Horror Game (1)

I was bound to a chair, body and all. The Demon King was no different.

"Stop it! You bastards!"

Swearing the Demon King wasn't supposed to hear—but this wasn't the time to worry about that.

"Uuuugh... stop..."

"Don't play the victim. You're a demon."

My former party members—Dorothy, Rebecca, Nine, and Yuria—had her tied up and were tormenting her.

"Open your mouth, Miss Demon King."

Dorothy scooped up a spoonful of stewed carrots and tried to feed it to her.

"Mmph, mmph."

A look of agony on her face, the Demon King clenched her mouth shut. She shook her head from side to side, dodging the spoon being shoved at her.

"Just stop already—"

A sickening crack.

"Ugh!"

Nine smashed the back of my head with a giant Ssang Ssang Bar. The popsicle snapped with a crisp crunch. A dark-red liquid—blood mixed with chocolate—trickled down my neck from the split in my skull. Dorothy watched it with a look of satisfaction and opened her mouth.

"Dongha. Please be quiet. Eating a balanced diet is good for your health, isn't it?"

"Fuck..... what would you know...? That's not something that happens just because someone force-feeds you. We even promised to eat one spoonful a week.... We're making progress...! I'm begging you! I'll eat it all myself, so just stop!"

Dorothy's amethyst eyes shifted their aim from the Demon King to me.

"...Haa... I suppose I have no choice."

The purple monster came toward me, still holding the bowl of stewed carrots she'd been stuffing into the Demon King's mouth.

Her heels clicked. A scrape of a spoon.

"Ah. Open wide."

"Kh... ah."

Dorothy scooped a generous spoonful and held it out. I chomped down on the stewed carrots without a moment's hesitation. This fucking—! Dorothy's cooking, all right! It tasted so goddamn awful I nearly spat it right back in ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠her face. This had to be what a rubber tire would taste like with sesame oil smeared on it.

I crushed it with my teeth alone, keeping it off my tongue as much as possible, and barely managed to swallow. If Dorothy had been a mess-hall cook during my military service, I would have deserted within a week.

"Th-that's it... cough. Let the Demon King go."

"Pardon? I never said I would let her go."

...!

"What? That's not how this works! You son of a—"

"Yuria? 'That,' if you would..."

Then the Divine Archer... no, the Moronic Archer Yuria pulled something from a box. Red. Thick.

!!??

"Kyaaaah!"

The Demon King's crimson eyes trembled violently at the sight. I thrashed so hard the chair rattled beneath me.

"You crazy bitch! That's crossing the line!"

Unmoved by my scream, Yuria carried it toward the Demon King. A raw carrot. There was even dirt on it, as if she'd just yanked it out of the field.

"Would this not be amusing? To watch how the Demon King's expression twists once this enters ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠her mouth..."

"Stop! At least boil it... dip it in ketchup or something!"

That was when the Demon King called out to me.

"H-hey."

Her already pale face had gone blue, yet she forced a smile. Her lips worked hurriedly, as if she had something she needed to say.

"I'm okay... thank you. For everything."

She looked as terrified as someone locked in a walk-in freezer with a growing elephant, and still, in the middle of all that, she thanked me.

...I have something to say too...

Maybe it was the chocolate and blood running down the back of my neck. Strangely, my mind was going dim.

A flash.

I jolted awake.

"Huff... huff..."

When I opened my eyes, the Demon King was sitting beside me, watching with an uneasy look.

"What's wrong...? You're covered in cold sweat..."

"...Haa. Haa."

I whipped around and felt the back of my skull where I'd been hit. It was fine. I scanned the room like a meerkat on sentry duty. Fortunately, the four lunatics were nowhere to be found.

Whew.

Then again, even if they had been here, what could they possibly do? The Demon King was sitting right there with her eyes wide open. I could still vividly picture that spectacular scene from when I first arrived at the Tower—those bitches' highest-tier skills getting utterly demolished right in front of my face.

"...Thank god."

"W-what's going on? You're not sick, are you?"

