I listened to Linda's story. It was a terrible story. Hearing it, it was stranger not to go mad. How did she endure it? Linda said she endured it by thinking of cake. But the cake she mentioned didn't seem like just a simple cake to me. It felt like the emphasis was on the 'friends' she was supposed to eat the cake with, rather than the cake itself.

And so, she endured the painful time thinking of her friends and the cake, but... how empty must she have felt when her friends, the cake, and even the enemy who had been feeding her poison disappeared, and she was left alone? I couldn't dare to imagine.

From what I heard... the one called 'teacher' seemed to have been trying to create a medicine to save his own daughter. It seems she had some kind of incurable disease. So he kidnapped orphans from the streets and forced them into experiments. Linda was one of them.

But in the end, instead of a medicine, he created a demon in the basement. When she was kidnapped and entered the dark underground room, she was a weak little kid. But when she came out, she was Mad Linda, a master of poison. It was, in a word, the birth of a Poison Demon. And so, the Poison Demon was unleashed upon the world.

Linda's chilling murmur echoed in my ears.

'...They're too weak. They all die. I was left alone.'

So, was this girl wandering around looking for a friend who wouldn't die even after eating poison? So that she wouldn't be left alone in the world anymore. Was the tea party for that?

Although kidnapping a perfectly fine person and feeding them poison cannot be seen as the right way, it was her own struggle to somehow not be left alone.

I looked at Linda, who had a dazed expression after being slapped.

"Linda. You wanted to save your dying friends, right?"

Linda nodded foolishly.

"Yeah."

"Then you should have done that. This time, you should have killed the teacher first before your friends died."

"Ah?"

"You said... 'Why didn't I kill the teacher sooner?' right?"

Nod, nod.

"Are you going to repeat the same mistake?"

Shake, shake.

"If not, then you just have to kill the other teachers now. Before they torment and kill your friends. Think about how you can save your friends."

"Hmm..."

Linda rested her chin on her hand and thought seriously.

I watched her quietly and then offered some advice.

"First. Think of the people you don't want to die."

Linda looked at me blankly, then raised her hand and pointed at me.

"Devil."

I grabbed her finger and gently folded it.

"Not me. My survival is not your concern."

Linda was convinced.

"Yeah... because the Devil is strong. Then..."

This time, Linda pointed at Shushruta, who was watching quietly from the side.

"Huh... me?"

Nod, nod.

"Me, why me?"

Linda answered simply.

"Friend."

"...."

Shushruta, as if at a loss for words, opened and closed her mouth, then looked at Linda with wide eyes. Come to think of it, this one was also a loner. A fool who was happy when her tormenting senior brother said he would help. A fool who was obsessed with the word 'comrade'.

Shushruta looked at Linda and me with a flustered face.

"Uh... ah..."

Should she be shy that Linda had pointed her out as a friend? Or should she be angry that Linda had pointed at her without hesitation after being convinced that I was not her concern, as if she were taking her lightly? She seemed to be unable to make a choice easily.

Since it wasn't a very important choice, I left her to think on her own and then looked at Linda.

"That's where you start. How can I keep my friends from dying? How can I keep my friends from being tormented? How can I keep my friends from being sad?"

I decided to help this girl draw her own line.

"Linda. You kill the teacher and save your friend. Simple, right?"

"Yeah... but what if I'm not sure?"

"Then put it on hold."

"On hold?"

"Everyone has potential. They could be a teacher, or they could be a friend. You can put it on hold until you're sure whether they'll be a teacher or a friend, and it won't be too late to kill them when you're sure they're a teacher. In fact, if you kill them when you're not sure, you'll just lose a friend."

"Umm..."

"Think about it. If you had killed Shushruta as soon as you met her, you wouldn't have become friends like this, right?"

Linda nodded.

"That's right."

Shushruta snorted.

"The Shadow Phantom Shushruta is not someone you can kill just because you want to."

It seems she had chosen to be angry.

I looked into Linda's eyes and said.

