Chapter 88

Solitär is the eighty-eighth chapter of Yamada Kanehito & Abe Tsukasa's Frieren: Beyond Journey's End.

Summary
Macht's recollection continued at the scene of another village being massacred. There he encountered Wahrheit, one of the Three Great Knights of the Northern Countries. Wahrheit began attacking Macht despite the demon's warning. Initially, Macht engaged in combat with him. However, once Wahrheit stated that through examining Macht's previous attacks he concluded that there must be some complicated activation mechanism to his special magic, Macht unceremoniously ended the battle, turning the knight into gold without any trouble.

Afterwards, Macht met up with an eccentric demon who engaged in research on human beings, whose name was Solitär. She led him back to her lodging and showed him the skeleton specimen from a shark and an orca. She explained to him the concept of "convergent evolution". When Macht asked her about the human emotions which demons lacked, Solitär told him the reason was because the demons evolved to prey on humans. Even though they have similar appearances and behaviors, they are entirely different creatures, thus they would never be able to understand each other. In response, Macht told her that demons might be able to coexist with humans if they were able to understand their emotions, and that demons like him had more than enough time to waste.

Afterwards, Macht sat by himself at the site of another settlement he destroyed. He was visited by the Omniscient Schlacht, who asked for his assistance in the battle to take down the Hero of the South.

Plot Details
Macht, having destroyed a human village in the Northern Countries, found no new emotion coming to him. He discovered someone was trying to ambush him and told them it was useless to find an opening. It was Wahrheit, one of the three Great Knights of the Northern Countries. Macht commented that he must have stayed in the region too long that humans had begun sending annoying daredevils after him. He told Wahrheit to leave him alone, but the knight refused, beginning to attack the demon with a flurry of arrows. Wahrheit said that according to the orders from the Emperor, he must eradicate all presence of the Demon King Army.

Initially, Macht defended against the onslaught using his sword. In the middle of battle, Wahrheit talked about his conclusion that Macht's signature magic, Di Agölze, must have a complex activation condition because not every village he had attacked was transmuted into gold. This thought amused Macht, who smirked and looked down on the idea that his magic requires any "activation conditions". He asked Wahrheit if all humans worried about such intricacies every time they use magic. Demons thought of using magic as simply a natural function of the body, like moving once limbs, which is done almost subconsciously. Macht then decided to answer the knight's question, telling him that there is no "activation conditions" to his magic; if he chooses to use it, every battle would end in an instant. To demonstrate, he immediately turned Wahrheit into gold.

Wahrheit, shocked by the revelation, could not complete his question of why Macht would not use his magic all the time. Macht answered him anyway: because it's boring to do so. His magic was simply too powerful that it rendered almost every battle meaningless. He asked Wahrheit whether this could be called a battle and whether it was fun, which naturally Wahrheit could not respond. Macht left the scene, saying he detested such battles.

On a beachside, he met Solitär, a female demon who engaged in research on human kind, who was examining the corpse of an orca. She introduced herself and offered a handshake, but Macht either did not understand the gesture or deliberately chose not to, instead choosing to inspect the body of the dead orca. He called it a "fish", to which Solitär agreed that it did "look like" a fish.

Solitär later brought him back to a hanger she had repurposed from the humans and showed Macht the skeleton specimens of a shark and an orca. She explained that only one skeleton belonged to a fish and asked if Macht knew of "convergent evolution". When Macht replied in the negative, Solitär explained that the orca's ancestors used to live on the land, but through hundreds of years having adapted to live underwater and taken on a form similar to a fish. However, in the inside, the orca is a mammal, a creature completely different than a fish.

She invited Macht to tea and told him his question was trivial when he asked about the emotions of malice and guilt. Solitär said that if demons felt hurt every time they deceived humans, they would have gone extinct. When Macht did not understand what this meant either, Solitär explained that humans and demons are completely different creatures; their appearance, ability to converse and humanlike behaviors were nothing but means to deceive and kill humans. Thus demons would never be able to understand those emotions humans have, like one cannot hope to understand the feelings of an insect flying in the air. She told Macht that it was only a waste of time to ponder such thing. Macht was not deterred by this assertion, saying that he had nothing but time to waste, and believed that coexistence with humans was possible if he could understand their emotions. Solitär was fascinated by his statement.

At the site of another village destroyed at his hand, Macht was approach by Schlacht, the right-hand of the Demon King who was capable of seeing the future. Schlacht propositioned Macht to cooperate with him in defeating the Hero of the South, to which the latter appeared reluctant.

Characters in Order of Appearance

 * Macht
 * Wahrheit
 * Solitär
 * Schlacht

Locations
The Northern Countries

Events
Macht versus Wahrheit

Spells
Di Agölze (Universal Gold Transmutation Magic): Macht's signature magic. It is the ultimate curse, undetectable as magic and cannot be undone even with the Goddess magic. Therefore, defense and evasion are impossible. According to Macht, he can activate this magic at will, without any apparent contact with the target. He was even capable of doing so remotely to targets outside the Great Barrier of El Dorado. The gold created by his magic is indestructible and unmalleable.