373. Gap (1)
373. Gap (1)
- 1 -
It was the hour when the blue darkness of dawn began to thin and the eastern sky brightened faintly.
"...Hmm?"
Paimon, who had been leaning against the carriage window, narrowed her eyes.
Her pupils flashed.
Her keen senses had caught something.
A presence approaching from afar. No ordinary being.
- What is it?
"They're coming."
- Yes, my lady.
The Black Knight stepped outside the moment he heard Paimon's answer.
He moved to alert his comrades.
Leaving the Black Knight to his task, the demon of a bygone era gazed out the window.
'Two of them.'
Only two, but they could not be ignored.
The force radiating from the owners of those presences was simply that immense.
One from the sky.
The presence of a giant 'falcon,' condensing colossal power like the eye of a storm and driving thunderclouds before her.
The other from the ground.
The presence of a ferocious 'wolf' that seemed ready to shake the very earth and tear apart anything blocking her path.
Paimon's lips curled with interest.
'They're making this much noise, and yet the humans aren't even on alert...'
Even by the most generous estimate, their power and wavelength bore no resemblance to human movements.
Yet she sensed no sign of soldiers mobilizing on alert anywhere in the territories nearby.
The vast net of magical power blanketing this entire land was recognizing their movements as 'allies' and disseminating that information across the realm.
"Magnificent. Truly...!"
Once again, Paimon marveled at the unknown being who held dominion over this land.
Perfect control. Absolute domination.
This was the proof of power that only a true monarch could display.
A strange possessiveness swirled in her ash-gray eyes.
A red tongue flicked out and traced her own lips.
"...It just makes me want to take it. This land—and its master as well."
She awaited the two approaching figures with eyes full of sharp interest.
In her mind, the fact that this long journey was supposed to be 'reconnaissance' had long since been forgotten.
- 2 -
The first to arrive was the master of the thunderous presence.
Kwareureureung!!
A single bolt of red-gold lightning tore through the blue darkness and struck down toward the earth.
It burst into light explosively just before impact, slowing its descent, and out of its heart emerged the figure of a woman.
Giant wings of lightning flared behind her back, beating slowly as she descended, scattering arcs across the land.
Kwang — !!!
Moments later, with a thunderous roar that seemed to shake the earth's axis, an entire hill was pulverized as another figure slammed to a stop.
Pure white hair whipped about in the aftermath of her storm-like charge.
Above it, a blood-red aura shimmered like a heat haze.
The two women's gazes turned to Paimon inside the carriage, then briefly met each other's.
The woman resembling a wolf nodded once, and the woman resembling a falcon stepped forward.
"Are you a noble of the Demon Realm? Or..."
Her voice was cold.
"...a contender from the surface?"
At that bold question, Paimon suppressed a smirk.
'Interesting.'
It was a strange smile, touched with both satisfaction and displeasure.
She appreciated their discernment and their confidence in treating her as an equal after instantly gauging her power—but it irked her that they dared to classify her among the weak 'nobles' of the present age.
Still, she kept her composure.
Spreading her hands, Paimon spoke with a conciliatory smile.
"A fine morning, masters of this land."
Her eyes swept over the two women, one after the other.
"Now then, which of you rules this land upon which I stand? I wish to offer proper greetings."
Inwardly, she admired the aura radiating from the two beings before her.
Each was a lord-level monster whose power rivaled her own.
Naturally, she assumed the master of this land was one of them—or perhaps both.
But soon, something felt off.
'...Wait. They're not Dungeon Lords...?'
The bewilderment that flitted across her face was genuine.
Such power, and yet they were not the 'master' who governed the laws of this land?
Then who in the world...
As if seeing straight through her confusion, Saya introduced herself.
"I am Amatsu Saya, a shadow warrior sworn to the noble master of this land."
"The Amatsu clan...?"
Paimon's eyes widened in shock.
The Cheoneung Cheon-gu Amatsu Clan, renowned as a prestigious house among the demons of the Western Continent.
It was a name she had encountered often when she had investigated the continent's strong before she was sealed.
But what was a scion of such a family doing on the Eastern Continent, calling herself a mere 'warrior' instead of a Dungeon Lord, and serving another master?
'Is this another gap created by two hundred years?'
She barely managed to school her expression.
"...I have been rude."
The conversation seemed to be getting off to a smoother start than she had expected.
But that peaceful atmosphere was shattered by Paimon's own hand.
"Watching such beautiful, strong ladies..."
Paimon rested a hand against her cheek and whispered, gazing at them with rapt eyes.
"...makes me want to break you."
The air froze in an instant. It was unmistakable hostility.
"It seems you did not come with good intentions."
"For an uninvited guest, that's only natural."
Saya and Shue's voices carried not tension, but cold certainty.
Paimon's eyes narrowed as she recognized that their composure stemmed not from 'arrogance,' born of underestimating their opponent, but from 'confidence' in their absolute power.
"I'll go first."
With Shue's short words, her pure white hair instantly flared as red as fresh blood.
Kwakwang — !!!
With a savage explosion, the wolf of the earth bared her fangs first.
- 3 -
Kwakwang—!!!
