“The other adventurers and mercenaries are completely fixated on only defending. Do you understand?”
“Yeah, seems that way. I mean, that’s what he said the plan was.”
“That won’t do.”
“Huh...”
Lefille quite flatly put down the strategy that the trade corps was adopting. The way she was speaking reminded Suimei of what she’d said before.
“That’s... You mean that stuff about breaking through?”
“That’s right. Demons are, without exception, beings who know only how to steal, destroy, and kill. Above all else, their bloodlust is strong. They’ll only come at us harder if we take a defensive formation. If we want to deal with those things, just defending will do us no good.”
“I’m well aware of the dangers of just defending. But even if you say it won’t do any good, I can’t agree that running out on your own would be any good either. Just like defending is dangerous, doesn’t attacking also have its fair share of risks? If we’re really surrounded and that’s what we have to do, then it’s what we have to do... but I still can’t say it’s the most reasonable course of action right now.”
Suimei was trying to hold Lefille back from doing something reckless. It may have just been the opinion of an amateur, but Suimei didn’t believe that the motley group protecting the trade corps would be able to accomplish Lefille’s goals.
“Are you saying you think we should stay and defend?”
“No, I’m just saying that it’s unreasonable for you to try and cut through them on your own.”
Suimei didn’t doubt Lefille, but he didn’t know the true extent of her strength either. As a magician, he didn’t have a trained eye for assessing someone’s ability with a sword. He knew she was strong, but not how strong. And he didn’t know how strong the enemy they’d be facing was. He simply didn’t have enough information. Lefille then turned towards Suimei and gave him a nod like she understood what he was thinking.
“Your point is certainly valid. But what I said still stands. I know those things very well. There’s no way I’d underestimate them after all this time. And...”
“And?”
Lefille paused for a moment. Suimei felt goosebumps for an instant as the atmosphere around her darkened.
“...And you won’t be able to wipe them out like that, right?”
The cold beauty’s expression clouded over for an instant, and it wasn’t because of the overcast sky. Her face now revealed the dark shadow behind her righteous heart as a swordswoman. A single red eye glimmering with anger and hatred pierced through that shadow, the very same way it threatened to pierce through her enemy. Suimei was sure there was something behind that gaze of hers. Just how closely were demons tied to this girl’s destiny?
“Suimei-kun, demons are evil. From the moment they’re born to the moment they die, they are wholly and utterly despicable. They know no other way to live. That’s why... That’s why those things must be cut down. I will kill them all. I won’t leave a single one alive.”
Lefille’s dark determination overpowered any of Suimei’s objections.
“That’s how it is.”
That was all she muttered before turning away from Suimei.
“H-Hey, Lefille!”
Suimei called out to her with a flustered voice. And as if to apologize for darkening the mood so dramatically, Lefille looked over her shoulder with a bright smile.
“Thank you, Suimei-kun. But there’s no need to worry about me. Please help take care of the cargo in my place. See you.”
With those parting words, Lefille went deeper into the forest. Somewhere ahead of her were the demons she intended to defeat.
She’s fast...
It was like watching a red gale cutting through the trees. And seeing her move like that, Suimei could no longer think she was being reckless. The footing in the forest was poor and she was carrying a massive object, but she was moving like that made no difference to her. Suimei found it simply beautiful. If she was capable of moving that swiftly in such conditions, surely there was no chance she’d lose in any ordinary fight. And it wasn’t long before he lost sight of her. The others who had seen her run off were noisily making a fuss in bewilderment and anger, but it didn’t last long.
“They’re coming!”
An adventurer cried out as the trees swayed unnaturally and a mana presence closed in. And then, the existence that intended to cut them down finally appeared. Someone yelled in surprise, or perhaps it was fear.
Demons. Several of them began appearing from the myriad of trees. They had figures similar to humans, but with grotesque, uncanny features—bat wings, winding goat horns, and rusty red flesh. It was like they were an amalgamation of man and beast, truly repulsive in their appearance. They looked like something straight out of a fantasy, the very picture of the monster you’d expect a storybook hero to be fighting. These were demons.
In general, demons were a cut above other aggressive creatures such as monsters. They were regarded as the natural enemy of humanity, and universally reviled as evil by all the races of the world. According to the stories Suimei had read, their existence was closely tied to the Evil God. It was vague, but all the myths of this world said the same thing in regards to their origin. They also chronicled a few details of the race, including that demons retained humanoid forms and could speak human language.
Back home we had apparitions, but seeing this kind of thing is really a first for me...
Suimei had fought against inhuman creatures before. But to face something like this that seemed to have jumped straight from the pages of a book was unexpectedly a first for him. Back on Earth, not even the ancient dragon looked anything like it was described in fiction. Even vampires appeared far more human than these demons did. Suimei never imagined that he’d encounter such vile creatures in this fantasy world before even coming across demi-humans or monsters.
But the real problem at hand was why the demons were in this kind of place.
Contrary to what that barcode baldy told me, the demons haven’t made any big movements since assaulting that country to the north...
