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Maou no Hajimekata Volume 2 Chapter 15 Part 3

 

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Translator: DarkHeartedAlchemist

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Chapter 15: Let’s Destroy the Immortal Hero, Part 3

「Impossible!」

Aur shouted, confirming that the bed Hoseli was supposed to be confined in was indeed empty.

However, the vines that bound her body were left completely intact, there was not even a trace of them being tampered with. But something like that was just not possible for her to do, unless she possessed an ability similar to Yunis’ teleportation.

「Sofia, scan the entire Dungeon for any traces of Hoseli! And what about the limbs you threw in the freezing room yesterday?!」

「I can’t sense her anywhere, but her limbs are still in the freezing room, exactly where I’ve left them.」

「What did you say?」

So did she managed to escape without reclaiming her lost limbs, crawling on the ground like a caterpillar? Aur didn’t dwell on that thought for long though. For now, “how” was not their most pressing concern. It was “where”.

She couldn’t have gone far in her current state. Otherwise she would’ve surely made a move on Aur already. But if Sofia said that she was nowhere in the Dungeon, then it must’ve been the truth.

In that case…..

「Mari! Call Gaius for me!」

「Okay. He should be able to lend us a hand since he’s such a nice guy.」

So Mari did as Aur ordered her.

「Hear my voice and respond to my summons, oh all-seeing sacred spear, Gaius 『The Unknown』!」

Mari’s blue eyes turned red, and her hair turned gray. Right now she became possessed by a soldier who once struck down the saint with his spear and became a blind Heroic Spirit with the ability to see everything in a thousand miles thanks to the blood that sprayed over his eyes, Gaius 『The Unknown』, currently known as Gaius the Blind. His ability was vastly inferior to that of Eve, but he could probably see the whole country of Yamato with it.

「The one you’re looking for is standing at the edge of the forest, Demon Lord.」

「Hmm, that’s actually closer than I thought… wait, did you say she’s standing?」

For a moment Aur thought that he did not hear him correctly.

「Standing, as in… she has her limbs on?」

「Yes, a pair of arms and a pair of legs, without any visible scars.」

In addition to his clairvoyance, Gaius could also determine the exact movement of muscles and the number and pace of the heartbeats. If she has all of her limbs on again, then she must’ve used some kind of healing or restorative magic, but even the strongest spells known to Aur would still require about a day to take full effect. So it must’ve been something even stronger than that.

「She’s moving again!」

Sofia screamed, and made a projection of the area of the forest that Hoseli was currently in.

The person running through the forest was without a doubt Hoseli, but there were no visible traces of damage of any kind on her body or clothes she was wearing.

「What is the meaning of all this?」

「We can try asking her directly, but if you want to know my opinion, it’s going to be the same as yesterday.」

Standing beside confused Aur, Hoderi grabbed a hold of his blade.

「Let’s just get this over with. Miss Sofia, can you please drop me to her location?」

「R-right!」

If his sister still hadn’t learned her lesson, then he will pummel it down that thick skull of hers as many times as necessary.

「Hoderi!」

Before he headed out, Aur called out to him.

「I know, I know. I won’t kill her.」

「No. Be careful. I have a bad feeling about this.」

For someone of Aur’s caliber, that was an awfully vague advice.

「Don’t worry, I will.」

Hoderi blinked a few times and tightened his expression.

Be careful not to kill her, that is how he interpreted this. Do not kill her, and avoid any unnecessary damage.

Whether or not that miraculous regeneration of hers was a magic trick or not, but all he had to do was to cut off all of her limbs again to prevent her from moving. Besides, whatever that ability was, there must be a limit to it.

Hoderi prepared his sword as his sister emerged from the shadows of the forest. And she just charged him head on in a foolish maneuver. There was no trace of his old sister’s refined assassination movements and techniques left in her. It was like she was someone else entirely.

Stepping forward, Hoderi slashed his target without a shred of hesitation, aiming for the opponent’s head. If he pierces her forehead with too much strength, he’s going to destroy the brain and kill her, so he needed to drive his blade in for about half an inch. For a refined swordsman like him, something like that was as easy as breathing.

She tried to dodge it, but was too slow, resulting in the sword passing straight through her right eyeball. But at that time, Hoderi had a strange feeling.

「Mu…..?」

His attack was more shallow than he thought. Initially he wanted to slash sideways after the thrust to take both of her eyes out, but unfortunately he only managed to get one of them. Unfazed by the blood gushing from her eye socket, Hoseli attacked her brother with her longsword.

Her attacks were so unrefined that Hoderi didn’t even had to use his legs to dodge them, he just did that by parrying Hoseli’s blows and shifting his center of gravity ever so slightly. At the same time, when he prepared a counter aimed at her arm, the feeling of discomfort grew even stronger.

「What?!」

Taken aback, Hoderi made a hasty retreat. When his sword connected with Hoseli’s arm, it felt as if he struck a plate of tempered steel, not human flesh.

