Akuto’s tone was completely serious. Fujiko looked shocked.
“And so you came to me?”
“That’s right. I wanted to ask the best fighter I knew.”
Fujiko smiled wickedly.
“I might try to set a trap for you.”
“I think you will, but still, you’re the best person I can learn from.”
Fujiko could tell he meant it, and she had no idea how to react.
“Y-You’re really naive, you know that? Or is this some kind of attempt to show me what a good person you are?”
“No, I don’t think I’m really a good person. Sometimes I get mad and take it out on other people, for one thing. But I think it’s safe to say that I have faith in you.”
“And that’s why you’re naive.”
“No, that’s not true. You have a nasty personality, right? You’re self-interested, you worship power, and you try to turn other people’s power to your advantage. The problem is that you don’t believe in other people. That’s why you end up getting scared and doing things in secret.”
“Wha—...?” Fujiko’s jaw dropped.
—Did I say too much? But it is true, after all...
Akuto kept talking despite worrying that he’d already gone too far.
“Like I said before, I have faith in you. You know, even if there’s somebody you can’t trust at all, you can trust them to work to their own advantage, right? So I’ll give you something in exchange. It’s not exactly a trade, but maybe I can make you a promise. If you teach me magic, I promise that I won’t interfere with your activities. How about that? Knowing how much you love to scheme, I think you’ll accept.”
Fujiko angrily slammed her palms against the table in front of him.
“You think you know everything about me, don’t you?”
—You claim to be a villain, so I was trying to give you a compliment a villain would like... And isn’t it normal to do a little research before deciding to associate with someone, anyway?
He crossed his arms and frowned, but since he realized he was getting nowhere, he lowered his head.
“I apologize if I was rude. But I’m here, knowing the risks. And you’re the one who wanted to make me your servant, right? So if you can have me as your student...”
“Wh-What is your problem?!” Fujiko screamed. She was slamming her fists onto the table again. “Fine! You want me to teach you to fight, I will! I’ll do it right now! But don’t blame me if you end up regretting this later! You demon! Demon King!”
—Well, I got what I wanted, but now she’s mad at me for some reason...
Akuto slumped his shoulders.
“Um... there’s one more thing...”
“What now?!”
“Could you... stop calling me Demon King?”
“I refuse! I don’t want to admit it, but you’ve got the talent for it!” Fujiko slammed her fists in the table a third time.
○
Fujiko told him to open his student handbook and take notes in it.
“Magic is the art of using the mana in your body to cause a reaction with the mana in the air. You know that, right? And the mana in the body acts in response to electrical signals in the brain. Everyone knows that, too. Now, what decides how the mana itself behaves? The gods. ‘Energy’ is what is produced by the central generator and is released into the earth itself, so it wouldn’t be the right term to use here. It’s better to call it a kind of ‘mana program.’”
That, Akuto knew. But he only vaguely knew about the information that followed.
“The behavior of mana is decided by the gods. Mana may seem omnipotent, but in this way, it’s actually limited. And so the question here is, what are the gods? The gods are beings that constantly monitor and log human brain activity via mana. That’s the simplest way to put it. Some people think of them as computers while others consider them entities worthy of worship. It depends on the individual. If your emotions are being monitored, that means that the gods can give you more or less of their blessing based on your behavior. The logs themselves are never made public, but this means that humans are, in effect, forced to be good because of their desire for the convenience that magic offers.”
“Philanthropy is a virtue according to the god Ko-Roh, while Suhara prefers bravery. And so they each make their own type of magic easier to use. Normal people just worship the gods as divine beings, but at the upper levels it’s much more systematic. The truth about what the gods are isn’t kept a secret or anything. It’s just that most people don’t want to think about it too hard. All those involved in academics are aware of this. Even among those who aren’t, most intelligent people simply ‘choose’ to act as if it’s a religion. Doing so allows magic to make your life much more convenient, and there’s a great advantage to it.”
“So the ultimate goal of this academy’s graduates is to become priests; who are capable of influencing the inner workings of the gods themselves. But the black mages are opposed to this. In other words, we oppose this system, and want to see a revival of humanity’s old ways. At least, the organized black mages do. I won’t deny that many of them are just people who enjoy committing crimes.”
Akuto interrupted.
“So what’s a Demon King then?”
“You don’t know anything about yourself, do you? No, I suppose nobody’s tried to tell you. Children born in this country are baptized, right? That’s a contract with a god, and without it, you can’t use magic. But this means that those who are left out of this system cannot live regular lives as humans. It’s said that the last Demon King was someone who doubted this system. This information isn’t particularly classified either. It’s just that nobody cares.”
“So what does this have to do with using magic?”
