The Demon Descends (1)
There was a smell.
At the faint odor tickling her nostrils, Yona blinked her eyes open.
It drifted close enough that she thought she might still be dreaming, and even after her eyes opened, the smell refused to leave the bridge of her nose — it kept tickling away at it all the same.
Smoky, unpleasant, and somehow familiar — a smell she was sure she'd caught somewhere before.
Yona's eyes flew wide open.
In the same instant she kicked off her bedroll and sprang upright like a released spring, staring at Alec, who had bedded down nearby.
Alec was already awake as well, mace drawn along with his shield, scanning their surroundings.
"Smell something?"
Alec asked quietly, his voice dropped as low as it would go.
Yona gave a nod, then darted behind him in a single bound, resting her hands on his shoulders as she looked around.
Kayak, who had been standing watch, was also surveying the area with an axe clutched in each hand.
The smell was still tickling at her nose.
The smell she could never forget, no matter how much she wanted to.
The smell she had grown thoroughly sick of breathing at Carpatia Port.
They knew.
They knew exactly what this smell was, and exactly what it had come from.
Fog began to descend around them.
There was no water anywhere nearby — no reason for mist to form — and yet it came billowing up thick and heavy, soon swelling as if to swallow their vision whole. And rising out of that fog came the acrid stench of acid, filling the air around them until there was nothing else.
"...Berbaria..."
Yona's whisper might as well have been a signal flare.
Only hours ago, before they had lain down to sleep, the night sky had been brilliant — a luminous moon hung overhead, ringed with stars as if they were decorations.
Now, as if to bury that sky, a dark crimson curtain unfurled across it, and the stars vanished along with the moon, as though wiped away.
And from between them, a shadow — one that could hardly be mistaken for anything human — appeared and began to take shape before them.
A serpent with nine heads.
It had to be far thicker around than even a full-grown man, and all nine of its heads stared downward in unison as it descended from the sky.
To be precise, it was staring back down at the three of them — the ones looking up at it from the ground — as it slowly drifted down toward them.
- Fools, all of you.
No one could find their voice.
Gulp. Alec swallowed hard and tightened his grip on the shield and mace in his hands.
They had come from the cathedral armory.
Weapons that had only been granted to Alec because Yona gave up her own share of the reward.
They had been forged to match the very date, day of the week, and hour of the Heavenly God's creation of this world.
The shield, emblazoned with the crest of the Heavenly God Religion, was truly exceptional in its defensive power, and the moment the mace settled into Alec's hand, a faint holiness began to radiate from it.
"...You ran, and yet you talk so much, demon."
- Hoh.
At Kayak's words, all nine of Berbaria's heads tilted sideways at once.
The sight was so grotesque, so wrong, that Yona's face twisted of its own accord.
- I? Ran away?
"Yes — that is the truth of it. At Carpatia Port, you couldn't beat the Hero, and you fled."
Kayak tightened his grip on his axes and deliberately spat out words meant to antagonize Berbaria.
He understood instinctively that this was where the final battle would have to be fought.
Berbaria — surely this wasn't the true body. It had to be an avatar, a projection.
The fact that it had shown itself here meant it had come to finish things once and for all.
Which meant they had to settle it here.
But by Kayak's own reckoning, the odds were poor.
Not their odds of winning — their odds of surviving.
So if he could spit a few insults while he was at it, wouldn't that at least vent some of the bile?
- Enough with your clumsy provocations, insignificant whelps. Even if your words were true, there is no Hero here now. You have no means of refusing your own deaths.
"...That remains to be seen."
Kayak glared at Berbaria.
It was still in the air.
Descending, yes — but not yet. Not yet.
At that moment, Berbaria finally touched down, twisting its scale-covered body into a great coiled mound.
And yet the ground, covered in dry sand, raised not a single speck of dust.
Watching it with tense eyes, Yona was struck by a sudden thought.
When Berbaria had appeared at Carpatia Port — descending from the sky and settling onto the ground — there had definitely been a heavy sound. It hadn't been loud, but it had certainly made a sound. This time, there was nothing.
No sound at all.
And though its tongue was flickering in and out like that, it didn't make so much as a whisper.
Only the smell. Nothing but that smell.
And this serpent, appearing alongside that curtain blotting out the sky, was shaped like Berbaria and yet somehow different.
"...Alec, hold on. Just a second — listen."
At Yona's words, Alec leaned his upper body back slightly, his gaze fixed forward.
Gripping the rim of his ear, Yona kept her eyes locked on Berbaria as well and tried to whisper into his ear.
That Berbaria seemed to be a mirage.
Not the true body, not even an avatar — an illusion with no substance at all.
But she never got the words out.
Just as she was about to speak to Alec, Berbaria spoke first.
- I have come to make you an offer. It would be easier than swatting flies to seize you and kill you where you stand — but I shall grant you my mercy instead.
"...An offer? From a demon?"
As if it had heard Yona's murmur, Berbaria's gaze swung toward her.
The look in its eyes was strangely different.
Different, somehow, from the gaze of the Berbaria that had descended at Carpatia Port.
- You there. The white-haired woman.
"Not a woman, you—! ...No, wait, that's not the point—"
Caught off guard by being addressed so abruptly, Yona flustered and glared at Berbaria.
But Berbaria seemed entirely unbothered — showed not the slightest concern even for Kayak and Alec, who looked ready to charge it at any moment.
- Yes, you. The inscription that was born upon your arm. Are you not curious about that inscription?
