The Demon Lord Is An Angel
Chapter 102: Speed Run, Longplay

Chapter 102: Speed Run, Longplay

Kir awoke with a jerk of his whole body, finding himself laying on his side. His tail hit something hard and he lifted himself to look, seeing that it had hit a tree.

Pushing off the ground with one hand, he saw that everyone had made a small camp where he’d fallen. Most of the Black Sheep were asleep, resting on cots and using their bags as equipment.

They’d dragged him away from the circle of destruction that marked the former location of the portal down, and in its place was a jagged black crack that seemed to pulse and throb, the air around it distorted in both color and dimension. It made Kir’s head hurt to look at it.

Taking another look at the camp, he saw Stella sleeping in a tree, Cheshire curled up on top of her. Underneath her Sam was leaning against the trunk, clearly keeping watch.

Kir stood and approached them.

"Hey," Kir said quietly, aware his steps were quite loud because of his size. "How long was I out?"

Sam looked up at him, their face unreadable with the mask. "Not long. You’re strong."

"Thank you... You fight well," Kir complimented back.

"Sword... Can I see it?" Sam asked.

"Oh... um. Sure." Kir reached into his storage and pulled out Kangetsu, as well as her sheath. He handed both to Sam. "Her name is Kangetsu. Cold Moon."

"Not steel..." Sam said instantly. "Enchantments are... Cold. Empty."

Kir was surprised Sam could recognize there was no steel in it. But he was more curious about they’d said. "Empty?" he asked.

Sam turned Kangetsu, showing the circle etched into the hilt. "Cold," they said, then turned it over. An empty circle was etched on the other side. "Empty."

Kir sounded his understanding. He hadn’t noticed before. "The metal gets tougher when it’s cold," he explained.

"Sounds... wrong," Sam tilted their head.

Kir smiled. "It would be for steel or iron... most metals people use. Not this."

"What is... this?" Sam asked, sheathing Kangetsu for Kir and handing her back.

Kir shook his head then stored Kangetsu. "You’ll need to visit my smith for one. His name is Enumasam."

Sam’s eyes were glittering when Kir looked back up. "Enumasam." "I will remember." "Thank you... Kir."

It was the longest string of words Kir had ever heard from them.

After standing around for a moment, Sam asked, "What are... you?"

"Hm? Oh. Just a half-demon," Kir said. "I, uh, this is my war form."

"War form... rare. Very tough. Boy or girl?"

"Boy," Kir said. "May I ask...?"

"Human... just human. Sometimes girl... sometimes boy. But... Don’t know. Too strange..."

Kir nodded, reading the story behind Sam’s words. "You don’t have to be either, if you don’t want to," he said.

Sam tilted their head. "Not either? Then what?"

"If you think of male and female as a binary, then to be neither is to be non-binary," Kir said. "They-them instead of he or she."

Sam thought about it for a moment. After a long while they leaned against the tree and looked up. "Didn’t know. Thank you. You’re smart."

"Good to see you two are getting along," Noir said as he walked up to them, rubbing his eyes. "Sam’s our scout. She’s usually-"

"They." Sam suddenly interrupted. "They."

"They..." Noir caught on, "...are usually a good judge of character. And the reason we didn’t slit your throat after dealing with the corpse stealer."

"Big throat," Sam said in a slightly teasing tone.

"I’m glad my throat remains unslit too," Kir said. "Thank you."

"You’re not mad at us for admitting it?" Noir asked.

"You have every right to be suspicious. I know I look all-demon right now, but this is my war form and I can’t figure out how to get out of it." Now that he had to interact socially with people who weren’t Stella, Kir could feel a more urgent need to stop being a quarter-sized kaiju.

"Getting a war form is rare for half-demons," Noir said.

"So I’ve heard," Kir replied. "I got it after destroying the main body of that corpse eater we fought."

"There was more of that thing?" Noir shuddered.

"Just the one that I saw. About the size of the Knight Academy in Norneau," Kir explained.

