Ch.316The Final Blow NPC. (1)

“AAAAARGH!!!”

“Shit!! Wake up, you bastard!! If you fall too, we’ll…?!!! AAAAGH!!!”

“Damn it!!! Master!! No, that bitch!!! I knew she abandoned us?!!”

“Then what are you going to do about it?! Want to just get digested and die?!! If you have any energy left to grumble, pour it all into maintaining the power!!!”

“Fuck! I thought it was strange when she offered spiritual energy!! Believing that bitch’s summoning, whether she’s one of the Seven Deadly Sins or whatever, I’m the idiot here!!!”

Immediately after Luxuria, Miho, and Chikuyo disappeared, the power space that she had been maintaining instantly contracted to less than half its original size. The six high-ranking demons visible before me would certainly be natural disaster-level threats from a normal human’s perspective, but they were now having violent convulsions just trying to maintain the remnants she left behind.

“Rize, are you alright?”

“*cough* I’m, I’m fine. More importantly, what about the other soldiers?”

“Sadly, it’s impossible for all of them to survive. The power walls are collapsing from the edges first…”

I can see that one of the positions Luxuria mentioned has already crumbled completely. The outer wall where we were is still intact since it’s relatively close to the center, but if the space contracts further, even that place will lower in height and can’t be considered safe. No, from the beginning, none of us left behind here are in a safe place.

“Shit! You, elf!! You know that bitch!! Can’t you just protect us?!! If you focus on protecting us, this absurd situation wouldn’t happen!!!”

“…That’s.”

“*cough* Absolutely not. I’m sorry, but please follow Luxuria’s instructions!!”

“You fucking bitch!!!”

A demon who had fallen once with a broken horn got back up and shouted at us. However, Rize confronts the demon with determined eyes. Truthfully, I also want to abandon the human army and hold out around us to extend our time.

“Green Dol. I’m sorry, I know what you’re thinking, but this one thing…”

“…It’s fine. My life was over the moment I fell in love with the Saint. Not that I regret it. You apologized even to demons, but I don’t feel particularly sorry for them.”

The demons targeting the human realm was the cause to begin with. Moreover, if Luxuria hadn’t taken our side, and if she hadn’t bound them by contract and given them orders, they wouldn’t have sided with us at all. Being deceived by her and used by us is their own doing.

“Haha, that elf’s mindset really suits a demon? Just so you know, we’re protecting you right now.”

“Don’t make me laugh. You were deceived into sucking humans’ spiritual energy, and now you’re just struggling to save your own lives. Did you think I wouldn’t know? Even your attempt to gain leverage over me just now was a ploy to twist Luxuria’s order to ‘protect them,’ wasn’t it?”

“Kekek!! *cough* As expected, a long-lived pointy-ear has experience with demons. Is that it? So, what do you think? Let me tell you, I want to live too. Unlike these bastards, I don’t intend to badmouth my master, but if we hold out for the full 10 minutes she mentioned, both you and I will die. If you make a new contract here asking me to protect just you, I can hold out not for 10 minutes but for 10 hours, you know?”

“……”

A female demon, clearly stronger than the others and showing higher loyalty to Luxuria, acting like her close aide, raises the corner of her mouth in a smile while black blood drips from her mouth. That appearance is, no matter how I look at it, just a bluff. I could tell she was barely holding on, about to collapse and die at any moment. Indeed, abandoning the human army here would be…

“Absolutely not! I may not know about the dead, but I cannot abandon those who are still alive…!!!”

“Saint, shut up, will you? You might think it’s natural to die for others, but I—and that elf over there—are the type of beings who’d rather pass on such things. In fact, do you think I don’t know the reason that elf is listening to my proposal is because of you?”

“Ugh…!!”

“…Ha, a demon’s whisper is so sweet it’s troubling. Even at my age, when it gets into my ears, it feels like my brain is filled with sugar water.”

“Green Dol?!”

“So…”

“However, I refuse.”

It truly is a sweet temptation. In a situation where our remaining lifespan is 10 minutes, no, not even that anymore, she offers to extend it to 10 hours. It’s an attractive proposition with no reason to refuse. But you see.

*Grip*

“The demonic woman my beloved trusted, and to whom you swore loyalty, is quite a tough one. And the beastfolk from our country who went with her are amazing enough to make even that tough woman fall for a man. I will believe in Rize’s choice. And in our people’s choice.”

“…Tch.”

After pulling Rize’s arm strongly into my embrace, I smile with the corner of my mouth raised, and the female demon clicks her tongue and spits blood. Now, there’s probably less than 5 minutes left.