It was a difficult story to swallow. The demons were supposed to be in the northern country of Noshias after taking it. And there were two countries and a mountain range between here and there. It was extremely unusual for them to appear here. But his opponents weren’t human, so it seemed that perhaps applying human logic to their actions was a mistake. And with that realization, Suimei knew there was no point in dwelling on it now.
Suimei narrowed his eyes and let his own bloodlust radiate. One of the demons approaching the convoy noticed and decided to mark Suimei as its target. It came straight for him, prepared to strike. Was it mana, or perhaps aetheric? An artlessly gathered mass of power formed a fiendish shape in the demon’s palm, and with a swing, the projectile flew towards Suimei with the speed of a fired arrow.
I won’t be so easily―
Suimei dodged the attack as it whistled passed him. The mass of power blew a hole in the ground and kicked up a cloud of dust. Suimei was unharmed. Anything moving at the speed of an arrow was far too slow to catch a magician. As if chasing after the projectile, the demon flapped its wings and dove towards Suimei.
It rose up towards the sky and then following an earthbound diagonal line right for Suimei. It was going to rush him, but Suimei lunged forward to meet the attack. This defied all of the demon’s expectations. If he had dodged backwards or to the side, the demon would have been able to correct its course. But with him stepping forward, the demon would have to hit the brakes to adjust its swing.
“SHA!”
As their paths crossed, the demon let out a yell and swung its black claws at Suimei. But since its target had suddenly moved, the demon was unable to properly correct its posture in time to make a decent attack. It was a wild swing and a miss. That was Suimei’s goal, and then he used the momentum from dodging the blow to pivot on his left foot. He grasped the demon�
�s extended arm and gave it a light twist as he spun around.
“Hah!”
Suimei let out the air in his lungs and threw the demon. Still moving at the speed of its reckless charge, it hit the ground with a great deal of force. It seemed largely unfazed, however. After rolling along the ground a bit, it got right up and took to the skies again. Flapping its bat wings, it kept its distance from Suimei and stared him down. It was uninjured, but clearly irritated. With a sharp glare and a hoarse voice, it began speaking to Suimei.
“You damn human, using such strange techniques...”
“Calling it strange is mean. That was a proper, normal technique.”
Standing at the ready for another attack, Suimei decided to try a little provocation. The demon scoffed back at him, then shut its mouth and focused its bloodlust on him.
“Hmph.”
Feeling the twisted pressure fall over him, Suimei shot a disinterested and cold stare back at the demon. The demon was wriggling its claws like an insect’s mandibles, and it left Suimei with an unpleasant feeling. It seemed that was the extent to which the demon was willing participate in conversation. But though it had no intention of talking anymore, it didn’t immediately move to attack again either. It seemed to be analyzing Suimei’s movements after being so easily caught in his throw.
Just watching? In that case...
While the demon was observing him, Suimei took a quick survey of his surroundings. The merchants were hiding themselves well enough that he couldn’t see any of them. The other adventurers and mercenaries were also out of sight now, but he could sense mana in the distance and could hear the din of battle from the vanguard of the trade corps. It seemed that the rest of the demons were focused on where all the humans were gathered.
He could also sense a great deal of mana deeper into the forest. In other words, Lefille’s preemptive attack may have actually been fruitful. It seemed she’d hit the strategic bullseye. Contemplating all this, Suimei thrust his hand into his pocket. Seeing that, the demon suddenly flapped its wings and decided it was time to act.
“Die...”
“Don’t wanna.”
With a snap of Suimei’s fingers, the ground in front of the charging, low-flying demon exploded.
“Nu―?!”
The demon let out a grunt in surprise. This was just a smokescreen. The sudden strike magicka brought the demon to a dead stop in its tracks, and it remained floating just above the ground. Suimei took a leap backwards to create some distance. He took a quick breath, and then began his magicka.
“Now then, let’s see just how powerful the bane of humanity in this world really is.”
With a mere murmur, Suimei manifested the requisite amount of mana for his spell. He quickly kneaded together his spell, and magicka circles began appearing around him. Each was filled with numbers and words that gave them power, and Suimei called out to them to activate them. This was one of the Kabbalah’s most important practical techniques, numerology.
“O flammae, legito. Pro venefici doloris clamore...”
[Oh flames, assemble. Like the cry of the magician’s resentment...]
A roaring flame came pouring out from the magicka circles hanging in the air. And then, as if being sucked into a single point, the flames converged on the demon. This was fire magicka. But the demon didn’t flinch or even move. It looked intent on letting itself get hit with the fire.
Huh...
Suimei had expected the demon to do something, but it wasn’t lifting a finger to evade or defend itself. Was it just that stupid? Or perhaps it had some sort of inherent defense? While Suimei was pondering the demon’s actions or lack thereof, the flames engulfed it. Seeing the demon’s reaction to the fire, however, Suimei furrowed his brow.
Magickal flames. Upon contact, they would burn an enemy to ashes. At least, that’s what they were supposed to do. But the silhouette within the pillar of flames showed no signs of struggling or even feeling pain. And before long, a strange power blew the flames away.
“You’re severely underestimating me if you think this level of magic could possibly defeat me.”
