Chapter 398: Adaptation
Aura stood in the doorway, clutching the bundle of clean clothes to her chest. She stared at the spot where Solifra had vanished, lost in a daze. That jet-haired, dark-eyed kin of hers moved with a swift, predatory grace; she had disappeared around the corner in a heartbeat, as if haunted by some urgent, invisible duty.
"Welcome to the Magic Association."
Aura chewed on the words, tasting the surreal absurdity of them. A demon telling another demon, "Welcome to the most prestigious bastion of humanity,"—if the fanatical demon-hunters outside these walls knew this scene was playing out, a few of them would likely drop dead from pure, unadulterated outrage.
She looked down at the clothes in her hands. The fabric felt impossibly soft, a texture she had never encountered, embroidered with intricate silver runes. She couldn't decode the craftsmanship, but the faint, rhythmic pulse of mana vibrating from the silver threads suggested this was no mere garment—it was a magical artifact.
A sudden, jarring thought struck her: Was Frieren's white mage robe also an artifact? It would explain how the elf had withstood a barrage of spells from a dozen mages and remained utterly immaculate, even while Aura herself had been reduced to a soot-streaked, ragged mess.
Humanity's mastery of the arcane has truly reached an apex, Aura thought.
She retreated, pushed the door shut, and sat on the edge of the bed. After a moment's hesitation, she began to change. As she peeled off her tattered, blood-caked robes, the movement tugged at her wounds, sending shards of pain through her torso. Yet, it was leagues better than before.
Solifra's Holy Magic hadn't fully mended her. That was expected; as a demon, her very essence was at odds with the sanctity of the Goddess's craft. She couldn't absorb the restorative mana, and Solifra's own technique was admittedly clumsy. But looking down, Aura saw that the deep, bone-exposed laceration on her chest had already scabbed over into a thin, protective layer. Even the smaller gashes on her arms had faded into faint, pearlescent white scars.
It was impossible. Holy Magic was the signature weapon of the Sky-Winged—the force that had been codified and weaponized by humanity specifically to shatter demons. In theory, even the most rudimentary holy rite should have caused her flesh to recoil, or as Solifra had warned, exacerbated the trauma.
Why did it work?
Aura knew the history. Over the centuries, the original, soul-scorching Holy Magic had been diluted, refined, and replaced by human-made arcane circuits. Most of the original runes—the ones that carried the Goddess's hatred for the demonic—had been scrubbed away in favor of efficiency. What remained was a shell of its former self, stripped of its anti-demonic potency. That was the only reason she had dared to accept Solifra's touch.
Yet, even modern Holy Magic carried a lingering instinct for suppression. She had felt it once before—a "man" had once tried to heal her, and his holy light had burned with a stinging, discordant static that had made her skin crawl.
But from Solifra? Nothing. Only the cool, rhythmic flow of repair.
What is going on here? She whispered to the empty air. There was no answer.
She finished dressing and stood before the mirror. The reflection made her pause. Aside from the fit being a bit tight across the chest, it was unexpectedly perfect. She turned, the hem of the robe swishing with the movement. She searched for a word to describe her appearance and settled on one that felt alien to a demon: Decent.
Only the broken horn remained, a jagged, eyesore of a reminder. She reached up and traced the edge of the stump; it was clean, sheared off by a blade of pure, concentrated space. The residual bite of the Divine Strike.
If I had been one step closer, she realized with a shudder, it wouldn't have been my horn. It would have been my head.
She violently shook the thought away. Stop it. Don't think about it. Alive. Just stay alive.
Through the window, she could see the sprawl of the Imperial Capital. It was her first time laying eyes on the legendary "Ideal Kingdom of Humanity," the heart of the arcane world. No one in this city—not a soul—suspected that in the highest tower, two demons resided.
Aura found herself laughing. It wasn't a laugh of mirth, but the brittle, hollow sound one makes when the world becomes too absurd to process.
She remembered her earliest memories, just after birth, overhearing a human adventurer boasting in the woods. He had bragged about his time in the capital, detailing the height of the Association's tower, the sheer power of the mages, and especially the "God-slayer" and the "Elven Saint"—legendary figures who had slain more demons than there were stars in the firmament.
Back then, a newly hatched Aura had hidden in a hollow log, holding her breath, trembling as she vowed to never, ever set foot near that tower. Especially not that "God-slayer."
And now?
By a cascade of freak errors, she had met the master's grand-apprentice, been dragged into their lair, and was now tucked into their finest linens.
Though, I suppose I am technically a pet.
Aura flopped onto the bed, staring at the ceiling. The mattress was so soft she felt like she was drowning in it. She had never known luxury like this. In the wild, she'd slept in damp caves or hollowed trees, clinging to life. Thanks to the "God-slayer's" tireless campaign, the demon race was no longer merely hunted—they were treated as a plague to be purged. Even the simple act of having horns had led to discrimination against other horned races, though that was hardly a byproduct Rhodes could control.
He couldn't exactly issue a racial guide to teach humans how to tell them apart.
That had left newborn demons like her in a desperate, hand-to-mouth existence in the wilderness, until the day she had snapped and tried to raid a village for food… and walked straight into Frieren.
Ignoring her precarious reality, this was the most comfortable day of her life.
"Survive! As long as you can survive, anything is possible!"
The words bubbled up again. Aura closed her eyes, visualizing the "man" who had said them to her—an accidental, fleeting encounter. She didn't know why he had said it to a demon he didn't know, nor why she had clung to those words for two days of travel.
But she had kept them.
And she had survived.
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