Chapter 12. The Child I've Watched Since She Was a Girl (2)
Chapter 12. The Child I've Watched Since She Was a Girl (2)
Berdia first met Serika roughly ten years ago.
'Mister, who are you?'
'Someone you'll be seeing quite often.'
'Are you going to play with me?'
'Heh heh, indeed. If there's a chance, I'll play with you as much as you like.'
At that time, Berdia was an attendant assisting a holy knight of the Church. She had set foot in a rural village to find the one who had received the oracle and been chosen as the Hero.
She was there to assist the man who was meant to fill the very role she now held — the priestess assigned to support the Hero.
'......That child is the next Hero?'
Given her position, she thought satisfying a bit of curiosity wouldn't hurt, so she asked. He answered without fuss.
'Yes. The oracle has been granted, but she has yet to awaken her power as the Hero.'
'...Are we truly meant to entrust humanity's future to a child like that?'
'It would be impossible right now, yes. But one day, it will be possible. If the balance between the Demon King's army and humanity does not collapse.'
Yes, one day.
Until that day came, their mission was to protect the world this girl would live in.
Even though she was nothing more than an attendant, Berdia respected and revered him for his devotion to that mission.
She never once doubted that he would one day meet the promised time and, together with that girl, fulfill the mission to save humanity.
Until the day came when she herself would inherit that mission.
'Big sister, why are you crying?'
There's a story many people get wrong.
The reason the balance of power between humanity and the Demon King's army exists is because the two sides fight on equal footing.
But the truth is that humanity is actually the weaker side.
Those on the front lines die like dogs, sacrificing themselves so that the ones behind them can pursue peace without being exposed to merciless malice.
In that struggle, the noble man who was meant to assist the Hero also lost his life.
It was an utterly common story in this world.
'It's nothing.'
She had traveled alone to the girl's village to deliver even that news, but Berdia could not bring herself to tell the girl about his death.
Would it be right to burden a girl who still did not understand war with the misery of reality......?
To a girl not yet an adult, she couldn't bring herself to unload feelings about a reality she herself had been unable to endure.
'I'm just... a little tired.'
'Do tears come out when you're tired?'
'Yes, some people are like that.'
So, at the time, she'd glossed over her feelings and hoped the girl would quickly leave her side.
'Big sister, may I ask just one thing?'
But Serika didn't leave right away. She insisted on staying beside her, perched on a rocky ledge under the dreary sky.
'Ask something? What is it?'
'Why do you speak to me so politely?'
'What? That's...'
Because she was the Hero.
She'd stumbled into the role almost by accident, inheriting it from the previous Hero, but even without that title, she was the savior of humanity. Treating her as a superior wasn't strange.
'It's strange. An adult speaking politely.'
But the girl had no awareness of being the Hero yet.
The "normal" way of things felt off to her, and she faced eyes filled with despair over reality with a gaze of pure innocence.
'I don't know what happened to you, big sister.......'
Without a single stain.
And with a gaze utterly straight and true.
'Even so, it's okay to be comfortable around me. Because I want to be close with you.'
Facing a girl who thought of her circumstances and wished she would lower her guard, Berdia felt a poignant tightness in her chest for the first time in her life.
She was a child she mustn't rely on.
No, rather, she was the one who had to make the girl rely on her.
'......Alright.'
Even so, Berdia couldn't bring herself to refuse the girl's words.
It was a light far too simple and small to brighten the dreary sky that mourned the dead.
And yet, she could feel the light shining from the girl vividly illuminating the dark days ahead.
'If that light spreads a little further...... perhaps it's not a dream that people with pain like mine could be saved.'
That was the moment a sense of mission ignited within her — toward a girl who still had no awareness of being the Hero.
Through that light, Berdia steeled her resolve and took to the battlefield once more. In the end, she gained the strength to single-handedly defeat even officers of the Demon King's army.
Salvation, justice, duty, hope.......
There were many reasons to fight. The journey, where she could have crumbled under the pressure at any moment, finally bore fruit when that child drove a stake into her resolve.
'Serika, the hope of humanity. And my light.'
Though their old relationship could never return after the girl fully gained her sense of duty as the Hero, Berdia had long since shaken off any regret over that.
