CHAPTER ONE

Cyberpunk City—Shinjuku

And so, five hundred years went by.

It was the quickening of new beginnings, followed by newborn cries.

The moment of resurrection had arrived.

Rebirth felt like rising to the water’s surface. His consciousness floated up from the murky depths, and after five hundred long years, he was revived.

Veltol Velvet Velsvalt: the Immortal King, the Dark Lord, the Invincible One. He had many names, all symbolizing the absolute, terrifying evil he represented to the mortals.

And there was one particular title he was called most often: Demon Lord.

Five hundred years earlier, he had created the Immortal Kingdom, formed the Immortal Army, and battled against the mortals in a struggle to dominate the world, only to be defeated at the hands of the Hero.

His body had crumbled to dust and returned to the darkness. And yet, after several centuries had passed, he was back.

His return had only been possible through the power of Methenoel, a type of reincarnation magic Veltol himself had created to tie his memories and physical form together with his soul, then convert that into data and send it to the future. The aether used that data to emulate his body and rebuild it.

Aether was the greatest form of matter, capable of imitating any phenomenon, and magic was the method through which one could manipulate the aether to bend the world’s logic.

There was nothing, theoretically, that couldn’t be achieved through magic. Resurrection, time travel, universe creation… No matter how preposterous or absurd, as long as one possessed the required mana—magical power, that is—and knew the correct technic, anything was possible.

Among these possibilities was reincarnation. It had existed in theory only with no history of success—until Veltol perfected the forbidden art.

Veltol was a darkling—all immortal beings without exception. Immortals were, naturally, beyond the concept of death.

However, even souls became worn and weathered. No matter how undying the flesh may be, souls were not indestructible. A soul would eventually perish once all of its power had been exhausted.

The purpose of Methenoel was to conquer that destruction. It was a cosmic endeavor to revive body and soul even after both had rotted and perished.

Veltol had evolved. The completion of this magic had elevated his soul from a mere immortal to a higher being. He had become truly invincible.

And now, five hundred years later, he would once again envelop the world in darkness. His rebirth would bring him world domination.

So…it succeeded?

Veltol was still trying to wrap his head around his second life, his thoughts as sluggish as one would have when waking from a deep slumber.

It was, of course, the first time he’d ever used Methenoel. Although he had figured out the logic and completed the technic, he’d had no opportunity to test it out.

Veltol was not reborn as the fantastical creature that the Hero had faced but the human form that had crumbled to dust following his defeat.

His long jet-black hair, captivating as a crow’s damp feathers, contrasted with his snowy-white skin. He was perfectly androgynous, possessing equal parts delicate feminine beauty and masculine virility. His eyes were the color of darkness. His limbs were long and slender, his body utterly proportionate: lean and toned, yet covered in muscles hard as steel. His almost artistic physique was completely exposed, not a single stitch of clothing on him.

He looked just like a human. He didn’t have fangs like an orc, or pointed ears like an elf, or horns like an ogre.

And this much was natural, since Veltol had originally been human.

Immortals were supernatural beings separate from gods or living creatures. Mortals called them darklings out of fear, for such beings were human yet undying, human in appearance but wielding inhuman powers. In fact, all immortals were considered darklings, be they human or elf or orc or otherwise.

Veltol looked like a human in his early twenties when in fact he was one of the oldest darklings at more than three thousand years old.

Where am I…?

He was lying on an altar made of white rock. His vision was blurry, and he was having a hard time grasping the situation—perhaps an aftereffect of Methenoel.

He took a deep breath, filling his lungs with cold air and aether. The aether coursed through his veins all the way to his heart before transforming into mana. The mana then traveled to every one of his veins, his nerves—every cell in his body.

Mana, besides being fuel for magic, was an indispensable element for life.

Once his eyes were full of mana, his vision returned. He could see he was in a vast, dark space.

“Lord Veltol…”

He heard a voice, one that he knew all too well. It was clean and clear like a chime. Even after five hundred years of sleep, there was no way he could forget or mistake it.

“Machina?”

He turned around to find a girl on her knees.

She was lovely and ephemeral like freshly fallen snow. Her skin was almost transparent, her long hair silver, and her eyes a light crimson. Her face, respectfully looking downward, as well as her petite frame would perhaps be better described as cute rather than beautiful, yet the charming allure that seemed to ooze from her pores belied her girlish appearance.

She looked almost exactly like a human, but she was in fact an ignia.

“Yes, sir. It is I, Machina Soleige, Duchess of the Dazzling Blaze, one of the Six Dark Peers. I have been waiting for this moment long enough for a dragon to lose all of its scales.”

The Six Dark Peers were a group of powerful darkling aristocrats appointed by the Demon Lord Veltol. Machina was a particularly essential subject among them.

She looked slightly younger than Veltol, but she, too, was an immortal darkling. She was over a thousand years old.

“Please excuse me for receiving you in such crude attire, my lord.”

She wasn’t wearing her usual magnificently red formal armor but a thick white coat and hat.

Both her outfit and the situation were unnatural. The realization of Methenoel—the rebirth of the Demon Lord—should be a grand ceremony for all the Immortal Kingdom to celebrate. Machina should’ve been wearing ceremonial robes, and the entire country should’ve been present to receive Veltol.

And yet, Machina was the only one there in that bare, lightless place. What had happened?

Veltol didn’t reproach her for her unseemly attire. He had absolute trust in her loyalty. There had to be a logical reason why she was dressed the way she was.

“No matter. You saw to my revival and completion of Methenoel, and for that, I commend you.”

“Such is my duty as your vassal, Lord Veltol. Your praise is wasted on me.”

There were a few requirements for restoring a soul via Methenoel. There had to be a caster to activate it at the proper place and time. Methenoel, a ritual spell, couldn’t be performed alone. One person had to cast it on their soul while another resurrected that soul.

Veltol sat up.

“So where are we? Is this underground altar in Readelm?” he asked while getting down from the altar made of skullia. With a wave of his arm, aether covered his naked body in black armor and a cloak of the same color.

“No, Lord Veltol. We are in the underground cathedral of Nelldor’s dungeon, below the former Shinjuku Station.”

“Shin…juku…?” he repeated, confused at the unfamiliar word.

Veltol was familiar with the underground cathedral of Nelldor. It was built on an island to the far east of Alnaeth for the purpose of worshipping the Demon Lord and receiving him in his eventual rebirth. The word Shinjuku, however, was new to Veltol.

“Well, in any case…”

He paid no further attention to the little details. Five hundred years had passed, so it would be perfectly natural for the name of the place to have changed. Veltol had no need to cling to such changes to realize his objective.

“The Demon Lord has returned, Machina. Let us conquer the world once more!”

World domination: his mission and ambition, and the immortals’ dearest wish.

“Beg pardon, Lord Veltol…,” Machina interjected timidly. “If I may…”

“What is it?”

Machina was struggling to say her piece. After a moment’s hesitation, she got herself together and looked right into Veltol’s eyes as she told him:

“The world we were trying to conquer…has already perished.”

“It happened around eighty years ago,” Machina began as she and Veltol walked through the dungeon’s passageways. “Our world—Alnaeth, the planet of magical civilization—experienced an unprecedented disaster when it came into contact with another world: Earth, the planet of industrial civilization.”

Earth, January 2023.

Alnaeth, Month of the Behemoth 2023 CE.

Oddly enough, both planets’ calendars happened to align when their worlds merged across dimensions—nay, across universes.

“They…merged?” said Veltol.

“Yes. Earth’s scientists named this catastrophe the Fantasion.”

“Fantasion…”

The Fantasion, naturally, caused a variety of problems.

The planets and their respective worlds fused into one, causing large-scale changes on a geological, celestial, and climatological level. In just three years, the aggregate population of Earth and Alnaeth dropped to one tenth of its former number.

And then came the clash between species.

Earth had only one ruling species—Earthoid humans—while Alnaeth was home to a plethora of species besides their native Alnaethoid humans: elves, orcs, therians, ogres, goblins, dwarves, among others, each with their own territories.

Both Earth and Alnaeth had internal conflict by the way of race, religion, and politics, but Alnaeth had interspecies conflict in addition.

“These otherworlders had not only different cultures and languages but strikingly different appearances as well,” said Machina. “And from their point of view, we had appeared out of nowhere in their territory…”

“So conflict was inevitable.”

“Indeed…” Machina nodded.

Existing infrastructure was destroyed, followed by food shortages, epidemics, territorial and residency disputes, technological disparities, and finally, discrimination among species. Problems piled on top of one another, and it wasn’t long until war broke out.

The Fantasion mayhem mixed species and territories up, rendering any previous national borders meaningless. Countries became defunct, and it was only a matter of time before cities started acting as their own autonomous nations.

Conflict arose between cities, and over a total of forty years, two massive City Wars took place.

