DKFTI 41

“Well, maybe it was to take revenge on the demons, to repay the grace of being spared… something like that.”

“I don’t think it was such a grand reason… I just did it to live. If I don’t have a reason to live, then being alive feels like a sin.”

It was the first time. The first time getting to know the human called Aizen. That was why it felt strange.

He thought he was just some loafer who grabbed the Apostle’s seat and lived off being coddled. Everything was unexpected.

“Why, are you suddenly feeling sorry?”

Aizen was right. He started to feel compassion. But he didn’t want to show it.

Who was he to pity someone else?

The sound of his slow footsteps rang loudly.

“Living trapped in the past is no different from a curse. The things I crave are all out of reach.”

“Mm.”

What was it like to live trapped in the past? To move forward every day, yet for your soul and mind to remain far back somewhere.

“That’s why I came here, but I stepped in shit.”

“Shit? Who’s the shit?”

He was feeling sorry for him, but the choice of words that wagged its tail and vanished was infuriating. Anyone who heard it would think shit meant the Demon King’s castle itself, or Sibel.

“So you weren’t killed by your lack of tact.”

“No, wait, why are you suddenly like this after going along well! You always make it impossible to see you in a good light, even when I try.”

Sibel grumbled. He thought maybe he would look pitiful, but then Aizen kicked him away with his own feet. His nature wouldn’t change.

“Why would you pity me when even God abandoned me.”

“Did you actually check if he abandoned you, Hero?”

“Well, it’s obvious even without checking.”

Aizen had an illness. Sibel knew that was the reason the Hero had come to the Demon King’s castle.

Isn’t it something that can be solved by taking an antidote? Sibel couldn’t understand why he went so far as to seek God and act high-handed.

Sibel would probably never understand Aizen’s skepticism and helplessness. To claim to fully understand another person was as arrogant and ignorant as saying you had grasped the laws of the universe.

Sibel just didn’t like Aizen’s words. Why was a young guy so twisted?

So Sibel pulled Aizen’s hair while pretending it was a mistake.

“Ah.”

“Oh, it’s a mistake.”

In an instant, Aizen’s scalp muscles twitched.

“Thinking too much is also an illness. You eat well, sleep well, shit well, and yet you say God abandoned you.”

“So then what, should I work hard, cheer up, and fulfill my mission again?”

“Heh.”

Sibel didn’t know what kind of inner conflict Aizen was going through right now, but it was certain that his own life was safer if Aizen remained powerless.

“Maybe it wasn’t that he abandoned you, but that he had no interest from the beginning.”

“Huh?”

Aizen replied as if it was absurd.

“So forget about that mission or duty, and just rest well.”

“Are you trying to comfort me, or mock me?”

“You’re the one making it confusing, Hero!”

“Oh, now you’re even shouting at me? Have I become easy to deal with?”

“Not at all, sir.”

Sibel quietly let go of Aizen’s hair. No hair had come out, his scalp was intact.

“You have a lot of hair. You won’t have to worry about going bald.”

Sibel suddenly found himself examining the state of Aizen’s thick hair.

“Stop spouting nonsense. It makes my brain weird too.”

“Yes, sir…”

He had tried to change the mood, but the Hero was merciless.

“But so in the end, being here is like a vacation, right?”

It hurt his pride that the Demon King’s castle had become the Hero’s vacation spot, but in any case he had to figure out Aizen’s next moves.

Would he kill and leave, or just leave? That was what Sibel was most curious about.

“You know I just sympathized with you and empathized with you emotionally just now, right?”

“Do you really think you could die by my hand?”

“Half a day ago I almost died falling from the sky, so why couldn’t I die at the Hero’s hand.”

“Fuck, why does that make sense?”

Aizen had gone past absurdity into emptiness.

“Behaving like that anywhere else just sets things up so everyone will tell me to kill you.”

“…It’s my survival strategy.”

“You are going to lie flat on the ground and beg me to spare you?”

“I could even roll backward.”

“And what will you do, living like that?”

“I’ll become a Demon King strong enough not to need to grovel.”

“Simple. Very simple.”

Aizen sighed. Sibel no longer had any pride left to be hurt.

