Swish! Dignitas slashed Dainsleif in an arc in front of him, forcing Lorelai to retreat.
Taking advantage of this, he charged forward and thrusted his sword forward like a rapier.
Somehow predicting this, Lorelai elegantly dodged sideways. A faint grayish glow could be seen shining from her eyes, a sign that she was indeed using Death's Vision.
Still, Dignitas knew she was only getting used to it, and it would take a bit of time before her mind managed to adapt to the many different images that appeared every time an enemy moved.
Once Lorelai was out of his range, she swiftly sheathed her sword and brought out the bow on her back.
Nocking three arrows simultaneously, the girl fired them seemingly without issue. Ftoop, ftoop, ftoop! The arrows pierced the very air they flew through.
Dignitas' own Death's Vision came into play here. As he was still in his recovery form from the last swing, he would have had no time to turn around to deflect the arrows. As such, he calculated the trajectory of the arrows and moved just enough that he barely got hit.
As he stood up to recover, Lorelai suddenly appeared in front of him with Wind Steps. His face showed hints of surprise as he raised Dainsleif to fend off her slashes.
Still, with her now superior vision, Lorelai managed to see the vulnerable spots in Dignitas' defense that he could not see.
'But Diggy will most likely see me go for it the moment I swing. In that case, I'll feint my swing.'
Seeing a glaring unprotected spot on his leg, Lorelai made a show of going for it. Then, when she saw Dignitas' eye look in the direction of her slash, she unexpectedly dropped the sword, letting it fall to the floor.
"Damnit, she got me." Dignitas cursed as he eyed Lorelai's smug expression.
It was too late. With a mischievous look on her face, the girl stretched her leg out and sweeped Dignitas from down under. With his balance lost, she exploited that moment and launched herself at the swordsman.
"Hiyah, haha!"
The both of them fell over from the charge as Lorelai wrapped her arms around Dignitas.
If people were to see their current position, they would most certainly get ideas. Lorelai was quite literally straddling the boy beneath her like a horse.
The sword called Dainsleif was still on Dignitas' right hand, meaning he could simply stab it through Lorelai's defenseless back if he wanted to.
Still, he didn't do it, simply allowing the girl to childishly rub her face in his chest.
"I win with this, right?"
"Yes, yes, you win. What do you wish for me to do, oh great Lorelai?"
"Then, how about we sleep on the same bed tonight?"
"You're taking this way too far. But you know what, a promise is a promise."
***
The next few hours, the two lovebirds continued their nightly routine. In just a few hours, Lorelai had already managed to get accustomed to the way he lived.
When she saw that Dignitas rarely ever took the time to eat a home cooked meal, the first thing she did was make him one. Just like the feast she had prepared before, this night's dinner felt as if it could hold up against even the fanciest restaurants.
Sleep was next. After they cleaned themselves up (separately) Dignitas headed to sleep first, taking the far end of the bed.
The bed that he had always slept on wasn't that big, being only around three quarters the size of a queen's bed. The reason for this was because he had never had an issue with the space due to being the only one sleeping there.
But now that Dignitas had a persistent gremlin vying for his warmth, he needed to find a way to take his mind away from it.
He planned to sleep early to spare himself the embarassment, but it seemed like Lorelai had other plans. Upon seeing the author hurrying to doze off, she launched herself onto his unaware body.
"Yaa! What the hell?"
"Shouldn't the man be on the other end of the bed? What if there's monsters?" Lorelai giggled as she rubbed her body all over Dignitas'.
"If there were monsters, I'm certain you'd be able to sense them."
Sighing, he got up and pulled the girl away from him and lied down on the place she left.
"Shouldn't you also be looking at me?"
"Well, I wouldn't be able to see the monsters if I did."
"I'll just tell you! Then you'll get up." Lorelai hmph'd, placing her hands on Dignitas' face, forcing him to look in her direction.
"What did I get myself into?"
