Within the deepest recesses of the demon kingdom, there stood a castle with a throne room at its heart—here, the Demon Queen reigned over the land.
In this place, two enemies were locked in combat.
One was a handsome young man, whose lithe physique belied a fierce inner strength. He was equipped with a full set of armor and a slender longsword, both forged from silver. Overall, he was a remarkable example of a hero.
His opponent, the wielder of a black rapier, could have been mistaken for a bewitching woman, except for the ram horns sprouting from her head and the sinister robe that enshrouded her. She was the mistress of this castle—the Demon Queen.
Without exchanging a single word, the two fighters lunged toward one another, their swords clashing in the middle. The Demon Queen met the hero’s brutal slash head-on, and although the rapier was slimmer than the hero’s longsword, her blade blocked the attack with ease. A lesser sword would have snapped in two.
They disengaged for a moment, only to jump back into the fray. This time, the hero repelled the Demon Queen’s thrust with the flat of his blade. His longsword readily absorbed the impact, deflecting a blow that would have pierced clean through a regular sword.
Their blades met again and again, as both parties wielded their chosen weapons with perfect confidence. The battle wore on, and eventually, their expressions took on identical shades of bewilderment. Both the hero and the Demon Queen had equipped themselves with a god-tier weapon, so it was unfathomable to them that this battle had not yet ended. The same thought lingered in each fighter’s mind—shouldn’t my opponent’s weapon have long reached its limit under this assault?
Their shared puzzlement soon brought them to a halt. They both lowered their swords simultaneously.
The hero spoke first. “Demon Queen, I have a question for you, unrelated to our fight.”
“Fine,” she replied. “I have one for you as well, likely along the same lines.”
“Then, if I may. Which blacksmith forged your sword?”
“Just as I suspected,” she remarked. “I wanted to ask who forged yours.”
“It must’ve been...”
“Yes. A certain stubborn and grizzled blacksmith made my rapier,” the Demon Queen confirmed. She sheathed the weapon and showed her blade’s pommel to the hero. Imprinted upon it was a plump cat squatting on its haunches.
The hero turned his own pommel to face the Demon Queen, displaying the same insignia. “I see. Damn that geezer.”
The Demon Queen sighed. “He must’ve forged both of our weapons knowing that this was going to happen. How conniving.”
“There’s no point in fighting any longer,” the hero said.
“We could always see whose strength fails first.”
“It’s clear that we’re equal in that regard.”
“True,” the Demon Queen conceded. “No matter which one of us wins, ultimately exhaustion would leave the victor vulnerable to attack. It’s meaningless to continue.”
“Well then, I suppose there’s only one option.”
“Yes—let’s agree to a truce, at least during our generation.”
“I’ll let him know too, all right?” said the hero.
“Go ahead. I have no objections. If we tell him, then neither of us will draw his ire, and it will keep us both in check. After all, it would be troublesome if one of us offended that humorless grump, and he backed the other’s side.”
“Okay, I’ll proceed as discussed. Until we meet again.”
“Farewell, hero,” the Demon Queen said, turning on her heel. “Now then, I must prepare a proclamation...”
They exited the throne room in opposite directions. Although the air had been thick with tension at the beginning of the battle, the hero and the Demon Queen—polar opposites in all regards—now wore the same expression of wry amusement as they recalled a blacksmith whose commonplace features were weathered by age.