Chapter 132: You’ve changed a lot since I last saw you, Leon (3)

In a dark forest, a man and a woman walked at a leisurely pace down a path.

Two gnarled horns sprouted from their foreheads, indicating that they were demons under the control of Madame.

Her men were traveling through the forest to the orphanage when Madame suddenly decided to raid the orphanage in a nearby village.

“Hmm, I don’t really like the idea of killing orphans…”

The male demon with the sword slung over his shoulder grunted but they could not disobey the orders of the city’s only black-horned demon.

His useless pleading was interrupted by the female demon next to him, clutching another, a well-honed wooden staff.

“And now?”

“I’m from an orphanage, too.”

“You’re being ridiculous. How many of the humans you’ve killed for ‘Madame’ over the years do you think were orphans? Most of them, I’d wager, wouldn’t be upset if you disappeared.”

Puzzled by her retort, the man scratched his head with the handle of the sword he held.

“…If that’s so, then I can’t help it.”

“…”

The woman shook her head, tired of his ignorance.

“More than that, why is it an orphanage, what is here?”

“I don’t know… What can I say, I’ll just keep my mouth shut and go along. They’ll give me three humans for every two of you when this is over. Isn’t there a lot for a small orphanage?”

The man clicks his tongue and clears his throat.

“Idiot… Please, think about it. Do you think a normal orphanage would take this many people?”

After finishing her sentence in a rather harsh tone, the woman turns her head and looks around the forest.

In this forest, besides them, other demons under ‘Madame’ were also heading to the orphanage.

There were quite a few of them. It was almost as if she had scraped together all the demons that had been languishing in the city.

“What’s in that orphanage…?”

The man grumbled, but his words trailed off because it was a bit odd to hear.

It was a bit too much for a group of demons to be raiding an ‘ordinary orphanage’, as she put it.

As they stared off into the distance, they began to walk forward again but the male demon in the lead soon stopped walking.

“…People.”

The woman behind him immediately straightened her stance, pointing her staff at him.

The ease with which they had appeared earlier was gone.

The man swallowed hard as a rustling sound came from the direction the woman was pointing at the staff and something small pops out of the dark bushes.

“…What is it?”

The man’s arm that held the sword flinched slightly.

“It’s a kid, isn’t it?”

It was a young girl with blond hair and red eyes who emerged from the bushes.

“Kid, what are you doing here?”

The man, now relaxed, approached the girl and bent down to be eye level with her.

“…”

The girl’s red eyes tremble as she backs away from the man, clearly frightened by his appearance.

“Are you a child from the orphanage?”

The woman behind her puts down her staff and approaches, scrutinizing the girl.

“Come here, little one. We’re not scary people.”

With that, the man beckons the blonde girl over, and the cowering girl stops backing away.

It was Madame’s order that all the children of the orphanage be rounded up and lined up before her.

“…What are those horns…?”

The girl who had been cautiously approaching asked, pointing to the black horn on the man’s forehead.

The girl was still young and didn’t seem to know much about demons.

Soon, the kneeling male demon was showing off to the girl, tapping his horn and opening his mouth.

“It’s a demon’s horn. What do you think, is it cool?”

The girl oohs and aahs at the man’s horns, even though he’s revealed himself to be a demon.

“…Can I touch them?”

“Sure. Touch it.”

The female demon, who was watching the male demon touching the girl’s horns, closed her eyes tightly and sighed.

‘Maybe it’s because she’s the same mental age as him.’

Just as that thought flashed through her mind a strange sound reached her ears, it was the sound of something hard breaking.

The woman’s eyes snap open, and she sees the girl holding the man’s broken horn in her hand.

“Huh?”

Surprised by what had just happened, the man groped for his forehead, where his horn had been ‘attached’, without feeling any pain.

The horn that was supposed to be there was now in the tiny hands of the girl in front of him.

“…”

The girl’s red eyes opened nonchalantly, reflecting his shattered black horn.

She had broken the man’s horns with her tiny, callous-free hand and the pain of a shattered horn came to the male demon.

“Holy shit……!”

The man cursed and tried to scream.

Or rather, he ‘tried’ to.

But…

-Poof.

…The man’s screams are cut off as the girl drives the horn into his neck.

