Whispers of a Scheming Demon - Chapter 30

WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B

◈ Whispers of a Scheming Demon ◈

Chapter 30: Apostle and Angel (2)

──────

The moment an Apostle and an angel, two Transcendents, collided, everything around them would be reduced to ruin. The backlash, like a natural disaster, would ravage the land and claim countless lives.

If he wanted to live, there was only one choice.

He had to run.

The moment the fight began, Johan took to the air.

Ignoring the explosions behind him, he focused solely on escaping.

He was not yet accustomed to flying at full speed, so he was tiring faster than expected.

‘I should have practiced more.’

Just then, Ilea spoke from Johan's arms.

“We're far enough now.”

When he looked back, they had put considerable distance between themselves and the battlefield.

Explosions still roared, and fragments of debris occasionally flew their way, but nothing posed an immediate threat to their lives.

Johan stopped flapping his wings and slowly descended.

Before he could even touch down in the wide-open grassland, Gaf shoved himself away from Johan and jumped down.

“I must look ridiculous.”

As if it were not enough that the Apostle's presence had left him trembling, he had fled with his tail between his legs while being carried by a demon. It had been an unbearably humiliating day for Gaf.

Ilea, meanwhile, was still clinging to Johan.

She looked up at him with a playful expression.

“You've grown taller again already.”

“You should let go now.”

“And after you went out of your way to carry me?”

“The situation was urgent then.”

Johan pulled the snickering Ilea away.

“What a shame. I wanted to touch you a little longer.”

Johan frowned, and Ilea laughed as she waved her hands.

“It's only for research, so don't misunderstand. More importantly, your body was quite solid. It felt closer to a carapace than skin.”

Ilea's gaze traveled over Johan from head to toe.

“A white horn, black skin, red markings, bipedal movement, and a body covered in carapace. Hmm... Even with all that, it is difficult to identify Johan's race.”

Johan clicked his tongue.

“If I could figure it out with a cursory look, I wouldn't have been agonizing over it.”

Ilea smiled strangely.

“Whatever you are, I know one thing.”

“What?”

“You don't know your own identity either, do you?”

It was true.

“That's right. I never intended to hide it.”

“Then we know where to begin. Let's investigate your birth first.”

Her eyes shone like those of a child who had found an entertaining new toy.

‘I feel like I've become an experimental frog. Should I not have given her permission?’

Johan's expression turned uneasy, and Ilea gave him an innocent smile.

“I'll say it again, but nothing you're worried about will happen.”

Just as Johan was about to respond, Gaf spoke.

“The situation isn't even over, yet the two of you seem awfully relaxed.”

As he said, the battle was still ongoing.

Explosions rang out one after another, while debris such as trees and rocks scattered without end.

Chatting peacefully amid a war zone was something Gaf, who had spent his entire life as a mercenary, could not understand.

Johan said,

“Nothing will change if we stay tense. What we had to do is over. We only need to wait quietly for news of victory.”

“...Whose victory?”

“Who else's? Shaperia's. The winner has already been decided.”

Gaf frowned. He could not understand a word Johan was saying.

“Did you not release the Apostle to kill Shaperia? Yet you're waiting for Shaperia to win. None of this makes sense.”

Ilea nodded as if she agreed.

“I think that needs some explanation.”

Johan opened his mouth.

“As you know, I had two main objectives. Stealing a Great Saint's corpse fragment and eliminating Shaperia. The first is nearly resolved, so I'll explain the matter of Shaperia.”

Father and daughter silently watched Johan.

“Shaperia's authority is fatal to demons and witches.”

Appraising Eye. It was the power to see through a target's essence, an exceptionally troublesome ability for Johan and Ilea, who had to conceal their identities.

“I had no choice but to kill her. So I borrowed the Apostle's power to deal with her.”

Apostle Beris had certainly said that they had torn Shaperia in half and killed her.

Ilea tilted her head.

“Not only is she alive, she even awakened as a Transcendent. She's fighting the Apostle right now.”

