*
"... They... Had a family...?" (Karell)
Her utterance came off as a surprise. It seemed that within their party alone there were already multiple types of people, multiple types of reception towards that information.
"As much as humans do before they become orphans, yeah." (Barius)
Barius was indifferent to it, as a commander she had to make some unsavory decisions during her career. She had firmly positioned the lives of various people and beings and understood which one to prioritise.
If it was to save someone higher on the priority list, she wouldn't hesitate to discard those who are lower. Only Kaori clashed with her head on, arguing to save everyone there is. She was the idealism that Barius rejected.
But things were fine like that, Barius wouldn't want to lose Kaori's shimmering dreams, but she wouldn't give away her perfection for anything else either.
"... There was nothing we could do about it, not that we should have smuggled her for the sole sake of having a family. How many demons do you think will have a similar backstory? How many others do you think will use it as an excuse to backstab us?
Moreover, how many humans do you think they've killed...? " (Kaede)
"... Didn't we just annihilated an entire town? " (Karell)
"... Do you want me to take your head now to avenge those people? " (Kaede)
She hadn't dematerialized her rapier, it was still gripped firmly within her fingers after she flicked off the remains of the demons off its blade. Her aura didn't flare up in any way but noticeably got darker, her residual magical particles were getting denser showing a higher usage of magic.
This lasted for a moment before Kaede turned towards the exit and signaled for the rest to follow. Was it a sensitive subject for her? It must be, considering her strong sense of justice and the monumental regret that must have been born from it.
To Karell, justice wasn't something for her to uphold, but to use as a weapon. With how Kaede went about it, she could only see it as a shackle that served no meaning to abide by. It gives her reasons, excuses to hurt the enemy and torture them, bringing out some of her sadistic tendencies... Karell had lived in a remote village.
Within the boundary of those tall fences, there was no such thing as hope. So she had long turned to herself, relied on her own strength. And when she awakened as a magical girl, she took it exploited its power as if it was karma. She couldn't let the others run away, so she pretended to be a guardian of the village all the way up until the selection for the Human King started. She met Kaede, then event stage incident occurred.
Up until she didn't see anything wrong with planting those mines. She held a name, Alesha dtirunomia deep within her heart. While she was born in the village, Alesha was 'adopted' there. She didn't have any say in the process, it might be more accurate to call it a kidnapping. To make it short, Alesha was forced to take a husband from the village and ultimately died an untimely death.
Karell didn't want to think about what happened in those days any longer. When she awakened as a magical girl, she began labeling her rule under the name of justice, the villagers were forced to accept it. She didn't do much for the most part of an entire year, earning their trust. So she asked for their support which they gleefully agreed. If the Human King came from their village, what riches would they be bestowed upon? In the face of such elusive rewards, what better way to win than to use the villagers as supporters to pad the numbers?
When they began to deviate from the slightest bit of the rules she made, Karell killed them. Without a bit of hesitation, a single slap from her turned them into mince meat. No one dared to touch the corpse for a while. The smell of rot and insects lingered on the remains for a while longer. Anyone who got near felt like their nostrils were peeling inside out, as if their life was being defiled.
Karell had applied spacial magic to preserve the corpse, it continued to decompose of course but its contents would never seep into the ground and escape. All 100% of the original body was still there, rotting in the carcass water of itself. This very much solidified her rule, while justice was a leash that kept her hold on them, it also prevented her from outright rampaging and tearing their necks.
Just as how she had suddenly awakened into a magical girl, she feared that one of the survivors might do the same. So she limited the violence to a minimum and waited until she managed to gather all 200+ of them in the same place. The spatial mines, they simply launch the space above them at a fast speed, tearing through the bodies with a vacuum.
She had to wait to gather them all first before lining the perimeter with the mines, otherwise they would get killed early and alert everyone. So she faithfully waited for everyone to arrive before slowly planting them around from a distance. She had many hours to work with, and all she needed to do to keep their attention was to entertain them? This idol event or whatever... It was a convenient weapon after all.
But now that was all in the past. Oddly enough, she felt like going along with Kaede just this once. The demons had breached the line, the prophecy had no mention of such a thing. Everyone had assumed the Human King would be chosen and the Demon King would be killed before anything serious happened. It had given everyone an unearned sense of safety, as if the world itself was protecting them by following their interpretation of the prophecy.
Her ferocious back shone even within the darkness of this humid dim labyrinth. Her arms weren't too thin or too thick, they seemed like they would open the door to a new world each time she stared from behind. If it was her... Then even she might even find it. Something she was concerned with before she executed her revenge, she was looking for something.
They past through multiple rooms with ease, searching for demons along the way. In the rooms her radar could reach, Kaede would kill them before they even noticed her. Slicing an entire room apart laterally, they enter room to see a few bisected demon corpses. Without batting an eye, they continue moving through the series of rooms. At this point, Kaede was getting used to the layout and texture of the rooms as she travelled with utter ease, her legs bent optimally and propel her forward to exactly where she wanted to go.