“It’s been just over two decades since City War II ended. Those scars are finally starting to heal… And that brings us to the current state of the world. In Alnaeth terms, we are in the former underground cathedral of Nelldor in the Myrd archipelago, which also corresponds to the former special ward of Shinjuku in Tokyo,” Machina explained as she guided the Demon Lord through the dungeon.

Veltol couldn’t understand all of it. Or rather, he couldn’t believe it. It was too sudden and bizarre, and it felt more like he was hearing a fairy tale. His incredulity kept him from noticing the rusted ticket gates and machines they’d passed.

“The world you’d known has perished, Lord Veltol. A new one was built in its place.”

They were in an amalgamation of what was once Shinjuku Station and the underground cathedral of Nelldor’s dungeon. The old train station had transformed into a full-fledged labyrinth.

The broken escalators extended for over fifty meters. Machina and Veltol made their way to the top—the labyrinth’s exit.

“It is now year 2099 of the Fused Era.”

The heavy metal door before them was closed.

“This is the new world.”

Light flooded in when Machina opened the door, making Veltol squint.

And that’s when he saw the world.

The landscape far exceeded his imagination.

It was overwhelming.

Aether neon lights so vivid it made his eyes hurt.

Lights from the buildings’ windows.

Lights from the gigantic hologram displays covering the buildings.

Lights from the red lanterns hanging from the buildings’ eaves.

The glow of taillights from the land vehicles racing through the streets.

Lights indicating the positions of the drones and flying vehicles soaring through the sky.

Lights, lights, endless lights…

It was night, and yet it looked as if the stars had fallen to the planet’s surface, their dazzling lights ridding the world of any darkness.

Veltol couldn’t take it all in. It was exceedingly more luminous than the Immortal Royal Capital or the Imperial Capital Astrica’s castle town. This was the light of a city that never sleeps.

The chilly, somber sky was far off in the distance. Thick, black clouds obscured the darkness of night as polluted snow fell on the city, illuminated by the vivid hues of the lights yet sparse enough not to sound alarms from the nearby speakers.

“Wha—?”

Veltol’s eyes and mouth were equally agape as he took in the sights, incredulous.

From the city’s center rose a giant pillar 243 meters tall—the aether reactor. It drew aether from the underground aether lines, converting it into mana and electricity for the city’s consumption as well as the cryotolerance zone that protected Shinjuku from the cold. The barrier wasn’t perfect, however, as there were still spots throughout the city that reached subzero temperatures even during daytime. Just one step outside the zone was uninhabitable.

Surrounding the aether reactor were brand-new limestone buildings of slim neo-elvish architecture, intermingled with squat structures made from reinforced concrete. The latter were clearly made on the cheap; there was no sign that a single thought went into their structural integrity. Unfettered expansion led to an increase in vertical construction of slipshod steel frames stacked one on top of the other. The resulting homes were no sturdier than tofu, all grouped together in clusters like tombstones.

The city was a forest, and power poles were its trees, cables stretching everywhere like a giant spiderweb. Humans, elves, goblins, and many other species spoke a hotchpotch of languages—elvish, Japanese, English, Chinese, dwarvish, orcish—as they walked the streets beneath swarms of surveillance drones.

“What—”

Aether neon signs in various languages jutted out from shoddily constructed buildings, their surfaces crisscrossed with steaming pipes and gutters reminiscent of veins.

The streets were littered with all manner of trash: old flyers, cigarette butts, empty cans, bottles of moonshine. Below a poster reading PUT A STOP TO HOMELESSNESS! PEOPLE ARE FREEZING TO DEATH ON THE STREETS! in elvish, the common tongue, lay a street urchin wrapped in filthy rags—it was difficult to tell whether the person was alive or dead.

All of this was decidedly different from the culture of any country Veltol knew.

“—the hell is thiiiiiissssss?!”

The Demon Lord screamed to the sky in astonishment.

This was the Cyberpunk City of Shinjuku. One of the biggest cities in the world, with a population of over three million people.

Veltol was on Kabukicho Street, the main drag through Shinjuku’s southern end and the city’s biggest shopping district.

Civilization had advanced too much over these past five centuries.

Throngs of people and ground vehicles navigated the streets, while flying vehicles and surveillance and delivery drones crowded the skies.

The Demon Lord was aghast at the fantastical landscape.

“This is how much that little island to the east has prospered…,” he murmured.

The Japanese archipelago that Veltol knew—the Myrd archipelago, that is—had been undeveloped land, used only as a destination for exile. Criminals there lived in caves, and that primitive state was the last he knew about it.

“The country located in Earth’s version of this archipelago was already highly developed. A paradigm shift occurred after Earth’s advanced scientific technology and Alnaeth’s magitech became intertwined, and development skyrocketed.”

“The mortals’ civilization is this advanced and yet the gods haven’t taken matters into their own hands…?”

“The gods are dead.”

The catastrophic planetary fusion affected more than just humankind. There were new denizens from a different world, an influx of unfamiliar religions. People’s values changed; various apocalyptic philosophies took root; morals and ethics were turned on their head. All of this cheapened the divine and debilitated faith.

The gods fell to degradation.

“Existing civilizations regressed heavily right after the Fantasion, which led many scholars to believe that had been the gods’ last show of wrath.”

“I see… So the world has really ended…”

Veltol’s words were tinged with sorrow.

His fight in the olden Alnaeth was not only a struggle against the mortals but against the fate the gods had created, too. And it had ended without him even knowing. He cast his gaze downward.

The people walking the streets looked absolutely bizarre to him.

“I see many people here have arms and legs that are rather…inorganic.”

Their extremities appeared to be made of steel or some mysterious black material.

“Indeed, they are using artificial limbs,” said Machina.

“Artificial…? Are they really? They’re quite lifelike.”

Prostheses existed even back during Veltol’s time but in much simpler and cruder forms, mostly just pieces of wood or bone sculpted to resemble the intended limb.

“Those are called magiprostheses. They use a metal armature for the bone, which is covered in artificial muscle made of synthetic mithril fiber. Aether is used to simulate the nerves, so these work exactly as real arms or legs when connected to the body.”

“This many, though? Is it because of the wars?”

“The wars have something to do with it, but I believe the main reason is most jobs around here involve physical labor.”

“So accidents are common?”

“That’s another part of it, but it’s mostly because of frostbite. Many of these people work outside the barrier, and it’s truly freezing out there…”

The city’s climate was certainly cold enough even for Veltol.

Even within the cryotolerance zone, you needed enough protection from the cold if you didn’t want your fingers, ears, and nose hurting. A regular person would surely freeze to death just staying put for a few hours.

“By the way, they call people with magiprostheses magiborgs, although some consider the term discriminatory as of late.”

“Hmm… And what about them?”

Here and there were folks wearing some sort of bucket-like metal tubes or helmets on their heads. Their bodies underneath their clothes were similarly metallic.

“Those are full-borgs, people who supplement their bodily functions with machines. It’s a sort of full-body version of the magiprostheses.”

“…Wait, wait, wait. Supplement their bodily functions? You mean their organs, too?”

“Correct. People who replace everything but their brains and spines are not uncommon.”

The machines Veltol knew of were much simpler and more primitive. It was easy for him to imagine how artificial limbs worked, but he couldn’t fathom how an artificial organ was even possible.

“There are also automata, which look just like humans. They’ve been getting quite advanced lately, so much so it’s hard to tell them apart from the real thing.”

Veltol also noticed that everyone had a piece of metal affixed to their nape. Machina had one as well, although Veltol couldn’t see it since it was hidden beneath her hood and long hair.

He wondered if that, too, was some sort of prosthesis as he stood dumbfounded, watching the pedestrians coming and going. He was so wrapped up in thought that he was too slow to notice someone walking right his way.

“Ah, Lord Veltol, you’ll—!”

“Tsk! Don’t just stand there blocking the way, asshole!”

The big ogre with an artificial arm clicked his tongue as he bumped into Machina, who had stepped in front of Veltol.

“Sorry, I had something on my mind. Are you all right?”

“Oh, yes, I’m fine. Forgive me…”

“Honestly, does that oaf not realize he just bumped into one of the Six Dark Peers?”

Veltol looked up at the thick clouds covering the night sky.

“…”

Then he smirked.

“Is something the matter?” Machina asked.

“I think it’s time to shake those foolish mortals to the core… Make them well aware of my triumphant return.”

“L-Lord Veltol?”

Machina knew very well he only made that expression when he was about to do something ludicrous.

“Hah!”

Veltol’s internal mana initialized and constructed a technic that expanded into a large, elaborate magic circle.

“Ell Stunna!”

As soon as he said those words, a pillar of light emerged from the circle, piercing the thick clouds and opening a big hole in the sky. Moonlight and starlight shone over Shinjuku for the first time in fifteen months.

Veltol had performed a method of aether-based phenomena modification. In other words, magic.

Magic involved the initialization of one’s internal mana followed by the construction of a technic using a spell. Next came the technic’s expansion in the form of a magic circle, then the incantation—reading the spell aloud—and finally, the proclamation of the maginom, or the magic’s name.

