Chapter 8: Emotional Roller Coaster at the Winter Festival [Rewrite]
Time went on and before I knew it one and a half years past. Irina, Issei, and I had entered the winter of our second year of school. The time of Christmas was almost here but some people couldn't wait for Christmas and decided to celebrate early. Because of this not far from my house a winter festival was being held.
This year was the first year they'd have a winter festival near my house but everyone was excited about it. Mom and Dad love festivals but because there are rarely any near Kouh they haven't gone to any, however, with the winter festival being held nearby both of them were in a frenzy. Just the other day I remember both of them went out to rent a few yukatas for the family.
At first, I thought they were pretty cool but once I remembered that I'll have to wear this in cold weather I told my family I was good and decided to wear jeans and a jacket instead.
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*Ding*
*Dong*
"I'm coming!" I said making my way towards the door.
"Ohayou~," Irina said as she walked into the house
"It's four in the afternoon already," I said while looking at Irina's yukata, it was pink with many different bright flower designs on it.
"What do you think?" She said giving me a slow twirl letting me get a full view of her yukata
"It's cute," I said while nodding my head, "You ready to go?"
"Yeah!"
When it was announced that there was going to be a winter festival it wasn't only Mom and Dad that were excited so was Irina. When she first heard about the festival she came over to my house with the poster and invited me to come with her. To this, I said yes since Issei had previously invited Murayama and Katase to the festival and I didn't want to be around Mom and Dad while they flirted during the festival.
I don't know why this happens but whenever Mom and Dad get happy they tend to flirt A LOT so I knew that they would do the same during the festival. So Irina's invitation was like a godsend allowing me to get out of that situation without making it seem like I didn't want to spend time with them.
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"…Woah…" We said when we entered the festival grounds
"I didn't expect it to be so big," I said
"En"
The festival took up not only part of the shrine grounds but even the whole street market nearby. Walking throughout the stalls were people from all over town enjoying food, playing games, or buying charms and such. Even the forest behind the Shrine had many lanterns brightening the area. Whoever's responsible for setting this festival up must've put a lot of thought into it.
"What do you want to do first?" I asked Irina who seemed to be eager to go in and participate in the festival
"Everything!" She replied pulling my arm dragging me to the nearest stall
"I follow your lead then."
From then on from four to seven we ran around different stalls playing games or trying out different snacks. I thought it was pretty entertaining, but since I've never been to a festival before I couldn't compare it to any other festivals. Along the way, we even saw Issei with Murayama and Katase as well as my parents but ignored them in the end.
We ignored them not because we wanted to but because it seemed like we would ruin the mood if we did. Issei seemed to be having a good time with those two and us coming into the equation would complicate the situation. As for why we ignored my parents just like I predicted they were flirting with each other and neither of us wanted to be around them when they were like that. We also meet a few other acquaintances along the way but after a few greetings, we parted ways to go enjoy the festival ourselves. After spending three hours of constant running around while my body wasn't tired my mind was a little worn out and I decided to rest on one of the shrine benches nearby.
"Yu what do you want to try next?" Irina said still energetic as if we didn't just spend three hours enjoying the festival.
"How about we rest a little," I suggested envying Irina's energetic attitude, "You do know we've already been here for three hours right? Aren't you tired?"
"Now that you mention it, my feet are a little sour," She said sitting next to me while messaging her sore feet.
Seeing her take the time to rest I felt relieved since we've basically done everything in this festival already, but knowing Irina she'll want to at least try everything again before leaving. Thinking about this I started looking towards the shrine courtyard not far away from us.
"Seems like there is going to be a performance," I said watching a few festival staff working on a small stage
"I wonder what they'll show," Irina said while biting into a Taiyaki
"Where'd you get that?"
Is what I wanted to say but before I could my [Magic Sense] picked up a few unknown energy signatures inside the forest behind the shrine. Since this was the first time I experienced something like this I didn't know how to react. One part of me wanted to just ignore it, while another part of me wanted to investigate.
After spending a few minutes wondering what to do, I decided to go with option C which was used [Spiritual Sense] to scan the location of where I felt the energy signatures. When I did, I discovered that there were five people deep within the forest. One of them had a higher mana output coming from its body while the other four had weaker mana outputs.
"What are they?" I said asking the system for more information, "They don't seem human."
*Ding*[Correct they aren't human, the one with the higher mana output is a low level pure-blooded devil while the other four are reincarnated devils. Judging from their mana signatures they have reincarnated fairly recently as pawns due to not having any special changes done to their bodies.]
"Devils huh," I said, "While it's not determined whether they'll start trouble I'll investigate just to be safe."
