An Unexpected Encounter
The plague, surging grotesque enough to swallow a mountain, lunged with singular fixation at me and me alone. It looked as though the entire world had been dyed pitch-black and was coming crashing down all at once.
It was a spectacle unlikely to be seen again in a lifetime, but the sheer pressure was staggering—enough that blood was streaming freely from my eyes and nose. It was proof of how dense the demonic authority woven into the blight was, and just how exalted its rank stood.
Seeing me like this, the horrified elves shouted at the top of their lungs.
"Avatar Alzen?!"
"The Savior is in danger!"
"No! The Avatar of Nature is—!"
"Lord Savior!!"
"Proxy of the World Tree! Please, fall back!"
They sure had a colorful variety of titles for me.
Letting out an involuntary chuckle, I activated the Ring of Absolute Evasion and observed the nauseating undulations of the plague engulfing me.
Squirm, slosh! Slosh!
"Hmm..."
It wasn't just my imagination. This was imbued with an authority far thicker, far denser than the plague that had afflicted the elves and the World Tree.
"What on earth happened here...?"
Even as blood kept trickling down my face under the absolute disparity in our tiers of existence, I triggered the Absolute Counter Ring.
Surging outward with the terrifying momentum of an inverted waterfall, the black aura operated like a bespoke vaccine designed solely to eradicate the blight, melting away every speck of the plague in the blink of an eye.
"Phew..."
"Are you unharmed?" Having slipped beside me unnoticed, Muriel was already dabbing the blood from my eyes and nose with a handkerchief.
"Yeah. I'm fine."
"Please do not push yourself so recklessly. It breaks my heart."
"...You really know how to catch me off guard sometimes, you know that?"
I wrapped an arm around Muriel’s waist and gently stroked her side. She leaned against me, returning the embrace with tender affection.
"Hey. Tone down the flirting, would you? And for someone so disgustingly weak, why do you insist on throwing yourself to the front every damn time? Do you have a death wish? Or are you doing it on purpose just so the women will fuss over you like this?"
Weller’s rebuke was sharp, but sensing the worry and concern buried beneath it left me feeling a bit tickled.
"I hardly know what to do with myself, having an older sister worry so much about her useless little brother."
"Who said anything about worrying? If you drop dead, I lose my only walking encyclopedia, that's all."
"Then how about I hand the rings over and let you take the lead, dear sister? I'll even tell you every single strategy to deal with Sukra. I'd love nothing more than to kick back and slack off."
"...Just get moving and lead the way, you obnoxious brat."
Unable to hold back at her ferocious glare, I burst out laughing.
"Heh, fine, fine. Will do. Now let's see..."
The bizarre horde of abominations that had been surging toward the Elf Village like a tidal wave now lay sprawled out, completely limp after having the authority-woven plague stripped from them, creating an eerie panorama. Though technically corpses, because they had been fashioned from the living matter of the forest, they bizarrely gave off the fresh, vibrant scent of grass and damp earth.
"...I really don't want to walk through that."
"Indeed. I feel it would be far easier on the nerves to tread across an ordinary pile of corpses," Rebecca agreed.
Nodding along with her sentiments, I cautiously took a step forward.
Squilch! Crunch!
The sensation of trampling over the monsters was revolting in the extreme. Underfoot, they crunched like brittle, parched grass one moment, felt like dense, fibrous muscle the next, and squished like rotten mud or loose, sagging wrinkles. It was flesh seemingly congealed from every sickening, repulsive substance imaginable. I realized for the first time that unstable footing alone could instill such a raw sense of dread and danger.
"...This is... an utter desecration of life itself. How dare they...!" Unable to stomach her disgust and righteous fury, Cecilia furrowed her brow fiercely, her fists trembling.
None of us offered a spoken reply, but in silent, shared agreement, we pushed slowly into the Great Forest.
The lush, vibrant forest of before was gone. Having been reduced to raw material for the plague and demonic authority, the woods had lost all their refreshing vitality and mystique, transforming into a dark, grotesque, and claustrophobic forest of death.
