Demon King & Hero Chapter 4.4

“Wha, what the h.e.l.l!”

The man, no, demon who had been trapped by chains in the center of the magic formation just seconds before, was here holding my hand.

“Don’t overdo it. Your life is mine. Don’t do reckless things.”

“Let go! If that blows up, we’re all going with it!”

I was going to die anyway. The best case scenario was that my life alone would be sufficient.

As I steeled my resolve, the aura around my sword grew brighter.

‘That’s right. I am the Guardian of Azure Flames, Yuria the Hero!’

It was when I had grit my teeth and was about to knock away the demon king’s hand.

Whack.

“What are you doing!”

I need to concentrate, d.a.m.n it!

The demon king aimed for my forehead again with the hand that he had used to flick my forehead just now.

“It hurts!”

“It was meant to. I believe you’re mistaking something; your life belongs to me.”

And then he grinned.

“I’ll deal with that.”

“You’re the powerless one, what are you saying!”

The demon king didn’t reply to my words, but stared at the black-robed man that collapsed on the ground.

“Doesn’t something seem odd?”

“Wh, what do you… mean…”

Looking at the man, whose flame of life was just about snuffed out, the demon king grinned evilly.

“If I was truly powerless… How would I have run away when you lot were at your peak?”

“What are you saying?”

“That’s the point. You managed to lose me when your organisation was stronger, but you managed to capture me when your forces were weakened. You get what I’m saying?”

“You mean…”

The grinning demon king turned to look at me.

“Yep. It’s true that I am weak. And I do sometimes feel embarra.s.sed when I’m compared to other demon kings, but that’s between demon kings.”

He turned back to the now-appalled man, and said,

“Even if I look like this, I am still the ruler of ten thousand evils. The master of darkness. It’s not like I can’t undo a simple human dark magic spell.”

The demon king stretched a hand out towards the ever-increasing dark ma.s.s and said,

“Undo technique. Activate circuit. Revitalise. Accessing code. Codename, ‘the one who dreams.'”

With that, an enormous demonic aura radiated out from the demon king. An aura that even I felt powerless in front of.

“Devour.”

Right underneath the dark ma.s.s, an unfathomably deep abyss formed.

“Greed.”

And from that… a black hand.

The hand took that ma.s.s, which could have blown us all up, and swallowed it down into the abyss.

(TLN: Back to a third person perspective.)

“How’s that, did I do good?”

The demon king grinned, looking at Yuria.

“Ye, yeah…”

The stunned Yuria turned to look at the still-open abyss.

As if it was still hungry, it felt like it would lunge at her with an open mouth at any time.

“Activate technique. Stop circuit. Undoing code.”

The demon king said as he saw Yuria’s face, and as soon as his command finished, the demonic aura vanished and so did the abyss.

“Demon king, I…”

For a long time, Yuria continued to stare at where the abyss was. Without having time nor consciousness to sort out her thoughts, she looked for the demon king .

And the demon king was…

“Yes?”

Tied up again.

“Wh, what are you doing?”

“Me? I’m tied up, aren’t I?”

“Wait a… you came to me just now, didn’t you?”

At Yuria’s utterly stunned expression, the demon king laughed and said,

“I need the hero to save me, so I tied myself up again?”

At those words, Yuria’s gaze turned to the ceiling, before her hysterical laughter echoed through the room.

“Get out, right now, before I kill you!”

“Don’t be like that~ Save me~”

Even facing her bloodthirsty smile, the demon king didn’t stop laughing.

“Pw, pwahahahaha! Cough, ahahahaha!” The man collapsed on the ground laughed like a madman.

“I have been completely toyed with by you, my lord demon king.”

“No, I didn’t?”

“You even stopped our last card, what on earth are you talking about? The demon king wouldn’t even have been summoned anyway!”

“No, that’s not it. If you had successfully summoned another demon king, I would have left you alone either way. The problem was, the hero would have self-destructed.”

“What are you saying now?”

Yuria scowled at the demon king’s words.

“Like I said. I don’t care whether they summon a demon king or a heavenly being, but it’s problematic if you die. You’re mine, after all.”

“I, I told you to stop saying that!” Yuria shrieked, her face turning red all the way to the tips of her ears.

Looking on the two in disbelief, the man said to the demon king,

“If a demon king appears, then the hero and the demon king is destined to fight… It seems like even you, the weakest demon king, could defeat the hero?”

“Nope, I’m weaker than the hero. That’s certain. But I’m stronger than the other demon kings.”

“What would that mean?”

“What are you on about?” (1)

Yuria and the man said simultaneously.

“Oi, when did the two of you meet before, so that you can synchronise like that? Did you two, in secret… Ah, sorry, please don’t glare at me like that, hero.”

“Shut up and talk.”

“Yes ma’am…”

Faced with the hero’s rage, it was the demon king that retreated.

“I told this to the hero before, I’m known as Economy in the demon world, but to be more accurate, I am Greed of the Seven Deadly Sins. The demon kings are chosen existences, ruling over an aspect of the demon world, but I just happened to be talented in economics.”

“Then what was that earlier?”

“That was a power pa.s.sed down through the demon kings of Greed. It’s not really my power but one borrowed from the demon G.o.d.”

“And?”

At Yuria’s question, the demon king puffed up his shoulders with pride.

“I regulate the economy. If I’m gone, the demon world falls to ruin. Because of that, nearly all the other demon kings are indebted to me one way or another. And if they try to come at me with brute force, the demon G.o.d protects me. In one word, the demon G.o.d’s got my back!”

As the demon king laughed, the black-robed man closed his eyes and said,

“I don’t know how… But it appears that I’ve been made a fool.”

Those were the man’s last words.

Author’s note.

At the man’s last words, the man cried, Yuria cried and the author cried too…

Originally, for a stronger impact I was going to say,

“I don’t know how but I’ve been made a r.e.t.a.r.d…”

Buuut I eased up for the children.

But sorry, you were only the sacrificial lamb for the next chapter…