Those were the five processes needed for magic.

The Elderish spell names belonged to ultimate magic used by rulers since ancient times to demonstrate their royal might.

And Veltol didn’t need one of the five processes—the incantation.

Not even a demon lord should have been capable of skipping the steps necessary for magic activation. But Veltol, with his enormous mana capacity, natural affinity for magic, and ultra-high-speed magical processing output, was able to compress the most time-consuming step into the next one. The result: a quasi-omission of the incantation process.

That was what made the Demon Lord the Demon Lord. His forbidden secret technique: chantless magic.

“…Hmmm?”

Veltol looked up at the sky and squinted in dissatisfaction at the light shining through.

“I’ve gotten far too weak.”

The ultimate magic manipulated the weather on a scale big enough to get rid of all the clouds in the area, yet as he was now, he could barely open a hole in one of them.

“Is that…?”

Veltol looked through the hole at the dark red star shining beside the moon. It symbolized a bad omen in ancient Alnaeth.

“It seems I am not welcome in this world.”

The star shone mysteriously, sinisterly.

“Wh-what the hell?!”

“The sky…”

“Who’s stupid enough to manipulate weather with magic these days?”

Right then…

…a shrill siren went off.

Veltol’s magic had tripped the sensors that picked up anomalies in nearby mana. The commotion started spreading even farther.

“What’s that racket? It’s ruining my triumphant return. Has the concept of respect vanished while I was gone?”

“Oh no! You can’t use ultimate magic inside the city!” Machina flailed her arms in dismay. “The City Guard will come! Let’s get out of here!”

She grabbed Veltol’s arm and dragged him away.

“Wait, Machina, why should I be the one to flee?”

“Please! I insist!”

Veltol shook off his growing concerns and allowed Machina to lead him down the main drag through the throngs of people.

That was when he spotted it—something impossible in the crowds. A hooded man was approaching, his face momentarily visible when the wind lifted his hood ever so slightly.

“Huh?!”

Veltol couldn’t help but stop and look back as the man passed by, but he had already vanished into the crowds.

“Is something the matter?” Machina asked, puzzled as to why Veltol had stopped.

“No, it’s nothing,” he answered, shaking his head.

There was no way that man could be here in this world after five centuries.

Veltol tried to convince himself of it. He squeezed his hand, open and shut, to rid himself of the reluctant sensation—and to gauge his own power.

“Hmmm… My mana has certainly weakened greatly compared to five hundred years ago, in terms of both output and capacity. Beyond that, my body itself doesn’t feel up to my standards, either. It feels as if I’ve entered the battlefield without any armor, though it pains me to admit.”

“It must be because faith in you has plummeted, Lord Veltol…”

“Yes, I sensed that as well. I’m no stronger than an average human. My power as an immortal is also weakened. It seems hardly anyone in this current era knows who I am.”

Faith was what higher incorporeal beings, such as gods, needed to intervene with the material world. This power was derived from the thoughts or emotions an individual conjured from the masses; the stronger these emotions were, the more power they provided.

There were two kinds of faith: positive and negative. Negative emotions such as anger, sadness, and fear fueled lower incorporeal beings such as demons. Despite their opposite aims, both kinds of faith were based on a third party’s observations and feelings toward a subject.

Veltol, having elevated his soul while retaining a corporeal body, was in between god and demon, so he was strengthened by both positive and negative faith.

Five hundred years earlier, during his reign as Demon Lord, he received positive faith from the immortals and their brethren who adored him; the mortals who spread his infamy and terror throughout the world provided him with negative faith. He had achieved the kind of power that gods could only dream of.

“Even elves live a mere three hundred years, so those who were infants during your reign have long since died,” said Machina. “You are only talked about as part of history, my lord. Even the gods are starting to be forgotten.”

The opposite of faith was oblivion—or even apathy.

Faith was determined by how many people recognized and had feelings toward an individual. A loss of recognition translated to a massive power deficit.

That was the root cause of Veltol’s weakened state. With five hundred years gone, he was just as forgotten as the gods.

“It is what it is,” he said. “In any case, I now have eternal life—it’s only a matter of gradually reclaiming my faith. Now, Machina, what are the other Six Dark Peers and nobles up to? What about the Demon Lord Army?”

As he asked, he looked toward the entrance of a narrow alleyway at one end of the street. He saw an ogre, an orc, and a therian engaged in a fistfight around a steel drum, lit up as a bonfire.

“From what I can tell, it seems members of the Blood Alliance coexist in peace,” he continued. “What happened with the treaty?”

The Blood Alliance was a treaty the Demon Lord Army formed with the orcs, ogres, and therians. The purpose was to give favorable treatment to these three species so that they could prosper together.

Of course, this was only a temporary pact born from aligned interests. Both the immortals and the three species had planned to kill the other in their proverbial sleep.

The mortals greatly outnumbered their immortal counterparts, and the Blood Alliance was formed in order to bridge that gap.

“The Alliance was disbanded after our army’s defeat. The leaders died during the Three Blades Revolution in 1616 CE, and the remaining populace submitted to the mortals,” said Machina.

“I see.”

“The species allied with our army suffered awful treatment. I heard they were forced into brutal slave labor. Discrimination is still very pervasive to this day, just not as explicit as it once was.”

“Mm, I expected as much.”

A common trait between all three species of the Blood Alliance was that none possessed a great aptitude for magic. The reasons were manifold: orc, ogre, and therian mana stores were small and their magitech crude, a byproduct of their paltry education standards. As a result, the other mortals always looked down on them. Furthermore, these three species were sturdier and tougher than the rest, which stoked fear and a sense of inferiority in other mortals. Those feelings only served as further proof among mortals that magic was greater than physical prowess.

That’s why Veltol welcomed the orcs, ogres, and therians into the Blood Alliance. He could easily imagine that they would end up subject to other mortals if he was defeated and the Alliance was disbanded.

“The Immortal Kingdom agreed to a ceasefire with the mortals,” Machina explained. “The Six Dark Peers assembled under Ralsheen of the Blue Storm and decided to wait in hiding until you were to be revived. And just when there were less than a hundred years left before your resurrection, the Fantasion destroyed the world as we knew it. We were also greatly affected by the disaster—the Immortal Kingdom’s citizens went their separate ways to various cities. Then one year after the First City War, several corporations started leading a massive city-wide movement.”

“What kind of movement?”

Machina held her tongue for a moment. Her trembling lips signaled it was hard for her to say it.

Finally, she squeezed the words out:

“…The Immortal Hunt.”

“Immortal Hunt…?”

“Its purpose was to annihilate or imprison all of the immortals scattered worldwide. A number of immortals produced various military achievements during the First City War; our kind doesn’t die and tends to be very experienced in battle, so between the Earthoids who didn’t know of our existence and the Alnaethoids who had largely forgotten about the threat we could present, our wartime achievements came as an enormous shock. During the interwar period, darklings were considered an inhuman evil to be exterminated.”

That was also the common preconception five hundred years prior, and even back in ancient Alnaeth. Darklings, being immortal, were feared by the mortals as monsters because of their extraordinary power.

“We resisted as much as we could, but advances in magineering led to the mass production of anti-immortal weapons. Once those became increasingly commonplace, the mortals grew overwhelmingly powerful, and we were defeated.”

“What…happened to the Six Dark Peers?”

“They were…annihilated…,” Machina replied morosely. “I don’t know where May of the Mournful Firmament, Sihlwald of the Black Dragon, or Ralsheen of the Blue Storm are. I’m not sure if they were killed, or if they’re captive somewhere, or if they’re still in hiding. I haven’t been able to confirm whether they survived the Immortal Hunt. As for Zenol, Duke of the Karmic Sword, since only Ralsheen and I knew how to activate Methenoel, Zenol acted as a decoy so that I could escape imprisonment…and he alone stayed in the enemy camp…”

May, Sihlwald, Ralsheen, Zenol… All of them were Veltol’s vassals, immortals who had served him for a long time.

He had thought the sadness of losing someone was something he’d left in the past. That his ability to think fondly of someone had died long ago. And yet now, the loss and emptiness felt insurmountable.

“But the Immortal Hunt is now a thing of the past. Fear of immortals has been diminishing since the City Wars ended, so there’s no need to be as wary these days. It used to be so much worse—there was a lot of betrayal, and some mortals were even arbitrarily labeled as immortals…”

“The Immortal Hunt, huh…?”

Then Veltol realized there was one person Machina hadn’t talked about. The Six Dark Peers were, naturally, six darklings. The four Machina mentioned plus herself amounted to only five.

“What about Marcus?”

Marcus, Duke of the Bloody Arts.

He and Ralsheen assisted Veltol in political matters. A dark elf, Marcus also oversaw the Immortal Kingdom’s magitech research.

“…U-um…L-Lord Marcus…is…”

Machina looked away and started twiddling her thumbs. It was very clear she was hiding something, but before Veltol could get a word in, Machina shouted:

“I-in any case, Lord Veltol! Aren’t you thirsty?!”

