Chapter 49 - Waking, Capture, and the Demon Lord
—It hurts. It hurts.
It hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts. It's hot. It's burning. I'm scared. What is this. Stop. I don't know. I don't know what this is. I'm scared. Who is it. I can't see. I'm scared. I'm scared. It's hot!
Elenoa was tormented by pain. She felt something writhing within her, as if her body had undergone a metamorphosis.
Her entire body would not move.
She felt as though she were being devoured by someone.
Trying to escape the fear, akin to the frustration of being eaten alive by insects, she opened her eyelids.
What flew into her eyes was an overwhelming amount of light.
It was so bright it felt like it would burn into her retinas, and a scream nearly escaped her. But her throat would not produce a voice, as if it had not been used for a long time. Instead, she ended up coughing.
—Truly, her throat had not been used for a long time.
Even this painfully bright light—yes, it was because she had not used her eyes for so long that it was so dazzling.
It was a strong light that even fairy eyes could not withstand upon opening. —It was nothing more than soft, commonplace sunlight.
"Hm…?"
Accustomed to the light, Elenoa looked around the room. Unfamiliar structure, unfamiliar furniture. Only the sensation of the bed she was sleeping on was familiar, and she recognized that this was her own room.
—It seems I was asleep for a long time.
She had no memory since Louis had said "goodnight" to her. She did not even know what time it was now.
What had happened since then? She should not have been able to see, yet she could see, and although hoarse, her voice was working.
Being released from petrification meant either the caster had died, or it was judged that there was no longer a need for her to remain stone. …Likely the latter.
Did he heal her?
If so, could she walk?
Filled with expectation, Elenoa extended one leg from the edge of the bed.
Her leg moved. At that simple fact, her face relaxed, and she slowly crawled out of the bedding. But strength did not enter her limbs. Her lower body felt strangely cramped, and her groin and other unexpected places throbbed with sharp pain.
"Hi…ck!?"
Unaccustomed pain assaulted her weakened body, and she collapsed onto the floor. Fortunately, a carpet was laid out.
Elenoa remained silent.
Lying prone after rolling over, she observed the room through her long silver hair.
"Demon… Lord's… Castle."
If her memory was correct, this was the Demon Lord's residence.
Even reconfirming that fact, she felt no surprise.
Bis, the previous Demon Lord, had visited this room as Louis's subordinate, and Louis's remarks had often hinted at as much. Combining the information Elenoa had heard before turning to stone, that was simply how it was.
She had entered the era of Demon Lord Louis Stylus.
—…As expected, it has come to this.
Although he had insisted so strongly in the past that he had no intention of becoming the Demon Lord, his future had not changed.
Her body felt heavy. The pain in her lower limbs became increasingly severe, and Elenoa crouched on her side. Curling her body up made it slightly easier.
After staying like that for a while, she heard footsteps. Footsteps ascending. It seemed this room was located at a high position within the Demon Lord's Castle. Someone climbed the long stairs, opened the door, closed it behind them, and then the sound stopped abruptly.
"…Elenoa…?"
"Hm…?"
Elenoa looked at the owner of the voice while maintaining her posture.
Who is it, she thought.
Golden hair that sparkled smoothly under the sunlight. A young man with a beautiful, regular face. Although not a robe, he wore black attire.
It was Louis. Louis Stylus.
He, whom she surely knew, looked like a different person. When he snapped back to his senses with a "Hah," he rushed over to Elenoa, who was still lying on the floor.
"Elie! Do not get out of bed right after waking up! I told you so many times not to act recklessly, are you an idiot?"
—Ah, this normally rude tone is Louis.
Elenoa was picked up and placed back on the bed.
At that moment, she noticed a strange scent coming from him.
—The scent of iron.
But before she could ask about it, he embraced her tentatively. Gently, as if handling something fragile.
"…Louis?"
"Yes."
"You've grown bigger."
When released, he instead held her head with both hands, forcing their eye levels to meet. You don't need to do that to make me stay, you know, Elenoa thought, but his slightly forceful nature was also nostalgic after so long. It was endearing, and her mouth relaxed into a smile. Realizing that he was staring intently at such an unremarkable face, Elenoa asked something with her gaze.
