Life Is Cruel (6)
Halfway to the Magic Tower, Surging Cheongsanho's escort caught sight of a white signal rising into the sky.
It was the citywide evacuation order—reserved for emergencies.
And then there were the searchlights trained skyward from the western and southern gates.
"So they must have already filed a report on the demon…"
Those signal lights meant evacuate in this direction. That only the west and south were lit meant one thing: do not use the northern gate.
And the one he had been fighting until moments ago was still in the warehouse district near that northern gate. In the end, the lights were command's way of keeping people from blundering north and straight into the fight.
That the southern searchlights outnumbered the rest simply meant the south was the safer route.
"…Just how bad is this?"
Only—yes. The more detailed the guidance, the more unsettled the escort grew. That command already had intelligence on the demon, that an evacuation order had been issued at all…
In Bemyurhen's entire history, an evacuation order had been given only twice—both in the city's earliest days. Since these walls had gone up, this was the first time.
"Get up right now!"
"Up! Get up!"
"We have to evacuate!"
"Grab your things! Essentials only!"
Perhaps it was because the civilian peacekeepers had already been organized to lead the people whenever the military went into combat. The crowds followed instructions better than they panicked—a small mercy, at least…
"What on earth is going on?"
"An evacuation order has been issued! Evacuate south or west!"
"What about the north?"
"Do not go north! I say again—do not go north!!"
Watching people begin to file away one by one, the escort shifted his grip on Cheongsanho in his arms.
He already knew the situation was dangerous enough to warrant an evacuation order. He only hoped nothing catastrophic would break out before everyone got clear.
It was a desperately small, desperately earnest wish.
At Pandemonium's words she raised an eyebrow—then kicked off the stone floor, dodging the red water that came surging at her.
It crashed over the spot where she had stood like a breaking wave. Fast enough that a fraction of a second's hesitation would have swallowed her whole.
Given a single second, it would spread more than ten meters.
But that speed did not rattle her.
She had seen something like it beyond the Eternal Gate, in the land of ice where even warriors did not go. That one had been so slow it barely looked as though it flowed at all—but still.
Had the people of her homeland seen Pandemonium's red water, they would never have called it "flowing fire."
"Two kinds, then…"
In any case, what Pandemonium used came in two varieties: one heavy and slow, and one light as water, lapping and rushing with real speed.
The former could take a definite shape and strike at her; the latter could not hold form, but it came on fast.
She judged the latter the one to watch for—and swung her wooden staff.
A wind pressure rose fierce enough that the staff nearly snapped, and shoved the lava back. The fast kind had looked light enough that she had tried it on a hunch. It worked.
Using what she had just learned, she struck at the red water itself.
Slash!
The staff scraped the ground and drove the flowing fire, flinging it back toward Pandemonium.
She had wondered whether the demon might take damage from its own power. Unfortunately, the red water simply soaked into the hem of Pandemonium's garments of its own accord. Not much use.
Fwoosh!
And the wooden staff caught fire. It could not melt stone—yet it burned wood without hesitation.
That, too, matched what she had seen in her homeland. The flowing fire there never melted rock, but it always burned wood.
The weapons she had once dipped experimentally had been the same. Iron only heated; wood turned to ash.
"I should have brought a proper weapon."
Then this stuff likely could not melt iron either. Watching another surge of red water come on, and remembering the dull-colored halberd shattered in her fight with the Demon Knight, she felt a brief pang of regret.
"It doesn't matter."
Regret, nothing more. She did not cling to it.
The halberd had been her master's. For more than twenty years since the day she killed him, it had been her partner—but that was all it had ever been.
As long as a single drop of that day's blood still clung to it, it was always meant to break.
Her foot kicked free a stone; she vaulted onto a building and seized one of the wooden pillars that framed the roof.
Her muscles swelled with the effort, standing out in hard relief—and the massive pillar tore free as it was.
Whoosh.
She even threw it straight at the demon. At the hurtling timber, the faceless devil pricked up its ears, loose and lazy—as if it were smirking.
Pandemonium drew up dark-red water and caught the pillar. Slow as the movement was, the viscous liquid stopped the wood with ease.
Whoosh!
But was there any reason she would stop at one? Absolutely not.
She tore free pillars, wrenched out stones, and hurled them in a storm.
Get close and that searing liquid would burn her—she had no choice. Until some weakness showed itself, she would have to learn her opponent this way.
Thud, thud, thud.
Most of what she threw was stopped by the dark-red water, and the thinner liquid began to fill the alley. If it had not been a canal, it would have done exactly that.
She watched the liquid the demon had summoned pool in the waterway—then looked again at the devil that still had not taken a single step.
Was that confidence? Or was there a reason it must not move?
The way it was handling her now, too. If it summoned that colossal giant the way it had last time, it might not kill her outright—but it could press her far harder than this.
And yet the creature still seemed unwilling to use its full strength. Why?
"You have no intention of fighting me properly."
A strong one's patience was always evidence of something. Of its kindness, or…
…or of its schemes.