“Shaperia has two lives. She must have resurrected the moment the Apostle killed her. It is the Great Saint's blessing.”

Some people in this world were born with the blessing of the moon.

Shaperia was one of them.

Moon Anastasis. The blessing she had received could resurrect its bearer from death once in their life.

“Immediately after resurrection, it also lets her draw out all her potential. It only lasts an instant, but Shaperia is an angel right now. A being close to a demigod.”

“If the blessing is that powerful, there must naturally be a price.”

Johan raised the corner of his mouth.

“Exactly. Shaperia will soon lose all her power. Her Holy Power, Appraising Eye, even her future potential. In other words, she will return to being an ordinary human.”

Ilea let out a small sound of admiration.

“You used the Apostle to steal the Great Saint's corpse, then used Shaperia to eliminate the Apostle once the Apostle had served their purpose. On top of that, Shaperia will lose all her power and potential. You arranged this beautifully. It truly is a demon's scheme.”

Gaf looked at Johan.

“So Shaperia had two lives. This is what you meant when you said we should kill that child?”

“More or less. My real objective was to eliminate a future threat.”

The resurrected Shaperia would soon return to being an ordinary human.

A commoner with neither power nor authority. Such a person could not harm Johan.

Valkyrie Shaperia no longer existed.

He had completely changed the course of the original work.

‘I’ve brought forward events that were supposed to happen near the very end.’

With the Valkyrie's path sealed off, many changes would come. The demons she would have slaughtered would now survive, and further variables would continue to arise from that.

Johan would have to bear it.

If he moved cautiously out of fear of variables, he would merely repeat the original work's course.

‘The story has already changed. If I handle it well, I survive. If I can't control it, I die. Keep it simple.’

Johan steeled himself once more.

Gaf spoke.

“Then you deceived the Apostle. There was never any chance of you becoming the Apostle’s thrall.”

Ilea tilted her head.

“You deceived the Apostle? And what is this about becoming a thrall?”

Johan said,

“I made a contract with the Apostle. The moment Shaperia was erased, I would become the Apostle's thrall.”

“Beris in their current state cannot defeat an angel. Perhaps if they were whole.”

An Apostle split into ten pieces could not easily defeat an angel.

“Right. The outcome was decided from the start.”

“Johan played Beris like a fiddle. The Apostle of Contracts, no less.”

Ilea smiled as though she found it satisfying.

Gaf let out a hollow laugh.

“I have nothing to say.”

Johan shrugged.

“Well, that's only if everything went according to plan. We haven't confirmed it with our own eyes yet, so we can't be certain of anything.”

A variable could arise at any time.

For example, there might be a world line where the Apostle won despite odds of several trillion to one.

It was a hypothesis Johan did not even want to imagine. Nothing could be more disastrous.

Ilea said,

“Then shall we go and check? It has become rather quiet.”

Silence was settling over the mountains.

No more debris came flying toward them.

Just as Ilea was about to mount her broom, Johan spoke.

“I'll go alone. You two find Rail.”

They had been in too much of a hurry earlier to take Rail with them.

Rail was a useful piece, too valuable to discard now.

Johan spread his wings.

“Meet me again in front of the Great Saint's coffin.”

Then he flew into the night sky.

* * *

The armor was far too heavy. There was no strength in the hand gripping the sword. She did not even have the energy to stand.

Shaperia was kneeling in the wasteland, which had been devastated into a flat plain.

Her pupils trembled.

‘I can't feel anything. Neither Holy Power nor Appraising Eye... Everything is gone.’

An extreme sense of weakness struck her whole body.

Just as her awakening as an angel had come suddenly, her decline arrived without warning.

She instinctively understood.

‘The Great Saint has taken back all my power.’

Was it because she had abandoned her convictions and submitted to the Apostle?

No. She had immediately regained her resolve and defeated the Apostle.

She had corrected her mistake and upheld her convictions.

Yet her stigmata had vanished. She could not understand why.

She was utterly bewildered.

As she remained lost in confusion, an unpleasant laugh echoed out.

