Kyou kara Ma no Tsuku Jiyuugyou! Vol 8 Chapter 3

Chapter 3

      His voice wouldn’t reach from here, but Murata still called out his friend’s name.

      “What?  What can’t he do?”  Lord von Bielefelt was much calmer than Murata and didn’t seem to be particularly disturbed.  He’s likely unaffected because he has experienced Yuuri’s explosive magic many times over.  “It’s his usual high-and-mighty form.  Of course it is powerful… and inconvenient magic, but if we keep our heads down for a little bit and stay put, he’ll come back to himself all on his own.  I’m worried about him being totally exhausted after he collapses, but he’s somehow worked things out with that condition so far.  You could call it something like a small-scale typhoon.  It’s nothing for us to get worked up about.”

      Wolfram’s expression darkened like the way his mother’s does and looked back and forth between Yuuri standing on the stage and Murata.

      “It’s just different.  The quality of the magic and the circumstances are different… First of all, he hasn’t been back to Earth in a long time.  This might have happened in the past, but he hasn’t kept repeatedly using magic without going back.  And then you saw it, didn’t you?  On the boat?  It was as if he said something un-Shibuya… I’m worried about that… Hopefully something unstoppable isn’t happening inside Shibuya… And then…”

      Taking notice of Murata’s unease, Josak tries to bend the iron bars.  Realizing the gaps wouldn’t widen with just the strength of an ordinary man, he starts hacking away at the metal with the axe.

      “What?”

      For a split second, Wolfram made quite an unpleasant face.  However, he quickly recovers his faith as a close friend of the king and respectfully gazes at the Twin Black Great Sage as if he was a novice.

      “You?  But Lord von Bielefelt, your back.”

      “It’s not certain, but probably a little.”

      He kicked open the entrance.  While the guards standing on both sides were taken by surprise, he takes them down with one hit from the somewhat-supplied weapon.

      “You wound me, Young Master.”

      The snow drawing figures in the black sky slinked about according to its master’s will as if it were alive.  First was a bird, then a dog, then a mou-… no, a red squirrel.

      Before the spectators had the chance to yell ‘Adalbert, behind you,’ the mass of snow shaped like a bucket took a nosedive and attacked the man standing on the round stage.

      It was a hard blow to the back of the head.

      “… Hey, what gives…?  Wasn’t this match normal combat?  If magic without any sense of art is allowed then you should have said so from the beginning… Ah, the shape of my head is going to change.”

      When Yuuri brought his hand to his neck, his fingers were wet by something that wasn’t sweat or water.  It was blood.  He gazed silently at his palm, but before long the snow rubbed against it.

      By the time he slowly raised his head, the light in his eyes was different than usual.  He was standing with his arms crossed and a cynical look on his face, his chin slightly lifted as if to look down on others.  His fiery, glittering black eyes were focused on one target: Adalbert.

      A low and resonant voice with a roundabout, hard to understand way speaking.  Expressions you would only hear in period dramas in a halfway literary style.

      “You make fallacious arguments with your selfish grudge and turned your back on your homeland to wander.  As if that was not enough, you wish for chaos in your native land because of a foolish reasoning that can only be thought of as resentment!  How foolish and lacking is your soul?  My nose cannot stop dripping at the shamefulness.”

      “However!”

      It stopped right when Adalbert got tired of listening to the lecture and was thinking if he should just attack already.  Nice timing.

      As if he was beset by an earth-shattering tragedy, he places a hand to his brow and gazes up at the sky.  The snow sculpture in the night sky accompanied that move by twisting its body as if it was wailing.  How ghastly.

      Several people in the arena cocked their heads to the side as if to say ‘eh?’  That’s unreasonable.  And unsanitary.  However, most of the people were admiring the somewhat dignified string of words.  It felt like mass hypnotism.

      He didn’t have to say that one part just like she did.

      Left out of all the goings on and just watching his master from afar, Conrad was taken aback by the man’s boldness, although the spectators and the judges who knew nothing of Yuuri’s social status and position were as well.  He was defiant even in front of the Super Demon King.  It was to the extent that it seemed like he would start digging around i-… brushing off his nose.

      “… Ugh, there is no medicine for muscles… So your muscles have eroded your brain?”

      “Quiet!  You are a treasonous man who wishes to overthrow my authority and spread useless chaos in the kingdom!  Von Grantz, your existence is a large obstacle in the way of my flawless and absolute reign which I’ve named ‘My Bronze Statue’ Plan.  Even though we are of the same race, fleeing the country is a serious crime.  On this occasion, even spilling blood is not disagreeable…!”

