Iria, who arrived just in time, was able to save Rena.
She blocked the sword flying towards Rena, thwarted the demon that had wounded her, and absorbed the incoming sword strikes with her entire body.
It was because she thought of her as a friend.
Although Iria wasn’t human, she was oddly very interested in them. How to define the relationship she had with them was a mystery, though.
Still, she decided today.
Rena defined their relationship as friends. She had made that decision for Iria when Iria hesitated.
Iria decided not to deny the relationship that Rena had defined for her.
Today, Iria protected her as much as she could.
*
In the narrow corridor, the magical energies of the two were intertwined.
Seir was undoubtedly strong. The fact that she could keep up with Iria, who had opened her magic, was proof of that.
Was it because she was a demon that she had high resistance to magical energy? It didn’t matter. She would just keep cutting until Seir couldn’t regenerate anymore.
Iria, being a similar race, knew how much energy it consumed to heal wounds.
How long could Seir hold on?
Iria put more power into her swinging sword.
And then…
Thwack!
Seir’s left arm was severed and fell to the ground.
“Hah.”
The half-crazed expression on Seir’s face changed; she looked intrigued by Iria’s strength.
“……”
Iria wiped the black blood off her face.
Even though Seir had unleashed her magic, Iria was stronger. That was because Iria had unleashed her own magic as well.
“Phew… What kind of monster are you? I’ve never heard of something like this.”
At this point, she had no choice but to acknowledge it. Iria was stronger than Seir. It probably wouldn’t change, even if she unleashed all her magic.
Seir couldn’t defeat Iria, not through ordinary means, anyway.
Of course, Seir hadn’t revealed all her cards.
After regenerating her severed arm, she rummaged through her pockets. In her hand was a golden fragment that looked familiar.
“You know what this is, right?”
Seir asked as she showed it to Iria.
Iria naturally knew. It was a Fragment of the Demon King. It certainly existed within Iria’s own body.
She knew what it was, but what was the point? Iria tilted her head slightly.
“If I have this, even the most pathetic monster can become a vicious beast. It could take out a few academy professors.”
“……”
“Then, if I, instead of some pathetic monster, eat this, what do you think will happen? Are you curious? I was discouraged from it before, but I really want to know!”
Seir shouted, and with that, all the surrounding magical energies were sucked towards her.
Even lower-class monsters would become seeds, growing strong enough to overwhelm the academy professors. This was because they inherited the full power of the Demon King.
So, what if Seir, who had already overwhelmed those professors, consumed the fragment?
Seir acted immediately.
She put the fragment in her mouth and swallowed it.
The wave of magical energy that had engulfed the area rapidly changed. The black magic took on a hint of red.
It was the same form of magic that Iria had displayed.
“Now it feels a bit like we’re kin.”
Iria sensed a similar aura from Seir, who had absorbed the fragment.
Seir transformed into something resembling Iria as she absorbed the fragment.
Her red eyes glowed.
The eyes of Seir and Iria both sparkled simultaneously.
Seir, having absorbed the fragment, gradually began to change, time slowly twisting her form into something alien and different from before.
The power of the Demon King was something that an ordinary being could not handle with their body. Seir, merely a demon, had to pay the price for looking down upon the power of the Demon King.
“RAAAAWR!! UUUUURRGHH!! RAWR!!”
She roared in agony as her body morphed and began to grow massive.
Seir’s body, once similar in size to a human, swelled to three times its size. While her human-like shape didn’t change much, her appearance did.
The horns on her head grew larger, and her entire body was drenched in black.
Before she ate the fragment, it seemed she had some intelligence, but now? Who knew if that thing still had normal thought processes.
“……”
Once the transformation had finished, Seir twisted her head in an unnatural motion, her eyes lacking focus.
Then…
THWACK!
What was once Seir leaped toward Iria.
It was fast. Much faster than before.
It swung a sword that had several times increased in length, wrapped in magical energy. It was a hefty strike too heavy to block with just a small dagger.
