Nothing is more foolish than facing Demonkin at night, when the sun has hidden itself. Anyone familiar with the seven races would agree.

* * *

Ravens cried.

Bats flew through the dark sky with the sound of fierce wingbeats. At that moment, the fighters of the various races standing on the ground could not move so much as a fingertip.

"... Ugh, uh, ugh."

With the sun gone and the moon risen in its place, the Demonkin had become the masters of this space. While everyone else stood frozen, only the nobles of the night were free within the darkness.

"You have all led such painful lives."

The Demonkin emerging from the deep darkness looked out of place here. Their pitch-black formal attire belonged in a banquet hall, and their steps and speech were leisurely. Rather than fighters, they looked like nobles visiting to watch the contest.

"You... fucking... bastards."

That was the defining trait of Demonkin.

The other races who knew them always described them in a single phrase.

Obnoxious bastards.

"You should have covered your eyes and hidden yourselves when night fell. If you did not wish to meet us, that is."

Alluring voices spilled through the dark forest. Walking with flawless poise, the Demonkin passed the fighters frozen like ice, brushing their cheeks one by one. Even when poked and prodded with a finger, the other fighters could not budge.

"Ah, how dull it is when no one answers."

To be precise, they were incapable of moving.

Because the fighters could no longer see reality.

"You must all be busy enjoying your nightmares."

Of the many special powers that defined Demonkin, this was the most famous. A dreadful power that, once experienced, could leave someone tossing and turning at night at the mere mention of Demonkin. An appalling power that, with a little bad luck, could destroy the mind entirely or leave its victim asleep forever.

People called that power...

"May you sleep peacefully and never wake again."

Hell.

* * *

Darkness swept through the forest.

Swallowed by the pitch-black dark, Seolyun squeezed her eyes shut without realizing it. When she opened them a moment later, she found neither darkness nor a forest. A silent wilderness stretched before her, pale dust rising from its barren soil. Countless people lay scattered across it like dust.

"Ah."

The people sprawled on the ground made no sound. With a dazed expression, Seolyun studied their faces one by one. Each lay differently. Her kindly neighbor had closed his eyes peacefully. The woman who had always shared cheerful jokes lay with her eyes wide open, clutching her son. The child in her arms, only just five years old, had closed his eyes with a piece of straw gripped in his little hand.

Countless lives, each lived differently, each holding the possibility of so many different futures, had all crumbled here. Like heat haze wavering beneath the blazing sun.

"..."

Seolyun silently took in the scene.

She knew perfectly well that this was not reality. Yet she could not turn away from the sight unfolding before her. This was neither a hallucination nor a nightmare.

It was a memory she carried from the distant past.

A memory she desperately wanted to forget, yet must never forget.

As she stood there numbly, a distant voice echoed in her ears.

It was not the language of the West.

It was familiar to her. The language of the East.

["We have disposed of them all cleanly. Not a single one remains."]

["Excellent."]

The voices came from beyond the dust. Behind its pale billows, mounted soldiers exchanged dry remarks.

["Do not look back. This was not wrong. Someone had to do it."]

["... That is truly so, isn't it?"]

["Yes. It was absolutely necessary for the Great Land."]

Seolyun remembered every moment.

She remembered the faint scent of blood in the dust, the acrid smell of earth, and the overpowering reek of tobacco that clung to them. The breathing of their warhorses remained vivid. As though it had happened yesterday.

["Trust in the Great Land. If you cannot trust in the Great Land, trust in the great conqueror. Our Khan is never wrong."]

Seolyun remembered every word they had spoken.

She remembered what they had murmured to themselves.

After that brief exchange, they left.

Hooves pushed against the earth, and by the time the sun hung directly overhead, Seolyun was the only living human there. A small, insignificant girl had been left in the midst of death.

"..."

Seolyun watched her younger self crawl out of a well. The little Eastern girl, drained of all color, briefly looked at the bodies of her neighbors and friends, dead as dust, and of her parents, who had left the world before her. Unable to accept reality, she did more than look. She reached out with her tiny hands and stroked them.

But nothing changed.

Only then did the girl burst into tears.

Through her sobs, the girl caught sight of a blade caked with dust. It was a sword. Something far too heavy for her to lift. Seeing it, she thought of a legend she had once heard.

["Seolyun, they say that if your mastery of the sword reaches the heavens, you can ascend as an immortal and leave for paradise. There, the people you cherished will be waiting for you, and sweet happiness abounds."]

Yes.

