The Daughter of Evil - Volume 1 - Chapter SS1

THE DEMONIC TWIN BLADES; SCENE 1
The Demonic Twin Blades short story

☼ Master Craftsman Langley ~In the Kingdom of Lucifenia, “Langley Smithy”~

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The country had changed, and so change had also visited upon the scope of my work at the smithy.

When it came to the “Langley Smithy”, one could say that things had changed primarily in a good direction.

The settlement of the revolution certainly didn’t mean we would have peace. On the contrary, the chaos caused by the change in leadership had led to the birth of several new seeds of war.

Whether it was invasion from foreign countries, or further internal conflicts—that’s not for this mere blacksmith to know. But this prediction was something everyone could make. The fact that this smithy had been flourishing despite the fact that the war had ended was more proof of that than anything.

Frankly speaking, supplying weapons for the resistance had been an extremely dangerous gamble. If the revolution were to have failed, then it wouldn’t have been the princess beheaded in the town square, but rather the members of the resistance. Naturally, I was included among their number.

But it didn’t turn out that way, and high quality of the weapons that the resistance used had resulted in my becoming known to a great many people.

One such person was the great merchant, Keel Freezis. Thanks to his considerable financial assistance, the outlet for my smithy grew, and I gained in both equipment and workers.

…Though I’ll have to pay him back for all that over some long months and years, on the whole the benefits have been fairly large.

Now, there are three other smiths outside of myself in the smithy. Two of them are new hires, but both of them had originally worked for other blacksmiths before. They were fairly skilled for their youth. Our workload going up was no reason to let the quality of our goods go down, and as long as I had the two of them I didn’t think I had much to worry about there.

The other one—Nagisa Coulomb, the lone woman in the smithy, started working here around eleven years ago. I recall my Chartette loving the yet youthful girl Nagisa like a little sister when she first arrived.

Nagisa hardly swung her hammer like the other smiths. Her strong suite was the construction of weapons that used gunpowder. To an old man like me who could only make old-fashioned swords and shields, the weapons ideas that Nagisa came up with were extremely innovative and interesting, and in practice during management of the store Nagisa’s gunpowder rifles grew more heavily prioritized as the years went by.

…Only, she’d really dropped the ball when she’d come up with the plans for the “Gunpowder-filled iron glove”. It was something that allowed one to fire a glove like a weapon, and the prototype that she’d made for it was hardly practical.

Its power as a weapon certainly wasn’t bad. But thinking on it as a defensive garment, it was too dangerous to always have on you something that could potentially explode on impact. Its kickback when fired was so intense that only brawny men could really handle it well.

At some point that prototype had disappeared from the smithy. Nagisa had probably not wanted her failure to be exposed to the public, and so disposed of it without anyone knowing.

That was little more than a guess on my part.

She was always shy, and never said much.

–Not even who was the father of the baby that was inside her growing belly.

I realized that Nagisa was pregnant right after the revolution had ended. I hadn’t heard anything about her having a boyfriend, but I didn’t really have the right to judge her for being with child. At the time I had thought that if she’d found someone to marry, then that was good enough.

But according to the gossip of the other smiths…the child’s father was a man who was just passing through. And furthermore, he was the leader of a band of mercenaries, and died during the revolution.

In the end, the only thing I could do was ask Nagisa the truth, as the person running the smithy.

As expected she didn’t tell me anything concrete, but…she did plead to me, “I will raise the child by myself once they’re born. I have no doubts about this. So please, let me work here like I have until this point.”

I couldn’t do anything so heartless as to cast Nagisa out. Without much alternative I decided to pay heed to her request, but seeing how big her stomach has gotten she’d be on her last month soon. Naturally I’d have to give her time off before and after the birthing.

What should I do after the baby is born?—I consulted my wife on it, and she delightedly volunteered to help take care of the child.

“Our fool girl is all grown up and out of the country, so it’ll be perfect.”

And then after saying so, she laughed loudly.

Yes, our daughter—Chartette—had suddenly gone in a journey after the revolution, having been seized by some notion or another.