“So Marziel's protection has vanished. Serves you right. Angel, nothing but an empty shell, you are now nothing more than a pathetic human. How did it feel to wield omnipotence for a moment? And how does it feel to have it taken from you again? Explain it to me! I want to hear your cries!”

The malicious mockery shook the land.

Shaperia raised her head.

Beris lay face down on the ground, their upper and lower body separated and their face crushed beyond recognition, bursting into wild laughter.

“My thrall will arrive soon! He will tear you to pieces and restore this body to its original state!”

Shaperia did not respond. The Apostle's words did not even reach her ears. She only wanted to deny reality.

“I will kill every human connected to you painfully! I will skin them alive and use their hides as contract parchment, signing them with blood instead of ink! I will nail their bones into the beams of my palace!”

Pitch-black Demonic Energy surged forth. It was malice given form.

Only then did Shaperia regain her senses.

Whatever happened, she had to finish this.

She tore a strip from her clothing to bind her hand to the sword's hilt. She could not hold the sword by her own strength.

Beris cackled.

“Do you truly believe you can touch even a hair on this body without your blessing?”

Shaperia painfully rose and trudged forward.

“I sentenced you to death. Even if I must bring this sword down upon your neck a hundred times until my arm breaks, a holy knight never takes back a word once spoken.”

Life returned to her eyes.

Still lying face down, Beris shouted,

“Fine! Cut this body as much as you desire! Strike a hundred times, a thousand times, and carve your own helplessness into your bones! I look forward to watching you slowly break!”

Shaperia lifted her sword with every ounce of strength she had.

“I'll kill you, you filthy spawn!”

As she swung down, a sharp whistling sound cut through the air.

The earth shook and dust billowed up.

Through the scattered haze, red eyes gleamed.

A cold voice sank low.

“How disappointing. You failed to kill them.”

Johan was gripping Shaperia's blade in one hand.

Startled, she tried to pull back at once, but she could not overcome Johan's physical strength.

Unable to reinforce her body with Holy Power any longer, Shaperia's physical abilities were no better than those of an ordinary person.

Pinned in place, she muttered,

“A, a Horned Demon!”

As if an Apostle was not enough, now a Horned Demon had appeared. What in the world was happening in the south? A terrible unease welled up inside her.

Beris said,

“I failed to kill her because of you! If you had only given me information about that woman, this would not have happened!”

Johan frowned.

“I wasn't speaking to you. I'm disappointed in Shaperia. Why did you fail to kill Beris?”

Moon Anastasis drew out its bearer's abilities to their absolute limit.

With Shaperia's potential, an Apostle split into ten pieces should have been easy to kill. Yet for some reason, she had struggled.

Johan could not understand it.

Beris roared,

“What bullshit are you spouting now?!”

“Quiet.”

Johan stomped on Beris's head.

Black blood sprayed upward like a fountain.

The Apostle's already mangled face twisted into an even more grotesque shape.

Beris was so dumbfounded that they could not even open their mouth.

Being trampled by a mere mortal was something Beris could never have imagined.

Johan said,

“No. Now that I think about it, this worked out well. Shaperia, I should thank you.”

Shaperia looked as though she had no idea what he meant.

“I found a way to use Beris. Thanks to you leaving them alive.”

Johan looked down at the Apostle.

“According to our contract, the deadline for fulfilling the condition was midnight. Your failure is approaching. You couldn't even honor a contract with a mere mortal, so you will surely pay a price. I look forward to seeing what form it takes.”

In truth, Johan knew what would happen to Beris.

Beris's expression stiffened.

Johan snickered and released Shaperia's blade.

“I have no more business with you. Run away or do whatever you wish.”

Johan grabbed Beris by the hair.

Then he began dragging them away.

“Y-you bastard! What do you think you are doing?! Release me at once!”

Beris had lived for eternity, but this was the first time they had ever been treated like this.

Shaperia stared blankly at Beris and Johan.

‘What in the world is this...?’

She slapped her own cheek hard.

‘Get ahold of yourself.’