Chapter 108 - If You Lose, You Have to Do Something You Hate

After letting the horses graze, we sat on a hill to rest.

The gentle breeze stirred my hair. But a bloody wind still seemed to be blowing through the Wicked Laughing Demon's heart.

"How did you kill the Soul-Seizing Demon?"

I let out a chuckle.

"You said I was persistent about pretending to be good, didn't you? You're every bit as persistent as I am, Laughing Demon."

"Don't you want to boast about it? At your age, Second Young Master, you should want to brag to the whole world. I killed the Soul-Seizing Demon! So lower those insolent eyes in my presence! Don't you want to lord it over everyone?"

"I do like to show off, but not to the point of claiming I did something that never happened. Yes, I'm strong. Strong enough to arouse this sort of suspicion. But I didn't kill him."

I denied it to the bitter end. Saying anything that could become a weakness to a man like the Wicked Laughing Demon was as good as handing him that weakness. If I spoke in a moment of emotion, I would regret it for years to come.

"Fine. Then let's have a bout."

I had known he would say that eventually.

After watching me fight the assassins, he must have been seized by the desire to fight me himself.

Killing those assassins had turned him into a beast that had scented blood. The desire he had suppressed for so long had raised its head.

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because fighting among ourselves with a powerful enemy ahead of us would be foolish."

"We can just keep it mild enough that neither of us gets hurt, can't we?"

"It's only natural to get carried away in a fight."

"I won't get carried away."

"I will. If, as you believe, I'm skilled enough to kill the Soul-Seizing Demon, could you handle me when I get carried away?"

"Now I want to fight you even more."

He was boiling over, lava spattering out. To keep him from causing a major disaster, I needed to let some of that lava flow out today.

"Let's do it!"

"No."

"A lot of assassins died today. Would they attack again before even a day has passed? Realistically, it's impossible."

"There's another reason I don't want to."

"What is it?"

"I lose out whether I win or lose."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"If I win, you'll want to kill me. If I lose, you'll lose all interest in me."

"What good does my interest do you, Second Young Master?"

"I only have one goal. If you take my side, you'll be a decisive force in helping me become the successor. I could afford to make enemies of all the other Demon Supremes."

The Wicked Laughing Demon snorted.

"You say that, but next you'll try to bring another Demon Supreme over to your side, won't you?"

"Is it that obvious? How did you know?"

"It's plain as day."

He had a profound distrust of people.

"I'm sorry, but I can't sail in the same boat as you, Second Young Master."

"Why not?"

"You know why. The Demonic Path you dream of isn't mine. So there's no need to try to impress me. That Divine Art of Flattery of yours is nothing but a waste of mental effort."

"I'll keep trying anyway."

"Why?"

"Because I have nothing to lose by it."

The Wicked Laughing Demon laughed. Apparently, that answer suited him perfectly.

"A very good reason. If you'd spouted nonsense about liking or respecting me, it would have backfired."

How wonderful it would be if this were all there was to the Wicked Laughing Demon.

But everything up to this point was merely his clothing. His shoes, the mask he wore. His true nature lay beyond this.

"So let's fight. We'll never become close anyway."

The places he had shown me as his world weren't his real world.

I knew the Wicked Laughing Demon's true world.

That moment when his eyes went wild and he could no longer see anything, when his madness burst out and no one could stop him—that was his real world. Only in that moment did he feel alive.

Right now, he was restraining himself only because he was curious about me, because I was unusual in pushing him in ways he had never considered.

Normally, he wasn't someone who begged for a bout. He was someone who lunged in to kill and fought. I couldn't let him realize just how much he was holding himself back.

"All right. Let's fight."

"!"

The Wicked Laughing Demon was startled by my words. Apparently, he hadn't expected me to actually agree.

"Excellent! Let's do it right now!"

He laughed loudly. He was genuinely delighted.

"Laughing Demon."

"What is it?"

"Do you see that tree over there, at the far end?"

"I do."

"Let's compete in lightness arts first."

I hurriedly added, before disappointment could cross his eyes,

"If you beat me at lightness arts, I'll spar with you."

"Agreed."

A look of derision flashed through his eyes. Confident in his lightness arts, he naturally felt certain he would win.

"If I win, grant me one favor."

"Anything. Just say the word."

"Have a drink with me tonight. You don't have to take off your mask. You can lift it a little and drink like this."

I lifted my mask and mimed drinking.

"Second Young Master."

"Yes?"

"Lift it a little and drink? You're a little mad yourself. No one could be this persistent."

At that, I laughed like a madman. This was the approach I had chosen to deal with one. He called it persistence, but it was steadfastness.

Knock, and knock, and knock again at the same spot. His mask lay at the spot I was knocking on.

"Fine. If I lose, I'll drink with you."

"Shall we begin, then?"

We stood shoulder to shoulder. It had been a very long time since my last lightness-art race.

The Wicked Laughing Demon asked me,

"Have you ever raced using lightness arts?"

"Yes. Just once."

"Against whom?"

'You.'

"Someone. An old friend."

"You're so young, yet you have an old friend?"

"There's one bad fellow I know."

"I would have liked him if I'd met him."

"You probably would have. Or you might have disliked him for being too much like you."

My inscrutable smile earned me a puzzled look from the Wicked Laughing Demon.

"May I start first?"

"Go ahead."

"Here I go!"

I set off first, and the Wicked Laughing Demon followed at his leisure.

