Banished from the Hero’s Party, I Decided to Live a Quiet Life in the Countryside - Volume 12 - Chapter 4.2

Dawn had broken, the sun rising over the horizon, and a woman in a kimono stood alone on the shore of a beach.

Altra, still in her human form, was greeting the new day.

“Traveling as a human was not too bad, surprisingly.”

Memories of the trip with Habotan flashed across her mind. It had been an arduous, perilous journey…but even so, it had been a beautiful sight watching Habotan see the world for the first time and come to learn more about it.

It had touched her heart in a way that Altra, in her long life, had forgotten was possible.

“Forced to obey a false demon lord, made to fight, and worked to death… Having suffered so many humiliations, in protecting you, we shall finally be victorious.”

Shadows appeared over the eastern sea. Wyvern knights—the flying knight squadron once led by Gandor of the Wind. The greatest threat of the demon lord’s armies that made every band of knights across the lands shudder.

“Vidosra and Madhu.”

Leading the wyvern knights at present were the new heavenly kings of wind, Vidosra, and water, Madhu. Both Asura demons.

“So you’ve finally come.”

Altra had sunk all of the ships following them, but the demon lord’s armies had wings to cross any sea. That was why Altra had needed to hurry and gain Ruti the Hero’s trust before the wyverns arrived, so she would protect Habotan.

And it had been a success—Habotan was under the protection of the strongest Hero.

All that remained…was to serve as a stand-in for her.

“Where is the demon lord’s daughter?!”

The two heavenly kings circled above Altra’s head.

“She stands before you. I shall have vengeance for my father.”

Still in the form of Torahime, Altra glared at the flying forces.

She couldn’t use her inherent abilities.

They will find out eventually, but taking my corpse back to the dark continent and examining it should buy a significant amount of time.

From the moment she had begun this journey, Altra had decided that Zoltan would be her final stop. Vidosra and Madhu had never met Habotan before; Demon Lord Taraxon had needed to secure the daughter without having her killed to get the upper-tier demons to follow him, and to prevent another potential candidate for the title of demon lord from being born elsewhere. Information about her had been kept to as few people as possible. And, as an upper-tier demon herself, the demon lord’s daughter could freely change her form.

They had no way to determine on the spot whether the person they’d killed was actually the demon lord’s daughter or just another demon. That was why Altra had asked the people of the Jade Kingdom to treat her as the princess, and they had traveled so far and fought so hard all for sake of this conclusion.

You can have my head…but I’ll kill enough of you that you won’t be able to march on Zoltan and massacre every living person there.

The wyvern knights raised their lances and descended.

“Overlord Wrath.”

Altra summoned a greatsword more than two meters long into her hands.

“Come!!!”

Altra cut down the charging wyvern knights.

“Gyaaaaa!”

The wyvern knights cried out as they were torn to shreds. Fragments of broken lances and bits of flesh rained down all around Altra.

“It can’t be! That’s the demon lord’s sword!!!”

“They say it’s a legendary weapon passed down through the demon lord’s lineage!”

The Asura demons cried out in surprise.

“Let’s do this, Madhu!”

“Aye, these small fry can’t win alone!”

The two heavenly kings joined the fray, and more and more attacks fell upon Altra. Faced with the powerful sweeps of the demon lord’s sword, Vidosra adapted by organizing waves of attacks to wear Altra down.

Rotten though they are, they are still heavenly kings, and that is the correct strategy to use here…which is precisely why I was waiting for them to do that.

In order to keep attacking in waves, the enemy had to maintain a certain distance, and that gap was just what Altra had been aiming for.

I can’t use my skills as heavenly king of the water, so this is the strongest attack I can manage right now!

Altra thrust the demon lord’s sword into the ground and formed a seal with both hands.

“Blackened blood, words of destruction, paradise-splitting spear of the overlord! The end is nigh! Demon’s Flare!!!”

It was a power passed down among the upper-tier demons of the dark continent.

An incredibly powerful, secret spell that unleashed one’s full magic power in order to eradicate their enemy.

“Damn it!!!”

All the wyvern knights were within the area of effect of the spell.

Altra had brought out the demon lord’s sword as a feint leading to this.

“Roooooar!!!”