“Certain types of magic require special rights to use them, and using them is considered a crime. But you’re aware that just because it’s a crime doesn’t mean it’s impossible, right? For example, you’re supposed to need a license to use flight magic, but everyone here at the academy practices it. The same can be said of ‘forbidden magic.’ You can’t use it unless you have the required rights. But if you can deceive the gods into thinking you do, it’s possible to use it. You could say that black mages are people who do that. But the use of ‘forbidden magic’ is monitored by the gods. You can trick the gods into thinking you have the right to use it, but that doesn’t stop them from penalizing you. So the more you use black magic, the weaker you become.”
“Then there’s no point in being a black mage, is there?”
“Correct. That’s why the black mages sought their own god. A god of freedom. A god who would forbid nothing.”
“And what happened to that god?”
“It’s gone now. It was destroyed in the last war. Recreating it is the dream of all black mages. That’s why some black mages are trying their best to get the High Priest to turn. Only the High Priest, and those around him, has the knowledge required to create a god.”
“I see,” said Akuto, nodding. Fujiko had covered most of what he’d learned in his first-year classes.
—But it seems to me like the black mages are just being selfish... I guess if we see things that differently, I couldn’t become the Demon King, huh?
Fujiko finally got to the point.
“So, we were talking about fighting. The reason I told you all that was to explain that the god that baptized you, as well as the layout of your psyche, determine what types of magic you’ll be good at.”
Fujiko stretched out her hand over Akuto’s student handbook and drew a diagram. Four lines intersected to form a star shape. She’d drawn an eight-pointed matrix. And at each point of the star, she wrote these words, in this order.
“Illusion,” “Healing,” “Telekinesis,” “Destruction,” “Spirits,” “Artifacts,” “Religion,” “Transformation.”
“These are the eight magic specialties, determined by your psyche. As the diagram suggests, nobody has both one specialty
and its opposite. People who are good at illusion magic are terrible at spirit magic. Recognizing this is the key to improvement.”
“What’s your specialty?”
“In my case, it’s transformation, using mana to change the structure of matter. That means I can make medicines, or transform the body itself. In my case, I’m specialized in making medicines. What’s important is to realize that that means I’m bad at destruction magic. You learn them all in class, but in a fight, it’s best to just give up on the ones you aren’t good at. It’s not efficient. In your case, you’re very clearly my opposite. It’s obvious that your specialty is destruction magic.”
“Which means that’s what I should focus on, right?”
“Right. Once you know that, you have to learn the rest through practice, but we don’t have time for that, so...”
Fujiko put something that definitely looked like a gun on the table.
Akuto gave her a confused look.
“What’s this?”
“An incantation gun, which uses mana bullets. The bullets come pre-loaded with mana, and the spell takes effect after you fire it. Everybody is capable of using it, but someone who can control their mana can tune the bullets to do different things.”
Fujiko lined up the bullets in front of him.
“You always carry this with you?”
“Yes. Is that a problem?”
“Isn’t that illegal?”
“Not necessarily, at the Academy. Everybody here can already use dangerous magic.”
Fujiko opened the revolver’s chamber and gave him a simple demonstration of how to use it.
Then there was a brief pause in their conversation, and Akuto suddenly remembered something that had been bothering him.
“Hey, you’re the dorm head, right?”
“That’s correct.”
“Do you know a girl named Eiko Teruya then?”
“No, I don’t... Is that the strange girl who was doing filthy things with you this morning?” asked Fujiko, her face tensing up.
“Do you know anything about her? The student council president said she didn’t, but it felt like she was hiding something. And she even told me to be careful around her...”
Fujiko seemed to think for a moment.
“She seemed to have it out for me, so I was wondering about her too,” she said.
“Did she attack you?”
“No, just gave me a bit of a hard time. If there’s something both you and I have in common, it’s probably that treasure map...”
Fujiko quickly put her hand over her mouth, realizing her mistake. But Akuto didn’t miss it.
“What does that mean? Do you know something about the map?”
Fujiko’s expression clouded.
“N-No... I just think it might’ve been something my late brother made.”
“Then...”
“N-No. My brother said he didn’t.”
“Huh? Wasn’t he dead?”
“Necromancy. Did you forget? I’m a black mage.”
Fujiko looked like she was trying to seem stronger than she really felt. A shadow had fallen on her normally arrogant attitude.
“I think I remember hearing that when you use necromancy on someone, they can’t tell lies, right? Sorry. It must’ve been painful, having to use necromancy to talk to your brother.”
Akuto was trying to apologize after seeing the look on her face, but she just started to shout frantically.
“Not at all! He’s a terrible man! He shamed our family! I remember being with him all the time when I was young, but that must just be because he was an awful lolicon! If he was still alive today, he’d be a sex offender!”
—If you’re worried about shaming your family, why’d you become a black mage?
Akuto decided to keep his thoughts to himself.
“Either way, I’m worried about that Eiko Teruya girl. But I just don’t know how to be forceful around women...”
Fujiko stared at him with fury in her eyes.
“You’re pretty forceful around me, don’t you think?”
“Well, sure... but... you’re evil, right? And I doubt you’d want me to suddenly start being gentle with you after all we’ve been through,” said Akuto without thinking. Fujiko pointed the incantation gun at him, her voice shaking.
