It Doesn't Flow Away (5)
Deathbringer raced desperately through the secret passage. Having glimpsed the Demon Knight’s face before he entered, he knew he had to put as much distance behind him as he could.
“Ugh, I’m gonna die.”
Still, there was one small mercy: they wouldn’t be able to follow him in easily. This entrance was known only to him—not even the current lord’s household was aware of it. How could they possibly know the method and use it?
If they tried to smash their way through the wall, part of the passage near the entrance would collapse by design. Short of that, he was unlikely to run into them here.
He propped a hand against the wall of the secret passage, gasping for breath. His stamina wasn’t bad, but trying to sprint the entire two-hour length without a single pause was starting to kill him.
“When I get out, the place is probably crawling with priests…”
If that happened, he’d simply have to give up. It was a one-way passage—the entrance couldn’t be opened from the inside—so there was no going back.
“Hah…”
Still, surely they wouldn’t be right there the moment he stepped out. He rose again, thinking a thought that would have earned him a chorus of “way to jinx it” if anyone had overheard.
All that physical training hadn’t been for nothing; after a brief rest he felt almost human again.
“Anyway, I’m outside the city now…”
The lingering traces of demon energy still worried him, but even those had a time limit, or so he’d been told. He had no idea when they would fade, but if he just kept running long enough, something would work out.
With that thought he approached the end that was slowly coming into view. The exit had been camouflaged with packed earth; he would have to break through it to get out.
“Ah—wait.”
Before he started digging, he patted himself down, checking for any item that might tell him whether a group of priests was waiting on the other side.
The instant he held the item up to peer beyond the wall, something familiar—and the last thing he wanted to see—filled his vision.
“Shit.”
A hole punched clean through, as if something had been gouged out. A signature unique to the Demon Knight.
“What the hell…!”
And it was close—close enough that he could almost believe the man was standing right on the other side of the earthen wall. Worse, the hole was growing larger, as if something were approaching. Deathbringer’s eyes went wide.
Boom.
By a hair’s breadth he threw himself clear of the collapsing wall. Where he had stood a moment before, stone, sand, and tangled roots now lay heaped in a ruin.
In place of the faint glow of the luminous pearl, blinding sunlight poured in.
“So this is where you were.”
At the same moment a black silhouette stepped into the light, blotting it out. The contrast was so sharp that the single feature that could still shine even by the pearl’s weak glow—his eye—flared with a dreadful brilliance.
Deathbringer’s throat bobbed.
“Speak.”
A man who normally uttered fewer than five words a day unless he was hunting demons had already spoken more today than anyone could count.
“Why is there demon energy inside your body?”
Ordinarily Deathbringer would have needled him—“My lord can actually string more than ten words together?”—but he couldn’t manage it now. Whether it was because the man had contracted with a demon, forced or not, or simply because he was terror itself, the urge to joke had evaporated completely.
Deathbringer’s gaze dropped of its own accord.
“My lord…”
It wasn’t only fear that made him look away. Separate from the killing intent rolling off the Demon Knight, he simply did not want to witness that hostility directed at him. That was a different argument from fear altogether.
If that hostility, that murderous will—if beyond all of it something like disappointment rose in that eye…
“My lord.”
Ah, what a ridiculous thought. He was the one who had tried to kill first; what right did he have now to flinch from the other man’s disappointment?
Even a beast could tell the difference between the hand that fed it and the hand that hurt it. As a human, he had no business entertaining such shameless ideas.
He swept every useless thought aside and reminded himself once more of his place. Whatever the circumstances, he was still a worthless man. Even as a member of the party gathered to stop the Demon King, he had been helpless when it counted. No matter how this ended, he had no right to remain among them.
He forced the crumbling emotion down and lifted the corners of his mouth in a weak, crooked smile—not because he felt like smiling, but because the sheer mess of the situation demanded some kind of armor.
“I—”
At least he would say this much before he went. He started to speak, still smiling, then raised a hand before the words could finish.
A sudden stream of blood ran from his nose.
“Cough.”
And then he was coughing up blood as well.
“…You.”
All he had meant to say was that he couldn’t say anything. Even that, it seemed, was enough to trigger the restriction.
Pain lanced through him; he spat blood several more times. He didn’t think he would die from it, but it hurt that badly. The whole thing was so thoroughly damned he could hardly stand it.
“Heh.”
And yet the laugh came more easily than the words. Maybe the sheer absurdity of his fate was starting to amuse him. Deathbringer’s lips curved into a faint, uncertain line—too sorrowful to be a real smile, too relieved to be pure grief.
“Just… cut me down, my lord.”
“Talking’s a pain anyway. Just… just cut me down.”
His hands rose, palms open, in a clear gesture of surrender.
Blood kept dripping, soaking the inside of his hood until even the deep green cloth showed the stain from outside.
“That’s your job, isn’t it?”
