The Black Drug

A lightning bolt tore free of Ferda's grip and punched straight through a man's skull.

He toppled in a spray of blood, the sight so jarringly out of place that no one managed to react in time.

"Wh-what the hell!?"

The enemy ranks still hadn't grasped the situation.

On the heels of Ferda's opening strike, Consilus and Marco rose and strode into the enemy formation.

"Gah!"

"Guh!"

Consilus and Marco cut down the two men at the front.

Only then did the rest understand.

"Ambush!"

"R-run!"

Just as they began to dissolve into panic, a woman barked an order.

"You idiots! There's no escape route anyway! Draw your weapons!"

At the command of Dark Elf Major Linne, the confused soldiers fumbled for the arms they had been wearing.

Major Linne lifted her staff.

"How dare you assault this place! The sniper as well—show yourself at once!"

Ferda obliged without protest, stepping into the open.

Major Linne's eyes went wide.

"Gray hair and blue eyes… so you're Ferda Valdrova."

She had recognized him.

"I should have known. I was thinking I'd like a look at the face of the bastard who wrecked my nest, and here you are, paying me a personal visit."

"Does that please you?"

"If I must answer, yes. Now I can kill you with my own hands. All of you—kill him!"

Her underlings charged at Ferda.

In that same instant a quiet power began to circulate through Consilus and Marco.

Knightly mana—aura—wrapped their bodies from head to toe.

A knight who could wield aura was worth a hundred ordinary men.

Facing a mere twenty servant-class fighters was child's play.

Whoosh—!

Every arc of Marco's and Consilus's blades left another underling crumpling bonelessly to the floor.

The hirelings, little better than a ragtag band of mercenaries, lost their will to fight almost at once.

The Dark Elf watched them and seethed.

"Useless garbage! Secretary!"

"Y-yes!?"

"Come here!"

At her beckoning the dazed secretary shuffled closer.

The Dark Elf pulled something from the bag slung over her shoulder.

A syringe filled with black liquid.

She drove it straight into the secretary's neck.

"Ghk!?"

The black fluid vanished into his body.

"Urgh… ugegegegek!?"

The injected man began to convulse, every joint twisting with wet, cracking sounds.

Consilus sensed the threat on pure instinct and shouted.

"Marco! Stop him before he finishes changing!"

"Leave it to me!"

Marco raised his sword and lunged at the mutating man.

"Not a chance!"

The Dark Elf's palm snapped toward Marco.

A magic circle bloomed across her hand.

What she cast was human magic—Force Rush.

Thud!

"Ugh!"

The space before her palm compressed, then erupted as a shockwave that hurled Marco backward.

They had failed to interrupt the transformation.

"Ugek! Gegegek!"

The man's body swelled with grotesque, gurgling cries.

At the same time his skin darkened to a deep, unnatural hue.

He tore free of his clothes and kept growing until he stood the size of a gray bear, and only then did the change stop.

He lifted his head.

Black skin, crimson eyes, and needle-sharp fangs.

Every classic trait of a demon, without exception.

"A demon…!"

"A Bouncer, at that."

Physical specialists who could snap binding spells with raw strength alone.

Marco and Consilus felt the pressure of its presence settle over them like a weight.

"Ghehehehe!!! Me too! I received His grace as well!!"

The Bouncer capered about like a child who had just been handed a new toy.

Still unused to its own power, it slammed the floor with every step, making the whole room boom.

The vibrations froze even knights who had crossed countless battlefields.

Yet none of it held Ferda's attention.

His gaze was fixed on the Dark Elf's bag.

She pulled the syringe from that bag.

And there was no chance it held only that single syringe.

I have to secure that thing, no matter what.

Ferda turned and gave Consilus his order.

"Count, take the Bouncer. Can you manage it?"

Consilus answered at once.

"If I cannot clear a wall this high, how am I supposed to walk with my head held high?"

"My sword belongs to the Regent!"

Consilus refused to yield.

Inspired by him, Marco found his courage and gripped his blade anew.

"I understand your resolve."

Ferda extended a hand.

"But there's no need to make it harder than it has to be."

A magic circle formed in his palm.

Ferda began the chant.

"Frenzy."

A circle stained pure black lanced out as a bolt of lightning and drove through the Bouncer's skull.

"Ghehehe! Gh… ghek?"

The Bouncer, still cackling, suddenly clutched its head.

"Guh… gyaaaaaah!! Aaaaah! It hurts! It huuurts!!"

The muscle-bound monster began thrashing, hands clamped over its skull.