Black flames erupted all around them, and swirling darkness enveloped the wyvern knights. It was a single attack using all of the magic power Alta had built up while recovering since her arrival in Zoltan.

“Haah… Haah…”

Altra wanted to sink to her knees but held on. The soldiers of the demon lord’s army fell from the sky, but two figures rose among the unmoving masses.

“As expected of the demon lord’s daughter… That was impressive.”

“But a poor choice. You should have held back enough strength to flee.”

Even the dark continent’s strongest spell hadn’t been enough to defeat Vidosra and Madhu.

I win.

In her heart, Altra smiled with relief.

The enemy had lost a lot of soldiers, and their means of transport was cut off. How long would it take to return her corpse to the dark continent? Having been scarred by defeat so many times, Altra and the heavenly kings had won their final battle exactly as planned.

Farewell, Habotan. May you become a powerful demon lord…strong enough to reclaim the sword they will take here… Ah, and… Aaah…

Altra was embarrassed and perplexed by the final emotion that welled up inside her, but without any time to consider it, she just accepted it.

“I hope you never lose your smile.”

She didn’t realize it, but Altra’s words were those of a parent to a child.

The two Asura raised their swords and charged at Altra, who stood tall before them. The battle was over…or at least it should have been.

“We can’t have you dying then, can we?!”

As fast as lightning, a bronze sword caught both of the Asuras’ blades.

“How did you manage to stop our swords?!”

“Who are you?!”

But the man just grinned fearlessly.

I—I made it…

I masked my unease with a smile.

Catching my opponent off guard by acting like I had everything under control was my style of fighting.

The truth was, though, that I had a cold sweat running down the back of my neck. A hair later and I wouldn’t have been able to block that attack; I was on the verge of thanking God I made it in time.

“I’m just a simple apothecary.”

“An apothecary! So you’re Gideon, one of the twin hopes of humanity?!” an Asura shouted.

“I’m not sure how I feel about the demon lord’s army knowing my true identity when not even the humans do.”

“So you’re the swordsman who crossed swords with Shisandan? Why do you protect the demon lord’s daughter?”

“Is it that strange? If someone I know is going to be killed, it’s just natural to help them.”

“Pitiful humans.”

The two Asuras raised their swords.

The Asura demons I’d fought up to this point had all been multi-sword users, but these two only wielded one? How had I found myself forced into another fight with limited information?

I wish I could have fought them after talking more with Altra…

But when we heard she’d left the hospital, I’d immediately realized she was planning to die in Habotan’s stead. There had been no time to search for tracks, so I’d just predicted that any pursuers would come from the sea to the east and rushed here as fast as I could.

Thankfully, my guess had been right on the mark, but it was just luck that I’d made it in time—and only just barely.

If we make it out of this safe, Habotan better give Altra a serious talking to.

“Be careful, Sir Red! These two demons are Vidosra and Madhu, the new heavenly kings! Powerful warriors even among the Asura!”

That explained why their swords had been so heavy.

“Hey, can you transform into a lighter form?” I asked.

“If a dwarf child will do.”

“All right, do it.”

Altra turned into a small dwarven boy.

Now I had to create an opening, even for just a second.

I attacked Vidosra with a slash, and the Asura blocked with his sword.

“Sorry, Mogrim!”

I let go of my sword, as if throwing it away.

“Whoa?!” Vidosra shouted in surprise, and my sword spun around his to cut him. It was a shallow wound, but a spurt of blood erupted from his face.

The Bahamut Knights’ sacrificial spin counter.

It was a simple sword technique, not a skill born from a blessing—a feint designed for when you locked blades with a superior opponent. It worked by distracting the opponent by letting go of your sword at close range, where even a moment’s hesitation could get a person cut down, and spinning your own sword around theirs. When you weren’t expecting it, it was an attack that was almost impossible to block. However, it was easy to counter if you did know what to expect, so trick strategies like that only worked on opponents who had never seen them before.

The Bahamut Knights had a broad range of feints and tricks in their repertoire for staying alive, but they still taught that the proper path of swordsmanship was fundamentally the strongest.

I knew it wouldn’t be enough to defeat a heavenly king.

But all I’d needed was to make him stop for a second!

“Lightning Speed!”

Spinning around with my new burst, I grabbed the dwarven boy that was Altra and quickly sped up.