“Huh? No, not rea—”

“The city air may be harmless, but it is much too filthy for you, sir! So! I’ll go get you a beverage to moisten your noble throat! Please wait right here for a moment!”

“W-wait a second, Machina…”

Machina cut the conversation short and scurried off into the crowds.

Veltol couldn’t tell if there was something wrong with Marcus or if Machina simply didn’t want to talk about it, but he knew she wouldn’t to lie to him. Seeing her change the subject indicated that she would rather not say anything than lie, something he felt came from her sense of loyalty.

“Sigh. What am I to do with her?” Veltol muttered. “Machina hasn’t changed a bit in five hundred years.”

He felt relieved that at least she had stayed constant in this world so sweepingly changed.

Veltol stood beneath a streetlight and eyed his surroundings. He could hear people talking and even shop barkers hawking their wares.

To the main drag’s north was the ever-visible landmark: the aether reactor.

A holographic display that covered one side of a building was playing an ad for a flying vehicle. The music was loud but catchy.

The screen showed the hottest virtual idol trio’s adorable avatars riding the flying vehicle into a tunnel full of psychedelic lights.

“Huh… So it’s the same principle as image projection…? But something so large and detailed… Surely it must be a waste of mana…?”

Veltol watched agape, when a black-and-white police cruiser—the words Shinjuku Police written in Japanese on it—passed by, sirens blaring and red lights shining.

“Hmm…?”

Then he looked around. He sensed a slight distortion in the aether.

It was a variation small enough that a normal person wouldn’t notice. Even with his reduced power, the Demon Lord’s aether sensitivity hadn’t lost its edge.

He turned to see a girl with a strange outfit—although as far as he was concerned, everyone was wearing strange outfits.

Her black hair was cut short, and a tuft of her bangs was dyed red. She was wearing a red qipao with golden embroidery and a short-sleeved dwarven jacket along with a pair of comfortable-looking shoes. On her head sat a pair of round sunglasses.

Her black hair, brown eyes, rounded ears, and peachy skin were characteristic of humans from the East. She looked to be around seventeen or eighteen years old. Her graceful features, strong eyes, and general poise gave her an energetic aura.

The girl was leaning against an iron fence and staring straight at the ad playing on the holographic display.

The corners of her mouth lifted into a smile.

Suddenly, the screen went black. A funky logo of a bunny’s skull appeared for a split second before the screen turned black again. Then it started playing something entirely different from before: an ad for a pornographic video site.

Sensual moans echoed throughout the city at full volume accompanied by uncensored nudity.

Passersby couldn’t help but stop and stare because of how sudden it had been.

“Whoa, what’s up with that?”

“What’s with the porn? Did the video bug out?”

“I think it got hacked.”

“Mommy, what are they doing?”

“Don’t look!”

The crowds were astir.

Meanwhile, one person in particular wasn’t watching the video but clapping and laughing at the resulting confusion: the girl Veltol had just glanced at.

He approached the girl as she grabbed her sides in laughter, then addressed her in elvish with a strong Elderish accent:

“Hey, lady.”

“Huh?” Her shoulders twitched, and she looked around.

“You, with the black hair.”

“M-me?”

“Indeed.”

She pointed at her face, and Veltol nodded magnanimously.

Her eyes darted back and forth as she asked, clearly very wary, “Wh-what is it?”

“What did you just do?” He crossed his arms and motioned to the screen with his chin.

“Huh? Wh-whatever could you mean? I have nooo idea what’s going on! It’s probably just a bug or something.”

She put her hands behind her head, crossed her legs, and gazed into the distance whistling a dull tune.

“Do not utter such falsehoods in my presence. That video changed following an aether disturbance in your vicinity. You were the only one whose surrounding aether wavered, and the only one directing your attention to that screen. Of course you must have done something.”

The girl looked even more suspicious and shocked. “…You could tell I hacked it from an aether disturbance…? No way. Not even wizards can sense that much… What exactly are you?”

“Hmph. Is it not obvious? Ignorance is a sin, but I’ll forgive you. Today is a national holiday—the celebration of my rebirth.”

“Uh, pretty sure it’s just a regular weekday…”

“Therefore, I grant you pardon.”

“Okay, okay, whatever. Just tell me who you are,” she demanded, obviously very annoyed.

Veltol paid no attention to the way she glared at him. He raised his arms to the heavens, eyes closed, and announced:

“I am the Demon Lord.”

“Are you being serious right now?”

“Surely you at least recognize my face.”

“Uh, nope…”

Veltol looked at her in disbelief, then immediately sighed and shrugged.

“So are you gonna report me to the City Guard?” the girl asked. “Save yourself the empty sense of justice. Those bastards won’t give you anything in return.”

“I’m not quite sure I follow, but rest assured I won’t hand you over to any sort of law enforcement.”

The girl seemed relieved to hear that. “Then what do you want?”

“What kind of magic was that just now? I can tell you used the aether to change the image projected on that screen, but I don’t understand the principle involved. You used a magical technique beyond my own comprehension, so you piqued my interest. You must be quite dexterous for me to be unable to discover how it works at first glance. And I can tell you’re confident in your skills by how you conduct yourself.”

The girl’s cheeks relaxed into a dopey smile, pleased by Veltol’s praise.

“Aw shucks, it’s not thaaat big a deal. I just did a li’l hacking!” she chirped.

“Hacking…?”

“Yep. Aether hacking. This may come as a surprise, but I’m actually an aether hacker, which means I’m always risking my life for my job. Anyway, those IHMI holodisplays are super common here in Shinjuku, and they all have a fatal security flaw in their technic’s logic barrier. I just took advantage of that to swap the video with some porn. The actual trick is real simple—what’s hard is finding that vulnerability in the system ’cause you’d basically need to be a genius like me, y’know? Oh, but don’t get me wrong, I didn’t just do it outta curiosity or boredom or as a prank or whatever. Thing is, IHMI’s always trying to censor the net or put filters on it, and me, I think the net’s the only truly free place out there, so IHMI’s basically my enemy. I mean, yeah, I do this stuff as part of, like, a bigger social protest. I’m pretty much the embodiment of punk, rebelling against this rotten society we live in.”

“I—I see…”

“Yep. So like I said, your average hacker wouldn’t find this weak spot, but this super genius hacker babe was able to spot and exploit it. Plus…”

The girl kept on rambling at full speed. Veltol was getting more and more confused, so he tried to interject, “Oh, by the way—”

“Then the technic fluctuation algorithm… What? I was just getting to the good part.”

Veltol had to make her stop, otherwise she would never shut up.

“Do you know of a man named Marcus?” he asked.

“Marcus?”

Considering the whole Immortal Hunt situation, Marcus could still be in hiding somewhere if he was alive. Not that Veltol had high hopes that this random girl he’d just met would know about the man.

Then, against all odds, he received an unexpected answer:

“Oh, you mean the director of IHMI? Yeah, I know about him.”

“What…?”

“Look over there.”

She pointed to a large limestone tower of neo-elvish architecture in the distance.

“That’s IHMI’s headquarters. You might find him there. I mean, he’s head of the company, so he’s a pretty famous guy.”

IHMI—Ishimaru Heavy Magical Industries.

Formerly Ishimaru Heavy Industries, the megacorporation IHMI started as an arms dealer during the City Wars before expanding at breakneck speed.

It was one of the biggest companies not only in Shinjuku but the entire world. Construction and administration of the aether reactor, the core of the city’s infrastructure, fell under IHMI’s jurisdiction. The company also excelled at magicalectronics and communications. It even had strong sway in the Shinjuku City Council. IHMI was the city’s de facto ruler.

“Technology is the spark of a new era” was its slogan, and its logo was based on a torch, displayed proudly on the second-tallest building in Shinjuku.

And Veltol was about to enter that very building.

He wanted to ask Marcus for help. Their world had been destroyed, the Immortal Kingdom had fallen, and Veltol’s own power had weakened—he needed a new direction.

It would be easy to decide a new objective if he had great social status, authority, and assets in this world. That’s why he needed Marcus.

Veltol arrived alone, without Machina. He’d kept this visit a secret from her since she seemed to be hiding something from him and would have very likely stopped him from even going.

The question is whether this is the Marcus I’m looking for. It’s a bit of a puzzle how he managed to nab such a lofty position while this Immortal Hunt was going on.

The automatic double set of vertical and horizontal doors opened, and Veltol entered the lobby.

The lobby was spacious, with a color palette and interior somewhat similar to the furnishings in Marcus’s past manor. There were a few people in suits here and there.

In a corner was a bizarrely prominent presence: a mysterious, short and chubby, pink costumed character.

“What is that strange rabbit…? Or rather, that literal insult to rabbits…”

The character noticed Veltol’s stares and waved at him, but Veltol ignored it and looked away.

He headed straight for the elf woman standing at the circular reception desk by the entrance.

“What can I help you with today?” she asked with a smile.

