Evidence (8)
The Inquisitor swallowed hard as she stared at the man barely clinging to life under Meister’s fingertips. Guhk, kuhk. Tears and snot streamed endlessly down her flushed cheeks and dripped to the floor.
“You cry so damn ugly…….”
“Hwaaaahhh.”
“Ah, stop wringing yourself dry already. You’re going to dehydrate!”
Deathbringer, watching the spectacle, wiped her face with the lining of his cloak. The gesture was anything but gentle. All the grudges he had stacked up against the Inquisitor made his hands rough, his strength even rougher.
Her face got squashed flat.
“We didn’t even bring water.”
“I-I’m, I’m soooorryy hwaaahhh—”
For fuck’s sake. Deathbringer stared at the fresh burst of wailing and simply yanked his cloak off entirely. The tear-and-snot-coated surface had grown too wide to keep using.
“Demon Knight—aaaaahhh!”
“Because of you I can’t even cry properly, damn it…….”
Not that the face he revealed looked much better. His nose and the rims of his eyes were red, if less dramatically so than hers, and he gave a loud sniff. Every drop of it was worry for the Demon Knight.
“Shut up, both of you, before I kill this bastard by failing the treatment. I can’t concentrate with all the noise.”
“Guh-hik.”
“Shit…….”
Right now the strongest person present was none other than Meister. At his single order the two of them clamped hands over each other’s mouths. Meister was exactly the type who really would murder them for being loud, so they had no choice. The Demon Knight had to be saved first.
“Ha, this is fucking miserable…….”
While they desperately sealed their lips, Meister—already performing the bare minimum of first aid—felt a quiet madness of his own rising. Nothing complicated: he simply could not see a way to keep the Demon Knight alive.
“I think we need to bring a mage who can actually cast healing magic.”
How was anyone supposed to fix someone whose limbs had been pulverized when there were no proper tools and no proper medicine? And it was not merely the limbs. A puncture wound ran through the abdomen; every other part of the body was covered in equally ominous marks. They had left the realm of ordinary first aid far, far behind.
The fact that the man was still breathing at all was thanks to his own stubborn vitality, not anything Meister had done. There was nothing more that could be accomplished here.
“Th-then…….”
“Ride back to the walls right now and grab a few mages. Honestly, that’s the only option left.”
Of course, even if they returned with mages, the odds of the patient dying first were high. Round trip would take roughly thirty minutes, and in this condition the Demon Knight did not look like he could last thirty minutes.
But carrying him to the walls? His guts would slosh around until they impaled themselves on his own shattered bones and finished him off. This was still the best they could do.
“Ah, okay…….”
“You go too. If we send only one of you, that one will definitely mess up the explanation, and if you go alone you might get jumped by a demon.”
“…Y-yes.”
“And you—put up a barrier before you leave. I don’t feel like dying to a demon.”
“…B-but then the Demon Knight—”
“I already fitted him with gear that lets holy power through. He’s fine.”
Meister hurried them out, then went back to wrapping bandages and spreading salve. The face that had lost so much blood it looked like plaster—like a corpse—still rose and fell at the chest. Meister wiped away the sweat that kept beading for no good reason.
“If you pull through, I might as well research the tenacious life force of mana users.”
No—hadn’t that already been thoroughly studied up north? He had never once cracked open a paper on biology, so he had no idea whether the research even existed.
Muttering to himself, Meister popped the lid off a coagulant with a soft pong.
“Anyway, surviving is still the prerequisite.”
He dumped the coagulant liberally over the crushed leg.
Even if the man lived, the leg was probably beyond recovery. Healing magic still had not reached the realm of limb regeneration, and given the Demon Knight’s physical nature he could never receive a priest’s holy healing.
Even now, Meister’s mind coldly dissected reality.
Yes. Everything has to start from the premise of survival.
“…….”
But when the man who had been dying with vacant, unfocused eyes suddenly made a clear sound, Meister flinched back on pure reflex.
Click. At the same moment his hand closed around the multipurpose knife he had modified so it could be used any way necessary.
“What.”
Well. Who else would it be?
Two gazes crossed and tangled thickly together.
—Well. Who else would it be?
I let out a long sigh the moment I saw the bastard demon start acting up the second he got outside.
