Malice And Devils

The contract I had made with Garmon-san consisted of doing chores and becoming his apprentice.

However, what Garmon-san had originally intended to demand from the devil he summoned included not only chores, but also guarding the tower.

I could handle the chores just fine, but guarding the tower was another matter.

After all, if the tower needed guarding, that meant either the tower itself or Garmon-san had enemies who might attack.

Those enemies included monsters inhabiting the forest surrounding the tower, as well as humans known as adventurers.

Why had this tower been built so far away from human settlements in the first place?

Familiars from the Sorcerers’ Association delivered the bulletin, while merchants likewise dispatched by the Association brought daily necessities and food, but even so, living here was unquestionably less convenient than living among other people.

Yet despite that inconvenience, Garmon-san—and other sorcerers who lived in similar towers—had reasons why they needed to stay away from human settlements.

It was so they could refuse to belong to any nation.

If a sorcerer lived within human territory—in other words, within a country—they would be placed under that nation’s control.

That was because sorcerers represented considerable military power.

Apparently, a single sorcerer was roughly equivalent in combat strength to an entire squad of knights.

Naturally, nations wanted to regulate sorcerers, mobilize them as military assets during wartime, and use their sorcery to enrich the country during peacetime.

The only place sorcerers could really escape such national ambitions was probably in territories under the influence of the Sorcerers’ Association.

The Sorcerers’ Association was apparently an organization made up of sorcerers who disliked national interference, and it possessed enough military strength that countries couldn’t casually meddle with it.

But returning to the point, sorcerers who built towers and lived far from human settlements like this did not belong to any nation.

Put more bluntly, that also meant they existed outside the protection of the law.

So even if adventurers stormed a sorcerer’s tower and robbed them of everything they owned, the country wouldn’t punish those adventurers and might even praise them instead.

They would be hailed as heroes who had defeated an evil sorcerer.

By reducing the number of independent sorcerers in that way, undermining their standing, and eventually bringing every sorcerer under state control, the nations of this world hoped to achieve complete domination over them.

It happened one day, almost exactly a year after I’d been summoned into this world.

As usual, I was transferring water I’d drawn from the well into the water jar when an arrow suddenly flew in and buried itself deep in my chest.

“Huh?”

Startled, I fell backward onto my rear and dropped the wooden bucket I was holding, spilling water across the ground.

Fortunately, that was about the extent of the damage, and I was relieved that I hadn’t knocked over the water jar, which was already half full.

…Yes, I knew there were probably more important things to worry about, but the water jar genuinely had been the first thing that crossed my mind when I panicked, so I couldn’t help it.

After all, while the arrow embedded in my chest had startled me, I couldn’t feel any pain from it whatsoever.

“He’s still alive! Keep shooting!”

I turned toward the shout and saw several more arrows flying at me from within the forest, and before I even had time to think about dodging, they buried themselves in my throat, shoulder, and stomach one after another.

Whoa. What was I supposed to do?

…It still didn’t hurt.

My heart had nearly stopped from the shock, but when I looked more closely, the first arrow had struck exactly where my heart should have been, making it an unmistakably fatal wound.

That realization shocked me to my very core—or rather, the arrow looked like it might have gone straight through my heart and out the other side—but more arrows seemed likely to come flying at me if I stayed upright, so for the time being I let myself fall backward.

It didn’t hurt, but being shot at with arrows was still frightening and certainly wasn’t pleasant.

Thinking back on it later, even I found my own thoughts strangely detached, but everything happening felt so unreal that I think I simply wanted a moment to calm down and figure out what to do.

“Good, he’s finally dead. Don’t let your guard down. The sorcerer living in this tower is supposed to be an old man. This one must’ve been his apprentice or something. Our real target’s still inside.”

Hearing the men emerge from the forest and head toward the tower entrance without paying any further attention to my fallen body, I finally understood what was happening.

Ah. These people had come here to kill Garmon-san.

Garmon-san had told me before that people called adventurers sometimes attacked sorcerers living in isolated towers.

But at the time, the story hadn’t felt real to me at all, and I’d completely forgotten about it until now.

After all, I simply couldn’t imagine anyone trying to kill someone as kind as Garmon-san while calling him an evil sorcerer.

But the arrows sticking out all over my body were undeniable proof that what he’d told me had been true.

Come to think of it, I vaguely remembered hearing that devils couldn’t be killed through ordinary means.

Even if this body were destroyed, I’d merely be sent back to that dark space where I’d waited before—the place apparently called the Demon Realm.

The price, however, would be the termination of my contract with Garmon-san, and I would probably never be able to see him again.

Even if the contract were destroyed, the connection created through naming would remain, but it would take time before I could be summoned again, and Garmon-san’s lifespan would probably run out first.

…I’m glad I’d hidden my horn.

I’d learned how to make it disappear through spiritual-particle manipulation a little while ago, although I still forgot to hide it fairly often.

If I’d left my horn visible, the attackers might not have let their guard down like this and could have made sure to completely destroy my body.

No, if anything, it was fortunate that I had been the one attacked.

Because if Garmon-san had been the one riddled with arrows like this, he certainly wouldn’t have been able to lie there leisurely thinking things through.

But if I did nothing, those men would attack Garmon-san next.

That was something I absolutely had to prevent.

Garmon-san was unquestionably an incredible sorcerer, but from the way he normally behaved, he had never struck me as someone particularly skilled at fighting.

Suppressing the fear inside me, I forced a smile onto my face and stood back up.

“W-What the hell?! Why are you still alive?!”

One of the attackers noticed me and shouted, prompting the others to turn their weapons toward me as well.

The blades gleaming as they caught the light looked like they would hurt terribly.

Well, I probably wouldn’t actually feel pain even if they cut me, but I still couldn’t help being a little scared.

Even so, I was definitely faster than they were.

―ru―

I moved my tongue once inside my mouth.

There was no need for some long incantation; since I could manipulate spiritual particles and magical essence directly, that tiny motion was enough.

The next instant, gravity suddenly intensified around the attackers—or, more precisely, around the five adventurers.

Struck by the sudden force, some dropped to their knees while others collapsed flat against the ground.

“W-Why aren’t you dead?! I’ve never heard of sorcery like this!”

They shouted in confusion, but naturally they didn’t know it.

Gravity sorcery had only been made available to sorcerers affiliated with the Sorcerers’ Association—in other words, sorcerers who did not belong to any nation.

Besides, what I had used wasn’t gravity sorcery.

It was gravity Magic.

To my surprise, one of the adventurers actually tried to stand up despite three times normal gravity, so in alarm, I increased the gravity affecting him to five times normal.

That finally stopped all of them from moving.

I had chosen gravity Magic because I wanted to incapacitate them without killing them.

A year had passed since I’d come to this world, and although I’d become capable of doing things I’d once thought impossible—like butchering and eating rabbits—I still hadn’t steeled myself to kill another human being.

Of course, if it were necessary to protect my own life or Garmon-san’s, I knew I would have to do it…

If I had to make an excuse, though, while the attack had certainly startled me, I hadn’t really felt as though my life were in danger.

I knew that might be naïve of me, but I decided I’d discuss what to do with them together with Garmon-san.