The first people to be thrown by this unimaginable defeat were Gradim’s Three Generals. They were stout allies, fascinated by the Beast King’s path and sharing in his dreams. Their anger and grief were palpable enough to affect the entire war situation around them.
The first to react was Baraga. He stopped engaging Gabil, turned on his heels, and rushed to Gradim’s side.
“Sir Gradim!!”
Everything below Gradim’s head had been obliterated by Carillon’s Beast Roar. The chagrined face told the whole story. It would be impossible to revive him from this state.
“Oh, how…how horrible… Right when his long-cherished wish was almost fulfilled…”
Gabil arrived, following the lamenting Baraga. He remained on guard, his treasured Vortex Spear pointed straight at him.
“Sir Carillon,” he said, eyes still on Baraga, “my congratulations for your great victory! I am truly amazed by your brilliant authority on the battlefield!”
He was offering praise to Carillon for defeating an enemy general, and he meant every word of it. Gradim, with his God-class offense, was more powerful than Gabil despite not even being a demon lord yet. And even if it was a coincidental stroke of luck that sealed it, it was only natural for him to commend Carillon.
But the receiver of this praise looked oddly pale.
“Whoa, whoa, I hate to say it, but he didn’t just…?”
He was deep in thought, seemingly unable to give Gabil a coherent reply.
“Mm? What is the matter?”
Gabil wondered if he was feeling well. Carillon turned away, looking terribly concerned, and then he gave the shocking truth.
“Sorry, guys. I know I came all this way to pitch in, but it looks like it’s over for me.”
“What? Are you hurt?!”
“No, not that. It’s that ‘awakening’ thing. I think the souls Gradim was supposed to get are all swarmin’ for me instead. Man, what a curse. Now I get why he was so damn defenseless…”
“What?!”
Carillon’s tone was self-mocking. Gabil, sensing the levity of the situation, couldn’t hide his shock.
“So, yeah, I’m sorry, but I’m going to sleep right here. Try to protect me when you can, all right?”
“But of course! You may rest assured of that.”
Gabil smiled, hoping to reassure Carillon. Carillon returned it, then turned his back to him. “Hope I see you guys when I’m back up,” he said, and then he fell asleep. He took it as stoutly as possible, but that’s just the way evolutionary sleep works.
Baraga was less than excited about this. If things had been any different, he would have been running guard duty, not Gabil—and it would be Gradim enjoying his slumber at the moment, not Carillon.
“Noooooooo!! Never! You will reap all the benefits after doing nothing at all to sow them! I refuse to let this pass!!”
He seethed at Gabil and Carillon, enraged. In his hand was a shining relic of Gradim—his White Tiger Claws, a God-class weapon that embodied and projected the will of anyone it acknowledged as its master.
“White Tiger Claws, lend me your power. We must avenge Sir Gradim!”
The claws shone more radiantly, as if responding to Baraga’s call. Then the light converged into the form of a single spear.
“Ah… You have recognized me as your master!”
Baraga rejoiced. In his hand was the newly reformed White Tiger Claws—now called the Azure Dragon Spear.
“Your name was Gabil? Then let me kill you and dispatch the thief who lies before us!”
“Ha! I, too, have made a man-to-man promise. Know that I will never allow the sleep of Sir Carillon to be disturbed!”
With that roared-out challenge, the battle between the two giants resumed.
As she soared through the air, locked in high-speed combat, Frey was also sizing up the ground situation. For this, she used the extra skill Celestial Eye, a form of vision that observed a given range and offered a panoramic view from corner to corner for the user.
“…Oh. So that’s how evolution works.”
Her keen mind immediately told her what was happening on the ground, giving her the right answer even as she kept fending off Nazim.
“No… Sir Gradim…”
“They say luck is a part of one’s skill…and I suppose it’s really true.”
“You! How dare you mock Sir Gradim! You can’t even lay a finger on me!”
“That was not my intention. I was merely stating facts; I didn’t mean to make light of you. And it’s not that I can’t touch you; it’s just that I haven’t yet. I wish you wouldn’t jump to conclusions like that.”
Frey, a passive woman who rarely made bold moves on her own, possessed commendable force as a former demon lord. Her magicule count didn’t hold a candle to the Vermilion Bird’s, but a mixture of speed and technique let her hold her own well against Nazim.
“Big talk, coming from someone who’s done nothing but evade me so far.”
“We’ll see who has the bigger mouth once this is over.”
She held her own verbally as well. Some people have a natural gift for making other people dislike them, and Frey was very much that type. Not even the demon lord Milim could outclass her on that front.