He was a Demon King who couldn’t even walk without borrowing the Hero’s back, it was humiliating and ridiculous.

“Hero seems like someone who’s not as simple as I thought.”

“You’re even simpler than I thought.”

“When someone gives a compliment, shouldn’t you reply with a compliment too?”

“That was a compliment.”

As expected, his rotten nature. Sibel gave up on hearing good words from Aizen’s mouth.

“These days, aren’t you sticking too close to that bastard?”

“That bas… hm. Who?”

“The white human.”

In the Demon King’s castle, if someone said white person….

“Ramiel?”

“Do you even know what that thing is, and you hang around it like that?”

“Are you worried right now?”

“What, you think I have nothing better to do than nag?”

Sibel couldn’t figure out where to even start pointing things out. Honestly, wasn’t the Apostle the most dangerous person to himself right now, more than anyone else?

“He seemed nice.”

“He’s nice. Did all the nice ones die?”

“He’s fun, and we get along when we talk.”

“Who here doesn’t get along with you when talking.”

“You, Hero?”

“You want to roll around on the ground?”

Sibel quietly closed his mouth. Whenever it was about attacking him personally, Aizen reacted with ghostly speed and hypersensitivity.

“Strangely, when Ramiel is around, I feel reassured.”

It was because of Ramiel’s unique calm atmosphere. He made the people around him feel at ease. Sometimes he made you so comfortable that you even forgot he was next to you. Ramiel had a knack for blending in like scenery. Did he have some kind of skill of his own?

“I like the harmless feeling.”

“And I give off a harmful feeling?”

“You’re very self-aware.”

At the very least, he could conclude that Aizen had a high level of meta-cognition.

Sibel thought Aizen would throw back some rebuttal, but surprisingly, he stayed silent. As expected. The pinnacle of meta-cognition.

Thud, thud. Again only footsteps could be heard. The sound, mingled with the chirping of insects, was peaceful.

At times like this, he didn’t seem like a bad person.

But he always thought. Was this okay? Why was the Hero treating a Demon King well?

Today too, when it came to his inner thoughts, at some point Sibel had no way to approach, only circling around. Aizen was not someone easy to deal with.

But once Aizen closed his mouth, Sibel felt strangely sorry. Maybe he had been too harsh.

After all, Aizen or Ramiel, both were just guests sticking around in the Demon King’s castle.

Hm. Maybe he had been too stiff.

“But, Hero.”

Sibel spoke again. Between the two of them, when they were alone, the one who couldn’t bear silence was surprisingly Sibel, not Aizen.

“But honestly, these days the Hero doesn’t feel all that scary anymore.”

“…What are you trying to say now.”

“I was worried you might think I favor Ramiel only.”

When it came to being suspicious, both of them were about the same.

Even if Ramiel was comfortable, he was different from Shanti or Ruru. And even if he wasn’t an Apostle who stood as an enemy, no one could know what thoughts he held inside.

Sibel lived messy and noisy, but he wasn’t that careless. His own safety was always the top priority. Shanti also gave him frequent lectures on mental discipline.

“To me, the Hero and Ramiel are the same.”

Which meant, both were scary!

Sibel thought his remark was pretty cool.

Wow, a Demon King full of compassion, ooh!

But what Aizen felt was far from what Sibel expected.

“Fuck. How the hell am I the same level as that bastard?”

“Hic.”

“Me, ha, was it that bastard who saved you when you were in trouble? When the mages came and messed up the Demon King’s castle, who saved you? When you lost it in the rain, who grabbed your wrist? Who’s carrying you on his back right now? Your ancestors?”

Aizen was furious. Why did Sibel keep forgetting the wise saying that if you just kept your mouth shut you’d at least make it halfway. He should have just stayed still and let himself be carried.

“Don’t ever say nonsense like ‘the same’ again.”

“Yes, sir.”

“The more I think about it, the more ridiculous it is.”

“Sorry.”

He decided he had to just shut his mouth.

In the end, today again, Aizen got angry. If he was just going to get angry at every word, then why did he keep helping every time. He really was a psychopath.

And so today again, the distance between the two didn’t close at all.

Impossible to figure out.

That was what they both thought of each other that night.