Chapter 428
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 428
Chapter Title: That's Right.
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Boom, rumble! Kaboom!
Every time the shadow writhed, pillars of darkness shot up into the sky, causing the heavens to flicker between light and dark.
As he slashed through those shadows with his sword, Rimon muttered under his breath.
"I did think it was strange."
Slash!
Revolution's Dawn.
If the government hadn't fled.
If they had simply clashed with the revolutionaries.
If he hadn't stepped in.
The revolution would have failed, and the revolutionaries would have been rounded up entirely.
Even so, no matter how much assurance of cooperation he'd received, how could Sergei—someone Rimon had never even met—have launched the revolution so boldly?
Rimon had his doubts deep down.
But now he knew.
He had ultimately been nothing more than insurance.
There had simply been too much risk to use him, but Sergei had an ace up his sleeve.
About 70 years ago.
The calamity that had laid Europe to waste.
Not only had it routed even the Blue Dragon Princess of the time, who defended the British Empire.
It had ultimately forced her to sacrifice herself, making it the only entity to drive a Seven Dragon Society princess to death without being a Sword Master.
The worst card of all: the Demon God.
"To think he'd prepared something like this as his trump card. What a mad bastard."
"You're pretty shocked, huh? I was shocked too."
"And you, the dictator who monitored every citizen in the nation, didn't even know the revolutionary leader was a black mage? A Black Path Sorcerer, no less?"
Kaboom!
The silver-haired girl lightly evaded the shadows surging like waves with the Snow-Treading Without Trace Style, scattering them like snowflakes.
Then, hurling a stone with Flying Strike Heaven-Shaking Thunder Style, she shattered part of the shadow like a bomb exploding.
Yekaterina shrugged her shoulders and countered.
"How was I supposed to know something even you didn't? I did think it was weird how well he kept escaping, though."
"Tch. That's black mages for you."
Rimon could only click his tongue.
Black mages were already experts at hiding their identities and fleeing, even more so than witches.
Especially a Black Path Sorcerer on par with a Grand Witch Sorceress—unless they revealed themselves, spotting them was incredibly difficult.
That was why the Dark Dawn Society had once rivaled even the Seven Dragon Society in power.
Of course, that was ancient history.
After Rimon obliterated the Dark Dawn Society during the Demon God War.
Every nation in the world, along with the Seven Dragon Society that ruled the shadows, had hunted them down relentlessly, nearly wiping out black mages entirely.
The few who survived had been neutered, reduced to running occult shops or curse agencies.
The Demon God had instilled that much fear into the world.
And now, 70 years later, not only had a Black Path Sorcerer reemerged, but the Demon God itself had been revived.
For Rimon, who had fought black mages endlessly, it felt like the cockroaches he'd painstakingly exterminated had crawled back with their entire nest.
"In any case, it's clear he planned this from the start."
"Even before meeting me, he intended to summon the Demon God?"
"He probably completed the revival ritual the moment he proposed negotiations with you. He just timed the awakening perfectly."
Splash!
Rimon judged coolly.
Reviving the Demon God with a few incantations was impossible, even for hordes of Black Path Sorcerers.
In the end, Sergei had turned Moscow into a trap, waiting for Yekaterina from the very beginning.
Even if it meant dying at her hands, the Demon God would revive.
It wouldn't have mattered if she'd refused the negotiations either.
Whether to save the country.
Or to achieve revolution.
Yekaterina and the New Revolutionaries would have come to Moscow anyway.
He just needed an excuse to keep Rimon—the biggest potential obstacle—at bay.
That was why Yekaterina giggled.
Just looking at Rimon slicing through the shadows whole confirmed Sergei's fears had been spot on.
"Hmm... For all the effort he put in, the finish feels sloppy. Knowing you were in this country and still summoning the Demon God."
"......"
"But bro, aren't you going to deal with that thing soon? I'm getting bored playing around like this."
"......"
"Bro?"
Yekaterina turned her head.
And there was Rimon, silently slashing away at the shadows.
No answer.
She wore a strange expression as she watched him.
"Why the long face? With you looking so serious, it feels like we're too late to stop the Demon God."
"......Fortunately, we're not too late."
"'Fortunately' sounds nice, but why the 'too'?"
As if refusing to fall for wordplay.
Under Yekaterina's narrowed gaze, Rimon stayed silent for a moment.
Then, as he slashed another shadow, he spoke.
"You crazy princess, the Demon God is a god."
"I know that much."
"Meaning it's a being tied to the world's natural order."
"......"
"Which also means if I kill the Demon God, the world's natural order will be shaken."
The same reason he hadn't easily slain Bellos, the specter of the Liberation Brigade that had descended as an avatar and rampaged in Leviathan.
If you think of the world as a great house.
The gods are its pillars.
God of abundance, god of hearths, god of thieves, god of arts, and so on.
No matter how insignificant they seem, they uphold the natural order in their domains.
So, just as a house collapses without its pillars.
When a god vanishes, calamity strikes the world.
Of course, it's not like removing a few minor pillars from a house with hundreds will bring it down immediately—the aftermath varies by the god's rank.
For lesser gods, it might mean spreading flu, poor harvests, or rampaging animals.
