Chapter 6
In a Slumber
(part 3)
The next night, despite being told I didn’t need to come here for a while, I found myself heading towards that country again, unable to let go.
I had no intention of meeting him.
It had just become such a habit, visiting almost every night, that it was almost unconscious.
I planned to observe the situation from a distance and then turn back, but something felt strangely off. I couldn’t sense the magical energy I always felt when approaching the country. Although the master didn’t have long left, judging by yesterday’s state, he should have lasted a few more days.
Had he reached his limit maintaining the barrier and dispelled it? If so, fine, but I felt uneasy. There was no sign of anyone else setting up a barrier in its place, and even the guards usually stationed before the castle walls were absent.
It was as if I was being invited here. If that were the case, then some kind of trap was likely set.
Normally, I would ignore it, but I was worried about the master.
Even knowing it was a trap, I had no choice but to enter.
“So, they knew I was coming every night from the beginning…”
That seemed the natural conclusion.
I had always been cautious to avoid being seen. I never let my guard down, even when conversing with the master.
The most dangerous time was our first meeting; perhaps I had been marked since then. They had likely grown complacent because the humans took no action until just before the master’s death.
If everything was a ploy, letting me roam free for this very moment, then this blatant guidance made perfect sense.
With no barrier, there was no need to suppress my magic and sneak in.
I flapped my wings, flying over the castle walls. So far, I felt no sign of attack. If there was a trap, it would likely be in the master’s room.
Flying made the journey faster, and I soon alighted on the balcony. Unsurprisingly, there was no sign of the master coming out as usual.
The window latch was unlocked; it opened easily when I pulled. The master’s room, usually lit by indirect lighting, was pitch black today, the depths unseen.
I retracted my wings and leapt through the window into the room, hearing a small sound like crackling electricity.
The next moment, the window slammed shut with a loud bang, untouched by anyone.
Then, a magic circle emerged from the carpet, and countless chains sprung from it, coiling around my body.
The chains completely restrained my upper body, tightening relentlessly.
“You knew I was coming here from the start?”
I spoke these words towards the back of the room, and several humans filed out from the depths of the darkness.
Most seemed to be the ones activating this binding magic that held me, clutching grimoires and muttering incantations.
The one in the center, wearing an exceptionally ornate robe, swept back his hood.
Ah, I didn’t know his name, but I recognized that face.
He was a famous magician, whispered among demons as a person of interest, someone to be wary of. His face often appeared during my research into ‘the human born to seal the immortal demon.’
So, he was the leader of those who cast magic on the master’s soul.
“I didn’t think it was you on the first night,” the lead magician said, pointing towards a corner of the room. “But the young master was so blatant about clearing people out, we decided to observe the situation through that.”
It was dark, but I could make out a box-like object with a lens. It seemed to be one of those recently developed devices that record visual information.
“Humans are evolving technology beyond just magic,” he continued. “The young master doesn’t know of its existence.”
“I see. For creatures who tamper with souls, you humans certainly create strange toys and do amusing things.”
The lead magician snorted displeasedly and raised his hand, signaling the others.
Several people who weren’t chanting spells simultaneously pointed spears they held towards me.
“Demon, come with us,” the lead magician stated flatly, opening the room’s exit door and proceeding through it. “We’ll let you see the young master. He can’t move anymore, you see.”
A human who had moved behind me prodded with his spear, gesturing with his head for me to move forward.
Still bound by the chains, I passed through the doorway, the humans maintaining a set distance.
This was my first time inside the tower. Beyond the door, there was no hallway, only a spiral staircase leading down.
It was unadorned, and I felt the master’s room was like a furnished prison. No wonder he grew to dislike such a life.
After descending the stairs, I was led out of the tower and into a deeper basement.
No one uttered a word; only the sound of shoes clicking against the stone pavement echoed.
After walking down the basement stairs for a while, we emerged into a flat, square-like space.
Magic tools resembling crystals were placed around, beautiful stainless steel lined the walls, and moonlight faintly streamed in.
Seen alone, it would be a fantastical, beautiful scene.
A large magic circle was drawn on the floor, emitting a pale light.
Stepping on the circle sent a needle-like pain through the soles of my feet. If I stopped due to the pain, a spear would likely fly at my back from behind.
As I walked, I saw a greatsword thrust into the center of the magic circle… the center of the room. My eyes widened involuntarily.
A drop of sweat trickled down my forehead, and my lips quivered slightly.
I knew the magical energy overflowing from that greatsword all too well.
“It’s an imperfect vessel,” the lead magician said, “but we judged it suitable for sealing you. We didn’t think a demon would keep a childish promise for long.”
“You turned the master, with his current magical energy, into a Sword of Seal?! This folly has its limits!”
I had thought they imprisoned the severely weakened master here in the basement, using him as a hostage to try and kill me.
But I was wrong. I hadn’t expected these humans to act so hastily.