Veltol felt something was off about her facial expression and, indeed, her entire aura. Her voice was also flat, lacking any real humanity.

“Tell Marcus that Veltol has arrived. He’ll know what to do.”

“…Unable to confirm any previous visits. I’m afraid we cannot allow any visits without a prior appointment,” she answered in a polite yet direct manner, her voice just as flat and a smile still on her face.

“Never mind that; just tell Marcus I’m here.”

“I’m afraid we cannot allow any visits without a prior appointment,” she repeated with the same expression and tone.

“Sigh… For goodness’ sake, does no one in this day and age know who I am? So be it.” Veltol decided to use magic to get done with it quickly. “Rexagino.”

This spell made it possible to manipulate a target’s mind through their mana. A type of charm, it temporarily attracted the target to the caster. In the hands of the Demon Lord’s magitech, the spell was almost as powerful as a geas.

“Call Marcus.” So the Demon Lord demanded.

This was an absolute command a mere elf receptionist shouldn’t be able to resist. Shouldn’t being the operative word.

“B-level mana assault detected against this unit. Suspect designated a threat. Authorities have been contacted. Now entering combat mode.”

“Wha—?!”

Veltol was shocked. The elf woman appeared unfazed by his mindjacking, and not only that—she was now on top of the desk taking a fighting stance.

“Wh-what’s happening…?”

“What’s that guy doing…?”

The people in suits, startled as well, turned to look at the sudden commotion happening at the entrance.

Did she block it…?! How?!

Veltol immediately reconsidered the situation. It didn’t feel like his magic had been blocked—it was as if it had never taken effect in the first place. Like trying to use mind control on a tree or a rock.

So that means…

Between his feeling that something was off, the elf’s reaction to the magic, and even her motions when getting on top of the booth…

It’s one of those things Machina was talking about…an automaton!

Veltol’s guess was correct. The receptionist wasn’t an elf; she was a magiroid made to resemble them. In other words, a robot. Of course mind control didn’t work on her.

“I will now suppress the threat.”

“Ha! A modern-day puppet? This should be entertaining.”

Just as they were about to enter battle, a calm voice echoed through the lobby:

“That’s enough.”

The unrest settled immediately.

“T-260F, cease all combat operations.”

“Administrative order received.”

The magiroid immediately relaxed and returned to the reception desk. Veltol turned his attention to the voice’s source: a human woman exiting the elevator.

She appeared to be in her early twenties; her long hair was in a ponytail, and she was wearing a women’s business suit.

Veltol couldn’t take his eyes off her. She was good-looking, yes, but that wasn’t why he was staring. Still poised for battle, he’d instinctively turned his attention from the magiroid to her.

She reminded him of a fine naked blade. Clearly, this was no regular woman. It was obvious from her poise that her confidence came from plentiful combat training and surviving many a serious fight.

Her aura was enough to let the Demon Lord conclude she was strong.

She walked straight toward him, then stopped just a meter away.

“Please excuse T-260F’s discourtesy. This product line also functions as a security guard, so it is very sensitive to magical attacks. You have my apologies.” She bowed deeply with an affable smile on her face.

Even while giving that charming smile, her sword-like aura didn’t falter.

“I am Director Marcus’s private secretary. My name is Kinohara.”

“I’m Veltol.”

“Yes, I am aware. I took the liberty of looking at the footage of your exchange with T-260F. You asked to meet the director, correct? He’s instructed me to let you in, so I will guide you to his office.”

Veltol followed Kinohara into the elevator.

She operated the control panel, then the elevator quickly began rising. The weight of gravity on their bodies was barely noticeable, however, thanks to the constant use of gravity-manipulation magic.

A heavy silence settled over the elevator, which was much too spacious for just the two of them. Were there a third person there, the tension would be enough to make them faint.

Veltol stared wordlessly at Kinohara’s chest.

“…Can I help you?” She glared at him, thinking he was looking at her breasts.

However, that wasn’t the case. Veltol was staring at the strange decoration on the end of the pen clipped to her suit’s breast pocket.

“Oh, that bizarre creature caught my attention… There was one at the entrance, too. Is that a…rabbit…?”

“You must be quite the connoisseur to have noticed. It’s our company’s mascot, Ishimary. We intend to expand its popularity worldwide.”

“R-right… Indeed, it’s quite the, uh, distinctive creature, I see…”

They arrived at the top floor in no time.

The elevator’s doors opened, and they immediately found themselves at the director’s office.

It felt empty and desolate compared to the lobby. That much was to be expected, since the immensely spacious office took up an entire floor, but most of all, it was practically bare. There was a chair and a desk, but nothing more. The walls were made of glass, allowing an unbroken view of Shinjuku’s nightscape.

Facing the elevator was the company director, like a king in his castle.

His hair was pure white and his skin brown, his eyes red and his ears long. He wasn’t in the crimson armor Veltol was used to seeing him in—instead, he was wearing a crimson suit, a long scarf around his neck, and red-rimmed glasses.

One of the Six Dark Peers, this slim man was an immortal dark elf vampire who had overcome the sunlight and his instinct to suck blood—the Duke of the Bloody Arts, Marcus.

“Long time no see…Marcus.”

Veltol instinctively smiled once he saw Marcus sitting on his chair.

It had seemed entirely likely that the director was a different person with the same name as the duke. More than anything, Veltol was simply happy to finally meet his confidant again.

Veltol hadn’t lost everything just yet. He couldn’t take back what he had lost, but he still had hope.

“It’s truly been a long time, my king. I knew you would stop by ever since I sensed the mana waves from your Ell Stunna a while ago,” Marcus replied in his shrill voice, still sitting calm and collected on his chair. Right behind him was the IHMI logo blown up and printed across the wall.

“…”

Veltol felt a little confused, and angered, by Marcus’s attitude.

Veltol was the king; Marcus was his vassal. At least from Veltol’s point of view, that hadn’t changed after five hundred years. And needless to say, it was disrespectful for a vassal to remain seated when receiving their king.

First of all, Marcus—not his secretary—should have welcomed Veltol. Furthermore, he should’ve been present at Veltol’s revival along with Machina.

“Marcus, it’s rude to remain seated before your king.” Veltol glared at him.

That was enough to make the surrounding aether waver and the reinforced glass vibrate. And yet, Marcus didn’t move an inch—a faint smile was still on his face.

“…Fine, I’ll allow it for the time being,” Veltol added.

This was Marcus’s personal castle, built after surviving five hundred tumultuous years. Veltol respected that and didn’t reprimand him any further.

“So, my king, what have you come all the way here for?” Marcus asked while looking away and leaning back in his chair.

Now there was no speck of reverence left in his behavior. On the contrary, it felt as though he was provoking Veltol.

Veltol would’ve immediately chopped Marcus’s head off had this happened five hundred years earlier, but now, he was feeling more confused than anything.

As far as he remembered, Marcus was a loyal vassal. He never would have imagined him acting this way.

“I’ll get to that. But first, you should be celebrating my revival, Marcus.”

“Yes…I suppose you’re right.”

“…Very well. Marcus, I command you as the Immortal King: Help me rebuild the Immortal Kingdom and take over the world.”

The first thing Marcus did after hearing that was…

“Ha!”

…laugh.

“Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!”

He covered his face and arched his back as his cackling echoed throughout the room.

“Marcus…”

Then, his cackling came to a sudden stop.

“I refuse.”

He looked straight at the Demon Lord with his blood-colored eyes when declining.

“What did you just—?”

“I said I refuse, my king. No…” His intentions were clear from his gaze. “…Veltol.”

He was looking down on him. His eyes were as if he looked at someone of lower birth—the same glance many immortals directed to mortals.

“You dare address me in such manner, you vulgar—?”

Veltol was now fully set on killing him, when…

“Dragon Blade: Chidori.”

…Kinohara, standing right behind him, activated her mana and dictated a maginom. She was clearly hostile.

Veltol turned around to find her holding a katana sheathed in a black scabbard.

“—?!”

He dodged to the side, right up to the window, as soon as he saw it.

A flash of light and a gust of wind, followed by the graceful sound of the katana being sheathed again.

“…A clean unsheathe?”

Clean unsheathing was the name of an old sword technique.

Veltol was astonished by Kinohara’s unsheathing and sheathing speed. Even in his weakened state, he barely caught sight of her blade.

And speed wasn’t the only astounding thing about her technique. The instantaneous flash of light he saw and the nature of the mana he perceived tipped him off: Her strike had been imbued with mana-infused electricity.

He was only able to evade the attack thanks to his many close brushes with death. Had he faltered for one mere instant, he would have been decapitated.

And still, the blade had scraped his cheek—she had made the Demon Lord shed blood.

My reflexes must have dulled considerably for me to have been unable to completely dodge it. That blade of hers… I don’t think she summoned it. It’s too realistic… Perhaps she used magic to forge it instead of cast it? In any case…

Besides the lightning-quick swordsmanship, Veltol felt something was off about Kinohara’s movements. Despite her using armament-forging magic, he didn’t hear an incantation. Moreover, she appeared to have skipped two other magical processes: construction and expansion. That was supposed to be impossible.