What she truly ought to pursue was not simply staying by that child's side, but helping the light that had guided her to shine not just upon herself, but upon all of humanity.
Yes, that was the future she had always hoped for.
"Ohho, ohhhohh~!!"
And yet, that child in the room was shouting such vulgar cries while plunging into her own hole.
Of course, the act of masturbation itself is merely embarrassing, not abnormal. But no one would have ever wished for her awakening to adult sensibilities to take such a form.
Even though she'd been granted the Hero's mission, to relieve her lust so basely like that.
"Uh, haa, ah, nn......♡"
Schlick. Schlick.
Even after several climaxes, Serika kept plunging her fingers into her hole.
The hand that groped her modestly swelling breasts was rough, but even that didn't seem to satisfy; the force of her grip focused entirely on two fingers.
"Ah, aah♡ I-it's, good, this is, goood......♡"
Stimulating the nipples also helps one feel sexual pleasure.
After realizing that fact, Serika, half out of her mind, began to tremble softly.
'Serika, what in the world.......'
No, was that really Serika?
The Serika she knew was a child with a very pure gaze.
Not particularly bright, but innocent, a child who always showed consideration to those around her.
That purity might perhaps become the greatest trial in surviving this brutal world, but even so, she'd never once doubted that if her heart didn't break, she'd be reborn as the hope of the era.
On the other hand, what was over there was someone wholly absorbed in relieving her own base desires.......
Yes, base.
So much so that even a slum prostitute probably wouldn't handle her own hole this recklessly.
"N-not enough."
But that denial of reality was, in the end, only momentary.
Ironic as it was, this was not the first time Berdia had watched someone masturbate.
'Yes, back then too.'
A very long time ago.
Back when she taught aspiring holy knights at the Church, she'd once hidden and watched a young boy masturbating where he thought no one could see.
He was clearly the most diligent boy, and yet, without even realizing she was watching from behind, he'd been shaking his thing mercilessly.
'Lady Berdia, Lady Berdiaaa......!'
What's more, the target of that lust was none other than herself.
Of course, she did wear thin clothes in the training yard, but still, she couldn't understand at all back then why he acted that way.
'At the time, I didn't know what to do and scolded that child harshly.'
Masturbation wasn't forbidden in the Church, but excessive lust interferes with one's cultivation.
After that, the fact that she wore her armor everywhere except right before bed was also because she worried the men around her might go through such an experience because of her.
She herself didn't care, but if a child overflowing with sexual curiosity acted that way, she had no choice but to become aware that she was that kind of existence.
'Then, is Serika in the same state as that child right now?'
No, it might be even worse.
That child had unleashed his sexual desires during puberty, but Serika had had absolutely no such experience until she became an adult.
Her body had merely become that of an adult; she was still effectively a child with zero tolerance for sex.
And female sexuality is different from male sexuality. Unlike men, who lose strength after finishing once, women who climax repeatedly tend to pursue even stronger pleasure.
In a place shielded from others' eyes, that lack of inhibition would only grow stronger.
"O-one more time......."
"Seri—!!"
She bristled and grabbed the door handle impulsively, but only for a moment.
Realizing belatedly that her emotions had overheated, Berdia bit her lip and quietly stepped back.
'......No, Serika is an adult now too.'
And one who must shoulder the great undertaking of the Hero going forward.
Her abilities must be governed for the sake of others, her conduct managed to set an example for others — but interfering even in places unseen by anyone risked undermining her confidence.
Berdia did not wish for her to become a puppet of the leaders who represented humanity.
Her upright heart was her own. Her desire to save the world had to be her own will. So how could she carelessly do something that might greatly harm Serika's personal pride?
'Yes, as long as I'm not caught. If I just accept it as a natural physiological phenomenon.......'
So here, she should close the door, pretend she saw nothing, and retreat.
She knew that, but.......
'......No, I can't.'
Even so, in the end Berdia neither entered the room nor left the entrance. She clenched her slackened fist tight.
Her heart wanted to just back away, but the situation now was not a good one.
'Why.......'
A child who had always been so gentle was doing this after bringing a man into the party.
'Why, of all times, when she brought a man in with her own hands, does she do something like this...?!'
At this rate, she had no choice but to assume she viewed that man as that kind of target, didn't she?