The Greatest Demon Lord Is Reborn as a Typical Nobody - Volume 6.5 - Chapter 2

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Dues to the Demon Lord Reborn: The Tale of a God Slayer

A Myth-Killing Legend Is Made in a Day

BOOOOOOOOOOOM!

…A peaceful afternoon.

Following several hours of alchemy practice, the students filed into the cafeteria to fill their empty stomachs. They looked satiated and visibly relaxed as they enjoyed their lunches.

…Until something exploded, a boom ringing in their ears.

Some of the students assumed this was a demon attack and went on high alert…but most looked fed up, silently groaning not again.

Those flat stares—me, Ireena, and Ginny included—centered on one student in particular—our resident troublemaker, Sylphy.

“Oh? Someone set off another magic trap—,” Sylphy announced, not only with zero shame but with a look of pride—

“SYLPHYYYYYYYYYYYYY!! WHERE IS THAT IDIOT?!”

Olivia sounded absolutely furious. She burst into the cafeteria in an ogre-like rage an instant later.

“Fouuuuund youuuuu!”

“Aaaaaaaaaaaah!”

The fur of Olivia’s therianthrope ears and tail stood on end as she pounced on Sylphy, grabbed her by the back of the neck, and began to drag her away.

“H-heeeeeeelp meee! Someoooone!” Voice echoing, Sylphy disappeared with Olivia.

“…Should we?” Ireena asked.

“She’s brought this on herself.”

Ginny had a point, but abandoning her felt like a lousy thing to do. We followed the pair.

Olivia had made her way toward the food storage room inside the school. Preserved rations were distributed in the event of earthquakes and other unforeseen disasters.

…Smoke was billowing from the room.

A crowd of onlookers had gathered, and their reactions ran the gamut. Cutting past the throng, Olivia pushed her way into the storage room and finally released Sylphy.

“Hey, idiot. I imagine you know what’s happening here.”

“O-of course. My magic trap went off—”

“Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why would you set a magic trap inside the storage room?”

“M-my supersharp sixth sense told me the Academy was in danger, so I laid more traps than usual not too long ago. I was just thinking of the school. I—I wasn’t trying to hurt anyone. With the selfless sacrifice of some potatoes, the Academy is safe once again—”

“You haven’t protected shit, dumbass!” Olivia’s fist slammed against Sylphy’s head. Thunk!

“Aaaaaaaaaah! You split my skull! You split it in half!” Sylphy clutched her head, writhing in pain on the ground.

Olivia looked down at the girl in tears, expression as merciless as ever. “It’s all your fault…! Now my precious dried sweet potatoes—made with love—have burned to a criiiiisp! How are you going to make it up to me? These serve no use to me anymore!”

“Well, n-no! The ashes can be used to filter the sewers, disinfect wounds, and lots of other stuff. They’re not worthle— Gah?!”

Sylphy fell to the ground in a stupor as another giant fist came crashing down on her head. Olivia stood over the girl imperiously as her victim let out a silent scream.

“This is the eighth time that my potatoes have fallen victim to your schemes! The eighth! Two more times and we’ll have to celebrate the ten-mark milestone!”

The rage was messing with her head. Olivia was definitely in one of her moods.

“You’ve said your last sorry! Prepare for a full-course beatdown from hell!”

“Eeeeeeeeeek?! Wh-what did I do?!”

Sylphy was full-on sobbing, tears streaming from her eyes like a waterfall. She looked straight at me, silently begging me for help. I sighed, already exhausted.

“Fiiine… Lady Olivia, please calm down. Can we call it even if we return your charred sweet potatoes to their original state?”

“Excuse you?!” Her threatening tone and savage eyes turned to me, but I walked straight past Olivia and approached the dried sweet potatoes.

…Hmm. They really were burned to nothing. Not that it posed any problems.

It took me a split second to do some alchemy. A magic circle manifested before me and traveled through the sweet potatoes (in their barely-there state). Then—

“What?!”

“Th-the burned potatoes…!”

“…L-look fresh out of the oven!”

The onlookers were right. But this was strange. Why were they acting so surprised? This was no big—

“Ha-ha-ha-ha! I guess I should thank you, Ard Meteor!” Olivia patted my shoulder with a dazzling smile.

…In her case, a smile wasn’t a sign of friendship. In fact, it was the opposite. I broke out in a sweat and tried to get away from her as fast as possible, but Olivia squeezed my arm tightly and foiled my escape.

“You’re one crazy guy. I thought Lost Skills were long done and gone, but here you are, using them like nothing.”

“A-a Lost Skill…?! Are you talking about the spell I just used?!”