The earth detonated.
Shue's body launched upward like a crimson comet.
All that remained where she had stood were cracks spidering outward.
A white-and-red wolf sprinted through the air, leaving afterimages in her wake.
Her target was one alone.
Paimon.
- You shall not pass...!
It was Paimon's Black Knight who threw himself into her path.
Dukungk!
Red eyes blazing beneath his black helm, he summoned a massive black shield, the blue flag draped over his shoulders like a cape.
Before he was sealed, he had been the symbol of absolute defense, having single-handedly held back the charge of hundreds of monsters in a forest.
"...Huh."
But his confidence shattered in the face of the ferocious smile twisting Shue's lips as she met his gaze from beyond the shield.
Kwang — !!!
At the moment of impact, the Black Knight wondered if he had been struck by a dragon.
By the time he came to his senses, he was already airborne.
- Keuheok — !!
The Black Knight's body was hurled like a cannonball and plowed into a hill.
His hands were empty.
The shield he had trusted so completely was already crushed, like a plank punched through by an ogre's fist.
One blow. A high-ranking demon elite was incapacitated in a single strike.
Seueueu...
Blood-red steam escaped from Shue's lips as she came to a stop.
Her slightly heaving frame made it seem as though the attack had drained all her strength.
The other demons could not possibly miss that fleeting opening.
The witch whose veil rippled like mist, and the towering shadow human who seemed well over three meters tall, simultaneously stretched out their hands.
A black, viscous curse energy rose like fog from their fingertips and surged toward Shue.
- I will show the death of what you hold most dear...!
- Despair. Wail...!
In an instant, Shue's vision warped horribly.
The sensation of all the world's colors inverting. The ground beneath her feet turning into a squelching swamp.
The flow of air grazed her skin like a blade, and the shouts of her allies distorted into sharp shrieks stabbing at her eardrums.
Her entire body grew heavy, as though hundreds of pounds of lead hung from her limbs.
An unclean foreignness burrowed into all five senses.
But the physical pain was meaningless.
「Shue...」
Every one of those curses was nothing.
The only thing that reached her psyche was the most terrible illusion unfolding amidst the sensory chaos.
「Run away. My love...」
A bloodied Libertas was weakly reaching a hand toward her.
A huge hole gaped through her chest, and dark red blood welled and spilled from her small lips.
Thud.
Before those delicate fingertips could even reach her, they fell, strengthless.
The face that had always smiled warmly at her was now filled only with the emptiness of death.
The sight of the being she loved most, dying.
A scene she had already witnessed once before. It unified her spirit into a single, burning point.
"...You dare."
A terrible growl leaked through the strands of red hair hanging toward the ground.
"You dared to wear my master's form..."
The curse meant to erode her spirit and neutralize her had become the worst possible catalyst.
"...with your filthy touch?"
The single fact that they had defiled Libertas's image incinerated the last remaining thread of her reason.
- Keuaaaaah — !!!
Pure rage, detonating as the trigger within her snapped.
Kukukung — !!!
The Blood Demon's power erupted as though to pierce the heavens.
Magical energy, saturated with blood-red frenzy, spread outward with physical force and shattered the pathetic chains of the curse that had bound her in an instant.
Red mana stormed wildly, and the witch and the shadow human who had cast the curse both staggered.
The curse they had woven was backlashing, inflicting internal wounds.
- Keureureu...!
The rage did not stop there.
Seething bloodlust dyed both her eyes a burning red.
They were not eyes anyone would call human. They were the eyes of a beast that craved nothing but destruction.
Shue turned her head and pinned precisely the one of the two demons who had conjured the illusion of Libertas—the witch.
- D-Don't come any closer...!
The Witch of Mist screamed, frozen by instinctive terror.
The Shue reflected in her eyes was neither a monster nor a demon.
She was calamity itself.
The witch frantically tried to throw up defensive magic, but the moment that red afterimage blazed into her vision, everything was already over.
『Trace of Tears』
Kwajik—
Shue's claws, sheathed in blood-red magic power, ignored every one of the witch's barriers and pierced straight through.
- Ugh...?!
Before the witch's eyes could even fully flood with despair, her heart was impaled.
Lub-dub. Lub-dub.
Held aloft by the hand that had burst out from behind her, the heart was still beating.
Udeuduk —
Expressionless, Shue tore the witch apart.
In an instant.
No blood flowed from the witch's body, but the power scattering in all directions in its place more than made up for the brutality.
"What—!"
- Ennasha...!
The witch scattered without even managing a scream.
Cheolpeok!
Shue's foot planted onto the witch's remains, and she stopped.
She caught her breath.
But this time, the demons could not move.
Because they had realized it was not a gap—it was simply her habit.
"Next is..."
At that moment, Shue raised her head very slowly.
The demons shuddered in unison at the sound of her voice.
"...who?"
What rose on the faces of the remaining five demons was an emotion beyond shock, beyond even despair.
Pure terror.
They finally understood.
This was not a battle.
It most certainly was not the reconnaissance mission that had been their original objective.
This place was their grave, and the woman before their eyes was the gravekeeper.
The funeral administered by the red gravekeeper had only just begun.