Chapter 035. Glasya-Labolas’s Trial (5)
With the child's warning, the shelter instantly became busy.
Rum and Tequila carried nets woven from iron, while Absinthe ran around with a bucket.
“A swarm of rats? Did Valefor show up or something?”
Of course, Mikael was joking.
Still, he hadn't seen Valefor since the monastery incident, so he did feel a little disappointed.
“Well, next time I see him, I'll make sure to squeeze him dry.”
Thinking fondly of Valefor, who was probably doing just fine somewhere, Mikael joined the chaos.
Jin flinched in surprise at Mikael's sudden appearance.
“Oh. You could've rested a little longer...”
He subtly glanced toward Tequila.
It seemed he was worried another fight might break out.
Mikael understood why he was concerned, but Mikael was also under the time limit of the trial.
He couldn't afford to sit around doing nothing.
“Doesn't look like there's time to relax. What's this about a swarm of rats?”
“They're the furry beast's favorite snack... Vodka?”
The child running toward them, Vodka, was breathing heavily and covered in cold sweat.
“Good work, Vodka.”
Brandy came out of the bar and tried to pat Vodka's head.
Smack!
But Vodka slapped her arm away with a startled expression.
Everyone froze for a moment.
Apparently, Vodka normally allowed Brandy to pat her without any trouble.
Vodka spoke in a trembling voice.
“W-What are you all doing?”
She raised her head and looked at everyone preparing equipment.
Then she shouted.
“You need to move right now! The rats are coming here!”
The moment she finished speaking, a gray wave surged in from the direction Vodka had come from.
Rumble, rumble, rumble!
“Looks more like you're the snacks for those things.”
“There were never this many before...”
Mikael and Jin weren't the only ones who froze at the strange sight.
“Hiiiiiik!”
Absinthe saw the wave of rats and quickly hid behind Tequila.
“Hey! What are you doing? You're getting in the way!”
“But there are way too many of them! Do something, Tequilaaa!”
Even after Absinthe used the magical phrase Do something, Tequila merely frowned while stroking his fluffy beard.
He didn't exactly have a good idea either.
“Have this many ever come before?”
“I've been trapped here for decades, and there's still something I haven't seen. Hahaha. This won't be enough.”
Rum, who looked like the oldest among them, lowered the chain net he had been holding.
“Tequila, give me a hand for a moment.”
Clatter, clatter.
With Tequila's help, Rum pulled a long, stretched-out net from his shelter nearby.
“This should give us a chance. You two men over there, help too!”
Just a little while ago, Rum had been arguing about whether Mikael had crossed a line or not.
Now he was casually asking Mikael for help.
He had quite the thick skin.
“Yes! I'll help right away!”
“Good grief...”
Mikael gave a dry laugh.
Still, he wanted to get this over with quickly, so he followed Rum's instructions and grabbed the huge net together with Jin.
Squeak! Squeak!
As the swarm of rats drew closer, Mikael studied them.
For something called a snack, those aren't living creatures.
And there was an obvious reason for that.
All the so-called rats were dolls.
They didn't even move naturally like the cat did, nor did they seem to possess any emotions.
They simply moved straight ahead, almost like wind-up toys following a fixed path.
“They're coming! Get ready to throw!”
Whoosh!
Fwooooosh!
Rum threw first.
One by one, everyone released their grip and sent the huge net flying forward.
The net spread wide enough to cover the entire width of the sewer.
Squeak! Squeak!!
A large number of rats were trapped instantly.
But they hadn't caught all of them.
The rats outside the net's range simply climbed over the ones that had been caught.
“They're coming again! Everyone, get started!”
At Rum's shout, they kicked the buckets and nets they had prepared into action.
Some people grabbed spears.
Others had placed rows of rat traps across the ground.
Squeeeak!
The rats that crossed over the net charged into the shelter.
The people responded immediately.
They stabbed charging rats with spears and scooped others into buckets.
Whenever a large group gathered together, they threw nets over them.
And the rats that still managed to slip through were caught by traps.
The defense seemed to be going smoothly.
But then—
Screeeeeech!!
A sharp cry came from beyond the swarm.
The rats, which had previously rushed forward in one direction, suddenly scattered in every direction.
They started slipping through the gaps in the defenses.
Is someone controlling them?
Whenever one path was blocked, they immediately searched for another.
It almost looked like the rats were thinking.
