Chapter 117
Chapter 117
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 117
Chapter Title: The Saint's Inner Thoughts
-----------------------------------------------------------------
How on earth am I supposed to explain this situation?
Victoria, who had lost her memories, was showing jealousy while looking at the illusion her past self had left behind.
"......"
Victoria sat perched on the edge of the bed in silence, as if demanding an explanation.
Having watched her from closer than anyone else, I could tell she was furious to the tips of her hair right now.
The way she kept fidgeting her toes and maintained her arms crossed without letting go was a familiar habit of hers.
[Lord Astal is quite passive when it comes to love, so even if I lost my memory, he'd probably say we weren't lovers.]
I broke out in a cold sweat while watching the illusion of Victoria within the recorded message. I had acted exactly opposite to her expectations.
I had used kiss marks and rings as evidence to reveal to the memory-lost Victoria that we were lovers, and I had almost crossed the line from comrade to something more, to a degree not much different from before.
p>[So, I'm leaving proof like this that you and I were lovers. Painful memories can be overwritten with good ones, after all.]
"Ha, is that really me before I lost my memory? She's so vain and arrogant it's hard to even call her a Saint."
Victoria frowned and glared at the illusion before her. I couldn't tell her the truth—that she was the one who had become the most vulgar and frivolous person on our journey to defeat the Demon King.
"...I was an idiot who rejected your confession once. I never wanted to experience seeing someone I know die in front of me ever again."
I brought up my own past mistake, trying to clear up Victoria's misunderstanding. Rejecting her confession was still one of my biggest regrets in life.
"What's the problem with that? We were heroes gathered to kill the Demon King in the first place. Prioritizing the greater good over personal feelings is only natural."
But the memory-lost Victoria spoke as if it were no big deal.
Thinking about it, it was obvious.
No matter how much I talked about the memories I shared with Victoria, they wouldn't resonate with her now.
"...I'm sorry. That was thoughtless of me. I must have been someone precious enough for you to risk your life for."
Victoria seemed to realize she had misspoken, covering her mouth with her hand as she apologized to me.
It's not you who should apologize, but me, who failed to protect you.
A thought crossed my mind—if it were me, not Victoria, who had lost my memories, the situation might have been better. My hand trembled slightly at the idea.
"No. It's my fault for failing to protect you in the first place."
"Don't blame yourself too much. It's not your fault, is it?"
"......"
Her words were similar to, yet different from, the ones that made me fall for her.
The image of Victoria before she lost her memories kept overlapping, and I felt like I'd be crushed by guilt.
p>[Anyway, the Lord Astal I know was a very lecherous and perverted man. He turned me, who only knew the doctrines given by the Heavenly God Lumina, into a full-fledged woman...♡]
Then, the Victoria in the recorded message began saying things even I found shocking.
She even used her fingers to lewdly spread the heart-shaped hole in her lower chest, playfully sticking out her tongue in a way that felt strangely erotic.
"Huh, is that true? Just now, you didn't resist at all even when I tried to push you down..."
- Something's off... Would I really say something so frivolous and vulgar?
The memory-lost Victoria tilted her head, looking at her past self.
"Astal, were we originally the type to mix bodies often? Is it true that I was so consumed by lust that I forgot prayers and doctrines?"
Victoria moved closer to me, firing off questions as if denying the possibility.
"I can't say..."
I held back my answer, looking at her. If I explained everything we'd done, she'd probably want to cut off my lower half right then and there.
p>[He even disparaged me, saying I had a more obscene body than the Succubus Queen, and I had no choice but to submit to those rough, savage hands and his masculine weapon...]
What on earth was Victoria thinking, recording such obscene nonsense in her message before losing her memory?
I was too embarrassed to look Victoria in the face properly, constantly averting my gaze.
"Is everything that illusion is saying true? I only thought you were an honest and kind person..."
"Back then, it was to remove the flower blooming on your body. I had no choice."
"That's hard to believe. What kind of insane god fixes a terminal life through quasi-sexual acts?"
