The Extinguished Flame
That question seemed to freeze my mind. What had I done? What had I done wrong? Why did those eyes hold such deep sadness and pain?
“What……?”
I barely managed to open my mouth, but at that moment her flames darkened and began to rage even more violently. A short while later, the flames seemed to weaken slightly, and then she spoke.
“…The flame.”
I didn’t understand what she meant. But I couldn’t ask again right away. Though the flames had returned to red, I stood there frozen in that ridiculous posture. A moment later, as if noticing my state, she spoke again.
“Your flame went out!”
“……!”
Only then did I understand the situation. The Life Candle. The third-rate spell I had left behind this morning had vanished. The connection must have been severed because of the mana disruption spell or the Key of Tantalus.
“You said the mana wouldn’t run out in just a day or two! But it went out! Do you know how much I……!”
She couldn’t finish her sentence. She simply lowered her head and sobbed, her flames gradually losing their intensity until they flickered weakly like a dying campfire.
“I-I’m sorry, Miss Rofena.”
I wanted to comfort her, but I didn’t know what to say.
Suddenly, she lifted her head. Her flames turned black and thrashed as if they would swallow the entire barrier.
“Don’t tell me this was another one of your tasteless jokes? If it was, I swear on my name that I’ll……!”
The killing intent was far greater than anything I had felt even when we were enemies. Honestly, during the last war, the fear I felt toward her among the Demon King’s commanders had been relatively mild. Now, the terror itself was greater than when I had faced the Demon King.
“Th-that’s impossible! It isn’t. No matter how lacking I am in humor, I would never pull such an absurd prank!”
At my desperate explanation, her flames shrank once more.
“…….”
Silence fell between us. The killing intent and anger had vanished from her. She simply sat there with her head lowered.
Watching her, I felt strangely distant from myself for thinking that her earlier anger-filled appearance had been preferable.
“…What exactly happened?”
She still kept her head down. When she raised one hand to her face, it was clear she was wiping away tears.
Come to think of it, this was the first time I had seen her tears. I hadn’t even known a demon like her could cry, let alone that she would cry because of me.
And I felt ashamed of the faint joy stirring inside me at the sight.
“I was ambushed. The information I had was false.”
“…Why did the flame go out?”
“It seems the connection was cut because of the mana disruption spell or the Key of Tantalus. I swear I never thought the flame would actually go out.”
“…You weren’t hurt?”
Seeing her raise her head to examine me, I truly wanted to break the barrier. I wanted to hold her in my arms and soothe her. It wouldn’t be easy since she was taller than me, and I might turn to ash in those flames, but I genuinely wanted to.
But I couldn’t. I never would.
Because I was never righteous. Because I was twisted. And perhaps, as Orcan said, because I was a coward.
“…As you can see, I’m perfectly fine.”
The flames around her body disappeared. A moment later, she took a deep breath and slowly stood up.
“Then you took care of all of them?”
I took back what I said earlier about preferring her anger-filled appearance. Unlike before, she wasn’t emitting flames and her emotions weren’t showing much, yet the way she asked felt almost chilling.
“Of course. It was a bit troublesome, but I managed.”
I smiled as reassuringly as possible and spoke as naturally as I could. I was certain that not even Rofena, let alone Rowell, would notice this lie.
But contrary to my hope, her expression only hardened further.
“Anak.”
It was the first time she had called me by name. It felt strangely peculiar. Like a spell that bound me while also gently embracing me.
“But why does your face look like that?”
“My face?”
I reflexively raised a hand to touch my face, but the equipped barrier was active. There was no way I had been injured.
“At least don’t try to hide or lie to me right now. You don’t look fine at all.”
Her expression and voice were firm. Even if she had said nothing, nothing would have changed. It was impossible to keep lying while facing those eyes.
“…I didn’t finish them all. I let the most important one get away.”
“What kind of guy?”
Her intensity made it seem like she would chase after him immediately, and for a moment I was at a loss for words.
“Well. He’s definitely not someone I’d like to get close to.”
The madness visible in those eyes promised nothing good.
“Why is he targeting you in the first place?”
I considered telling her about Hyler, but there was no need. As a former Flame Demon Commander, she wouldn’t care about such matters, and I didn’t particularly want to talk about it anyway.
“I’m not sure exactly, but it probably doesn’t matter.”
It wasn’t a lie. I couldn’t even begin to guess the red-haired man’s purpose.
“He’ll be dealt with tomorrow anyway.”
“You can track him?”
I hesitated. There would be another trap, likely far more dangerous than today’s, and saying I planned to walk right into it wasn’t a good idea, at least not to her right now.
“…Yes.”
But I couldn’t lie either.
“Normally I couldn’t, but they probably left traces hoping I would follow.”
“Another trap?”
“Well, probably……”
“No.”
Before I could finish, she spoke.
