The Demon King's Rules of Death

KUUUUNG! Tudududuk!

A sound too monstrous to believe a human had just crashed down onto the earth rolled across the land, and thick clouds of dust veiled my vision.

Space-warping might have skipped the fall itself, but it did nothing to erase the acceleration I'd built up on the way down. That staggering impact shook me to my core, and blood welled up from deep inside, spilling from my lips in a cough of red.

I released the conjuration of that cursed Excalibur, useless in my current state, poured the power of Lingual Magic into the word Heal, restored my body to wholeness, and dragged myself upright. After hastily straightening my wrecked appearance, I glanced back over my shoulder — and through the hazy, wavering veil of chaos drifting out from the Demon World Tree, the near vicinity blurred dimly into view, warped by the influence of the Supreme Astra, Pashupata of Shiva the Destroyer.

...There's only one choice left to them over there now, isn't there.

The aftermath of a Supreme Astra could only be quelled by an Astra of the same caliber. And just as anyone would flee outdoors when a fire breaks out in their home, the Demon King would surely lead his army elsewhere to establish a new stronghold. After all, the Demon World Tree was hardly something his side needed to defend at this very moment.

Starting tomorrow, a colossal war of attrition would erupt over whether their lines broke or held — and for that, there was something important I had to do.

"Rohen!"

As I slowly made my way toward the Second Defense Line, built before a natural fortress of jagged, crisscrossing terrain, the massive gates swung open and Lapis came rushing out. I tried to infuse Lingual Magic into our conversation, but whether it was because the day wasn't over yet, the words simply wouldn't come.

When Lapis read the paper I held out and let loose a sigh of relief, I gave her a small smile and stepped inside. In the room prepared for me, I changed out of my ruined, rag-like clothes, wet my parched throat, and turned my gaze to the hourglass sitting nearby. The visible markings told me it was now around eleven forty-five at night.

With that, I drew out the White Feather Fan and gripped its handle. When the flowing sand of the hourglass finally signaled that this day had run its course, I poured Lingual Magic into every single one of the Great Fortune words I possessed. Warning windows declaring that each word would vanish upon use popped up again and again, but I was already well aware of that, and swept them aside without a second thought.

The layering of every single stored word related to good fortune. Of this much I could stake my life: at this very moment, no person alive was luckier than I was.

'Project the past, White Feather Fan. Set the time to exactly ten o'clock last night, and the vantage point to the Demon King.'

Was this what it would look like, rewinding a life? The space-time around me collapsed inward, and my very existence vanished for an instant — yet my senses of hearing and sight remained perfectly intact, allowing me to observe everything from the moment I had used space-warping.

'If hell exists in the mortal world, it must look something like this.'

Across a blackened earth where the haze of chaos smoldered, the monsters and demonkin swallowed by Pashupata's aftermath had died with their entire bodies necrotized black, like humans wasting away from the plague. And yet the damage was smaller than I'd anticipated — because the Demon World Tree had reared its roots up out of the ground, shielding the demonkin and monsters from Pashupata's influence.

My ultimate gains from this ambush, after all, were intelligence on the Demon King, and the short-term war of attrition that would come from wrecking their central stronghold and forcing a relocation.

'That one, I can safely assume, is dead.'

Having stood at Pashupata's ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠epicenter, the Demon King had taken the blow head-on. Even trying to escape, his body had already been eroded by the haze of chaos, blackened from head to toe, and crumbled apart like so much dust. But I knew better. The Demon King was a monster that revived without end, unless the manner of his death was one he chose for himself. The ambush timing had been sound — even if he had tried to respond, he couldn't possibly have worked out anything so elaborate in that fleeting instant.

"We must relocate the center of our operations."

Even having watched their leader, the Demon King, die before their eyes, the highest-ranked demonkin wore expressionless faces as they marshaled the survivors — those shielded by the Demon World Tree's roots — and began moving south. I'd just finished marveling at that composure when, barely moments later, the Demon King's crumbled body revived anew.

"Was that your last resort? Or merely the average capability of you evolved humans?"

The haze of chaos stretched out once more to devour the revived Demon King — but this time, for some reason, it could not erode him. This, perhaps, was a crucial clue to determining exactly what manner of death the Demon King had chosen.

"Scatter."