No way. That didn’t seem right.

“Th-there were remnants of the original potato left behind! If I used those to reconstruct the dried sweet potatoes, that isn’t a big deal, wouldn’t you say?!”

My shouting caused a commotion among the crowd.

“H-he thinks that’s nothing…?”

“I knew it; the guy’s a powerhouse…”

There was a mixed response of discomfort and praise. Ireena and Ginny stuck their chests out proudly.

“Hee-hee! That’s my Ard!”

“Our Ard, indeed.”

The two were fuming.

…The students, restless. Ireena and Ginny, locked in a glaring contest. Sylphy, breathing a sigh of relief after her close brush with death. And…

“Why don’t we have a nice long talk in the staff room? Mr. Ard?”

Olivia’s blinding smile told me that I couldn’t turn it down.

…My heart was screaming bloody murder.

Why do these things always happen?!

…I, Ard Meteor, have a troublesome past.

In my old world—that is, thousands of years ago, in ancient times—I was feared as the Demon Lord. People were absolutely terrified of me, and my subordinates projectile vomited whenever I tried to speak to them. I wanted to be friends, but I was largely misunderstood…and ended up haunted by my own loneliness. Fed up with the situation, I reincarnated into the future without telling the former Heavenly Kings or other important people. I started a new life, spending my days doing my best to make one hundred friends. That was my goal.

…All this to say, I reunited with Olivia—an old Heavenly King and a sister figure—at the Academy, which I was attending to make friends. She was totally suspicious that I was the Demon Lord, and certain reasons demanded that I make sure she never, ever found out.

With that in mind, I fervently explained myself once we stepped into the staff room and somehow managed to dispel her suspicions that I was the Demon Lord.

I thought I’d get to relish in my victory now. However…

“Hold on. I’ve got something else to talk about with you guys.”

I wasn’t the only one in the staff room; Ireena and Ginny were with us, too. They had tagged along. Wherever he goes, we go, they seemed to say.

Sylphy would normally be part of the group, but she was currently paying for the earlier incident and repairing the damaged food storehouse.

“…‘Something else’?” I asked meekly.

Olivia crossed her arms, sullen as usual. “Yeah. As you know, our school has an underground dungeon that we use for classes. And there’s been…a number of disappearances down there lately.”

“Ah. Do you mean the rumor about people vanishing without a trace?” Ginny asked.

Olivia nodded. “Yeah. I know the students jokingly call it the Terror House. I wouldn’t be too concerned if this were a spooky campfire story.”

I’d heard about this. Legend had it, those who ventured into a certain room on the third floor of the underground dungeon were transported into a different dimension. This seemed to be the rumor of choice lately. I brushed it off as a spooky story and didn’t pay it much attention. I couldn’t believe it was actually happening.

“Three students have already gone missing. I don’t know if the rumors are true, but there’s something going on in the dungeon… As the instructor, I should be the one looking into it, but my schedule is absolutely packed.”

“So you’re passing the torch to us?”

Olivia nodded, and I prepared to accept her request…but before I could—

“…Ireena, is something wrong? You’ve gone pale.”

“Huh? Th-th-th-th-that’s n-not t-t-t-true!”

I’d never seen such a face on her. Where’s all this coming from? I tilted my head.

Ginny broke into a smug smile. “Hmm? Miss Ireena? Don’t tell me you’re scared!”

Her smile and mocking tone must have done a number on Ireena’s ego.

“Wh-what?! N-never! Apparitions don’t give me the heebie-jeebies! They’re just stories!”

Apparitions? I guess there was word that a student who died in the dungeon was haunting the place, snatching the missing people. So Ireena isn’t a fan of the supernatural.

“I-I’ll do it!” Ireena declared nonetheless. “Ard and I will solve this case in three seconds!”

Ginny’s challenge was effective, it seemed. Ireena was raring to go.

And so the three of us would head down into the dungeon to uncover the secrets of the Academy and solve this mystery.

After classes finished for the day, we hurried to the school’s underground dungeon. The disappearances were happening on the third level, but we stumbled across nothing on our way there. It was like we were taking an afternoon stroll.

“Well…we’re here. This is our destination.”

All dungeons had the same basic construction, though there were some exceptions. They were designed to have a series of wide hallways and rooms made of stone. The one at our academy was no different. The site of the incident—the Terror House—was just some room, no frills or tricks in sight.

…Yeah, it was really normal. In fact, that’s what was so unusual about it.

“What’s the matter, Ard?” Ginny asked. “You look confused.”

“…I just assumed the cause of the attacks might be demons infiltrating the inside of the dungeon.”