And Frey wasn’t just fleeing her opponent, either—she was observing her, looking for weaknesses. Strengthwise, she had nothing to beat her with. She was faster, but Nazim had more endurance. She appeared to be in a losing battle…but then again, victory can often arise from unexpected places.
“You’re panicking, aren’t you?”
“What? Where did that come from—?”
“I’ve finally gained the power to see people’s souls. My ‘eye’ has adapted to it, but let me tell you, having this ‘insight’ is so convenient…”
Frey could tell that her Celestial Eye had improved itself. It made her smile. This could give her an advantage after all. And the information she just received, she felt, would be the key to her victory.
“What are you seeing?”
Nazim’s talons grabbed Frey’s upper arm as she spat out the words in disgust. This small victory made her grin. Harpy claws have a Magic Interference effect that can block the skills of anything they grab.
“Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha! You’re a fool, you know that? So engrossed in conversation that you let me catch you!”
Her tone brightened. She was assured of victory, and that just proved she was panicking all along.
Frey remained calm through the crisis, observing Nazim, checking over every action of hers.
“Take this! Shock Wave!!”
So Nazim’s barrage began, seeming to make this a one-sided affair. Frey’s clothes were torn by the impact, but her expression wasn’t contorted by anguish. She continued to coolly observe Nazim; it struck her foe as strange, but she dismissed it as a bluff. It pained her to admit it, but her twin sister Frey had a sharp mind. Nazim was the more powerful fighter in terms of simple force, but a crafty trickster like Frey was a handful to deal with.
Trying to con your way out of my talons, then? No… I’m sure she’s looking for an opening, trying to turn the tables on a moment’s notice.
So Nazim continued toying with Frey, believing that a continued attack was her best option. But Frey remained utterly unconcerned.
“Maybe a little more?”
It was a small muttering, but it rang loudly in Nazim’s ears. “What?!” she demanded without thinking.
“You’re going to awaken pretty soon, aren’t you? Your magicule count’s rising more and more compared to when we began, it looks like. And once you awaken, I suppose you’ll fall asleep like Gradim. That’s all I have to wait for, huh?”
Frey was smiling like a fiend as she spoke.
Nazim turned pale. Yes, she was aware of the symptoms she was feeling. This, indeed, was the cause of her panicked impatience. Frey had her all figured out.
“S-so what, then?! I’ll just kill you right now and retreat to a safe place!”
The gut-wrenching truth to Frey’s words only added to Nazim’s disquieting alarm. She had to be rid of her before the evolutionary sleep began—it was the only way. With that decision made, she turned her fierceness up a notch, attacking with her full force—but she now lacked the means to realize this was exactly what Frey wanted.
“Shock Wave…!!”
A fierce electric shock churned its way through Frey for the nth time. But it didn’t burn her, or even hurt her at all. The impact threw her off-balance a bit, but otherwise, nothing.
This is madness! How can she be so carefree about this?
But by the time she realized as much, it was already too late.
“Looks like you’re wondering about something? But now I’m sure of it. Our mother, the previous queen, wanted you to be happy in a world where our flock was irrelevant.”
“What?”
“If you knew the queen’s secret, you would have to be killed. That’s why she banished you without telling you anything.”
“Don’t give me that!” Nazim shouted in a rage. “How could a newborn chick survive after being abandoned like that? She had every intention of leaving me for dead!”
But Frey calmly dismissed her.
“And yet you survived. That is proof positive that someone was taking care of you in hiding. Mother always did spoil you like that.”
“…?!”
It was something Nazim always wondered about. She questioned how she managed to survive in her very young days, before she could even remember. It was her mutant instincts, she presumed, that saw her through that ordeal—but after hearing Frey’s words, she began to wonder if there was another explanation.
Still, after all the hatred that had accumulated in her mind, Nazim wasn’t about to change her stance.
“You’re bluffing! Now I’m onto you. You’re trying to trick me and gain the upper hand, yes? It would’ve been cute of you to simply beg for your life, but your pride as a former demon lord wouldn’t allow it, now would it?”
Frey, having exhausted all other options, was making her believe she had some grand scheme ready to take her down. Thinking about it this way made sense to Nazim—in fact, she was all but forcing her mind to make that conclusion. So, assuming she was being hoodwinked, she upped the intensity of her electricity.
“Die! Maximum Shock Wave!!”
The full force of her violent electrocution attack struck Frey. And that was the moment she had been waiting for.
“It’s too bad. You were let off the hook, and now you’ve come back yourself to die.”
“Huh?”
“There is only one queen. I killed our mother in order to seize her throne. And if you hadn’t been abandoned, we would’ve had a duel to the death as well.
