The Royal Knights

The order of the Demon King

The Royal Knights are the armed order attached to the demon crown. Volume I's account of Magnus records that the Demon King is protected by three royal knights, while stressing that a ruler described as ancient, powerful, brutal and cunning has no practical need of such protection. The order is therefore introduced as an institution of standing rather than of necessity.

Chapter 20 names its commander for the first time: Akiyama Magnus, who is styled Commander of the Royal Knights in the same line that names him Golden Prince of all demons and Heir to the Demon throne.

The company at the portal

The only body of Royal Knights the published story has shown is the one Akiyama leads at the close of Chapter 20. It numbers fifteen men in armour, moving in formation down a vast stone hall toward a swirling emerald portal that opens into an underground chamber below the Tower.

Zero watches them approach and reports it to Shun Sato as “The Cavalry.” The scale is worth recording precisely: fifteen knights and their commander, dispatched to a fortress whose lord defeated a national army of thirty thousand in the First Transgression.

Standing and reach

Two things about the order follow from that single scene. It can be moved through the Gate portal directly into the Tower's own foundations rather than approaching overland, and its commander is the heir to the throne itself — so a deployment of fifteen knights carries the authority of the Demon Court rather than of a garrison.

The arrest

Chapter 21 brings the company through the portal and into the chamber beneath the Tower, where Shun Sato and Zero are waiting. Shun surrenders without resistance, and one of the knights manacles him. That knight then whispers an insult — calling Shun an abominable half-ling — and Akiyama Magnus knocks him unconscious for it, then turns on the rest of his men.

A former Royal Knight

Akiyama's rebuke is the order's first recorded account of its own history. He names Shun to his knights as **the former Royal Knight of the Demon King**, as well as the Hero of the Demon War and the Lord of the Tower, and forbids them to disrespect the legacy of his achievements. The published story therefore now places Shun among the order's former members.

The knights' conduct is less disciplined than their commander's. They snap to attention in horrified unison at his rebuke, and when Roku emerges from Shun's shadow they draw their swords in a frantic blur and are reduced to whimpering behind their helmets.

The escort

The company escorts Shun back through the portal and down the main road of the Frontier to the dungeons of the Demon Castle, six knights marching ahead of him with Akiyama at their head and six following behind. Two others are ordered to carry the unconscious guard.

Undisclosed details

The order's size, its ranks and its recruitment are still not established at this boundary, and nothing is yet said about when or why Shun left it.