It smashed everything within reach without discrimination.

"Gah!"

"What are you doing?! We're on your side—puek!"

It was like loosing a rabid dog into a chicken coop.

The underlings were shredded in moments.

"It hurts so much! It hurts, I said!"

Just as that fury was about to turn on the Dark Elf herself, the elf hastily completed a spell.

"Restrain!"

A runic formula punched through the Bouncer's head.

The raging creature went still in an instant.

"Do you recognize who I am?"

"Uh, M-Major?"

"Back in your right mind at last. Now that you understand, wipe out those pests!"

"Y-yes, ma'am!!"

The restored Bouncer charged the two knights.

"To disgrace myself in front of the Major… you bastards! I won't forgive you!!"

Marco and Consilus met the assault head-on from the front line.

Boom!

"Ugh!"

"Hmph!"

A heavy impact drove both men back.

Yet they held.

Because they held, they could counter.

Crack—!

Aura that could slice human flesh and bone like radishes now barely managed to break the skin.

"Ahahaha! Stronger! Me! Strong!"

The clash between the two knights and the Bouncer became a brutal, grinding contest.

In such a deadlock the mages would decide everything.

Victory or defeat would hinge on the support of Ferda and the Dark Elf.

The Dark Elf raised a magic circle first.

What she meant to cast was Slug Time—

a spell to slow the two aura-clad knights and hand the Bouncer an opening.

"Slug Ti—"

She sensed the attack before she could finish the chant.

What her eyes saw was a bullet shaped from pure mana.

It flew with perfect accuracy straight into her circle.

"Ugh!?"

The circle, already charged with magic, detonated on the spot.

"Destroying a magic circle with a Mana Shot…"

Major Linne reeled from the shock.

She forced down the uneasy questions rising in her mind.

Very few people can read a mana blind spot and exploit it…

A blue glint turned in Major Linne's pupils.

She was gauging the true strength of Ferda's mana.

And she had not been wrong.

A greenhorn regent who's only just reached the 4th Circle is using mana blind spots?

The doubt only deepened.

Against a complex spell like the Slug Time she had just attempted, it was a lethal technique.

"What are you waiting for? Cast something already."

Ferda taunted her.

"An elf who threw away nature's grace for the ugly magic of humans—what happens if you lose a magic duel?"

"You're fourth-rank at best. Getting a little arrogant for someone of the same rank, aren't you?"

Ferda concentrated his own mana and measured her circle in turn.

The scale looked roughly equal to his own.

"Don't lie to me. I already know you're fifth-rank."

"These eyeholes weren't punched through leather for nothing, Regent. Anyone at the fourth rank should at least be able to read mana circuits—"

"Do I look like enough of a fool that I wouldn't recognize someone using the Aquinas school's cultivation method?"

At Ferda's words the Dark Elf's eyes went round.

Before she could even spit out How did you—, Ferda cut her off.

"Don't make that face. It rather spoils my mood."

Ferda prepared a magic circle of his own.

Among fourth-rank spells, Magic Blast was one of the strongest.

Its power meant a long, intricate cast.

But Ferda was already a practiced mage.

Every step moved faster than other mages could manage.

And the very choice of that spell made his meaning clear.

He was looking down on her.

"Cheap provocation!"

Yet the circle lost its force before it could fully form.

Not by Ferda's will.

"That's right. Just as you said—I'm 5th Circle."

Linne's hidden secret had been exposed, but it hardly mattered.

"Which means I don't need flashy little tricks like mana blind spots the way you do."

Once the circles themselves differed in rank, simple overwhelming force was enough.

She unraveled the shape of his circle with purer, higher-grade mana.

In truth, Ferda was the one at a disadvantage.

She's using the Aquinas school's method.

The Aquinas school sacrificed lower ranks to compress mana—a school of pure firepower.

It could deceive an opponent's eye, and it amplified the effects of higher-rank magic.

Looking into the Dark Elf's body, one saw only fourth-rank mana.

In reality it was high-purity fifth-rank mana held under compression.

In a pure contest of weight class, Ferda's defeat was already written.

"Did you know?"

Ferda had always lived looking upward.

If weight class failed, technique.

If technique failed, the next means after that.

And if even that failed, he would fight with his gums if he had to.

That was how Ferda had always fought.

"There's a monster living under your desk."

"What?"

What kind of nonsense is that?

She was about to ask when something registered beneath the desk.

In the darkness under the wood, a blue light kindled.

It was unmistakably part of a magic circle.

"How did a circle get under—!?"