Trees sheathed in fur or reptilian scales squirmed, twitching with clusters of eyeballs, tongues, and grasping fingers. Leaves sprouted legs to pounce on and devour insects, while small crawling and bouncing critters indiscriminately mauled every living thing nearby, spraying blood in all directions. The larger beasts stretched or flattened their bodies grotesquely to slither through the densely packed trees.
What made it truly chilling was that despite the ceaseless horrors unfolding around us, a heavy, ominous silence hung over the surroundings. The jarring dissonance between what we saw and what we heard was enough to induce vertigo.
"...Everyone took their antidotes, right?"
"Yes. Everyone took theirs without exception."
"Hey. Does this stuff even do anything?"
"Practically nothing. But hey, it's better than nothing."
"Hmph..."
And so, we pressed forward, trading trivial banter to stave off the creeping unease. Perhaps because this was the domain of a High Demon, Weller raised her staff with an edge of tension, scowling as she scanned our surroundings.
—Skreeeech!
—Giiiii-ik!
—Gurgle, grrrk...!
Scattered haphazardly around us were the corpses of unidentifiable creatures—things that had approached carelessly, lunged with murderous intent, or simply blocked our path.
"Cecilia. No need to focus so heavily on the barrier. Save your holy power."
"Y-Yes...!" Tense far beyond what was necessary, Cecilia flustered at my words and quickly dialed back the divine barrier.
"Hyaaap!"
"Take that!"
Vivian and Pashtra bustled about the perimeter, methodically hacking down any aggressive or bothersome abominations. The idea was to spare the stamina of our Master-rank combatants as much as possible, though in truth, nearly all the corpses littering our wake were the handiwork of those two.
"By the way, do you even know where you're going?"
I chuckled and shook my head at Weller's question. "Nope. How would I know where the bastard is? Even the World Tree couldn't pinpoint him. I'm just wandering around aimlessly."
"What?! Weren't you tracking him down with that know-it-all ability of yours?"
"When did I ever claim to know everything? I've told you a dozen times, I'm neither a prophet nor an incarnation."
"Then how do you plan to find Sukra?"
"We don't find him; we make him come to us. If we keep marching forward like this, he'll probably pop out on his own, won't he?"
"...What kind of logic is that?" Weller raised her voice in sheer disbelief, but I merely shrugged.
Even for me, there was nothing else I could do. It was an established fact right out of the setting lore that Sukra’s stealth capabilities were second to none. How on earth was I supposed to track down someone like that?
"Are you sure this is okay? That sounds extraordinarily dangerous."
"To be honest, it's not okay at all. Didn't I tell you? For a guy like him, altering the terrain or setting ambushes is child's play. So if we drop our guard, we'll get picked off one by one and—"
"...!?"
"Lord Alzen. Behind me."
Mid-sentence, a chilling sensation crawled up my spine, and my mouth snapped shut. The others must have felt it at the same instant, whipping around toward the same direction with weapons drawn.
"...It seems we have been spared the trouble of searching," Muriel murmured.
"Indeed. Delivering himself right to our doorstep... we ought to thank him," Rebecca agreed.
"This presence... the murderer of my kin...!" Nemeth hissed.
"Seems he's stupider than I thought. Or is he just looking down on us?" Weller added.
Listening to Muriel, Rebecca, Nemeth, and Weller speak in turn, I focused my awareness on the Absolute Ring Set.
Drip.
Fresh blood trickled from my nose once more.
"Master-ya, you going to be all right?"
"Lord Alzen... you're bleeding again..."
Cacciola and Lampon Pashtra glanced back at me with worried expressions, but I managed a smile and nodded. "I'm fine. It's surprisingly manageable."
The fact that I hadn't blacked out was likely thanks to having consumed the Permanent Flesh and the World Tree's Fruit. I really was glad I'd eaten those. Losing consciousness the instant I caught wind of a High Demon’s presence would have been utterly pathetic.
"...Here it comes."
Before long, an unpleasant noise began to ring in my ears. It sounded like viscous mud being violently churned, trapped pockets of air bursting wetly from within. Repeating in steady, rhythmic intervals, the noise drew closer as the densely packed abominations twisted and broke their own bodies to part a path.
And at the end of that cleared corridor, the author of the sound finally revealed itself.
