It Would Have Been Better If I Were Under a Spell
I would have preferred it if I had been under a spell.
“Haa… haa…”
Ilena, who had kissed me with fierce intensity several times, looked down at me while catching her ragged breath. Her eyes gleamed like those of a beast that had finally sated its starving hunger. The way both her eyes were bloodshot and dyed a deeper red made her gaze all the more terrifying.
Uh… wait. How did it end up like this?
I was definitely on top at the beginning. But when I came to my senses, I was the one lying defenseless on the bed.
I had forgotten. That Ilena was actually the ruthless Demon King.
I might have won last time, but this time I had clearly lost.
Still… losing like this wasn’t so bad.
“Slurp…”
Ilena lightly sucked in the saliva that had trickled from the corner of her mouth, then wiped the rest from around her lips with her sleeve.
“So, are you satisfied?”
“……”
Ilena didn’t answer my question about whether she was satisfied. Instead, she leaned down again. Looks like she still wasn’t done. Was another merciless kiss about to begin?
I resigned myself and closed my eyes.
Chu.
But my expectation was off the mark. Ilena simply pressed a light kiss to my forehead.
“Hehe…”
Then she slowly slid downward and buried her face in my chest, taking a deep breath.
“Good. This is enough.”
“Enough for what?”
“You smell like you.”
“Smell? What kind of smell…”
Ilena proudly declared that I had a scent on me, then pulled me into a tight embrace.
“You asked me earlier, remember? You wanted to know what that woman was trying to do to you.”
“Did I? I don’t even remember now.”
“She was trying to devour you.”
Devour me? She probably didn’t mean literally eating me. In that case, there was only one meaning left. It was sexual.
So that’s what she meant by taking me away, tying me up, and forcing herself on me. Just imagining it sent chills down my spine. I knew Silvia was a frightening woman, but I never thought she harbored those kinds of desires toward me.
I gently stroked Ilena’s head, the one who had saved me from that horrifying situation.
“Thank you. For saving me.”
“Mmm, I should be the one thanking you.”
Ilena hugged me even tighter.
“I was scared, even if it was only for a moment. I was afraid you might run off with that woman.”
“Why would I do that?”
What a needless worry. The hand that had been stroking her head now moved to pat her back gently.
“I told you. I already have someone.”
“Hehe…”
Still, it was a little disappointing. I had thought she would kiss me passionately again, but it ended with just a kiss on the forehead. I hadn’t realized I was secretly hoping for more.
Holding her small, soft body like this felt nice, but we couldn’t stay like this forever. I glanced out the window and saw that the sun had already set.
“Wait. How much time has passed?”
“It hasn’t even been a full day yet.”
“That’s a relief. No, wait. If it hasn’t been a full day but it’s already evening… does that mean you took care of me all day long?”
Ilena looked up at me and nodded. Her eyes, reddened from overexertion, looked even redder than usual.
“Your body isn’t well either, yet you stayed with me the whole day?”
“Hehe. Because it’s you.”
“Ilena…”
We were silently gazing at each other like that when—
Crash.
A sharp sound came from outside.
“I’m sorry! I’m so sorry!”
“It’s fine. It’s okay, so just stay still. You’ll get hurt if you move.”
It was clearly the sound of a plate shattering. The voice frantically apologizing belonged to Silvia, and the one soothing her was my mother’s.
At the unmistakable noise, Ilena and I exchanged glances and nodded. With no other choice, we got up.
When we opened the door and stepped out, the scene was exactly as I had imagined. Silvia was trembling amid the scattered shards of broken plates, while my mother was carefully picking them up.
I let out a sigh and looked at Silvia with a low voice.
“Silvia…”
“D-don’t look at me with that pathetic expression! I’ve never done a single chore in my entire life!”
In the meantime, Ilena naturally began helping my mother.
“That’s enough, really. Your body isn’t well—go rest some more.”
“No, Mother. I’m feeling much better now.”
While my mother and Ilena cleaned up the broken pieces, Silvia simply sat there trembling with an expression that looked like she might cry at any moment. Seeing the usually confident Silvia look so pitiful was both refreshing and… satisfying.
“She really does nothing but cause problems.”
“S-sorry…”
Dinner preparations had already been finished. The accident happened when Silvia tried to set down the last plate. While Ilena went inside to wake the sleeping Dipe, whose magic power had run low, the three of us sat down at the table first.
My mother, sitting beside me, gave me a light nudge and asked.
“What are you going to do, being such a weakling as a man?”
“Pardon…?”
“You only helped with the farm work for a little while and you’re already collapsing from exhaustion?”
I quickly assessed the situation. It seemed my mother didn’t know that I had collapsed because of Silvia. I had no idea how Ilena had explained it, but it was fortunate. If she knew I had been hit with a powerful paralyzing poison strong enough to knock me out for a week, she might faint on the spot.
