Karnak, Monarch of Death

His voice resonated through the corridor.

”Rise. O wretched souls of the underworld...”

Dozens of summoning circles flared to life on the floor.

”...Reveal your monstrous fangs, drawn by the darkness!”

With a metallic clatter, black shadows began to take form. What emerged in droves were skeletal soldiers clutching swords and shields and half-decayed ghouls. They were signature summons of necromancy. The restless dead, robbed of their peace, groaned in agony.

Uuuuuuuh...

Aaaaaaaah...

Alius shouted in fury, his voice reverberating through the hall.

”Accursed necromancer! How dare you desecrate the eternal rest of the dead so vilely!”

Meanwhile, Karnak had a different reaction.

What a diligent and hardworking fellow, he thought to himself.

To the untrained, necromancy might seem like a simple matter of snapping one’s fingers to summon undead minions. In reality, preparation was key. What one did not sow they could not reap.

Cleo had summoned twenty skeletons and ten ghouls. In other words, he had to have desecrated at least thirty graves to gather the necessary materials.

[Looks like he’s been diligently stocking up, like a squirrel hoarding acorn,] Karnak mused.

Varos, however, had his own opinion. [Diligent? Yeah, right. You think he did the grave robbing himself? He probably made his subordinates do it.]

[Don’t be so quick to judge. He could’ve done it personally.]

[Oh, come on. I happen to know a certain necromancer who wouldn’t move a finger to do the dirty work and always had his servant dig up graves for him.]

[Really? I guess there was someone else besides me.]

[...You really are something, young master.]

[Huh? What are you talking about?]

Even as they bantered via magical telepathy, the group prepared for battle. Varos stepped forward to block the corridor, sword at the ready. Karnak gathered mana in both hands, while Alius focused, chanting a holy incantation.

”Hatoba, grant your blessings to your faithful servants!”

A divine radiance enveloped Karnak and Varos.

”You are now shielded from the corruption of malice,” Alius announced.

At the same time, Varos’s longsword began to glow with a brilliant white light, imbued with the power to cut down the undead. With his allies prepared, Alius retreated a step.

“Hold them off for a moment! I’ll use this time to eliminate the necromancer!”

***

Varos was the first to charge.

”Haah!”

With a sharp cry, he leaped into the skeleton ranks, swinging his blade in wide arcs. The skeletal warriors retaliated swiftly, their rusty swords slashing and thrusting with surprising coordination. The clash of steel echoed loudly.

Clang!Claaaang!

Karnak unleashed his magic.

”Magic Arrow!”

Simple, but effective projectiles of pure energy shot into the pack of ghouls. The blasts tore limbs from their bodies, staggering the creatures momentarily. But they didn’t fall. Being undead meant losing an arm or leg wasn’t enough to stop their relentless advance. The dead continued to defend Cleo, while Karnak and Varos worked to protect Alius as the battle raged on.

Varos swung his blessed blade and spoke to Karnak through magical telepathy. [So this is what a priest’s blessing feels like, huh?]

[How is it?]

[Honestly? Feels a lot like that berserk curse you used to cast on me. No, I say it’s all the same except the color.]

To Varos, the effects were indistinguishably similar, save for the radiant glow in place of Karnak’s usual shadowy aura.

[Well, my curse did include maintaining reason while amplifying rage. If a berserker keeps their wits and fights strategically, they’re basically indistinguishable from a paladin.]

[I doubt paladins would agree with you on that.]

As Varos deflected two skeletons with a single swing, he asked, [What about you, young master? How do you feel? It’s your first time being blessed, right?]

[It was worth testing,] Karnak replied, casting a glance at Alius with a faint smirk. [Looks like he hasn’t noticed anything unusual.]

Even though chaos magic was visually indistinguishable from mana, its origin lay in necromantic energy. It could have caused unexpected reactions with the priest’s blessing. Although there should have been no issues in theory, reality often deviated from theory.

[What if something had gone wrong?] Varos pressed.

[That’s why I engineered this scenario,] Karnak explained.

Finding a random priest to perform a blessing risked complications that would need silencing. But in this situation?

[The area’s drenched in necrotic energy, so any oddities can be blamed on that.]

Just as he had pinned everything on Randolph before, Karnak could scapegoat the necromancer if anything went wrong.

[I’m trying my best to live differently.]

[Oh, now that sounds like actual human reasoning. Who are you, and what did you do with the real Karnak?]

[...I’ve always tried to live like a human.]

Meanwhile, Cleo scowled.