But Mikael was certain they were soulless dolls.
That could only mean one thing.
Someone else was controlling them.
Kiiiiik!
“Hieeeek! What are these things?! Tequila, help meeee!”
Several rats suddenly leaped at Absinthe.
And there was something different about some of them.
The gray wave wasn't made up entirely of dolls.
Mixed among them were a few rats that behaved like actual living creatures.
Slash!
Hearing Absinthe's desperate cry, Tequila swung his Chinese cleaver and sliced the rats apart.
He dealt with the immediate danger.
But that wasn't the end.
More rats began pouring in through openings all around them.
“Th-Thank you, Tequilaaaa...”
Absinthe, nearly in tears after surviving the attack, wrapped her arms around Tequila's waist.
Crack.
Tequila finally lost his temper at the useless Absinthe, who only kept making him heavier.
“Argh! You're annoying! If you're just going to get in the way, go crouch down next to Vodka over there!”
“Waaaaah! You're so mean!”
Near Vodka, where Tequila had pointed, Brandy was stabbing approaching rats with a spear.
It seemed Brandy had already known how to use one before being trapped inside the artwork.
Her spear movements were practiced and smooth.
Stab! Stab! Screeeech!
Brandy struck a charging rat several times in quick succession, then frowned.
“Tequila, these things...”
“Hmph! I know. They're not fluffballs!”
Tequila snorted after cutting one of the rats in half.
The dead rat gave off an unpleasant energy before crumbling into powder.
Sensing that aura, Mikael grabbed one of the rats that had leaped toward him.
Riiip!
He tore it in half with his bare hands.
A familiar energy brushed against his senses.
Demonic energy...
This isn't actually a demon, so did a demon create it?
The ordinary rats caught in nearby traps gave off no energy at all.
Only the ones behaving like real rats contained demonic energy.
“So only some of them are being controlled.”
If that was the case, the one controlling them had to be hiding somewhere nearby.
Mikael stepped toward the direction the rats were coming from.
“Mikael?! Come back!”
Jin, who had been throwing smaller nets over the rats with Rum, called out after Mikael's sudden movement.
Squeak! Squeak!
Jin's voice was drowned out by the noise of the rats.
Truthfully, Mikael had heard him faintly.
He had simply ignored him because he believed his own judgment was correct.
Mikael stepped onto the net spread over the ground and focused his senses.
“So this is about my limit right now?”
Even without closing his eyes, he could sense the demonic energy around him.
The only problem was that without aura, he couldn't scan a wide area like Sia could.
So Mikael curled his right hand around his mouth like a megaphone.
“I heard Glasya-Labolas only binds garbage into his works that isn't even worth recycling. Guess the rumors were true?”
It was an obvious provocation.
Ordinary rats and mind-controlled dolls wouldn't react to an insult.
Mikael intended to use that.
Every time he ripped apart one of the rats that leaped at him, he could feel the flow of demonic energy.
Like following Ariadne's thread through the Minotaur's labyrinth, Mikael followed that energy.
Crunch!
Crunch!
Screech! Squeak!
“What, are you like a certain someone I know? Acting tough while hiding behind your subordinates? You're actually weaker than a low-ranking demonic beast, aren't you?”
Mikael kicked away the rats rushing at him and crushed others in his hands.
Every time he sensed the direction of the demon, he threw out another insult without hesitation.
And exactly as expected—
One rat inside Mikael's field of vision twitched.
“Found you, you sneaky bastard.”
Mikael immediately launched himself toward it.
F-Fuck! Why the hell is that bastard coming this way?!
Meanwhile, the demon that had reacted to Mikael's provocation nearly jumped out of its skin.
Mikael was running directly toward it while trampling over the other rats.
Judging from his direction, there was no doubt.
It was his target.
I-I need to run first!
Tatatatata!
The demon fled without even looking back.
Unfortunately, with its tiny legs, escaping Mikael's reach was almost impossible.
Grab!
“Got you, little bastard!”
Squeak! Squeak!
The captured demon desperately tried to pretend it was an ordinary rat.
It held its breath and tried to make the same mechanical noises as the others.
But that didn't fool Mikael.
Mikael snorted and grabbed the demon by its tail.
“Hey. Want me to tear you in half like the others, or are you going to cooperate nicely?”
To the rat demon, Mikael was a complete stranger among the refugees living here.
