The Demon King Originally Had Two Horns (Or Not)
Rin closed his eyes late at night and slept straight through until the following evening.
It was a testament to just how much he had suffered lately.
Fortunately, one of his few saving graces was his sturdy constitution; a single deep sleep was all it took to wash away his exhaustion.
Lucy, on the other hand, woke up around noon and spent the rest of the day in an anxious frenzy, worrying over his deathly still, unmoving form.
Had his soft breaths not been tickling her hair, she would have thrown a complete fit.
Lucy quietly watched his sleeping face, careful not to wake him.
His cheeks, once plump before the subjugation of the Demon King, had now sunken so much that his cheekbones stood out.
Feeling a pang of pity—yet secretly thinking his leaned-out features looked better than before—Lucy kept her eyes glued to him.
The more she looked, the handsomer he seemed.
Completely blinded by love, Lucy found herself utterly lost in his face.
She buried her nose in his chest to inhale his scent, rubbed her cheek against him, and freely indulged in all the physical affection she couldn't show while he was awake.
Eventually, her gaze drifted down to his sleeping lips.
They were dark, dry, and rough—the typical lips of a working man.
They were nothing like Linefold's, which had always been a soft, pristine pink.
Yet, Lucy preferred this.
Those rough lips had never lied to her.
They only ever spoke to worry about her or to put her mind at ease.
They were so different from her own cruel lips, which had once mocked and belittled him.
As negative thoughts crept in, Lucy squeezed her eyes shut.
Everything was perfect, but she desperately, fiercely craved to hear those lips say I love you or I like you.
But she knew that, given her past misdeeds, it wouldn't be easy.
Even so, she had absolutely no intention of giving up.
Lucy could no longer live without Rin.
Even when her limbs healed, she would never let him go.
He was hers.
Her only ally, her greatest companion, her Rin.
One day, she would make those lips utter the words my Lucy.
Can I really do it?
Another wave of doubt and anxiety.
Lucy stopped staring at his lips and listened instead.
Sleeping Rin's heartbeat was slightly slower than usual.
She could no longer fall asleep without this sound.
Wondering if her mind had fully recovered, Lucy had once tried to sleep while Rin was away.
"Aaaah!"
The result was predictable.
The nightmares had pounced on her instantly, as if asking where she had been all this time.
Terrified, Lucy had wept hysterically in Rin's arms after he rushed in at the sound of her scream.
And she had made a vow.
She would never, ever leave Rin's side again.
At the same time, she stopped trying to cure her trauma.
There was no need. As long as she had Rin, nothing else mattered.
Yes, only Rin.
She didn't need anything else.
The Hero's party could go rot for all she cared.
Rin kept hinting that a new threat to the world would emerge, but Lucy didn't care.
Whether the world ended or not, she only needed Rin.
Ah, but there was one thing she absolutely had to do once her body recovered.
Revenge on Linefold.
It wasn't just payback for his betrayal.
Because as long as that bastard was alive, Rin would never respond to her affection, no matter how much she begged.
Every time she spoke, Rin associated it with Linefold, leaving Lucy completely helpless.
Besides, Linefold was a dark stain on her past.
She had to kill him.
The past where she had loved Linefold would be severed along with his neck.
More than being played by a false love, she loathed herself for desiring Rin while carrying such a filthy past.
To think she had harbored feelings for such a man. Ah, her affection, which should have been pure white, was stained.
She couldn't offer something so tarnished to Rin.
She had to offer him a version of herself that was flawless.
Though she had already ruined it, she would wash it clean with her tears and Linefold's blood, and beg Rin for forgiveness.
Would Rin be happy when that day came?
Would he praise her, saying she was finally worthy of his affection?
Just imagining it brought a smile to her face.
Once my arms heal, I must learn to cook. That is a wife's duty.
Once my legs heal, I must always go out to greet him when he returns from work. That is proper etiquette for a husband.
In this way, listening to Rin's heartbeat allowed Lucy to acknowledge her current state while systematically laying out hopeful plans for the future.
To become a woman fit for him.
That was her life's goal and her sole joy.
No one would stop her.
Even if it were the Goddess herself, Lucy arrogantly believed there was nothing she couldn't achieve, having already conquered death alongside him.
Unable to break her old habits, she had once again harbored impure, insolent thoughts.
Without even pausing to consider what consequences they might bring.
Regardless, Lucy simply smiled, endlessly tracing every inch of the sleeping Rin with her eyes.
"Are you comfortable?"
"Yes, very."
This time, Lucy had secured the carrier wrap so that she faced forward, looking in the same direction as Rin.
Lucy, who usually insisted on being held tightly against his chest, had requested a different position today.
"I've had enough of being held for now. I need to clear my head too."
"Ah, sorry."
Thinking she was subtly reprimanding him for oversleeping, Rin apologized, but Lucy quickly shook her head.
"That's not what I meant! I loved being in your arms all day. I want to do it more, but if I do, I feel like my body won't be able to take it..."
"Your body won't be able to take it?"
Rin mentally conjured several question marks, but Lucy didn't elaborate.
The urge to press her tongue against his lips, and the desire to slide down against his firm thighs and press herself between his legs, were things she could absolutely never say out loud.
"Lucy, I'm ready."
"Are we going out right away?"
"Yeah, we need to buy winter gear. At this rate, we'll freeze to death searching the mountains. It's going to be cold out there, so brace yourself."
"I won't be cold at all since I'm stuck to you."
"Right."
