I checked the total points I currently held. A whole 2,050 infamy points! I was rich!
All right, so where do I spend them?
Going purely by the amount I’d gathered so far, I had more than enough to level Theo up to eighteen. But I hadn’t satisfied the number of quests that needed clearing yet.
The system window laid my current status out at a glance.
500p + 1 quest cleared : Destroy the statue (cleared) → Level up to age 15 (complete)
1,000p + 2 quests cleared : Temple arson (cleared) : Soul offering (in progress) → Conditions for age 18 unmet
1,500p + 3 quests cleared : Destroy the holy knights’ armories (in progress) : ?? : ?? → Conditions for age 20 unmet → Must reach age 18 to unlock the age 20 stage
So for now, I intended to spend every last one of these points on myself. The harder the quests got, the stronger I needed to be. After some deliberation I reinforced my stats and skills a little at a time, and with the remaining 600 points I bought a new skill.
As a result, my status window changed like this.
Shane (half-demon, age 125)
Stats (□/10) Strength 5 → 6 Magic 4 → 5 Resistance 7 Agility 8 Accuracy 5
Skills Innate skills: Flame Lv. 2 → Lv. 3 Stealth Lv. 1 → Lv. 2 Disguise Lv. 1
Acquired skills: Locksmith Lv. 1 (new)
Locksmith. Exactly as the name suggests, a skill specialized for thievery. The higher the level, the more complex the lock you can pick, and in less time. With enough mastery, you can undo not only ordinary locks but even barriers cast by mages.
Warehouses four through seven of the holy knights’ armories were fitted with ordinary locks. Ordinary or not, they were sturdy and intricate enough that no normal strength could break them. Warehouses one through three, on the other hand, were sealed tight with mages’ barriers.
The weapon fit for a hero like Theo was in warehouse one. To open warehouse one, I had to strengthen Locksmith further.
Even now, Theo was steadily practicing with the wooden sword I’d bought him. His skill was exceptional, as befit the youngest student ever admitted to the Imperial Academy. Having played as a knight character myself, I could teach him the orthodox swordsmanship of the imperial knights fairly convincingly. For now the lessons ran on wooden swords, but soon I’d hand him a real one. And a very cool treasured blade at that.
Of course, walking around with a treasured sword stolen from the knights would get him noticed in all the wrong ways. So I planned to use Disguise. Pull Disguise up to level 2 and I could fool the shape of inanimate objects to a degree. Passing a rotten apple off as a plump, wholesome one, or making a gleaming famed blade look like an old ordinary sword, was entirely doable.
I’m going to need more information on the holy knights.
Thanks to having played the game over five hundred times, I already knew how the warehouses were laid out and how they were watched. But a lot had been changing since I got involved. The freshest information ultimately spills out of people’s mouths.
I thought of Madam Cecile’s tavern. It had been the same when I played the game. Sit in a corner of that tavern and usable rumors came rolling in.
After dinner I asked Theo,
“I’m going to run over to the tavern for a bit. Do you want to go to sleep on your own first?”
Theo answered a question with a question.
“Can’t I come with you?”
Taking a minor to a tavern gave me pause, but in this world it wasn’t especially taboo. In this setting, minors drinking wasn’t even illegal. I made a resolution anyway: absolutely no alcohol for him. Our hero had to grow up good and upright, after all.
The tavern was packed, as expected. Loud laughter, the raised voices of drunks, and the clash of glasses rang through the heated air. I put orange juice in front of Theo, and in front of myself, deliberately, a low-proof cocktail. I hadn’t come there to get drunk in the first place, so keeping up appearances was enough.
Then the man in the next seat spoke to me.
“Hey, friend, why are you drinking that pathetic stuff? A real man drinks whiskey.”
“I’m not much good with strong liquor.”
“Aw, don’t hold back. Drink, drink.”
The man suddenly wrapped an arm around my waist and forced the whiskey he’d been drinking into my mouth. He shoved the whole bottle in, and the neck of it knocked against the back of my throat.
“Urk, hgk...”
A physical urge to gag surged up. I was flustered, but I didn’t want to make a scene for nothing, so I swallowed what I was given. If I didn’t swallow, I couldn’t breathe. The high-proof liquor went down my esophagus. My throat burned where the liquid had scoured past. More of it ran down and soaked my chin than actually made it down.
A small hand shot out of nowhere and shoved the man’s forearm away.
“Rihen said he doesn’t want it!”
The man looked down at Theo with a startled face.
“What’s this? Who’s the kid?”
He blinked a few times, then slapped his own cheeks hard enough to make a sound, twice. An attempt to shake off the drink. Once the heat spreading across his face had settled a little, he scratched his head, looking sheepish.
“Ah, sorry about that. I must be pretty far gone.”
The man scrambled off to another table. Fortunately he was just an ordinary middle-aged guy with terrible drinking habits. If he’d been rude to Theo, I’d have given serious thought to making him my next offering.
Theo took out a handkerchief and carefully wiped my chin and neck. Then he sighed and said,
“I want to be an adult soon.”
“Why?”
“So if anyone pushes drinks on you, I can drink all of it in your place.”
After he finished, he shook his head as if he’d startled himself.
“...But if I become an adult, you won’t have a reason to look after me anymore, will you? I don’t want that.”
Ah. He’s been worrying about being thrown away. I rubbed Theo’s back to reassure him.
“Even when you’re grown, I’ll always be with you. Really.”
It was true. I had to stay by Theo’s side. Leveling a companion up was only possible if you stayed within a certain distance of them. That’s how the game system was designed. Well, even without dragging the system into it... I’d already grown quite attached to Theo myself.
