From Hero to Four Heavenly King
"It's a little chilly."
I stepped into the interior of the Demon King's Castle.
The moment I crossed the threshold, multiple branching corridors unfurled before me, and the place radiated an unmistakable sense that nothing ordinary belonged here.
"This way, was it?"
Still, I wasn't particularly surprised. As someone who had completely cleared the game, I had walked these halls more times than I could count. A faint familiarity even settled over me.
"They should be showing up soon."
That was why, rather than forcing my way deeper from the entrance, I simply waited. If you stood still long enough, a certain demon always came looking.
"Greetings. If you wish an audience with the Demon King, please come this way."
Sure enough, a demon in a maid uniform approached from the far end of the corridor. Her face was almost completely blank as she offered a polite greeting, then turned and began walking ahead without another word.
"..."
I had come here to meet the Demon King. Following her was the obvious choice. I fell into step behind the maid-clad demon.
As expected of an eroge, huh?
Even when I tried not to look, my eyes kept drifting to her outfit. The maids at the Imperial Palace had already been scandalously dressed, but true to demon aesthetics, the mesh panels over her chest and the sheer stockings were brazen enough to make a man stare.
The world inside an R-18 game really was something else.
"... Um... Hero, if you keep staring at me like that, it puts me in a rather difficult position."
A faint flush of red colored the maid's otherwise expressionless face.
You're the one wearing clothes like that and you're embarrassed I looked? It felt like common sense itself was being rejected, but I decided to roll with it. Around here, this was probably normal.
"This is the Demon King's chamber. I shall take my leave."
I followed the demon maid at a measured pace and eventually arrived at the royal chamber—an enormous space that dominated the very center of the castle.
I stepped inside and found the Demon King seated upon the throne, while three of the Four Heavenly Kings remained concealed, watching the situation in case anything went wrong.
The atmosphere plummeted the instant I entered.
"We cannot comprehend this."
The hidden Heavenly Kings fixed me with wary stares. The Demon King, legs crossed in leisurely arrogance, looked down at me from her throne and spoke.
"Why have you come here alone?"
Golden hair that radiated an ominous aura, a dress cut with lethal allure—her beauty was so devastating it felt dangerous simply to approach, yet impossible to look away from.
She fixed me with an icy gaze while pouring out a cold, dreadful wave of Demonic Energy.
This was the Demon King history called the worst of them all: Arteria.
"Answer Us. If your life holds no value to you, We can personally claim it."
Most people would have been shaking in terror. I wasn't. Or rather, I simply couldn't be.
Knowing everything I know, she's actually kind of cute.
Because I already knew the full story—and therefore the Demon King's truth.
She's ridiculously weak.
In reality the Demon King was not particularly strong. Weaker than any of the Four Heavenly Kings, and not dramatically stronger than an ordinary demon. If you somehow kept Ronan alive all the way to the final battle inside the Demon King's Castle, that truth became obvious.
She was a fake final boss.
Her every word and gesture had been so heavy that before the fight I had been tense, wondering how I was supposed to take her down. Then she dropped from a single basic attack. Once you realized the real final boss was the fight against Jaxx, it became clear the Demon King was nothing more than a demon putting on a grand performance.
The way she abandoned the whole act at the end and burst into tears had been surprisingly adorable. Even now she was putting on an enormous show of weight in front of her subordinates, but it was obvious she was trembling inside.
A laugh almost escaped me, but conversation mattered more right now. I set the amusement aside.
"I want to join the Demon King's army."
I stated it plainly, without hesitation. Let me into your forces.
It might have sounded abrupt, but this was the only way to solve the seventy-nine days of lifespan I had left.
"... Hmm. One question. Are you doing this so that you may become a demon and thereby extend your life?"
"That's right."
A brief silence fell, yet the Demon King understood perfectly. Her words had been exact.
In this game, the only reliable method of extending lifespan was to become a demon.
"Is that so. So that was your purpose. We understand the heart that brought you here. We already know everything that has befallen you."
