DGDITMIAE 11

Chapter 11

Two days had passed since they returned from the monster hunt, but the knights’ discipline remained as tight as ever.

“…Yawn.”

“Did you catch a cold, Your Highness?”

Terestia stretched her arms out like a cat and waved her hand dismissively at the knight who greeted her from the side.

It was early spring, but the days were still short in the North, so even though it was morning, it was quite dim.

Terestia, who was tilting her head and loosening her neck, looked quite out of place against the training ground where the knights were kicking up clouds of dust.

Her slender build, pale skin, sparkling golden hair that fluttered lovelily, and violet eyes that symbolized royalty.

She looked like someone who would be far more suited to sitting quietly, wrapped in a splendid dress, hiding her rosy cheeks behind a fan.

However, Terestia, dressed casually in a thin beige shirt and black pants, blinked her eyes.

Having woken up and loosened her body, she roughly tied her glossy, curly long hair into a single ponytail, pulled out a wooden sword, and slowly walked into the training ground.

To the well-trained knights, her unpretentious and delicate appearance felt like an imposing predator approaching with not a single gap in its guard.

The knight swallowed nervously and reported to Terestia.

“Your Highness, Sir Jade, who was originally your sparring partner for today, has not yet returned from the border area due to an investigation.”

“Is that so?”

After pondering for a moment, Terestia surveyed the knights standing with tense faces.

Then she picked out, one by one, the ones who looked inadequate at first glance.

The chosen knights fell into despair, while the unchosen ones rejoiced.

But their joy and sorrow were short-lived, as Terestia mercifully distributed despair evenly.

“The rest of you, tomorrow.”

Even if hell was scheduled for tomorrow, the knights who had survived today quickly scrambled out of the training ground.

And the chosen knights were immediately pitted against Terestia in sparring.

There was no time to fall into despair.

Terestia, as superiors typically did in sparring, did not yield the first attack.

“Have you ever seen a monster give way to a first attack?”

—

That was the reason.

As soon as the sparring began, Terestia rushed at the knight standing foolishly with a sword in front of her in an instant.

Her swordsmanship was not as polished, flashy, or ornate as that of some nobles.

Terestia wielded her sword as crudely as a monster.

With an incomprehensible monstrous strength coming from her slender frame, the knight’s wooden sword, barely able to block, snapped with a crack.

Terestia did not exploit that opening but instead struck down the knight’s nape with terrifying speed.

Then, grabbing the knight by the collar with one hand, she hurled him toward another knight charging at her.

“Ugh…”

The knight couldn’t even let out a proper scream before losing consciousness.

She then drove her wooden sword deep into the abdomen of the next knight charging at her, and he collapsed, gasping for air and writhing.

Compared to the sparring within the knight orders of nobles or royalty, it could only be described as crude and barbaric, but Terestia didn’t even blink.

Of course, at first, there were not a few knights who protested.

However, Terestia firmly adhered to this method of sparring.

—

“Don’t delude yourselves. What you’ll be facing aren’t pretentious noble bastards—they’re beast-like monsters.”

—

And sadly, the knights had no choice but to agree with her words.

Monsters attacked with tremendous strength and speed, and there was no case where they would politely fight one-on-one with any sense of courtesy.

Terestia’s sparring, which resembled a brawl, was always exhausting and left them covered in bruises, but the knights could feel themselves growing little by little.

How could they not improve when they were engaging in such rough sparring, like hunting with a being far more powerful than a monster?

When the sun finally sparkled in the dim-looking sky, there was no knight left standing on the training ground except Terestia.

Terestia gulped down the water handed to her by Argo, who had approached with a blank expression, and said with a disappointed face.

“You need to get within two steps of me.”

Of course, there were no knights who understood her words, nor any knights who were conscious.

Argo glanced at the sprawled-out knights and muttered.

“That’s not a matter of steps…”

Well, the knights getting sprawled out while sparring with Terestia had become a daily occurrence now.

Argo soon averted his gaze from them and spoke.

“There’s an urgent dispatch that needs your immediate attention right now.”

“…Hmm.”

Terestia stared at Argo for a long while at those words, then slowly walked out of the training ground.

Normally, Terestia would have headed straight to wash up after leaving the training ground, but the ominous feeling from the word ‘urgent’ dispatch made her turn her steps toward the office.

—

* * *

—

“What’s this? A heretical cult?”