Louis apologized with just his lips, saying, "No, I am sorry."
"You are reflected in my eyes, and you called out to me with that voice. That is all, and yet…"
Louis squeezed out the words, "I am happy."
He touched every part of Elenoa's hair and cheeks. It was ticklish, and Elenoa ended up giggling and rolling around.
"I had planned to discuss important matters once you woke up. …For now, how about some tea?"
Louis, who had left the room once saying "Please wait a moment," brewed lemon black tea without using magic.
Elenoa put her lips to the tea, which had been cooled to a moderate temperature.
"I thought apple might be better, but for some reason, there was a large amount of lemons."
"It's fine, it's delicious."
"It has been about four years since I last brewed tea for you."
"Were you lonely without me?"
"Lonely does not begin to cover it. I felt like I was dying. …I was half dead."
Stunned by his exaggerated words, Elenoa was at a loss for words. Looking up, she saw Louis with serious eyes, and she could not bring herself to laugh.
He looked happy, but his eyes also seemed shadowed.
"Regarding what I wanted to discuss—"
Louis's gentle atmosphere remained, but it was slightly dark.
Elenoa opened her mouth, confused.
"Does it have to be now?"
"…Because you cannot move right now."
She was unsure how to interpret that answer.
Unable to feel a serious sense of crisis toward Louis, Elenoa said,
"The one who made that drug was House of Stylus."
"…Eh."
She lost her words at this ambush-like statement. She did not understand what he had said.
Noticing Elenoa's dumbfounded state, he mocked himself and imposed his selfish reasons upon her, saying, "I wanted to tell you everything while I had the chance."
And for safety, Louis took the cup from her frozen hands.
"This happened over a hundred years ago. A certain mage of House of Stylus completed an ultimate healing drug unlike any other. A miraculous medicine, like something from a fairy tale, that grants magic power to those born without it after a single dose, and allows the use of magic after a second dose."
"Wait a minute…"
"'Fairy Tale'."
Elenoa reflexively tried to escape. She lowered her feet to the side of the bed opposite Louis and stood up, but nearly collapsed from dizziness. His hand, reached out instinctively, grasped at empty air.
Elenoa did not want him to pronounce the name of that panacea, the miraculous drug whose very existence was like a fairy tale.
Because it was refined from the wings, bones, hair, and magic power of ten fairies.
It was made from the corpses of her kin.
Unlike the impure magic power of humans, only fairies, who stored the pure magic power of nature as is, could become the drug. Therefore, humans captured fairies. For the sake of humans. Killing fairies.
—And then, they dried them, ground them up, and swallowed them!
"…No."
"Elenoa."
"No, …no, no."
She wondered what this unnatural pain in her body was.
She wondered what the faint scent of blood clinging to Louis was.
Only shocking facts swirled in her head, which had just awakened and could not process them. She did not know how to connect and process this information.
She was simply terrified.
The knowledge that Eren, the fairy from the game, was subjected to very painful experiments by Louis, the Demon Lord, directed her thoughts in the worst possible direction.
Gravity felt abnormally heavy. Her joints would not obey her. But she moved her body along the wall.
"No, ah…ck!"
Disgust, nausea, aversion, and various negative emotions made her want to get away from his side. She did not want to be here.
The window closed the instant Elenoa looked toward it.
The door she rushed toward, whipping her body, only made the sound of a lock clicking shut.
Both were his silent magic.
"Why, open it, no!"
Louis restrained Elenoa from behind as she stubbornly pounded on the closed door.
The arm wrapped around her chest was not gentle.
"You must not. Beyond this point is a long staircase that your current self cannot walk down."
Her left hand, which had been clinging to the lever, had her wrist gripped tightly.
Even without silver threads, her body froze and would not move.
"I remembered it. That scene."
"St, stop…ck."
"I remembered the parents mixing a bottle of the drug into baby food, and forcibly pouring that bitter substance into the crying child's mouth."
"Nooo!"
—Disgusting, disgusting, disgusting!