"No."

"Really? For real? You can't get sick. If you get sick, you're in trouble."

The Demon King looked at me the way you'd look at a puppy groaning and refusing to come out of its kennel. Well, if I weren't around, who would send her to Mars?

"...It's really not that. I just had a scary dream."

"...Pfft! What! You scared me!"

The Demon King, who had no idea what I'd just been through, flushed and started laughing, all playful.

"Kihihit! You're so cute! Sometimes you have this childish side. Hihihit."

Without any warning, she grabbed my cheeks and started squishing them. She slathers herself in so many buffs I can barely even touch her most of the time. Selfish little horn-head.

And who's calling who a child, when she sleeps hugging a dinosaur stuffed animal with a runny nose.

"Uhohoho. Cute. Cute."

"...Move."

"Oh my? Are you sulking?"

"I'm not sulking."

"You are sulking. You're sulking. How can my friend be this cute? I want to put you in my mouth and roll you around like a sugar cube."

The second you put me in your mouth I'd melt into sugar water.

...And don't lump me in with you—the one who sulks during Little Farm and tosses Potato Bombs at me from a distance.

I'd spent the whole night fighting to protect her from the Suicide Squad four. It was a dream, but the back of my head still stung from getting smashed with a Ssang Ssang Bar. There was even a faintly sweet smell.

"Uhoho. Come here. Coward. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠It's okay. It's okay. Let's hold hands real tight every night when we sleep? Hehe."

...Doesn't even know gratitude.

Next time I have that dream, I'm joining the party members and stuffing a raw carrot in her mouth.

Thunder rumbled. A crash. Rain roared down in sheets. She flinched.

A torrential downpour came with thunder and lightning. Of course, this place sat above the clouds, so the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠rain itself never reached us—but the clouds were so close that the thunder sounded far louder than it ever did on the ground.

Thunder rolled again. The Demon King, who had been stitching a teddy bear's neck, gave another little start.

It was complete nonsense that a girl who used Chain Lightning as easily as breathing would jump at a clap of thunder.

"...Are you scared?"

"S-scared? Am I a kid?"

Thunder crashed. She flinched.

You're scared. You really do seem like a kid.

"I'm done. How about you?"

"I'm done too."

"Then shall we go play Iron Fist?!"

"Sure. You want to use illusion magic, huh."

"W-what! I told you I don't use illusion magic anymore!"

"Yeah, yeah."

"What's with that face? Why are the corners of your mouth like that? You're suspecting me right now, aren't you? You think I'm some wicked Demon King who uses cowardly tricks even though she's terrible at games?"

She wasn't called an Akashic Master for nothing. Maybe she really could read other people's minds.

"No way. You're such a righteous demon."

If you're self-aware, try reforming a little. Irredeemable dirty gamer.

"Hehe. That's not true. I still have so much left to learn."

A hell of a lot, yeah.

Then the teddy bear's head, which she'd been about to drop into the sack, just... fell off.

It rolled. It rolled.

"...Huh?"

The rolling head bumped against my feet. I looked down, and my eyes met the teddy bear's.

A shiver ran through me.

I grabbed it.

"H-here it i—"

Huh?

...!

When I lifted the head, red liquid dripped from the severed cross-section.

What is this...

I dabbed the liquid with my finger and smelled it. A sour-sweet scent. I brought it to my mouth. Ketchup. It was ketchup.

...Why?

"Uh... I was sure I sewed it properly earlier... why did it fall off?"

She took the teddy bear's head and tilted hers.

"H-huh? Is this b-blood?!"

"...It's ketchup."

Once she realized the dripping stuff was ketchup, she flipped the doll's head over and started sucking it. Slurp, slurp.

"Let's go play Iron Fist now."

"Yeah. Slurp."

A nightmare, pouring rain, a teddy bear's head...

Something felt ominous.

"Huh?"

"What?"

"Ah, no, this is—"

She looked bewildered as she tried to press down eleven times, the way she always did, to select Iron Fist.