Still, Dignitas wasn't one to refuse a girl's wishes. Especially if it was the person who he adored the most. He hurriedly turned around to face the girl who was beside him.
Thankfully, nothing else happened that night, much to Lorelai's dismay.
***
Even as the warm atmosphere threatened to lull Dignitas to sleep forever, he somehow couldn't get himself to do so.
In the middle of the night, flashbacks of what had happened just a few days ago were playing in his head. A certain demon was in the center of it all, its mysterious figure threatening to swallow him without even looking.
"Who was that?"
Instead of sleeping, Dignitas flipped through the Log, hoping to find something that could help him pinpoint who the demon was.
"No… it just wrote down what I already know."
Unimportant details like the demon's hair color and physique were the only things that were mentioned in the Log. There was no mention of who it was.
"Well, I know it's an A+ rank at the least. It was able to suppress its killing intent almost perfectly, so that means it's trained."
Demons had a unique trait to them. Unlike every other race like humans or elves, they were the only ones who leaked out Devil Ashra continously.
Their very existence was Devil Ashra itself, and the ones who weren't trained on how to conceal this were often the less experienced ones. Concealment had a number of benefits for them as a whole, but mainly, it was used to blend in with other races without getting sniffed out.
A tough and grueling process, demons often had to suppress their killing instinct, their destructive habits, just to get rid of even the slightest stench of Devil Ashra. They couldn't help it. It was in their nature to cause havoc, and no one had ever managed to figure out why.
Shift… Lorelai suddenly shifted in her sleep. Her eyes opened the next moment later, almost as if she had sensed that the person next to her wasn't asleep.
"Hey, it's not good to read in the dark, Diggy." She chastised the author.
"I know, I know. Say, Lorelai, I don't wanna bring up any bad memories, but…" Dignitas hesitated to ask.
"No, it's okay. I'll tell you everything. What do you want to know?"
"Thanks. Then… uh, a few days ago, when the school was invaded, did you perhaps get a glimpse of who took your eyes?"
Just thinking of the demon and what it did that day was enough to boil Dignitas' blood. He could sometimes imagine his hands on its head, ripping it clean off.
Lorelai seemed hesitant to recall. She did indeed manage to a good look of the demon, but it wasn't enough to surmise who it was.
It happened faster than she could blink. Here she was, enjoying lunch with Curie on the rooftop, and then the very next moment, a demon had appeared and taken her sight.
"It's okay, don't push yourself. You don't have to tell me."
"No, I remember. Just… give me some time, please, Diggy."
Silently nodding, Dignitas patted the girl's head with a smile and went back to skimming through the Log. Maybe he missed something, and it wouldn't hurt to take a look.
After a minute or so of silence between the two, Lorelai opened her mouth to speak.
"It… it was like me. The demon looked like me, only if I were a man."
Dignitas figured that was the case. Even with what little information he had on it besides its appearance when viewed from behind, it still was enough to think of a few hypotheses.
Namely, the possibility that the demon was someone related to Lorelai. Was it Mordecai, her brother?
'No, Mordecai should still be comatose alongside his girlfriend. There's no way it could be him. Last time I checked, he wasn't S rank.' Dignitas thought to himself.
"I see. Were you able to discern the demon's eye colors?"
This was it. Depending on Lorelai's answer to the question he had presented, the probability that the demon who attacked her was Mordecai would increase or decrease.
He patiently waited for her answer, keeping a positive expression the whole time to let her know it was all okay.
"I think it was… red."
"Red? This just makes it even more complicated."
With that answer, the question posed to them had just taken a different turn. It just so happened that red was the common color that demons' eyes took.
And this applied to both natural born demons created from Devil Ashra and those who were turned into demons by the former category.
This by itself already made it plenty annoying to distinguish the two types of demons, but when combined with the fact that red was also a common color of pupils for all races…
"I see now. Thank you for this, Lorelai. You were really helpful." Dignitas patted her head.
"You've been patting my head a lot, Diggy! Is it that addictive?"
"Oh, shut it. Go to sleep."