The Reunion of the Demon King and the Ancient Hero - Part 2
An envy Lucretia couldn't quite conceal had colored those last words. She had come here simply to deliver Jae-hyun's message, but the knowledge that Ji-ho's wives and the Archangel Gabriel would, by tomorrow, be carrying Jae-hyun's children filled her with a longing so sharp it ached. After all, she wanted nothing more than Jae-hyun's forgiveness — to become his woman.
Ji-ho's wives and the Archangel Gabriel, however, felt only disgust.
Lucretia's appearance had already plunged them all into despair — the exhausted women, their companions, and even the dragons and angels resting behind them. Like Ji-ho, none of them could step forward. Having just faced Laylana's overwhelming power, they remained slumped where they sat, able only to watch Ji-ho and Lucretia in silence.
This was especially true of Ji-ho's wives and the Archangel Gabriel. Rather than fighting themselves, they had planned to transfer their remaining strength to Ji-ho if the situation demanded it, hoping to restore even a fraction of his mana and magical energy.
But Lucretia's words sent Rachel and Ruina surging to their feet.
"That will never happen!"
"Tomorrow, you'll be watching the Demon King fall!"
Lucretia smiled at the sight of them boldly declaring their faith in their husband's victory.
"Then I suppose we'll have to wait until tomorrow. I do look forward to seeing how it all turns out."
Lucretia didn't doubt Jae-hyun's victory for even a moment. Watching them struggle against her, then barely scrape by against Laylana, had only deepened that certainty. The Jae-hyun of now was a being so powerful that even she and Laylana attacking together couldn't hope to match him. Even if Irene joined their assault, bringing him down would be impossible. The idea that these women could defeat him was simply unthinkable.
"Tomorrow, you'll be looking at the Demon King's corpse."
Rachel's beautiful green eyes locked onto Lucretia as she answered, her voice cold and filled with fierce, unshakable faith in her husband.
"That's right."
"I think so too."
"Same here."
Ruina, Silvia, and Kim Da-gyeom each voiced their own unwavering faith in Ji-ho. They were, in every sense, devoted wives whose love and trust in their husband was absolute.
But Lucretia, who already knew exactly how they would change by tomorrow, merely smiled at them.
No one caught the jealousy threaded through Lucretia's voice. She still believed in Jae-hyun's victory without a shred of doubt, and she was certain that tomorrow's fate — these women pregnant with Jae-hyun's children — would not change.
The moment Lucretia vanished, everyone who had been tense at her presence exhaled as one.
"Haaah..."
"My legs have gone completely numb."
"Same here. Whew! Going weak in the knees while sitting down... that's a first."
The angels and dragons behind them let out sighs of relief, their bodies — locked rigid with tension — suddenly going slack as the pressure vanished all at once.
"Six hours..."
Ji-ho weighed whether to trust the six-hour rest Jae-hyun had offered through Lucretia. The deliberation didn't last long.
At this point, even Lucretia attacking us would be the end — never mind the Demon King himself.
The situation was already beyond their ability to handle Lucretia, let alone Demon King Kim Jae-hyun. Given that, they were better off trusting the six-hour promise and resting. Whether they believed the promise and rested unprepared, or distrusted it and stayed on guard without truly recovering — if Jae-hyun attacked, they were finished either way.
They had no means of stopping an attack if it came. Better to believe the promise was genuine and rest. If Jae-hyun's word held true, he and his companions would all recover their strength.
"Ahem. Ancestor. I'll be heading to the Imperial Palace for a short while, if you'll permit it."
Griffith cleared his throat and bowed his head slightly toward Ji-ho, requesting permission in a polite, formal voice. Griffith was a distant descendant of the child born between Ji-ho and Silvia. In a sense, that beautiful mage with her blue-silver hair was his ancestor.
The bloodlines had tangled and retangled across so many generations that people who shared the same ancestors had married without ever knowing it, their degrees of kinship stretching into the dozens or even hundreds. Beyond unions among Ji-ho and Silvia's descendants, there had been marriages with the descendants of Ji-ho and Rachel, and of Ji-ho and Ruina as well. By that measure, Rachel and Ruina were Griffith's ancestors too.
The only one among them with no blood connection to Griffith whatsoever was Kim Da-gyeom, who had come to this world for the first time.
"Go ahead."
Ji-ho looked at Griffith with something like pity. The man wasn't going to simply rest during the allotted time — he was heading back to the Imperial Palace. Ji-ho knew exactly why.
He's going to get it over with in advance.
Griffith had yet to be freed from Jae-hyun's curse. He still had to periodically perform those unspeakable, horrific acts with Ferdinand, or endure agony so unbearable that it couldn't be withstood until he did. Binding himself accomplished nothing. Even if he sat still, when the time came he would find himself seeking Ferdinand out as if hypnotized, without even realizing it.