“Ah, me too. I thought the demons could be involved and wondered if they might use the dungeon for a ceremony like the one they attempted after kidnapping Miss Ireena.”

“That was my guess, too. However…,” I murmured, putting my hand to my chin and looking around the room. “I don’t sense anything strange here. There’s no magical response from demons, humans, or any other race. Levels of mana aren’t especially high here, either.”

“Um… Soooo that means?”

“That means…I don’t think the students were taken by some spirit. The suspect is not demon, human, or anything in between. If someone did something here, magic residue would have been left behind. Both people and demons are creatures who release magic unconsciously. I assumed that if we followed its trail, it would lead us to the perpetrator.”

But there were no traces of magic. Far from it, in fact; I wasn’t picking up any magic at all. In other words, no one had been here for a long time. This included potential suspects and vanished students.

“…So maybe this is the work of an apparition? What do you think, Miss Ireena?”

“I—I—I—I—I don’t c-c-are if it’s an a-a-a-a-a-apparition! I-I’ll crush them in three seconds flat!” Ireena shouted, body visibly trembling.

Ginny giggled and broke into a devilish smile. I observed their exchange and mumbled quietly to myself. “When I think about apparitions, Ghosts come to mind…but I find it a bit hard to believe they could have any effect on mortals.”

Ghosts were masses of thought that lacked all substance. It was pretty much impossible for them to cast deadly hexes on people like in the stories. They kind of just existed in the world, never making an impact on it.

…However, there was one exception.

That was if it was a thoughtform, left by someone larger than life. An example of this was the thoughtform of a great hero when I was the Demon Lord several thousand years ago. If one of these materialized forms had found their way into the dungeon and acted violently, everyone else might assume the supernatural were at work.

But I would have felt the presence of an apparition in the air, and I didn’t sense the barest whisper of it here.

“What is go—?”

I was midsentence when, without warning, the room was flooded in light—

Its brilliance filled my vision, and we opened our eyes to a different setting.

“…Oh. This is a surprise,” I remarked with a sigh.

We’d been dropped in a forest. Moments ago, our feet had stepped across the stone dungeon and now treaded over damp earth, lush foliage all around us. Having said that, we hadn’t been transported to a new locale. Proof of this could be found above our heads, where darkness stretched in the sky rather than the familiar sun. It wasn’t the night sky, either; it was like a black wall. The forest, however, was bright as noon, even with no light source.

“Um… Um. Wh-what’s going on?” Ireena broke into a cold sweat as she took in our bizarre circumstances.

Opposite her, Ginny clapped her hands, trying to get us to get it together. “Pathetic. Look at you, so scared,” she remarked, chuckling, before growing serious and turning to face me. “Have you already forgotten that we have Ard?”

That seemed to do the trick. Ireena’s expression did an instant one-eighty—from fear to faith.

“…Ginny’s right,” I assured. “This situation presents no problems to me. In fact, it works in our favor. Our opponent has come to us.”

I partly said this to reassure the girls and express my true thoughts. Whoever had done this was behind these incidents. The mastermind had made us their next targets.

I’d make sure they regretted this choice.

…I was still concerned about why I couldn’t sense any magic, but the reason for this would be revealed in time, I imagined. Our priority at the moment was…

“Let’s search the forest. This is just a theory, but…it’s possible that we’ve been locked in an Eigen Space with boundary magic.”

“Boundary magic?”

“Eigen Space?”

The moderners—Ireena and Ginny—were having trouble connecting the dots. Fair enough. In this era, both boundary magic and Eigen Spaces were Lost Skills, niche spells.

“They forcibly transport the target and the caster. If the caster is defeated while inside that space, the target can return to the real world.”

As Ireena and Ginny nodded furiously, I crossed my arms and continued.

“I’m curious as to whether the caster is also behind these incidents under review. For now, let’s do our best to escape this Eigen Space and uncover the truth.”

The girls appeared to understand the game plan, and we trekked farther into the forest. Our eyes and ears were open, yet we sensed nothing out of the ordinary. It was silent to an annoying degree, and the plants surrounding us on all sides were almost nauseatingly dense.

In the midst of this, we discovered something.

“I-is that…?!”

“…A-a dead body…?!”

Ireena’s and Ginny’s skin grew clammy. Before their very eyes was a skeleton hanging from a large tree nearby. Ginny had stayed strong until that point, but even she couldn’t hide her distress now. The corpse shook the heart of a moderner like Ireena, too.

It wasn’t a rare thing for me. I casually approached the skeleton to inspect it.