With the master’s current magical power, it was insufficient to seal me. Everyone here should know that. This action would render the lead magician’s years of achievements worthless.
Seeing me flustered, the previously stoic lead magician grinned a creepy, thin smile.
“But you wish to sleep eternally with this young master, don’t you?”
Those words, the very wish I never wanted to hear from a human’s mouth, reverberated deep in my ears.
A wave of intense anger caused dizziness, and a错觉 seized me, distorting the scene before my eyes.
The lead magician pulled the greatsword from the floor and pointed it towards me. Perhaps because it was made of magic, the sword seemed lighter than it looked.
Ah, I see. If all my conversations and actions have been monitored since that day, then my one foolish wish must have been overheard.
I thought it didn’t matter if others knew when I spoke of it… how foolhardy I was. I never imagined it would be used against me in the worst possible way.
I felt neither the master’s soul nor anything else from the greatsword. It was merely a mass of magical energy in the shape of a sword. Nothing more, nothing less.
The dream I thought I could finally grasp, the one I was genuinely drawn to for the first time in my countless long years of life, was effortlessly lost in a single night.
Seeing me hang my head helplessly, some laughed gleefully, while others continued to spit curses filled with resentment.
Taking my state as an opportunity, the humans intensified the magic infused into the chains. The bindings tightened further, squeezing so hard I felt nauseous, as if I might vomit the contents of my stomach. An ordinary human’s arm bones would have shattered.
“….scum.”
My muttered word came out smaller than intended, drowned out by the maddened shouts of the humans.
As I stood motionless with my head bowed, the lead magician, grinning and snickering, approached and raised the sword.
“Vanish…!!”
As he swung the sword up, a loud crack sounded, and the lead magician’s head and everything above it disintegrated, turning to dust and vanishing without a trace.
Deprived of his head in an instant, the lead magician couldn’t even utter a scream before he collapsed, his back hitting the ground.
The sealing greatsword slipped from his hand and clattered loudly onto the floor.
The surrounding people were speechless, unable to comprehend what had just happened in that single moment.
No wonder—until moments ago, they were all convinced of their victory.
How utterly they looked down on me. It was infuriating.
The mastermind was probably the now-dead lead magician, but the surrounding humans were equally guilty.
I won’t forgive any of them.
I can’t let any of them live.
Releasing magical energy from within my body, the chains restraining me shattered into pieces in an instant.
Freed, I immediately thrust my hand towards the humans behind me.
“Wha-?!”
The humans holding spears behind me made faces of disbelief before being blown away by a powerful shockwave, vanishing without a trace before they could utter another word.
“Gyaaaaaah!! D-damn monster!!”
Finally understanding the situation, someone screamed loudly.
Triggered by that shriek, the remaining humans raised their weapons, and the magicians began chanting spells.
The binding magic was reactivated, and numerous thick chains shot out from the magic circle on the floor.
The chains, writhing like giant serpents, flew straight at me to bind me, but with a slight infusion of my magic, they broke with a loud crack.
Such feeble things couldn’t even restrain my arms. Pointing my arm at the chanting magicians, I snapped my fingers, and they were effortlessly blown away, leaving behind only fine dust along with their grimoires.
This power, to decompose a target into dust, is my ability. No human has ever withstood it.
“How weak. For all your numbers, these are more fragile than the master’s chains, the one who confessed to me upon our first meeting.”
Even the spearman who had closed in right beside me vanished with a shockwave when I snapped my fingers before his blade could reach my throat.
It’s a scene I’ve witnessed countless times. Ordinary humans can’t even stand beside me. I let out a weary sigh.
The stinging pain in my feet was a nuisance. I released a shockwave towards the magic circle on the floor; the floorboards split, and the circle’s effect vanished.
That eliminated the stabbing pain in my soles and should have further weakened the humans’ magic.
“It’s impossible… We can’t win…”
“R-run!! You lot, buy us some time!!”
“Hey! Don’t screw around!!”
Several humans, realizing they couldn’t win, threw down their weapons and tried to flee towards the exit.
A human trying to pass through the exit door bumped into an invisible wall as if hitting a wall, falling backward. Getting up, he panickedly banged on the invisible barrier over the door, shouting, ‘What’s the meaning of this?!’
“You shouldn’t be so surprised,” I said. “It’s your beloved结界魔法… just a slight difference in whether demons or humans can pass through. Did you really think it couldn’t be used against demons?”
Having lived so long, I’ve mastered every spell that anyone can use with training.
I simply don’t use them normally because there’s no need. I used this one because I absolutely don’t want any of you to escape.
“Consider it a bonus. As a farewell gift, I’ll show you my true demonic form. While in the human world, reverting to my original form consumes a massive amount of magic, unlike in the demon realm. But without the need to hold back my power, I can handle magic with even greater precision.”
Since you’re all going to die anyway, there’s no need to hold back.
