Chapter 22: It Was You, Huh? (3)

The demon groaned through his swollen and split lips.

I stared down at him with cold, sunken eyes and brought the tip of my sword up to his eye. “Still not talking? Well, I guess there’s no helping it then. Let’s start with the most useless part, your eyes.”

The demon pleaded with desperation in his voice. “I-I’ll talk! I’ll tell you everything, just please stop!”

“Oh yeah? Then go ahead, let’s hear it.”

He bowed his head, trembling, as if trying to remember what I had said before beating him. “I,

uh

... what you asked earlier, it was...”

Then, that same black aura erupted once again from his chest, and he said, “Oh right, the question was—how do you want to die, right?”

The demon sprang up like a coiled spring, arms crossing in front of him. In an instant, two sickles appeared in his hands. He unfurled his crossed arms as though he were a bird spreading its wings, wildly slashing the weapons now cloaked in dark energy.

“I must’ve knocked his brains loose. Guy can’t even remember what I asked,” I muttered.

Convinced he had found an opening, the demon came at me with a crazed grin. I smirked faintly and stepped back. The acupuncture technique I had used to seal his pressure point could never subdue someone with high mana. I had known from the start that with my pitiful amount of mana, I wouldn’t be able to hold a demon for long. But that didn’t mean I was unable to take him down.

I unleashed the Sun Sword Style First Form: First Eclipse, an upward slash rising from an unseen angle. My sword weaved between the whirling sickles like an acrobat and slashed across his chest. His flesh tore open, and blood sprayed.

Then, I said, “Let’s try this again. Listen carefully this time. Okay?”

The demon staggered back, pale and wide-eyed, clutching at the gash across his chest. Blood gushed through his fingers, and both of his scythes clattered to the cave floor. He asked, “

Ugh!

Aaah!

W-what the hell are you?”

“I told you. I’m the one asking questions.” I stomped on his knee. A sickening crack echoed through the cave, followed by a bloodcurdling scream.

“What were you really doing here?” I asked.

“

Agh

,

ugh!

”

“Let’s see. Which part did I say was the most useless again?”

“I-I was only following orders!” he quickly shouted.

“Whose orders?”

“That’s...” The demon glanced away, avoiding my gaze. His face twisted in anxiety, teeth sinking into his lip. Just as he was about to speak further, he suddenly clutched his chest, writhing in pain. Then his eyes bulged, his blood vessels bursting into a crimson web across the whites. Ugly, root-like veins spread up his neck and crawled over his face.

I found it somewhat familiar. “This is...”

Is it a geas

[1]

that prevents him from leaking information?

I thought.

I quickly reached toward him as he convulsed, and blood foamed from his mouth as though he were being electrocuted. But the light was already gone from his eyes. I had considered the possibility of a geas being present on his body the moment I had first subdued him, but this one was not just an ordinary geas.

It’s a high-level geas,

I surmised.

A typical geas would activate when its target spoke a forbidden word or performed a specific action. This one, though, triggered just from the intent to reveal information, instantly killing the demon the moment he even thought about talking.

“What the hell are these bastards?” I said to myself.

The demon had mentioned something about becoming a priest, so they were definitely from the Demon Cult. However, the cult itself was fragmented into numerous factions and operated in a cell-like structure, so it was impossible to tell which group he belonged to.

“

Hm!

” I picked up the black nail-like object the demon had been using earlier and examined it.

Seems like something meant to interfere with the ley lines.

The ley lines in the cave were rich in mana and strong enough for clusters of magic-infused Seven Star Herbs to grow. Based on what I had seen earlier—when the demon had driven the nail into the rock wall and channeled that dark mana into it—the nail was obviously designed to affect the flow of the ley lines’ energy in some way.

“But I still can’t figure out exactly what it’s supposed to do.”

A troubling thought crossed my mind:

Could this nail be why the Demon God’s seal weakened in my previous life? No. That can’t be it.

If a tiny nail like this could weaken the Demon God’s seal, that seal would’ve broken a long time ago. Even if there were dozens or hundreds of these nails, it wouldn’t matter. The seal on the Demon God wasn’t so flimsy that it could be undone by merely tampering with the ley lines a little.

So, I kept thinking about what the nail was for, but no clear answer came to mind.

Guess I’ll have to look for more clues,

I thought.

I moved toward the corpse. Just as I reached it, however, I heard footsteps echoing faintly in the distance and instantly froze for a moment.

Withdrawing my hand, I then activated my senses and spread mana through my body. It didn’t take long for me to analyze the owners of those footsteps.

They must be the ones who gave this guy his orders. There are three... no, four of them. They are likely heading this way to investigate why he has yet to return.