“Hmm… This fabric must have come from a uniform. There’s no question that this person was the victim of something.”

How unfortunate. If the astral spirit was still present, I could have revived them, but they had already ascended—their spirit had left this world.

…The person had to have hoped to live longer. There must have been things left to do in their life. It was clear that I wasn’t the only one feeling righteous indignation toward whoever took this child’s life and future.

“…I won’t let anyone else fall victim,” Ireena growled.

“…Me neither,” Ginny added.

They sounded like they were vowing to the lost soul. Making up their minds, their steps became swift and sure. It was a pace that said We’re going to find that criminal and put a stop to their violence.

…A half hour after resuming our search—another development dampened their spirits.

“Um. Th-that’s…”

“Th-the same skeleton from before…?”

We were met with the same sight thirty minutes later. Initially, we thought it might be a different victim, but this was confirmed not to be the case. The corpse was the one from before. Which meant—

“It seems a Wandering Curse has been placed upon us without our knowledge.”

“A Wandering Curse?” Ginny asked.

“Yes. One example of curse magic being used within this forest. It throws off the target’s sense of direction, and they continue to roam the same area before starving to death, but…”

I hadn’t sensed any magic. Was there really anyone out there so powerful that they could suppress their magic enough to keep me from picking up its residue? No one like that had existed even in ancient times…

Anyway, I needed to focus on the present. Once I cast cancellation magic on everyone and nullified the curse, we set off into the forest once again.

Several minutes later…

“…Hmm. Fascinating.”

We were back at the same skeleton.

“Wh-what’s going on…? Did the nullification spell not work…?”

“That might be the case, or it might not… I must say I find this confounding.”

I had definitely cast nullification magic. And yet, here we were. I could only scratch my head at this conundrum.

“S-so this is a curse Ard can’t even break…”

“H-how could there be such a thing…?”

The girls were growing more distressed…but I wasn’t exactly sure why.

“Fear not. Our current predicament is perplexing, but it’s not impossible.”

“Huh? D-do you have a plan?”

“Yes. A very simple and straightforward one,” I said, giving Ireena a smile before lowering my voice. “If we cannot break the Wandering Curse, we will just have to create a situation where we’re not lost.”

Then…I cast attack magic. Sixteen circles appeared around us. Beams of crimson light shot out, burning down the entire forest almost instantly.

“I get it now! If we’re lost in a forest, we just have to get rid of it!”

“I knew you could fix things, Ard! I never would have dreamed up such a plan!”

The girls sung my praises.

“This person is different.”

I heard an unfamiliar voice and quickly cast a detection spell. I couldn’t pick up on any magical response, however. Maybe it was all in my head… A strange sensation washed over me, making me frown.

My sixth sense warned of danger. Not wasting any time, I instinctively canceled the magic circles and leaped backward. At the same time, I used a wind spell to lift Ireena and Ginny into the air and bring them with me.

“Wha—?”

Both were startled when I jerked them out of harm’s way. The ground we’d just been standing on began to rise, and—

“ROAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAR!”

Clods of earth cut through the air as a giant caterpillar monster burst out of the ground, disgusting mouth open and lined with razor-sharp teeth. If we’d waited a second longer, we would have been its next meal.

It wasn’t that big of a deal.

“I’m not a fan of getting swallowed whole…or insects. In fact, I hate bugs,” I whispered to no one in particular, seething in hostility. “You’re a sight for sore eyes. I’ll dispatch of you quickly.”

The earlier surprise attack had forced me to cancel out my magic circles. I conjured them up again, firing them at the monster in front of us with as much heat as I could muster.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

It failed to get away, quickly vanishing into the inferno.

…Weird. Even a pea-brained monster should have been able to avoid the attack.

As soon as this thought crossed my mind, I understood something: The caterpillar was a decoy. The real contender…

“GAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

…was this guy.

Before anyone could notice, a goblin shaman appeared right next to us. It was dressed in long leaves and grasses and held a staff in its hand. And as soon as it screamed…

“H-huh…? M-my body is…!”

“I…can’t move…!”

Ireena, Ginny, and I were in the same condition.

“Hmm. Fascinating. Our bodies aren’t paralyzed… This is a form of magic that stops time within a material form. A low-level spell for someone like myself, but I’m astonished a goblin is able to use a time-manipulation spell.”

“A-a time-manipulation spell…?!”

Ireena’s eyes were like saucers, surprise personified. It was no wonder, really. After all, any magic involving time was considered a major Lost Skill in this era. It had been tricky to find someone who could wield it even back in ancient times. Time-manipulation magic was an incredibly powerful technique that could only be mastered by the most accomplished of mages.

