and cold.
He looked at each prisoner in turn, as if marking them one by one.
“The Death God Cult and the demonkin are enemies of the Goddess Church.”
The atmosphere shifted in an instant. The prisoners felt their blood freeze.
“Hey! We told you we were captured by the Death God Cult! Don’t you know the saying ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend’?!”
“I don’t, actually…”
“Kid! N-no—just listen to us for a second! We have our own grudge against the Death God Cult! Humans don’t all think the same, do they? Demonkin are the same!”
“Hmm. Is that so…”
“If you save us… if you save me, I’ll tell you everything! How we ended up like this! We could become allies, couldn’t we? You must want revenge on the one who kidnapped you too!”
“I don’t really care…”
“Please, just spare us!”
Realizing logic was useless, the prisoners begged desperately, but Laward only stood with his arms crossed, lost in thought.
What ended that thought was the word of the Goddess.
“No. I should just kill them after all.”
Hummmm—
Two halos appeared behind Laward’s back.
“This crazy… he was a Holy Knight…!”
“Ha… ha… so… he was never someone we could reason with to begin with…”
The prisoners split into two groups.
Those who thrashed and fought to the end.
And those who had already given up on living.
“Book of Joy, Chapter 1, Verse 6.”
As Laward spoke, the two halos began spinning at high speed.
“O light of the heavens, dwell within my blade and burn away the corruption of this earth.”
“O eternal Watcher of the Light.”
“Here lie wretched souls, lost and drowned in darkness.”
“By sacred authority I command—”
“Let the chains that bind their flesh be severed.”
Daywin had once regretted not making the boy read more books—but Laward had already been reading.
The scriptures.
He had read that single book every single day without fail.
Until it was worn thin.
Only that one book.
Laward stretched out his hand, and one of the halos pivoted toward the prisoners.
Even those who had given up on life now trembled in terror.
KRAAAAAASH!
The moment the prayer ended, a shockwave fired from the halo and severed the uppermost chain—
the one connecting the entire string of cages to the cliff face.
“G-gyaaaaaaaaah!”
“Save us!”
The cages full of prisoners came crashing down in a thunderous collapse.
“Welcome, Lord Karma.”
While passing through Houndry to gather Lucia’s equipment, I ran into Chronos.
I knew it.
It had to be him.
Lucia had come to the Academy on Tuesday, yet she said she never saw Laward.
That Tuesday had been bothering me.
The day the zombies appeared in the south.
The southern territories and the Marquis’s domain had nothing to do with each other, and the distance was enormous—but Chronos was different.
A ghost unbound by terrain or distance.
He could have returned here in an instant and kidnapped Laward.
Had he tricked the boy by claiming I was in danger?
Besides, I was the only one who could see Chronos in his spectral form.
Only me, after upgrading the Scouter.
Even someone like Laward could have been taken by an enemy he couldn’t even see.
The moment that thought crossed my mind, the man appeared before me.
There are no coincidences.
Nothing happens “just because.”
Everything was Chronos’s doing.
“This one has been waiting for you all this time.”
“This is the first time I’ve seen you in person.”
I kept my voice as calm as possible, speaking slowly.
“Is that so. There is much this one would like to discuss, yet might we begin with the main matter? Truthfully, this one’s circumstances are not so leisurely.”
Not leisurely?
He had Laward captured—what was he so anxious about?
Beside me, the moment Lucia saw Chronos, her fists clenched tight.
She had no weapon to draw, but she quietly stepped half a shoulder in front of me, settling into a bodyguard’s stance.
“This one shall be frank. You already know of Julian in the south. Lord Karma personally disposed of the princess’s fiancé, did you not?”
“…That’s right.”
“This one went there in order to meet you, yet committed a grave blunder.”
A blunder.
There was no doubt what that word pointed to: turning Julian into a zombie.
So it hadn’t been planned after all.
Cornered while being hunted by me, he had, just as he said—
screwed it up.
“As things stand, this one cannot return.”
Something about Chronos’s expression looked hunted.
“Until this one makes amends for that blunder, return is impossible. And the key to that…”
He extended a gloved hand with formal courtesy.
“…is none other than Lord Karma.”
“Why me?”
“The man Lord Karma so despises—Daywin Hasgard—brutally murdered one of our comrades.”
At those words, Lucia’s guarded posture eased.
Knowing both of my faces, she seemed to decide this entire situation was mine to handle; the tension drained from her fists.
She was simply going to listen.
If the heroine standing beside me hadn’t been Lucia, things could have gone very wrong.
The eerie aura Chronos radiated was not the kind one could simply endure in silence.
Anyone else would already have launched a preemptive strike by now.
“He was frivolous, yet a useful man. Ever since he vanished, our plans have gone thoroughly awry. And now this one has committed a blunder of his own—frankly, the situation is dire.”
Chronos slowly shook his head.
“Only Lord Karma can set things right.”
“You’re telling me to join the Death God Cult?”
“Indeed.”
Chronos admitted it without the slightest hesitation.
We have grown weak, and thus we need a comrade to fill the empty seat.
That was the naked invitation he extended.
“Of the five seats originally planned, only two remain. And this one, who occupies one of those two, has made an irreversible…”
As if he no longer wished to speak the word “blunder,” Chronos bit down on his lower lip.
I had never seen Chronos this shaken before.
In my previous life, that detestable manner of speech and expression had never once wavered—
as rigid and unchanging as a corpse in rigor mortis.
“Of course, this one would not ask you to become our lord’s strength without recompense. In order to make amends for this affair, this one must bring Lord Karma back without fail. Therefore, a small gift has been prepared.”
A small gift.
As he spoke those words, Chronos’s face returned to its usual composed mask.
“Daywin Hasgard’s beloved disciple. By now he is bound to a cliff, no doubt regretting the day he ever followed Daywin Hasgard. Well then, Lord Karma—shall this one guide you to ‘that place’ at once?”
What.
I already found him?