There was no way those four approaching figures were the only demons who had infiltrated the academy. There had to be more. I didn’t know their purpose for sneaking into a place swarming with heroes, but since they were bold enough to do it, they couldn’t just be some small-time rogue group of demons.

I thought about what to do with them. Even if I took them down, I wouldn’t be able to get any information out of them, thanks to that geas. To trace the tail of the Demon Cult faction involved in this matter, I needed to find another way.

Now then, what should I do?

As I continued to think, my eyes landed on the two sickles lying on the ground. The moment I saw them, a spark of inspiration hit me. “

Aha

. Let’s see, first...”

I raised my sword and cleanly severed the neck of the demon, who had died spewing blood. Now, they wouldn’t think he had died due to the geas. With a slight smirk, I picked up one of the sickles from the floor. Then, without a second thought, I drove it into my abdomen.

***

Four men in black robes walked through the cave. The man at the front turned his head, his crimson hair spilling over the hood. A hideous burn scar covered the entire left side of his face. His deep-set, bloodshot eyes shimmered with a threatening crimson light that made one’s skin crawl just to look at him.

The crimson-haired man asked, “How long has it been since we last heard from Husk?”

“I-It’s been about thirty minutes,” stammered one of the others.

The crimson-haired man’s brow twitched with annoyance. “Thirty minutes,

huh.

I distinctly remember telling him not to go alone, that at least two people should work together when driving the nails in.”

The three subordinates behind him, all demons, bowed deeply in fear. “I’m s-sorry, Priest Calyx!”

Calyx’s cold eyes swept over them before he clicked his tongue and turned away. “I’ll deal with this issue later.”

“Y-yes, sir!”

For now, their priority was to locate the missing demon.

“Lead the way.”

“Yes, right away!”

Cautiously but swiftly, Calyx and his subordinates headed deeper into the cave. When they reached the designated spot for placing the nails, the scene before them baffled them. A bleeding cadet lay collapsed on the ground, his abdomen torn open, and Husk was a corpse nearby, his head severed.

“

Ugh!

Ahh!

H-help... me... please,” said the cadet.

Calyx frowned and glanced at his subordinates. “Why would a cadet be here at this hour?”

One of them quickly responded, “There wasn’t any outdoor training scheduled for today!”

“

Hmm!

”

That meant this cadet had most likely entered with special permission from a professor.

“This is going to be a problem,” Calyx said.

Given the scene before them, it wasn’t hard for Calyx to figure out what had happened: The cadet had entered the forest with a permit, stumbled upon Husk, and fought him. In the end, despite being gravely injured by Husk’s sickle, the cadet had beheaded Husk and barely survived.

Calyx looked down at Husk’s corpse in disgust. “

Tch

. What a pathetic fool!”

Even if Husk was a low-ranking monk, how could he have lost to a mere cadet? This human wasn’t even a full-fledged hero yet. It was an embarrassment, a disgrace for someone who had received the Demon God’s blessing.

Calyx furrowed his brow, his head pounding

.

They had planned this operation carefully to avoid the outdoor training schedule, yet a no-name cadet’s intrusion had derailed and messed up everything. Calyx clenched his eyes shut, trembling all over.

If that person finds out... No matter what, this has to be buried

, he thought.

If word of this failed operation reached that person, Calyx could very well end up like the corpse on the floor.

One of the other demons looked down at the pale, gasping boy and asked, “What should we do with the cadet? He won’t last much longer from the blood loss.”

Calyx didn’t hesitate and ordered, “Kill him.”

“W-what? But!”

If the academy found out a cadet had died, the professors would no doubt launch an investigation.

“W-what if we healed him and sent him back? We could silence him or maybe even buy his cooperation,” another demon asked.

A mocking smile crept onto Calyx’s lips. “Silence him?”

Heal the cadet, then coerce or bribe him into silence and send him back? That would be the ideal option—if it worked.

Calyx extended his finger toward the fallen cadet. “I don’t trust the living.”

A dark aura surged from his left chest, swirling into the shape of a black awl. Then, the awl shot out in a flash, piercing the cadet’s heart.

“

Ugh!

Guh

!” With a final breath, the gray-haired cadet died.

“Dispose of him,” Calyx said.

“Y-yes, sir!” His subordinates, visibly shaken by the ruthless act, quickly picked up the corpse and hoisted it onto their backs.

Calyx watched them for a moment, then turned away with a click of his tongue. “Mark my words. If you want to survive in this world, never trust the living. The only ones you can trust are the dead.”

With that, Calyx strode off toward their hideout.

1. In Irish folklore, a geas is an obligation or prohibition magically imposed on a person. ☜