With each passing day, Lucy's obsession and dependency grew worse.
Rin had also noticed the sticky, intense gaze she sometimes directed at him.
He tolerated it, reasoning that she couldn't help it in her crippled state, but the excessive attention was suffocating.
He merely clung to the groundless optimism that things would change once she recovered.
Still, he had to say what needed to be said.
"Lucy."
"Yes?"
"There are demons in this city."
"...That's impossible. The Demon King is dead. We subjugated him with our own hands."
Lucy's denial was only natural.
The Demon King was the pinnacle of the demon race, but he was also the source of demonic energy itself.
The destruction of the Demon King meant the eradication of demonic energy, and without that energy, the demons should have vanished as well.
"Do you remember when I said the world would soon need you again?"
"No way..."
"I don't know why, but I'm certain."
"How do you know that, Rin? How could you possibly know that demons still remain even after the Demon King's death, let alone that they are in this city?"
Because I'm the only player who cleared Arrogant Saga in my past life.
And in games, events always trigger wherever you go.
He wanted to lay it all out, but doing so would ruin everything.
There was no reason to take a pointless gamble when he couldn't predict how she would react.
"The Goddess told me. She said the Demon King originally had two horns."
"The Goddess? When? Was it back then?"
"Yes. The day we met the Goddess for the first and last time. The day I received the Luggage Carrier's Bag."
In the original game, right after the Hero's party encountered demons for the first time and struggled, the Goddess appeared before them to reveal the existence of exclusive items.
It had played out the exact same way in reality, and Rin had been granted his exclusive item, the Luggage Carrier's Bag, during that very encounter.
Since this world was based on a game, Rin guessed that from a designer's or developer's perspective, it was probably too much of a hassle to create a dedicated map or acquisition questline for a mere luggage carrier.
Simply put, they met the Goddess, she explained the items, and she handed over the carrier-exclusive item on the spot as an example.
That was why half of the original game's story revolved around searching for the exclusive items of the other party members, excluding the luggage carrier.
"I am sorry, Rin. You are a carrier who must shoulder not just physical items, but mental burdens and the weight of the future as well."
It was an apology he had received alongside the Luggage Carrier's Bag when he was summoned alone to the Goddess's realm.
Back then, rather than feeling honored, Rin had been too busy asking when his duties would finally end.
He had been truly exhausted, having half-abandoned the goals he had once set with such passion and ambition.
"What is your wish?"
Even though it was a question from the Goddess, it had felt as ominous as a monkey's paw.
Rin had spoken the raw, unfiltered emotions surging in his heart.
"I don't want to be ■■ anymore."
At that, the Goddess shed tears.
"Only true ■■ and ■■ shall save you and grant you forgiveness."
Correction: she hadn't just shed tears.
But he couldn't remember exactly what the Goddess had done to him.
What was certain was that since then, Rin had become much better at his job as a carrier, and the Goddess had never actually mentioned anything about the Demon King having two horns.
It was merely a convenient lie Rin had spun to explain things to Lucy, drawing on his thorough knowledge of the game's lore.
"I see. So the Goddess told you."
Lucy openly showed her discomfort.
If Rin's story was true, it meant the Demon King was still alive, or at least something similar to him remained.
That entity would emerge as a new threat to the world, and the carrier Rin, acting on the Goddess's words, had saved her to stop it.
Lucy didn't care in the slightest about the reason Rin had saved her.
He had said he would have saved her even without such a grand justification.
Lucy believed in Rin.
If it were Rin, she would gladly accept it even if he tried to kill her again.
But if the threat Rin spoke of appeared, and the world was pushed to the brink of destruction, she wouldn't be able to build a happy future with him.
That thought made Lucy highly displeased and irritated.
"...I can't just let them be, then."
Because the world needs to remain intact for me to marry Rin.
Meanwhile, the carrier brightened, assuming Lucy was recalling her duty as the Hero.
"Exactly. No matter how trashy this world is, it would be troublesome if it were destroyed."
"Yes, extremely troublesome."
Besides, I'm definitely going to have at least two children.
She couldn't hand down a ruined world to the lovely children born between her and Rin.
"So, even if a demon appears before us or speaks to us, you mustn't lose your temper. Our current strength is still lacking."
"I understand."
"Instead, once you recover from your injuries, we'll definitely come back to eliminate them."
"Of course."
Oh, she's being proactive. Good.
Just as Rin, feeling excited for the first time in a while, grabbed the doorknob, Lucy asked sharply.
"Rin."
"Yeah?"
"By any chance, that demon isn't a succubus or something, is it?"
"Huh...?"
"You said even a remote city like this has a brothel alley, right?"
As expected of the Hero, what a sharp intuition.
Hearing the inexplicably chilling edge in Lucy's voice, Rin chose silence.
"Rin."
"Y-Yes?"
"If that bitch so much as speaks to you..."
This was dangerous.
The temperature around his abdomen was rising rapidly.
Specifically, the area where Lucy was strapped to him.
"I'll personally pull out that demon's tongue to show you how long it is."
How could a single sentence carry such heavy, suffocating weight?
Rin pondered deeply once more, took a deep breath, and replied.
"A demon's tongue? Don't touch something so filthy."
"...Okay! I knew it, Rin, you're the only one who cares about me!"
His abdomen was still burning hot.
Well, whatever.
Walking around last night, it had been freezing cold.
With this much heat, it would at least ward off the cold outside for a bit.
Clinging to yet another groundless optimism, Rin finally turned the doorknob and pushed the door open.