In other words, there was no way a spell like this could keep a former ancient heavyweight—read: me—down.

“Flare.” I raised my arm calmly, pointing my finger at the goblin as I glanced at the immobile girls.

A magic circle unfurled under the creature, and a pillar of crimson light fired into the sky.

“GAAAH?!” It jumped to the side to escape the heat ray, eyes bulging from its head.

“Hmph. You’re nimble by all appearances,” I praised.

Ireena stared at me. “Y-you’re amazing, Ard. You can move even when time has stopped.”

“Oh, no. I’m not moving. I’m the one being moved.”

“…Huh?” Ireena cocked her head to the side.

I tried to explain. “A time-manipulation spell isn’t exactly what it sounds like. It interferes with the target’s astral spirit and looks like it stops or rewinds time. Counteracting this spell is simple. My astral spirit is split into multiples, so I control my body via the untampered ones. That is the only way I am able to ward off magic.”

“…I…don’t follow, but I do know you’re awesome, Ard!” Ireena shouted.

“Exactly! His powers are on a different level!”

I had thought my explanation was pretty straightforward. Well, there wasn’t much I could do if they weren’t getting it. Our priority was…

“Let’s put an end to this. I doubt you can provide any information on our—”

—foe, I was about to say…

“You’re strong. So strong. You might be able to…,” garbled the goblin, seeming slightly upset by the unexpected turn of events.

A second later, its body dissolved into light particles and reformed into a single mass—a ball of light the size of a large fist with winglike appendages. I’d never seen anything like this before in my life, but a certain word flashed in my mind.

“Incredible. This person is incredible,” cried out another voice from elsewhere.

I turned to face it—another winged ball of light soaring up from where the caterpillar monster used to be.

“Are you both…sprites?”

The two orbs of light flashed as if in confirmation.

“Uh-huh.”

“Righto. Righto.”

“Friend to humans. Allies.”

“Always by your side. The cutest sprites.”

Sprites. I knew it. All the unknowns about this situation began to dispel.

“I see. It’s no wonder I couldn’t sense any magic.”

Sprites had powers very similar to magic—something nearly identical but also different. With unique abilities, they used an energy completely divorced from magic, which was why they didn’t give off any residue—hence why I couldn’t detect them. It was the reason we failed to find any clues in the dungeon.

“Um, question. Weren’t sprites destroyed back in ancient times?” Ireena whispered with a wide-eyed look.

“Lady Olivia taught us that. When the Old Gods were wiped out, the sprites disappeared along with them, she said.”

Sprites were considered extinct in the modern world. According to all known records, they were creations of the Old Gods…the rulers of a time known as the far ancient era, which was centuries before my past life. They supported our lives, serving as friends to humanity…supposedly.

This was all speculation based on old records, and I didn’t know if it was true. What I did know was that the sprites vanished when their masters and Creators—the Old Gods—were destroyed for whatever reason. This was fact.

There was one more thing I was certain of.

“You’re the ones taking people away, right?”

The two sprites flickered, appearing to convey sorrow.

“Righto. Righto.”

“We killed them. We killed them.”

“We didn’t want to, but we did.”

“It makes me upset—so upset.”

“We killed them.”

“Someone ordered us to.”

“We wanted to refuse, but we couldn’t.”

Someone. I frowned at the word. I was just about to voice my questions, when—the sprites’ bodies glowed as they pleaded with me.

“Help us. Please help us.”

“We don’t want to hurt anyone else.”

“We love people. We don’t want to kill them anymore.”

“Get rid of that guy.”

“You’re our only hope.”

The sorrow in their voices almost broke my heart. They were most definitely in the wrong in this situation, though someone else seemed to be pulling the strings.

“Who is this ‘guy’ you keep talking about?”

“That’s—” The sprites were about to answer…

“Swine. Do you dare defy your Creator?”

For a moment, I asked myself if this was an earthquake. The rumble was far louder and deeper than any person could ever produce.

“…I get it now,” I whispered to myself as the earth began to shake so violently that it was impossible to stand.

“Aaaah!”

Ireena and Ginny toppled down onto their butts. Tendrils of ivy shot from beneath their feet and tried to twine around their bodies. Naturally, I wouldn’t let anything happen to them. After casting a blade of wind and cutting down the ivy, I used defensive magic over Ireena and Ginny. The glowing golden film would protect them. After making sure they were safe…

“Oh dear. Seems this situation is bigger than I anticipated.”

I lifted the girls into the sky with wind magic and cast a flight spell on myself to soar through the space. Just as we flew toward the edge of the black wall that served as the limit of the Eigen Space—the ground where we once stood split to reveal the truth.