From the rooftop, her golden eyes swept the ground like a hawk hunting prey. She did not believe a word Pandemonium said.
She would sooner trust that the Demon Knight's foul temper was an act than put faith in a demon's mercy.
"Ah. I see."
Just look.
"The ritual is still underway, isn't it?"
Beneath all that talk of chances, a trap was practically advertising itself.
Every drop of red water that had come at her so far had leaked from Pandemonium itself. The way it scattered outward, too.
So she had begun to think it was already too late to stop the ritual… but no. Inside the building the demon had emerged from, the rite was still being performed.
The red water she had taken for Pandemonium's alone was, in truth, mixed with what was flowing out of the building itself.
The ritual was happening in there.
"I can try."
She looked at the building, half-swallowed by red water and already burning.
She was no mage, and she could not carve through a wide area in a single stroke the way the Demon Knight could. Facing this would be genuinely difficult.
And her opponent was stronger than she was. Under ordinary circumstances, there would simply be no way.
But…
"Still hesitating?"
"I'm ready."
On the condition that her opponent still had no intention of facing her in earnest—if it were the complete "her," there might yet be a way. She knew that, and she pressed.
"…Fine."
No answer came. Decades of stubbornness had set too hard to be shaken easily.
"Then I have no choice."
Even so, she could not abandon the fight. She tore free another set of pillars and flung them with ferocious force.
She was not aiming at the demon's body, so the red water made no move to intercept them.
Several pillars drove vertically into the flowing stone and began to burn. Pandemonium still stood motionless, as if it had not yet grasped her intent.
Strong enough to be called a Great Demon, yes—but unaccustomed to this kind of fight.
And the less it understood, the better for her.
Her feet dropped toward the stakes she had driven into the ground. Already collapsing under the savage heat, they still served, for a heartbeat, as her footholds.
Still, that it had read her intent so quickly meant this was no truly stupid demon.
She kicked off a stake and stepped onto a collapsed stretch of the building's wall. Inside, the place was packed with burning crates—but that was no reason not to step on them.
Her body drove into the building. Acrid air stabbed her nose.
"…!"
And when she set foot on the stacked crates beyond the wall, the scorching heat made the cloth wrapped around her body shrink and cling to her skin. The crate piles were still burning—of course they were.
But she had no attention left for that. The view ahead was nothing like what she had expected.
"This is…"
Hundreds of crates piled inside the building were burning in real time, pouring out molten metal. And that molten metal was gathering endlessly toward Pandemonium.
Where the crates burned away, something else was being painted over the space they left.
Inner walls of black stone. A burgundy carpet across the floor. Gold candlesticks set here and there along the walls. Elegant statues and paintings placed throughout.
A landscape that called to mind some ancient, high-born manor was rising in its place.
But that antique grandeur was warped by the Demon Energy rolling off it in thick waves—turned into something grim and malignant.
Even she, ignorant as she was, could tell: this was a world that should not exist.
Startled for a moment by a sight she had never imagined? She wiped the shock away with a single blink and moved.
Anyone ruled by emotion had no right to call themselves a warrior. That much was obvious.
But when she saw the ritual altar standing in this landscape of another world, she leapt up onto a beam.
As if the interior really was the weak point—Pandemonium itself began to move after her.
Boom!
It was still holding, but the great beam, chewed away by fire, gave an ominous groan.
Even so she sprinted along it. The demon closed hard on her heels. No—it was faster.
Leaving a trail of soot, it cut ahead of her and spread three pairs of hands.
Slash! Red water erupted from the floor and blotted out her vision. The message was plain: you will not cross this line.
Didn't it know that only made her want to cross it more? She tried for a small smile, tried to keep her ease.
Slaaash!
But once the demon stopped underestimating her, its attacks turned genuinely vicious.
She saw several tentacles surge up—red water drawn out long and thin—and threw herself into an evasive rush.
Pandemonium's assault did not end there. Even as the tentacles reached for her, they sheared through the beams; others had aimed for the pillars from the start.
Pandemonium itself joined the fight. Razor claws tore open her shoulder and chest and punched through her side.
Even then she twisted her body and counterattacked, so her bones did not break and her heart was not crushed—but her muscle cooked, and her skin hung in tatters.
That arm would be useless now.
Sizzle.
The hand she had struck with fared little better.
Driving a blow into Pandemonium's gut and shoving it back had been the right call—but the price was a burn branded into her palm.
Boom.
Even in that instant the beam she stood on was being cut free, collapsing and tilting beneath her.
She felt the gap between them anew and decided to abandon the secondary goal of stopping the ritual.
Now that her opponent had stopped holding back, chasing that objective was arrogance.
Slash! As she fell back, a single tentacle grazed her leg—and in that one pass her hem and flesh burned away.
Thud, thwack!
Pandemonium's body was the same. That its outer shell was made of yellow molten metal was a thoroughly miserable fact.
