Side Story Chapter 187
Tshchary and Perchilin had disappeared into Creshua’s mouth. In all his years in both lives, Joshua had never seen anything like it.
‘Did he just eat the demons?’ Lilith asked.
-...Yeah, he definitely ate them. I can’t feel the Overlord Symbol linking me and Perchilin.
‘Does that mean...?’
-She’s been completely absorbed.
Lilith was shocked silent. The demons were obviously terribly powerful, yet they were helplessly swollen by a hatchling of a race on the verge of extinction.
“Do I have your attention now, Joshua Sanders?” Creshua asked.
“Parenting has never been my forte... I have to take care of someone else’s child when I can’t even take care of mine?”
Creshua tilted his head in confusion. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that you look like you have a lot of things to learn. Has your father not taught you that you’ll get a stomach ache if you eat random things?”
The hatchling gave him a blank look.
“Judging from the look on your face, he hasn’t,” Joshua mumbled.
Creshua’s cheeks swelled up.
“Uaaaaaaagh! Blarrrrghhhh!”
Bits of undigested matter splattered out of the hatchling’s mouth.
“Look at that.” Joshua tilted his head. “You already have an upset stomach.”
-Fuck!
Tshchary cursed as he crawled out of the pool of sticky sick. As expected, Perchilin was long gone.
-I would have definitely died like Perchilin if it hadn’t been for the Evil Sins. Who in the world is this boy?
Tshchary fearfully distanced himself because he knew that he didn’t have a chance against either the juvenile dragon or Joshua even though he had survived Creshua. The demon’s eyes darted around his surroundings and he concluded that the only escape route right now was opening in the ceiling which served as the entrance to this underground space. Tshchary had always been quick to analyze the situation and come up with a solution; his current analysis was that he was dead meat at the end of this staredown and that his two Evil Sins were useless in front of a god slayer and this dragon hatchling.
Paah!
Tshchary used his inherent ability to levitate to launch himself into the air. Once he was above ground, he could go on the offensive again.
-What—?
An invisible force quickly caught Tshchary and dragged him back down.
“You may have entered freely, but you aren’t leaving without my permission,” Creshua announced.
-You’re just a whelp!
Tshchary spread his arms and gathered the Aura of Lust and the energy of Sloth in either hand. The two Evil Sins were a good combination; the Aura of Lust could be used to attack an enemy’s mind and Sloth would slow down time around the target, making the enemy experience the trauma for hundreds of years.
-Take this!
Tshchary flung his hands at Creshua, engulfing him in the two energies.
‘It worked!’ Tshchary shouted to himself.
The foolish dragon hatchling simply looked at himself without realing what was going on.
-Your inexperience has doomed you, little lizard!
“Well, I think that’s precisely the reason why you will lose.”
Tshchary whirled around to face the new voice
-What? What kind of nonsense is that?
Joshua was watching Tshchary with his arms crossed as if the fight had nothing to do with him at all.
“Lust is all about breaking down your enemy’s mind. The power can be used to bewitch your target by making them feel sexual desire unlike anything they’ve ever experienced before or put them through a traumatic experience that will scar them forever.”
-Exactly! That’s why—!
“That’s why Lust doesn’t work on Creshua.”
Tshchary was going to immediately tell off Joshua for trying to bullshit him when he realized that Creshua hadn’t even reacted to his attack. The hatchling should at least been in pain by now, but all he did was continue to examine himself expressionlessly.
-What in the world...?
“A dragon hatchling refers to a dragon who is under the age of five hundred years. Compared to humans, who can’t even live for a hundred years, dragon hatchlings need to be five times older to be considered adults,” Joshua explained.
-So what?
“As I understand, Creshua is less than a hundred years old, never mind five hundred. In fact, I’m quite sure that he’s younger than me, and I’m only around fifty years old.”
-Wait...
Tshchary stilled as he finally realized what Joshua meant.
“Which means that Creshua has literally no experience to speak of. He doesn’t understand sex appeal nor does he have any memories that are even bad enough to make him cry. Trauma? From his perspective, it’s as foreign as an ant digging a tunnel in a faraway land.” Joshua chuckled quietly.
-Then...!
“I’m sure that Creshua is one of the few creatures in the world that Lust doesn’t work on at all.”
