Chapter 121

"My soul is bound to this temple."

"…So you've been waiting for the ones who'd set you free? And that's me and Iberin?"

"That's right."

"Then what do I have to do now?"

"You only need to give me the seed."

"…The seed?"

Lyssel could feel the seed inside him writhing and thrashing.

It had been reacting strangely from the moment he'd set foot in this temple.

The seed, broken by demonic energy, had lost the power of the god.

"If I give it to you, you'll be resurrected?"

"Not resurrection. Return."

Lyssel carefully set Iberin down and took a step toward the god.

Demedeto reached out a hand as if barely able to wait, but Lyssel quickly pulled back.

"Why pull away? Hand the seed over and you'll be able to find peace yourself, won't you?"

"…Then why isn't Iberin waking up?"

"…What?"

"I'll give it to you once I've confirmed Iberin is awake."

"She'll only wake once we leave the temple!"

"Why?"

"Is that really the important thing right now?"

Demedeto's voice rose a notch.

"It's important."

"Why?"

"I only trust what Iberin tells me. However much you may be a god, I can't trust you."

"……Hh."

"And to a god, a human life would be a trifle. What am I supposed to do if you've rigged things so she can't wake up?"

At that, Demedeto's body shook with rage.

Unable to contain it, she shouted,

"Hand it over! It's mine to begin with!"

The screeching shouts soon lost their force and dissolved.

"……You."

The pure god's aura he'd felt had broken.

There was no way Lyssel could miss it.

Demonic energy, felt now so thickly it couldn't be mistaken — energy he definitely hadn't been able to feel outside the temple.

Why was there demonic energy here?

"You weren't {Demedeto."}(#u57lujfuol4e)

Even though she knew she'd been found out, the one who'd introduced herself as Demedeto laughed without a flicker of expression changing.

"Hh, if you'd handed the seed over quietly, I'd have killed you easily."

The space twisted.

Lyssel and Iberin were dropped again into the middle of the cold temple.

This was the space of the god.

The outcome of the Holy-Demonic War thousands of years ago was unknown, but the fact that the Demon King was bound here meant the god, too, had to be somewhere within it.

Only — without question, the god was even more weakened than the Demon King.

He had to find her.

The Demon King had said Iberin was the guide.

Iberin would know the way to the god.

The Demon King must have tried to intercept her to stop that.

"Hand it over!!"

The Demon King reached out toward Lyssel again.

But the energy wasn't all that strong.

To the same degree the god had been weakened, the Demon King's power too was less than whole.

If he'd simply handed the seed over, what he'd have seen wouldn't have been the god's return but the Demon King's.

A chill ran up Lyssel's spine.

How was he supposed to wake Iberin?

And why hadn't the Demon King killed Iberin, who was supposedly the guide?

If he'd just killed her earlier, that would have been the cleaner move from the Demon King's standpoint.

But the Demon King hadn't killed Iberin.

No — it was more likely he couldn't.

Why?

If so, would that still hold now?

Watching the Demon King — who had no interest in Iberin at all and was after only the seed of evil hidden somewhere inside him — Lyssel swung his sword.

The Demon King couldn't directly attack Lyssel. But by the same token, no blow Lyssel struck landed either.

"Demedeto."

Lyssel murmured it quietly.

"You wretch!"

The Demon King cracked like a thunderclap.

"To get rid of you, I have to find Demedeto."

"Shut your mouth!"

"Demedeto."

"Khk. Do you really think you can find her?"

The Demon King, who'd seemed worked up to the breaking point, had apparently calmed somehow — there was a thin, sneering smile at the corner of his mouth as he spoke.

He'd clearly pulled something.

It seemed that everything would become clear once Iberin woke up — but how was he supposed to wake her?

"Hehe. Hehe."

Then the space that had seemed to come apart re-formed, and Iberin — who'd looked like she was asleep — suddenly coughed and spat blood.

Startled, Lyssel ran to her, and at some point a sword had appeared in the Demon King's hand.

A sword dripping blood.

Cough—

Iberin kept coughing up blood.

"Lyssel…."

Her eyes, pinched shut in pain, slid open and called his name in a small voice.

"I don't want to die… Khk…."

"I-Iberin….."

"Save me… Cough…!"

Tears of blood streaming down her face, Iberin kept murmuring that she wanted to live.

"And… why am I like this… why is there blood…?"

"Hhng… I-Iberin….."

At the Demon King's sudden attack, Lyssel couldn't get a word out, just let tears fall in heavy drops.

"It hurts… it hurts….."

"Just a moment, just a moment….."

When Lyssel rushed to press his hand to her wound and lift her up, Iberin poured the words out.

"It's because of you….."

"…What?"

"This is what I am because of you."

"…Iberin."

"If I'd never met you…."

The resentful words kept coming. Lyssel, who'd been gripping Iberin's hand tightly, went still as stone.

"Die… die….."

"……."

Lyssel dropped his sword.

Then his eyes met those of the Demon King, who was still snickering from the other side.

"Iberin."

He looked at Iberin again.

"Die… die in the cruelest way the world has to offer."