Maybe I shouldn’t have let him out. Maybe I should have gone myself. That quiet regret came as a free bonus.
W-will it be all right……?
“I’m watching. He’ll keep it reasonable.”
I had already blocked the last-resort measure he tried earlier, and we still had a contract that let me rein him in whenever I wanted. Surely he wouldn’t try any more tricks.
With that thought I briefly replayed everything that had just happened. It began the moment I muttered “I want to go home” and blacked out.
“Ah.”
First of all, at the moment I thought I was dead I opened my eyes again in the mental world. Why didn’t I go back? The question was only natural.
I groped at my own heart and kept scanning the surroundings to confirm whether I was dead and whether I had returned. Honestly it was also pretty fucking annoying. They said if I die I go back, right? If I die I go back!!
…The bomb didn’t go off.
What quieted my rage was the remark from the boy who still had the demon thoroughly bound in chains. [You fucking XXXXX XXX—] The chained demon was currently shoveling out a stream of obscenities too vulgar to transmit.
The boy and I cleanly ignored her.
“It didn’t go off?”
…Yes.
“That can’t be right.”
White Wind had sworn that the moment the keyword “I want to go home” was spoken aloud the heart would explode. So why? There had been nothing to damage it, and even if there had, it had been repaired promptly—so why?
Even during the Bemyurhen incident the bead had sat quietly in my inventory the whole time and come out without a single scratch. So how the hell—!
I-I don’t know.
Neither the boy nor I had any way of discovering the reason. I flopped onto my back in pure emptiness. Ah, we’re on a boat. Only then did my vision register the surroundings. I was lying in a small skiff floating on a sea of blood.
“…And I still can’t go back even now?”
Because you’re not dead yet…….
“I see.”
After spilling that much blood I still hadn’t bled out? And the Inquisitor still hadn’t cut my throat either?
I felt a complicated mix of emotions at the latter fact and sat back up. Maybe I had misremembered the keyword for the chest piece; maybe I should try shouting it again.
But every attempt to wake up outside was bounced back by a crushing drowsiness. No matter how many times I tried, the result was the same.
So it wasn’t possible. I accepted the realization and simply gave up on waking outside. Death was in no hurry to arrive; it only kept tightening the noose around our hearts and nerves.
…….
Around then the demon finally gave up thrashing and flattened herself against the deck. The boy, who had been hesitating, sat down while still holding the chains. Faust’s eyes were red-rimmed, yet not a single tear had fallen.
“Faust.”
…Yes.
“Come here.”
……!
Something about it felt anticlimactic. With that idle thought I pulled Faust into my arms.
A boy who might die at any moment—at least let him feel some warmth at the end of his life. I was still resentful, but that didn’t mean I wanted a child to die alone.
“…Hey.”
…Yes.
“If I die like this, I wake up straight back in reality, right?”
Yeah. No matter how much you wronged me, the end of a life should still be allowed a little warmth.
…Yes. You’ll wake up immediately.
“Same as when I logged into the game?”
…That part, no. Even if the flow of time is different, time still passes there.
“…Time passes there too? How much?”
It’s not set at a fixed ratio…….
Still nestled against me, the child raised a hand and began folding and unfolding his fingers one by one, as though counting.
Uh…….
He did not seem very good at math. While he worked out the answer I blankly surveyed the mental world. Depending on the severity of the wounds, the sea of blood seemed to be rising higher and higher. The demon, still chained, floated on another little skiff nearby.
Only about two weeks……?
“Two weeks.”
I had been wondering why death was taking so long, then lightly furrowed my brow. The period was shorter than I had expected.
“But my body should still be in the capsule……?”
And yet that was not pure good news.
An old problem—something I had first thought of right after realizing I was trapped inside the game—stabbed me again. My eyebrows rose on their own; my eyes narrowed further.
“…My body didn’t die, did it?”
N-no!
Would the people around me have found me before my body died of malnutrition or dehydration?
At my reflexive mutter the child shook his head hard in alarm. The last traces of baby fat and his messy hair swayed.
Your flesh is protected by the contract. Even without special nutrition, even if physical force is applied, nothing happens to the body.
“…Oh.”
That was at least decent news—perhaps even an obvious measure—but still.