What’s this unsettling feeling?

At first glance, it seemed like a typical adventurer team. The warrior held the front line, the mage provided support from the rear, and the priest enhanced the party’s abilities. There wasn’t anything odd. They were certainly adhering to the traditional method of fighting in a team.

But something’s off...

Something about the way the two fought the undead rubbed Cleo the wrong way. They weren’t tense or frantic—instead, they seemed disturbingly relaxed. Their expression suggested that they were almost... comfortable.

He had seen a similar expression in the past. It reminded Cleo of a baker back in his hometown, Mr. Arold. He was a man who’d kneaded dough every day for twenty years. He had worn the exact same expression when he started his day. His movements seemed casual, even lazy, yet the dough always turned out perfect. But his assistant’s doughs were always flawed, no matter how hard he tried.

Does that mean... these guys fight undead as often as that baker makes bread?

Cleo laughed. The thought was absurd.

No, they’re just too naive to grasp the situation’s gravity.

Regardless, they were undeniably skilled. Nearly all of Cleo’s summoned skeletons and ghouls had been wiped out. But it didn’t matter. They were only bait to buy time.

“You’re quite the fighters, aren’t you?” Cleo sneered, forming a hand seal. “But this was merely a warm-up...”

Dark energy coalesced into a massive magic circle, radiating malevolence.

“Now witness the true power of darkness!”

A summoning circle erupted, spewing forth a massive figure.

“Come forth, beast of the abyss! Descend upon this realm by my will!”

The creature stepped out, its massive frame filling the corridor. A hulking demon with fiery red skin, enormous horns, and rippling muscles wielding brutish battle hammers in both hands. Standing nearly two meters tall, it loomed menacingly, its presence suffocating.

“Grrrrr...”

The demon exhaled flames as it spoke.

“Contractor, what is your desire?”

“Their deaths!”

“It shall be as you wish...”

With a roar, the demon unleashed a wave of malice, its killing intent flooding the room. As Cleo’s triumphant grin widened, expecting the intruders’ faces to twist with despair, their actual reactions caught him off guard.

“Oh!”

“Now this is more like it!”

Instead of dread, Varos and Karnak’s eyes gleamed with excitement.

***

Adjusting his grip on his sword, Varos grinned.

[Finally, something worth practicing against, young master.]

Karnak nodded in agreement. [Couldn’t have said it better myself.]

Skeletons and ghouls were hardly formidable opponents. At best, they were on par with ordinary soldiers. While they served as efficient tools in an undead army—easy to create and capable of converting fallen foes into allies—their individual combat strength was modest at best.

Skilled warriors typically faltered against such undead not because of their raw power but due to lack of familiarity. Skeletons moved no faster or stronger than mortal soldiers. But they moved differently when it came to defense.

They were corpses to begin with, so severed limbs or decapitation wouldn’t stop them from attacking. For soldiers accustomed to mortal enemies, they made the mistake of assuming that their opponent was done for. Moreover, the psychological toll of fighting what refused to die was significant.

But objectively speaking, it wasn’t a big deal for an enemy to be moving after losing their limbs. After all, severed limbs didn’t reattach. A skeleton without an arm was a one-armed foe. Without legs, it was a sitting duck. They wouldn’t die, but they would be incapacitated.

For veterans like Karnak and Varos—two of the most experienced undead slayers alive—such enemies weren’t even practice material. The demon now before them, however, was a different story.

[What rank would you place this demon at?] Varos asked.

[It’s the lowest-tier one, but that makes it perfect for us right now,] Karnak replied.

[True. We’re back to square one, after all.]

They were no longer the Monarch of Death or a death knight lord. Karnak and Varos needed to recalibrate their abilities, rediscover their limits, and rebuild their combat instincts. For that purpose, this demon was a perfect sparring partner.

Varos roared, his voice brimming with resolve. “Demon! I’ll take you on!”

Just as he charged forward, a thunderous incantation rang out. “By the light of Hatoba, smite this evil!”

Alius slammed his staff into the ground, unleashing a burst of radiant energy. “Holy Dispel!”

Wings of light coursed through the corridor, climbing walls and ceiling before enveloping the demon. Caught in the brilliance, the demon flinched, panic flashing across its monstrous features.

“Th-this is—!”

A void opened beneath it, sucking its massive, flame-wreathed body into its depths.

“No! A reverse summoning?!”

With one final roar of frustration, the demon disappeared, dragged back to the abyss. The oppressive miasma and killing intent vanished along with it. Alius had used Holy Dispel, a spell used to dispel darkness, to destroy the summoning circle in its entirety.