“Not so fast!”

The other Asura, Madhu, thrust his sword toward my back.

“?!”

The sword stopped.

A slender thread of spider web glittered in the light.

Cautious of a trap, Madhu focused on the thread for just a moment.

Of course, there was nothing there; there hadn’t been any time to set a trap. Mister Crawly Wawly in the pouch at my hip had sneakily managed to spin a thread the moment he’d been in the two Asuras’ blind spot.

However, something had suddenly appeared where there had been nothing before, and a first-rate warrior like Madhu wouldn’t ignore that.

“…Gh!!!”

I didn’t have a sword anymore, so I couldn’t afford to take even a single attack. But I didn’t have to turn around; I just had to run with all my might.

Thirty-seven seconds.

That was how long I’d had to run before I saw Ruti and the others.

“We’re up against two Asura demons, the new heavenly kings!” I shouted, stopping at Ruti’s side. My body ached in pain. “I thought I was gonna die there!”

I set Altra down, and a torrent of sweat dripped to the ground.

“Thanks, Mister Crawly Wawly.”

Peeking out of the pouch, Mister Crawly Wawly looked just as relieved as I was. He hopped up onto Tisse’s shoulder.

“They’re crazy strong. I can’t do anything against them without some sort of a plan.”

“They didn’t get appointed heavenly kings for nothing,” Yarandrala said grimly.

Yarandrala had fought Desmond of the Earth too, and she knew his strength just as well as I did. The reason I’d chosen to throw away my sword like that was because I had judged it would be too difficult to try to hold them off until Ruti arrived.

“Lady Torahime!!!”

Habotan clung to Altra, who was still in the form of the dwarven boy.

“Why are you here?” Altra asked, looking confused.

I had never imagined I’d see one of the demon lord’s terrifying heavenly kings in a state of confusion like that. You really do never know what life will bring.

“No! Don’t die!” Habotan shouted, tears pouring from her eyes.

“You think of Habotan like a daughter; it’s the same for her.”

“In what sense?”

“Habotan thinks of you like a parent.”

“I…”

Altra looked unsure how to process these emotions.

“Seeing as Altra can’t fight anymore, we’ll have to face them ourselves.”

I took the sword we’d found in the sunken Veronian galleon from Rit’s item box. It was a valuable magic sword forged by a renowned swordsmith, but I wouldn’t really be able to rely on it facing off against a heavenly king.

“I’ll take the front,” announced Ruti. “Tisse, cover me.”

“Understood.”

Ruti drew her sword and moved forward.

I would’ve liked to give her some sort of advice…but I came up with strategies by figuring out an opponent’s blessing, which meant Asura demons without blessings were the ultimate counter to me.

“It’s okay. Let’s just trust Ruti,” said Rit.

“Yeah…”

I needed to focus on going along with Ruti’s orders.

Our opponents were two heavenly kings. According to the demons, they weren’t true heavenly kings, but Desmond of the Earth alone had been enough to give us a hard time in multiple battles. It would be fair to say that, at that time, a heavenly king and Ruti had been about equal in terms of ability.

And now we were up against two enemies of equivalent power…

Ruti’s Ruler skill, which nullified people’s blessings, wouldn’t work on Asura demons. So even Ruti had to stay on the alert against these two.

“Why would you come? Hero Ruti…you must understand that our best option is for me to die here.” There was a hint of reproach in Altra’s voice.

“Because my friend was crying,” Ruti answered without turning back.

The two Asura demons were approaching.

“If Gideon’s here, then of course the second twin hope would be too,” Vidosra said when he spied Ruti.

“Ruti the Hero!” Madhu roared, raising his sword.

It was a unique sort of stance, with his sword hand held back, similar to Shisandan’s style.

“Why does the Hero protect the Demon Lord! What justice moves your sword?!” Madhu shouted.

“Sir Ruti…,” Habotan said, looking nervously toward her.

“I am no ally of justice.” Ruti’s turned her sword on Madhu. “I fight by my will alone.”

“I see. So that is why you are no longer deluded by another person’s sense of justice?”

The expressions on Vidosra and Madhu’s faces warped.

““Fascinating! So this is what it means to be human?!””

The two of them leapt forward at once.