Personally I’d like for her to come home soon and start looking for a husband…but, well, maybe it’s always been a pipe dream to think that we could keep our wild girl cooped up in this tiny smithy.

Frankly speaking, I’m not that worried. I’ve heard tale of her efforts during the revolution, and she’s with Germaine besides, so she’ll be fine.

But….it was starting to look like it’d be a while before I’d be able to see any grandkids.

–Thinking on that, perhaps the situation with Nagisa’s child was perfect for his wife after all.

“Lucifenian women are all stubborn…Don’t you think so–Leonhart?” I murmured without thinking, facing the direction where the Lion Knight’s grave was.

My job of striking metal with my hammer had grown extremely rough lately.

It would probably be time to retire soon…While I swung my arm with such thoughts in my head, one of the other smiths across from me suddenly lifted their head and said, “…Looks like we’ve got a customer, boss.”

When I turned around, I saw a young man wearing garb that wasn’t often seen around here looking around at the smithy with great interest.

“~♪”

I didn’t know why, but he was cheerfully humming a little tune.

Even stranger, he was shouldering some kind of long thin case wrapped in cloth.

Though I had been in the middle of working, perhaps my ears have been getting worse from age that I didn’t notice all until I had it pointed out to me by someone else.

…The melody of the tune he was humming was familiar.

“Who’re you?”

I didn’t say that with any intention of intimidating him, but it seems the other man took it that way. He took a step back with an apologetic expression, and began to introduce himself.

“I beg your pardon. My name…is Mikhail Asayev. My profession is—”

“You a monk?”

“—Yes, exactly. That’s quite a good guess, considering I’m not wearing my robes.”

“You were humming a hymnal. So I figured that might be the case. –This is a smithy that specializes in weapons. If you want a rosary you’ll have to find some other shop.”

“Oh no no, that’s not it—I came here with a comission regarding weapons, nothing less. I was encouraged to come here by King Marlon.”

A referral from Kyle Marlon—that must mean that he was a fairly high-ranking monk.

In that case, I couldn’t very well dismiss him.

Mikhail laid the case he was carrying onto the floor, pulled off the cloth and opened the lid.

And there inside it—were two unrefined looking swords.

“These are ritual objects long held in Holy Levianta…the ‘Twin Swords of Levianta’,” Mikhail said, his left pupil abruptly rotating around once.

“These are ritual objects? –You’re putting me on. The Levin church making swords into ritual objects?”

“These are being held not by the church, but the country of Holy Levianta itself. Monks don’t carry swords. However, though this is a religious country, military might is necessary to protect the dignity of our country and religion. Think of this as a symbol of that.”

Spinning.

Mikhail’s left eye swiveled again.

–I couldn’t help but find the movement unnaturally awkward.

It probably wasn’t the eye he was born with. It looked fake, man-made.

“…So then, what is it with these swords?”

“Right. Among these twin swords, it is said that one represents ‘Creation’, and the other ‘Ending’. They originally belonged to the Li family in the distant past when Holy Levianta was called the Magic Kingdom, but they were taken outside the country shortly before the Leviantan Catastro—Ah, you don’t seem terribly interested in this sort of history. You have a very bored look on your face.”

“…”

“Well then let’s put a stop to that for now, and move on to the main topic of conversation. My commission—is for you to completely destroy these swords.”

“…Wha!?”

I didn’t understand what he was getting at.

Expressly going to the trouble to take swords to a smithy, not to hone them or hammer them back into shape…but to destroy them?

…No, hold on.

“I understand, I know what’s going on. You’re…trying to get the crime pinned on me. You want the swords destroyed for some reason. But if you destroyed ritual artifacts you would obviously be punished for it. So to keep that from happening you’re going to use another country’s blacksmith—”

“No no, it’s nothing with that kind of conspiracy to it,” Mikhail denied my assertion, waving his hands exaggeratedly. “I’ve obtained permission from the archbishop on this.”

So saying, he showed me a sheet of parchment.