And now a critical battle loomed ahead.
At their original pace of advance, they would already have been fighting Demon King Jae-hyun by now, and Griffith wouldn't have needed to do that terrible thing. But they had agreed to take six hours of rest, and unfortunately, his next episode fell within that window. He would have to go perform that horrific act of his own volition and come back.
Ji-ho's companions knew this, and even Jason — who had something of a rivalry with Griffith — looked at him with sympathy. That pity only made it worse.
Kh...!
Telling himself that this nightmare would end tomorrow, Griffith gathered what remained of his magical energy and teleported to his private residence within the Imperial Palace. The Habsburg Empire's palace was warded against teleportation magic, but a duke's power could ignore those barriers and travel to certain designated locations — his own chambers, for instance — whenever he wished.
Once Griffith had teleported away, Ji-ho lay down on the ground and closed his eyes. He needed to ease his body's exhaustion first. Still lying there, he slipped quietly into meditation, focusing on recovering the mana and magical energy he had spent.
His companions did the same, pouring everything they had into restoring their strength.
While Ji-ho's party focused on recovering their strength, Jae-hyun — the one who had granted them that time — was inside the Demon King's Castle, already deep in the act with Estia.
"Hah, haah! Haaaahn! Nngh, yes... hngh! It feels so good! Haaah! More, more!"
Every time Jae-hyun's cock scraped along her inner walls and rammed against her cervix, Estia bucked her hips as if coming apart, sobbing with pleasure as she rolled her waist even harder. She lay on the bed, her beautiful golden hair fanning out with every movement, while Jae-hyun drove into her from above as if pinning her down, one of her legs hooked over his shoulder.
"Hngh, hah!"
"Haah, hnnngh!"
And of course the room was far from empty. Lin, Selina, Lucien, Serphius, and Lillian were all having sex with Jae-hyun's clones, their hips pumping back and forth in earnest. Irene, too, was taking Jae-hyun's clones from both ends at once, rolling her waist around them. Only Estia, who was having sex with Jae-hyun for the first time today, was taking a single cock.
Laylana watched the scene in silence, wearing the form of an eight-year-old girl. Watching Irene — Jae-hyun's wife — and his concubines lost in the throes of pleasure, she found herself wondering.
Is it really that good?
Irene she could understand, in a way. As Demon King Laylana, she had known Irene only as Hero Kim Jae-hyun's lover and companion, a woman of astonishing talent in both swordsmanship and magic. But Selina, Lucien, Serphius, and Lillian were people she had known well since her own days as Demon King. She had once ruled over them. Of course she knew them.
Selina and Serphius, in particular, had been famous for their dignity. Serphius was simply indifferent to most things beyond her magical research, but Selina — as Vampire Queen — had always been meticulous about her appearance and conduct. Even she, who had always carried herself with such noble elegance, was now rolling her hips in the most obscene way. To Laylana, who for all her time as Demon King had never experienced sex, it was a rather curious and amusing sight.
It was then, while Jae-hyun was still thoroughly enjoying himself with Estia, that the door to the Demon King's chamber opened. Lucretia returned, having finished delivering her report to Ji-ho's party.
She entered the room and looked with open envy at the women having sex with Jae-hyun, then approached the bed where he was still inside Estia, bowing her head to report.
"I said exactly what you instructed."
"I see."
Jae-hyun didn't even thank her. He didn't so much as glance her way. Lucretia had known it would be like this from the start, but the old saying about the fickleness of the human heart existed for a reason — she felt a small pang of disappointment that he wouldn't even acknowledge her effort.
She shook the feeling off quickly enough. A moment later she watched Jae-hyun press himself hard against Estia's body and come inside her, and she watched Estia take his seed with a burning moan, her whole body shuddering. When he had finished filling her, Jae-hyun pulled his cock from Estia's cunt and looked down at her — trembling on the bed, his semen leaking from her, her body still shivering with pleasure.
Then Jae-hyun turned his head. Not toward Lucretia — toward Irene. He looked at her for a moment, then his gaze returned to Estia, and his hand gently stroked Estia's sweat-dampened golden hair.
The resemblance to Irene in both air and appearance, the same hair color — all of it was why Estia and Lin, this mother and daughter, had captured Jae-hyun's interest.
"Six hours from now."
Jae-hyun murmured it without so much as glancing at Lucretia. In six hours, Ji-ho's party would stand before him as enemies. The seventeenth day since his descent upon the Intermediate World was almost upon them.
Jae-hyun didn't linger with Estia. He rose from the bed and dressed. Darkness rippled around his body and clothed him on its own, so he didn't need to lift a finger.
Only once he was dressed did Jae-hyun finally look at Lucretia. Even then, his gaze wasn't for her alone — it took in both her and Laylana.