Deciding on my next move I gave Irina an excuse to get away from the festival and entered the forest just as the snow started to fall from the sky. Slowly making my way further into the forest I activated [stealth] and did my best to conceal my own mana signature. Along the way, I also used [Spiritual Sense] to keep an eye on the devil's situation.
When I was finally able to reach them the reincarnated devils were arguing with their master about being able to go to the winter festival. To this, the master refused their request and instead started ordering them to follow him back to the underworld. That statement brought with it a huge argument between the four devils and their master.
One side wanted to have freedom while the other side wanted them to obey. Watching this I knew that nothing good would happen so I decided it was best if I got away before things escalated beyond my control. Sadly the moment that thought entered my head things already started to get out of hand.
The strongest of the four devils threw a punch at his master, but before he could make contact with his master a magic circle appeared in front of the devil. Before the devil could react the magic circle sent him in the sky landing a few meters behind me.
The moment the devil touched the ground the other three devils started to attack their master from all sides. In terms of magic abilities, those devils had none but in terms of physical capabilities, there had plenty. Due to being outnumbered the master devil wasn't able to focus on attacking one of his opponents because when he did another would attack him from behind.
Following this strategy over and over again the devils ended up beating their former master to death all while the former master was helpless to do anything. As for me I was like a statue and watched the procedure without moving. It's not like I wanted to see it and more like I couldn't move in general.
The situation had advanced so fast that I couldn't even activate [Mind of Tranquility] and the act of those devils beating their former master to death was something I've never seen before and somehow was able to bypass my [Mental Resistance] causing me some shock.
I may have ended the lives of many monsters in the dungeon, but none of them had humanoid bodies. The thought or resolve of killing a human had yet to form in my mind so watching someone die right before my eyes was something I was not ready for. Evidence of this could be seen in the fact that when the master had died my stealth was deactivated and my body could be seen by everyone in the area.
"Well, what do we have here," One of the devils said when he saw me, "What are you doing here kid you know it isn't safe here."
"Shit a kid saw us," Another devil whispered to his companion, "Guess we'll have to kill him."
"Don't worry," his friend said as he closed the distance between him and me
Forming his hand into a claw he tried aiming for my throat but, my instincts kicked in and I jumped into the air faster than the devil could react.
*Ding*[Survival Quest]
[Three hostile individuals have made it their goal to kill you, now is not the time to stay idle kill your enemies or you will die]
[Time Limit: Five Minutes]
[Failure Penalty: Death]
There was no time to hesitate anymore, whatever choice I made would result in someone's death and I don't plan on dying. The act of taking a life wasn't something many people had to experience but with me and the path, I walked it was something I'd have to be resolved to do.
Gritting my teeth I forcefully activated [Mind of Tranquility] beyond its usual effect. With that, emotions like guilt, panic, and hesitation went away. All I felt was pure clarity all I had on my mind was completing the task I had in my head before activating [Mind of Tranquility].
All that happened while I was in mid-air and the moment I landed on the ground I used spatial magic to attack the nearest devil with a spell that created spatial tares in mid-air cutting the devil's body into many small pieces.
"What-"
Before the second devil could finish his sentence I appeared before him and cut off his head with my pair of bowie knives I had stored in my storage. As for the last guy I used [Ground Shrink] to reduce the distance between the two of us before snapping his neck three hundred and sixty degrees.
*Ding*[Congratulations you have survived your survival quest. Rewards will now be distributed]
*Ding*[You have received-
"JUST SHUT UP WILL YOU!!!" I shouted interrupting the system's notification
The moment I completed the quest was also the moment [Mind of Tranquility] deactivated. When that happened all of the emotions I was suppressing had hit me like a wrecking ball. Nausea took over and it took my all to not throw up.
Spending around five minutes to calm the raging sea of emotions in my head I began cleaning up the scene of the crime. Using spatial magic to open a portal to the dimensional gap I dragged all of the corpses into it with shaking hands.
"Wait," I said realizing there were originally five people and not four, "I need to make sure the other one is dead."
Judging from the way those reincarnated devils so easily betrayed their "master" even a child could tell they weren't good people.
"KYAAAA!!!"
"IRINA!!" I shouted recognizing the voice of the person who screams
Ignoring the discomfort in my body I ran as fast as I could towards the source of the scream and arrived there within two seconds. When I got there I found the last surviving reincarnated devil. He looked a little banged up but that wasn't what I cared about.
In his hand he was holding the neck of an unconscious Irina, and when I saw that my mind went blank with rage.
----System Notification----
*Ding*[You have entered a state of uncontrollable rage]
*Ding*[Large amounts of your killing intent and anger have stimulated a portion of your bloodline forcibly activated the innate bloodline skill [Demon's Gateway]]
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
LostWriter
LostWriter Here's a rewritten version of chapter 8
Weekly Power Status
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Ranking 
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