He caught up with me in an instant. As though teasing me, he ran out in front. Then, from up ahead, he looked back and said,

"You challenged me to a lightness-art race with that paltry skill?"

"It isn't over yet."

I couldn't close the gap even by the time we rounded the tree we had chosen as our turning point.

Of course, the Wicked Laughing Demon was keeping his guard up. He knew perfectly well I wasn't the sort to propose a contest I would lose.

But apparently, however he looked at it, he couldn't imagine losing to me.

With the finish line not far away, he indulged in one last show of ease.

"So even you have a weakness, Second Young Master. You're starting to look human now."

"What did I look like before?"

"A monster. You're so young that you keep making me lower my guard, but underneath it all, you're a monster."

"Like this?"

At the very instant he turned his head, wondering what I meant—

WHOOOOSH!

I suddenly accelerated and surged forward. I caught up with the Wicked Laughing Demon in an instant. I had unleashed the Swift Step of the Wind God's Four Steps, which I had kept hidden until now.

Powered by internal energy pushed to its utmost, my Swift Step was swift in every sense of the word.

Belatedly, the Wicked Laughing Demon drew up his internal energy and pursued me, but the gap only widened.

"Stop right there!"

ZING!

The Wicked Laughing Demon fired a Blood Calamity Finger from behind me. It was meant as a warning, so it passed beside me.

As I nearly reached the finish, he unleashed an Ultimate Demonic Rampage Palm. Crazed with the desire to win, he sent it skimming past my head, but even so, he couldn't bring himself to hit me.

The tree in front of me shattered and toppled. Leaves showered down over my head as though celebrating my victory.

Killing intent rose from the Wicked Laughing Demon's body when he arrived after me. He strode toward me as though ready to strike at any moment.

"Are you going to lose twice in one day?"

My calm delivery was precisely what made it effective.

The Wicked Laughing Demon was evil, but he wasn't petty.

Instead, he took his anger out on the sky. Ultimate Demonic Rampage Palms laden with irritation shot into the air one after another. Repeated peals of thunder rang out beneath a clear sky.

I waited for him to calm down.

After venting his surging anger, the Wicked Laughing Demon asked me,

"What on earth was that lightness art?"

"One I kept hidden as my trump card."

"I'm asking what it is."

"I can't tell you. It's my trump card."

He refused to accept the outcome.

"Let's race again. Use that lightness art from start to finish."

Losing was bad enough, but apparently, losing because he had let his guard down angered him even more.

"Next time."

I vaulted onto my horse and set off first.

Behind me, killing intent raged once more, then subsided.

CLOP, CLOP.

The Wicked Laughing Demon followed a short distance behind me.

I could feel the heat at my back. It was the heat I had wanted. His lava was overflowing toward me.

Yes, that madness of yours. Let some of it out, even this way.

That night, the Wicked Laughing Demon and I made camp. We had traveled so slowly that the next village was still a long way off.

Across the campfire, he watched me dress the animal I had hunted. He hadn't said a word since that afternoon.

One good thing about a campfire was that it made any silence feel comfortable.

I roasted the meat I had prepared and handed it to him.

"Go eat in the carriage, then come back."

Then the Wicked Laughing Demon finally spoke.

"Why aren't you asking me to drink? Because there's no point asking a piece of trash who won't even keep his promises?"

I met his barbed words calmly.

"I'm going to."

For a moment, he had no answer to that unexpected response.

"Of course I will. I ran so hard to win."

"Then why haven't you?"

"I wanted to eat first and drink afterward. You don't seem all that fond of alcohol. You don't like drinking with your meals, do you?"

"If you knew I didn't like it, why did you ask me to drink?"

"Because it's a penalty. If you lose a contest, you have to do something you hate."

After gazing at me for a while, the Wicked Laughing Demon looked down at the meat I had handed him.

Then he suddenly lifted his mask a little and began eating.

I was startled.

I hadn't expected him to lift his mask and eat in front of me so readily. I had thought I'd have to prod his pride a little before he would eat. His unpredictable whims were beyond my control.

"It's bland."

"Here's the salt."

When I extended my hand, the salt on the spread-out hide rose into the air. The Wicked Laughing Demon's eyes flew wide at the sight. He knew that lifting countless grains of something like salt through object manipulation through the air was far more difficult than lifting a single object.

SHHHH! The salt streamed through the air and sprinkled over his meat.

His eyes trembled as he stared at me. The desire to fight me was rising again.

"It's still bland."

"You haven't even tasted it."

He wanted to see more of my ultimate techniques. I smiled and said,

"They say eating less salt helps you live longer. The Demon Physician said so, so you can trust it."

"Second Young Master, you really are..."

He started to say something, then stopped. What had he meant to say? That I was a madman? That I was infuriating? Or...?

The Wicked Laughing Demon began eating again. I watched him for a moment, then started eating too.

Once I had taken the edge off my hunger, I brought out the liquor. We camped so often that our supplies never ran out of it.

Once again, he lifted his mask a little and drank. For someone who claimed not to like it, he drank perfectly well.

"I won't even take my mask off properly. It looks rather pathetic, doesn't it?"

"It certainly doesn't look impressive."

"At last, you're being honest."

"That's why I like it. Being around someone who tries too hard to look impressive makes me uncomfortable. My brother is proof enough of that."

The Wicked Laughing Demon suddenly drew a long line on the ground with the meat bone he was holding. Then he drew a vertical mark at the spot where I had drawn one before.

"Where am I now? You said you'd spare me if I made it this far. Have I made it here?"