The Laughing Swordsman

The three-horned demon was on its last legs and decided to use its last resort. It gathered mana for one last mysterious attack.

But stopped.

Although Apollo was right next to the three-horned demon, he did not do anything. Instead, it decided to stop gathering mana on its own.

It was as though the three-horned demon was moving on instinct, but had a sudden realization.

Before Apollo could even do anything, a small explosion came from the three-horned demon. A large hole had formed on his chest, but was otherwise intact.

Yet, in the end, it was dead.

Apollo's smile slowly disappeared from his face.

"Huh..."

He raised an eyebrow, then looked towards the mound of snow.

"What were they trying so hard to protect, anyway?"

Layla jogged over and raised her hands up high.

"That looked like so much fun! What should we do now?"

Apollo looked towards the corpses of the two-horned demons.

"Well, first..."

  He walked over to the two-horned demon's corpses and peeled away the flesh above their chest, using his bokken as a scalpel.

A set of bones, along with a small translucent gemstone, was revealed.

Apollo took the three gemstones without much hesitation, even though they made strange squelching sounds and got blood on his hands.

After pocketing them, he turned around to see Layla eagerly looking at him.

She tilted her head to the side, letting her furry ears flop to the side.

"Do we play now?"

Apollo looked towards the mound of snow.

"Before that, let's check out this thing."

Layla turned to where Apollo was looking, then pouted.

"But it's just snow!"

Apollo shrugged his shoulders.

"Is it?"

He took in a deep breath while the muscles in his arm tightened considerably.

Then drew a horizontal arc, as though he was trying to slice apart the horizon.

Like a tidal wave, the snow on the floor lifted up. The bare ground was revealed, then... something else.

It was as though a band-aid was being peeled off, unable to protect the wound any longer.

As for what this wound was, it was a strange house.

The house was fairly large, enough to house many people. It was in the shape of a dome and white in color, blending in with the snow. It was quite unassuming while snow was all around it, but now that it was dry soil, it had become quite apparent.

Layla looked at it curiously.

"What is that?"

Apollo shrugged his shoulders.

"Only one way to find out."

There was a hatch at the very top of this house. The two of them walked up next to it.

Apollo stared at it for a few moments.

Were they hiding some sort of precious resource?

A special technique?

Or maybe a special demon?

He pulled open the hatch, ready to release the pandora's box.

...And when Apollo looked inside, he furrowed his brows.

Layla tilted her head to the side.

"Eh? Are they friends?"

If the house was filled with monsters, Apollo wouldn't have been weirded out. Even if there was some sort of creature, he still wouldn't have been perturbed.

But...

"Ah!"

"No!"

"Don't hurt me!"

They were children, human children.

One common thing between all of them was their ragged clothing and dirty appearances. They seemed to be prisoners trapped, but not at the same time.

While the floors and walls were stone, like a prison, there were no bindings on any of them, or a cage of some sort.

Instead, there were beds evenly spaced out within the room and plenty of food rations scattered about. There were several candles within the place that seemed to light it up.

Apollo narrowed his eyes.

Why would the demons protect these children?

...Was there something wrong with them?

Despite all the food in the room, many of the children were emaciated. They were clearly hungry, but did not touch the food. It was as though they were scared to eat. 

Once Apollo opened the hatch, many of the children either averted their eyes or covered them with their arms.

In any case, they seemed to have been captured only recently, judging from how clean the beds were. Despite the children being so dirty themselves, the beds only had a few stains.

Apollo tried to understand, but really couldn't.

Although he was curious, he wasn't one to solve any mysteries. As such, he quickly lost interest.

As for Layla, she glanced at a few children. As though they could feel her gaze, they stumbled backwards and cowered.

Layla pouted.

"These friends look boring."

Apollo nodded.

"Yeah..."

There was a ladder to the hatch, meaning the children could leave at any time. However, a few of them were already shivering from the draft of the open hatch. In the end, it seemed like this was the only place they could survive.

Apollo did one last scan for any valuables. After finding nothing, he closed the hatch.

Apollo sighed with a bit of disappointment.

"More importantly, the request was finished easily enough."

He turned to Layla.

"The hardest part was just finding the demons, but you covered that, I suppose."

Layla bashfully giggled with her hand over her mouth.

"I'm not that good~"

Apollo's face twitched.

"...Yeah."

With that, he stepped into the shadow world. Among the grey mist was a trail of red mist.

Apollo followed that mist until he reached the association's symbol.

With just a touch, he was back in the request room. Like last time, Layla appeared from a crack of space.

Her tail swayed enthusiastically.

"So now friend gets a technique?"

Apollo walked over to the grey desk, pulling out his iron coin as he walked.

"Yeah, it should be."

Upon flipping the coin, plumes of mist shot out. After a few moments, a bowl and parchment appeared.

Layla peeked over Apollo's shoulder.

"Is that the technique?"

Apollo took out the three gemstones and put them in the bowl.

"No, just wait a moment."

The parchment tore in half, while large clouds of mist covered the table.

Once the mist cleared, two condensed lines of white mist appeared, along with a black crystal that glimmered softly.

Now, he could finally learn what exactly this technique was.