The End and the Beginning of Wandering
“Aaaaargh!!”
Bang, bang———!
I found myself back in the room once more. Trapped again. But I couldn’t just sit still. I couldn’t afford to. If I stayed motionless, if I remained quiet, I felt my mind would truly shatter.
Yuda died right before my eyes. Yuda, who had been close enough to touch if I’d only reached out a little farther, was killed by the Demon King. He was our comrade. Our friend. The finest hunter in the Hero Party. Why? Why Yuda?
We could have talked. Yuda recognized me. In his final moments, he called my name. We could have reached a better understanding through conversation. Why? Why did it have to end like this?
Thud———
I began smashing everything in the room. Anything I could grab, I hurled across the space. Tables and bookshelves were torn down with all my strength. None of it mattered anymore. The memories of living with that man refused to leave my head. The moment we first met. The hunts we went on together. The times he rebelled against his inferiority complex. Even the day news arrived that he had slain a bear with his bare hands. He was always positive. He truly loved Jeren. So why? Why did he have to die? Why couldn’t I do anything?
“Cartoriaaaaa———!!”
I screamed her name while clawing at my own head with both hands. If she had let me go, if she had given me the chance to save Yuda, I might have succeeded. Why, Cartoria? Why did you do it? Ah, please…
“Kgh, aaaaaah———!!”
I no longer knew whether the sounds tearing from my throat were roars, howls, or screams. I had been like this for hours. Days. Weeks. I couldn’t tell anymore. I simply couldn’t stop raging at my own powerlessness, at the comrade I had lost before my eyes, at the Demon King and Cartoria.
How long had I been rampaging? My body was covered in scratches and small wounds from the broken furniture. The skin on the backs of my hands and fingertips had been completely torn away from punching too violently. Still, I couldn’t stop. I wanted to release this unbearable grief, this rage and sorrow over losing Yuda. But I couldn’t. I had endured this wretched existence hoping to meet the survivors someday, hoping to save Yuda. In the end, I achieved nothing. Nothing at all. What reason was there left to live? Why was I still breathing?
As much as I hated the Demon King, I despised myself even more. A weak, worthless insect who dared to speak of ideals yet lacked the resolve to make them real.
“Uuuuugh, kghhhhh……!!”
What could I do just sitting here, Karia? What could you possibly accomplish, Belberman? What exactly are you—
“What have you even saved?”
“Haaahk……!!”
A mirror. It was a mirror.
“Ugh……”
From the shattered fragments scattered across the floor, my own reflection moved and spoke.
“When you think about it, you’re the one who killed him.”
“What… are you saying……!”
I had fallen to the floor, kneeling as I glared at my broken reflection. The version of me inside the mirror sneered back with cruel clarity.
“Honestly, if you had never played at being a hero, everyone would still be alive and happy, wouldn’t they?”
“Shut up……”
“This tragedy began because of you. You killed them all. You killed Yuda. So what gives you the right to act so proud?”
“I… I didn’t…… I didn’t kill him……!”
Yet as I began to back away from the shards, the reflection lunged forward.
“No. You killed him.”
It seized me by the collar with both hands and slammed me against the wall.
“Kgh……!”
With a vicious smile, it pressed close and hissed, “You killed him because you were foolish enough to rely only on your unique magic and charge ahead.”
I remembered that moment. The first time Counterattack’s Potential had manifested. The day I shattered my own weapon. The moment the court mage explained that I possessed a rare innate magic. I had been the catalyst. The one who brought magic to the entire party. The beginning of the hero legend.
But what legend could exist for a defeated hero?
The reflection was right. I was a loser. It wasn’t wrong to say they died because of me. I couldn’t even save an old friend right in front of me. I was a true failure.
“That’s right. Accept it.”
“I… I……”
I couldn’t meet the eyes of the vicious face gripping my collar. As it lifted my chin with both hands, forcing me to look up, it whispered, “Accept the deep darkness inside you.”
Without warning, the surroundings began to darken.
“Fear, guilt, sorrow, longing, regret…… All of it belongs to you.”
My shadow, darker than anything I had ever seen, began to be sucked back into my body. No—rather, I was being pulled into it.
“Ugh……”
At that moment, I lost consciousness.
Tap———
It happened in an instant. Just as I was about to be completely swallowed, someone flicked my forehead.
“……”
I opened my eyes.
“Your soul stone went out of control.”
The Demon King stood before me, gazing directly into my eyes from far too close. I flinched and glared at her.
“What… happened……”
“Your magic power ran wild. Your emotions lost control, and the rampaging mana began devouring your mind. You nearly had your personality completely overwritten.”
I touched the spot on my forehead where she had flicked me.