The Demon Knight’s breath seemed, for an instant, to hitch.
“So just…”
“You.”
The Demon Knight started to say something, then let the sentence die unfinished. The shadow cast across his face hid whatever expression he wore.
“You…”
But he did not move the hand that held the sword. A Demon Knight who could have cut him down in a single stroke simply stood there.
“My lord.”
From that alone Deathbringer understood one thing. His existence had meant at least a little something to the Demon Knight. Perhaps he had even been accepted, in some small way, as a companion.
“If you don’t cut me down…”
And why, of all things, should that make him feel glad?
“I’ll stab you myself.”
Really—what was there to be glad about…
“I’m not joking.”
Yet even with that realization, Deathbringer knew. If he was going to die anyway, better not to leave a memory behind. The joy of being recognized as a companion lasted only a moment; the knowledge that a companion had died would last forever.
“I mean it.”
So instead of arguing further he measured the timing deep in his chest. On reflection, there was no real need to die by the Demon Knight’s hand.
The restriction was designed to kill him the moment certain information left his mouth. With something that efficient already in place, why force the Demon Knight to be the one who killed him?
If he died by the restriction, the Demon Knight’s hands would stay clean, and he himself would not have to carry the grief of being struck down by that man. Everyone wins.
“So just—”
The blade whistled through the air before he could finish timing it.
Perhaps it was only to be expected, yet it still made him a little—or endlessly—sad. He didn’t know why. It simply ached, for no reason at all.
So, amid the flood of memories rushing past, he found a single one and sank to his knees before it. If this was the last thing he was allowed to recall, better a memory of someone than the pain of a heart being cut open.
And if he had to choose only one among so many, it had to be Emit. Only Emit.
The friend he had forgotten for half a lifetime, the one he had not thought of in so long—that pure boy from the days when he still knew how to love was more fitting for his end than every villain he had hated and every injustice that had made him rage.
The blade stopped.
“…?”
Yet the pain, the death, never came. The friend he had recalled after so long simply looked at him with the same eyes as always, with no intention of drawing nearer.
When Deathbringer opened his eyes a moment later, a trembling sword tip hovered right in front of him—close enough to touch, yet not quite touching, not even cutting a single fold of cloth.
He lifted his gaze a little higher.
“Why…”
The blade fell with a dull clatter against the gravel.
“Why are you making that face—”
A merciless blow drove into his solar plexus and snuffed his consciousness out like a candle.
“Hah!”
His mind returned almost at once. Or had it? Deathbringer broke into a cold sweat as he took in the sight of himself firmly bound to a chair and the completely transformed scenery around him.
An interior built of precious marble and the whitest stone available. Even rolling around on the floor, he could tell it was a temple.
“Ah! He’s awake!”
And only when the space filled with beings that radiated an unpleasant sensation, when the very air seemed to press against his throat, did the full weight of it hit him. It felt as if the atmosphere itself were hostile—his whole body crushed under an invisible weight, his breath strangled.
When he looked at the faces around him, a few of the figures in priestly robes struck him as especially disagreeable. Judging by the high-ranking cut of their garments, every one of them possessed holy power.
Deathbringer blinked, wondering if this was the rejection caused by demon energy. If so, the Demon Knight lived with this every single day… how did the man even endure it?
The pressure was bad enough, but the Inquisitor—who held the greatest holy power of them all—gave off a revulsion like staring at a corpse swarming with every kind of vermin: cockroaches, centipedes, larvae. Just imagining seeing that every day made him feel sick already.
“You’re awake?”
But he had no time to dwell on it. With the entire party staring down at him, what room was there for idle thoughts?
“W-what… what is this…”
Please just kill me. Wouldn’t it have been better if you’d finished me while I was out? At least then I would have died without pain or all this noise in my head.
Or was this an interrogation? Had they dragged him all the way here because they needed to question him? That didn’t quite match the expression the Demon Knight had worn at the end…
“What is this? Is that really what you should be saying right now?”
Meanwhile the goody-two-shoes was already throwing down a challenge over his choice of words. He had no idea what she wanted from him. If she was going to pick a fight, she could at least start by explaining why he was here. If this was an interrogation, she could ask a proper question.
“What? Then what am I supposed to say?!”
“You—!”
“Enough. Inquisitor, please, that will do.”
Still… still, the familiar bickering was better than the cold look she had given him a moment ago. Whether or not there was truth in her eyes, seeing that expression on her face felt like something that should never break was about to shatter. The same way he hadn’t wanted to see disappointment in the Demon Knight’s gaze.
“You…”
Ah. In that sense, dying earlier really would have been cleaner.
He considered forcing a contract violation right then and there, timing be damned, just to end it. If he had to go, he wanted to take only the memories of their squabbling with him—not their betrayal, not their reproach.
Even if the last time he had seen them, before the contract with the demon, they had been yelling and fighting… still…
“Did you form a contract with a demon?”
