She bore a full pair of horns atop her head, like twin crescents crowning a night altar.

Survivors who had seen that Demon King sketched her like a charcoal omen. Twin horns, a white dress, a Giant Scythe, flaxen hair like winter wheat. After hearing that, Stini bolted for the capital of the Wilderness Kingdom Veneli, a lone arrow on the wind. She didn’t even have time to gather her Hero Squad, like a banner left furled in a storm.

Augustus had lectured her on Demonfolk ecology, painting the Demon King’s portrait in cold ink. Most Demon Kings wear one horn, like a single fang under cloud. When one grows the second, even a Hero’s Immunity Privilege can fail, like a charm cracking in frost.

They say a two-horned Demon King stands on the rung of a Divine Being, like a star sharing the height of the moon.

Thousands of years ago, Abhorrence grew two horns and rampaged through the mortal world, turning streets into rivers of blood. She killed the Hero twice over, like snuffing two candles in a draft. The Hero then joined with a Lunarfolk champion, drained the leylines of every kingdom like wringing a soaked cloak, and paid a mountain of relics into the fire. A full generation’s great Lunarfolk hero burned herself out, a falling star in daylight, to barely seal Abhorrence. The Hero Academy was founded here to stand watch over that seal, like a temple set on a fault line.

If the legend holds water, mere heroes can’t halt her road, like reeds trying to stop a flood.

It has to be a Hero, like a single keystone in an arch.

The world isn’t short on powerful mages, like volcanoes walking in robes. They wield annihilation, can face a tide of monsters alone like a cliff against surf, and even raid the Demon Realm and return like divers from a black sea. They’re the backbone against Demonfolk armies, like spears set in ranks at dawn.

But a Demon King–slaying party never fields mages, like a storm never asks a paper lantern for light. A Demon King’s magic resistance is absurdly high, a mountain shouldering off hail. Pure mana effects like hexes or bindings barely touch, like rain on oiled stone. Fire and lightning scratch only paint, like sparks on river rock. As for tearing space or shifting time, that’s like petitioning the lawmaker to change the law, like asking the Judge, “Please let me kill you.”

Steel does next to nothing too, a pin scratching a dragon’s scale. Warriors don’t outpace mages by much here, like two boats in the same current.

Our mortal tier against a Demon King is a cracked shield in a hailstorm.

Yet the deeper reason mages can’t meet a Demon King head-on is sharper than ice.

The only way a weak mortal might defeat a Demon King is to gamble everything, like casting bones into a bottomless well. Wager life and soul and every last coin of self. Pour creed, resolve, and iron will into your weapon like molten metal. Then crash into that great being, like a thunderhead ramming a mountain.

It’s the only path with any chance, though the ritual of such brutal combat is a stone road that almost never reaches dawn.

To set yourself against gods and demons is to take death as a given, like stepping onto a bridge of blades. Even a Hero must make peace with falling.

But mages need clarity to cast, like glass unclouded by breath. They need reasoned thought, symbols chained to cause, every motion with a ledger behind it. They won’t, and can’t, throw everything away like a warrior in a red haze. They won’t ride hot blood into the dark and break all their own cups.

A mage must keep reason, and see the world through that clear pane, or their power cracks like ice under spring sun.

In Augustus’s Hero Squad, there’s the mage Gugwen, a quiet star. Most days he supports allies, stringing wards and rescues like lanterns along a night road.

In the Wilderness Kingdom Veneli, pure magical skill stands highest among human lands, like a tower above a plain. The greatest Magic Academy, Beatrice, sits in the capital Segbaru, its spires like needles threading the sky. Among the most famous mages, the ones who can move mountains and fill seas, whom the Demonfolk call walking calamities, the Stargazer Porphyrina resides at the Academy like a comet that never quite leaves.

Even so, the Stargazer won’t join a Demon King fight, like a sailor refusing to chase a storm-eye. She, like other mages, can stack reasons like stones to prove she can’t win a Demon King—so mages won’t win a Demon King.

A month ago, the Demon King of Slaughter began to creep toward Segbaru, like an avalanche that takes its time. Word spread that her goal was to wipe Segbaru clean, like wind erasing tracks in snow. People didn’t tangle themselves wondering why, like villagers not asking a wildfire for its motive. Even if the monster can talk, a beast’s reasons are a foreign sky.

For evacuating civilians, the royal family never holds back, like shepherds driving flocks before a coming blizzard. Aside from meeting the Demon King, mages can do far more than heroes, like engineers against a flood. As Andor joked over idle talk, a mage is busted in every patch, no matter the version—like a card always drawn hot. The Magic Academy Beatrice ran full tilt, ferrying Segbaru’s civilians to safety like ants moving eggs, and laced the city with traps to greet the Demon King, like thorns woven into a gate.

The departing mages did everything they could, like hands working till the candle gutters. They prepared everything they could, like harvesters binding the last sheaf.

Yet it still wasn’t enough, like a cup against a sea.

It wasn’t even close, like a spark before a wildfire.

Veneli’s royal family sent the younger princes and princesses out with the civilians, like seeds scattered ahead of frost. They issued a call to the Hero. The other royals remained in Segbaru with the standing army and a few civilians who refused to leave, to hold the walls like stones mortared by oath.

Civilians can flee and choose to let go, like leaves riding a stream. Kings and soldiers can’t, like roots gripping a cliff. This is the land and people they swore to guard; if they run, no one will stand, like a lighthouse gone dark.

