Inside or Out, the Demon King's Castle
The Demon King's Castle was thick with demons, whether one stood outside its walls or within them. The party held at regular intervals had drawn an even greater crowd than usual, and only on occasions such as this could the nobility — Duke Jonas among them — come and go through the place as they pleased. The cost of that freedom was vigilance. A gathering that pulled in every sort of guest was watched with a very tight hand.
Yujun stepped into the castle's banquet hall and pricked up his ears. A few paces off, two nobles were deep in conversation.
"An unusual number of guests today."
"The black-market merchants... no. The great magnates of the Demon Realm. They promised His Majesty the Demon King a special gift, and this gathering exists for that purpose. Spectators were bound to come in droves."
"All these demons, merely to watch a handful of items change hands? What are a few black-market peddlers worth?"
"And yet here you are. Why did you come?"
"I never miss a place where a party is being held. There is a martial tournament of considerable scale as well."
"Ah. True enough. This party ought to have a tournament too."
A martial tournament — a contest of arms convened whenever a banquet grew past a certain size. Demons matching strength against strength, a spectacle as entertaining to watch as it was to fight.
A meaningful look crossed Yujun's face.
Even in the game, I knew the Demon Realm held martial tournaments... I just never entered one.
He had heard of their reputation, though. Rank among the winners, and the rewards were said to be enormous. Merely placing among the Demon Realm's strong was close to impossible — but if one possessed overwhelming force, there was no finer opportunity than this.
The tournament was part of the plan Jonas mentioned, too.
Nobles were permitted to enter as well, though only those who had not competed in any of the last five tournaments. That condition made it impossible for a single fighter to claim the rewards again and again.
"We stick to the plan?" Yujun asked Jonas, keeping his voice low.
"I competed three months ago, so I am ineligible. Those who may enter this tournament are you, your companions, and a single marquis."
"More bodies in the ring isn't automatically better, is it?"
"A single misstep can cost a life. If one's skill sits in an uncertain place, I would consider it wiser simply to watch."
"Right."
In truth, the tournaments killed a great many demons. The race ran tough by nature, and the Demon King's Castle, which hosted the event, made no particular effort to restrain them.
"Does it start right away?"
"Eight hours after the party begins. Come evening, the tournament opens. Allow me to see to the entries."
"Thanks."
The procedure was not especially complicated, but a duke filing the applications in their stead would see the matter settled at once.
"Still. There are a ridiculous number of demons."
More than ten thousand had gathered, and still the place refused to feel cramped. The banquet hall was vast beyond imagining — no department store on Earth could have borne the comparison. For all the numbers, it was not rowdy. A surprising share of the guests were taciturn, and the mood of the feast sat a little low. Most of those present were nobles, or the strong of the Demon Realm.
Duke Jonas set off through the crowd, trading words with one demon after another.
"What are we supposed to do until then?"
Yujun, Do Jiyun, Paranet, and Manuela — the last of them slipped in with her identity concealed. The four of them had nothing in particular to occupy them. They were not about to settle in the Demon Realm for good, and cultivating friendships here would be a waste of effort.
"I'll walk the place alone and take the measure of things," Manuela said.
A witch had more reason than anyone to be careful inside the Demon King's Castle. Even so, her ability was exceptional, and Yujun was not greatly worried.
"Yeah. You might be better off on your own."
He could reach her through the communication orb whenever he wished, and since they had formed a party, he would know whether she lived or died.
"And don't go raiding the storerooms. Keep it quiet."
"I won't! That was a mistake, that one time!" Manuela cried.
A smile tugged at Yujun's mouth as he turned his head.
"And you, Jiyun?"
"I'll stay with you. Being on my own makes me a little uneasy..."
Paranet required no such question.
Yujun drifted through the hall, sampling as he went. The Demon Realm had not, as one might expect, served up anything grotesque or foul. To his surprise, the tables held proper cooking of the sort one might find on the Continent.
This is actually good.
The seafood in particular was extraordinary. Where in the Demon Realm was there a sea that could produce dishes like these? Curiosity got the better of him, and he asked Do Jiyun.
"Is there a sea in the Demon Realm?"
"No. Not that I know of."
"Then where do the ingredients come from?"
"I couldn't say."
Do Jiyun knew no more than he did. Yujun scratched his head.
Well. They got it from somewhere.
His stomach already felt full, but he kept eating as he walked. The other demons were no different, wholly absorbed in the buffet.
I wonder if some of them came just for the food.
That was when Do Jiyun spoke.
"It's strange, though."
"What is?"
"We're undead, and yet we're eating. We can even taste it, and we feel full. I know this is a world where magic and supernatural powers run wild, but do you really think that's possible?"
Yujun's eyes went wide.
Right. I was in an undead state.