“Let’s just go back. You can leave the cleanup to the Hero or that shadow guy. Or bring that old man along.”
She spoke calmly, but the end of her voice trembled ever so slightly. For her, this was almost a plea.
“You don’t need to worry. Today was just a sudden ambush that caught me off guard, and the flame going out wasn’t dangerous so much as it was simply……”
“No.”
“No, I’m perfectly fine like this……”
“No.”
“But……”
“I said no!”
With that shout, dark red flames engulfed the barrier once more.
“Do you know how I felt when that flame went out? Do you know what was going through my mind!”
Along with the black flames, red lightning struck the barrier walls again. But unlike before, there was no threatening feeling. It was instead a terribly sorrowful and fragile sight.
Look at her now. As the Flame Demon Commander, she had stood just below the Demon King’s army’s peak. She feared nothing, and the thought of her begging someone was unimaginable.
Yet now? Trapped in a barrier, pleading like a child. Not to anyone else, but to me, and not for any other reason than my safety.
“…….”
One corner of my chest ached terribly. It felt as if I would drown in a sea of guilt.
This had nothing to do with my hopes or her true feelings.
It was simply because she had been trapped in this barrier for too long. For the past few years, the only person she had met was me, and it would remain that way.
This was an illusion.
Love inside a cage was nothing but a fantasy.
If you put a pair of birds in a small cage, they will undoubtedly see each other as mates. But what happens when that cage disappears one day? What if the door opens? Will the birds still see each other as mates?
No, they won’t.
This was merely a limited emotion created by circumstance.
And as I said, making her fall into such an illusion was far crueler and sadder than keeping her imprisoned forever.
Just because she was a demon, just because we had to keep her locked away for the safety of others and myself, did not mean I could toy with her feelings.
“…You don’t need to worry.”
I turned away from her and walked toward the beast-shaped ornament that served as the medium maintaining the barrier.
Following my gesture, runes appeared in the air, and soon the spirits manifested. But what I intended was no ordinary summoning.
Above the floating spirits, symbols representing contracts and symbols representing life appeared once more, and atop them formed a seal symbolizing time.
-……!
The spirits resisted with pained expressions for a moment before settling into the beast ornament.
This was a spell that used spirits as a medium. Treating spirits as mere components of the spell and forcibly binding their existence to it was a method they disliked, but it couldn’t be helped. A simple summoning spell wasn’t enough to keep controlling the spirits regardless of time or distance.
If I were a slightly more skilled mage, or if I had been a little calmer with some time to spare, I would have adjusted the spell on the ornament itself rather than using this roundabout method, but that was a meaningless assumption.
“…What did you do?”
“I gave the spirits an order. If I die, they are to immediately destroy the medium maintaining the barrier.”
“What?”
The red lightning striking the walls suddenly intensified.
“Don’t tell me you……!”
I quickly raised a hand to calm her.
“Please calm down. You know me well enough.”
It wasn’t a lie. Yes, it was absolutely not a lie.
I slowly walked toward her. I knew how cowardly this was, but the only thing I could do, the only thing I was capable of doing, was this much.
I reached out and placed my hand on the barrier wall. Then I looked straight into her eyes.
“This is a promise. Please believe me. There’s nothing to worry about. I will never die.”
I had wanted to sound more convincing, but the slight tremor at the end of my voice was frustrating.
“…Really?”
Fortunately, she gradually calmed down at my inadequate words.
“Of course. You’ve said it yourself, Miss Rofena. Even the Demon King Thanatos and his commanders couldn’t kill me, so who on earth could?”
Her eyes gradually softened, and I saw the lightning and flames disappear. I had worried she might show a hint of disappointment or awkwardness in her eyes, but she looked so relieved by my words that I felt ashamed of myself for even thinking that.
“Besides, you didn’t get to see the final battle, but I survived taking the Demon King Thanatos’s strike head-on.”
Though all ten layers of my equipped barrier had been blown away at once and I hadn’t been able to do much afterward.
“Honestly, even the Demon King looked a bit surprised.”
“Right. You’re capable of that.”
A smile returned to her face, and following it, a smile appeared on my lips as well. Not an intentional or forced smile, but a genuinely pure one.
“You don’t need to worry. In just one day, everything will be cleanly resolved.”
“You’re sure?”
“Of course.”
Thus, she and I looked at each other for a while. I truly wished the emotions flickering in those eyes were entirely my own, but that was a hope beyond my station.
“…Then I’ll get some rest. Honestly, I’m a bit tired today.”
I needed to prepare the equipped barrier, but my mind no longer had the capacity. Today had brought too many sudden shocks in too many ways. Of course, the greatest of them was standing right before me now.
I prepared my bed and collapsed onto it as if falling. Her gaze, still fixed on me and refusing to leave, was burdensome in many ways, but I had to endure at least that much.