"I won't explain it one by one anymore. It's time for you to make your own judgment."

Linda also met my eyes.

I looked at her for a long time, then said.

"You can do well this time, right?"

"...Yeah!"

I had to make a midnight escape, so I had no time to learn martial arts from the Heavenly Demon, and I was tired, but seeing Linda smile, it wasn't so bad.

"Devil, can I bite your ear?"

"Why my ear?"

"Just because."

"No. Get lost."

"Okay."

"Go bite Shushruta's ear."

Shushruta got angry.

"Why my ear?"

Linda looked at Shushruta.

"Shushu, can I bite it?"

Shushruta, who had been thinking for a moment, glanced at Linda and then slowly nodded.

"...Just a little."

"Chomp!"

"Meow! Didn't I say just a little!"

"Heehee."

The two ran out of the carriage and continued their chase in the forest.

As I was watching the scene with a pleased expression, the Heavenly Demon's low laughter echoed gently.

***

While Linda was contemplating over and over again, I went up to the roof and enjoyed the cool night air, watching the ever-darkening night sky.

Shushruta, who had come up with me, was sitting on the front edge of the roof, dangling her feet.

Shushruta, who was grumbling and applying ointment to the ear Linda had bitten, glanced at me.

"By the way. You must have inhaled Linda's poison, are you okay?"

"I'm fine. It just stings a little."

Shushruta muttered in a dissatisfied tone, touching her ear.

"How can it just be a little sting? It stings so much from just a small bite."

I looked at Shushruta and answered in a solemn tone.

"Do you know the realm of being immune to a hundred poisons?"

"I don't."

"Then never mind."

"...Hmph."

Shushruta whipped her head back around and looked ahead.

Clip-clop— Charrrr—

The carriage ran tirelessly, relying on the moonlight. The wind blew, and Shushruta's hair swayed like a black wave. The moonlight that settled on her hair was like silver foam. She smelled of grass.

As I was admiring the black wave rushing towards me and the sparkling foam in between... the Heavenly Demon spoke to me.

[Then what are you going to do now?]

"What can I do? I can only pray that the guards don't chase us."

[Hmm.]

When I thought about who to pray to, the only god I was relatively close to was Ketel.

I put my hands together and then offered a prayer with a reverent mindset.

"Oh, Ketel, goddess of the cold night. It is I, your faithful believer, the blind saint Ashuban."

As I muttered the night's prayer, Shushruta turned to me with a 'what kind of nonsense is he spouting now' expression.

"First of all, thank you for raising a moon as round as our goddess's face. Thanks to you, we are running through the night without any problems."

Shushruta sighed and looked ahead again.

"Uh... and, it's nothing else, but please watch over us so that we can arrive in Maia safely without any trouble. Even if it's difficult during the day, please help us at night. Our master is looking forward to it very much. It seems he wants to see the ugly faces of the magical beasts and the ugly faces of the mercenary corps guys. Please use your power."

As I was muttering the prayer as it came to me, something suddenly came to mind.

"You, are you close to the blacksmith god, Volund? That hammer-wielder said some nonsense to the former king of Blake. Can't you hit him on the head and tell him to stop talking nonsense?"

Shushruta turned to me with a dumbfounded expression.

"Ah, come to think of it, you must be close to the old man Ophosis. Since you possessed him from time to time. Please pretend you didn't hear that."

Shushruta shook her head and turned away.

"Our Lady Ketel. It's late, have you eaten? It's not much of an offering, but please have some of this."

I took out a piece of beef jerky from my pocket and threw it forward towards the jet-black night. Then, for some reason, the beef jerky drew an arc and fell on Shushruta's face.

"Meow!"

Is this a miracle of God? The wind wasn't that strong, but the beef jerky was pushed by the wind and blew onto Shushruta's face.

"No, why is that in my mouth?"

Shushruta, holding the beef jerky that had fallen on her face, glared at me and then threw the beef jerky at me.

"You eat it."

I caught it with my mouth. The salty taste of the beef jerky was excellent.

