Awakening(?) and the Trial
The voice echoed inside my skull, sharp with urgency.
Life is so dull, empty, and fleeting.
Things like that can't make the world beautiful. Right now, I don't need anything.
A crushing sense of ennui and sticky melancholy swallowed everything—my thoughts, my heart, my very being. I no longer wanted to do anything. The only feeling left was the desire to simply sink away, right here, right now.
......Ah!
In that instant, vivid memories surged up from the depths of my mind. The monsters bound by the Academy President, forced to wail in helpless agony. The beast-fucking perverts high on drugs, trying to NTR another man's wife. The lizard beastman's desperate plea for me to demolish the Academy.
That's right. Nothing was over yet.
A quiet hatred and seething rage ignited, using the boredom and depression as fuel. My sluggish fingertips began to twitch. Life returned to my rotting eyes. Strength seeped into every loose muscle—arms, legs, hands, feet, head, my entire body. I tore apart the suffocating lethargy with a blade called willpower.
I rose from the Throne of Virginity and stretched both arms toward the sky.
Just moments ago I had been a corpse, showing no reaction despite the unicorns' thunderous cheers. Everyone had been watching me with worry and concern, murmuring among themselves. But when I suddenly stood and reached upward, the commotion died instantly. Every gaze locked onto me.
I breathed in. I gathered my strength. I opened my eyes.
And finally, I spat out the word that had been boiling inside my heart.
"APPLAUD!!!!!!!!"
Unlike before, an overwhelming burst of light erupted from the Throne of Virginity. Tears poured endlessly from the eyes of De-yunicorn and the other unicorns as they witnessed it. De-yunicorn reared up on his hind legs, gazed at the heavens, and proclaimed in a majestic telepathic voice.
"The God of Virgins has descended!!!!!!!!"
「「「「「God of Virgins!!!!!!!」」」」」
De-yunicorn's telepathic declaration rang out, joined by the voices of every unicorn across the sanctuary. It was the moment the land truly became the Unicorn Sanctuary once more.
Wow, fuck. That was seriously dangerous.
The overwhelming post-nut clarity that had dominated me vanished in an instant. It felt as if the Throne of Virginity had tried to devour me whole. It had been incredibly perilous.
De-yunicorn answered the question forming in my mind.
"Forgive me. There should have been no issue, yet the throne happened to lack perfect symmetry."
According to De-yunicorn, because the Throne of Virginity was not perfectly symmetrical, it had entered a state of CI (Chastity Imbalance). The throne had tried to compensate for its insufficient virginity by preventing me from leaving. Had the condition persisted, my sense of self would have been consumed, trapping me on the throne forever.
Elsia, it's you again?
I looked at her with a hint of resentment. Elsia clasped both hands together politely and put on an apologetic expression.
"...I'm sorry. I've never encountered this situation before, so I had no idea it would turn out like this."
"Sigh."
"I'm sorry. Really, truly sorry."
I gave her bowed forehead a light flick.
"Be more careful next time."
"...Thank you. For before. And for now as well."
Elsia beamed at me with a happy smile once more. I stroked her head gently to conclude the matter.
At any rate, the same crisis wouldn't happen again. The throne no longer emitted that previous light, yet sitting on it brought no discomfort whatsoever. If anything, it felt incredibly cozy and comfortable—like sinking into a chair with excellent cushioning.
De-yunicorn approached and sent me a telepathic message.
"O God, though you must be weary, I humbly beg for your assistance."
"Speak."
I had already grown accustomed to the unicorns' manner of speech. De-yunicorn lowered his head apologetically and spoke with earnest desperation.
"Please conduct the trial of the unicorns."
The location was the same as before, yet the atmosphere had completely changed. A heavy, suffocating solemnity filled the air. Two unicorns were being dragged forward in restraints.
「......」
「Release me!!! How can you call yourselves unicorns after this!!!!」
One lowered its head in humility. The other thrashed wildly, clearly displeased with its situation. I pointed at the humble unicorn and asked De-yunicorn.
"Why has that unicorn been brought here?"
"It is the crime of equine murder."
"Equine murder?"
"Indeed. It killed another unicorn."
The moment the words ended, the unicorn raised its head and stared directly at me, sending its telepathic voice. Its eyes were somber yet filled with conviction—and even a trace of relief.