So, Iria dodged.
BOOM!!!!
With a loud bang, the entire building shook, making it feel as if the structure was about to crumble.
Ironically, thanks to the barrier covering the whole building, the interior was not as severely affected as one might expect.
However, it was undeniable that each strike was powerful. Even just getting hit once would not end with just a bruise.
No matter how powerful Iria was, her arm might very well get completely severed.
‘……I’ve had enough of the sensation of losing an arm from my time as a sword saint.’
Having plunged a great sword into the wall, Seir turned immediately.
She charged at Iria with breathtaking speed. Even Iria wouldn’t be able to evade forever.
Iria stepped back.
THWACK!
And then she took the strike.
The unimaginable weight was felt. The ground she stood on cracked, and the dagger that couldn’t withstand the weight shattered.
Since the dagger was broken while blocking the strike, Iria had to step back even further to avoid the descending great sword.
This was more troublesome than she had expected. Unlike when she fought Albert, she didn’t have a backup weapon.
Iria was facing an unprecedented crisis. When she fought Albert, she had intentionally taken some attacks, resulting in severe injuries, but this time was different.
Seir’s strengths lay in her extraordinary physical abilities and the overwhelming speed that came with it.
Before absorbing the fragment, her statistics were inferior to Iria’s. It was safe to say she was Iria’s complete inferior.
However, everything changed after she absorbed the fragment. She now surpassed Iria in pure physical ability. While speed remained on Iria’s side, the weight was different.
Iria had to endure the storm of strikes from Seir’s great sword, without any weapon whatsoever.
Every time a strike grazed her, small and large wounds marked Iria’s body. It was a corridor drenched in blood.
There was a limit to how far she could retreat. Cornered and with no space left to move, Iria raised her foot.
She aimed to block the downward-swinging great sword with her foot since she couldn’t use her hands.
Iria, who had some knowledge of martial arts, quickly got into position and extended her leg toward the great sword.
CRUNCH!
As the weight of the great sword was transmitted through her body, a horrifying cracking sound echoed as her bones splintered.
“Ah……”
At that moment, Iria took a small breath.
The red magical energy surged fiercely.
Iria’s physical abilities spiked as her body swelled with magical energy. Healing her mouth wound in an instant, she pushed Seir away with the leg that had blocked the sword.
She created some distance between herself and the persistent demon.
Iria sighed as she realized she couldn’t take her opponent lightly.
Iria closed her eyes and tapped into a power she hadn’t used until now.
Something she didn’t want to resort to.
“……I’ll show you only this.”
Using the power of the Demon King felt like being stained with something each time, so she had exercised restraint.
But now wasn’t the time for such considerations.
The crimson magic enveloped the surroundings. It was even denser than what Seir had unleashed before.
To cut to the chase, Seir wouldn’t be able to defeat Iria even after absorbing the fragment.
Seir had only absorbed a single fragment, while Iria had at least three or more within her body.
As Iria released her power, the terrain around them shifted. The reddening landscape resembled something out of hell.
Seir witnessed the manifestation of crimson magical energy. Iria grasped the form it took—a long sword of magic.
As the red sword appeared in her hand, Iria’s hair also turned crimson.
It was the influence of the red magic.
Until Iria finished all her preparations, Seir was unable to move at all.
The red magical energy that enveloped the terrain bound her feet.
Iria took her stance against her immobile enemy.
It wasn’t the Imperial Sword Style she often used, but rather her own unique talent that she had awakened.
Focusing magic to a point, she gathered everything into a single strike.
And then.
SWISH!
A red line sliced through the transformed Seir.
As her body was split in half, the barrier covering the academy vanished.
Having finished everything, Iria turned, her red hair flowing behind her.
The words she spoke afterward were not in her usual kind and friendly tone.
“Go have a nightmare.”
Iria collected only the fragments within Seir’s body and left that place.
