Found You
The rain pounded loudly against his ears. In the midst of it, Antonis leaned comfortably against his bed, preparing to sleep. This place had been built atop the ruins of a castle on high ground, so mud and rainwater didn’t easily seep in. On top of that, a tent woven from special magical cloth kept out even a single raindrop. While the others suffered, he—as their leader—enjoyed the privileges that came with his rank and savored his leisurely mood.
Then…
“…What? Why did your hands stop?”
“S-sorry… My hands… they hurt too much…”
The young demon who had been massaging his legs since earlier. Both of the child’s hands were swollen, and a magical collar was fastened around his neck. At Antonis’s rebuke, he quickly bowed his head and begged for forgiveness.
“Tsk. Getting tired from just this much? I can’t have that.”
With those words, Antonis slowly stroked the ring on his finger. The demon child’s face went deathly pale, and he began pleading with all his strength.
“! I… I was wrong! I-I won’t make the same mistake again. So please… please, just one more chance…”
“How noisy…”
Ignoring the child’s scream that bordered on a shriek, Antonis poured mana into the ring. Then—
“A… ah…”
-Thud!!!!
With a short, sharp sound, the young demon’s head fell cleanly to the floor. Paying no mind to the expression filled with terror and despair, Antonis took a sip of the wine beside him and thought.
‘Come to think of it… I heard that dancer is in there too. She’s not really my type since she’s over twelve, but… occasionally enjoying a different flavor isn’t bad either.’
Although the dancer was a valuable commodity and he couldn’t lay a hand on her recklessly, savoring her for a moment without claiming her officially should be possible. With expectations for another spoil of war he would obtain after victory, Antonis quietly drifted off to sleep.
*
-Rumble!!!
-Crackle!!!!
Lightning and thunder flashed between the dark clouds. Rain poured down as if the sky itself had been torn open. The adventurers on a long expedition frowned at the unseasonal downpour.
“Good grief… What kind of rain is this?”
“Tomorrow’s the battle. This is going to be troublesome in more ways than one.”
High-ranking adventurer Gosen wiped his face with a damp towel, trying to shake off his irritation, but it wasn’t easy. The humidity made even breathing feel stifling on the muddy ground. Despite it being spring, the heat was as oppressive as midsummer. This situation, which made simply standing irritating, was hard even for Gosen, who prided himself on his patience.
“Seriously… I just want to end this damn battle quickly and go home.”
“Same here. Anyway, things should be mostly wrapped up by tomorrow, so let’s just endure a little longer.”
At his fellow adventurer’s words, Gosen tried to soothe his frustration by drinking from his canteen. Yet even in this situation, Gosen and the other adventurers remained confident in their victory.
Weather was always a sensitive factor in battle—especially when thousands of troops were on the move. Still, despite these adverse conditions, the adventurers felt no sense of crisis. It was common knowledge that the enemy’s numbers were less than half of theirs. Moreover, Gosen and the adventurers here were mostly veterans hardened by years in the border regions. They knew exactly how to deal with demons, so they believed defeat was impossible.
“Then you should go in and rest.”
“Thanks. See you tomorrow.”
After greeting Gosen, his colleague entered the tent. Although the inside was just as damp, they had no choice but to force themselves to sleep for tomorrow’s sake. Except for those on watch, the adventurers began drifting off one by one.
‘That said… I still can’t let my guard down. Who knows what tricks those evil bastards might pull…’
No matter how advantageous the conditions, they always had to prepare for enemy ambushes—especially here, with the enemy camp right in front of them.
As Gosen surveyed his surroundings without neglecting his vigilance in the pouring rain…
“Huh?”
The next moment, a sudden, strange sensation made him frown. It was an unpleasant, sticky feeling. The source wasn’t far away—it was right beneath his feet. With the torrential rain turning everything into mud, this should have been nothing more than an unavoidable natural phenomenon.
Or so he thought…
“W-what…? Why is the mud like this…?”
The mud had begun swallowing his shoes completely and was now sinking up to his knees. No matter how much it was raining, this situation felt wrong, so Gosen tried to report it urgently.
“H-hey, something’s wrong here…”
At that moment—
-Thud!!
“Ugh!!!”
Something suddenly shot up from below. Made of black mud, it had the shape of a human hand. The black hands, evoking an unpleasant and sticky sensation, began wrapping around Gosen’s entire body like living snakes, starting by covering his mouth.
“Ugh! Uuuuugh!!!!”
The sensation of his breath being cut off and his body being bound. Gosen struggled desperately.
‘Damn it! This little thing… I can smash this mud in one go with my hands!!’
As a high-ranking adventurer, Gosen possessed overwhelming strength. He could shatter rocks with a single mana-infused punch. Yet even with that power, he couldn’t shake off the mud hands. They regrew the moment they were destroyed, continuing to entangle him. Moreover, his strength was draining faster and faster from his body, which had now been swallowed by the mud up to his neck.
‘What… this… what the hell is this?’
A situation he couldn’t understand, and which was all the more terrifying. This was a time when he desperately needed his comrades’ help, but unfortunately, what Gosen saw were his comrades sinking into the mud just like him. It was a scene that crushed even his last remaining hope.
‘N-no way… Am I going to die like this? Me, Gosen, done in by mere mud? No, no! I don’t want to die! Not here! I don’t want to die so meaninglessly!!’
A silent scream he couldn’t utter because of the mud covering his mouth. In it, as he keenly felt what an inescapable death meant…
Eventually, Gosen’s body was buried in the mud. The only thing left was his right hand, flailing desperately to escape. With his breath completely blocked and squeezing out his last bit of strength, it writhed with all its might until the end, as if seeking help from something invisible.
However.
A moment later.
Gosen’s hand slowly stopped moving, rendering that effort meaningless. Like a withered sprout, it lay broken on the ground, showing no movement.
At that moment—
-Twitch!
Gosen’s hand suddenly began moving again. But at the same time, the hand outside began to shrivel rapidly, as if its nutrients had been sucked out by the ground. The muscles dried and twisted, and the skin clung to the bones. The flesh-colored skin turned blue without a trace of blood, and the blood that had flowed through the veins became empty like a riverbed dried up by drought.
In the end, the hand looked like nothing but bare branches. Starting with that, Gosen’s buried body slowly began to rise from the ground. His living appearance was nowhere to be found. In the form of a rotting, decayed corpse…
-“Everything… is for the sake of my lord…”
*
“What… what is this? What the hell is going on?”
Antonis woke from an unexpected situation. But even with his eyes open, he couldn’t understand what was happening. A world where all the lamps had gone out—not a single ray of light visible. And in that deep darkness, eerie sounds and occasional horrific screams echoed. Although the still-pouring rain made it hard to hear clearly, Antonis could be certain of one thing: the situation in that darkness was definitely hell.
“Gah! Damn it!!!”
Concluding that something had gone terribly wrong, Antonis hurriedly left the tent. At that moment, a chilling voice suddenly reached his ears.
-“Found you…”