"...Hey. Is that really him?"
At Weller's question, I fell silent, my head tilting in confusion. The creature before us looked far too different from the Sukra I remembered.
"Why does he look even more revolting?"
The half-melted limbs, the crimson hair, and the pitch-black body matched my memory, but there were far too many eyes, noses, and mouths that hadn't been in the lore. It looked as though dozens of heads, large and small, had been shoved beneath his flesh, with raw slits poked through the stretched, translucent skin for eyeholes and mouth-slits. On top of that, Sukra’s core frame was emaciated to the point where his bones looked ready to burst through his skin.
The bat wings and avian tail feathers remained, confirming his identity, but... I couldn't help feeling utterly appalled that someone already hideous had managed to become even uglier.
"...Looks like it's Sukra, all right."
An unexpected development, perhaps, but what we needed to do hadn't changed. No introductions or pleasantries were necessary. Focusing my mind on the rings, I took a step forward, and the others flared their aura, falling into combat stances.
"Ah, aahh... F-Found youuu..."
Just as I was about to trigger the ring, a feeble, limp voice trickled out.
"S-Stanasila... Alzen...?"
"...Huh?"
A jarring sense of wrongness in that voice and cadence made me halt the ring's activation. As our eyes met, Sukra strained his gaunt, wrinkled face into an awkward, distorted smile.
"Hehe, ehehehe... F-Found you. Found you. Found you..."
"......"
Did Sukra ever speak like that? I didn't know. I had read through his lore entries, but they hadn't detailed his exact tone or vocal quirks. Still... given his volatile and arrogant personality, even in this state, he wouldn't be babbling like that.
"I-I'm going to take you with me. D-D-Don't worry. I'll wrap you up nice and tight so you won't die... I-I'll even keep you alive, you know? Ah, a-and! If you come quietly... I w-w-won't touch your companions either...!"
As the creature spoke, it shot furtive glances our way, shrinking and squirming like a bashful maiden.
...It was a gesture repulsive enough to induce vomiting.
"Something's off. This is way too different from what I know. It's almost like... Wait, no way?" A sudden realization flashed through my mind. If this thing wasn't Sukra, then this behavior made complete sense.
"...Lord Alzen. How much longer must we endure this?" Grinding her teeth, Nemeth seemed pushed to the brink, igniting her Aura Blade and radiating pure bloodlust.
"Hold on a second. Mm, could it really be...?"
Drip.
Wiping away the blood streaming from my eyes and nose, I stared intently at the monster.
"H-Eeeek...!"
The moment our gazes locked, the creature flinched violently, snapping its head away and curling inward even further. Seeing that reaction, I was practically certain.
"Are you Demon King Otiliv?"
"...!?"
"!?"
I could feel the party staring at me in sheer shock, but my attention remained entirely fixed on the abomination.
"Uh, ah, ahh?! N-No. I'm not?!"
"The hell you aren't. Anyone can see you mutated Sukra's body and turned it into your 'avatar.' Did you absorb Sukra's abilities too?"
This wasn't 'possession' or 'domination.' A pathetic, shut-in loser like Demon King Otiliv didn't know how to do that sort of thing. The only way she could directly see and hear across long distances was by utilizing the Authority of Life to craft an 'avatar'—in essence, creating another version of herself. An avatar was virtually an identical clone. Her mindset, her behavior, even her minor idiosyncrasies were replicated down to the letter. The only difference was the gulf in raw power compared to her true body.
"Heeeh?! H-H-How did you know...?!"
Instead of answering, I curled my lips into a grin. "I called this a mock Demon King raid, but I never expected it to turn into a literal mock Demon King raid."
"Wh-What...?"
"Say your prayers, you bastard."
As I had noted before, our current combat power was formidable enough to take down an actual Demon King. Even if this had been the Demon Realm, that fact wouldn't change—though if it were the true Demon Realm, we would have had to brace for casualties.
Fwoooosh!
An unforeseen variable had emerged, but there was no reason to hesitate. Whether it was Sukra or a Demon King, they were marked for death all the same. Even if this was merely an avatar... Either way, I immediately activated the Absolute Ring of Taunt.