Found You, Pest
Wrath will come.
…Impossible.
Wrath will come, no matter what.
Why else did this body devour even that unholy flesh…!
It will come to kill you.
I am Biryuho! I who have claimed even a Great Demon’s power! I could never lose to some mere human!
Something you cannot defeat is coming.
This body cannot lose…!
“Biryuho?”
Whir!
Biryuho spun on pure instinct, claws unsheathed. The hand she barely stopped short hung inches from the human she had decided to claim as her own.
“…Is something wrong?”
The color had drained from him, yet the veins themselves had turned black. Bloodshot eyes stared up at Biryuho; a fresh line of blood marked his cheek from the near-miss.
Ah. I hurt you.
Something tore inside Biryuho’s chest. The wound being one she herself had inflicted was almost pleasing—and yet the fact that she had nearly killed this fragile thing filled her with aching sorrow.
And Leon, Young Lord of Ednium, now cradled against her, thought only:
What a load of crap.
That was not all. The stench growing more nauseating by the hour, the sneer at how even that once-pretty face was rotting away—those came with it.
The face pressed to her chest turned, vacant, surveying the surroundings. A few more of Biryuho’s words brushed his ear; none of them stuck. All he could see was the earth rotting around them.
Maybe killing Biryuho really is the right move.
He remembered the forest as it had been at the start—so lush and dense it had shocked him that no one had ever found it. The beasts that lived here had seemed swollen with that same dense vitality: massive, impossibly swift. Almost as if mere animals had somehow taken mana into themselves—like the spirit beasts of an age before humans even had language.
All of it had fallen in six days of sunrise and sunset.
The beasts that had looked so sacred had drawn out the demon energy they had been hiding. The entire forest had begun to rot and exude poison. Six days had been more than enough.
So he had understood at once: if this continued, he himself would not last long.
One glance at the back of his own hand confirmed it. Black veins—the textbook symptom of Demon Energy Invasion that every human learned—had filled every inch of his skin.
And yet he welcomed it. Sitting like some beloved doll in the middle of a rotting forest was simply too hard. Beyond the boredom and discomfort, breathing itself had become labor, his head spun, and his body ached as though it had been beaten.
If Demon Energy Invasion killed him early, that would almost be a good death. With that bitter joke he gently pushed Biryuho away.
Why?
Taking it as rejection, Biryuho’s eyes turned vicious. A familiar script.
Leon said nothing, only took her hand and led her to a patch where the grass still lived—a place soft enough to lie down.
You wished to rest?
Stupid beast. While Biryuho misunderstood on her own and solved it on her own, he stretched out in the grass. She, who could not even notice the world rotting around them yet remained oddly gentle with him alone, lay down beside him.
Even that was torment. The one he wanted beside him did not have platinum hair; that person had black hair.
“Why did you leave us?”
Hmm?
“In the past. You vanished from our sight.”
Ah.
…Idle talk was the best way to forget. He managed to push the afterimage lingering at the edge of his vision aside.
Nothing important. I merely wished to postpone the death that was approaching.
“…What?”
Even if he had not expected the price to be nothing but rising bitterness and rage.
Yes. Even the turtle that crawls beneath the earth received immortality—why then should I have to die? I alone have the right to eternity.
“Then… the land drying up…?”
I simply took a little of the life that should have flowed through the world. It is an honor for them as well. Better to become this body’s blood and flesh than to fade meaninglessly.
He covered his eyes with a hand against the rising misery. He could feel the skin itself trembling.
Of course, when mana pooled in the forest I used as a nest, there were a few side effects… but that is fine, is it not? Because of it, I met you.
Even then the words that goaded him never stopped.
Leon grabbed a fallen branch and considered whether driving it into that throat would kill Biryuho. He knew it was impossible; he simply could not endure otherwise. If he did not do at least this much…
You and I…
Boom!
An explosion rolled through the trees, just as it had once before.
“…?”
What…
And just as then, one side of the forest inverted, spraying debris and kicking up a dust storm. Between the reddish-brown clouds born of rotting wood, black cloth fluttered like a war banner.
“Found you.”
You…!
It was a moment that truly resembled the garden of the castle.
“This time I will not let you escape.”
Only one thing was different.
“Pest.”
This time the knight would not let the tiger slip away.
Kraaaagh!
“Where do you think you’re going!”
