Gluttony Demon King with the Swampman ~A Man with No Magic Power Who Dreamed of Magic, Wielding Knowledge from His Past Life Through Steady Research and Hard Work to Become the Most Vicious Final Boss~

Chapter 31: The Demon King Manifests

I have to praise myself—this is a truly beautiful magic design.

Fool God Praise Cthulhu. That is the name of the latest magic that controls ink.
This spell uses the power of dragon blood to produce an inexhaustible supply of ink.

This time, using the enormous magical power I borrowed from Egiy as capital, I created enough volume to turn the ground into a sea of ink.
The reason Fool God Praise Cthulhu can produce such massive output is because it also incorporates an aspect of “analogy magic.”
Analogy magic is a technique that increases power by modeling the shape of the spell after something else, like the astronomical magic of the Levi family.

In the case of Fool God Praise Cthulhu, there are two models.
One is the model that strengthens my own thoughts and perception—the fictional deity from a popular creative cult horror in my previous world, which I even quoted in the spell’s name.

The other is the evil god of this world, the counterpart to the mermaid guardian deity of sea voyages—the great octopus that sinks in the deep sea.

“I’m glad I went to see those murals right before this. Thanks to that, I was able to remember such an obscure god.”

In this kingdom, it is rarely worshipped—an ancient sea god whose very name has now been lost.

Yet slimes originally have strong affinity with the water attribute, and since ink shares visual similarities with “octopus ink,” the compatibility is outstanding.

By fixing the design and the original form of the ink to the shape of an octopus, the output correction from analogy increases dramatically.

“Test complete. Shall we clean this up quickly?”

Thanks to all the magical power Egiy poured in, I was able to wipe out the goblins in one fell swoop.
All that’s left is Zilmoza. I need to save him.

That Zilmoza—
No, the Demon King possessing the sword inside him grits his teeth hard and glares at me.

“You bastard! A test? Clean up quickly!? You dare mock me—!”

The Demon King tries to come toward me while slashing through the ink prison.
But no matter how much he cuts, the ink regenerates and wraps around Zilmoza’s body again.

“Th-this thing! A mere octopus dares—!?”

This is compatibility. It’s simply bad compatibility.
A cursed sword whose only strength is slashing can never defeat a slime that takes no damage no matter how much you cut it.

“H-Haro… a-are your arms okay!?”

“Yeah? Oh, they’re fine.”

While chasing the thrashing Zilmoza around—
With a slightly foggy head, I answered Zaria’s worried voice.

“They’re fine. The magic crests carved into each part of my body are linked to the magic that uses that part.”

For example, magic that uses the right arm is linked to the right arm, magic that uses the left arm to the left arm, and the central control for ink is carved around my neck and collarbone—
This is in case, like this time, I ever lose a body part.

In other words, even if my right arm is blown off, I only lose the magic that originally required commands from the right arm.

“So even if I lose my right arm, the ink control won’t break down. It works just fine.”

“…! Th-that’s not what I meant! I’m not worried about the ink, I’m worried about your injury—!”

“Huh?”

Oh. That’s what she meant.
It’s completely fine. It’s currently under perfect pressure hemostasis.
And then I buried the scimitar I caught from Zilmoza inside the octopus leg.

“Ink… compress.”

Exactly as I ordered, the ink-made right arm wraps around the scimitar in the shape of an octopus leg.

An enormous amount of ink that dyed the entire ground.
If I concentrate all of it into one place like this, what happens—?

“The answer is ‘the water pressure rises.'”

“W-what the—!? What is this intense pressure!?”

The vast amount of ink converged into a single octopus leg applies pressure to the blade like the deep sea.
Crack, crack—the unpleasant creaking sounds run through it, and the blade screams.

“G-g-giiiii—!? S-stop! Stooooop! One of my soul fragments that was split into eight, I finally—!”

Zilmoza rolls his eyes back and screams.
I ignore him and raise the water pressure in the right arm even higher.

