“This experience should help make you quite strong... Sophia, have you done any studying yet today?”
“Not yet, my lady!” Sophia replied, beaming.
“Can you actually fight, Sophia?” I asked plainly. You couldn’t really judge a devil by their appearance alone, but compared to the devils I had fought in my life as a hero, she didn’t strike me as the fighting type.
“Now now, little one. I am a knowledge devil, remember? What do you think the very first thing I learned from you demons was?” Sophia flashed a bright smile. “From hand-to-hand combat all the way up to spearmanship, I learned everything! And I am more than confident that I can replicate it all!” That bright cheerfulness was soon overtaken by ferocity. “I think my knowledge will be quite beneficial to your education.”
Aha ha ha, you think so? Then bring it on, you lowly devil!
“Now then, little one. Are you willing to study today?”
If I were to be completely honest, after my previous realization, I felt like it would save me trouble in the future if I just did as I was told here. But what kind of demon would just roll over in a situation like this?
“Not a chance,” I declared, standing up from my seat.
“Oh, really? In that case...” Sophia could barely contain her laughter. “It’s study time, little one!”
A flutter of black and red flashed through the air as the butler swung a fist at me without the slightest hesitation.
As she closed the distance between us, my body responded reflexively. She was aiming for my stomach. Should I jump out of the way? No, she would chase me up into the air. I needed to parry it somehow. Slapping her incoming fist aside, I leaned around the incoming punch. My body moved first, my mind racing to catch up and communicate my choices only after the fact.
How ironic. Even in this new body, my old instincts still held strong. As that crossed my mind, I retaliated with a light jab. Sophia’s attack had been quite vigorous, but I could sense a softness in it, the laxness of one fighting with no intent to take their opponent’s life. A single hit was all I needed. At this range, even my little baby hands could reach her no problem.
“Whoa!” But as if to sneer at the laws of physics, Sophia jerked to a halt and dodged away from my fist.
Damn. This is why I hate devils. Floating around without giving a crap about gravity; only natural they’d apply that ability to hand-to-hand combat as well. I had been forced into more than one tricky situation by their illogical movements when I was active as a hero. If only my arms and legs were a bit longer... I couldn’t wait to grow up.
Giving up on a pursuit, I extended my left hand and held my right hand near my hip, shuffling sideways as I observed her.
“Oh?” It seemed Sophia was content to wait and see as well. She dropped to the ground, the sound of her claws clicking on the floor signaling her return to gravity. “You’re pretty good, little one,” she said, tilting her head in confusion as she looked me up and down. “But where did you learn to fight like that?”
My blood, boiling at my first fight in years against one of the denizens of darkness, quickly froze. There was no way a two-year-old would know how to fight like I just had. Dammit! My natural fighting instincts were actually backfiring!
“I saw them practicing at the parade ground.” Mind racing, I squeezed out an excuse.
“Really? Doesn’t seem like any demonic martial arts I know of...” Sophia copied my movements, sticking her left hand out and pulling her right hand back, then sliding sideways.
A shudder passed through me. She had almost perfectly replicated the stance, one taught by the Holy Church to its monks as an all-purpose close combat fighting style. After only seeing it a single time?! But wait, this was actually much worse! If she was replicating it, that meant I was showing it off clearly! Anyone familiar with it would immediately recognize it! As a cold sweat ran down my back, I glanced over at Prati.
“Unfortunately, no one else can replicate movements just by looking at them like you can, Sophia,” Prati sighed, fanning herself. “It only makes sense his movements would be off if he was trying to copy what someone else did. Besides, you’re only familiar with demonic martial arts, right? That doesn’t include any of the styles used by the other races.”
“I see. I suppose you are right,” Sophia admitted.
“Zilbagias’s movements look fairly close to the martial arts that the beastfolk practice. He must’ve seen some of the rank and file training.” Conveniently, she found a way to explain my abilities for me. “As expected of my son. If you can pick up things that well just by watching, I look forward to seeing what you can learn in the future.”
I was saved. As she had said, this particular form of martial arts was designed by mimicking the movements of the beastfolk. Giving it some more thought, the martial arts of the Holy Church were rarely witnessed on the battlefield by the Demon King’s armies. Unlike the beastfolk who could fight empty handed, or at least with teeth and claws, we used swords and shields. Losing our weapons usually meant we were dead long before we had a chance to engage in unarmed combat. Anyone who recognized my movements would have had to practice the same style, or be some kind of weirdo who was constantly getting into fistfights with humans.
“It seems we should’ve started his physical training earlier. I thought he was too young for it.” While I was overcome with relief, Prati continued, conspicuous disappointment in her voice. “Zilbagias, as a proud prince of demons, having picked up the beastfolk’s martial arts first will be a stain on all of our reputations. You are to abandon what you have learned for now, and focus on learning the martial arts of our own people.”
“Okay,” I replied after a short pause, a little nervous. Luck was on my side today, but next time I may not be as lucky. Whether Prati commanded it or not, abandoning what I knew about fighting would be like throwing away a piece of my past as a hero.
“Now then, Zilbagias. It’s time to teach you the honorable and historied lineage of martial arts passed down among the demons.” Though she hid her mouth with her fan, there was no missing the sadistic grin that crept onto her face. “Don’t worry. We have all the time in the world. Sophia, please take it from here.”
“Yes, my lady.” Sophia took a stance again. This time she had both hands raised, an aggressive stance that looked ill-suited to a girl of her stature.
Ah, so this is the “honorable and historied” martial arts of the demons?
“Honestly, you’re putting up much more of a fight than I expected. I’m going to enjoy this more than I thought. It seems underestimating your moves is not an option. Actually, I might even be able to learn something from them.”
Dammit! If I slip up again, she’ll memorize my moves in a flash. There’s no telling when that would come back to haunt me.
“All right, here I go!” Casually announcing her attack, Sophia lunged forward.
With my skills from my past life forbidden to me, what I had to offer was nothing special. In no time at all, I was flat on my back. That said, I was still a child, so she was obviously pulling her punches. Compared to the pain of being disintegrated by the Demon King, this was nothing.
“Ah! I did it! Finally! Finally we can study!”
Glancing back at the deep emotional event Sophia seemed to be experiencing, I reluctantly trudged over to the desk. I had lost, so it was time to study. There was no helping it. For now, I’d pretend to make an effort here to learn the bare minimum of reading and writing. But once I get older, I’ll beat the stuffing out of that damn devil!
As I entertained those thoughts, a piece of paper was placed in front of me.
“Now then, little one! These are what we call letters!”
Some kind of cipher was written on the page. It was practically gibberish to me.
“Wait...huh? These are letters?” I said dumbly.
“That’s right,” Sophia replied, “these are the letters of the demonic language.”
Now that I thought about it...I remembered something one of the priests I had served under said once. Even though we spoke the same language, the demons had a different writing system...so even if we swiped their sensitive documents, it would take time to decipher their contents.
“Now, little one! The letters of the demonic alphabet are all phonetic. Each has its own unique sound. This one sounds like ‘ah.’ This one sounds like ‘ee.’ If you combine them, the sound changes. Ah, you’re probably curious since I called them phonetic, but there are also ideographic alphabets out there too, used by humans and elves and such. In those alphabets, each character has its own meaning, rather than its own sound—”