Whether she attacked or defended, only she took the punishment. She kicked a falling pillar into Pandemonium and leapt for the next beam.
Rumble…
And in the middle of all this, a red giant began to rise from the building's floor.
A giant of dense fire and rock heaved the beams aside and set its head against the roof. The uppermost beam she had just landed on was already being burned through by the giant; its center was turning to ash and giving way.
Crack!
So she smashed through the ceiling and escaped outside. Pat-pat-pat. The burning roof punished her on the way. As a parting gift, Pandemonium's final strike punched clean through one of her calves.
If only she had a weapon—! The complaint rose before she could stop it.
Whinny!
Then, from far off, a horse's cry—and a familiar presence closing in. Vast mana, and a carefully ordered breath. Someone she knew.
"Demon Knight!"
Her face twisted hard. The humiliation of being driven back the moment her opponent got serious—and the relief that she had still achieved her goal—both hit at once.
But damn it, it still burned. Being handled this helplessly was too much.
So… please. Can't you just drop that stubbornness already? Don't you want to?
"There's a ritual altar inside! Something is being summoned—it has to be stopped!"
Even as she crushed the frustration of her own powerlessness, she did the best she still could and leapt down from the roof.
Pandemonium seemed to have no further interest in attacking her; no more interference came.
Her body hung in the air, a hand reaching toward the approaching presence.
"Confirmed."
Hands locked hard on hands, each pulling and shoving. Their positions reversed.
"Take the horse and go to the walls."
"I'm sorry I couldn't be of more help."
Her body was thrown onto ground the lava had not yet claimed; the Demon Knight's was flung into the building. Pitch-black mana began to howl like a storm.
Slash!
A black blade-stroke cut the giant down.
Boom!
A technique that spun black mana into a spiral and whipped it outward. When I developed it I thought it would be useless—turns out it comes in surprisingly handy.
I ground the lava apart and flung it in every direction until I had somewhere to stand, then gave it that assessment.
But what good was a place to stand? The thing I actually wanted to cut, I had not cut.
I knew by instinct that the lava giant had blocked my sword-stroke completely.
It was not a case of being severed and then regenerating because it was liquid. I simply had not cut it. That was all.
My right arm, maddeningly itchy since earlier, had started to throb as well. Ash-choked air stabbed into my lungs.
Boom!
The giant's hand came down on where I had been standing.
I threw myself back in a hurry. Lava crowding every direction made it awkward—but the building collapsing was, if anything, a blessing.
I retreated over the mounting debris. The fragments still shedding fire were plenty hot, but I did not feel my feet burning.
Berserk… no—Weapon Master? After so long, she seemed to have taken Frederick and evacuated; her presence only receded.
I had worried she might try to fight alongside me, but she must know that body of hers cannot manage this. Good.
Then there was only one thing left to figure out.
How do I smash the ritual altar supposedly waiting beyond that? Load more mana into the cut? But the faceless bastard was not going to just stand there. The giant seemed sluggish—better to circle around and cut? Force a breakthrough with the mana spiral?
I pulled my gaze from the lava giant and studied the demon in its veil of molten rock. The triangular ears I had taken for horns fanned open like wings.
The lava giant moved—and at the same time a meteor shower began to fall from empty air.
Well. "Meteor shower" was the first word that came to mind; on closer look they were closer to volcanic bombs. They carried lava inside as they flew, after all.
A bastard who can't do a damn thing without money…
I cut two of them to test, confirmed that even the leftover chunks slammed into the ground as real threats—and settled on pure evasion as my method.
The lava giant's movement was a problem too.
Built of high-viscosity lava to hold its form, it was sluggish, yes—but one solid hit from something like that and you were done.
And its outer surface being lava meant you could not even step on it. That made it even filthier.
Boom, boom, boom!!
In the end I jumped back from a meteor, sidestepped the giant's fist, then gave ground again as the lava rolled in.
Fall too far back and I would lose all control of distance, so I tried to circle around even if it meant using the building as footing—only for a volcanic bomb to hammer down wherever I meant to go.
And it was not just the impact. A second later they exploded and started pumping out lava.
Spamming permanent hazard zones… truly, demonically vicious.
Slash!
The Chamgyeok I threw out once or twice in the middle of all that did not land either. Standing in a sea of lava, looking at a demon I could barely even attack, I forced down the fury boiling in my gut.
My mana was harder to control than usual today on top of everything—twice the strain on my nerves.
Ah, for the love of—give me a foothold already. Even that damn Moby-Ho handed out random platforms! In the aerial fight the Inquisitor made me footing!
But this? Just because there's a building, no platforms? The giant is collapsing the whole thing and drowning it in lava!
I sucked in the scorching air and ground my teeth. If it was going to be like this, I should have taken support from the Magic Tower. This was really just too much salt in the—
…way too much salt in the wound.
I had been swearing more than usual lately, so I ran a little self-censorship, then let out a long breath.
I was dying for a cigarette!
…Kill that son of a bitch.
Mana began to surge and ripple across the surface of my body.