The Archmage asked carefully. It was a question he could not answer. Even if he could have, he would not have.
The facts he was allowed to speak were limited, and the words he could use would never be enough to persuade them. That much was obvious.
“Answer me.”
“What do you want from me? You already know.”
So he chose instead to play the villain. Maybe it was better this way. For a sinner who had gotten dozens, hundreds of people killed in the name of avenging a friend, this kind of death was exactly what he deserved.
“You truly…”
“Just send him to the torture chamber. He admits it himself. Clearly he was acting under a demon’s orders while he traveled with you.”
A death as a traitor, a death that meant nothing at all—that was the only fitting end.
“No!!”
A ringing voice cut through the room. It was the Inquisitor’s.
“He is not!”
“If you’re going to send the little hunter to the torture chamber, you’ll have to get through Berserk first. I won’t allow it.”
Berserk was the same. She sat in the corner with a bored face, idly turning her halberd in her hands. Everyone understood the threat for what it was.
“But that man—”
“Ah, whatever, whatever. Berserk warned you.”
“My lady, companion of the Proxy—”
“It’s a rather extreme way of putting it, but… I hold a similar view.”
“Proxy?”
He truly did not understand why they were doing this. He was replaceable labor; they could just discard him and be done with it. That would have been easier.
He was not a being worth this kind of stubbornness.
“I… I have neither evidence nor any certainty beyond that. However…”
In the meantime the goody-two-shoes fumbled her way forward.
“I know what kind of man he is. That idiot is shameless and less than perfectly moral, yes… but not so far gone that he would join hands with a demon.”
It was an absurd claim. She said she knew him, but as far as he could see she knew nothing about him. Still. Forever.
“He has thrown his whole heart into our journey to drive out the demons.”
And yet you…
Deathbringer clenched his teeth and recalled what he had once believed. If his contract with a demon ever came to light, the two people he had counted on to kill him without hesitation were the Demon Knight and the Inquisitor. Those two inflexible souls, he had thought, would never let sentiment stop them from cutting down evil.
“And in every one of those moments I saw not a single shred of falsehood.”
He had been wrong.
“I, who watched him from the side, can swear to it.”
That prejudice had been the most mistaken judgment of all.
“But, Proxy—”
“There must be a proper reason he will not speak! That fool… that fool has always had too many secrets. But they will not be the kind that harm us! At least, that is what I believe!”
The two people he had thought would move without the slightest hesitation were the very ones who…
“So I beg you to postpone both torture and execution. An investigation must of course be carried out to resolve the incident, but it need not lead to torture!”
…the very ones who…
“Who… who are you calling a fool…”
Looking at the one who was defending him most fiercely of all, Deathbringer finally let the tears fall. He cried for the one standing behind them in silence as well—the man who had surely heard that he had contracted with a demon and still said nothing. He cried for Berserk, who was defending him for no reason other than that she felt like it, and for the Archmage looking down at him with quiet warmth.
An emotion he could no longer suppress welled up in choking waves.
“You’re the fool…”
He had wanted to die as the villain so they would not have to feel unclean about it. Why, even now, would none of you cooperate?
“Hmph! Wipe your tears and then speak!”
“Untie my hands first and then talk, you stupid goody-two-shoes…”
He had known they were this hopelessly, stubbornly impossible to deal with; that was exactly why he had followed after them so they wouldn’t charge headlong and get themselves killed.
“I don’t believe this one is a true traitor either.”
“Even you, Archmage…”
“Think about it. If he had truly been a collaborator, he would have remained an ordinary person at our side until the end. That way he could have stayed with us without ever drawing suspicion.”
“But the contract—”
“On the other hand, he was recently targeted by a being we believe to be a demon. Is it not possible that a trap was laid and a contract forced upon him?”
“I have never heard of a method for forcing a contract.”
“Just because something did not exist in the past does not mean it cannot exist in the future. You know this yourself. A curse jar capable of spreading plague was only recently developed.”
Deathbringer watched through a steady stream of tears as the Archmage persuaded the bishop. Every time one of them spoke, the tears that had almost stopped started again. It hurt. It hurt so much…
“But if that is truly the case, why will he not speak?”
“As the Inquisitor said, there must be circumstances, must there not? According to the Demon Knight, the moment he tried to say something he coughed up blood. Perhaps this is a new form of curse that takes the shape of a contract.”
He was glad.
“Excuse me, my lords.”
And because of that he opened his mouth, ready to die. Whether this would kill him or whether he would finally force open a loophole in the contract and succeed, he had no way of knowing.
“You’re free to believe what you want, but…”
He wasn’t even sure they would believe him. Right now he was nothing more than a suspicious man who kept silent about everything that needed saying.
“I… I know.”
Still, he decided to tell them. A thin thread of blood spilled from the corner of his mouth.
“The… Demon King’s location.”
He had said it.