Gather water and make it smaller.
It’s a simple principle. The smaller you make it, the higher the pressure inside becomes. It’s intuitive physics even a child would understand.

Time to return Zilmoza’s dignity quickly.

The creaking soon turns into cracks that race across the entire blade like lightning—

“Gyaaaa!?”

With that scream, the old man suddenly jerks his body.
Zilmoza loses consciousness and collapses limply to the ground. I take the sword from him.
The sword is shattered. Completely pulverized.
I also take the enormous magical power that spilled out like blood inside the ink.
Well, in the end—

The battle with the reviving Demon King came to an unexpectedly quick end.

Afterward, I was greeted by cheers from Zaria and Noiche, but before anything else, I started treatment.

There were far too many injured people this time.

First, the beastman Aljan had lacerations on his side, shoulder, leg, and temple—he was in a dangerous state where a human would have bled to death.
Several other adventurers were injured too, and my other disciple was unconscious after a hard blow to the head.

Everyone was in a state where someone could die at any moment, so we spent the whole night treating them.

…Come to think of it, I lost my right arm too. But since I now have eight much more useful arms, I don’t feel sentimental about it at all.

“That’s not the point! We really thought you were going to die just like that…!”

“Haro. Don’t make Zaria cry.”

“No, I didn’t get injured on purpose to make her cry…”

At the night campsite, Zaria and a relieved-looking Noiche cling to me from both sides, tears in their eyes.

They stroke my hair while I cast cleansing magic on them.
I already know your friend distance is way too close, but could you at least stop doing this in front of people?

The adventurers’ stares hurt.

“That’s right, Haro-kun! If you had died back there… I-I wouldn’t have known what to do with myself…!”

And now there’s one more.
Egiy hugs me tightly from behind.

The soft, generous sensation pressing against my bare back is… huge. Way bigger than it looked from the outside.

Egiy spent the whole night like this, going back and forth between the collapsed Zilmoza, the senior disciples, and me… never able to relax.
Well, it can’t be helped.

After such a hectic night, the next day we joined the carriage with the injured and set off on the road back to the city of Dura.
Fortunately, that night and along the way, the injured people began waking up one after another.
With their gradually increasing help, we walked the same distance back to the city.

Passing through the somehow nostalgic castle gate, we finally arrived in town.

The group that stayed behind said they would handle the report to the guild first, so we were told we could go home ahead.
They were being considerate in many ways. But this time, I decided to accept their kindness.

As we were leaving, the one who called out to me was the beastman Aljan, the blacksmith’s head disciple.

Even though he had suffered the worst injuries, he showed the astonishing recovery power typical of beastmen.
He recovered enough to walk before Zilmoza, who was still asleep.

“Haro-kun, we really owe you this time. You saved our lives. Thank you so much.”

He bowed deeply as he spoke.
Egiy, standing beside him, hurriedly bowed as well.

“No… as escorts, we were second-rate at best. We even let you get hurt.”

“That’s my old man’s fault. And we also misjudged the danger of the journey. The moment a Goblin King appeared, this request was already B-rank level.”

He said the guild would hold additional rewards, and asked us to please forgive his master with that.
He raised his face.

…He’s an honest man, I thought.
I had imagined beastmen to be a bit rougher, but as expected, the disciples gathered under Zilmoza are all good people.

At that moment, a voice came from afar.

“M-Master! It’s dangerous to get up so suddenly!”

Aljan, Egiy, and the rest of us all turned toward the carriage at once. It was the voice of the disciple named Calion, I think.
The one unsteadily stepping down from the carriage was—Zilmoza, who should have been unconscious until just moments ago.

“Old man…!”

“Master, you’re awake!”

As the disciples reacted in their own ways, Zilmoza walked toward us.
I exchanged glances with Zaria and Noiche and decided to just stand there and listen to what the old man had to say for now.

After a brief silence—

Zilmoza slowly opened his mouth and quietly said, “It seems I caused you a lot of trouble.”