She lands a few metres away from the entrance of the room and stabs her extended rapier into a closet at a distance away, the closet was sticking closely to the wall and her rapier grew to the length of the room before piercing through it. When she pulls out her rapier with swift dexterity, a heavy armoured body was pulled out along with it. A demon jumps her from the other side, slamming a giant axe onto her rapier which was recovered to parry in time, releasing a guttural screech between the weapons.
An extra appendage grows from the side of her rapier and pierces its heart and decapitated it in a single agile motion. She shortens her rapier and swings it, as if flicking away blood from its edges. But she was actually resharpening it, letting its constitution become similar to a liquid to freely flow before swinging it to extend and thin it.
"Let's go." (Kaede)
In this short span of time, her mission was extremely clear and simple. Slaughter the demons, leave none of them alive. If she want to be the Human King, now was the time to prove herself by putting things under her belt. It seemed Karell had taken a backseat, but knowing her Kaede didn't believe for a single moment that Karell had quit. In fact Karell must be trying to gather further intelligence on Kaede.
She walked forward, bent her knees and shot to the front faster than a bullet. Landing in a room with a demon, she swung her legs and plowed through its armour and flesh with sheer force. She twists her legs, mangling the metal beyond recognition between her thighs as blood and flesh seeped out between the cracks in the metal. For a moment, she was grateful that her combat dress had thigh highs. She couldn't imagine how gross it would be for the corpses to stain her skin under the thigh highs.
"... This was more like a hunting ground... There hasn't been much threat, as if only the weaklings are left... " (Karell)
"... Hey..." (Kaede)
An inexplicably complicated expression dyed her cheeks as she gazed at Barius. Barius wore a similarly contorted face as she nodded. Kaede then turned to face the owner. From the start, the place hasn't been adding up.
"Owner... You have the residents kept safe don't you? They're here somewhere, aren't they?" (Kaede)
All this time, they had been optimistically trusting the owner of the labyrinth. But... That was just hopeless optimism, at a time like this it was far better to at least check. If they were wrong and the people were truly safe... That would be better... But...
"This space is an endless labyrinth of rooms, while the demons wouldn't get far no matter how much time passes, it wouldn't make any sense for some kind of 'safety room' to be around to keep the people safe. Where are they?" (Kaede)
To have a safety room and definite space... If the owner travelled an infinite amount of rooms away, would this space still be retrievable? Is it even possible to have such a convenient shelter in this Oblivion Magia?
"..." (Owner)
"... If someone could use an Oblivion Magia, they would be able to choose who gets to go in and who wouldn't.
Usually someone would just bring the humans in, it would become impossible for any demons to get in unless they had a similar skill to Karell. " (Barius)
"... Then the demons likely broke in. There's little chance that the people are still alive after all this time. This was a vindictive hunting ground. " (Karell)
So they were too late... Kaede was filled with such regret, her fight with Karell resulted in not one but two atrocities. Her knees felt powerless as she dropped onto the floor.
" Damn... Damn it...!!! " (Kaede)
"It's not your fault..." (Karell)
"DAMN!!! THEN WHOSE DO YOU THINK IT WAS?!" (Kaede)
Her throat growled with anguished fervour. Another group of people lost. Her hair shook around, her rapier trembled.
"..." (Karell)
She remained speechless. As a matter of fact, she did set off those attacks and directly contributed to this situation, but it felt uncomfortable attributing all of it to her. But she understood that telling Kaede that now wasn't the right move, she might lose her life in the next second.
Not to mention, Kaede would be the one who understood the most... That the blame partially lay with her. That was why she was so mad right now. It was her regret lashing out with nowhere to go.
"... Enough, Kaori. We got more important things to do, clearly it's too late for that shitty prophecy anyway. Let's take the Demon King's head now." (Barius)
As if on cue, the owner let them out. The demons had been exterminated by Kaede, they had nothing left to do here. The dark rooms vanished and the familiar light of the setting sun painted over her skin in a tone of gold. A lone magical girl appears in front of them, it was likely the original body of the labyrinth's owner. Pushing herself to maintain that dimension had left her haggard and breathless right after leaving it.
She had fluffy brown hair with a lime green and dark navy dress. Her skin was slightly tanned like Kenzi's. She must have been one of the guards dispatched here to deal with the demons.
"... Their boss... He was way stronger. He looked like a giant lizard man, and he abducted the residents away... Leaving the weaker demons behind..." (Owner)
So they weren't dead. In fact, the leader of the demons sent here had kidnapped the populace without letting his own men know. He must have left every demon subordinate of his back here and went back alone. Kaede looked straight at Karell with what seemed to be a rigid glare.
"... My bad for shouting earlier. Looks like there's still here, would you continue helping us? We'll hunt down that last demon, take the head of the Demon King and plunge their country into darkness." (Kaede)
"... I'm in!" (Karell)
She returned with a similarly ferocious smile, cause the edges of Kaede's lips to perk up and reveal some teeth. The adrenaline was getting to them, Barius observed. But this was good, far better than having Kaori mope around. A tangible enemy that she could see and fight, it would drive Kaori forward far more than any feelings could.