“Don’t regret those words, and…”

*Crack!!*

“Ugh…!!”

As the female demon’s horn begins to break and her raised arm tears, spilling black blood, she groans and then curls her lips into an amused smile.

“I quite like you. If we get out of here, I’ll have to seduce you.♡”

“What…?”

“Huh?!! What are you saying!! Green Dol is my man…?! *cough*!!!”

As I stare in disbelief at this sudden incomprehensible talk, Rize shouts but then coughs heavily. Having put “all” of her holy power into Luxuria’s body, she’s completely exhausted—even raising her voice now is a tremendous burden for her. Anyway, protecting Rize and surviving here is the priority…

*CRAAAAAACK!!!*

“Huh?”

“What?! The, the sky!!”

“…She succeeded? You vermin belonging to the hierarchy of Lust!!! Pour in all your remaining demonic energy!!! Our master has succeed—!!!”

As the pitch-black sky began to collapse and the space started to be sucked into the gap, the blood-covered demon shouted, and our consciousness was immediately cut off.

*

“…Wow. That’s terrible.”

The demon’s mouth turned golden, and immediately after, Miho and Luxuria exploded out, and I, who was outside, caught them. Incredibly, Luxuria said she had once filled her body with holy power 8,000 years ago, and she told me that back then, she couldn’t properly contain it and it leaked out everywhere. But in the current situation, if I could give her spiritual energy while she filled herself with demonic energy, she could create an energy that would repel the enemy by ‘mixing demonic and holy power,’ feeding it an ability it had never tasted before.

“Well, I can see that it worked.”

Luxuria’s arms and wings had completely evaporated. Her once beautiful features, attractive even to a woman, were smashed as if burned. Well, she did say she would recover if I shared my spiritual energy with her, so that’s not what I find terrible. The real problem is…

[HUWEEEEEEEEEEEK!!!!]

*—————————!!!!*

I’m talking about the sight of Greed’s flesh mass, with its upper body blown off, vomiting without dying. From the ruins of what could no longer be called the outer wall, all kinds of melted human flesh masses, occasional demon corpses, and an enormous amount of unidentifiable soil—it’s like chaos itself spewing from an endless well, truly difficult to look at. Above all, as a beastperson with a good sense of smell, this odor is really…

*Ears perk up!*

“Ah, Miho, Luxuria, I’ll be right back? I found the Elder and Rize.”

“”……””

There’s no response. Miho is less injured than Luxuria but has lost consciousness. And Luxuria, who gathered holy power to the point of ending up in this state, would be strange if she were conscious. Well, anyway, with the Greed demon in this abnormal state, it’s my duty to retrieve Rize and the Elder who flowed out with all that vomit.

*Tap tap!! Tap tap!!*

“Hm?”

*Dragging, dragging. Drag… Thud.*

“Hm? This demon…”

Quickly approaching and tracking the scent of the Elder and Rize, I found the two people farther from where the vomit was spewed. More precisely, a demon who had retrieved the two before me, whose name I don’t know but who definitely spoke quite familiarly with Luxuria…

“Haa, haa, hey. I think I’m dying. *cough!!* …Please. I brought your companions, so take me too. To my master’s side…”

“……”

Covered in vomit from head to toe, and clearly severely injured—no, truly dying—the demon breathes roughly and asks to be saved, making me hesitate slightly. Hmm, I did discuss this with Luxuria, and she said it would be best to let all the demons she summoned be eaten by Greed and killed. But…

“…Make a contract. You won’t attack us. You won’t suck people’s spiritual energy without permission. Then I’ll take you.”

“What a tremendous burden this is. Following my master’s summons was a mistake. *cough*…”

The demon clearly protected the Elder and Rize, who are also covered in vomit but appear uninjured. So I’ll save this one and take it with us. Having made that decision, I confirmed the demon made an unequal contract with demonic energy, then put Rize on my back, lifted the Elder with one hand, and dragged the demon along…

*Drag, thud. Thud. Thud. Scraaaape…*

“Gah?! I’m, dying…! This will kill me. *cough*… At least carry me… I’m a high-ranking demon, I don’t want to die smashed into the ground, pu-gahk?!!”

“Hmm?”

I briefly stopped when the demon, repeatedly smashing into the vomit-covered ground, tearfully claimed it was really going to die.

Hmm, I guess I should drag the Elder instead. Since we made a contract, letting it die like this doesn’t seem right, so I switched the positions of the Elder and the demon.