Had his magicka simply lacked the power to do the job? Looking closely, Suimei could see that not even a hair on the demon was singed. He hadn’t been particularly stingy with his mana or choice of spell, yet this was still the outcome.
Hmmm, with that level of mana, it shouldn’t be able to resist my magicka. And it doesn’t seem to have an especially sturdy body or any kind of natural armor either...
Suimei had intended to end the fight with that single spell, but apparently he had been too optimistic. Based on the demon’s mana capacity, he guessed that it might be able to put up a little resistance, but never would have guessed that it could render his spell completely ineffective.
It was strange. The spell hadn’t been outright extinguished, which meant the demon didn’t have particularly high resistance to magicka. And from what he could tell based on tossing the demon earlier, Suimei was convinced its skin wasn’t extraordinary in any way. In that regard, it seemed just like any other living creature.
It was possible it had an inherent resistance to fire. But even then, it escaping the flames without even a single singed hair should have been impossible. Magickally created flame was even more powerful than natural fire.
This ignition magicka wasn’t like simple combustion which burned as long as there was oxygen in the air. Instead, the manifested mystery would forcefully inflict combustion on its target. Anything that came into contact with the mystical flames would burn as they commanded. So unless the target was exceptionally resistant to magicka, it would crumble to ash in the flames. If they were merely mundane flames, that would be a different story, but Suimei’s fire was bona fide magicka. This was why he was stumped as to how the demon had survived unscathed. He couldn’t figure out why the flames hadn’t incinerated their target.
“Is it because magicka doesn’t work externally...?”
As Suimei muttered to himself, the demon once more gathered power into its hand. It stuck out its arm, and this time it fired off the lump of power without making any sort of motion. It seemed intent on keeping this a ranged fight now. Suimei gave the projectile a wide berth and dodged it by jumping to the side, but the demon quickly made another and then another. It began firing them at random, like an archer with a bucket of arrows trying to pin down a target with a wild barrage.
Suimei began running and taking evasive action while paying attention to the wagons behind him. The next shot from the demon was a much larger mass of power than before. And as it came for Suimei, it reduced the trees in its path to mere wood shavings. But even at that size and with that destructive power, Suimei could easily evade it and took a big jump backwards.
The instant after he did, a cloud of dust blew up against Suimei’s body. While shielding his scowling face with his hands, Suimei could hear an explosion to his side. Keeping one eye on the demon, Suimei glanced over and saw that someone else had fired off a spell. A different demon was caught in a magic explosion. Not only that, they were flames. However, unlike in Suimei’s case, the demon was consumed in the flame and perished immediately.
“That’s...”
Just what was happening? This meant that the theory about demons having a natural resistance to fire was out the window. While Suimei was deep in thought over the matter, he heard a man call out to him.
“Hey! What are you doing! Fall back!”
“Hmm?”
“You with the black hair! Fall back!”
The group who’d defeated the demon with the explosion was now running towards Suimei. Taking a closer look, it was the same party of adventurers that Lefille knew. The man in armor was the one shouting to him, and the girl behind him—who Suimei assumed was a mage—was chanting with her staff held out. She looked like she was about to let loose another spell, and sure enough, fire burst forth from the tip of her staff. When the demon Suimei was fighting saw it, it flapped its wings
with a thud and took evasive action.
So it’ll dodge that...?
It made sure to clear out of the way of the spell with plenty of room to spare. Suimei was bewildered as to why this magic seemed to scare it so badly when his hadn’t even fazed it. Only a few moments later, the adventurers running towards Suimei finally reached him.
“Fall back. Leave the rest to us.”
“No, I’m fine. I’ll manage on my own.”
“You’ll manage...? What the hell are you saying?! You were being pushed back just now, weren’t you?!”
“Pushed back? No, I wasn’t really...”
“No? That demon is still perfectly healthy!”
The adventurer did have a point. But to Suimei, the fight was just taking a bit of time. He still didn’t feel he was in any sort of danger. He’d hardly used his full power yet, and it wasn’t like he’d lost interest in the fight. However, all anyone else could see was that he hadn’t killed the demon yet, much less harmed it.
“...That may be so, but I would like you to leave this to me for now.”
“Negative. Retreat back to the trade corps. We’ll take this from here.”
“Huh? Wait, no, no, no! That’d be a problem!”
Suimei was frantically protesting against the adventurer who was shaking his head at him. It was indeed a problem for him. If he just left this to others, he wouldn’t be able to solve the mystery of why his magicka hadn’t worked. If someone else took this kill, he still wouldn’t know how much mana he actually needed to use in order to defeat demons. This were things he absolutely wanted to learn, and ideally in a situation that wasn’t dire. Like right now.
“What? What the hell kind of problem is that? I said we’ll defeat it, there’s no more to it right? Just quietly go back to where the merchants―”
The adventurer had gotten tired of Suimei’s stubbornness and began rebuking him, but was suddenly interrupted. Suimei evaded an incoming shadow simply by turning to the side. It was another attack from the demon. The adventurer, however, didn’t have the same grasp on the attack and had leaped back a great distance to evade it.
The Magic in this Other World is Too Far Behind! Volume 2 Page 12