The bigger problem was that this mysterious human was glaring at it as though he wanted to devour it.
W-What's with those eyes...?
Mikael had slaughtered millions upon millions of demons.
The rat demon had spent all its time trapped inside this artwork like a frog in a well.
There was no way it could withstand the murderous aura in Mikael's gaze.
“I-I'll cooperate!”
Dangling helplessly from Mikael's hand, the demon immediately became obedient.
The ordinary rats still wandered around the shelter.
But the rats containing demonic energy mixed among them suddenly stopped moving.
Seeing the situation improve, Mikael crouched down and smiled brightly.
“All right, then! Tell me what I want to know.”
For a moment, the rat demon doubted its ears.
Mikael was repeating the same method he'd once used on Valefor.
They're both rats, so it should work about the same.
It was an incredibly simple line of reasoning.
The rat demon was fairly quick-witted, so it began talking.
When the artwork had first been completed, the rat demon had been trying to stay out of Glasya-Labolas's way just like the other demons.
—
“Oh my! You're lucky. You fight like absolute garbage, but your puppet show is incredible.”
—
The problem had started when it had shown off its puppet show as a talent.
Glasya-Labolas had liked it enough to bind the demon inside this artwork.
After being trapped here, the rat demon had decided never to stand out again.
But today, it had received an order from the cat.
—
“Above. Order. Shelter. Sweep.”
—
The cat ruled the surface simply because it was better at fighting than the rat demon.
Having been reduced to nothing more than a tiny rat, the demon knew that challenging the cat would only end with it becoming a meal.
After finishing its explanation, the rat demon politely clasped its front paws together while still dangling upside down.
“That's everything! I really don't know anything beyond that!”
It was obvious that Mikael wanted to know the reason for the attack.
Apparently, the demon's guess was correct.
Mikael nodded, but he still looked dissatisfied.
“That's disappointing... Is that really all?”
“Y-Yes! That's really it!”
The nervous demon breathed rapidly.
It truly didn't seem to know anything else.
“Then do you know anything about that cat bastard? Like what condition causes morning to come or something?”
Right now, escaping this artwork was the most important thing to Mikael.
Realizing it had misunderstood the question, the rat demon quickly corrected its answer.
“I-I don't know how to leave the artwork. B-But that cat bastard was originally a demonic beast, so it follows its instincts and isn't very intelligent!”
In the end, Mikael still couldn't learn how to escape.
That was disappointing.
Still, information that could help him deal with the cat wasn't useless.
“Oh? You're smarter than I expected.”
Hearing Mikael's positive response, the rat demon finally relaxed a little.
“T-Then...?”
Riiip!
But contrary to its expectations, Mikael grabbed the demon's upper body with his other hand and pulled.
The rat demon was torn in half.
It stared at Mikael in disbelief.
“W-Why...?”
Because it was bound to the artwork, it would eventually come back to life even if it died.
But if it returned after failing its mission, the cat would probably devour its soul.
That was why the rat demon had surrendered in the first place.
It had simply wanted to survive.
Feeling wronged, the demon demanded an answer.
Mikael merely shrugged.
“Does a priest need a reason to kill a demon?”
There was nothing else he could gain by keeping it around.
And if he released it, its ability to control dolls would only become troublesome.
“A priest...? My luck... really is the fucking worst...”
Like the other rats, the demon's body crumbled apart.
The rat demon died.
The moment the demonic connection was severed, the rats scattered in every direction.
At the same time, the rats that had contained demonic energy went limp.
They turned back into ordinary dolls.
“Huh? What's wrong with these things?”
Tequila looked confused by the sudden change.
Absinthe immediately hugged Tequila's generously sized waist again.
“Tequila! You did it!”
“Hey! Stop clinging to me! It's disgusting!”
“Hahaha. We're certainly experiencing all kinds of things today.”
Rum casually stuffed the remaining rats trapped in the net into a bucket.
Whoooooosh!
While everyone in the shelter was still confused by the strange experience, the powder created from the disintegrating rats rose into the air like dust.
A thick cloud swept past them, enough to briefly obscure everyone's vision.
“Huh? Paper?”
A piece of paper fluttered down above Vodka.
Vodka naturally reached out and caught it.
Then she read what was written on it.
“Offer... a living sacrifice... on the mountain?”
It was a message that seemed to be leading them somewhere.
