<Chapter 10>

Fortunately or unfortunately, I first needed to figure out how to complete this quest,

but I felt like I would get indigestion if I kept eating, so I put down my fork.

Roakin grabbed my arm and pulled me up from my seat.

“If you’re done eating, let’s go.”

He led me straight out of the dining hall.

The only difference from Heligan was that my neck wasn’t being strangled, yet I was practically dragged out all the same.

“Where are we going?”

“You should sleep now.”

By the time we finished dinner, the sky had grown quite dark.

Roakin swiftly crossed the deck and headed below.

I pressed my heels into the floor and followed as if trying to pull him back.

“I’m not sleepy.”

“You also said you weren’t hungry earlier.”

*He could have just let that slide, but he had to point it out again.*

No matter how much I glared at him, he didn’t slow down.

He navigated the complicated and dark corridor as easily as if it were broad daylight.

*He’s not taking me to his bedroom again, is he?*

My tension proved unnecessary, and fortunately so.

The place Roakin pushed me into was a new room.

“Rest.

If you need anything, Irene’s room is next door, so call her.”

Then he left, leaving me alone.

I looked around the room, from the wardrobe holding sleepwear and casual clothes to the simple vanity and bed.

It was perfectly ordinary.

Thinking of how they were described in the game as nothing but absolute ‘evil,’ they were unexpected in many ways.

They did not tear into bloody raw meat with their hands.

They did not sleep inside pits of fire.

They did not revel in meaningless slaughter.

*They’re just different in race, that’s all.*

With a strange feeling, I changed into my pajamas.

Standing before the mirror, my exposed left arm caught my attention.

A strange tattoo was boldly engraved there.

The overlapping lines near the top looked like Arabic letters, or incomprehensible mathematical symbols.

As if possessed, I reached toward the tattoo.

*Was there something like this in the character modeling?*

The moment I tried to retrace my memory, a fragment flashed across my mind like lightning.

One arm forming a circle toward the center, one, two, three, four, five.

And a cheerful voice that bound everyone together.

– From now on, we are one!

That was all the fragment showed.

The low-resolution scene seemed like a memory from my days in the subjugation squad.

I immediately stepped outside to find Roakin.

He behaved as if he had known me for a long time, so perhaps he also knew about the comrades who had been with me.

From what I saw in the diary memory, there were two names.

Killian and Elise.

The others were insignificant compared to their fame, so they did not matter.

And if there was one name the Demon King would surely know among the two,

“Hero… Killian.”

“What?”

The voice I had been looking for came from right behind me.

When I turned around, Roakin was standing there.

Standing tall in the middle of the narrow corridor, he looked larger than ever.

Fidgeting with the tattoo on my left arm, I approached him.

“Well, I found this tattoo and a short memory surfaced.

Do you know Killian too?”

He answered with silence, but it clearly meant yes.

My delight grew stronger.

“So you do know him.

Then do you know where I can meet him?

I might be able to recover more of my memories.

I know it’s an unreasonable request to the Demon King, but if I regain my memories, it could help you as well—”

As I stepped forward, I suddenly stopped a few paces away from him.

*Something’s wrong.*

The air was shifting violently.

It felt ominous and unsettling.

The surrounding atmosphere froze in an instant, drying even my lips.

I slowly stepped backward.

From within the darkness where his face was barely visible, Roakin asked in a low voice.

“What did you just say?”

“Um… I asked if you knew where Killian is.

But if it’s hard to say, you can just ignore it—”

“So you remember him.”

He muttered quietly.

The end of his words trembled faintly.

I could not tell if he was laughing or crying.

His voice made my body shrink on its own.

Even my bones felt cold.

With just two steps, the distance I had tried to create vanished.

“W-why all of a sudden—ngh!”

Standing right before me, he gripped my left arm with brutal strength.

Now that he was close, I could see his face clearly.

He looked mechanical and numb.

His destructively handsome appearance was usually paired with a cold expression.

And now, he looked as if he feared what he might see.

And fear is like a bad premonition.

It always becomes reality.

Before I could scream, the smell of something burning reached my nose.

It was coming from my skin.

“Aaaah!”

Heat from his hand gripping the tattoo burned my flesh.

Smoke rose with a sizzling sound I could hardly believe even as I saw it.

I writhed within it.

“Why Killian, why!

I don’t know!

The only thing I remember is that he’s the Hero!”

Even as I desperately cried out in pain, he did not stop.

Instead, he pulled me into his arms and restrained me from moving.

His embrace was truly like steel.

My freedom was stripped away with absurd ease.

Like a prisoner trying to escape, I clawed at his arms that felt like iron bars.

My breath trembled as I swallowed my sobs.

“Stop.”

It sounded like the groan of a beast caught in a trap.

I was begging miserably.

“It hurts, Roakin, please stop.”

The hand that had comforted me when I cried upon finding the diary surfaced in my mind like a droplet breaking the water’s surface.

The hand that had naturally taken care of me while we ate,

the warmth that occasionally flickered through his cold gaze,

at least none of the kindness I had received had been false.

Clinging to that one truth, I sobbed and pleaded.

“You’re not this kind of person.

You don’t have to solve things by force like this.

Please, Roakin.

I could not believe that the same hand that had once been so gentle was now the one causing me such pain.

But he only tightened his hold.

“Do not mistake need for love, Lamia.

I am neither generous nor merciful enough to forgive because of a few tears.

Do not rashly believe that what you have seen is everything.”

“Let go!”

“Betraying trust is a very easy thing.”

Each word he ground out was filled with intense hatred.

It sounded as though he was referring to himself, yet also to someone else.

But as the pain intensified, I had no choice but to hate him.

“Cut the bullshit!

Forgive?

What did I even do wrong?”

As I squeezed out my anger and shouted, a growl like that of a beast brushed past my ear.

The grip restraining me loosened slightly.

Then he buried his face into the nape of my neck and murmured.

“…Trusting someone like me so carelessly.”

And pain beyond comparison crashed over me.

I screamed louder and struggled, until my consciousness finally slipped away.

As my vision blurred, Peligan’s voice echoed in my ears.

*The kind of guy who’ll snap your neck the moment he’s annoyed is talking about loooove? Does that even make sense?*

Ah.

Right.

Roakin could never speak of love.

He was, in the end, the Demon King.

When I regained consciousness, I was in a quiet and narrow room.

It was neither his bedroom nor the last room I had seen before losing consciousness.

With no windows and only the bed I lay on, the space looked more like a prison than a room.

“Ugh, my head…”

As I forced myself up, the bandage wrapped around my left arm caught my eye.

I immediately pulled at the knot and unwrapped it.

The tattoo I had seen had vanished as if it were an illusion.

Whatever he had done, my skin was clean without a single scar.

That did not erase the memory of the pain, and even the slightest brush of my fingertips made me flinch.

*What kind of answer did I expect from the Demon King when I asked about the Hero?*

They were sworn enemies.

Regret washed over me.

Still, thinking it had not been entirely meaningless—