「O King, as the words state, I am one who slew a fellow unicorn. Please deliver judgment upon me.」
"First, tell me the story. Why did you kill it?"
The unicorn closed its eyes for a moment as if recalling the memory. Then it opened them and spoke slowly, clearly.
「That unicorn was an author. Its novel was my favorite work. The genre was hero party stories—」
"Get to the point."
「However, it suddenly introduced a plot where the childhood friend—who I believed to be a virgin—had already given her body and heart to another party member long ago!」
"The tragic fate of childhood friends indeed."
The unicorn continued, tears streaming down its face.
「At first I coughed blood at that scene, but the author's atrocities did not stop there!」
"What atrocities?"
「The saint gained holy power through sexual intercourse, and the female knight's strength came from copying techniques through orgies with others—an explosive acceleration of the plot!」
"How terrible!"
「Twenty thousand characters had been uploaded, so I opened it with joy, only to find hell itself waiting inside!」
"And that's why you killed the unicorn?"
「That wasn't all!」
Every time the unicorn recalled the novel, it coughed up a little more blood. Even so, it refused to stop speaking. It had to say this.
「When I went to protest, the author said it had used similar developments before and would continue to do so! It mocked me relentlessly!」
"Was that creature truly a unicorn?"
「......It claimed it had converted from bicorn to unicorn.」
"How dreadful! One must never accept a two-horned beast!"
The unicorn seemed to lose all strength from recounting the tale and now stood in complete resignation. My heart ached despite myself. Still, I had to hear the entire story.
"How exactly did you kill it?"
「I ended its equine existence with 5,700 stabs.」
The unicorn shook its horn lightly before me as if presenting evidence. To summarize, a reader unicorn had stabbed an author unicorn to death after the latter ruined its story with sudden, terrible plot drifts.
If it were a human, it would be murder.
A red number floated above the unicorn's head, and it lowered its head even further in despair. It looked like it had regressed from a future where it received the death penalty and had simply resigned itself to fate.
I stared at the unicorn and pronounced its crime and punishment.
"Listen well. Your crime is the murder of a fellow unicorn citizen. Do you admit this?"
「I admit it.」
"Therefore, your punishment shall be to read 'a short parenting story in which a virgin undergoes TS into a maiden and adopts a daughter'!"
「......Pardon?」
The unicorn stared at me in utter bewilderment. It clearly didn't understand the verdict at all. The red number above its head rising higher was just a bonus.
"In the Unicorn Sanctuary, one must follow the laws of unicorns."
「Yes, just as you say.」
"To punish a being that acted in a manner unbefitting a unicorn is, in itself, an act of protecting unicorn law and the sanctuary."
「O King!!!!!!!!!!!!!」
When a person defies the natural order, one does not mourn their death. Especially not when the intent was to ruin unicorns, and the creature was originally a bicorn. It deserved to die in the Unicorn Sanctuary. The unicorn's face filled with shock as if it had never expected such a ruling. Then it asked another question.
「O King, however, I do not understand the punishment. Why that particular novel?」
"Woman and man represent yin and yang. When a virgin undergoes TS into a maiden, a yang soul resides within a yin body—thus achieving the harmony of yin and yang."
「!」
"Furthermore, when virgin and maiden become one single being, their purity is not merely doubled. It is squared."
「Oooooh!」
"Such perfect purity nurtures a new maiden. From a unicorn's perspective, is there any flaw in this judgment?"
All the unicorns began shedding tears once more at my verdict and explanation. The living, breathing law of unicorns. A new enlightenment. Both were more than enough to turn the entire space into a crucible of emotion.
I smiled lightly at the unicorn.
"Go! Why are you still standing here instead of carrying out your punishment!"
「God of Virgins! Thank you!!」
The unicorn, repeatedly expressing its gratitude, quickly left the area. De-yunicorn could no longer hold back the tears welling up and let them flow freely as it bowed its head to me.
"Entrusting this matter to the God of Virgins was the correct choice."
I answered De-yunicorn's words with a smile. The warm atmosphere lasted only a moment. I changed my expression and glared at the unicorn that was still thrashing wildly.
"Recite your sins, you wretch."