–And sure enough, the gist of what was written on there was basically, “The perpetrator who carries out the destruction of the Twin Swords of Levianta will not be charged with any crime”. As soon as I saw the archbishop’s signature and the dragon symbol next to it, I could tell…it was not a false letter.

“So then…I really don’t get why.  Why on earth would the archbishop himself want the ritual artifacts passed down in his country to be destroyed—”

“Mister Langley. Do you…know of the ‘Vessels of Deadly Sin’?”

“…Only what rumor tells me. Just the legends spoken of among the other smiths here.”

–In this world there existed several weapons and tools wherein dwelled “Demons of Deadly Sin”, and no matter how skilled the craftsman, these could not be remade or destroyed.

Long before, a certain blacksmith was able to find a spoon that was one of the “Vessels of Deadly Sin”, and tried to reforge it into a fork. However, ultimately not only was he unable to carry that out, but he was possessed by the demon and driven to die in madness–that was the kind of thing they would talk about.

“You don’t mean…these twin swords are ‘Vessels of Deadly Sin’?”

“Indeed…Though perhaps it’s a bit hard to believe up front. Thanks to that, the archbishop is greatly aggrieved at the fact that he sanctified items with a demon inside as ritual artifacts.

“So then just throw them away somewhere.”

“I can’t do that. If I did, and someone else were to find them, then there’s a chance misfortune would befall this person. I’ve already made this same request to blacksmiths throughout Holy Levianta, but none of them were able to destroy it.”

Cursed swords that held a demon inside, and couldn’t be broken—

My interest as a blacksmith was overcoming my terror.

I took one of the swords in hand and knocked it against the floor at several angles to test it out.

…Contrary to expectation, the sword easily snapped after several times of this.

It snapped quite neatly.

“Hey…It’s broken off.”

“You think so? And yet…by tomorrow I guarantee it’ll be remade like it was before.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Well then, you should see it yourself with your own eyes tomorrow. …You have seven days. That’s how long I’ll be staying in this country. I’ll come back on the morning of the third day, and if I’m able to confirm that the twin swords have been destroyed—” Mikhail swiveled his left eye, and showed me a bag full of gold coins. “—One million Ev. That is what I’ll pay you as your fee.”

“…That is an extremely large amount of gold.”

“It’s to compensate just for the risk you’re undertaking. After all is said and done, these swords have a demon in them after all. …If you feel any kind of danger or feel afraid and want to quit on the commission, then take the swords to the great Levin church. That’s where I’ll be staying. –Well then.”

Without waiting for a proper reply from me, Mikhail walked out from the entrance.

…So, what should I do?

For now, I tossed the snapped sword in my hand in the case. Next I scooped up the piece of blade that had broken off and similarly put it in the case.

I closed the case and set it in a corner of the smithy.

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–The following morning. When I opened the case to check, just as Mikhail told me, the sword that should have still been snapped in half had returned to how it had been before.

I had the key to the smithy on my person, and never took it off, so there wasn’t any trace that some outside person had made their way inside. It didn’t also seem to me like any of the smiths were pulling a prank on me.

I thought to myself that this was quite an interesting article. I didn’t necessarily believe the nonsense that there was really a demon inside, but regardless I could tell this was a job that wouldn’t be quite so straightforward.

I didn’t have any real obligation to take it on, but if I could get all that money just for destroying some swords, I had no reason not to.

First, I properly examined the twin swords to come up with an opinion on them.

In ancient times, the Magic Kingdom that supposedly was destroyed by a catastrophe caused by a dragon was said in legends to have had a culture that was far, far more advanced than what we had now. Whether that was true or not, when it came to these swords they didn’t seem to be made by any particularly advanced technology at all. The metal used in them had a low purity, and there was no particular detailed decorations like as would be on a treasured sword.

I decided to have the other smiths help me, and smash them into pieces using a large steel hammer. Not just the body of the blades, but also the hilts and the guard, everything. I put the items that had been reduced to rubble into the case and left it be, but of course by the next day it was completely reformed again.