Black blood gurgles from the man’s throat and the expressionless girl pulls the horn out of the man’s neck.

“Grrrr… Gurgle, gurgle…”

The man hastily clutches at his throat, but he can’t stop the rush of blood.

The girl tilted her head slightly, dodging the splashes, still, she couldn’t avoid all the blood that was flying everywhere.

Eventually, a few drops splashed onto the girl’s flawless face.

“Ah.”

Frowning, the girl wiped the black blood off her face in disgust.

At the same time, the man who had vomited up a large amount of blood at once fell to the ground.

“Mu… What…”

The female demon who saw all of this stumbled backwards.

The red eyes of the girl who had haphazardly tossed her companion’s horns behind her now turned toward her.

The woman pointed her staff at the girl, but her hand refused to stop trembling.

It was disconcerting enough that in the space of a few short seconds, a male demon who had been her ally had been killed by a child barely half his size without much of a struggle.

What was even more disconcerting was…

“You, you… Who are you…?!”

She was feeling ‘fear’ from the petite little girl.

It wasn’t simply that her colleague had been killed by the girl, it was more of a visceral fear, an imprint on her flesh.

The girl lurched forward on her short legs while she aimed her staff at the girl with her trembling hands and activated her magick but the girl disappeared from her sight.

The woman’s head jerks back and forth, but eventually she allows the girl to approach.

With a flick of her golden hair, the girl appears right next to her…

-Bam!

…and smacks her in the leg with her short legs.

The woman’s legs gave way under the enormous force of the blow, which could hardly have come from the body of a child, and her body tilted and fell to the ground.

The girl didn’t miss and her fist landed on the woman’s face as she fell, blocking her view of her diminutive stature.

-Thud…

The woman’s face is crushed under the force of the girl’s blow.

-Aaah!

The sound of the woman’s head exploding echoes through the dreary forest, and the brain matter that had been ejected from the woman’s head scatters against the surrounding trees.

“…”

Staring at the headless corpse of the demon, the girl silently wiped the black liquid from the back of her hand.

The blonde girl, Rei, was a former hero known for her skill with the holy sword, she was not limited to it.

Rei has the ability to wield any weapon with ease.

The peculiar thing is that this is purely her talent, not her strength as a hero.

She was a master at martial arts.

‘There is a leader.’

As it was, Rei was able to deal with the trash, but a demon leader with a large number of subordinates would be a difficult opponent.

‘I haven’t even held the holy sword yet. Despite its size, it was a problem to maintain after summoning it.’

That didn’t mean she could run away.

The demons that had just died had mentioned an orphanage, so they knew there was one up ahead.

Rei clenched her fists.

She couldn’t let the demons get to the orphanage.

But as a young girl, Rei was no match for the powerful demons. If she were to die fighting them, there would be nothing to say.

Rei knew her limits clearly, but…

…she picked up a sword from where it had fallen, and without hesitation, stepped toward the demonic presence.

What was the point of living if she couldn’t protect her people?

Rei was a hero and that was what a hero was.

***

“…Why don’t you give up now?”

Madame Sezuris asked the golden-haired girl in front of her in a soft voice.

“…”

Rei wiped the blood from the corner of her mouth and pushed her tattered body to her feet.

“What is a ‘hero’…?

Looking at Rei like that, Sezuris felt a small shiver run down her spine.

She had succeeded in finding the treasure chest through information from a demon named Jorgal who had come to her earlier.

The identity of the treasure chest is the hero who is a natural enemy of the demons.

Sezuris knew very well that if she could kill Rei, the hero in front of her, she could bring the entire world under the control of demons after the rebirth of the Demon King.

But Jorgal, the man who had informed her, had told her that in order to break the shackles, the hero must be captured alive and she had no intention of refusing.

It seemed better to capture her alive to get the credit, but Rei wasn’t about to go down.

‘You said the treasure chest wouldn’t become a Mimic… but since she hasn’t summoned the Holy Sword yet, I’m not sure it’s a Mimic.’

The sword that supported Rei’s shaking body on the other side, a sword that was disproportionately large for her diminutive frame, was definitely not the holy sword.

As far as she could recall, it was one of her subordinates’ swords.

It was a plain, ordinary sword, stained with the blood of demons, giving it a dirty glow.