A shield slammed into the heart of the forest that reeked of nothing but rot, stained reddish-brown and violet. At the same instant a vast golden barrier erupted from the shield and caught the tiger’s forepaw. Boom! The crash rang out.
Clang!
The barrier of Holy Power did more than stop the blow—it shoved the tiger backward. That was the moment my sword moved.
My blade cut empty air and the flesh beyond it. Had Biryuho not instantly shifted from her massive beast form back into human shape, the wound would have been far deeper.
You humans!
“Liar! My comrade is a liar! You said you’d leave the tiger to Berserk!”
But my sword was not the only thing Biryuho had to dodge. Berserk swung her halberd in a great arc and smashed the ground where Biryuho had stood. When the beast leapt back, Berserk used her monstrous strength to snap the weapon around and chase the motion as though it were nothing.
Clatter!
“Whoa!”
In that gap, a pale-blue chain—accompanied by a sound that would give anyone PTSD—snatched Young Lord Leon away.
From experience, being yanked by a line around the waist alone made you want to throw up and left nasty bruises… but it still beat staying over there. Getting caught between a creature that flickered between human and giant tiger and the three humans fighting it, all with a normal body? That would have been pure thriller.
How dare you! My possession!
“Hahaha! Looking the wrong way!”
“Foolish creature! He is not yours!”
Bonus: we stole Biryuho’s attention as well.
“Now.”
…!
“Have you learned your place?”
My sword spat three black crescents. Biryuho, who had been charging this way to reclaim the young lord, was forced back again.
The being whose colors had grown muddier overall bared its teeth.
Mere humans!!!
She seemed to have forgotten that the very existence she coveted was also human. If she claimed it was because he was a special rose, well, nothing to be done about that.
“His condition is critical. Get him to the rear at once.”
“Damn. Shouldn’t we force some medicine down him first?”
“If it’s medicine you need, I have it here.”
“…Mia?”
“You said you’d become a man who never worried me. Breaking promises before we’re even married?”
“M-Mia.”
But the young lord was already on our side, and he would never return to Biryuho.
I watched Dev and the Young Lord of Camborer—I had been rather surprised when she showed up insisting she would come armed; her determination to represent everyone’s vengeance had finally left me no choice but to allow it—carry Young Lord Leon away. Only then did I swing my sword in a circle.
Held vertical to the ground, the blade moved as though I were doing arm circles and left black stains hanging in the air—mana marks like sword-shaped stamps impressed on empty space.
When the sword completed half a revolution and stood perpendicular once more, I raised it horizontal.
Whoosh. The black stains rotated ninety degrees and locked onto the front.
“I’ll kill you.”
Kill.
Like someone who got slapped in Jongno and glared across the Han River, a clot of resentment that had not even been born in this place slowly seeped into the stains.
Damn it. If even half my grief had been rage, by now…
Shraaak!
The mana blades shot forward like dozens of arrows.
They punched into the shoulder and foreleg of the giant beast that had been looking for an opening on Berserk.
“Hahahaha!”
A golden barrier slammed down next, pinning the human-shaped Biryuho, and Berserk smashed her halberd through it.
Biryuho hastily raised an arm. The dull blade bit halfway through her forearm.
“Good, good. There has to be some resistance when you cut!”
“Hah—here I come!”
Ah. Overlap.
I had timed my leap to Berserk’s attack and then saw the Inquisitor winding up her golden barrier like a baseball bat.
Dodge? No. I refused.
Slash!
“Demon Knight!?”
I poured the forward momentum straight into the blade and cut Biryuho’s leg.
The price was taking the Inquisitor’s Holy Power barrier full-on… but it still hurt less than a mace to the face.
Sizzle.
So it was fine. The scorch marks on the clothes would regenerate eventually.
“Do not interfere! Both of you!”
“Demon Knight, are you all right—Berserk! This is no game! We must combine our strength!”
“Ugh, damn it!”
More than that, our teamwork was absolute garbage. We had rarely fought like this as a unit, so the result was inevitable.
After all, the only time the three of us had ganged up on a single target was Moby Dick. Even then the body had been so huge and slow that it felt more like separate one-on-ones. On top of that the Inquisitor had been too busy correcting the environment to join the real fight. If we had somehow found perfect harmony from that, that would have been the real surprise.
“I said I’m taking it down!”
I adjusted my grip while watching the scheduled disaster unfold.
