62

Once again, a cold silence descended over the crowd.

And the one who broke that silence was none other than Lord Edmure.

“A demon! What kind of blasphemy is that!”

The enraged lord sprang to his feet.

He flushed and let out a roar.

“Knight Commander. Seize that madman at once!”

Galahad, receiving the lord’s order, hesitated for a moment and looked at Hamel.

Hamel, feeling that gaze, gave a small nod.

The time was not yet ripe.

They had to wait a little longer.

Sensing that, Galahad raised his hand and said,

“Guards! Detain Baron Gilmore immediately.”

“Yes!”

Dozens of soldiers on guard gripped their spears and advanced toward Hamel.

It was the moment when some of the soldiers slowly approached Hamel.

Fwoosh

The previously quiet blue flame flickered again.

“This flame is my innate ability, Azure Flame.”

Hamel spread out his hand, burning with blue flames.

People flinched and listened to Hamel.

“And the Azure Flame…”

Hamel flicked the fire he was holding, scattering it toward the approaching soldiers.

The soldiers, suddenly doused with fire, cried out in alarm.

“U-uaaah…?”

But the screams soon quieted, and the area was enveloped in silence.

“Isn’t it hot?”

A soldier who had the Azure Flame on him tilted his head as if puzzled.

Indeed, the soldiers doused in the Azure Flame were unharmed.

Hamel said, looking at them,

“As you can see, it causes no harm to humans or ordinary things.”

“…Then why did the grape burn earlier? What does it burn?”

Rupert, who sat tensely, asked.

Hamel answered, trampling the half-burnt grape with his foot.

“Demons. And only things tainted by demons. The Azure Flame burns only those.”

“…”

A chilling silence settled over the assembly.

All eyes turned to the lord.

As if demanding an explanation.

Hamel then spoke, driving in the wedge.

“By the names of the beneficent gods, I announce: from now, we will begin the hunting of demons.”

The blue flame flicked like a serpent’s tongue.

The lord, watching in silence for a moment, slammed the table.

“On what authority do you brazenly act like this in my estate? What right have you?”

“This is my duty. I have permission from the order and His Majesty the Emperor.”

When Hamel calmly answered without backing down, Edmure, veins bulging, shouted.

“You…!”

Edmure, who had been trembling briefly, descended the dais roughly.

“Fine. Go ahead and do as you please. Whom will you investigate first? Me?”

Edmure threw off his ornament and cloak and drew his sword.

The well-trained physique typical of northern warriors was revealed under the light.

Hamel nodded calmly at that fierce appearance.

“The lord is the host of this tournament and the very person who offered the fruit containing the demonic energy as a reward. Naturally, he is a suspicious person.”

And that’s not all.

He is the one who distributed pendants to the domain’s people and who healed his wife of an incurable disease.

All circumstances pointed to Edmure being a demon.

“Then prove it. If, by chance, I am not a demon, you will pay the appropriate price.”

Edmure plunged his sword into the ground.

Hamel slowly spread his hands, as if to proceed with proof using the Azure Flame.

But at that moment.

“No.”

Hamel shook his head firmly.

The eyes of those watching with tension widened.

Even Edmure flinched, as if he hadn’t expected Hamel’s reaction.

“However, you are not a demon. There is only one demon in this estate.”

As he said that, Hamel kicked over the black barrel Rena had prepared.

The barrel tipped, and its lid flung open.

Then, with flapping sounds, something poured out.

“W-what is that?”

While people panicked, ‘they’ swarmed toward the Azure Flame and revealed themselves.

Brown wings resembling bark fluttered and painted the air.

But unlike butterflies, their wings beat long and fast like birds’, a swarm of insects.

They circled the Azure Flame briefly, then began to fly in one direction.

That place was—

“Kyaaaah!”

—around the lord’s wife.

“What are you doing!”

Edmure gasped and turned toward his wife.

Others also sprang up to help the lord’s wife—

Hamel blocked them and said,

“Everyone stop. These are not insects harmful to people.”

“…?”

“Those are vine moths. Pests that are natural enemies of grapevines.”

Carnosa Vinea.

Among them, the name Vinea means grapevine.

“They are also something the upper-rank demon Vinea, whose original form is a grapevine, extremely hates.”

The larvae of vine moths eat the fruit and act as vectors that lead to fungal infection.

They may be pests to farmers, but not in this moment.

“Kyaaa! Stop!”

The lord’s wife waved her hands and screamed for a moment.

Smack!

Suddenly there was the sound of crushing in the air.

The moths, attracted by the sweet scent from Carnosa Vinea, were torn to pieces.

“That is…”

Rupert inhaled and his voice trailed off.

“Found you. Carnosa Vinea.”

Hamel looked at her with cold, sinking eyes.

Dozens of vines extended from her hands, shimmering in the air like living whips.

The lord’s wife—no, Carnosa Vinea—slowly turned her head toward Hamel and gave a small smile.

“Oh my… I’ve been found out.”

“Don’t move.”

“Grr, you bastard!”

Hamel held a sword to the throat of Lord Edmure beside him and restrained him.

It had been revealed that the lord’s wife was a demon.