“It’s a common occurrence among demons and mages unskilled in magic. Their instincts and beliefs remain largely unchanged, but once their personality is replaced by one driven by magic, they become unrecognizable.”
The Demon King closed her eyes and pulled away slightly.
“You were nearly devoured by another personality just now. You almost died.”
“……Then you should have just let me die.”
My voice trembled. “Living with someone like you is worse than death.”
I wasn’t afraid of what Tia—no, the Demon King—might do to me anymore. Actually, I was terrified beyond reason. But I had decided not to care. I couldn’t afford to care. Because the pain of being alive right now was far more disgusting and unbearable than anything she could inflict.
I had failed to protect anything. I had laughed and played around while waiting for the day I could protect them. There was nowhere left to return to. If I could have died just now, that would have been better. If my body had been taken by that other personality, that would have been preferable.
“Kill me———!!”
I grabbed one of the Demon King’s arms with both hands and screamed. She was the only one who could kill me. No—that wasn’t true either. Anyone could kill me easily. The Demon King simply couldn’t finish the job because I would revive. So I should try dying at someone else’s hands. If I revived anyway, I could just let her turn me into a taxidermy specimen like she said. Suffering suited someone like me better anyway. I couldn’t even protect myself with my own power, let alone save anyone else.
“I just saved you, and now you’re trying to abandon your personality again?”
The Demon King spoke to me.
“I don’t need this……!”
I hadn’t known I possessed a second heart—a soul stone—like demons and mages. Even if I had, I assumed the Demon King had removed it when she changed my body into a woman’s. Yet it was still inside me, and magic power still flowed through it. But what did that matter? I didn’t know how to use it, and even if I did, it was probably just a remnant of the unique magic she had stolen. The Demon King had said I no longer possessed any power. So what use was any of this?
“I’m going to die. I’d rather die……!”
Still, I tried to bite my own tongue with all my strength, hoping to end it before that other personality could appear again. But at that moment—
Clang———
With the sound of chains moving at high speed, my wrists and ankles were bound. Then—
“Kaaahk……!”
The Demon King grabbed my mouth with both hands.
“Aaaah……!”
As I began to mumble with my mouth forced open, she spoke.
“You’ve finally lost your mind.”
I wanted to retort that of course I had, but the Demon King used magic to clear away the broken furniture scattered across the bed, then threw my chained body onto it. The chains stretched my arms and legs in all directions, fixing me in place.
“Kgh———!”
When I tried to bite my tongue again, she shoved a gag into my mouth.
“Kgh, uuuuugh——!”
With a disappointed expression, she looked down at me.
“I never expected the one who so desperately wanted to talk would fall this far into rejecting conversation.”
She covered my eyes with one hand and whispered into my ear.
“I understand. Then, as you wish……”
My body trembled slightly, but it no longer mattered.
“I’ll thoroughly crush only your sense of self……”
Whatever she said or did, it didn’t matter anymore. Overwhelmed by rage I could no longer contain, I could see nothing else. Even as she did whatever she pleased—
“Dieee———!!”
—I screamed at the Demon King. I was desperate. If I didn’t do this, if I didn’t resist like this, I felt I would become nothing. I had only just realized I possessed a soul stone and that magic still flowed within me, but that didn’t mean I could use Counterattack’s Potential again. The reason my body had become like this in the first place was because the Demon King had tampered with my soul stone. Now it made sense. The reason I revived even when my body was torn apart. The reason she could reconstruct my body. The Demon King, whose mastery of magic had already reached its peak, could manipulate soul stones. What Jemma had mentioned about the Demon King’s “surgery” when I first arrived was also about manipulating the soul stone. That was how I ended up in this body and lost my unique magic.
Now I understood. But what did it change? I was still a powerless wretch who could do nothing. Whether it was the Demon King’s fault or not, I was the one who had failed to do anything. So I would kill the Demon King no matter what. And then I would die too.
“Make me come more if you want……! I won’t submit anymore. I’ll kill you———!”
I shouted at the Demon King after she removed the gag she had enjoyed using on me for so long. She had already raped my body several times, but now that act alone could no longer break my spirit.
“Do your worst!! I’ll kill you———!!”
Bound and chained, I roared.
“I——!! won’t submit—kuh—ooh——”
Even as my body arched and a moan escaped at the moment of climax, I glared at her with all the hatred I could muster.
“I won’t…… give in……!”
I no longer held back. I didn’t stop. Even while being bound and violated like that day, I became a runaway train, trampling over every trace of trauma as I screamed.
“I’ll kill you. Absolutely……!!”
Yuda. Yuda. I will avenge you no matter what. I can’t stay still anymore. It’s too late, but I… I will avenge everyone. Absolutely.