Chapter 82 - The Demon Lord and a Premonition
From the window she had exited, he watched until that small silver figure vanished from sight.
The severe mountains spread across the earth. The fairy flying in a straight line beyond them looked so unreliable that he had almost said, "Please, don't go after all," countless times. Every time a strong gust blew, he watched with bated breath, but she was neither swayed by it nor did she look back, disappearing into the night's darkness.
If only she had been intimidated by the cold wind sliding down the mountain slopes toward him. If only she had, he could have gently embraced her, comforting her by saying how cold it was.
Indulging in such futile delusions, he could sense the limits of his own character.
"To nearly die without wings, yet fly away when you have them… what a troublesome creature…"
"But she's cute, isn't she?"
"Yes. The most beloved creature in this world."
Louis was not surprised by the sudden female voice.
He closed the window. The chair where Louis had been sitting until just moments ago was reflected in the glass.
He turned around.
A woman was sitting brazenly with her legs crossed on the chair that should have been empty.
Standing beside her was a familiar man. He was the black-haired man who had previously come to the castle as the 'Fairy Chief's Attendant.' The man, who had been looking down at the woman with a somewhat exasperated expression, gave a slight bow when his eyes met Louis's. Judging by their positions, the woman was this man's master.
——'By exposing the magic power flowing through her wings to the moonlight, she generates life force. By exposing high-quality magic power in a place closer to the moon—'
——'If you give her your magic power and life force, putting her in a semi-contracted state, her wings will return. —Or so he said. 'Through a more direct method.''
This was the person who had given advice through the man to Louis, who had been holding Elenoa while she was in a petrified state at the time.
The woman had eyes that seemed stronger-willed than Elenoa's, and long, loosely wavy hair. Her appearance was gorgeous yet hard, clad in silence. Although her atmosphere was different from the gentle Elenoa, the color scheme of blue eyes and silver hair inevitably reminded him of her. Her height and build were almost identical to Elenoa's, who was human-sized. He even thought they might be twins.
But there was a decisive difference.
The woman had no wings.
"You are, as expected, not a fairy, are you?"
He had known, though.
——'My master seems to be called the Fairy Chief, but she has never claimed to be a fairy herself.'
Louis remembered the man having stated that clearly before.
The woman wore a sarcastic smile. As expected, she was vastly different from Elenoa.
It did not matter where this man and woman had intruded from. They were likely neither enemies nor allies of Louis.
He had sensed the unique presence of a woman resembling Elenoa several times before.
The woman softly opened her mouth and asked,
"Eternal summer or eternal winter. Which would you choose?"
Asked this, he remembered.
Louis had once asked Elenoa the same question. About two hundred years ago, when he was nineteen. Back when the two members of House of Stylus and one fairy were happy. The young Louis, who knew no anguish, had simply voiced the question written in a book.
If he recalled correctly, Elenoa had—
"Elenoa answered winter, so I choose winter as well."
"I see."
He thought that he would never genuinely get along with this grinning woman.
He recalled that the book had also contained a description regarding a woman.
——'It is a myth. It is said that people who lived thousands of years ago were forced to make that choice. A sacrifice was required to resolve it. That sacrifice was said to be a woman as beautiful as a fairy, with silver hair and deep blue eyes.'
——'Apparently, her personality was the absolute worst, though.'
A crisp myth.
There was no way to confirm if this woman was truly the one from the story, but he assumed she must hold a high status. Her personality certainly seemed bad enough. He had no way of knowing her true character, but he was convinced that at the very least, he and this woman were incompatible. Furthermore, for some reason, he felt he did not want Elenoa to meet her.
"I came to talk. Will you listen?"
"Will it take long?"
"Not that long, I suppose."
"Then, please go ahead. You don't need to serve tea, do you?"
He had absolutely no intention of getting along with her. The woman seemed to have not even a shred of such intention either; she merely raised her subordinate by saying, "Of course. His tea is probably more delicious," and offered a thin smile.
"This is sudden, but do you know what Truck-kun Reincarnation is?"
"Tora-ten? …Tora-ten… Tora… Tora-ten… Tora…"
"………………… Hint: Truck and Reincarnation."
"Ah, one of the introductions to fantasy stories."
"Exactly. Dying by being hit by a truck, meeting God, and reincarnating. You can think of me as the so-called God in those kinds of stories. At least, as far as you all are concerned."
"How presumptuous."
Fantasy. A genre of fiction. The gods that often appear in fantasy have the image of roles such as asking someone to play the Hero to defeat the Demon Lord, or granting special powers to humans.
However, considering the myth about the woman's sacrifice, her position did not seem so simple.
"If you claim to be a god, I would like to see more divinity."
"What are you saying? I am this divine. Right?"