"Huh. And you destroyed it. I’d disbelieve if I didn’t just watch you single-handedly wipe out a mid-sized dungeon portal, four demon contracts, and a thing that’ll give my nightmares nightmares." He crossed his arms and leaned against the tree close to him. "So what’s a demon like you doing in a place like this? You mentioned Norneau."

Kir explained as best he could. He told Noir about the Academy, the journey into the Norneau dungeon, and the attempted assassination; leaving out details that seemed risky, like the fact he was a hybrid.

"Northern folks sure like stabbing people in the back," Noir grimaced after hearing the last part.

Sam shrugged. "Safest way."

"How about you tell me about the Black Sheep?" Kir asked. "I assume you’re an adventuring party."

"Party implies fun," - "I have fun," Sam interjected. - "And we’ve had a bit of bad luck lately."

Launching into his tale, Kir learned from Noir that the four of them had come from all over. Sam was from Botany Harbor, far to the southeast of Norneau on the continent. Caroon was from a town called Tov in the mountains south of Ro Tenet. Namosa was from Montmorency, one of the Lakelands nations. And Noir was from Nyandor, far to the northeast.

They shared common history though, each of them being misfits in their communities and all of them having wound up on Sweetling Island to work the sugar plantation of one particularly cruel overlord. A wagon accident killed the master of the house and in the ensuing confusion they’d escaped together before they could be forced into another contract. Since then they’d wandered, and their plan of late had been to earn enough to winter in Montmorency while trying to track down Namosa’s family.

Noir himself was disinclined to return to his homeland, Nyandor, since enchanters could make more money outside of majority-beastkin lands. A cultural focus on enhancing the body tended not to produce much demand for artifacts, and even the nekojin - known for their magic arts in ways similar to the foxkin - largely exercised the same bias against mage crafts. Kir suspected there was more to the story than Noir being a bitter magical engineer but didn’t pry. If it was important it would come up.

"And so after leaving Sousport they pretty much had us trapped on the boat... Ledot forced us into our contracts and that was that. I was playing along hoping he’d get himself killed, but Caroon has been taking things very roughly. I’ll have to patch things up with him later."

"Slavery is evil," Kir said. "I think... if ever I could dedicate my life to something, it would be ending it... And the people who profited from it. Then giving power to the people it’s harmed."

"Well you don’t aim small," Noir smirked. He raised a tiny fist as if to punch Kir on the leg but then thought better of it. "The whole world would hate you for that. The people on top at any rate. Gods included if you catch the wrong sort of attention."

"Fuck’em," Kir said. "The whole world hates demonkin already. So I’m not losing anything there. We live in a world with freaking magic. No one should be forced to work if there’s another way."

"Magic can’t do everything," Noir said. "Can’t fix people that just want to be evil because they can... So why do I get the sense you actually believe you can do what you’re saying?" Noir asked.

"Because I do," Kir said. "The way this world is being run, the cycles of Heavenswars and destruction... It has a cause. Slavery, poverty, war... those are all symptoms of an order that is made to take for the few more than it gives to the many... if it gives anything at all..."

Kir recalled his conversation with the history professor at the Academy. Something was clicking into place in his memories, faster now after his latest encounter with the voice. The sure knowledge that what he saw on Ayther was a symptom of the world being the periphery of an empire nobody recognized, because it was removed from their day-to-day lives. Their local suffering.

"If I can change how things are done. How things are made and how people organize themselves, then no one has to suffer for those who already have everything.

Noir stared at him for a long moment. "Right. Well. Mind taking the watch? This floor has some nasty critters but they mostly stick to the puddles. I’d like to talk about a few things with Sam." Noir’s ears flicked behind his horns.

"No problem," Kir agreed. He needed time to think. To figure out where his realizations were going. To apply himself dialectically to the problems of which the Black Sheep were all victims.

"Great. Once everyone’s up we’ll talk spoils and getting out of here. No reason to stick around after a dungeon collapse unless you feel like investigating the mysteries of death."