“Wh-what is that…?!” Ireena’s eyes widened. Ginny’s, too.

Their reactions were normal. The revelation before their eyes would have made anyone gape in shock.

We hadn’t been trekking through a forest in the Eigen Space. We’d been walking across the motionless surface of a giant. That “forest” was one part of its form.

“Hmm. It’s huge. And ‘huge’ might be an understatement.”

It seemed pointless to try to measure it. This incalculably massive figure slowly turned its stone face toward us.

“Ard Meteor, was it…? Offer your life to me…”

Its voice was like a storm, sound waves followed by gusts of wind that swept back my hair as I floated in the sky.

“Am I right to guess you’re a thoughtform of an Old God?”

“Indeed…meek human child…”

I knew it.

“The Old Gods perished for untold reasons. Some left thoughtforms to plan their own resurrections… I’ve heard the legendary tale but never imagined it would prove true.”

“Yes…I did perish once…but on the verge of death, I left my thoughts within a labyrinth… All so I could return and rule this world once more…”

So an Old God’s thoughtform had made a home of our school dungeon, of all places. What a strange coincidence… I had to assume this whole mess started because I was somehow drawn to this coincidence.

“Did you start to move—after lying dormant in the dungeon since ancient times—because…I stepped foot in this dungeon?”

When I asked this, a low rumble escaped the Old God’s stony throat. It was definitely a muffled laugh.

“I’ve always longed for resurrection…and devoured countless souls to this end… But time kept passing, and I never succeeded… So I resigned myself to my fate… Months and years passed…and melted into an eternity…until an opportunity appeared…”

In other words, me.

“If I devour your soul…I can have a new physical body…and materialize in this world once again… You’ve come straight to me like I planned… Even those shitty souls have proved useful…”

“…By ‘shitty souls,’ do you mean the lives of the student victims?”

“And what if…I do…?”

I bristled with rage when the Old God seemed to imply So what? Ireena and Ginny were angry, too, their expressions hardening.

“Consider retracting your statement. All souls that you took were precious—not something to be snatched away. Their futures—”

“Save it. Don’t bore me…or get too cocky, human… I am a God… All of humanity exists for us… You should be grateful for the chance to offer up your life… Don’t you dare think you have the grounds to complain…”

“It’s my humble opinion that your only duty as one fallen to ruin is to watch over a world ruled by humankind.”

“Humble, indeed… Humanity is destined to be under our heel… They’re livestock known as humankind—regulated and milked by the gods… This is divine providence… Lower life-forms live and die for us… That’s your greatest happiness…”

I see. So we wouldn’t come to a mutual understanding anytime soon.

“I almost align myself with human supremacy, you see. The mere thought of a world where pompous transcendentals treat humanity like slaves…absolutely repulses me.”

Then…I pointed at the Old God and made my declaration.

“I, Ard Meteor, shall perform your last rites.”

An instant later, its mouth opened to unleash violent rumbling and a gale storm, roaring with laughter. The giant before us was scorning me.

“A fool… I am a God… Lower life-forms should watch their mouths…!”

Then…

“Your soul…will be mine!”

I sensed hostility and piled on layer after layer of defensive magic around Ireena and Ginny before putting a good deal of distance between us.

An instant later—the Old God glittered red from head to toe and filled my vision with a deep crimson. I felt the heat. I must have been hit by an attack.

There was no magical reaction whatsoever. Was this the power of the Old Gods?

Exposed to melting temperatures, half my body was gone before I even had a chance to notice. It wasn’t an issue, though.

“Giga Heal,” I chanted, and my body and clothes regenerated instantly.

“Oh… Persistent, are you? …How about this…?” he thundered.

Immediately after, two spheres of light floated in front of me—the sprites, the poor creatures who had begged for my help only a short while earlier.

“Aaaaargh.”

“H-help…”

Their voices sounded strained. Then…their glowing bodies puffed out, and my vision turned pure white.

They had exploded. The force of it was intense, and I wouldn’t have been surprised to see it blow away a town or two if we were in the real world. That said, it was much too weak to do any damage to me.

“You know how to take a hit…but you can’t…keep regenerating forever…”

Like moments before, I healed myself in an instant. The Old God pointed a finger at me, and the exploded sprites suddenly seemed to respawn.

“U-ugh.”

“P-please stop.”

They gave off light and heat from the pain. This must have been the best that the Old God could do. Or he was using a weak attack, mocking me.