The woman sought agreement from her attendant, who gave an ambiguous answer: "If you think so, then that must be the case." She then turned back to Louis as if nothing had happened, paused for a subtle moment, and said, "Well, anyway."
"I wish you would be more grateful. After all, I am the one who has given you chances countless times."
"…Chances, you say?"
"As you know, you all have been restarting many times. I am telling you that this is due to my power."
It was likely not a lie. She had gone so far as to declare herself the God for Louis and Elenoa.
Even so, he was far from feeling grateful. It was clear from her disagreeable attitude that she had not done so out of mercy. Even if there had been mercy, he could only say, "So what?"
If anything, it would be more accurate to say that she had dragged Louis and the others into this.
With a doll-like, perfect smile, the woman began to pour out a nauseating complaint at length.
"Really, one of you dies horribly in front of the other. Or you end up with someone else. The thing that made me go 'Ugh' the most was probably when Elenoa was unknowingly turned into medicine and sold by weight to multiple people. You both became Demon Lords and squeezed humans dry to recover her, didn't you? Among all the happy ends I have observed, there hasn't been a single one for you two. Well, that is why you have been repeating this until now. Honestly, it feels hopeless."
He felt like vomiting. Although Louis did not remember most of it, just imagining it was ghastly. He did not understand the nerve of the woman who went out of her way to tell him this. Even if she paused as if to ask, "Do you believe me now?" Louis had no way of judging whether it was the truth or not at this moment.
Well, the past did not matter.
What mattered was the present. His current life, where he had effectively utilized the lessons from the past—namely, that Elenoa would run away immediately.
"So, what is your purpose?"
"I want to create a successor."
A successor?
"…What do you mean?"
"We have lived too long, and we feel it is about time to stop. However, for me to be released from this position, it seems I must place a successor in this role."
He had a bad premonition.
"As for this position, how should I put it… Perhaps I should say I am the one with the right to move time, so that the world does not come to a halt in eternal summer or eternal winter. An existence like that. A principle, or perhaps a phenomenon. For that, one must possess the same amount of magic power as I do, which is why I set my sights on you."
His bad premonition was correct.
"Every time you grow into a Demon Lord, you accumulate an immense amount of magic power that a mere human could never possess. If you repeat that process many times, you will eventually become equal to a god. Probably, your current amount of magic power exceeds even my prime."
This meant that if they were to engage in a simple magical battle now, Louis might win. But he was not so carefree as to feel good about merely that. In fact, the woman possessed knowledge that Louis did not. Had she and the man spent together a time far longer than the two hundred years Louis had lived—?
Louis briefly shifted his gaze to the man. The man was standing there, but he seemed to be staring intently at a painting on the wall, not listening to the conversation.
"You are repeating. But if you look at it from a long-term perspective, your time is indeed progressing. As proof of that, something unprecedented is happening to the current Elenoa."
"Something unprecedented?"
"It would be tactless for me to say what it is, so it's a secret."
The woman placed her index finger against her lips and smiled mischievously. Unlike her previous disagreeable attitude, she looked genuinely happy, without any hidden meanings. Acting like that, she resembled Elenoa a little.
The woman's story seemed to be over.
Louis looked at the window. The woman and the man were not reflected in it. The plush chair reflected in the window was empty. They must be that kind of existence. And he was being invited to become that kind of existence.
He had no intention of becoming such a suspicious entity. —Not yet, at least.
However, he could not say that he absolutely refused.
Louis voiced a question he had been considering for some time.
"My past self called this world a miniature garden. Outside this world… in your world, people are living as well, aren't they? Is it wider than here?"
The woman answered with unexpected honesty.
"Of course. This is merely a world I created by imitation. The world I lived in is much wider, and many humans are still alive there."
"Can you take a partner with you, like you have?"
"You can. That is why I have involved not only you but Elenoa as well."
"I see. And one more thing."
The question came out of his mouth with surprising ease.
"Was there ever a life where my sister, Elenoa, and I could remain as the three of us?"
No matter how terrible the situation, had there never been a time when the three of them could stay together? Was there not even a fragment of hope?
Louis had already guessed the answer.
"Among those I have observed, never. One always drops out."
As expected, it seemed words like mercy or kindness did not exist in the woman's dictionary. At her dismissive reply, Louis inadvertently gave a bitter smile. It was something like resignation, or perhaps acceptance.
Realizing that these were the only questions, the woman stood up.
"When you have made up your mind, come here."
In the instant Louis blinked, the two of them had vanished.
＊
Just before Elenoa left the Demon Lord's Castle and crossed the boundary between the Demon Realm and the human world.
"Oh?"
She felt something strange about her body. She felt somewhat heavy, but it might have been her imagination.
More than that, there was something even more strange.
Although Louis's magic power should have been filling her,
"…Am I… hungry?"