This was the moment Seolyun the girl had died, and Seolyun the swordswoman had been born anew. The memory that had changed her life completely.

"... Obnoxious Demonkin."

Facing that distant memory, Seolyun murmured with hatred in her voice. At the same time, the scene before her began to shudder chaotically. As though time were rewinding, the scattered bodies rose and regained life. In the rewound world, the people she cherished smiled brightly. Then, with the sound of hooves, long, sharp spears came flying. Crimson drops of blood splashed across their peaceful daily lives...

"Stop."

Someone crumpled with an ear-splitting scream. Arrows, spears, and swords rained down on people desperately trying to flee. Their bodies collapsed with such terrible ease. Every moment unfolded before Seolyun with maddening clarity. Even when she closed her eyes, it unfolded inside her head.

"Stop, stop..."

Seolyun clenched her teeth and forced the words out in anguish.

She knew this was the Demonkin's power at work. A trick that invaded a living creature's mental world, recreated painful memories, and broke the mind. It was an extremely simple mental attack, but a devastating one for most living creatures.

"Stop."

Seolyun was a swordswoman of extraordinary genius.

But before this hell, she was reduced to a mere wielder of a blade. She could neither cut apart the nightmares unfolding before her nor drive away the endless darkness. She could do nothing but face the repeating nightmares. Helplessly. Horribly.

Screams poured endlessly into her ears.

And...

「The very fact that I was breathing in the same world as him was unbearable.」

A familiar voice came from somewhere.

「How is that devil of a man still living amid praise?」

「Why is this world so wrong?」

With those words, the hell unfolding before Seolyun began to shake.

「No matter how much I think about it, I cannot accept it.」

「There are far too many things I cannot accept.」

「And so the conclusion I reached was clear.」

Seolyun slowly opened her eyes.

She knew whose voice this was.

「Only a swordmaster can kill a swordmaster.」

「So I decided to become a swordmaster.」

The Little Gladiator.

Arhan.

* * *

Facing Demonkin at night was exceedingly foolish. From the moment the moon rose, their physical abilities and their ability to wield Mana increased astonishingly. At the same time, their true powers, dormant during the day, awakened.

Foremost among those powers was Hell.

"Oh my."

Shamans communicated with the spirit world.

Elves communicated with the world of elemental spirits.

Many other races and practitioners of various kinds could communicate with worlds beyond the mortal realm, drawing power from them to wield the arcane. Among them, 「Demonkin」 were special.

Though restricted to times classified as 'night,' Demonkin could communicate with Hell. This Hell was a kind of world.

An inner world containing a living creature's painful memories, the sins committed throughout its life, its regrets, and its fears. As an inner world, Hell existed in the heart of every intelligent living creature. Demonkin could meddle with those worlds.

They could show a sleeper their most painful memory over and over as an endless nightmare. They could repeat the moment of greatest regret, or give concrete form to what the sleeper feared most and corrupt their mind. For Demonkin, combat began and ended with control over Hell.

And only Demonkin possessed that power. That was why, in the pitch-black night, they reigned as beings everyone shunned. Unless Demonkin blood flowed through one's veins, there was no way to defy the Hell they wielded.

Of course, some could resist it, even if they could not defy it.

Priests who entrusted their souls to a god and received sacred protection. Shamans who split their own souls and scattered them across the spirit world to free themselves from mental interference. Noble witches of the heavens who had cast aside every painful memory and regret.

"How very peculiar."

But to the Demonkin Hartias, the 「Red Count」, the human before him belonged to none of those categories. He possessed no spiritual abilities, had inherited no Demonkin blood, and harbored no divine energy.

The human was purely a swordsman.

And for a swordsman to resist Hell through his own power alone, he needed armor. The stage beyond radiant wings: sturdy armor capable of blocking anything. The invincible armor only 「sword experts」 could possess.

"What is that?"

Yet the young man before him was purely human, and his mastery of the sword was merely that of a 「sword walker」 who had not even sprouted wings. Nevertheless, he was driving away the darkness. Hartias found this situation difficult to comprehend.

"What exactly is that thing you carry within you?"

Hartias looked at the human.

The Hell drawn from the human before him vanished before it could even manifest in the world. Another inner world was replacing the darkness instead.

In place of pitch-black darkness, barren land stretched out without a single blade of grass. A dreadful silence hung over it, and a conspicuously tall hill rose from the quiet ground. On that hill stood a mansion that did not belong in this landscape. A boy sat in its courtyard, his face devoid of expression.