He did it again and again. In an unending loop, the sprites were reborn only to explode again. They suffered and cried out death throes, and then…

“Help…”

“Please don’t hurt us anymore…”

“Help…us. Please.”

“Gaaaaaaaaah!” Their tormented screams continued.

I imagined that made fifteen. After I finished healing myself, I questioned the Old God.

“Doesn’t it hurt your heart to use the weak, tread on them, and inflict a never-ending cycle of pain? Doesn’t the injustice disgust you?”

“Do…you even hear yourself…?” He sounded scornful. “Like you…sprites are a lower life-form…nothing more than livestock or tools… Why should I hold back…? Because a tool screams out in pain…? It should be grateful that it was even used…”

…Back when I was the Demon Lord, I was constantly admonished for being too arrogant, but my ego never got this big.

“My words might be in vain, but there are no hierarchies between any life-forms. Every life is precious. Using them as tools is inexcusable.”

“Do not put me up to…your vulgar standards… I am a God…”

“A God? You don’t look like one to me. From what I can tell, you are a stupid child drunk on their own power.” I snorted, and this seemed to piss him off.

“Do not mock me…! Swine…!” The Old God was really angry now. He pointed at me and prepared to make the sprites explode again.

“Aaaaaah…!”

“Ggh…!”

Tiny shrieks. Grand explosion. An impressive amount of force and heat, but it was useless against me. The Old God might have grown tired of waiting or become irritated, since…

“Hmph… You are persistent…for a worm… However…”

I saw the rocky face grin.

“How about this…?”

I saw through the Old God’s plan in an instant. At the moment of realization, a hole to a different dimension opened next to Ireena and Ginny, who were still floating in the air with golden walls of protection around them.

—Lightning flashed out of them.

Of course, this development was within the realm of my expectations. That’s why it was simple to deflect. In fact, I didn’t need to counteract it at all. An attack of that level couldn’t scratch the girls’ defenses. However…

“I won’t let you…!”

The sprites had come to a different conclusion. The sparkling orbs raced past the lightning toward Ireena and Ginny and protected them as two shining shields that towered over them.

“N-ngh…!” The sprites cried out in torment, taking the brunt of the attack.

“Y-you guys…!”

“Wh-why would you…?!”

The girls shouted, confused. Although the sprites answered between intermittent pauses, their intentions were clear.

“We don’t want…”

“…to hurt people anymore.”

“We won’t…”

“…let anyone else suffer.”

In short, they were rebelling against their master.

The Old God convulsed, visibly upset at his servants rising up against him, and an earth-shattering voice boomed.

“There is no defying your Creator…! You’re just tools…!” The Old God pointed at the sprites. The orbs of light swelled, and just as they were about to explode…

“N…no…!”

“We are…friends of humanity…!”

The sprites put up their iron will and defied their Creator. This seemed like an impossible scenario. The Old God was at a loss.

“You…! A tool dare assert its own will…?!” he roared in fury. The energy flowing from his fingertip intensified, causing the sprites to blow up again. “Tools…are made to obey orders…!” yelled the Old God, trying to squash their rebellious spirits.

He had been forcing these lovers of humankind to kill humanity. Just as the sprites were about to submit to his orders once again…

“Do you think I would allow this tragedy to happen before me?”

The sprites stopped ballooning.

“H-how…?!”

The orbs remained next to Ireena and Ginny fully intact, showing no signs of exploding. The flickering lights indicated their own confusion.

“Ngh…! What…?! What’s…going on…?!”

I offered the furious being a smile and launched into an explanation. “You can no longer use your powers. I’ve already analyzed and taken control of them.”

“What…?!”

The stony face was blank, but I could tell he was agitated. I elaborated further as I looked down on the Old God from the sky.

“I was born with very special skills: analysis and control. I can analyze the whole of creation and bring any concept under my control. In our short time together, I’ve been using this ability to dissect your powers. And now…you’ve been rendered useless.”

The Old God had assumed he would overwhelm me, thinking I’d have my hands full with regenerating and never risk a counterattack. He assumed he was above me.

But he had miscalculated. Little did he know he was being reduced to nothing.

“Ridiculous…! This is…!”

He tried to use his powers, but it was all in vain. I had sealed them away entirely. He would never explode the sprites or unleash anything like his initial heat attack again.

“Impossible…! I am a God…! That means a mere human can’t…!”

“I don’t think like you,” I said briefly as the corners of my mouth tugged into a bigger smile. “Did you honestly think some God could win against me?”

I wasn’t sure if he heard me. The earth continued to tremble with his howling for a moment, then…

“I am a God…! Someone who rules and guides this world…! I…will never be defeated by life-forms lower than beasts!!”