This time I tried melting it with heat. Thanks to the new model of furnace we had, it was comparatively simple to reduce the twin blades to masses of iron. But…by the next day, those too had returned to their original form as swords.

As expected the other smiths were creeped out, and though they had participated intending to get a cut of the reward, they soon wanted nothing to do with the twin blades. When they did, Nagisa who had seemed indifferent of it all up to then, suggested I try exploding it with gunpowder.

I couldn’t very well do that inside the smithy, so I decided to do it at a nearby riverbank. When I blew up the twin swords buried inside gunpowder, there was a great cheer from all the spectators watching. I took the pieces of the pulverized sword back to the smithy to see what would happen…but I couldn’t hope for much.

I decided to watch over the pieces of the sword through the night, by myself. It always reformed itself in the middle of the night. So then, I figured I would see this happen with my own eyes.

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–Around two in the morning, a peculiar event happened.

It seemed to me that the moonlight that was coming in through the small window in the smithy suddenly grew brighter.

Right after I realized that, the scene before my eyes suddenly grew too dazzling to see…And then I lost consciousness.

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–I realized that my body was sinking into the ocean.

I felt no difficulty at all from being unable to breath, so I quickly could tell that it was a dream.

An enormous fish with rainbow scales was swimming right in front of me.

“…Cease your pointless actions.”

It was a woman’s voice.

“You cannot destroy a ‘Vessel of Deadly Sin’. Even if you could—there’s no meaning in doing so.”

Was this fish the demon that dwelled in the twin swords?

When I asked her, the fish replied “Correct”, and then continued.

“You are quite lucky. I am a pacifist demon, and as such you are safe even now. If you were to have done such things on any other ‘Vessel of Deadly Sin’…You would have been cursed long before. However, I grow tired of playing around on this any further. And…none of you can protect me.”

“Protect you? Are you saying that someone is hunting you?”

“Yes. A ‘sorceress’ who is collecting ‘Vessels of Deadly Sin’—I refuse to be used by the likes of a human being. Mikhail Asayev…Right now, in this period I should be able to deceive her with an ‘Inheritor’ like him. And that girl, Nagisa or something…I could perhaps wait for her child to grow up, but—”

Sorceress—did she mean Elluka Clockworker, one of the Three Heroes?

And…what was an “Inheritor”?

“…I won’t let you put a hand on Nagisa.”

“Then return the twin blades to Mikhail immediately. I think that would be the best thing for the both of us, hahaha—"

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–And there, I woke up.

It was already dawn. Instead of moonlight, sunbeams were streaming in from the window.

And…as expected, the pieces of the blades were once more twin swords.

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Had that just been a dream? Or was it a vision that the demon had shown me?

Either way, it would be impossible to destroy these twin swords through regular means.

I had to think of what I would do after this point.

I could just obediently give up and return the twin swords to Mikhail. I’d lose the opportunity to make a large amount of money, but this all happened by chance anyway. I had little need to be greedy about it.

But if these blades really did have demons in them…Could I really just leave them be? They probably wouldn’t cause any trouble if they were in Mikhail’s hands, him being a monk and all…but there was no guarantee that he wouldn’t get possessed by a demon.

The other route that I could think of—I could entrust it to the sorceress Elluka Clockworker. Someone like her might know some way to seal the demon inside.

But I’d heard that Elluka had left the country after the revolution started. I had no way to learn where she was. And she was a friend of the Levin archbishop in the first place. So then, maybe he had already contacted her for help and it hadn’t gone well, or else…maybe he’d had some reason not to.

Well, that wasn’t something I ought to participate in. At any rate, the idea of entrusting the twin swords to Elluka wasn’t realistic.

There’s also—No, I can’t do that. That’d be ridiculous.

A certain being came to my mind, but I instantly dismissed it.

–Spirits.

That was another story told of in the smithy.

That there were dependents of the great earth god Held that were said to live in the Millenium Tree Forest.

And that among those various spirits, there was supposedly one that could destroy and devour anything.

But then…Even if that being exists, I’m hardly likely to find it in just two or three days.

In the end, no other good ideas came to mind after that.