"Lightning Bolt."

Crack!

A single fork of lightning shattered the wooden desk and erupted upward.

It drove straight through the Dark Elf's head.

"Kyaaah!"

The spell had been cast by Ferda's Shadow Hand.

In the middle of the chaos Ferda had concentrated on sliding a shadow all the way beneath the desk.

Even the Magic Blast had been only a feint to scatter her focus.

It worked perfectly.

Ferda had wondered how useful the technique would prove in real combat.

Now he was certain: as long as he kept his cards hidden well enough, no one would see them coming.

"Truly disappointing."

Ferda spoke.

"The Aquinas school wins by feeding an opponent incomplete information. Yet someone using their method gets caught off-guard like this."

It was mockery, and at the same time a kind of pity.

"Well… I didn't make perfect use of the chance either."

This had been Ferda's chance to end Major Linne for good.

Instead of collapsing, however, she staggered in place and then stood upright again.

"Grrrrgh…!"

Major Linne groaned.

Clutching her left eye, she steadied her head.

Ferda examined the wound.

The Lightning Bolt had punched up through her jaw and exited through the eye.

"Impressive survival instinct. I meant to kill you instantly, yet you still managed to dodge."

"Damn it! You short-lived little bastard!!"

The Dark Elf glared at him with eyes full of venom.

Ferda only answered with a twisted smile.

"Ferda Valdrova! I will never forget this humiliation!"

As a last resort the Dark Elf pulled out a scroll.

An emergency escape spell.

The moment she tore it, light flared around her body and swallowed her whole.

"Uh… Ma-Major…?"

The Bouncer stared blankly at the empty space where the Dark Elf had vanished.

Without its mage, the Bouncer was easily subdued.

Breathing hard after the brutal fight, Marco and Consilus looked down at the fallen creature.

"Hah… hah… I never dreamed we'd end up fighting a demon."

"Same here. To think I'd only see one after growing this old."

"Save the small talk for later. We have only twenty minutes left."

"Yes, sir."

Still carrying the heat of battle, they began their search.

The facility had been in the middle of sorting intelligence before abandonment, so classified material and ordinary records were already somewhat separated.

While they ransacked the room, Ferda moved to the spot where the Major had disappeared.

Emergency escape magic doesn't take belongings with it.

The speed of the effect meant everything was left behind.

It permitted neither possessions nor even clothing to travel with the caster.

What remained were clothes shed like a discarded skin—

and a leather alchemy bag.

Ferda flipped the bag open.

Inside lay a journal and a single case.

The case held syringe ampoules arranged in a grid, each bearing its own label.

Every name was an epithet of knight-class demons already recorded in history.

Aside from the Doppler he had learned of during the academy-head kidnapping, new epithets stared back at him.

So the Doppler wasn't the only real threat.

Everything he had seen so far had been a single tree, not the forest.

This is enough for now. What's in the records?

Ferda opened the journal from the bag.

Unknown hieroglyphic characters marched across the pages.

A cipher.

Writing designed so that even if the journal were stolen, no one could casually decipher it.

Ferda felt it in his gut.

Something far more valuable than the scattered intelligence in this room was hidden inside these pages.

He slipped the journal into the sample bag and sealed it shut.

"Count, we have everything we came for."

"Understood."

The intelligence raid had succeeded.

They slipped out unseen and began the journey back.

Meanwhile, the three who had headed for the research wing.

Bundled in cold-weather gear, Jed rubbed his arms vigorously as he pushed through the blizzard.

"Aww, shit, it's freezing. Who the hell builds a house in a backwater mountain like this and then goes nuts?"

"Please keep your voice down. What if someone hears?"

"Aw, don't worry about it. Weather like this, you wouldn't hear an orc howling right next to you."

Every time the freezing wind slapped his face he poured out complaints, and the knights walked on in silence, listening.

Soon they found the designated point and went inside.

"Quiet in here."

Unlike the residential wing, the research wing had already been emptied.

All that remained were bulky, useless objects, trash—

and the explosives prepared to bury the whole place.

"That devil was right. They really meant to smash everything within six hours."

"I wonder."

"You think not?"

"I mean it might happen right this second. How do you trust a word those devil bastards say? Let's move faster."

Their mission was the rescue of the "devils."

The experimental subjects meant for research had been locked in the research wing, they had been told.

No one would bother transferring prisoners on top of everything else.

They would simply have left them to be buried with the explosives.

That prediction proved correct.

"What the hell is this?"

When they saw it with their own eyes, however, they could not suppress their horror.