But the death of a major god with many followers can trigger earthquakes, storms, or plagues.
To say nothing of the Demon God that once devastated Europe?
"In the worst case, half this country will be engulfed by the calamity it leaves behind."
"Isn't that a bit exaggerated?"
"No exaggeration. It's the prophecy of a fool princess."
"......Aynsha foresaw the Demon God's revival?"
"Not the revival exactly. But she saw a future where half of Russia's people die."
Rimon was certain.
What Aynsha and Sir had prophesied wasn't Yekaterina's oppression or war with the revolutionaries.
It was the Demon God's revival.
No wonder the visions were vague.
Peering into the fate of a god tied to the world's natural order.
Especially one of the Demon God's stature.
That was no easy task.
Even vaguely foretelling the aftermath was only possible because they were two of the world's top prophets.
"No way to stop it?"
"There is."
The good news was that Rimon had arrived just in time.
Whether slaying gods.
Or capturing Demon Gods.
The foremost expert alive had the best way to avert this disaster.
"If I sever its divinity and the natural order it upholds entirely, I can minimize the fallout."
"......I don't know much about magic, but isn't that pretty insane?"
"Not insane enough to call it that. It's just suicidal if you mess up even a little—but don't mess up, and it's fine."
Rimon said calmly.
This was actually the method he'd planned for Bellos too.
And the one he'd used to kill the Demon God the first time.
Back then, the backlash from the natural order had turned victory into a mutual devastation despite severing it.
But this was his second time, so he was confident he could do it cleaner than before.
That was probably why the prophecy said only Rimon could stop this disaster.
"Then why not do it?"
"Even minimized, the fallout won't vanish completely."
"Meaning casualties are inevitable?"
"Yes."
Bellos had been manageable.
The descent was incomplete, it was an avatar with low divinity, and the fallout was relatively small.
Leviathan's location meant most damage was negligible anyway.
But the Demon God was on another level. With Bellos, lopping off a lake sufficed; here, Rimon had to prepare to cleave an entire sea.
Even for him, he couldn't nullify that scale of aftermath entirely.
"How much?"
Rimon fell silent for a moment.
Even as he slashed shadows, sharpening his senses, he quietly revealed his estimate.
"Best case, a million. Worst, around ten million."
"Really? Then we need another way."
Hearing that even the minimum meant losing a city, and the worst a whole nation, Yekaterina grumbled disappointedly.
But at his next words.
She could only blink.
"Unfortunately, we don't have time for that."
"......What does that mean?"
"The longer we drag this out, the worse it gets."
Rimon said coldly.
He was slashing to keep the shadows from growing, but this was just buying time.
The Demon God was steadily regaining strength even now.
The darkness pillar reaching the sky and the curse spreading ceaselessly proved it.
At this rate, it was only a matter of time before it shed its cocoon.
"If it fully revives, even severing the natural order won't save Moscow—it'll be obliterated."
"I get we have no time, but what are you planning then?"
Rimon answered her silence with more silence.
Yekaterina's smile faded.
She tilted her head slightly and asked.
"Just to be sure. You're not thinking of slaying the Demon God right here, are you, bro?"
She asked in the hope he'd deny it.
Rimon answered flatly.
"That's right."
Immediate.
Unhesitating.
Calm to the point of cruelty.
At that answer.
Yekaterina stopped even swinging her dagger and stared at Rimon.
"......In other words, sacrificing the few for the many?"
"There's no such thing as sacrificing the few for the many. It's just nonsense to shove the damage onto others and dodge responsibility."
Sacrifice must be voluntary from the start.
The moment it's forced, it's assault, crime, murder.
But...
"Still, you're saying you'll slay the Demon God now, whether it's a million or ten million dead?"
"Better than repeating the mistakes of the Demon God War."
Back when the Demon God descended before.
Rimon had hesitated to strike.
It had appeared in Paris of all places.
A spot where slaying it would inevitably kill at least a million.
So he'd ignored his instincts, buying time for civilians to evacuate.
After four days of delaying tactics, he'd severed it with the natural order, taking heavy wounds but minimizing casualties to fell it.
But that was a mistake.
While Rimon stalled.
The Demon God had absorbed the world's fear and despair, gaining the power to revive from death.
The result: Europe in ruins.
Over 100 million dead.
"I don't regret that choice. It was the best I could do then."
"And now, this saves more lives, so you choose it?"
"Yes."
"Even if it costs ten million?"
"Better I become the butcher staining my hands than stand by watching two hundred million die out of fear of blood."
"......"
Utterly rational.
In a sense, obvious.
Which made it all the harder to say so calmly, with those quiet eyes.
Yekaterina stared at Rimon for a moment.
Then she suddenly asked.
"Bro, do you know why I fell for you?"
"What nonsense is this?"
Rimon furrowed his brow at the out-of-place question, but.
Yekaterina didn't care.
She continued with a sly smile.
"It's because you're so much like me."
It was beyond mere suspicion now—certainty.
A secret others couldn't comprehend, let alone notice.
Only she, the Silver Dragon Princess, could perceive Rimon's truth.
"Both cursed by time."
Their common point.
She said delightedly.
"―And willing to massacre a million, or a billion, just to keep yourself sane."