Terestia blinked at the words written on the report she had received as an urgent dispatch.

—

[Request for Cooperation in the Judgment of the Heretical Oket Tribe]

—

“The Oket tribe, a minority group living near the border of the Inyument territory, has been branded as heretics.”

“Oket tribe?”

“They originally were a minority group living near the western Bernin River, but…”

“Keep it simple.”

“According to a decree from the Vatican, they are said to worship demons.”

At Argo’s words, Terestia was startled.

“Worship demons? Why?”

To humans, demons were both fearsome and eerie beings.

So she had thought that all the human servants who followed demons did so without knowing their master was a demon…

Was it really okay to openly worship demons like this?

According to Terestia’s suppressed memories, it wasn’t like the gods helped humans either… so was that why?

“There are various reasons, but… there is a very ancient prophecy passed down in the scriptures.”

At Argo’s words, Terestia searched her mind again.

The scriptures—a book compiling the words of that so-called god.

Was there a prophecy related to demons in there?

Since it was a memory of a book she had only skimmed when she was very young, Terestia, who had been groaning for a while, suddenly called out brightly as a memory flashed by.

“Hmm hmm… Ah! ‘After a long time, when my body crumbles into pieces and fragments are born, the demon shall once again covet the world!'”

Argo clapped his hands with an indifferent expression, then continued the prophecy that followed.

“‘Then, when the demon arrives, he and his servants shall bring destruction to all they see, and finally the world shall fall into chaos.'”

“Yes, that’s it!”

But, why.

She had excitedly said it because she remembered something that had been frustrating her from not recalling it well, but in the end, it was saying that everyone would die, wasn’t it?

“Do humans have a hobby of wanting to die?”

“Not a hobby… if I had to put it, they desire ‘chaos.'”

“Chaos?”

“The order of above and below. What is fixed. What one is born as. What will not change in the future. Those who are dissatisfied with such things…”

Argo, seeing Terestia looking at him with a puzzled expression as if she didn’t understand at all, trailed off in his explanation and summarized simply.

“Rebellion. Those below want to rise up by creating chaos.”

“Aha.”

So in the end, they want the world to be turned upside down?

They don’t like living a poor and miserable life, so they want to live in splendor like a king!

That’s the meaning behind believing in a demon that will bring chaos.

Terestia nodded and asked another question out of curiosity.

“So who do they worship?”

“A demon… so, from what I’ve heard, one of the primordial demons called ‘Pascal’…”

“Is that so?”

Not me.

Terestia immediately lost interest.

But upon thinking about it, something seemed strange.

Why didn’t that Pascal fellow protect his worshipping servants?

If they died, he would become weaker.

Ah, I see—those Vatican bastards can learn a demon’s true name, so he was afraid of being destroyed!

Poor things… if they had worshipped me, I might have at least protected them.

Though she had never clashed with the Vatican before, according to Terestia’s memories, those Vatican bastards were all foolish riffraff.

They only cried out the Lord’s name with their mouths, while their bodies loved material things and they bowed their heads to those in power.

In short, as long as her true identity wasn’t exposed, they were a group she didn’t need to fear.

Seeing Terestia lose interest, Argo swallowed a sigh and continued.

“This request… is actually a request in name only. The Holy Knights have likely already marched out.”

“What? So you’re saying those Vatican bastards are on my land right now?”

“Probably. They seem to be carrying out the ‘judgment.'”

Terestia thought those Vatican bastards were quite nasty fellows.

What’s wrong with believing in a demon a little? Yet they insist on killing them.

And they go through the trouble of coming all the way up to the distant border from the capital to do it.

And more than that, there was something even more irritating.

“They dare to send troops into my land without permission? Fighting without authorization?”

It said it was a request for cooperation, but the fact that it was already in progress meant that Terestia’s answer was essentially unimportant.

What an arrogant notification.

Those Vatican riffraff dare to run amok on the land of the Demon Grand Duke?

I am the Princess of the Pabelon Empire before I am a Grand Duke—how insolent!

With a cold expression, Terestia pondered how to give them a good thrashing.

Argo looked at Terestia’s face for a moment, then let out a small sigh and spoke.

“We can’t dispatch the knights…”

“I’ll go alone. No, you’re coming too!”

To throw a tantrum over such arrogance as worshiping demons—I’ll give them a good kick in the pants and send them packing.

Terestia smiled beautifully as she thought.