But Veltol had no time to be thinking about that. Kinohara was already crouched low, ready to unleash a second attack at any moment.

“That’s enough, Kinohara.”

She relaxed her posture at Marcus’s command.

Veltol wiped the blood from his cheek, and the wound started closing bit by bit. The recovery didn’t come from magic—it was his own immortal regenerative ability.

“You’ve grown weak… But I assume you must know that better than anyone,” Marcus told him with a pitiful gaze. “Years ago, a wound like that would’ve healed before you spilled even a drop of blood.”

He was correct.

Veltol’s decreased faith had sapped not only his mana but his regenerative abilities, too.

“Why, Marcus…?” he asked.

“Why? Do I really have to spell it out for you?” Marcus shot him the most scornful look. “Take over the world? Rebuild the Immortal Kingdom? Please, enough drivel. Such times are long gone, Veltol. The world has ended, the Immortal Kingdom has fallen—and now look at yourself.”

“…”

“The faith you used as a crutch and the fear you represented is now lost to oblivion. All those legends and myths about you are among the annals of history—simple entertainment, mere factoids. I have no reason to kneel to you. Now begone from my sight.” He paused. “Unless…you do the kneeling. Grovel before me and I might consider lending you a hand.”

He smirked, then licked his lips. His eyes glimmered with delight.

“……”

Veltol took a step forward, convinced there was nothing else to say. He wasn’t about to overlook such impertinence. No matter how loyal Marcus had been in the past, Veltol’s duty as a king was to punish any insolent underlings.

“Kinohara, stay out of this,” Marcus warned.

“Understood.”

He got up from his chair.

“Marcus…,” Veltol began.

Veltol initialized a spell. That first step, like the subtle movements a dragon made before breathing fire, was enough to make the surrounding aether, air, and even the glass tremble.

“Duke of the Bloody Arts, you must understand that not even you can defeat me.”

“Shall we put that to the test?” Marcus taunted.

Veltol and Marcus each extended their right hands and spread their fingers.

In order to activate magic, one needed to go through initialization, construction, expansion, incantation, and the proclamation. Not even the Demon Lord was exempt from these rules, even though he had factitiously achieved chantless magic. The abbreviation of this single step out of the five was enough to give him a great advantage in magical warfare.

Veltol had fought many a formidable opponent throughout his thousands of years of living, but he had never lost in a battle of magic. All kinds of warriors, heroes, and great sorcerers yearned for his strength and challenged him to battle, and every single one of them was defeated.

Not even Marcus, the most apt in magical warfare out of the Six Dark Peers, could live up to the mystic technique only the Demon Lord was capable of.

Defeat was impossible so long as Veltol had that advantage.

He loudly dictated the maginom:

“Vel—”

But Marcus…

“You’re two steps behind me, Veltol.”

…merely scoffed.

“Spell Breaker!”

Marcus was quicker to activate his magic. The magic circle in the palm of his hand expanded.

“Wha—?!”

Veltol’s eyes widened in astonishment.

This wasn’t a spell for shooting fire or light. It was much more subtle—one could barely tell he’d cast anything. And it was of the highest level in magical warfare.

Marcus looked as if he’d done nothing, as did Veltol. Rather, he couldn’t do anything. He managed to articulate what had just occurred:

“You…canceled my magic…?!”

There were two main methods of dealing with magic: The first was through resistance, a type of passive defense magic that provided a simple yet effective way to protect oneself directly through mana. The second method was to cancel, as Marcus had done. Canceling involved interfering with one of the five steps of magic, thus nullifying it.

Canceling was different from resisting in that it was an active form of defense by counterattacking. One had to have full understanding of the technic the opponent was trying to activate and stop it before all magical processes were complete. This wasn’t impossible, in theory, but in practice, only Veltol was able to consistently achieve it, thanks to his chantless magic.

Canceling was already a herculean task, but to activate it faster than Veltol’s chantless magic was impossible…or at least, it should have been impossible.

Veltol couldn’t believe it, but it was useless denying what had just happened.

“This can’t be… How?” He once again asked for an explanation.

“How, you ask? Ha! Ha-ha-ha…”

Marcus laughed darkly.

The dominance he felt over his opponent, whom he had feared and served before, gave him a rush. He felt like a conqueror, finally standing atop the previously undefeated champion. Sadistic pleasure coursed throughout his body. He was, in fact, erect.

“You wish to know why someone like you, capable of chantless magic, could have your magic canceled by me and my inferior mastery of the craft? Is that what’s going through your mind right now?! Oh, how could this happen to the Demon Lord Veltol?! Why?! It can’t be!”

Veltol was confused at the sudden explosion of emotions. As far as he remembered, Marcus was slightly neurotic but nonetheless a level-headed and courteous man. He was the brains behind the Six Dark Peers, and as such, Veltol greatly valued and trusted him.

To see him change so much over the course of five hundred years had Veltol more baffled than angry, and most of all—saddened.

How had Marcus ended up like this? Or had he been this way from the very beginning? The Demon Lord had no answer.

There was no trace of the noble darkling once known as Marcus. A contemptuous sneer reminiscent of a lesser demon arose on his face as he turned around.

“It’s thanks to this.” He pointed at his nape.

Embedded there was a small piece of black metal flickering with a green light. Veltol sensed a small amount of mana coming from it.

He had already seen this same device before on all the people walking the streets.

“What is that?” he asked. He guessed it was something meant to aid magic activation, like the wands used by apprentice mages—some sort of magi-gadget.

“This is the Familia, the fruits of human intelligence and cutting-edge magineering.”

The Familia was a type of magi-gadget born from the union of sorcery and engineering—magineering. By connecting it to one’s spinal cord and brain, it could expand the latter’s capacity, essentially functioning as a second brain. It was a digital assistant that took no physical space.

By connecting their brains to the Familia, people could improve their affinity with airborne aether and connect through it to other Familias or computers, surpassing the internet of old to create a new communications technology: the aethernet.

That was Marcus’s explanation.

“To summarize,” he continued, “it’s like connecting a computer to your body. Although I doubt your feeble intellect is enough to comprehend as much.”

Marcus wasn’t wrong—Veltol didn’t understand most of those words.

“The true value of the Familia, however, lies in magical warfare,” Marcus stated proudly. “The original plan came about near the end of City War I, when resources and personnel were scarce. The idea was to get children and those with no magitech training to enlist as quickly and efficiently as possible. And the inventor of this technology is none other than me.”

He was overwhelming Veltol with information, with zero intention of having him actually understand any of it. He simply wanted to boast about his accomplishments—he was itching to brag.

“Technological innovation has kept on advancing, and now, the Familia’s quantum processing device takes care of the initialization, construction, and even expansion processes. One simply selects the desired magic and issues the proclamation to activate it. This development is the main purpose of the Familia; the construction of the aether network and the development of aether communications are mere by-products,” he went on. “Let me phrase this so that even someone as thickheaded as you can understand: All intelligent beings in the modern world regardless of age can not only use chantless magic but constructless and expansionless, too.”

“This is outrageous…”

Veltol realized what was off about Kinohara’s movements just now. She had activated magic by omitting steps through the Familia.

This technique Veltol had spent such a long time developing thanks to his outstanding talent had been outdone in a mere five hundred—nay, eighty years.

“Furthermore, the Familia is incompatible with undying flesh—beings whose souls have reached godlike heights. That means that you, Veltol. Of course, I designed the basic technic that way from the very beginning.”

“What…?”

“I wouldn’t be in such a lofty position if you could use a Familia yourself once you revived, would I? I couldn’t allow that to happen.”

That meant Marcus had been prepared to oppose Veltol since long ago—that he was ready to become his enemy.

“—!”

Veltol once again framed and expanded the same magic, this time even more quickly than before.

But no matter how fast he was, he was still two whole steps behind Marcus.

“Spell Breaker!”

His magic was canceled before he could dictate it.

“Ugh…!”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself. Your magical processing speed is impressive—nowhere near a Familia’s, but well above human limitations. I would expect no less from the Demon Lord himself. I’m only able to cancel it since I know your technic’s composition…but in any case, the Familia is a necessary product for everyday life in the current world. And being unable to use one, you’re quite behind the times…”

Marcus looked at him with pity, like a teacher staring at a poorly performing student.

“Such a shame… The Demon Lord who once spread fear throughout the whole world is no different than a drunken lowlife wasting away in a filthy alley… You’re beneath kobold dung, no better than the stain left behind by a creeping slime… Your decline is truly, deeply pitiful.”

Marcus was quick to insult his former king.

“In fact, let me make myself perfectly clear: You are worth less than troll shit.”

Marcus had always had a deep understanding of magitech, so Veltol recognized how proud he was of his contributions to modern technological development. But he couldn’t understand why Marcus held such intense hatred for him.

“Why, Marcus?! Why would you do all this—?!”