Ruti met them head on, and their swords clashed with dizzying speed. The two heavenly kings really were incredibly powerful.

“Rit! Yarandrala! Let’s keep Madhu busy!”

““Got it!””

Even if we couldn’t beat him, Ruti would gain the upper hand if we could make sure she wasn’t fighting both of them at once.

“It’s fine.”

But Tisse stopped us.

“This will end it.”

Tisse threw her knife, and it suddenly changed path in midair.

Had she used a spiderweb to manipulate it?

“How impudent!”

The Asura demons immediately dodged the complicated trajectory of Tisse’s knife.

Gah, so they even saw through Tisse’s trajectory-shifting attack?

“Mhm, that’s enough.”

Ruti’s sword accelerated. It swung faster than my eyes could follow.

“It’s too fast. It almost looks like she’s attacking them simultaneously.”

“Shisandan was right. This is beyond even the Hero.”

The Asura demons’ bodies twisted unnaturally, and a line appeared running from their shoulders diagonally across their torsos. Then, their huge forms collapsed to the ground.

“This is Ruti the Hero…!”

Altra and Habotan could do nothing but watch in awe.

It had all come from the slightest opening caused by Tisse’s attack.

Ruti had slowed her sword enough to let the two demons keep up, all so she could take advantage of that opening. She had won exactly as planned.

She’d become even stronger since giving up being the Hero. That was because now she was fighting of her own free will, instead of letting her blessing decide when and where she fought. She had been determined to win that battle.

“You’ve gotten strong.”

“I owe it to you. You saved me,” Ruti said, smiling.

“Soul Seal!!!” Altra suddenly shouted.

“Wh-what?!”

Altra had drawn a seal in her own blood on a metal sphere about the size of a fist. Suddenly, the Asura demons’ bodies turned into light and were absorbed into the orb.

“W-with this, they will not revive anymore… It is a secret art we developed to defeat Asuras.”

“Lady Torahime!”

Habotan scrambled to support Altra, who wobbled unsteadily and let out a deep breath.

“So Asura demons do revive!” I exclaimed, and Altra nodded at me.

“Yes. They are not the creation of Demis, which places them outside of Demis’s cycle of reincarnation. As such, they form their own cycle of rebirth… An Asura that dies is reborn as the same demon. Asura are undying, indestructible beings.”

“But…!!!” Rit shouted. “That means Shisandan is still alive…and my master has yet to be avenged?!”

I’d thought there must be some secret to Shisandan’s resurrection, but to think he’d been unkillable in the first place… That was just absurd.

I put my arm around Rit’s shoulders and pulled her close.

“However, it is possible to seal them like this. So long as this sphere remains unbroken, the Asura within cannot be reborn.”

“With that seal…”

Rit closed her eyes, then relaxed her shoulders and exhaled.

“If Shisandan ever comes back to Zoltan, I swear I’ll put an end to him.”

“And if that ever happens, I’ll fight alongside you,” I told her.

That put a pin in any talk of vengeance for now. Rit wouldn’t chase Shisandan, so long as he stayed away from Zoltan… She’d chosen to stay and live here with me.

“This is a major victory for humanity,” Tisse said.

Yarandrala nodded in agreement.

“With that, all of the heavenly kings of the demon lord’s army have been defeated, right?”

“Yes, Dreadonna of the Flame died so that we might escape. The air force and navy, both crucial for the demon lord’s invasion, were taken over by Asuras calling themselves heavenly kings, but they are both done for now, too. And the heavenly kings’ armies, which made up the bulk of the demon lord’s forces, will no longer function properly anymore.”

Air force, huh? That’s a concept that doesn’t really exist on this continent.

The airborne wyvern knights had been a major factor in humanity’s continuous, one-sided losses in the earliest battles of the invasion.

What was important was that the pursuers sent by the demon lord had been wiped out without being able to report back what they had discovered. More would eventually come, but if the Asura demons worked under the assumption that they could to bring back information even if they died, then the demon lord’s forces shouldn’t notice anything wrong until the latest imaginable date for their return.

That would buy us around half a year of safety, I’d guess.

For now, we’d won.

“Altra.”

“…”

“We’re glad you’re alive.”

“Indeed!” Habotan responded loudly, in place of the silent Altra.