The Demon Lord Is An Angel
Chapter 307: A Novel Situation

Chapter 307: A Novel Situation

"You’re so mean!"

The human girl complaining up at Kir was dressed from head to toe in robes that absolutely did not suit her tattooed neck whined.

"Yeah, well, you’re the one who ignored all of Lumin’s letters." Kir crossed his arms, his tail coming automatically to his front as he looked at her sternly. Kir was disguised as a wolfkin man in his mid-thirties - about twice his actual age. He’d gone through a lot of trouble to get the disguise perfected after the first iteration of the glamour ring exploded on his hand.

"I didn’t ignore them! I put them away and forgot about them!" Moshui bent slightly and pulled the robe off of herself, pushing it away with her hair of all things. "I don’t need a degree to do what I want. Much less an ’honorary’ one."

They were at a degree-awarding ceremony - which at Kir’s suggestion was also turned into a party. Everyone gathered was either a professor, a guest, or a server - though this being at the Academy, almost all the guests and servers were students.

Kir slightly regretted ambushing Moshui with the honors she’d earned, but Lumin had left him no choice, and he had a solid excuse with Moshui anyway...

"You should have thought about that before revealing you know who I am," he said in a low voice, thoroughly aware she knew that little events like this were important for her to hold the spotlight in his place, since Kir Gale was supposed to be dead and not inventing half the things the city of Norneau now relied on for its economy. "For now, just enjoy the spotlight... Archmage Moshui the Novel."

She let out a long frustrated sound at the newest of her accumulated titles before sniffing the air. "Actually, I’m going to go enjoy the food..." She sniffed again. "I know that smell..."

Kir made sure to have the afterparty catered by her favorite restaurant, The Mouse’s Portion, which specialized in tiny versions of normal food, but mostly baked goods. And in short order, thanks to the boatload of tattoos that covered Moshui from her neck down to her toes, she was gripping dozens of little pastries with strands of hair that she could control as effectively as her own hands.

He, meanwhile, leaned against the wall and chuckled to himself as he watched Kordia walking with her new girlfriend.

Lapins had been a slow-burn romance for the last couple of years, and the fact she’d started to wear her hair and clothes in a more "princely" manner than most princesses made him wonder at once point if she - or perhaps he - might be like him. But Kordia had confirmed that for all her gentlemanly preferences, Lapins was very much cis-gender.

She had very high standards about who she was willing to engage romantically, namely only other royalty. This brought some sense to why she’d only tried deepening her friendship with Kordia after the latter became a princess in function, if not in name.

She was, however, was coming due to marry a prince, and stars knew she and Kir had been putting off discussing the issue in depth for quite a while, even though it came up whenever Kordia got letters from her fiance or her mother.

It had always seemed so far away, but now...

As he watched Kordia and Lapins start to dance, Kir wondered how he was going to break the news to her that her fiance-

A sudden clatter sounded, but the rotation of the serving dish had barely started when someone shouted.

"Death to tyrants!"

The clattering sound came from a dropped tray, and the assailant had cried out only after their dagger found its mark: The back of Princess Lapins van Montmorency.

Horrified, shocked cries began to sound out as the dagger was raised again.

Kir was already on the move, raising his hand to force a solid shield over the assailant, when from across the dance floor a flash of black and white preceded the arrival of Mercy, Lapins’ maid and bodyguard.

The attacker flew up, a slight popping sensation indicating just how weak the shielding they’d put up at the last second was, before crashing into the ceiling from the monstrously enhanced strength Mercy employed to protect her ward.

Forming a shielding spell, Kir hardened it and pinned the would-be assassin - a move he learned from his father when it was used against him. He and Mercy shared a look before the knife dropped, stabbing into the floor centimeters from Mercy’s foot. She didn’t even flinch.

On the floor, Kordia applied pressure and mana to Lapins’ wound, forcing it to close as the princess cried out with the pain of it. Magical healing without the assistance of potions was a painful endeavor, but as she continued, the silvery foxfire light of her magic eased the pain.

As soon as they realized they weren’t going anywhere, the assassin started shouting.

"Don’t save her!" "She knows what her Kingdom has done!" "All will be free!"

The last made Kir flinch. It was the motto of a group he was indirectly responsible for creating.

"Please quiet them, Professor Nasumi. I don’t want to waste mana getting past your shielding."

The speaker was Chancellor Lumin, a diminutive human woman with a friendly smile that belied her ruthless personality.

Nodding, Kir pulled the assassin to him roughly, keeping them shielded. Had they been a mage and shielded, they might have stood a chance at escaping, but up close Kir could tell they were just a normal person, perhaps possessed of only slightly more magical use in their life than average, based on what he could sense of their capacity.