At the Demon King's outstretched hand, the haze of Pashupata that clung to him simply vanished, erasing itself without a trace. Not all of Pashupata's aftermath had disappeared. But considering that a Supreme Astra could only be neutralized by an identical Astra — could this, too, be tied to the Demon King's unique ability?

'Aside from someone like me, no one announces their attacks before unleashing them.'

This was reality, not a comic book or a film. I had to speak because I needed to pour Lingual Magic into my words — but beyond cases like that, no one opened their mouth to announce, Here comes my attack! Even mages didn't chant the name of their spell aloud before casting it.

'Hmm...... a power that takes one's own action as the cause, and interferes with the result?'

The fundamental constraint, at any rate, appeared to be limited to physical contact. 'No one could recklessly spam an ability like that.' Both the System and the First Emperor had made constant mention of causality. If the Demon King's unique power truly was the ability to interfere with outcomes by making his own actions the cause, then he could hardly use it indiscriminately. In hindsight, deploying Nullification the instant our eyes first met and our brief skirmish began had been the right call.

"You will not eliminate it?"

"It isn't impossible. But leaving it as it is seems the wiser course."

The Demon King walked to where his army had regrouped and spoke with his subordinates.

"With the stronghold spanning the continent sealed off like this, there is at least no chance of our rear being attacked. For now, we must confirm just how far the memories of the distant past and the present have diverged."

"What that human just displayed was no magic whatsoever — ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and calling it the power of Dragon Tongue seems dubious as well."

"How unlike you, to fret so over nothing."

The Demon King cracked his stiff, aching joints with a series of dull pops and continued.

"As you know, a situation granting one side absolute advantage will never present itself."

"That is so."

"It is a contest of who maneuvers the board better. Had he been able to fire off such attacks indiscriminately, he would have used it not once, but many times over. In truth, this worked out in our favor — for I have already died once to that attack."

Above the teeming swarms of demonkin and monsters, the Demon King fixed his gaze on the road ahead as he walked.

"We divide our forces. Avoid open battle — the acquisition of intelligence takes priority."

"......Do I have to come along too?"

In a quiet corner sat a female demonkin whose entire body bore the needle-marks of what looked like countless surgeries. To put it bluntly, she was a corpse — or rather, a body forcibly stitched together from the assorted limbs and organs of others. Watching the Demon King answer her not with words but with a gesture of his hand, the woman rose with unsettling softness and took her place at his side. Under his commanding will, the Demon King's forces began splitting into four separate armies.

'Arrogance?'

Gathering the corpse-like woman into his embrace, the Demon King set off without a single soldier in tow. His direction: east. If he kept to that path, he ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠would arrive at Javelin County — where Aria held sole command of the defense.

And with that, the day of memories the White Feather Fan had stored came to an end.

'So I can narrow it down to about three inferences.'

The first: a power that interferes with the results when his own action serves as the cause — one bound by constraints of physical contact and number of uses. The next was an inference about what manner of death the Demon King had chosen.

'Well, going back over the conversation — "he possesses complete immunity to any manner in which he has died once" would be the first.'

And there would surely be a limit to that count as well. Having died once to Pashupata's influence and revived, the Demon King had displayed complete immunity to the haze of chaos. Of course, I couldn't say any of this with certainty until I learned more about his unique ability.

'And if not that — then perhaps he only truly dies after being killed a set number of times by the same method?'

The Demon King had called it fortunate that he'd died once to Pashupata — while remarking that such an attack could never be unleashed many times over. For now, only these two options carried any real probability.

Just as I was rising to my feet, thinking how much information the White Feather Fan had truly yielded, I noticed a small anomaly. Even though I had used it to view the past, the Great Fortune words I had invoked beforehand were still in effect.

Flowers upon Brocade — the idiom for one good thing blooming atop another good thing. That, no doubt, was why the notification of the words losing their potency and dissolving had never appeared. Reading the System's message, an idea struck me at once, and I put pen to paper.

Having recorded the two highest-probability conditions for the Demon King's death as revealed by the White Feather Fan, I took out a coin. Heads meant option one; tails, option two. I drew a small breath and flicked the coin into the air with a bright ting! — and at last, it landed.

Thk.

Heads.

At the same instant, the effects of the active fortune-related words ran dry, and as those words dissolved completely, notifications declaring that they could never be synthesized again began popping up one after another. This alone might not have been enough to call it a hundred percent certainty......

But it was a result no one could deny: option one was, by far, the most likely truth.