Fief Tax (7)
“Keeheehee! Something about you smells familiar. Who the hell are you, really?”
The count’s daughter sneered up at me with eyes of bottomless black. No—she could no longer be called a daughter at all. She was nothing more than a demon parasitizing a human body.
“Li—Lilia! Do you recognize me?! It’s me! Your father!”
Count Richmond, it seemed, could not see her that way. Still sprawled in shock, he crawled across the floor toward the bed. His wretched figure stood in stark contrast to the others watching from behind with blank, expressionless faces.
“Of course I do. Keehee! How could I forget my contractor’s face? We’ve spent years together!”
“Oh… ohhh. My beloved daughter Lilia! This father of yours always believed you would rise again!”
“That’s right! I promised you, didn’t I? Your daughter would wake up—just like this!”
The demon kept its gaze locked on me, snickering with amusement as it flicked its tongue.
“Tsk. What a filthy hobby.”
I shook off the hand clamped around my arm and clicked my tongue. At the same time, that stick-thin hand—little more than a withered branch—was flung back onto the bed with a sickening crack. After so long lying still, the bones had simply given way.
“You’re one to talk! Hee!”
Any normal person would have screamed and thrashed in agony. The demon only shook its shoulders harder, letting out that grotesque laugh.
So the young lady died a long time ago.
I wasn’t sure whether to call it fortunate, but the vessel of her body seemed to be holding the demon back. That was why it could only thrash its arms while stuck in the bed.
“Lilia! Lilia!! Look at your father! Quickly!”
“Shut up!! Bite your tongue and die already before I make you!”
“…..!!”
“You’re going to make my ears explode! Keep squawking like that and I’ll rip this girl’s eardrums out!”
The count’s endless wailing finally irritated the demon. Only then did Richmond seem to realize something was terribly wrong. He shook his head violently, eyes wide, as if denying reality itself.
“No. It can’t be. That’s impossible! This isn’t what we agreed!”
But what good was regret now?
“Demons exploit human desperation,” I said coldly, looking down at the count. “They deceive people with cheap wordplay and plant false hope with clumsy sleight of hand.”
“Why? I never lied. I just did exactly what that idiot asked me to do! Heehee!”
“You’ve got quite the mouth on you.”
“What did I do?! And who are you to lecture me? You’re the same as me, aren’t you? Kit! Come on, tell me. Who are you?! Wrath? Sloth? Hmm. No—with that pretty face, maybe Lust?”
Whether or not it knew what was about to happen to it, the demon kept wagging that pale tongue without rest. What an attention-starved little bastard.
I didn’t even bother acknowledging it. I just sighed.
“A word of advice. If you want to make a smart contract with a demon, you shouldn’t want anything. The demon should be the one who wants something from you.”
“Kheeheehee! You’re insane! What kind of idiot would contract with a demon when they don’t want anything?!”
“Not that this advice means anything now.”
“Hello?! Can you hear me?! Keeheeheehee!”
“You must have been desperate, though. Contracting with a demon this ill-mannered. Even so, there are lines you don’t cross.”
I stared blankly at the ceiling for a moment, then turned back to the demon with a thin, crooked smile.
“I’m busy, but I’ve got more than enough time for a lesson in manners.”
“Eh…?!”
“Clench your teeth.”
Without a second’s hesitation, I drove my fist straight into the young lady’s skeletal face.
—Thwack!!
“Gyaaak!!”
A beautifully proper, cheerful scream burst out. If I’d hit it with an ordinary fist, the thing wouldn’t have felt a thing. But I knew that perfectly well—so I borrowed the power of Greed and beat it without mercy, making sure it felt every blow.
“Ghk! Ngh! Yahk! Ugh! S-stop…!”
“Did you think I wouldn’t hit you just because you’re wearing a sick girl’s skin?”
“Gaahek!”
“A parasite like you, putting on airs?”
The sensation of facial bones shattering traveled cleanly up through my fingertips. I felt not a shred of guilt. The young lady was already dead. This demon was merely parasitizing her body, forcing her heart to keep beating.