All the demons Sezuris had brought with her had been decapitated by that little girl.

Rei had come to her before Sezuris, who had noticed the lack of response from her men, could do anything about it but Rei was already exhausted from dealing with so many demons, and Sezuris had a black horn sprouting from her forehead.

The outcome was a foregone conclusion.

At this point, Sezuris decided that it wasn’t that Rei wasn’t summoning her holy sword, but that she couldn’t.

“Whoa…”

Rei, who had been breathing heavily while holding the sword, steadied herself and regained control of her breathing.

-Boom.

With a short leap, Rei charges at Sezuris and her sword flies straight for Sezuris throat.

“Annoying…”

Infusing her body with magick, Sezuris narrowly avoids Rei’s sword.

Even if she was the hero, the young girl’s body would not have any muscle strength left in it, but Rei’s blade was still threatening her.

Cha-ching!

Sezuris, who was dodging Rei’s sword, blocked it with her dagger.

With her remaining arm, Rei threw out a fist filled with pure white light, but her arm was too short to reach Sezuris.

-Pfft!

Sezuris kicked Rei hard in the stomach.

The fairly light girl’s body flew through the air and crashed into a tree on the other side, landing on the ground.

“Ugh…”

Clutching the ground, Rei tried to push herself up once more, but her body was no longer able to withstand the force.

The girl’s body, which hadn’t even grown up yet, had reached its limit.

“Hah… I can finally see the end.”

As she said that, Sezuris slowly approached Rei.

Rei, who had fallen to the ground, no longer had the strength to even lift a finger.

At least, that’s how it seemed to Sezuris but in his desperation, Rei was thinking of one last move.

‘If it’s a summon…’

Rei was currently unable to wield the holy sword, but she could summon it.

If she continued to chant, the ‘star’ that had fallen from the sky would reach her fingertips.

And if a demon stood in the path of the blade’s fall… it would either hit the blade and snap it in half, or bounce off from the impact of the summoning.

‘Pick my moment.’

Rei had just finished thinking.

-Pfft.

Sezuris approaches Rei and kicks her once more.

“Ugh…”

Rei falls to the ground after being struck by Sezuris foot.

Pain wracked her entire body, but she remained focused.

“You’re not much, hero.”

Sezuris stares down at Rei.

“…”

Looking up, Rei realized that now was as good a time as any.

A fifty-fifty chance of success.

She glanced at the place where her sword had fallen, hoping to pick it up and fight again if the impact wouldn’t be enough to finish Sezuris.

In that moment, her world slowed down and the leg that Sezuris had raised to crush her head was moving very slowly.

‘…What is it?’

Rei wonders at the bizarre phenomenon that appeared without any foreshadowing.

It was definitely a split second but the girl, the reincarnated warrior, saw it clearly.

A dark-haired man emerged from the woods beyond, running at a ridiculous speed in a world where everything had slowed down.

The man’s red sword was clutched in the back of his hand, and the white bandages around his eyes naturally drew attention to them.

As she watched, a word popped into Rei’s head.

‘Blind swordsman.’

The blind swordsman arrived in front of her, and without a moment’s hesitation, he thrust out his sword.

A red beam of light, the same color as Rei’s own eyes, sliced through the neck of Sezuris, who was lifting his feet in front of her, followed by a splatter of blood.

With the clear sound of the sword, the flow of time returns to normal.

“…I was almost too late.”

After a moment of silence, the voice of the blind man was heard.

It was then that Sezuris realized that Jorgal, the blind demon, had planned all of this.

But why was he here, why was he having this conversation, not with her, but with the hero…

Sezuris wanted to ask about it, but her voice wouldn’t come out.

‘Why?’

As the question flashed through her mind, her vision dropped to the floor.

-Aaaah…

Sezuris head separates from her body, and blood gushes out.

“…”

Rei stares up, still unable to move her body.

“That was really dangerous…”

As he says this, a stream of black blood pours down the blind man’s back as he smiles kindly.

‘An ally…?’

She couldn’t say for sure, but there was no sign in the blind man’s smile that he intended to harm him.

Looking at the dark-haired blind man, Rei thought.

Even though she couldn’t see what his eyes looked like because they were covered with white bandages.