The Heavenly God Lumina, the one you believe in.
I swallowed the words that rose to my throat, unable to spit them out.
After all, she was the one who made me hear Victoria's inner thoughts, as if cheering on our relationship.
"...Don't tell me you were slowly conditioning me from the start to make me submit to sexual desires?"
- No matter how I think about it, that's the only possibility. Even if I read promiscuous books in the Holy Kingdom of Aurelium to relieve stress, there's no way I'd do that with a real person...!!
The memory-lost Victoria, looking at the illusion before her, was convinced she could never have spoken or acted like that.
After all, the Victoria of the past was a person praised as the most devout and pure Saint.
In a way, it was only natural for her to misunderstand like this.
"Well, you are a mage so powerful you were nominated to be the next Blue Tower Master, so one woman with a terminal illness would be easy to..."
I couldn't bear it, even if it was Victoria, insulting the Blue Magic Tower—the only place that took me in after I lost my family and became an orphan.
"No, before you lost your memory, you were the one who seduced me first, Victoria...!!"
I finally blurted out the truth to the memory-lost Victoria. Even for lovers, there are lines that shouldn't be crossed.
"There's no way I would do that! I was diligent enough to never miss a single prayer a day, and so pure I'd never even held a man's hand..."
Victoria raised her voice, sounding wronged. After all, the two people who changed the most in our party were probably her and me.
"Pure? Did you just say pure? With all the strange knowledge you picked up from whatever you were reading, you kept calling me a 'sympathy mage' and a 'pervert who's always having dirty thoughts'...!!"
"Th-that couldn't be helped! I learned about the concept of love from promiscuous books!"
Victoria's cheeks flushed bright red as she confessed this slightly shocking information.
As a devout Saint who knew nothing of love, she had accepted distorted information as truth.
"I'm sorry for insulting or disparaging you. But that's in the past, isn't it...! I don't even remember it!"
Victoria lost the composure she had maintained until now, speaking hastily.
Ironically, I could see glimpses of Victoria before she lost her memories in that.
Unexpectedly, Victoria was quite shy and had a stubborn side where she wouldn't back down from an argument with me.
p>[Well, having said this much, you probably get the idea now? Even if one of us lost our memory, we were close enough to play pranks like this without hesitation.]
At that moment, the Victoria in the recorded message clapped her hands softly, wearing a mischievous smile more playful than anyone's.
It had been a while since I'd seen this kind of prank. Before Victoria became aware of her own feelings, she always teased me, showing her mischievous side.
"Don't tell me... you predicted I'd react like this from the very beginning..."
Victoria gasped, looking at her own illusion.
p>[Before I met Lord Astal, I was a person so cynical about life that I wouldn't bleed even if stabbed...]
As if seeing us, the Victoria in the recorded message nodded.
p>[And before he met me, Lord Astal was a person who couldn't quit drinking and smoking, burdened by the guilt that his hometown people and parents died because of him.]
"Victoria..."
I began to understand what Victoria was feeling as she layered this recorded message.
She must have been afraid that if she lost her memories, she might never return to our past relationship.
She hid her emotions behind an awkward smile and concealed her trembling hands behind her back, but I could see through it all.
p>[So, no matter which of us loses our memory, I want to ask you to make the other fall in love again.]
p>[Because that's the love I believe in. No matter what hardships or trials come, I believe you and I will overcome them together.]
The Victoria in the recorded message had been preparing for the worst-case scenario with the saddest of hearts.
p>[So please, don't forget me. Make me fall in love again.]
"......"
"......"
Hearing Victoria's resolve, the two of us remained silent for a while, just looking at each other.
And that's when it happened.
"Victoria, Astal...!! It's an emergency! Come outside, quick...!!"
Kyle and the other comrades burst into the room of the inn, telling us something so strange we couldn't believe our ears.
"There's another Victoria...!"
They were saying another one had appeared, even though the memory-lost Victoria was right here.