A pitch-black, mist-like magical energy overflowed from my feet, dyeing my skin the same color.
Opening all my eyes, I could clearly see the faces of the humans that were too dark to make out before. All their earlier bravado was gone. Every single one of them looked at me with fear and trembled.
Now that I thought about it, I recall hearing that my true form is considered uncanny by humans.
Some shook with chattering teeth, eyes tearful; others crouched by the barrier as if having given up all hope; still others screamed incessantly with meaningless, maddened words—I could see it all so clearly.
If only they had left the master alone, none of this would have happened.
Although I knew I would grow bored of this scene of swirling madness and chaos by tomorrow, at this very moment, it was unbearably delightful.
Thrusting my arm forward, I formed a circle with my thumb and middle finger and snapped them. In that instant, the roughly thirty humans remaining vanished, blown away.
Not a trace of flesh, bone, or bloodstain remained. They were completely decomposed into dust and disappeared, as if no one had ever been there.
“An overwhelming difference in power is rather boring, too.”
I muttered this alone in the now-empty space. Of course, there was no one to hear it.
Thinking about continuing these hollow days from now on, this rage showed no signs of abating.
I dispelled the barrier at the exit and ascended the stairs.
Emerging above ground, I alighted on the highest point of the castle’s roof and looked down upon the small country.
Perhaps someone noticed me; people started coming out, shouting something loudly, and soon others filed out from their houses.
Adults stood dumbfounded, children looked on curiously without understanding, and some pointed at me with fearful faces, saying something—perhaps they knew who I was.
These people might truly be uninvolved. But to me, it didn’t matter in the slightest.
Demons are fundamentally selfish creatures, and I am no exception. Besides, I’ve had enough of being disturbed.
“Thank you for coming out. It makes you much easier targets.”
Slowly raising my arm, I concentrated power.
“Please disappear. I’ve come to hate this country.”
With a sharp snap of my fingers, a powerful shockwave instantly engulfed the dozens of humans.
I unleashed magic again and again, targeting those who escaped the first strike and those who came out upon hearing the sound of collapsing buildings.
Human magic couldn’t reach this location. Of course, everyone tried to flee.
But in my true form, my eyesight is exceptionally sharp. I can see everything so very clearly. I picked off the human souls mixed within the clouds of dust one by one.
Within minutes, every sign of life other than my own vanished from this country.
Although I had committed various misdeeds, this was the first time I had completely annihilated an entire populace and destroyed a country.
It was all so absurdly effortless.
Flying down from the roof, I landed on the ground, my wings beating.
I found the stairs leading underground, buried under rubble, and returned to the basement from there.
The basement was now filled with the smell of blood. Knowing that in a few days the corpses would produce a putrid stench, making it hard to stay here, I decomposed as much as possible—the headless body of the lead magician, and any other remaining body parts of the other humans.
Only the magical greatsword that was the master, and I, remained in the square-like space.
I returned to the form I usually took when meeting the master, approached the sword, and knelt.
Touching the hilt with my fingertips, I felt a shock like an electric current. Gripping the hilt felt like it would sear my arm.
“You’re still strong, even in death, Master. It hurts terribly.”
In human picture stories, most demons, though wicked, are interpreted conveniently for humans. Demons are depicted as underhanded and cowardly, but when making a contract, ‘they absolutely keep their promises.’
“It’s burdensome, but it can’t be helped… it’s a contract, after all…”
I used manipulation magic to make the sealing greatsword float gently.
Perhaps because my demonic magic didn’t harmonize well with it, it felt incredibly heavy.
A single strike from this greatsword would be excruciating. So painful that I might truly fall into an eternal slumber.
I knelt in the center of the square, folding my wings.
The floating greatsword, guided by manipulation magic, took aim at my back.
“If you don’t love even the me who is properly asleep, I’ll be cross, you know.”
I took a deep breath in, and out.
Using manipulation magic, I thrust the greatsword into my back with all my might… with full force. It pierced through my chest and drove like a stake into the ground.
An intense pain, enough to make me lose consciousness instantly, racked my entire body. A surge of blood rushed up my throat, filling my mouth, and I involuntarily spat it out.
It was truly painful; I had no room to even cry out. Only a bestial groan leaked from my mouth.
The blade glowed red, and countless chains burst from the wound in my chest, restraining my entire body.
My torso, wings, arms—everything was tightly bound in chains, impossible to move properly. It was the same magic as the chains from our first meeting, or the ones shot from the leather collar I gave him.
To be honest, when he said they were ‘matching,’ I didn’t dislike the idea. I wonder how the master would have responded if I had told him that.
Now, I can’t even convey such words.
“I love you.”
With my barely movable wrist, I touched the blade, mustering my voice to whisper the words of love I had never been able to fully convey until the end.
Assailed by the violent pain and overwhelming drowsiness, I let go of my consciousness.