"That is not a talent a human can possess."

Unfolding one's own inner world to fight back was a specialty of shamans and mages. An inner world took shape in proportion to its wielder's mental strength. Those unfolded by novices were invariably hazy and unstable.

Yet the boy's world before Hartias was far too solid. As though it were made not of mental strength, but of steel.

Hartias looked at the boy in that otherwise deserted domain.

The boy's voice rang out.

"Only a swordmaster can kill a swordmaster."

With those words, cold chunks of metal fell from the sky and drove deep into the ground. Blades poured down like rain. Cold swords stood one by one across the silent land like gravestones.

"So I decided to become a swordmaster."

The boy's face became that of a young man.

Behind the boy who had become a young man, the transparent soul of an old man shimmered. A lionlike elder, staring directly into Hartias's eyes. The voice of the old man standing behind the boy resounded like the growl of a wild beast.

「You have no right to set foot in the Land of Swords.」

The moment those words ended, Hartias felt violent pain. A strange, horrific sensation, as though swords had slashed his entire body. He burst into laughter despite himself.

"Well... I really have found an interesting human."

Even amid the pain of being hacked apart from head to toe, he did not stop smiling.

Nor did he take his eyes off the human before him.

Madness filled Hartias's eyes.

"I will visit you again before this night ends. Without fail."

With that, the darkness that had surged around them vanished.

Without a trace.

"I will remember you!"

* * *

The darkness obscuring my sight vanished. So did the crushing pressure constricting my body.

When I opened my eyes, I was back in the Pitch-Black Forest. Looking around, I saw fighters with dazed expressions. I hadn't even had time to understand what had happened.

A Demonkin had appeared, and before he could do anything to me, the gift the orc elder had given me had shone. The Demonkin had muttered something about remembering me and coming back, then vanished. Everything had happened in an instant, but one thing was certain. I had bought time.

That meant I couldn't waste this moment standing around in confusion.

"Seolyun!"

"... Uh, ugh. Huh?"

"Snap out of it! Let's go!"

I grabbed Seolyun's hand and pulled her along, though her face was still dazed. This was our chance, while everyone was out of their senses. The Racial Duels were descending into a chaotic melee, so simply securing a good position could give us a substantial advantage. To do that, we had to move fast...

「That orc gave you a useful gift. Not that I like it.」

I ran with Seolyun's hand in mine.

「Well, I suppose I can put up with a few nuisances for my pathetic descendant. It is my duty as an ancestor...」

"What do you keep going on about? You're distracting me!"

「Now, now. What kind of manners are those? After all the trouble I just went to for you.」

"I didn't ask. Please explain later. Later."

「Ho ho. Such fine manners. I wonder whose descendant you are.」

The situation was so urgent that I had no time to keep listening to Liam talking to himself. Things were chaotic enough already, and Master's voice constantly ringing inside my head was unbearably irritating. Whether he had decided to listen to me or was sulking, Liam fell silent.

Then.

"...?"

As we ran, the ground gave way beneath us.

'Damn it—'

A trap.

And what was more...

"Got you, human!"

Of all the seven races, one was the best at making anything.

"This is how we dwarves of the Sky Mountains fight! Hahahaha!"

We had fallen into a trap made by 「dwarves」.

"I can't stand idiots who fight with nothing but brute force! Bwahahahaha!"

Obnoxious laughter poured down from outside the trap.

Having fallen a long way down, I looked at my ankle. It was badly twisted.

Fighting would be too much.

"Master."

The time had finally come to use my trump card.

"Is there some way to sweet-talk the dwarves?"

「...」

"Well, when you think about it, aren't I a descendant of the magnificent dwarves? I believe this is a moment when I desperately need advice from my wise Master, who always provides me with the right answers. Your foolish descendant seeks his ancestor's wisdom."

「...」

"Please. Are you sulking?"

「Didn't you tell me to shut my damn mouth because I was distracting you?」

"No, I didn't go that far..."

Liam grumbled, making no effort to hide his sulking.

Seeing an old man act like that made anger well up inside me, but I had no choice.

「Kneel and say, 'I'm sorry, Grandfather,' and I'll help you.」

"I'm sorry, Grandfather."

Of course I could kneel a hundred times before the great ancestor of the Caravan family, the mightiest swordmaster in all of history, my venerable forebear.

「Once more.」

It really didn't bother me at all.

「Hurry up, or I won't help you.」

... It really, truly didn't bother me in the slightest.

Not at all.