“I hate men who disobey me, and even if they do obey me, I hate men who are weak!”
“Sorry about that...” Akuto reached forward with both hands and respectfully took the gun from her.
○
Akuto put the gun through its paces in the woods behind the school building, and it seemed to work well. He could immediately blow up a soda can that he’d placed a good distance away from him. He could control the bullet’s path, and the timing of when it blew up, so it was pretty easy to use. And unlike when he used his own mana, the bullet’s power was limited. He was relieved to finally have a weapon he could control.
Before long, Hiroshi showed up with a huge backpack. It seemed that he had finished packing, and Korone had come along with him.
“Boss, I packed you enough stuff to camp out for a week!”
“Thanks... But wouldn’t it be better to pack two bags?”
“I can’t let you carry our things, boss! Leave it to me!”
“Okay, but it doesn’t do me any good if you start wasting energy.”
“Don’t worry! I’m always wasting energy!”
“I see... Okay then. I guess it’s time to go,” Akuto said.
“It’s evening now. We’re not leaving tomorrow?” Korone asked.
“Let’s leave earlier than planned. I want to get started before anyone sees us going. It would be bad if we were spotted,” Akuto said, only to be answered by a voice above him.
“Spotted by who, Akuto Sai?”
He looked up in shock. Eiko Teruya was standing on a branch above him. She was puffing out her chest and standing with her legs apart, seemingly oblivious to the fact that he could see her underwear. Or maybe she wanted him to see it.
“You’re...”
But before he could continue, Akuto was astonished to see the underwear coming towards him. Eiko had leaped. She spun in mid-air, and landed directly on his shoulders with her legs around his head.
“Hey, you promised to take me with you!” said Eiko excitedly.
“I didn’t promise...”
“I’m going with you whether you promised or not. It’s okay, right?” Eiko rubbed her crotch up against the back of his head.
“Hey...” Akuto was stammering as he tried to speak, but Hiroshi complained violently in his place.
“Get off the boss, you whore!”
“You shouldn’t use ugly words like ‘whore!’ And anyway, it’s my business whose shoulders I ride on!”
“It is not! Boss is mine!”
“Are you gay? But he isn’t. Look, when I do this, his face gets all hot. See? See?”
She pressed harder against the back of Akuto’s head. With two soft thighs pressed hard against his ears, even Akuto couldn’t stop his cheeks from turning red.
“S-Stop it, please...”
But Akuto still couldn’t bring himself to protest strongly. And at the same time, Hiroshi just whined, and didn’t try to touch her.
“Take me!” Eiko insisted. “Even if you tell me you don’t want to, I’m going with you anyway.”
“No way!” Hiroshi said.
“Please don’t... Come on, it’s probably dangerous,” Akuto protested.
“I’m coming with you no matter what!”
Several fruitless minutes passed like this, before finally Korone spoke up.
“Arguing isn’t going to change anything. More importantly, the sun has already set. Why don’t we camp here for tonight?”
And so that’s what they did.
—Wait. Why am I camping in the woods out behind the school?
The question only occurred to Akuto after he was lying down in his tent.
At some point, Eiko
vanished. So he decided to try leaving the tent and sneaking away in the dead of night. But Eiko quickly popped out from behind a tree, so he gave up.
—I guess that means she’s watching me. She doesn’t seem like an artificial human, so she’s probably trained so she doesn’t have to sleep. Who the hell is this girl, anyway?
At this point, Akuto decided to just give up and go to sleep.
○
Hiroshi woke Akuto early in the morning, and he quickly broke camp. He decided he looked so stupid camping in the woods behind school that he didn’t want the other students seeing him.
At the same time Akuto was leaving, Junko had returned home from meeting with her father. He had told her that Eiko Teruya had snuck into the Academy in order to complete some kind of mission. What the mission was, or who her employer was, he didn’t know.
The Hattori and Teruya clans had a long and complicated history. They were both believers in Suhara, but they had different interpretations of the god’s teachings and they’d fought over them for many, many years. The Hattori had chosen to involve themselves in politics during peacetime to advance the nation’s defense, but the Teruya saw this as a sign of weakness. They preferred to devote their lives to mastering the arts of combat.
—If someone like that is here at the school, it’s probably because of...
Of course, the first thing Junko thought of was Akuto. Without even waiting for the morning’s flying bus service to begin, the first thing she’d done when she got back was head to the window outside Akuto’s room. But a single glance told her he wasn’t there. The curtain was open, and the bed was neatly made.
“He left? This early?”
Junko headed back for the girl’s dorm, where she knocked on Keena’s door. There was no answer, but the door wasn’t locked, and it opened when she turned the knob.
Junko went inside. The room was filled with stuffed animals and empty food containers. Keena was sleeping in her bed, oblivious to the noise.
“Sorry to bother you this early...”
Junko shook Keena by the shoulders and she started to mumble in her sleep.
Demon King Daimaou: Volume 2 Page 6
