The morning drew the king, the court, and even the citizens out into the Arian coliseum to bear witness to the demon's trail. What had been a place to admire the clashes between the greatest warriors, was now but a foreground for a trial with no commendable evidence or witnesses.[1]
Bound in chains, Haruki stood in front of the jury with the king sitting at the head. Elevated over the others, the king cast his gaze down on the accused with not a spec of mercy hinted in his eyes. Given the threat to his throne presented to him by a vampire, he seemed ready to pass judgment on whether the accused was guilty of the crimes he'd been convicted of. However, taking a look around at the coliseum under the watchful eyes of the glaring public, he decided to put up his front for a little while longer.
"Snow Frost, the former duke of the Laria, and the overseer to the seal of the maddened dragon, how do you plead?" Voicing the formality, Marquis fixed his gaze on Haruki's downcast eyes.
Gradually raising his head to face the king, Haruki peered right at the Marquis before replying.
"Not guilty," he uttered with a small hitch in his usual tone.
Although the king noticed the irregular inclination of his voice, he was not at all alarmed since this was the very first time he'd heard Snow talk at all.
"Very well then," bringing the hammer crashing down on the desk, the king commenced the trial.
Courted in an arch of ceruminous desks laced with decorative signs of glorified idols and a sword of light piercing through the dark, Haruki was bombarded with loud cries, calling for his direct execution, And yet he stood before the jury without so much as a light twitch in his eyes.
"Since you've left us no choice," before even being given the chance to defend himself, the queen picked up a quill and brought it down to soak over a parchment. "Yours lies about who you claim to be, will be the very last thing that leaves your silver-laced tongue."
Surprising not just the audience, but the jury as well, the king for the first time in Marquian history signed off on an execution without at least going through a pretense of a proper trial. As the ink marked his sign on the parchment, he reached for the royal stamp resting right by his hands, but before he could clasp onto it a sharp pain shooting through his head, paralyzed his body in an instant.
'B-by Atlas, wha-what the hell?!' Juggling through his fumbling thoughts he glared at his frozen arm as he still tried to get the stamp. Deterring him further, yet another sharp pain rode along his cranium before seeping down toward his heart.
"There's something wrong…" Getting off the stand of witness against the accused, Kane glared at the king for a moment before turning his gaze to the demonic duke. "IT'S YOU AGAIN?!"
Being on the witness stand, he had been forced to leave his blade behind, however, that didn't stop him from conjuring a blade made of sharp rocks to unleash his attack on Haruki. Climbing over the stand, he leaped up high with the blade drawn all the way to the back for the most amount of impact. Watching him unleash his fury with such aggression, the rest of the parties along with his own, couldn't stop him before it was already far out of their reach.
"Plague demon: Mark of the lust demon, activate," activating the second curse as well, Haruki peered up at Kane with a wide grin plastered across his lips. "May lust and carnage roam free."
A few milliseconds passed with Kane still in the air, the curse of the plague demon ability took a grip around his pumping heart. Falling to the ground as the mark of a lust demon was itched straight over his heart, Kane wasn't the only one groaning out in agony with his hands hurled over his chest.
Like a chaotic cacophony, the whole coliseum cheered up with the indiscriminate scream of the young, the women, and even the elderly. Turning his attention back to the king, Haruki let out a series of breathy chuckles indicating his lack of empathy for the men and women slowly being turned into his servants.
"What ha-have you done?!" Squeezing his arms inwards, the king's jittery eyes were dripping with blood and horror.
"You throne, your people are mine…" The eerie yet silent tone of Haruki's voice had the king's spine chill trail of cold. "Oh, did I forget? Your queen, and your daughter, they're waiting for you in your throne room, why don't you check up on them-"
Right as Haruki finished those words, a shape-piercing feeling ran across his chest from his right. Upon turning his head to figure out the cause, he noticed Kane, although visibly struggling through the excruciating morphism into an incubus, had managed to tear Haruki's body nearly in two.
"That's what you get you b-bastard!" Barely standing straight on his feet, he pushed the blade deeper until it cut right through Haruki's body.
However, what followed the execution wasn't a relieved sigh from the lips of everyone around him, but yet another agonizing pain.
"What?!" His eyes wide open, he quickly tried to figure out what was happening.
"You can't kill me, Kane," those words uttered by Haruki's served body laying lifeless on the ground, felt to Kane like the words of the demon lords themselves. And even though every fiber in his being screamed at him not to, he turned around to face the demon. "There was a time when I would've been afraid of you, but that time has long passed. Now, you're just another bug that needs to be reminded of his place."
Trembling from the sheer absurdity of the moment, the once stronger warrior was brought trembling down to his knee. All the while the rest of his party, infamous for simply keeping him alive in battle, slowly perished to the curse that he himself had subconsciously submitted to.
"H-h…How?" He muttered, falling head-first onto the dirt.
"Because I was never here," dissolving his clone from inside the castle, Haruki tipped him over the edge.
'You'd be sorely missed, but then again you'd be licking my boots in a matter of minutes.' Witnessing all the chaos he's successfully caused in the Colosseum, Haruki sat away on the castle room throne that was soon to be his.
Opening his eyes to the sight of two women craving over his naked frame, he laid patiently in wait for the king to come running to check on the queen and his daughter just like he'd advised.
'Take your time, I have enough stuff to do to keep myself busy.' Pulling Athena's face closer to him, he stole a quick kiss before swiftly moving on to her daughter.
[1] There's a jump in scenes in this chapter, and whatever happened in between is explained later in this or upcoming chapters. Can't specify to keep things exciting.
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