"What kind of offering to a god is cheap beef jerky? It's only natural that Ketel would refuse."

"No, why this delicious thing?"

"You eat a lot of it."

"Chew. You have a picky taste."

I chewed on the beef jerky and watched the night sky.

We ran the carriage again after taking a short nap in the forest around dawn. Anyway, the distance to the next village was quite far, so we had to camp out for a day.

We talked on the way... Neyman expressed his opinion that it was highly likely that the guards would not chase us. There is a price on everyone's life, and for example, if a noble or a priest is even slightly injured, the guards will investigate with fire in their eyes, but no one cares much about a pathetic life that rolled around in the back alleys, so the investigation will be closed after just pretending to investigate.

Daryl also agreed with him, and since it was a reasonable statement, I also nodded.

As he had said, there were no particular incidents on the way. Sometimes, bandits who were after the carriage would appear, but Shushruta would cut them all down before they could even approach, so the carriage never stopped except for breaks.

As soon as Linda finished her contemplation, she switched places with Neyman and learned how to drive the carriage from Daryl. Daryl seemed to be flustered for a moment, but he taught her how to drive the carriage without showing any particular expression. The carriage would sometimes swerve, but it didn't overturn. Because Daryl would take back the reins before a crisis of overturning occurred.

By that time, Daryl had started to glance not only at Linda, but also at me and Shushruta. It's one thing for Shushruta to have defeated all the bandits before they even reached the carriage, but I wondered why he was looking at me with those eyes. Come to think of it, Daryl had been a witness when I had blown away the poison mist with the wind. I had a suspicion that he might be thinking of me as a wind magic swordsman.

We ate beef jerky and dried fruit for our meals. In between breaks, we would soak the beef jerky and dried fruit in water and boil them. The salty and sweet and sour taste was a delicacy.

Perhaps deeply impressed by Neyman's skills, Shushruta volunteered to be the cook at the next meal, but it was so terribly tasteless that we all ended up throwing it away. Even Linda, who would eat anything with poison in it, said she couldn't eat it because it was so tasteless, so that says it all.

Perhaps thinking that the more she put in, the more delicious it would be, she used the ingredients generously and threw them away generously. It seems we'll have to restock on food at the next village.

In the end, she got a few flicks on the forehead from me and had a sullen face. Tsk. I knew it when she was acting up. For the time being, I decided to call her Food-Wasting Shushruta instead of the Shadow Phantom Shushruta.

And so, when evening came, we found a suitable clearing in the forest and decided to camp out. Because not only people, but also horses need rest.

Daryl and Linda were in charge of all matters related to the horse and carriage, such as parking the carriage and removing the harness. Linda had become an enthusiastic student and was learning various things about the horse and carriage while sticking to Daryl.

In the meantime, I prepared for bed. But the mercenaries insisted on standing guard, so I punished them with a pressure point strike. It was unavoidable because you have to sleep properly for your body to rest, and you have to rest properly to be able to run cheerfully again the next day.

I lay on the roof of the carriage with my hands clasped behind my head, looked at the night sky sparkling as if the stars would pour down, and then closed my eyes.

"...."

After dozing off for a while, I woke up to find Linda and Shushruta sleeping, each occupying one of my arms and legs.

"Devil..."

I half-sat up, then pushed away Linda, who was clinging to me and drooling, and rolled her to one side.

"Ugh..."

Linda rolled to the side with a strange sound.

I grabbed the back of the neck of Shushruta, who was sleeping soundly on my leg, and then immediately used footwork to get off the carriage.

As I ran through the forest where the cool night wind was blowing, I felt myself waking up and my body loosening.

Just then, I found a clearing full of ki. It wasn't too far from the carriage.

I hung the sleeping Shushruta on a tree and then sat down in a cross-legged position below it.

After calmly calming my breathing, I reported.

"Master. I am ready."

The Heavenly Demon asked nonchalantly.

[Ready for what?]

I answered readily.

"Ready to learn the second martial art."

(End of Chapter)