“Why?” Marcus pushed up his glasses. “You keep asking the same question over and over again. It’s pathetic how you can be so dense. Ignorance is a sin, Veltol.”

“…!”

“Did you seriously think my loyalty to you was sincere?”

“What…?”

“I couldn’t stand you from the very beginning.”

“…”

“You’re tyrannical, you’re vain, you’re better than me in every possible way—I’ve always hated you from the bottom of my heart! Oh, how many times I’ve fantasized about destroying you! Yet you’ve managed to overcome destruction, too! I can’t stand the sight of you! Can you even understand how I felt, having to work under such a dreadful man for so long?! Huh?! Can you?!” Marcus screamed, his eyes bloodshot with delirium. “…Excuse me, I lost my temper.”

“Was I…misguided this entire time?” Veltol clenched his teeth so hard they nearly cracked.

He always knew Marcus had ambition, and he thought well of the fact. He could’ve easily seen this coming. And yet, Marcus was still one of his vassals, who lived and fought by his side for such a long time. Veltol found himself in a vastly different world, betrayed by a close confidant—the psychological damage was huge.

“Indeed, you were,” Marcus declared, bluntly and mercilessly. “But that no longer matters. I don’t have the time to keep on clinging to a piece of garbage.”

Veltol concluded there was no point in trying to reach a mutual understanding. In which case, fighting was the only option. He had to draw the line, as king.

“Marcuuusss!” Veltol raised his arms and initialized his magic.

“Looks like you still don’t get it. Bloodsword!”

However, Marcus activated his own even faster than Veltol’s chantless technique.

Thirteen red swords appeared around Veltol.

Just as the title of the Duke of the Bloody Arts indicated, Marcus specialized in magic that used blood as its medium. Bloodsword was one of his favorites—a spell that transformed airborne aether into blood.

One of the bloodswords around Veltol rushed at him and stabbed him deep in one side.

“Argh…!”

The pain made Veltol fall to his knees, halting his magic’s activation.

His sturdy body and rigid skin, bones, and muscles weren’t his only defenses—as an immortal, he also had regenerative abilities. On top of that, the stronger his power as an immortal was, the less pain he felt. Pain was, after all, a way to signal the approach of the body’s death. A strong immortal would feel no pain even if literally minced to bits.

Veltol was in as much pain as a regular human, which proved how greatly he had weakened.

Five centuries earlier, Bloodsword had required three seconds of chanting to activate, but now there was no sign of an incantation, let alone any construction or expansion.

Marcus had truly achieved a technique superior to chantless magic, if everything he said was correct, and to a scale that anybody could do it.

“These days, even an ogre child can manage this much. You heard that right. You are now the world’s slowest sorcerer.”

Marcus made a fist, and the remaining red blades pierced Veltol’s body.

“Argh…! Gah…!”

“Now then, it’s time I ask you to leave.”

Three more swords appeared in front of Marcus before shooting straight at Veltol. Their momentum didn’t stop, taking him with them and breaking the glass behind him so as to blast him to the skies.

“Farewell, my king. Blood Bomb!”

The bloodswords perforating Veltol exploded, scattering his flesh everywhere.

Marcus watched as the pieces fell from the sky and said to Kinohara behind him, “Call management and tell them to fix the window in the director’s room.”

“Understood. By the way, Director…”

“What is it?”

“Couldn’t that man serve as firewood? I heard he was the former Demon Lord, an immortal.”

“Faith in him is too low. He’s lost too much power to be useful. Besides, he’s even greater than an immortal. There’s no point in feeding him to the Furnace. Just let him be. This is the best use for him. Let him suffer pathetically in this new world.” Marcus chuckled darkly. “And with Veltol reborn, that means someone helped him complete Methenoel. Take a look at the list again and do a background check.”

“Understood.”

“And about that rat sniffing around in the Furnace—how’s that purge going?”

“The plan is progressing accordingly. There’s a high chance of problems arising, so once we detect it, I’ll go take care of it myself, instead of outsourcing it to an allied guild.”

“Good. That sounds encouraging.” Marcus looked at the broken window again and said softly, “The old Demon Lord’s fantasy is over. It is time for me to become the true Demon Lord.”

“Is something the matter, sir?”

“Hmph!” He snorted, and no more interest for Veltol arose.

“Excuse me, Director.”

“Yes?”

“I’d like to discuss the distribution of Ishimary merchandising.”

“…Don’t ask me for help. Hold a project meeting first.”

His regeneration was slow.

Veltol staggered near a corner on the main street, feeling the full pain of his reduced faith.

Marcus had blown him to smithereens, sending his scattered flesh to the ground all the way from the IHMI building’s highest floor. Regenerating from that was time consuming.

Veltol’s mana conversion efficiency was low, and even using the majority of his resources in regenerating, he could barely keep his appearance on a superficial level. He looked fine from the outside, but his insides felt as if he had been put through a blender, his organs haphazardly bunched up together.

Regenerating from wounds and reviving from death were two entirely different things. The latter cost an overwhelming amount of mana in order to reference one’s complex physical data recovered from their soul right before death.

Faith in Veltol had plummeted, leaving him only as powerful as the lowest immortal. Even regenerating was hugely taxing.

“Dammit…”

Five hundred years ago, he would’ve fully recovered within seconds of the explosion. But not in this state.

Feeling dizzy, he put a hand on the filthy wall and managed to support himself to walk.

How pitiful he looked. This was the Demon Lord who had shaken Alnaeth to its core and maddened the world in fear of him.

Veltol had never experienced such humiliation.

The skies were once again covered by thick clouds. He couldn’t see the moon peeking through like earlier.

Without the moon’s sublime light, the sky was cloaked in somber darkness. The ground, meanwhile, was bursting with color as if it were shining a spotlight on this defeated man.

His influence on the world long gone, it felt as though the sky was telling Veltol this was no longer the Demon Lord’s age—that he was behind the times.

“Argh…”

Veltol bumped into a muscle-bound figure and clumsily tripped. He was so fatigued even the smallest impact made him lose his balance.

“Hah? Hey, you bastard, you’re not gonna apologize for that just now?” The big ogre he bumped into glared at him.

Ogres were known for their red skin and the two horns growing from their heads.

This one had a battle tattoo from his chest up to his cheek and golden hair styled in a mohawk. Despite the cold weather, he was wearing only a tank top and cargo pants. His arms were made of unrefined steel—prostheses.

“You insolent descendant of the Blood Alliance… Who…do you take me for…?” Veltol glared back at the ogre while unsteadily getting to his feet.

“The what? Blood Alliance?”

“Heh… So your brain is too small…for you to understand even that much…”

He taunted the ogre as he spat up regurgitated gastric juice, and along with it his now meaningless pride as Demon Lord.

“…I’ll fucking kill you,” the ogre growled.

He approached, then threw a swift right hook. His buildup was long, as if he was making light of Veltol. But Veltol wasn’t the Demon Lord for nothing. There was no way he would lose to a mere ogre punk even in bare-handed close combat.

However…

“Take this!”

“Gargh!”

…that only applied when Veltol’s insides weren’t a chaotic mess.

The ogre’s steel arm sank into Veltol’s side, throwing him off balance.

Most Alnaethian warfare had been done through magic since antiquity, leaving individual physical strength largely dismissed in favor of mana or magic capabilities. That was one reason why the species of the Blood Alliance were regarded with disdain.

But the tables turned when it came to hand-to-hand combat.

An ogre’s steely muscles and the sturdy bones supporting them meant that even the most physically fit human paled in comparison to the average ogre’s athleticism.

Ogres were the top of all species in simple physical strength. There was no way Veltol, with his reduced faith and power, on top of being severely injured, could put up a fight.

“And another!”

The ogre slammed his fist into Veltol, practically snapping the Demon Lord’s body in two.

“Gah…!”

He received two more blows to the torso, then his knees gave out, and he collapsed.

“Bleeegh!”

He vomited blood and pieces of his still regenerating organs onto his hands and the ground beneath him. Somehow, his immediate thought was that he needed to clean himself up.

“That oughtta put ya in your place. Damn hairless monkey… Try pickin’ on someone your own size next time, eh?”

The ogre grinned sadistically, glad to be able to unleash such violence.

The brute kicked and stomped on Veltol over and over and over again, from his head, his flank, thighs, back, pit of his stomach, and finally, his chin.

Veltol curled into a ball and covered his head as the blows kept on coming.

Why?

The ogre trampled his face, and blood gushed out of his nose.

Why did I lose?

The ogre kicked his teeth in, and he swallowed them on reflex.

How did it end up like this?

One of his eardrums burst.

Why?

The ogre punched him in the stomach, and he threw up again.

Veltol’s head was full of questions.

No one walking the streets tried to help him. They either paid him no mind or sped up to get past the brawl without being dragged into it. No one tried to report it to the City Guard, either. But such incidents weren’t uncommon here in Shinjuku.

The ogre lifted Veltol by his hair. His face was tremendously swollen; he couldn’t even properly open his right eye.