Even the Saintess wouldn’t have known.
If it hadn’t revealed itself, I never would have known either. Demons were masters at concealing themselves—even from their own kind. It had probably sensed a faint trace of kinship and couldn’t restrain its curiosity. That was its mistake.
“Guhhh…”
At the sight of the thing beaten into an unrecognizable pulp of blood, the count wept without end. Perhaps he had known the truth for a very long time. His desperate wish to save his daughter had simply blinded him to any clear thought.
“What is your name?”
I seized the demon by the collar so the count would finally face the truth he had worked so hard to ignore.
“P-please don’t! F-Father, s-save me… ghk!!”
When the thing still tried to play games, I swung my fist again.
“I’ll ask one last time. What is your name?”
“I-I am E-Envy. S-so please, stop now…”
“Envy, is it. I see. You envied people’s joys and sorrows, their laughter and tears? So you took the emotions of the fief’s people as your price?”
“Grrrk!”
When it answered only by twisting its face, I flicked my fingers and lit the candle on the bedside table. Then I walked over to the count, who still clutched his face in both hands, and held it out to him.
“This is your last chance at forgiveness.”
“I…”
“Do you want everyone to burn together? Or will you save whoever can still be saved? The choice is yours.”
“......”
With that, I left the young lady’s chambers. It was the greatest mercy I could offer.
—Whoosh!
“F-forgive your father! Aaaagh!”
“Kyaaaaah!!”
The count’s howl and a scream that threatened to split the eardrums rang through the lord’s castle. Thick smoke and flames surged up from the young lady’s room.
“Fire!! Run!”
“W-what have I done…!”
The moment the demon—the source of it all—burned to death, the emotions of the fief’s people came flooding back. Even those inside the castle milled about in confusion, not knowing what to do. Hands clasped behind my back, I strolled unhurriedly through their midst and walked out with my head held high.
“I—I surrender!”
“Open the gates at once!!”
“Damn it! The village is on fire!”
The soldiers and knights atop the palisade were in just as much chaos. And so were the fanatics who had been cheerfully setting fires of their own.
“O God! How could this be!”
“S-stop! Halt the Purification Work!”
“A miracle! A miracle has occurred!”
Miracle, my ass. I’d never heard such complete nonsense in my life.
Good. Everything’s perfect.
Mercifully, the bloodbath I’d feared most never happened. I’d have to check the fief itself later, but at least Elena’s musketeers and staff, along with Richmond’s guards and knights on the palisade, were unharmed. The count had left his post the moment he heard I’d entered the young lady’s chambers—that was probably why.
I climbed onto the palisade and waved at Elena, who was staring blankly up at me. A smile flickered across her lips for only a moment before she started thrashing about and shouting something. Judging by the shape of her mouth, it wasn’t anything pleasant.
The castle is intact. Things didn’t go exactly according to plan, but infiltrating was still a stroke of genius.
I hoped I hadn’t put Rhea through hell for nothing. Then again, if those fanatics had simply pushed straight through, or if Envy had never revealed itself, who knows how it would have gone.
I’ll make sure she gets a fat bonus the moment we’re back.
I waited for Rhea with a smile. More precisely, I waited for the good news she would bring. If the words “Huh? Tax Collector, sir, th-there’s no problem at all?!” came out of her mouth, I was fully prepared to throw off my uniform right then and there and dance.
“T-Tax Collector!! Tax Collectooor!!”
Before long, Rhea came barreling out with a sack nearly as tall as she was slung over her shoulder.
“Senior Secretariat Rhea, you’ve done excellent work. You’re medal material.”
I greeted her with a bright smile and a nod. It didn’t take long to realize I’d been counting my chickens before they hatched.
“It’s huge! Huge! Your instincts were right after all, Tax Collector! Count Richmond made the weights heavier than the standard!”
Beaming, Rhea pulled an enormous weight from the sack and held it up for me to see.
Ah… should I just burn the whole sack, weights and all?
Too many eyes watching for that.