I felt a small relief, along with the idle thought that the medical world would probably flip upside down. It was the kind of relief a living person could not help feeling.
…They’re treating him. The people around him are treating this body.
Yet while we braced ourselves for death and waited, the situation outside shifted a little.
“…Really?”
Yes. The Hero is even leaving to fetch someone who can heal him.
I gave the delighted demon a sour look, then finally sighed at the indescribable expression on the boy still held in my arms.
“But does that actually mean I’ll live? Feels like I’ll die of blood loss first.”
If I go out…….
“What changes if you go out? You still need mana for recovery, don’t you?”
…Mana can be filled by offering a sacrifice.
I see. Offer a sacrifice and the mana gets filled.
“You think I’ll allow that?”
My eyes turned cold. Just hear me out first. The demon immediately switched back into groveling mode. Only after crawling several more times and renewing the contract did he finally receive permission to go out—and that moment was right now.
—Don’t look at me like that. I’m pissed off too.
“That fucking bastard…….”
I narrowed my eyes at the demon who was now taking his frustration out on Meister. Should I call him back this instant?
…….
…Damn it. I’ll give him one more chance.
Watching Faust, who had curled up and was carefully observing the demon, I muttered another “forbearance” to myself. If the bastard dragged this out any longer, that was it. That resolve settled in alongside the word.
“What the fuck.”
Meanwhile Meister narrowed his eyes at the Demon Knight who was currently declaring everything “fucking miserable” right in front of him.
They had not known each other all that long, yet he knew perfectly well this was not the kind of language the Demon Knight used.
How can this be? O ancient magic, how can this be? How can I be stuck with such a complete fucking idiot……
“What the hell are you?”
Don’t rush me, Gretchen. Do you really think I have other options right now?
“…….”
Pathetic. So pathetic. Why am I reduced to this……
Should I just kill him? Meister briefly considered it while staring at the being that kept monologuing—Demon Knight or demon, he could no longer tell.
“…Meister.”
Fortunately for someone, the thought never moved into action. The red in those eyes had faded.
Meister instinctively recognized the owner of those eyes as the one he knew.
“What.”
“…I intend to borrow the power of a demon to regenerate this body.”
“Like that wager you made before?”
“…Hard to say. Closer to both sides’ wishes aligning and temporarily joining forces.”
“Why not earlier?”
At the question the Demon Knight slowly exhaled. The words that followed—each syllable drawn out as if the situation itself was exhausting—were a little ridiculous, yet perfectly understandable.
“…Temporary or not, joining hands with a demon in front of a priest would still look strange.”
Fair enough. From what he had heard, at the beginning she had been ready to kill him simply for being a demon. Doing rock-paper-scissors with a demon right in front of her would have been a bit much.
Meister understood the excuse instantly.
“So the thing that popped out just now was the demon.”
“…Yes.”
“Fine. I don’t care—do whatever you want.”
“Then step back. You’ll get caught in it.”
Further, he retreated all the way to the edge of the holy barrier. Soon the Demon Knight’s eyes, which had been ash-gray, turned red again, and white mucus began seeping up through the cracks between the stones on the ground.
Sssrrrkk.
The white mucus swirled across the floor like the Moskstraumen, then punched a pitch-black hole in its center.
Thud. Two long shadows shot out through that hole. One pure-white sword and one ordinary longsword.
“Those are…….”
The pure-white blade was easy to recognize. He had forged it himself, after all.
It was the masterpiece he had completed by using Biryuho’s bones as the base and layering every kind of magic onto it.
“Why do you have that?”
He knew the green-eared one used to carry those two blades. But after he woke up from collapsing in Bemyurhen they had been gone, so he had assumed they were lost in that mess… He never expected them to come flying out here.
Meister’s eyes blinked rapidly.
O ancient magic.
Unfortunately the one who could answer his curiosity was not present. The demon left him alone and began muttering an incantation.
"O ancient magic."
"O supreme law, O scales of the cosmos, grant a just exchange."
At once the two longswords began to crumble into powder and scatter as though they were being dismantled. There was no need for deep thought. This was clearly some variation of decomposition magic.
“Fuck.”
Do you have any idea how hard those were to make!
Meister spat a thick string of curses as he watched his masterpiece dissolve into the air.