In short order, their shouts, which he could now see came with desperate tears, were muffled as Kir adjusted his shields, increasing the internal reflectivity and surface area until he’d encased them in a soundproof, body-shaped space. To them, it would have looked as though the hexes of the shield suddenly lengthened into points all around them.

Now that he had a good look at them, the assassin was a short, close to stocky person with orcish and dwarven features, perhaps biologically male but it was hard to tell when the servers were all wearing aprons over white shirts and brown slacks. They had an orc’s green - and Kir suspected photosynthetic - skin and hair a shade of orange more common to dwarves.

"Please take them to the Watch, Professor Nasumi. I’ll make sure everyone here is taken care of." Lumin’s eyes flicked over to Kordia, who was healing a grimacing Lapins, and then Moshui, who was still eating.

"Wow, I did not see that one coming," Moshui said as she popped a tiny danish into her mouth.

Half the crowd looked at the newly minted Archmage with incredulity as she continued to eat.

As Kir was about to leave, one hand controlling the position of the would-be assassin, he was intercepted at the door.

"Professor! Please allow me to escort her to the Watch. It is the duty of nobles to ensure that those who would assassinate royals are meted their due justice."

The speaker was a well-groomed part-elven youth with long, golden hair and a retinue of equally vapid-looking female students. He was dressed in his school uniform, but had the golden-yellow embellished with rosevines and leaves.

"I’m sorry, who are you?" Kir quirked an eyebrow.

"Claud van Ingshire, a fourth year," the youth snapped his fingers and a light breeze blew, and a few magical sparkles appeared.

Kir felt like he should remember the name, but nothing sprang to mind. He ignored the pest and turned, walking the assassin out as Claud scoffed and muttered "Churlish dog!" at him. He was not in the mood to entertain some self-aggrandizing prick...

Nor was he in the mood to turn over the assassin to the Watch.

He let the assassin loose in the first unoccupied alley he could find.

"Whatever you’re going to do, make it quick." the assassin said in a hollow voice as Kir loomed over them. They were shaking with tension over the unexpected turn.

"Did you act alone?"

"I’m not telling you anything, slaver’s dog!"

"Oh for fuck’s sake... I’m trying to save your life! Are there any others you brought with you that I need to save? Because the odds of killing someone in a room full ofmages are pretty damn small."

"The killing would have been worthwhile... but the point was to deliver a message."

"Well, I’m sure your message was received! The way you were shouting it from the roof."

Kir stepped back and leaned against the wall of the alley. Almost immediately he had imagined any number of messages that abolitionists could send through assassinating Lapins. But most of what the assassin had said was the equivalent of ’Royal scum should die!’

"Who are you?" the assassin asked, interrupting Kir’s thoughts.

"I suppose you’ll find out eventually that I am Professor Kiryu Nasumi. Let me just say ’Where blue light shines...’"

"Let no slaver walk without fear," the assassin’s posture straightened a bit. "You’re with the Ghostlights?"

"In a manner of speaking," Kir answered.

The Ghostlights had founded themselves off the ideas and words Kir had propagated by introducing manga to Ayther, with the true - if embellished - adventures of his alter ego Ghostheart at the core...

Unfortunately they were so new and unprofessional that Kir found their antics to be a bit embarrassing. And if they were trying an attack in Norneau then they clearly hadn’t done their homework on the Academy... but trying assassinations at all meant something must have shifted.

The assassin eyed him coldly. "I came here alone... If you’re really with the Ghostlights, please let me go."

"I will, but only if you promise not to act out in this city. There are other means of abolishing slavery than violence, and they are available here. As Ghostheart says, "The correct methods should be timely, sustainable-"

"-and characterized to their specific places..." The assassin’s face brightened further. "Issue 18. That one’s my favorite."

"It was the one after that fucked up bank robbery in Tree Town. Amrita." The voice in Kir’s head was the real Kiryu Nasumi, his past life from Earth who was never lacking for ascerbic insights.

Kir tried to remember it. It was definitely one where Kordia had taken the most liberties with the story, tone, and action sequences... and he’d had to shorten a lot of his ideas to fit them onto the pages and not turn them into a novel...

"The point of that issue was that it is possible to do everything right and still fail. So let that be your lesson for tonight." Kir stood and bent, lifting up the sewer grate in the middle of the alley between him and the assassin. "Follow that down, it will take you to the New Docks."

Kir was unfortunately familiar with Norneau’s sewer systems after another mimic infestation was discovered when workers tried to install water purification and pressure spells for the new system he’d invented. One side effect was that the upper sewers were probably the nicest-smelling ones in the world...

"My name is Tulare," the assassin started lowering himself into the sewers before pausing. "Thank you... I’ll make sure the Ghostlights won’t forget this."

"Don’t be a martyr if you can help it," Kir said, picking up the sewer grate and sealing it above Tulare.

"Well... we’ll never see that guy again," Kiryu said sarcastically.

"Now all I need is an excuse for how they got away..."