With an ear-shattering boom, the Old God moved—body too large to be measured—and lumbered toward me furiously.

“BOW BEFORE MY POWER! WOOOOOOOOOOOOORM!” His giant fist came down on me as if swatting a tiny human fly.

“A worm. Ha-ha, a worm, you say?” My eyes narrowed, and my voice went cold. “That’s you, moron.”

I cast attack magic. An amalgamation of flames and wind came together as I summoned my Blaze Sword. A circle manifested in front of my hand, and the fiery blade appeared moments later…and then, it instantly transformed into a terrifyingly large weapon.

“You’re a husk of your old self. Go home.” I sidestepped the mountain-size fist coming right at me—and sliced the fist and towering Old God in half.

“Aaaah…! Th-this…can’t be…happening! I’m…! A master of all creation…!”

The lethal attack made it too difficult for the thoughtform to keep its silhouette, and the hulking being started to break into light particles.

“GAAAAAAAH! DON’T THINK THIS IS OVER…! I’LL BE BACK…!”

“Geez. Why do egotistic villains always say that?”

I sighed and declared the same thing I did back when I was the Demon Lord.

“No matter how many times you come back or how many strategies you try—”

“—I’ll destroy you every time.”

Soon after the thoughtform of the Old God vanished, the setting totally changed around us.

It was all stone. We were in a room of the dungeon.

“That settles that!”

“You were amazing as always, Ard.”

As the girls spoke…light orbs glowed before me. It was the sprites. Maybe because they were now free from the shackles of the Old God, they seemed much more upbeat.

“Thank you. Thank you.”

“It’s all over now.”

As soon as they said this…their bodies glittered and began to disappear.

“Huh? Wait, wh-what’s going on?”

“It must be because the Old God is no more. Without him, even the sprites…”

The sprites flickered as if to confirm my theory.

“Th-that can’t be…! That isn’t fair! They’re finally free of that awful guy!”

Ireena’s face crumpled in sorrow, and Ginny appeared conflicted. On the other side, the sprites were accepting of their fate.

“This is fine.”

“We killed people.”

“We killed the people we love so much.”

“We must pay the price.”

“The Old God made you do that! You did nothing wrong! Besides…didn’t you try to protect us?! You even fought against him! You’re too nice to just vanish from this world!” Tears welled in Ireena’s eyes as she looked at the sprites who were now practically gone.

Perhaps heartened by her words, the sprites emitted a warm light.

“If we were to ask for one thing…”

“…We would have loved to talk to people more.”

“We wanted to play with people.”

“We wanted to see people smile.”

“…We wanted to spend more time with you.”

These sounded like final words. Ireena, Ginny, and the sprites themselves came to terms with their inevitable parting. In the midst of this…

“As Ireena has stated, it’s the Old God—not you—who is responsible for this incident. There is no need for you to feel guilty. And so—”

With a smile, I voiced the future dreamed by everyone present.

“I shall grant the wish you have just shared with us.”

A few days later. Morning homeroom at the Laville National Academy of Magic.

“Two new students will be joining our class.”

With her usual gloominess, Olivia introduced a pair of charming twins.

“I’m Lumi.”

“I’m Lami.”

““It’s nice to meet you, everyone,”” they sung, flashing bewitching smiles.

The boys in the class were instantly enchanted by them.

“They’re so cute.”

“Twins are a plus in my book.”

“I can date one—and the other… Heh-heh. I could daydream forever.”

Their energy was palpable. However…

“That’s enough introductions. Okay, take your sea—”

“Daddy!”

“We did it! We introduced ourselves properly!”

Lumi and Lami—former sprites reborn as humans—cut Olivia off and rushed over to me.

“Praise me! Praise me!”

“Pet me! Pet me!”

The petite pair snuggled up to me like adorable puppies. In response to this, the boys…

“…Ard. I wish he were dead.”

“Maybe it’s about time to kill him.”

“Let’s hold a meeting at lunch.”

Their homicidal intentions seemed real. Why’d things turn out this way?

…Anyway, the girls were now mortal. Ireena and Ginny called it a miracle, but I didn’t see what the big deal was. It was the same alchemy spell that I’d used when Sylphy ruined Olivia’s potatoes earlier. Nothing more.

Alchemy was essentially a conversion of information, which was why I could make bodies out of the stone walls of the dungeon, rewrite the sprites’ causal data, and convert them into astral spirits of humans. I then placed their new astral spirits into physical bodies. Basically, a walk in the park.

“P-please let go.”

“Nope!”

“We’re staying with you, Daddy!”