Then the ogre spat in his face and said, “That’s what you get for talkin’ shit, you damn shrimp. And now I see you got no Familia, neither. What’s up with that? Some sorta religious thing? I don’t get you anti-technology people.”

“Argh… You measly ogre… How dare you… I’ll kill you…! Sword—!”

Veltol tried to chant a spell, but sooner than he could…

“Off you go! Wind Blast!”

…the ogre’s magic activated first.

A sphere of wind appeared within the ogre’s right hand clutching Veltol’s abdomen, then instantly burst.

The spell didn’t do much damage, but it was enough to send the Demon Lord flying.

Veltol’s body shot backward like a piece of trash slammed into a garbage can—and landed amid a heap of rubbish in the dump site across the street.

The ogre pumped his fist before walking away, laughing in hysterics. Veltol could see the light of his Familia shining on his nape.

Surrounded by trash and unable to move, Veltol simply looked up to the sky. Then a drop of rain fell on his cheek.

A heavy downpour immediately followed. The rain pelted him ruthlessly, so strong it could almost tear his body. As though the world itself was laughing at the now obsolete Demon Lord.

He closed his eyes.

“Why did I lose…?”

That was the only thing on his mind.

He couldn’t believe he had lost to a mere ogre. But the reason was quite simple: Human intellect and technology had far exceeded any demon lord’s powers over the past five hundred years.

Veltol was merely behind the times.

Even if he tried getting a Familia, he wouldn’t be able to use it if what Marcus said was right. And Veltol was certain that Marcus had been telling the truth.

After all, he had just discovered that a mere ogre could activate magic faster than him.

“Why did I lose…?”

Even though he understood the reasoning, he kept on asking the same unanswerable question.

Because we can see the value in life’s little glimmers.

From all his tangled-up thoughts and mangled brain, the words of that man from five centuries before (mere moments ago from his point of view) resurfaced.

“Ridiculous… Life? The light of life? …Such nonsense…such…”

Veltol closed his eyes and feebly shook his head, as though denying those words.

“Lord Veltol?!”

He heard a voice.

“Machina…?”

“Are you all right?!”

He opened his eyes to see Machina looking at him with worry.

Veltol averted his gaze. He didn’t want Machina to see him in this state.

The two of them headed to Machina’s home to avoid the downpour.

Shinjuku was built around the aether reactor at its center, and the elevated loop line divided the city into two zones: Inner Shinjuku and Outer Shinjuku.

Within the loop line was Inner Shinjuku, where Veltol and Machina had been moments before. This area had been redistricted during postwar redevelopment, and four main streets stretched out in the cardinal directions from the restricted zone around the reactor. This densely populated section of Shinjuku had a resplendent, bustling downtown full of skyscrapers.

Outer Shinjuku, on the other hand, hadn’t been redeveloped; many buildings remained exactly as they were right after the war. It was a gray, ruinous sprawl.

This part of Shinjuku was home to many slums filled with refugees from the City Wars, displaced persons, and those without a citizen ID—and even people who did have a citizen ID but couldn’t afford the rent in Inner Shinjuku. Outer Shinjuku was still within the cryotolerance zone, but its distance from the central aether reactor meant the climate was much colder than Inner Shinjuku.

Shinjuku’s structure was simple, based on the proximity to its center: The closer you got, the more prosperous your environs. The farther you got, the more desolate things became.

Meanwhile, Veltol and Machina were heading to a district in Outer Shinjuku, near the loop line.

They barely spoke on their way there.

“…Forgive me,” Machina said, unable to endure the silence any longer.

“Why are you apologizing?” Veltol asked.

“The Immortal Hunt was all Marcus’s doing, taking advantage of his position as the director of IHMI. He betrayed his fellow immortals so that he could be the only remaining one.”

“…I see.”

“That’s why I’ve been avoiding him… It’s all my fault for not informing you of Marcus’s betrayal… Maybe I could’ve stopped you… If only I had told you from the beginning, my lord…this wouldn’t have happened…”

“No need. Even if you had mentioned it, I probably would’ve still gone to see him. Now tell me, Machina, are there any other immortals left?”

“A number of others escaped the Hunt as I did, but…I haven’t been able to get in contact with many as of late. Immortals are still disappearing. I’ve even lost contact with Ornared and Palmlock, my close aides. I don’t know if they’ve gone into hiding somewhere or…”

“Or if they’ve ended up in trouble…? So the Immortal Hunt is still ongoing?”

“No…that was decades ago… These days, anti-immortal prejudice is nowhere near as prevalent as it once was. The Immortal Hunt proper ended before City War II.” Machina’s voice was somber. “…I visited Orna and Palm’s home after I lost contact with them. The place had been ransacked, and they’d left a hastily scribbled note.”

“What did it say?”

“Two words, in elvish: Immortal Furnace.”

“Immortal Furnace…”

He had never heard the term.

“I hope they’re both okay…”

Machina looked up at the sky. She sounded terribly worried. They had been not only her vassals but close friends while Veltol was gone for five hundred years. It was only natural for her to be concerned about them.

After walking a little while longer, Machina stopped.

“This is where I live.”

It was a box-shaped building with an iron roof. Many such buildings were stacked one on top of the other to form a housing complex supported by steel frames and connected by shoddy stairways and passages.

This was a tofu apartment building, made of tofu houses—so named for their precariousness.

“Wow,” said Veltol. “It’s perhaps not the most elegant residence, but it’s certainly big. Bravo for getting hold of such a castle despite the state of the world.”

“Ah-ha-ha…”

Machina could only awkwardly laugh at the huge misunderstanding.

They went up the noisy, rusty stairs, illuminated by the flickering white aether neon.

When they reached the second floor, Machina unlocked the door, turned the knob, and opened the creaky iron door to expose the interior of her house.

“Quite cramped, even for a storeroom,” Veltol mumbled earnestly as he looked around.

It was as small on the inside as it looked from the outside.

The entrance, so narrow only one person could pass through at a time, led to a similarly narrow hallway, in the middle of which was a tiny kitchen, which led to a prefab bathroom at the back. In a corner of the apartment was an old, outdated fridge, and in the center was a round table. A sliding glass door led to the balcony, and before it was a single futon.

It really was a small abode, quite detached from Veltol’s conception of a house.

“Actually…this is my apartment,” said Machina.

“Hmm? No, that much I understand, but for one of the Six Dark Peers to get proper sleep—”

“No, Lord Veltol.” She smiled sadly. “This is where I sleep.”

One room, one kitchen, one bathroom. That was the entire residence of the Dark Lord’s retainer, one of the Six Dark Peers, the Duchess of the Dazzling Blaze, Machina.

“Ha-ha, enough jokes, Machina.”

“It’s no joke, sir,” she declared. “This is my entire ‘castle.’ It’s all I can afford…”

Like all immortals, Machina didn’t age. In order to escape the Immortal Hunt, she had to relocate constantly. Every city she went to, she had to forge her documentation and lie about her date of birth in order to get a job, however little it paid.

If she stayed in one place for too long, people would notice she didn’t age and start suspecting her. Therefore, she had no choice but to go where no one knew her. During the height of the Immortal Hunt, she’d had to repeat this cycle even more frequently.

That was unquestionably one of the most humiliating times in Machina’s life.

“…”

Veltol could say no more.

Machina’s tone and expression were enough to tell she was saying the truth.

In all honesty, Veltol knew as much from the very beginning. She wasn’t the type to crack jokes like this.

There were no sturdy ramparts, no magnificent thrones or canopy beds, no luxury furniture or numerous servants here. Her castle was empty.

It was nothing like the castle she once had in the Immortal Kingdom. Her new home was, to put it bluntly, no more than a tiny, shabby room.

“Machina.”

“Yes?”

“You’ve been living this way this entire time?”

“…” Machina went silent for a moment, then nodded. “Yes, I have…”

“I see…”

Veltol’s slumber had amounted to five hundred years of Machina’s life. To her, it must have felt like an eternity.

Veltol couldn’t even begin to comprehend what sort of hardships, adversity, and humiliation she had experienced. And how could he, as a king? He had never lived through anything close to this.

Perhaps there was no need for his sympathy as a king, but just knowing she had been living in such a place made his heart swell with indescribable emotion.

“I’m so sorry…”

So he held her small body tight. That was the only thing he could do for her now. He had no reward or glory to give her.

“Forgive me, Machina… I’ve made you wait for so long…”

He only held her close and apologized.

“Lord…Veltol…”

Her small shoulders were shaking. Veltol hugged her even tighter as if to stop her trembling.

“You’ve more than proven your loyalty, Machina… Well done…!”

He offered his one remaining vassal the sincerest praise he could muster. There was nothing further he could do.

She cried on his chest. Tears she hadn’t shed in five hundred years.

“Lord Veltol…that’s…much too high praise for me…”

Veltol didn’t yet recognize the glimmer of light in his arms.

The only sound left was the driving rain against the iron roof.