Iberin, eyes empty, kept saying it.

Laying her down carefully, Lyssel staggered to his feet.

"Hehe, hehe."

The Demon King's stifled laughter grew louder by the moment.

Lyssel raised the sword he'd dropped high.

At Lyssel — at himself.

Schunk—!

But the direction the sword drove into wasn't Lyssel.

It was Iberin.

Tears spilling, Lyssel drove the sword in.

"Kyaaaaaa!"

The scream came from where the Demon King was.

"How could youuuu!"

He was being scattered, breaking apart.

When Lyssel looked down, the Demon King — wearing Iberin's form — was sprawled there, limp.

"There's no way Iberin would say something like that to me."

"Aaaaaaagh!"

The scream grew smaller and smaller.

For a Demon King, it was an emptily, absurdly anticlimactic death.

Watching the soul scatter into dust, Lyssel quietly closed his eyes.

The Demon King had said Iberin was the guide.

Which meant there was no way Iberin, the god's guide, would have come to the Demon King.

If the Iberin he'd been chasing from the moment he set foot in the temple hadn't been Iberin.

Then it made sense that he himself had come to the Demon King.

The demonic energy must have drawn the Demon King in.

"Lyssel!"

When the Demon King's screams had vanished completely, Iberin ran over and threw herself into his arms.

"Lyssel….."

"Iberin."

Lyssel held her back tightly and squeezed his eyes shut.

If he'd actually stabbed the real Iberin, he'd planned to follow her.

His hands were shaking.

Fake or not, the sensation of stabbing Iberin had been horrific.

Pouring tears, Lyssel buried his face in Iberin's shoulder.

"Hgh… thank god, thank god."

He clenched his trembling hands tight and murmured it.

"…Do you have any idea how worried I was?"

"You were watching the whole time?"

"Yes… hk…."

Iberin broke into open sobs.

And then, behind her, someone appeared. Most likely, the real Demedeto.

The benevolent smile the Demon King had been faking and her — the feel itself was completely different.

He had met the real god.

---

When Iberin, who'd been walking in a daze, finally came to a stop, Demedeto was waiting for her.

"You're Demedeto, aren't you?"

"I am."

"Why have you called me here?"

"Didn't you call for me first?"

"……You mean when I said your name?"

"That's one reason. Before that, I existed as only a body without a soul. Until you called out to me."

"Apart from that, what else?"

She'd never thought specifically about what kind of conversation she might have with Demedeto if she ever met her.

But standing in front of her now, the questions surfaced.

Above all — whether she could return to her original world, how she'd come to be here, and so on.

She was a god, so surely she'd know the answer.

"It looks like you have a lot of questions. Things about how you, from another world, came to be here."

"……H-how."

"Didn't you just think I'd be one who'd know everything?"

"…So you do know?"

"Will you be disappointed if I say I don't?"

"No."

She'd just been curious; it wasn't disappointment.

"It wasn't a coincidence."

"What?"

"Humans live finite lives, but they do go through something called reincarnation."

"Reincarnation?"

"Yes. A life where the world, the gender, anything can change. You probably thought of this place as the world inside a book, but in truth it was likely one of your many lives."

"That's possible?"

"There's nothing impossible about it, is there? Weren't you especially drawn to this world?"

It was true. From the moment she'd come to know this place through the book, she'd loved Ether for no real reason.

She'd been fine with the fact that he was a villain, and she'd desperately wished he wouldn't suffer.

"It was probably because Lecashe was tied up with your past."

It was a startling story, but not entirely a shock.

If anything, she was glad to know she wasn't just a nobody.

That she wasn't a complete stranger — that there was some connection — was a bigger comfort than she would have guessed.

It was good, too, that she didn't have to keep lying to Lyssel anymore.

After hearing the god's words, she found the courage to tell him.

"But — you can't leave this place?"

From the moment they'd met, Demedeto hadn't come down from the altar.

What's more, for a god, her holy power seemed only slightly greater than Rozelia's.

Though of course, someone as self-taught as Iberin would have a hard time really telling.

"Because the war isn't over yet."

"What?"

"The Demon King was also sealed in this temple alongside me."

"Whaaat?!"

Iberin started in shock.

"But the Demon King, too, lost his power and is bound somewhere, just as I am."

"Then we just have to find the Demon King and destroy him?"

"The Demon King has taken that child."

"……That child?"

"The one who was by your side."

Iberin blinked blankly.

When she'd opened her eyes she'd been here, and she'd just assumed she'd met with Demedeto.

But Lyssel had encountered the Demon King?

"Ah, th-then."

Iberin, now drained of color, cried out to Demedeto.

"Lyssel! Where's Lyssel?!"

"……So he's met the Demon King."

"What — what did you say? You have to do something, you're a god!"

Weakened or not, he was the Demon King.

Beside herself with worry for Lyssel, Iberin lost her composure and thrashed.

"…I'm sorry."

Demedeto, having lost nearly all her power, couldn't step in.

But watching the situation was at least possible.

There was nothing for it but to hope that Lyssel pulled through.

And Lyssel didn't take long to kill the Demon King and meet Demedeto.