      “You leave me no choice.  I’ll cut you down!  Throw yourself upon the sword of justice and fall just like Seizou Fukumoto!” (1)

      “Judgement!”

      Left behind on the ground, Conrad felt an indescribable unease at the succession of improper words.

      Something was wrong.  This was completely different than how Yuuri was until now.  It would be nice if he were just needlessly worrying, though.

      “Damn it!”

      “Whoa, the snow!” someone screamed in abject terror.

      A high-pitched trumpet sounded throughout the grounds.  It was announcing an evacuation alarm.

      A battle like this wasn’t something one got to see many times in their life.  Hands that held exploded millet kernels all froze in place and spilled alcohol on laps was left as is.  Air blown into balloons suddenly flowed back into mouths.  There were those who forgot to lower their raised fists and those who didn’t close their mouths.  There were even those who wanted to escape but were too afraid to move and would definitely have nightmares that night.

      It was more wanting entertainment than bravery.  It was an unexpectedly simple Shimaronian trait.

      Scraping his finger and leaving a single drop of blood on the blade, Adalbert mutters ‘what was that’ to himself before bringing up his rigid weapon in front of his face.

      “What!?”

      “… Aha.  It’s impressive that you can use this much magic in these wonderful circumstances of being in human land and having a temple right next to you on top of it all.  As one would expect of a soul born to be king.  It’s different than a normal demon’s.”

      “Impressive, a swarm of flies.”  How filthy.  The man that looks like he smelled of sweat twisted his lips up in what could be a sneer.  “But don’t get ahead of yourself.  It’s not always a given that your opponent won’t resist and will simply kneel before you.”

      “Did you forget?  I’ve thrown away my demon self.  My status, my position, my name… even my magic power.  But I received much in return.  The exorcist abilities that humans use is one of them.”

      “This place is steeped in particles that obey exorcism.  Just as one would expect from a temple in Big Shimaron.  Then again, this change in atmosphere might be trivial for the greatness of Your Majesty.  But, this is the best place for me to use exorcism.”

      “And my opponent is the current Demon King.  Nice.  This is exciting.  I’ll probably never get this chance again.”

      His jet black eyes glitter coldheartedly.  So much so that if someone who knew the usual Yuuri saw him they would think it was a different person.

      “Wait!  My relatives have nothing to do with this.”

      “Hey hey, isn’t your personality a bit different?  I feel like I’ve been beat at my own game.”

      “There’s no use arguing.  Prepare yourself, Adalbert!  I’m going to split your chin even more!”

      The giant snow sculpture separated into small masses.  Flying objects the size of thumbs circle around Adalbert.  The figures with their teeth bared heading towards their target looked more like a group of carnivorous insects hunting down prey than snow sprites surrounding a target.

      Neither side was making any progress.

      “… Ugh!”

      It was more grotesque than usual.

      “Annoying, buzzing like bugs…!”

      “My sword will slit your throat before your magic kills me.  Come on, Demon King.  Hurry and test my theory.  Throw a snowball or whatever else at me with your hands.”

      Yuuri snapped his fingers and Adalbert swung his sword down at the same time.  However, a few seconds before that, Conrad had managed to climb up to the top with his poor footholds.

      It was too late.  The man who had discarded the demons had already moved into unstoppable action.  Even if he heard Conrad’s voice.

      The tip of the blade was turned away to the left at the last moment just as it cut a single layer of skin.

      An unrelenting snowfall descended upon Adalbert from above as he stumbled forward.  Save for the elbow down of his right arm that was grasping his weapon, he was covered by a mountain of snow and stopped moving.  Several seconds of silence later, the audience erupted like a clock mechanism all at once in cheers.

      “… Who…”

      However, there wasn’t even a sliver of kindness within them.

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(1)    Seizou Fukumoto is an actor that plays in a lot of period dramas as the guy who loses the swordfight.  He also played the silent samurai in The Last Samurai with Tom Cruise.
(2)    So in the original Japanese, the ‘sei’ (正) in ‘seigi/justice’ (正義) was missing a stroke so it became 止 and read as止義 which isn’t a word so I can’t really give a pronunciation.  Shigi, maybe?  The characters mean ‘stop’ and ‘justice/right/honor.’

Chapter end