Her hoarse voice, like that of an invalid, struck her ears with a dry, murmuring resonance.
"I had been lying all along. In truth, if you had not been a former human, I intended to add you to the drug. Because I knew that 'Elenoa' held a special position in this world."
Elenoa was simply terrified. What she heard was the confession of someone she did not know at all.
"When we first met, while you were bound by silver threads and unconscious, I gave your magic power to that child. But you had no fairy-like magic power, and I thought you would not make a good drug, so I watched. Then I realized you were not the Elenoa who would kill me. So…"
Elenoa could not respond to his arms, which embraced her body and clung to her.
She vaguely remembered here that it was Lumina Stylus who had first noticed Elenoa's call when she came to House of Stylus. —'It seems my sister heard your voice.'— In House of Stylus, the sister was sometimes sharper than the brother, bypassing him.
I see.
So that was it.
"Humans are ugly. Even the parents who tried to keep that child alive were nothing more than one of the demons to you. And the humans who left that child to die and unjustly assaulted you are demons to me as well. It is only natural that you, a member of House of Stylus and a human, are feared by you. —But."
Elenoa's left wrist, which had been held, was pulled toward Louis. His large, rough hands slowly traced from her wrist downward. He touched her palm and fingers, as if confirming the sensation.
Finally, they connected.
Intertwining their fingers, like a loving married couple.
"It is no good. I cannot let you escape."
And then, he kissed her from her wrist to each of her fingertips, one by one.
When she heard his sultry voice say "Mm," Elenoa felt embarrassed and terrified by the soft sensation touching her, feeling like she might come undone. Her body flinched and stiffened.
Pleading with Elenoa, he put more strength into his arms.
"I will admit to being a monster who forces you, a human who only binds you, inhuman, or a pest. I do not care what you call me. But I cannot allow you to leave."
—No good. Snap, it broke.
"You do not wish to be chained like this, do you? Hey, I will not kill you. So please…"
—Somewhere inside him, something important in his chest.
"I like you. I love you, I love you, Elenoa."
—Something important in her heart broke.
Looking at the door, Elenoa bit her dry lips.
She stopped clinging to the exit. Something dropped heavily in her heart. It was not a refreshing feeling, but a dark emotion akin to resignation.
"Louis."
"…Yes."
"Even if you are gentle, you can become a Demon Lord. I didn't know."
When she thought she had heard her own lines somewhere, she realized they were the same as the game's heroine.
Unknowingly, she grasped the hourglass hanging from her neck.
In her head, she heard the sound of something clicking into place.
A square frame made of a thin silver frame floated before her eyes. Letters were lined up there.
『Turn the clock and return to the choice before the route is determined? (Data will be discarded)』
—That is obvious.
The answer is 'NO'.
Elenoa felt no doubt toward those words. Even the suspicion of Why now? was pushed aside somewhere. She did not doubt that a 'Reset Button' was naturally present in this world.
She did not want to reset and part with him.
When she removed her hand from the clock, the choice text disappeared. Instead, several familiar words such as 'Attack' and 'Defense' lined up in several rows. Numbers were lined up next to them. Most were four digits, but only one item was '0'.
The background of this list was semi-transparent white, and the door could be seen through it.
The written text and numbers seemed to be information about him, whom she was touching.
Name: Louis Stylus
Age: 26
Level: 75
Occupation: Demon Lord A, Mage S
HP: 4077
MP: 9999
Attack: 2500
Defense: 3076
Magic Attack: 9999
Magic Defense: 9999
Skills: [Skill: Grand Magician's Insight S], [Skill: Fire's Blessing A], [Skill: Water's Blessing B], [Skill: Wind's Blessing S], [Skill: Earth's Blessing B], [Skill: Darkness's Blessing A]
Affection: 0
She skimmed through it and closed her eyes. Leaning her weight against him behind her, he tightened his arms even more. What did he think of her attitude, conveying that she no longer intended to escape? Was the cramped embrace representing relief, or joy?
"…I like you too."
When Elenoa said so, Louis called her name once in a voice that seemed to fade away. He breathed into her ear. The item that had been '0' became '--'.