Even if his attacks were so powerful that they could cut a steel pillar in half, all he managed to do now was to tear the gloves off of his sister’s hands, revealing the skin without even a trace of hair on them.

「What is the meaning of this, sister?!」

He swung at her one time, two times, three times, making a rain of sparks fly into the air with each hit. He tore her armor and garments, but never the person herself. The only effective attack was the one at her eye at the very beginning of their battle. And even that was not as he originally intended to be.

He tried aiming for Hoseli’s other eye, but his attack was stopped by the palm of her hand. With her bare, soft hand alone, she was able to hinder a blow that had Hoderi’s entire body weight behind it.

「Forgive me, master!」

Aiming at Hoseli’s throat, he waited for the moment when she reflexively tried to grasp the tip of his blade. The moment her fingertips touched it, he twisted his body and spun around with Godspeed.

The sword tore through Hoseli’s mouth and teeth, coming out at the other side of her head. Unlike the exterior of her body, the inside of her mouth was apparently not hard enough to stop his sword from piercing through it.

When he pulled his silver sword out, a fountain of blood gushed from Hoseli’s pierced head and mouth. She then collapsed on the ground without moving. It was a clean, instant death.

「I beg your forgiveness, master. I wasn’t able to stop my hand from claiming my sister’s life.」

「No, it couldn’t be helped in such a… wait!」

Seeing what was going on thanks to Sofia, Aur’s eyes opened wide. That was because Hoseli’s body, that was supposed to be killed just now, has disappeared. Traces of blood and torn clothes are still there, but the body is nowhere to be seen.

「SOFIA!!!!」

「She, She’s nowhere to be found!」

「Nowhere in Yamato, at least.」

Sofia reports that to Aur, and Mari, who just returned to her original self, looks around, trying to assess the situation.

「What do you mean she’s not in Yamato?!」

Surely Hoseli was killed just now, there was no doubt about it. If she was killed by someone as skillful as Hoderi, there was no mistake about it.

Even from Aur’s perspective, she was dead, no questions asked.

Maybe what disappeared was clone or an alter ego similar to the ones created by Lilu? He shook that Idea off soon. The blood that gushed out of her mouth was unquestionably authentic.

With alter egos, there is no such thing as blood. When they die, they just turn back to the material they were created from. If she had meat and blood, the she must’ve been a genuine human being.

So maybe it was metastasis? But unless she was a spirit, there was no way for her to use such a technique after death.

「Sofia, Mari, anything?」

「No, I’m not detecting any kind of suspicious activity, so it can’t be the doing of someone from the outside.」

Sofia declared so quite confidently.

「Even with 『Unknown’s』 powers, I was unable to detect anything suspicious. But I can’t say for sure that it was not someone acting from outside the range of his powers or not.

「Such a thing should not be possible. His eyes are supposed to see everything in the thousand kilometers diameter, an ultra-long distance unavailable for anyone else but him…」

Noticing a certain possibility, Aur’s words broke off.

「Tena, your prediction.」

「Something has clearly changed, at yet all remains the same.」

Tena answers with a difficult expression.

「It’s still the same. Backed by the sunrise, Hoseli keeps on reviving, and eventually kills you.」

She must’ve repeated the foresight many times over, because her expression is dark and her voice filled with despair. Both times, Hoderi was going easy on his sister, but if Aur ordered him too, he would’ve surely killed her as many times as needed. However, that second Hoseli was stronger than the first one, to the point where it was impossible for Hoderi to capture her alive. If she was becoming stronger with each death, then it was no surprise that the outcome of the prediction did not change.

「When you said that I’m going to be burned by fire, did my soul disappeared together with my body?」

Tena raised her face when Aur suddenly mentioned such a thing.

「I was wandering about that the whole time. What do you mean when you said that if I won’t go back to the Old Continent, I’ll die no matter what?」

Hoseli could not use complicated and powerful magic like that. Compared to the magic of Zana, Eve, Tena, and Yutsu, let’s call it God Art for now, her magical power was mediocre at best. Even now she looked as if she was being controlled by someone, because she only used physical attacks. What that mysterious someone responsible for her cycle of resurrections?

「I meant just that. Every time you were killed, the cause of death was different: burned by the flames, beheaded, sliced throat, head crushed with a fist…」

「That’s quite the impressive variety.」

Aur was deep in thought now. Even if they were just talking possibilities, talking about him being killed was quite unpleasant.

But.

「I think I understand it now. Who Hoseli is controlled by and why I die every time in your predictions.」

Aur looked at the sun and narrowed his eyes. In a sense, Mari’s idea was correct.

Something that was outside Gaius’ ability range. But it wasn’t even something mysterious or unknown. It was visible even with the naked eye.

「The enemy is immortal, revives as many times as she wishes, does not fear death, and with every time she gets stronger than before… Just like a Heroic Spirit.」

Aur muttered to himself, staring at the rising sun.

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