Varos, mid-charge, came to a sudden halt, blinking in confusion. “...Huh?”

Alius, radiating righteous fury, pointed his staff at Cleo. “Your tricks are useless, necromancer! In the light of the goddess, all wickedness shall crumble!”

Cleo’s eyes widened in disbelief as he shook his head.

“H-how did you know?”

Defeating undead and dispelling a demon summoning ritual were entirely different disciplines of holy magic. Yet Alius had prepared the dispel before Cleo had even begun his summoning. Skeletons and ghouls were mere decoys, distractions to buy time for the true attack—the summoning of a demon. But Alius had foreseen it all.

”Looking at what you’ve done to this village. It’s crystal clear, necromancer.”

With his extensive experience as an inquisitor, Alius had learned to deduce a necromancer’s specialty based on their methods. Most necromancers preferred to unleash plagues or spawn hordes of undead, turning entire regions into hellscapes. Cleo, however, had enthralled the villagers and lured young maidens to his lair.

”Which means... using sacrifices to draw power from a demon. Such black magic must be your specialty,” Alius concluded with a triumphant smirk.

Turning to his companions, he declared, ”Now, let’s bring this to an end—”

But Alius trailed off as he noticed Karnak and Varos staring at him with blank, almost disheartened expressions.

”...What’s wrong?”

Startled, the two quickly composed themselves.

”No, nothing at all,” Karnak mumbled.

Varos chimed in, ”We’re just, uh, amazed. To think you dispatched such a massive demon in a single blow...”

Despite their words, disappointment was written all over their faces.

[Great. There goes our training opportunity.]

[Let’s just wrap this up, young master,] Varos suggested, his tone flat.

Cleo’s dwindling energy was painfully obvious. One good slash would end it. Varos strode forward, his blade glinting with a cold, deadly aura.

”Give up, necromancer,” he said.

Faced with his impending demise, Cleo’s expression twisted in desperation.

”Not yet... not yet!”

Reaching deep into his core, Cleo clawed at every ounce of dark power remaining.

”Aaaaaargh!”

His body convulsed violently, limbs stretching and contorting, muscles swelling grotesquely as his clothes tore apart. What emerged was no longer a man but a monstrous creature, snarling like a beast.

”Raaaaaaargh!”

The human Cleo was already gone. The figure that remained bore a striking resemblance to the demon summoned moments ago.

”A demon knight!” Alius exclaimed in shock. ”He still had that much power left?”

As Alius turned to warn his companions, he faltered again.

”Be careful! He’s performed demonification—”

His voice caught as he took in their expressions.

Karnak and Varos’s eyes were sparkling with excitement again.

Wait... why do they look so thrilled?!

***

Finally, another chance to train had come their way. Opportunities like this were precious and had to be seized.

[Let’s finish this before that priest interferes again!]

[Agreed, young master!]

Varos leapt into action. With a deep breath, he darted into the transformed Cleo’s reach, weaving effortlessly through the demon’s attacks.

”Y-you wretch!” Cleo roared, thrashing his massive arms wildly, but his blows hit nothing but air.

Varos dodged with ease, retaliating with swift, calculated strikes. Each slash sent blood and darkness spraying, reducing Cleo’s newly acquired form to tatters in seconds. Meanwhile, Karnak unleashed a barrage of spells.

”Fireball. Magic Arrow. Lightning Shock.”

They were basic attack spells, unremarkable on their own, yet Karnak’s precision and timing made them devastatingly effective. Every spell Karnak cast landed with uncanny precision, exploiting the demon’s vulnerabilities as if the attacks had been choreographed in advance. The hallway echoed with the sounds of explosions and Cleo’s agonized screams.

“Gah! Aaargh! Urrrggh!”

After about a minute of this relentless assault, Cleo’s demonic transformation unraveled. He collapsed to the floor, battered and shredded to the point of barely resembling a man.

[Ah, that was a good warm-up.]

[Quality over quantity, as always.]

It had been a brief but fulfilling training session. Satisfied, Varos planted his foot firmly on Cleo’s back.

“Urgh!” Cleo groaned weakly.

Varos turned to Karnak with an almost innocent expression.

“So, what now? Do we kill him? Or take him prisoner?”

Alius, who had been watching the entire spectacle, stood frozen in place, his mind struggling to process what had just happened.

Good heavens...

The situation had been resolved before he’d had the chance to contribute anything.

Just who are these people?