Even as they spoke, the invisible force continued to drag Tshchary down. Forced to change course, he created a new scythe that was longer than himself.
-Then I’ll use the power of Sloth to chop his head off!
Just when the invisible force amplified, Tshchary stopped flying upward and instead glided down, so fast that he turned into a ray of light. He arrived in front of Creshua in no time and swung his giant scythe at his neck.
-Die!
However, Joshua thrust his spear between the two, stopping Tshchary dead in his tracks. His scythe attack was blocked so easily that it made his attempt seem futile.
“I promised Greed that I’d gather all the Evil Sins and give them to it,” Joshua casually revealed.
Before Tshchary could react, Pride angrily buzzed inside Joshua. Joshua slowly shook his head. “Pride, there’s no need to be angry. I have no intention of interfering after all seven Evil Sins are gathered. Which means I won’t care if you slaughter each other or only one of you survives and eats the rest.”
Joshua knew exactly how to handle Pride. It overwhelmed all creation so it was only natural that it looked down on everything else.
“Judging from how easily you backed down, I guess you’re confident.”
Pride hummed. It seemed to be looking forward to the impending battle. Joshua chuckled. Tshchary’s Lust and Sloth glowed with a faint, nervous light.
-You...!
“As you’ve seen, I can’t let anyone else have you.”
-You lowly human!
“You called me the honorable Shining Darkness and acted like you would give all your organs to me if you had to. You’ve changed awfully quickly,” Joshua scoffed.
That was the last thing Tshchary wanted to hear from Joshua. He directed his baleful energy at the human, enraged.
-I am Tshchary, the king of the death reapers! I’ll kill—!
An immense pressure threw the demon to the floor.
-What... the...?
The pressure only grew once Tshchary had hit the ground, so all Tshchary could manage to do was look. Joshua stood there, looking down at him.
-Ugh...!
Tshchary’s pride was hurt. He finally had two Evil Sins, and no demon was stronger than him now! However, nothing he could do could make this pressure weaken—it only got stronger and stronger.
-I... won’t be... humiliated...!
Joshua's lips stretched into a sneer. “Pride wants you to know that it’s loving what you’re going through right now. The fact that you dared to covet it hurt Pride’s ego quite a bit.”
-You! You bastard!
“Tshchary, let’s put an end to this feud.” Joshua held up Longin without ceremony and thrust it through the center of Tshchary’s heart. Tshchary writhed like a stuck fish, just like Ulabis had earlier.
“This is for my friend,” Joshua said.
-Unbelievable... Not... like this...!
“I’ll be taking those two Evil Sins back.”
Lust and Sloth quickly moved into Joshua. Not that they had another choice in the first place. If they failed to find a new owner immediately after their old ones died, the Evil Sins would be equally dead.
-Ahhhhhhhhhh!
With an unholy wail, Tshchary shriveled up to the size of an ant.
“It’s over,” Joshua murmured.
‘Yes, it’s over now,’ Lilith agreed.
“Is it safe to assume that demons have also gone extinct?”
‘You’ve gone through a lot,’ Lilith said.
Joshua let out a long sigh.
However, Creshua was still staring at Joshua. He may have not even come up to Joshua’s chest, but his gaze stung.
“Is there something else you would like to say?” Joshua asked the hatchling.
“No, there isn’t.” Creshua turned to look at one of the soulless husks lying on the ground.
“Crevasse...” Joshua approached the black dragon with a grim expression on his face.
He didn’t have to look closely to discern Crevasse’s state. The dragon had been dying even before the battle, so it was impossible to restore him now. Joshua’s understanding of the situation did not lighten his heavy heart.
“...I didn’t get to say goodbye,” Joshua whispered as he picked up Crevasse’s corpse.
When a dragon died in their polymorphed form, they transformed back to their original form, but Crevasse had given the majority of his heart to his hatchling. Without the source of his power Crevasse remained in his human form after death.
“Where are you going to take him?” Creshua asked.
“If you’re asking where his grave will be... I think taking him aboveground would be a lot better than leaving him in this damp cave. His grave will be made in the sunniest place in the Palace.”
“I see.”
“Are you sad?” Joshua asked.
Creshua flinched. “...What is ‘sad’?”
“The emotion you’re feeling is called sadness.”
“I feel... sad?”
Joshua solemnly nodded. “You’re crying.”
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