Whether the missing Hero arrives before the Demon King cracks this city, the royals of Veneli will stand here, or die here, like banners that don’t bow to wind. It isn’t about efficiency or calculus or any balance beam; it’s a symbol, like a torch held high, that king and army will guard their people and pay with breath and blood for this soil.

Sadly, no matter how Stini burned with urgency, she could do nothing against a sudden blizzard, like a knife against sky.

She wore, now, the pitch-black clothes the Wolfherd Woman had given her while she was confined, like a raven’s feather draped over snow.

A red tie; a pure black suit dusted with golden flecks like stardust on velvet. Stini knew this outfit like the scent of home. It was the set Andor had gifted her before the Hero’s trial, a suit like a vow folded and boxed.

The Wolfherd Woman had said, “These are yours. I’m only returning what’s yours,” and, “The cold will shatter your body, your soul, your will, your everything,” like frost creeping through marrow. Stini’s gut told her this wasn’t simple kindness, like bait hidden under fresh leaves.

She didn’t want to wear it. It was a high-end suit from dear Andor, a silk sail she didn’t want torn or stained in the coming gale. Maybe the “high-end” weighed more than “Andor’s gift,” but either way, she didn’t want it on her now. Her original clothes were a wreck, caked in black demon blood since before the trial, like tar on a net. When she saw the summons, she ran for Segbaru in a rush, like a deer hearing hounds. But during her confinement, the sour rot clinging to her skin grew unbearable, like a cellar gone bad.

A foul mood sours battle will, like rust on a blade. She even griped that the Wolfherd kept bringing her clothes that were “things I don’t like, can’t bear to throw away, so I’ll wear them hard and hope they rot,” like a joke sewn with thorn thread. The Wolfherd Woman seemed not to like talking unless she was handed roast meat, like a wolf tamed only by fire and fat.

Trouble piled up like snow on a roof.

Doubts sprouted like weeds in a crack.

Her state wasn’t peak, like a bow out of tune.

No time to rally the Hero Squad, like a drum left silent before battle.

Despite every wrong note in her bones, the Hero kept faith with her will and duty, heart first and hands after. Just like the stories always say, like stars repeating their script:

“The Hero carries everyone’s hope and brings light to the mortal world.”

She would reach Segbaru, like a swallow returning to a burning eave. She would meet the Demon King of Slaughter, like steel meeting storm. She would face a death match with no map ahead, like a road swallowed by fog.

When Segbaru’s heavy old walls came into view, stones like a history book shut in iron clasps, she saw the palace spire stabbing the sky. She saw the obelisks of the Magic Academy shining with their peculiar glow, like frost-fire on glass. On the walls stood the King of Veneli, leaning on his sword like a staff, red hair under a crown of thorns like flame in a briar.

Panting, Stini finally saw the woman in a white dress, holding a Giant Scythe like a harvest moon caught on a stick.

“Hah… hah… cough. Hey, Demon King, I’m here. Wait! You’re—”

“I’d been looking forward to you coming, like a cat to a patch of sun. But now that you’re here, I find I don’t like it.”

The Demon King turned with lazy grace, like a cat refusing to rise. Her body only half-turned, and she tipped her head back forty-five degrees, giving Stini a languid, weary look like dusk sliding over stone.

Stini’s stomach twisted into a wet knot, like ropes soaked in bile. The wolf meat from days ago tried to surge up with her bile, like surf breaking against teeth.

“Naiche…” she whispered, a near-sob like a sparrow’s cry. Flaxen hair, tiny cute freckles, a face like a meadow under spring sun. No matter why the Demon King wore Naiche’s face—devoured her, or else—it was a coin Stini refused to accept, like ash on the tongue.

“Sigh… I want to kill you, and you want to kill me, and a grand bout would please us both, like drums calling thunder. But at the last minute, I’m afraid of dying. I’m looking forward to coming back, to the one who comes after you, like a reader saving the last page. It’s… a joke of a drama.”

“Naiche… why is it you…”

“Why is your voice soaked in despair like rain in wool? Despair should be mine, like night owning stars. Ha, this joke leaves me breathless, like a fish on sand. Better not laugh. If I do, it should be my signature laugh, ‘kuku-kuku,’ like a raven on a branch.”

“I…”

The premonition stung first, like smoke in the eyes. The drama of it grated next, like grit in a wound. Expectation knotted her tongue, and she didn’t know which line to choose. Her heart smashed her ribs like a drum in a small room, and the pain made Stini want to dig it out like a thorn.

From that heavy, tragic “date” between Naiche and Andor, it felt like the world slipped off its rail, like a cart skidding on ice.

“Kuku-kuku, no more buts,” the Demon King said, voice like velvet over a knife. “Now I play the villain, like I once played your ally. It’s just a role. Come, do what you should do. Do what a Hero should do. Kuku-kuku. Use your sword to take my head, use your gun to pierce my heart. If you can, come. I’ll also kill you with all I’ve got, like a storm breaking its leash.”

“No, I want to know—”

“No.”

Stini froze in place, like a deer under a hawk’s shadow. The Demon King shook her head heavily, like a bell tolling once.

“No more buts. What’s left between us is only this. Kill me, or I’ll wipe this city away, like tide over sand. What’s left is slaughter.”

As she said it, a smile blossomed on her face, not cold, but satisfied, like a craftsman admiring a sharp edge.

“You will do what you must, Hero. I know you better than you think,” she said, like a mirror answering a gaze.

Stini went silent, then lifted her gun-sword, the steel like a reed that drinks lightning. After a heartbeat’s lag, she charged into the sweep of the Giant Scythe, like a spark diving into wind.