"I accidentally pressed down a few extra times, and when I tried to go back up... the directional pad isn't responding."

...!

This was bad. This game console was precious to her. If it was broken, we were fucked. Panicking that she'd mash the pad and break it further, I quickly took it from her.

"Hold on... like this..."

I slid the protruding buttons to the side and shook the pad upside down. Grains of sand that had been stuck inside fell out with a tiny tink. Fortunately, the game pad started working normally again.

"It's good now."

"Yeah, yeah. Thanks. You saved me."

"Here... huh? This is..."

A game I hadn't seen before.

When I'd shaken her game pad up and down, the down key must have been pressed, and the selection bar that had scrolled all the way down had stopped on a game with a black background.

A doll with messy blonde hair hanging loose, lipstick smeared thick around a huge mouth just like the Demon King's, wearing a twisted smile inside a glass case. No matter how you looked at it, it was a horror game.

I swallowed.

The cover is scary as hell...

I was a former army sergeant—the ghost-catching kind—a real man's man, but I was unusually vulnerable when it came to anything horror-related. I thought back to my time on Earth.

In elementary school, I'd happened to see a horror comic with a motorcycle ghost. After reading that it would take your neck if you didn't wear a scarf, I wore a scarf until summer.

At middle school training camp, I snitched to the instructor on every classmate whispering scary stories under their blankets. I can still hear the screams of those guys doing punishment drills arm-in-arm in the middle of the night.

In the military, I volunteered as a cook because I was scared of standing night watch at the guard post.

It wasn't that I was especially cowardly. We just had different tastes.

Anyway, I was about to quickly move the cursor up, because that cover was too horrific to even look at—when I noticed the Demon King trembling three hundred times harder than I was.

I swallowed again.

"Uuh, th... this game!?"

She swallowed dryly and showed a rare, thoroughly cowardly reaction. I knew because I was a coward too. This girl was the real deal.

"...What's wrong with you? Is this scary?"

When I asked, keeping my own trembling voice in check, she denied it in a shrinking voice.

"...Not at all? No?"

...That was the reaction of someone whose weak point had just been hit.

Right. Would the king of demons guarding the 100th floor of the Tower be scared of something like this? Last time she'd even pulled out something like a devil's hand.

A beep. I moved the cursor up one slot, and the Demon King's trembling body immediately relaxed, as if a switch had been flipped.

...Hold on.

Another beep. I pressed the down key again.

She flinched. Flinched. Flinched.

...The trembling started right back up.

She's terrified.

What was this feeling?

Honestly, I could barely even glance at the Annabelle cover on the monitor myself, but meeting a coward on my own level for the first time, a strange stubbornness welled up, and I didn't want to back down.

The Demon King was twitching all over, as if she were getting a flood of text messages.

"F-first press the up key. Something else... something else..."

"...I don't know what you mean. Say it so I can understand."

"...W-we were going to play Iron Fist, so... uh, anyway, hurry... let's switch to a different game. Okay? Okay?"

"I can just move the cursor slowly. Is there some special reason I need to move it fast?"

Honestly, I couldn't make eye contact with the Annabelle doll on the monitor cover either, so I knew the reason, but.

"Hey, this is going to end badly... and a little kid like you who was shaking from a scary dream will die of a heart attack if you play this game. You'll definitely regret it."

...She's pinning it on me to the very end.

She was honest, but there were things she tried to hide sometimes. Like how she hated carrots... or like now.

...What was I doing. Getting shaken by this cheap provocation. How childish.

Didn't I consider her a precious friend, including all these sides of her?

When generous me took a step back. When I yielded the "brave friend" title she wanted.

"Yeah. Haha... I can't play this game because it's too sca—"

"...U-uhoho! Coward. I-I'm fine, but if that's how you feel, well, okay. Hehe, let's hurry up and play Iron Fist! You super-shivering scaredy-cat!"

It's on, Demon King.

I pressed the start button.

Ominous background music and the sound of rotting wood splitting open began to fill the dark room.