In the game, an undead eating a food item for a buff was nothing unusual. This was not a game. It was reality, and by any common sense it should have been impossible.
"They're event items. Maybe the system's doing something to make it work."
"Maybe. It still feels wrong, somehow."
Paranet chose that moment to speak.
"Master. I, for one, cannot taste the food at all."
"Huh? You ate some too?"
"No. Whatever I place in my mouth simply slips out between my bones."
"Try it."
Paranet speared a steak on his fork and put it in his mouth.
Plop. Just as he had claimed, the meat dropped straight through the open gap and hit the floor.
"For the undead to eat is a strange spectacle indeed," he announced, as if presenting evidence. "We cannot taste, you see. Which is precisely why I say it — persist in this business of eating, and you may well arouse suspicion."
Yujun nodded. The demons had been watching them with odd looks for some time now.
Come to think of it, being able to use event items at all is absurd.
He decided not to dwell on the inconvenience. He had no time to waste.
His stride broke sharp against the floor, and without warning he cut toward the far end of the hall.
"We've got tails," he murmured.
Paranet, close at his side, heard him.
"Following us?"
"Quiet. They can't know we've noticed."
"Yes."
Do Jiyun schooled her expression and followed.
Yujun lengthened his pace, and the ones behind him quickened in turn, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
They're tailing us. No question.
The hall was full of demons, but he felt it clearly all the same. He could shake them, or he could put them down. Vast as the banquet hall was, it was still a finite room, and losing them inside it would not be easy. That left one option.
Yujun turned and invoked it.
Rapid Advance
Becoming a Lich Lord had cost him some of his physical stats, but he was anything but slow. He moved like a streak of light. In the space of a blink he was in front of his pursuers, and the sword was already in motion. He measured the force and struck with the flat, and all three dropped unconscious instead of dead.
The demons who had been hounding him crumpled where they stood.
Yujun laid a working of Ancient Magic over them.
Spatial Distortion
Space itself does not warp. The senses of all who look this way are dulled.
That was enough. His control of mana was so fine that not a soul realized he had cast anything, and the whole affair had passed so quickly that no demon seemed to have witnessed it.
Too many demons in here, though.
He needed to know why they had been following him, and he had no gift for drawing information out of a captive. The one method available to him was torture, and that would very likely catch another demon's eye.
And I can't raise a barrier, either.
A tremendously powerful barrier already lay over the Demon King's Castle. Without the Demon King's leave, no barrier of any kind could be set within it.
Yujun drew out the communication orb and called Manuela. She came running to him at once, and the sight of her slight frame waddling along at a trot was faintly ridiculous.
"What's going on?"
"Look."
He pointed at the three unconscious demons. She was in his party, so she would be able to see them as well.
"Mm. Demons?"
"They were sticking to our backs."
"Not... a coincidence?"
"No. I'm sure."
"All right. You called because you need them interrogated?"
"That ability you used before. It looked useful."
"Didn't it?"
"I'm counting on you."
"Okay. It's a technique I can only use on someone who's already been subdued to a point. But this situation fits perfectly. Lucky us."
Mana poured from Manuela's hand, and the work of pulling information from their minds was over in an instant.
Definitely not an ordinary witch.
Yujun was impressed. An ability that meddled with the mind usually carried heavy side effects, or demanded a long list of conditions before it would even activate. Manuela's seemed to have none of that. There was surely something he did not know, but nothing inconvenient enough to matter.
I really was fearless back then.
When he had cleared Manuela's dungeon, his strength had fallen far short of hers, and he had not imagined she was capable of this. Had he known, he would never have thrown himself at that dungeon so recklessly.
Well. It turned out all right in the end.
He decided to take the charitable view.
"How did it go?"
"I got all of it. But..." Manuela's face grew complicated, and her voice trailed off.
"Why?"
"I think we're in real trouble."
"So tell me why."
"Duke Jonas. The plan he told us about — it's been blown wide open."
"The Demon King knows everything?"
"Looks that way. He's even waiting for the duke to make his real move. The trap's already set."
"How did he find out?"
"There's a traitor. Among the demons who agreed to take part in Duke Jonas's business."
"With that many demons, a traitor or two would only make sense."
"No. There are far more than that. The ones who joined from the start just to spy already number over ten. Count them in, and the traitors come to something like seventy. No — these three may not know everything. There could be even more..."
"Something's off, though."
"What?"
"Would a man of Duke Jonas's standing really decide his own camp couldn't possibly have spies? He isn't in any position the Demon King leaves alone."
"...You're right."
"Then he may be working a plan of his own."
Do Jiyun, listening behind them, went wide-eyed. She spoke.
"Then... Jonas doesn't trust us completely?"
"No. I doubt he ever trusted us. We appeared out of nowhere, and Manuela being hunted by the Demon King is nowhere near enough to earn that."
Yujun let out a thin chuckle.