Meanwhile Biryuho’s face grew even more furious.
Fair enough—harried so she could not break through, unable to find an easy gap against three opponents, and those same opponents were currently bickering over who got to claim the kill. Anyone who stayed calm in that situation would have been a saint.
First I’ll drive these humans off… the forest beasts!
And even the minions refused to listen.
Ah—not refused. Couldn’t. We had killed every single one we met on the way in. They had all been stuffing themselves quite thoroughly with mana and Holy Power.
Thanks to that I no longer had to worry about tracking down the twisted beasts I had almost forgotten—demon energy, mana, whatever. Anyone could see this was the source.
Slash!
Anyway, whether Biryuho was angry or not, I had no intention of simply letting it pass.
Kh…!
“Ah, comrade!”
I sheathed the two-hander, drew a longsword, and hammered mana into it. Clang clang clang! Every collision with Biryuho’s claws rang out loud.
“From now on I will never believe a word you say! You said you’d hand it over to me!!”
When did I? She had just shouted for me to hand it over on the way here; I never agreed.
And right now she was already feeding quite well on her own.
I saw the halberd’s arc about to catch both Biryuho and me and leapt clear. Suddenly the 2-on-1 had become a three-way free-for-all, but I couldn’t care less.
“Wh-what do we do…”
The Inquisitor, who had stopped attacking for fear of hitting us as well, stamped her feet in frustration.
“Do we have to assign turn order for the fight now?”
The Archmage, who had never found an opening to join in the first place, had been lamenting for some time.
“Berserk cuts first.”
“Try it. If you can.”
At my declaration Berserk shifted her grip, holding the halberd like tonfa, forming a guard along the outside of her arm. Shortened, the shaft left only the length of an ordinary sword projecting forward, while the rest trailed long past her elbow.
Boom!
Thighs thicker than mine kicked off the ground. The axe-like blade carved a diagonal rising cut from below.
When Biryuho retreated, Berserk bent her arm and used the projecting rear shaft to smash at the waist and sternum, then flowed seamlessly into a reverse grip and a downward chop with the axe head.
That very refusal to give Biryuho any breathing room was exactly what made it easy for me to slip in.
I found a position where I neither hindered Berserk nor was hindered by her, and swung. It was the instant after Biryuho had dodged the downward smash.
Slash!
You insect…!
Fearing I might catch Berserk in the blast, I wrapped mana around the blade alone instead of firing sword-energy.
But Biryuho, sensing the danger, transformed into the giant beast and offered a foreleg instead. That judgment turned out slightly wrong.
In human form the body would have been bisected; in beast form it merely cost her about seventy centimeters of foreleg.
A deep wound, yet considering Biryuho’s size it was not quite that. Still, this was not a strike meant to end here, so there was no need to feel too disappointed.
“You!”
Berserk, however, exploded at my underhanded move. Not my problem.
I poured even more mana into the longsword, drew it back, then thrust as though shoving it forward.
A Bombard condensed as narrow and precise as the blade itself punched through the side of Biryuho’s neck.
It had not pierced the center, only grazed deeply along the side, yet from Biryuho’s perspective it must have felt plenty cold.
“That’s Berserk’s!”
Berserk did not stay idle either. She barreled past me—momentarily frozen by the Bombard’s recoil—and swung. The fully extended halberd spun once, twice, and on the third rotation scythed across Biryuho’s front.
Kraaang!
The foreleg Biryuho had thrust out to attack me before Berserk charged met the halberd head-on.
Shraaak!
At last the blade punched clean through the foreleg and tore onward. The tiger’s paw split into two like a goat’s hoof as a bonus.
Pain from the torn webbing between the toes made Biryuho stagger back with a thin cry.
Mere humans, mere humans…!
And with all the humiliation of being ignored by both me and Berserk piled on top…
I will not forgive this!
At last Biryuho began to vent her rage.
The platinum fur that had still been rather beautiful despite her rotten nature gradually stained gray-blue.
Never, never!
Crrrack.
Worse, from the center of her belly a light-devouring pitch black began to gnaw away at Biryuho’s true form.
Kra-kra-kra-kraak!
The rapid plant-growth ability I had been wondering why she never used finally activated, blooming dozens—hundreds—of vines across a vast zone that included the ground Berserk and I stood on.
I will grant you death!
What, a second phase already?
That thought drifted through my head.