From now on, it was Hamel’s time.

“Sir Galahad! Now!”

“Yes!”

Galahad nodded, drew his sword, and shouted.

“Now! Heroes of Lonelybirch! The time has come!”

“Waaaah!”

The soldiers who had pointed their spears at Hamel all turned and faced the lord’s wife.

It was the result of Galahad having quietly altered today’s banquet guard roster earlier.

Among the soldiers guarding the banquet hall now, none were Vinea’s minions.

“Sir Rupert!”

Hamel turned his head and called out Rupert’s name.

Rupert, as if he’d been waiting, sprang up and drew a hidden weapon.

“The priest’s words have been proven true. In the name of God. Follow me, all of you!”

“In the name!”

Dozens of knights following Rupert sprang up and drew their swords.

In an instant, spears and blades were pointed densely at the lord’s wife.

Only the other guests, who knew nothing, didn’t know what to do.

Hamel glared at the lord’s wife and said,

“It’s over.”

“It is certainly dangerous, this situation right now.”

Vinea smiled as if troubled.

Hamel frowned.

She laughs?

Even demons are not indifferent before death.

They too fear what comes after death.

Whatever awaits them, I don’t know.

Hamel looked at her with a puzzled expression.

Vinea asked Hamel,

“You have prepared a lot. But if that’s all, I’m disappointed.”

“…?”

A strange sense of ill omen made Hamel flinch.

Before he could chew over the meaning of those words—

Thud

“Gurg…!”

From behind him, agonized dying screams that should not be heard rang out.

“What on earth…!”

“You… why?”

Knights pierced by their comrades’ blades staggered, eyes wide.

Rupert’s knights.

Half of them had attacked their fellow knights.

The pupils of those knights had already turned black.

“…When did this happen?”

As if answering Hamel’s mutter, Vinea said,

“I served wine at yesterday’s banquet. Wine mixed with my fruit; very rare wine indeed.”

“…!”

Rupert, uneasy, had followed Hamel’s advice.

He had forbidden his subordinates from tasting the fruit provided by the lord.

But the wine was an exception.

In the end, aside from the half assigned to guard duty, the rest of the knights drank the lord’s wine.

“I’ve already wasted two of my fruits, fruits so rare they yield only a few a year.”

Vinea said, grumbling.

“I trust you will pay the price for that.”

“…”

Hamel, instead of replying, assessed the situation.

The ambush had been painful.

The remaining uninfected knights were unable to effectively resist the assault and fell.

Meanwhile, the soldiers of Lonelybirch were shaken by the sudden situation.

They were hardly a match for the knights in the first place.

It won’t go smoothly, after all.

It was then, as Hamel sighed.

“Waaaah!”

The estate inhabitants who had been spectators began to move.

Some were Trents who had been turned into complete puppets.

The problem was…

“The lord is under attack! It’s a rebellion!”

“A heretic is attacking the lord! Seize the heretic!”

Even sane domain inhabitants swelled with hostility toward Hamel’s group.

…They must be under the influence of an illusion.

It may not be as powerful as the pendant the Trent disguised as an old woman wore, but it would be enough to bewilder those wearing a pendant.

Vinea smiled faintly at Hamel.

“So, who is finished now?”

The situation had been overturned all too easily.

Hamel once again reminded himself that his opponent was an upper-rank demon capable of destroying an entire domain.

“I’m sorry. I was a bit complacent.”

He didn’t think he lacked preparation. Hamel had done his best since arriving in the domain.

He simply couldn’t match Vinea, who had long since taken control of the domain.

So Hamel’s task was simple.

Click

Hamel popped the cap off the flask at his waist.

Then he dumped it down his throat in one gulp.

“What are you doing all of a sudden…?”

Vinea, watching him with puzzlement, suddenly stiffened.

A repulsion that demons instinctively feel.

A creepy, fearful aura emanated strongly from Hamel.

Crack

At the same time, Hamel drove his sword into the ground and grabbed the nearby oak barrel.

He lifted the barrel, which three grown men would normally need to hoist, with astonishing ease.

Hamel seemed to shift his hips lightly, then with a twist of his torso hurled the barrel into the air.

“Sir Daniel!”

“Leave it to me!”

A knight with a red-plumed helmet sprang up like the wind and split the oak barrel in midair with his sword.

Salt water from the barrel poured down like a waterfall from the sky.

The knights hit by the salt water—more precisely, the knights who had consumed Vinea’s fruit—froze in their movements.

Only for a moment—they convulsed violently as if in pain.

“Aaaah!”

Watching them writhe as if scalded by hot oil, it was clear they had been thoroughly corrupted by the demonic energy.

Without hesitation, Hamel cut the throat of one and said,

“Sir Daniel, Sir Galahad. Strike down the infected. Ono and Sir Rupert, try to restrain the approaching domain inhabitants without injuring them if possible. Lady Rena, tend to the fallen.”

The square, which had fallen into panic, began to calm in an instant.

Hamel, his blue gaze flaring like fire, said through his teeth,

“I will capture the demon.”

At that growling resonance, Vinea involuntarily stepped back.