She did not find my desire strange. As the single greatest incident to rock the Empire in recent times, the demon side could hardly have remained ignorant. Ronan's arrival at the Demon King's Castle needed no further justification.
"Even so, should you not consider more carefully? A demon, you say? That which your kind brands as pure evil. It is not a path one treads with half-hearted resolve."
She chuckled, looking down at me as though the very idea were laughable. Did I truly dare to join the ranks of the wicked and cruel demons? Did I even understand what that meant?
"Even so, demons are just a subspecies of humans, aren't they?"
"... Hmm. Unexpected. How did you come by that knowledge?"
"I'm a hero. Do I need a better reason?"
"..."
I answered simply. Joining the demons was no great ordeal.
"Just humans with horns, stronger mana, and longer lifespans. That's all a demon is."
I placed no special weight on the word, nor did I need to. Whatever demons meant in other games, in the one I now inhabited they carried almost no deeper significance.
"I already know that long ago they were simply humans cast out by ordinary people."
Demons were humans who happened to grow horns, live longer, and wield stronger mana. Beyond those traits the differences were nearly nonexistent.
"And that small difference was enough to start a war."
The rest of humanity could not accept even that much. War followed. Rejecting anyone who differs even slightly from the group is hardly unique to this world; reality works the same way.
If anything, the demons are the kinder side.
From the objective eyes of a third party, the war between demons and humans looked like nothing more than a human civil war. The protagonist being an Imperial hero forced a biased lens onto the story, yet far more often the demon side appeared cleaner and more decent than the rotten, corrupt Empire.
"Truly, unexpected things keep occurring."
The Demon King wore a look of mild surprise. The information I had just spoken was known only among demons; the Empire had long ago distorted and erased every trace of it. It was knowledge that only appeared once you reached the Demon King's Castle in the final chapter, so her reaction was only natural.
"Indeed. As you say, we demons were once a subspecies of humans rejected by humanity in the distant past."
She readily admitted that nothing I had said was wrong. Then, as though amused, she slipped a hand into her bodice and drew something out.
"Therefore the method you seek—to change from human into demon—exists. With it, your lifespan will certainly be extended. Without doubt, it can save the you who stands here now."
What rested in her palm was the Demon Elixir.
That single vial was the path to becoming a demon.
"We shall give it to you."
She tossed the elixir toward me. I caught it cleanly.
It's still a little warm.
Well, she had been keeping it against her chest. Of course it retained her heat.
While I examined the still-warm vial, she smirked.
"Drink it."
She urged me on with a faint smile.
"However, once you drink, you must prove yourself."
"Prove?"
Nothing came free, of course. The Demon King laid out the condition attached to the elixir.
"Soon we shall clash with the Empire once more."
A war around this time? I remembered one erupting just as the final chapter began. That had to be the conflict she meant.
"At that time, you will prove yourself—against none other than your former comrades."
She intended to hand me the hero party in the middle of a large-scale war.
"Should you show even the slightest mercy... the elixir will reject you. If you accept those terms, then drink."
She was staking the elixir's special property on my resolve.
Did the elixir even have a function like that?
I had no idea. I only knew the Demon Elixir existed; even after clearing every route I had never learned the finer details.
But what did any of that matter?
Gulp. Gulp.
The instant her words ended, I drained the entire vial.
"The second I get the chance, I'll tear them apart and kill them."
I turned the empty bottle upside down and shook it so she could see nothing remained, then made the promise absolute.
I didn't need the warning. I wasn't the original Ronan, and I felt not a shred of lingering attachment toward the party members who had betrayed me.
"Fufu."
At my firm answer the Demon King let out a soft laugh.
"Excellent. You are now a proper member of the demons."
An aura identical to hers began to stir inside my body. For a moment I wondered whether horns would sprout from my skull, but no external change appeared. Internally, however, the transformation was complete—I had become a demon without question.
"Then We shall bestow the first mission upon the newest of the Four Heavenly Kings—Ronan."
Starting at the rank of Four Heavenly King even though I was still a hero? The Demon King looked at me, now occupying one of the vacant seats, and issued her command.
"In the coming war, eliminate the hero party."
In other words: show results.