How could it know that?
Yona was so stunned that she couldn't get a single word out.
Her right arm, bound tightly in the Holy Shroud, was covered in tattoos — she was certain of it. The light had faded considerably by now, but the markings were still there, and she had never once exposed them in front of Berbaria.
And the fact that they were a divine inscription — only Ceres knew that, and Alevian.
There was no way Berbaria should have known.
- You wonder how I came to know.
All nine faces smiled at once.
The corners of their mouths curled upward even as their eyes stayed utterly cold — a warped, twisted kind of smile.
A smile that stirred nothing in its viewer but revulsion.
- You do not yet need to know.
- But you — you.
- Yes, you.
- Need to know one thing.
- Yes, only one.
- You have no choice.
- Only one thing, and it shall be forced upon you.
- And that is—
- Accept me.
"...What!?"
Yona's mouth hung open, too stunned to speak.
The words spilling from the nine faces tangled over one another, a droning hum that made them impossible to parse.
But those last words — accept me — came through with perfect clarity.
"You're spouting pure nonsense, demon."
Alec straightened his back, gripping his shield tighter.
His basic stance had him crouched low and coiled, eyes forward — but now Alec stood fully upright, planting himself so that he completely blocked Yona from view.
And Kayak stepped up beside her as well.
"Don't make me laugh. Yona is a priestess. A priestess of the Heavenly God, possessed by a demon like you? You're not even making sense."
- A priestess? A priestess of the Heavenly God? How amusing. There is no need for a long explanation. I called it an offer, but it is a command. You have no other chance to choose.
"We'll see about that once it's done! You think we're just going to let you do whatever you want with Yona?!"
- Is that so.
The uncoiling serpent reared its upper body straight up and let out a roar.
The bellow that tore from its mouths shook the very earth, and the fog that had settled so thickly began to take on an even more sickly yellow hue.
With every breath, the acrid smell tried to fill her lungs.
"You bastard!"
Kayak swung his axes and charged at Berbaria.
A silver flash streaked toward it, scattering holiness in its wake.
- The power of the Heavenly God. How pathetically little, for a mere lizard.
"Then get hit by something pathetic!"
Kayak surged forward and swung.
When a tail came flying, he stamped on it and vaulted up; when another tail whipped around, he ducked his waist to dodge it, closing the distance to Berbaria step by step.
For all his massive bulk, his muscles were just as developed — and with developed muscle came speed to match.
More than that, having fought Berbaria once already, Kayak had a rough sense of how he needed to move in this rematch.
"Snake, lizard — you're all the same!"
Kayak let out a roar of his own and leapt onto Berbaria's body.
Apparently it was no illusion — the instant he stepped down, it rang hollow against his foot, and Kayak launched into the empty air.
"Hyaargh!"
Off the air itself, Kayak twisted mid-flight and changed direction.
His rising momentum reversed in an instant as he shot straight down at Berbaria — and at last his axe buried itself in one of its faces.
Thud...
A crunching sound echoed out.
Yanking the axe free from the dead center of that face, Kayak kicked off again and leapt away.
Another tail came hurtling at him.
With an axe in each hand, Kayak saw the tail flying at his waist — and this time, he didn't dodge.
Another shadow was flying toward him as well.
CLANG!
With a shriek of metal, the tail deflected off its course and shot into the air.
A brown shield wreathed in a soft white glow batted the tail aside, and through the opening, Alec swung his mace and caved in another of its faces.
The moment the two of them leapt in opposite directions, Yona sprinted for Kayak's landing point.
"I'm fine. Yona, don't come close. You're the target."
At Kayak's words, Yona shut her mouth.
He wasn't wrong — now was no time to be stubborn.
But still. We're doing pretty well, aren't we?
We've already taken out two of its heads—
And the moment she looked up at Berbaria, Yona's words died.
The face that had taken an axe dead center was completely unmarked — and the one Alec had crushed with his mace bore not a single scratch either.
"...So this is what a demon really is."
Kayak's words rang terribly hollow.
- You put up a fair little performance, but you cannot even tickle me. What do you imagine you can accomplish with that? Pathetic. Utterly pathetic.
All nine of Berbaria's faces spoke at once.
The droning cacophony made Kayak and Alec slap their hands over their ears at the same time.
"Wh-what? What is it, what's wrong!? Kayak! Alec!"
Yona herself felt nothing at all — but Kayak and Alec were both covering their ears and wincing in pain.
- Now — accept me. Refuse, and I will kill them both where they stand.
Of Berbaria's faces, the one in the very center stretched its neck out long, drawing itself right up in front of Yona.
She flinched back with a startled yelp, and the face peered down at her expression for a moment before drawing out its tongue in a long slither and twisting the corners of its mouth.
'It's... it's smiling...?'
It was smiling. There was no doubt about it.
Yona could feel it.
- Accept me. Refuse, and I will kill every one of them.
As if to prove the threat was no bluff, Berbaria stretched out the necks of other faces and wound them around Kayak and Alec, coiling around their bodies before lifting them up.
Then it held them both upside down and shook them up and down, as if it might slam them down at any moment.
If it brought their heads down against the ground from that height, neither Kayak nor Alec could possibly survive. That much was obvious.
- Accept me. This is your final ultimatum. Refuse me again, and you too shall die.
Glaring at the face leering inches from her own, Yona bit down hard on her lip.
There was no choice.
No other path she could take — none that she could see.