“Then I would have killed you!”
As a rare fighter-type harpy, Nazim had absolute confidence in her battle skills. She lost out to Frey in flight speed, but conquered her in everything else. There was no way she could lose in a fight—and even now, she was on the verge of victory. She wanted to sneer at Frey and her act, barely worthy of being called the mutterings of a sore loser. But Frey’s next words made her change her mind.
“A harpy queen needs to have certain abilities, you see. One born with them may be recognized as the next queen. The mistake you made was being born as part of me.”
“Quit going on like you know absolutely everything about me—”
“Oh? Well, let me give you the executive summary, then. The queen has an incontrovertible advantage against all attacks from her own king. In other words, I have immunity against all harpy-based offenses.”
“Don’t lie to me! That’s absurd!”
There was a corner of Nazim’s mind wondering if this was true, but she dismissed it as impossible. If that story was true, then it instantly contradicted Frey’s claim that she killed the previous queen.
“I’m sure you’re trying to throw me off guard with your lies. You should have thought of something more plausible!”
“It’s a sad thing that you don’t believe me…but it’s true. And by the way, it’s not a given that an old and new queen must fight each other. Normally it would be two sisters vying for the throne—and whichever one seized the other’s powers for her own would win it all.”
That, and the winning sister would also obtain the power to become a potential demon lord.
“What…?!”
“But I had to kill Mother because you were imperfect. But what I truly can’t forgive you for is how Mother wanted you to live, and you trampled all over that wish. I don’t know if you were born before or after me, but I truly wish you could’ve lived out your years peacefully somewhere else.”
“Stop that! Think you’ve already beaten me? I have other skills besides my natural harpy abilities, you know. If I tap into them—”
“Too late. I’ve already accumulated enough energy. And I hate to see you suffer any further, so let me finish you off with a single blow right now.”
“N-no…!”
It was only then that Nazim noticed Frey’s wings had gained a purple tint. Her beautiful wings of pure white, covered in a golden mesh, had been discolored by the lapping waves of violet electricity. The realization of what it was made Nazim freeze up.
Was she storing the electricity I released into her? How powerful could that be…?!
She tried to escape in a panic, but the talons holding Frey’s arm refused to budge. The queen’s own slender hand had latched onto Nazim’s arm as well. If Nazim had awakened before encountering Frey today, the outcome might have been different…but, at least, that would remain a hypothetical for all time.
“Good-bye, my sister. Echoreflection!!”
“Wait—?!”
Frey did not hesitate. She discarded all hesitation once she became queen.
All at once, she released her stored electricity. This was the ability she had acquired—the unique skill Duplicator, letting her take any attack an opponent lands on her body and strike right back with the same thing. It wasn’t an easy skill to use, given how it required her to take damage—but since the attack came from a fellow harpy, Frey could dominate in it, despite facing an opponent she’d normally have little chance against.
So, hit by this vast store of electrical energy all at once, Nazim was instantly scorched, carbonized, and killed.
“I don’t care whether you’re my older or younger sister, but Mother spoiling you certainly gave me a hard time. Although I do envy you a little, Nazim. At least you know for a fact your mother loved you…”
It was a small measure of goodwill toward Nazim as she plummeted to the ground. But the words didn’t reach her. The reunion between the two harpy sisters had come to an end, and they had come no closer to ever understanding each other.
And would that it could’ve ended there.
“…What? The souls gathering toward Nazim are coming for me now!”
A sudden feeling of drowsiness overtook Frey.
“It can’t be… Evolutionary sleep? Oh… So they want to take their resentment out on me instead of Nazim…”
Frey wasn’t exactly going to turn down an invitation to become a true demon lord…but this wasn’t the time or the place. She thought Carillon looked ridiculous down there, in fact. She was going to laugh at him later, but now this didn’t seem so funny to her. No point complaining about it, though.
“Lucia! Claire! Protect me throughout this. Carillon as well, please.”
“Yes, Lady Frey!”
“As you wish, my queen!”
The two of them promptly took action. Frey then flew to Carillon’s side. It’d be easier to protect these targets, she reasoned, if they were together rather than separate. Carillon had Sufia of the Three Lycanthropeers protecting him as well, and the three of them together would help increase the chances of survival.
And besides:
Good heavens. I came here to help out our forces, but now I’m just slowing them down. Falling asleep in the middle of a battlefield… I never thought I’d make an error like this in my life.
She was inwardly writhing in shame. It was truly the last thing she was expecting. But still she was lured into falling asleep, unsure whether she’d ever wake up again.
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