113After an intense battle, rubble collapsed onto the path of the ravine.
Linie, having emerged victorious, sat atop the debris, her legs swinging as she bit into an apple pulled from somewhere.
Pausing briefly, Linie removed the apple from her mouth, clenched and unclenched her free left hand, reflecting on the recent fight.
"That was close…"
The enemy had been of a general's rank, as expected. The initial surprise attack, the explosion of thrown weapons, and the shock caused by her weapon replication had all contributed. If any one of these factors had been missing, Linie would have been instantly crushed.
She hadn't intended to fight head-on from the beginning, hence the victory achieved through her careful planning and strategy.
However, the fact that it had escalated into a battle at all showed a lack of skill on her part.
Linie's ideal was to take down her target swiftly and efficiently, without resistance.
"But, that last move was pretty good."
As she gathered dark mana in her free hand, Linie gazed at the replicated Whirling Great Axe Belwint, recalling the day she had defeated the demon who had once subdued her at the summit of that mountain range.
On her way down the mountain, she'd happened upon a battle between another demon unit and a party of four adventurers known as the Hero's Party.
Linie had been captivated by the skill of a dwarven warrior among them.
That warrior's name was Eisen—the one Linie deemed the strongest warrior.
While she lacked the sheer strength to completely replicate Eisen's technique, simply imitating his movements had already transformed Linie's combat style.
Despite his power, Eisen's stature was small due to his dwarven heritage.
Linie had learned from him how to maneuver against physically superior opponents. Although she had imitated the moves of countless warriors, Eisen's movements had embedded themselves as her foundation for the first time.
For the first time, Linie felt a special respect toward Eisen's technique, unlike any feeling she'd had for the original wielders of other replicated weapons and techniques.
"But, it's still not good enough."
She looked up at the sky, lost in thought.
This time, she had engaged in a fight. Occasionally, she would enter combat to replicate an opponent's techniques. In fact, Linie had actively sought out such opportunities.
However, she had spent months with this particular opponent, watching his every move. By now, she'd already memorized his techniques, making the fight entirely unnecessary.
Due to her way of infiltrating demon squads to strike from behind, Linie was fundamentally forced into a life of isolation.
Gaining allies among humans was impossible, and demons were merely prey for her to hunt.
Thus, Linie had to constantly improve her skills and stretch her abilities to the limit.
Of the warriors she'd imitated, she optimized techniques that she deemed essential for herself, making them fit her body perfectly. Her eyes, trained to read mana flow, had become sharper for observing her fellow demons, her primary targets.
Her mana detection ability had also improved, helping her infiltrate demon squads as a valuable asset.
She had honed not only surface-level skills, like these, but also her foresight, observation, concentration, situational judgment, and even the skill to create ideal hunting situations, as seen in her recent ambush.
Linie had cultivated every ability she deemed essential for her hunts.
Her ability to accurately replicate the swords she had acquired was, of course, second to none.
However, even with all that, she was beginning to feel the limits of her current hunting methods.
She knew she was growing stronger, but that alone was no longer enough.
Perhaps she could achieve more by utilizing elements that didn't involve herself.
"…That's it."
She placed her hand firmly on the apple.
Given her hunting style, Linie often infiltrated demon squads, waiting for the right moment to strike. Being part of these units also meant engaging in battles against human warriors, like those in the Kingdom's or Empire's armies.
In the process, Linie had slain countless humans.
However, she viewed those battlefields as mere opportunities to refine her skills while hiding within the demon squads. She would imitate the movements of any warrior she encountered, making them her own.
Now, in hindsight, she realized: during those battles, all demons would be fixated on the human warriors, creating ideal conditions for striking from behind.
She wondered why she hadn't thought of this sooner.
"I could use humans."
Linie knew how to earn the trust of demons.
She had manipulated demons by leveraging her mana detection ability, leading them into her hunting grounds.
This time, she could do the same with humans, setting them against demon squads.
The problem was how.
Thanks to the time she spent in a certain village, Linie had picked up some human customs and mannerisms, enough to blend in if she wasn't actively taking action. But since humans were fundamentally different from demons, earning their trust was out of the question.
Linie needed a short-term way to subtly guide humans, allowing them to clash with demon squads.
And finally, she reached an answer—
"Information."
Linie muttered the word.
Having been forced into a solitary battle for so long, she understood the importance of information all too well.
With their inherent disadvantage, humans would surely value information even more than demons did.
"I'll just leak information to humans about the demons."
Where her current squad was stationed, which town they were planning to attack—
She would leak these details to the human forces nearby, deliberately setting them up for a clash.
"It might even work both ways."
By feeding information to both sides, she could control the time and place of the battle to suit her needs.
It would create an ideal hunting situation.
She felt confident in her abilities to detect mana and blend into human society. By exploiting this, she had convinced demons of her usefulness in annihilating humans.
Whether she was ordered to infiltrate or she volunteered, she could easily create an excuse to immerse herself in human activities.
"Alright. From now on, I'll leak information to humans to hunt more effectively."
Satisfied with the plan's efficiency, Linie took another bite of her apple.
After a while, she stopped swinging her legs and looked up at the night sky.
Her narrowed eyes seemed almost solemn.
"But there is one problem…"
While her plan offered a more efficient hunting method, Linie realized a drawback in exchange.
If she used this method, there was a risk that humans might witness her hunting grounds.
Until now, no demon she had lured into her hunting grounds had survived, leaving no witnesses.
However, if she executed this plan, humans might also come to know of her hunts.
Linie's Sword Creation
Linie, who has modeled her abilities after Emiya's "Unlimited Blade Works," can similarly draw forth weapons she has seen from her inner world, expending mana to do so.
However, unlike Emiya, who pulls weapons from his reality marble through the process of "Projection Magecraft," Linie's method doesn't rely on Projection Magecraft but instead channels her abilities through the same "Weapon-Creation Magic" (exact name unknown) seen in the manga and anime. As a result, the weapon replication effect resembles the anime, with dark mana taking the shape of the weapon.
Furthermore, unlike Emiya, Linie can disassemble a duplicated weapon back into pure mana and reuse it to replicate another weapon. This ability helps conserve mana when creating weapons. Because of this, Linie can continuously recreate weapons one after another in battle, just as in the anime.
However, due to a lack of empathetic ability, she cannot use "possession experiences" (directly reliving past users' experiences with the weapon). To compensate for this, Linie relies on her own magic called "Imitation Spell: Erfassen"
Main Replicated Weapons:
"The Dach Family's Sacred Sword"
Appears in Chapter 64 of the manga, titled "Sword Demon." Originally owned by a famous demon, this sword is now preserved as the treasured heirloom of the Graf Dach noble family. The sword has been stolen by demons twice, indicating it holds a unique value known only to demons, according to Frieren. Consequently, it's a weapon that Linie, as a demon, finds well-suited to wield. In this fanfic, it likely occupies the role of "Kanshou and Bakuya."
"The Rotational Axe: Belwint"
This magic axe was created by a demon general whom Linie recently cleaved in half. An original weapon in this story, its size is similar to the great axes Linie wielded in the original work and anime. The magic in the blade increases with each rotation, making it more than twice as powerful as a regular axe. Linie uses it to execute techniques learned from the warrior Eisen. Like the Dach Family's Sacred Sword, she will frequently use this weapon from this point on.