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“Where do you think you’re going? I’m not letting you escape.”
“…”

Being a demon, the maid had a more resilient body than the average person, easily keeping up with me, though I was not running with all my strength. As I headed out of the city, I kept thinking how I could use the current situation. I had not expected to find a demon in the mansion, and on top of that she called the king a pawn, and something about luring the heroes.

Were they holding the king hostage in some way so he would obey their orders? And somehow that was related to the heroes as well, but there were so many things I did not know. For now all I could do was to keep the maid close and see if I could wring out any more information from her.

Slowly a plan was hatching in my mind, and I decided to barely outrun the demon, and once I reached the city walls I crossed them and continued running away. It would have been way easier to maintain a certain speed with Flight Magic, but there were almost no humans that knew how to use it, so doing that would blow my cover instantly. Running on the ground, stepping to the sides from time to time to evade the flying daggers, I went away from the city and any roads, heading into the wilderness before I stopped.

“Did you finally get tired of running? Seriously, all you did was waste both our time. Though I will say you know how to run.”

Looking at her, she looked completely out of breath. Karin and the others would have easily been able to catch me at that speed, so she was not as resilient as them. In other words, defeating her would also be an easy task, though…

“Anyway, just give up and die already. I’m not supposed to be away from that human for so long, and we’re shorthanded as is already…”

The maid reached inside her skirt again, and I expected her to throw daggers again, but instead she took out one and charged towards me with it. I was getting really curious to figure out how she kept so many things inside there, but now was not the time for that. I pretended to barely be able to evade her attacks, while parrying a few with my own blade. As the fight dragged on, she scowled and attacked more violently.

(Almost there…this might hurt but it’s all part of the plan.)

“Guh!”

I acted like I had been too slow to parry one of her attacks, letting her dagger sink into my arm. She dragged the blade along my arm then, tearing my flesh open and splashing blood into the night sky.

(Owww! It hurts way more than I thought!)

She swung the blade away, trying to end the fight right there, but I jumped back while holding my injured left arm.

“Oh, you managed to dodge now? You won’t last long with that wound, you’ll bleed out soon. It doesn’t seem like you prepared any healing potions, and recovery magic is beyond you, so you have no escape now. Stop running, I’ll cut your head off cleanly and end your suffering.”
“Wait…wait! Please, at least tell me before I go…why are there demons in the mansion? I would’ve accomplished my task if it wasn’t for you…”

Maybe because of the pain in my arm, pretending to be agonizing was not too hard. Right now I looked like a little assassin that had been caught with no escape. That was how the maid saw me as well, as she began to play with her dagger in a good mood.

“How does that help you though? You’re going to die regardless of what you know.”
“I just…want to know what foiled my plans before I die. Please…I’ll never be able to rest in peace…”
“Heh…alright then. I’ll tell you, we’ve taken hostage some of that human’s important people, so if we find out he didn’t follow our orders and revealed the plan to anyone, we can start killing the hostages off one by one.”

Hostages? And she said we, so there were probably multiple demons around the king. Still, I needed more concrete information. Until I found out who those important people to the king were, I could not do much to help them.

“What…important people?”
“Who knows. That’s for you to find out on your own. Oh wait, you won’t be able to.”

She moved forward, aiming to finish me off now. But I had expected that all this time, so I instantly jumped to the side and blasted her face with magic from close range.

“Kya-?!”

I used light magic. It was commonly used in dungeons and even in some menial tasks, but it was especially useful now that it was dark and it could blind my opponent.

“D-dammit! Don’t get c̲o̲c̲k̲y now!”

She began swinging her dagger wildly around her trying to hit me if I got close, but I had no intention of killing her yet. I would have done it if she was the only demon near the king, but it was more tricky if there were multiple of them. If I only killed some of them, it was possible the hostages would get killed too to set an example. I had to round all of the demons up and kill them at the same time if I wanted to get rid of them.

I quickly flew away with Flight Magic and left the maid there. I headed straight to the inn. I wanted to tell everyone what I had learned and hear their thoughts. This time I did not feel like I could do it alone, I needed their help. I also healed my left arm so it would stop hurting and entered the city that had gotten quite upheaved since I left.