“Y-yes, you’re right. I think I need to train my stamina more.”
“Tsk tsk… So frail, yet you have such good fortune with women.”
As my mother said that, she gave Silvia a meaningful glance. Ever since breaking the plate, Silvia had been sitting with her head hung low, looking utterly dejected.
My mother ladled warm stew into Silvia’s bowl first and said,
“What a shame.”
“Huh?”
“I mean you’re a step too late. My son already has someone.”
“Ehh…?”
Silvia’s eyes wavered. I had already told her myself that I had someone, but hearing it again must still be hard to believe. That made sense. After all, the person in question wasn’t an ordinary human, but the Demon King.
Fortunately, Silvia didn’t reveal that fact to my mother. She simply trembled, barely holding back her frustration.
“Ah, Roen!”
Dipe came out rubbing her sleepy eyes. The moment she saw me, she spread her arms wide and ran straight into my embrace.
“Did you sleep well?”
“Yeah! Roen too… hmm?”
Dipe suddenly started sniffing me, then said with a bright smile,
“You smell like Ilena!”
“Cough…”
“Huk…!”
My breath and Ilena’s caught in our throats at the same time. Maybe because it came from Dipe’s innocent voice, the impact was stronger than expected. My mother looked pleased, while Silvia slightly furrowed her brows.
“That makes sense. She was taking care of me until just now.”
“Ah, so that’s why?”
“Aren’t you hungry? Come sit down. Let’s eat together.”
“Okay!”
“You too, Ilena.”
“Of course.”
After the meal, I left my mother and Ilena to clean up and stepped outside with Silvia.
“……What the hell is going on?”
“What do you mean?”
“That! That right there!”
Silvia pointed at the house with wide eyes.
“Why is the Demon King Ilenater still alive?!”
She must be furious. I had told her I had defeated the Demon King, yet here she was, perfectly fine. And living in my childhood home, no less.
“It’s a long story if I explain.”
“I don’t want to hear a long, drawn-out explanation. Keep it short.”
The look in Silvia’s eyes as she glared at me was dead serious. At some point, she had drawn the dagger she kept hidden in her clothes and was now pointing it at me.
“If I have to, I’ll decide that you’re an enemy of the world!”
“Sigh…”
An enemy of the world? Hearing those words made a sigh escape me. The war had ended long ago.
“The Demon King is dead.”
“Dead? She’s right there, alive and well!”
“To be precise, the Demon King who only knew how to fight is dead.”
“What…?”
Yeah, this wasn’t something that could be explained shortly. Even if I told her everything, I wasn’t sure she would understand.
“Silvia, you know why Ilenater started the war, right?”
“Of course. To make the world kneel at her feet. She said so herself when she declared war.”
“That’s right. But what if that wasn’t her own will?”
“……”
Silvia kept her dagger pointed at me and waited for me to continue.
“Subjugating the world was never Ilenater’s dream. It was the previous Demon King—her father’s—wish. He instilled his own dream of conquering the world into his daughter.”
“Even so, the fact that Ilenater waged war doesn’t change.”
“I know. But…”
I pointed at the various facilities scattered throughout the village.
“That, and that one too. Those are all things Ilenater built after coming to this village. You won’t find facilities like these even in most cities.”
“What are you trying to say?”
“Ilenater is trying. She wants demons and humans to live together in cooperation. The reason she came to this village was to study humans.”
Silvia stared at the facilities I had pointed out for a long time before finally lowering her dagger.
“Well… I didn’t sense any hostility from the way the Demon King treated your mother.”
“Right? And she spared you instead of killing you in the first place.”
“That’s exactly what I’m curious about.”
Silvia pulled out a small glass vial filled with a sparkling liquid from her pocket and held it out to me.
“What is this?”
“Holy water.”
“I know that. But why holy water?”
When I hesitated, Silvia even opened the lid for me.
“This isn’t ordinary holy water. It’s been blessed by Saintess Eris.”
Eris. It had been a very long time since I last heard that name.
“Drink it.”
“You want me to drink it?”
“I need to confirm whether or not you’ve been bewitched by the Demon King’s magic!”
“As far as I know, this stuff is pretty expensive.”
“Stop talking nonsense and drink it already!”
This reminded me of the first time I met Ilena. She had gone wild, accusing me of using illusion magic to mess with her mind. I accepted the holy water from Silvia and drank it in one gulp.
As the holy water went down my throat, a refreshing and warm energy pleasantly spread throughout my body. Of course, nothing else happened.
“See? I’m perfectly fine, aren’t I?”
“……Tsk.”
Silvia irritably kicked a pebble rolling on the ground.
“Why are you so upset?”
“Shut up.”
After telling me to shut up, Silvia sulked by herself and squatted down on the spot.
“……It would have been better.”
“What?”
“It would have been better if you had been under a spell…”