Theo’s face brightened.
“Honestly, becoming an adult scared me. I thought I’d drift away from you. But if that isn’t how it works... then I want to be an adult soon.”
Watching that bright smile, I made up my mind. I’d grow Theo into an adult as fast as I possibly could.
I turned my attention back to the talk drifting around us. But the holy knights hardly came up at all. Instead, a different kind of rumor reached my ears.
“Did you hear? They say there are strange types going around lately. Serving the Demon King, or something like that.”
“They carry out human sacrifices, claiming they’ll summon a demon. Lunatics.”
The hand tipping my glass stopped. Humans, serving the Demon King? At that absurd combination, a buried memory surfaced. A memory from back when I played this world as a game.
There had definitely been an event like that. A side quest unrelated to the main route, but a nuisance if left alone, and worth a decent number of points. Wiping out the human-sacrifice cult.
Of course, it was a mission that only appeared on the good faction’s side, so it didn’t apply to me now. Still, if I could recall when and where the next sacrifice would take place, I could deal with them quest or no quest.
As I remembered it, it was...
Tomorrow at dawn, the abandoned house behind the Levio River.
All right, then. The next souls I offer will be...
This time I didn’t even need to think about it.
It’s your turn.
The shabby ruin gave off a thoroughly grim air. The walls were cracked, the roof half-collapsed, and old blood and candle wax had dried into each other on the floor. At the center of it, some ten people stood in a circle.
Today’s sacrifice, in the middle of that circle.
The apprentice cleric, Luna.
She’d been giving blessings to people beneath the tents, and on her way back late at night to the inn she was using as temporary lodging, she’d been taken. Luna’s mouth was stopped with cloth, and her hands and feet were bound tight with rope. All she could do was tremble and dart her eyes about, unable to say a word.
“O demon, answer our call!”
One of the heretics cried out in an exalted voice. The others followed, chanting a grotesque incantation. A dagger was raised high. The angle aimed for the heart.
That was when it happened. A pitch-black mist spread as if seeping in from somewhere, and then something seized the wrist holding the dagger. A sleek hand in a black leather glove. A moment later, a pleasant voice rang out.
“Ah, no need to offer the heart. I’m not particularly fond of the smell of blood.”
The black shadow took shape, and a figure revealed itself. His face wasn’t covered, and still his appearance couldn’t be registered. Even so, they could at least tell that one corner of his mouth was faintly raised. It was the Thirteenth Corps Commander of the Demon King’s army, the one who had only ever circulated as rumor. An unknown being whose name and face alike lay behind a veil had descended upon this decrepit ruin.
“Well now. I’ve graciously answered your summons in person, so what am I supposed to do next?”
He tilted his head.
The heretics simply collapsed. Overcome, every one of them knelt and wept. A man who appeared to be their leader held out a sheet of paper, supported in both hands. Written on it, packed close together, were a great many names, sexes, ages, and even addresses.
“It’s a list of humans suitable to be offered as souls. Offer these and make them the cornerstone of the Demon King’s resurrection.”
The commander looked down at the paper without a word, then snapped his fingers. A black flame bloomed and swallowed the page in one gulp.
“Ah, how disappointing. You claim to serve the Demon King, and this is the extent of your resolve?”
He laughed. That light laughter turned the entire space cold.
“Shouldn’t you be offering up your own souls, at the very least?”
“M-My... soul?”
The man’s eyes went round. Understanding the demon’s words a beat late, he staggered back a couple of steps.
“C-Commander. It would be far more advantageous to you if we stayed alive and helped with the offering of souls. There’s so very much we can do for-”
“Ah, you do yap away noisily.”
The commander squinted as though he found it tiresome. He grabbed the man by the collar and flung him aside like tossing a deflated ball. His body slammed into a corner. The impact brought a precariously stacked pile of firewood crashing down on top of him.
“Commander, why would you-!”
The heretics stared at him with expressions that refused to accept it. With every trace of amusement wiped from his face, the commander muttered low,
“To think you assumed I’d want the help of worthless humans. How lightly have you been taking me?”
A jet-black ball of fire rolled over his palm. The flames caught immediately on the firewood pinning the man down. If his comrades hadn’t wrung out the last of their reason to drag him free, the black fire would already have swallowed his body. Fear rose in one solid mass inside the heretics’ chests. Terror climbed all the way to their throats and choked off their breath.
Once things had gotten this far, extracting the souls was simple. The commander waved his hand gracefully. White smoke slipped out of their bodies and rose into the air. A gap resembling the mouth of a bottomless pit opened wide and swallowed the souls, every last one.
When it was all over, only silence hung inside the ruin.
Luna had been watching the scene, having forgotten even how to breathe. Feeling her gaze, the commander turned his head sharply and came toward her.
Is it my turn now? Luna squeezed her eyes shut and prayed desperately to the goddess. Hoping for a single thread of grace.
The commander picked up the dagger that had fallen to the floor. Contrary to expectation, the blade didn’t turn toward anything vital. He cut through the ropes binding Luna with it. After undoing the gag in her mouth, he took her hand and helped her to her feet. The hand that brushed the dust from her clothes was, unexpectedly, gentle.
“Why... why on earth...”
Luna asked in a trembling voice. The commander looked down at her, then pressed an index finger to his lips and smiled brightly.
“Secret.”
With those parting words, the black shadow vanished like mist. What remained in the ruin was one cleric, stunned by the fact that she had survived.
