“I see…”

After Cy revealed to me in no uncertain terms the location of the ‘missing’ Thousand Throne of darkness, I had asked Charlotte to report to me while we walked through the tower, towards the basement.

“Good work, Charlotte. Have your vampires continue monitoring this ‘Emily’... And these ‘Angel’s Wings’, too, while you are at it.”

“As ord’red. What o’ the Black Ravens?”

“Who…? Ah, the party who assaulted you? Leave them be. There is no need to concern yourself with every ant that believes you desirable, just like I will not speak to every single demon who would have my position. ‘Twould cost me too much time for no reason.”

“Und’rstood.”

A sudden thought shot through my head.

“... Ah, yes, Cy. After the… gift… I have another question for you.”

“Gotcha, gotcha. Look, we’re here.”

She gestured towards a heavy stone door, nowhere near as decorated as the doors in the castle. Still, it was not unpleasant, appearance-wise.

But the aura it exuded was the true impressive part. Despite being nothing more than a door, it managed to give me visions of death and decay, as though I was looking at a corpse.

“... Remind me again, Cy.”

“ ‘Sup?”

“Why do you have a dungeon in your tower?”

“C’mon, that’s not important~”

I squinted at her.

She squinted back.

I was the first to back off. Nothing good would come of provoking her. That much, I knew.

“In any case, if the ‘gift’ is down here, then I presume I was correct when I suspected…”

“Yup. Ding ding ding! I went fishing, and I left the biggest catch for you.”

In other words, she had gotten her hands on a saint. Indeed, it matched up with what I knew—after all, Remiel had been sent to enlist the great sage’s cooperation.

Absurd.

Did Lady Luciel truly believe Cy would pick her side? Preposterous.

And the end result was this.

“... Davna. Navillus. Do not look, do not listen. This is for your own sake.”

I did not trust Cy to have chosen a restraining method that was suitable to be shown to children.

“Gotcha, Master!”

“Navillus will, obey?”

They turned away, and Davna covered her ears, for good measure.

With a small gesture and a touch of magic, I opened the door.

A dark room, lit only by a few candles. Shoved away in the corner, a pile of corpses, and—

The clattering of chains as a girl crawled away from the door, perhaps startled by the sudden influx of light.

Remiel. The Holy Saint of Healing. The Hero with the skill to improve the effect of every healing spell cast in her vicinity. The ultimate support.

And…

With gentle steps, I approached. There was a definite sense of fear in her innocent, golden eyes as she looked at me.

The most innocent of children. The girl who never should have become a Saint to begin with. Ever timid, never speaking up, never disagreeing with anyone. The only reason she had become a Saint was that she did not dare refuse.

“Remiel…”

“H-how do you… My name…”

Quivering, she attempted to crawl further away from me, but the clattering chains kept her where she was.

I knelt down, stretched out my hand, and gently cupped her cheek. After a few moments, I wiped away her tears.

“Remiel… You never wished for this to happen, did you?”

She had been sent on a veritable suicide mission. Perhaps, Lady Luciel had planned to use Remiel’s disarming, innocent charm to sway Cy to her side… But more likely, she wanted to make sure I could not get my hands on one of her Aspects, by giving the girl to the great sage instead.

Unfortunately for her, that had backfired.

“Wh-who… Who are you…?”

Indeed, Remiel was nothing but a sweet, innocent little girl, who had committed no wrongs.

“I am… Aye, I am he who rules demonkind. I am Astaroth. He who has sworn to return the world to its proper state. And in addition, I am…”

She did not have the strength to resist my embrace.

“I am your old friend. I am Arthur, the Hero who swore to make the world a better place. You do not deserve this, Remiel. You do not…”

I was loathe to perform an experiment like this on an old friend, let alone the girl I liked best even amongst the seven Saints… But circumstances did not allow anything else. Hearing my previous name certainly sent her into a state of confusion, but at this rate, it would turn out the same as it had with Theliel.

That could not be allowed.

No more.

I would lose no more of my old friends.

I absolutely refused.

That day, I had lost enough of my friends to that absurd monster of an angel. I would not allow Lady Luciel to take any more from me.

Enough was enough. I was tired of this stupid story.

The demon king, forced to kill his former friends? Absurd. Absurd, absurd, absurd. To hell with that.

Enough. Enough. Enough. Enough. No more, no more, no more, no more—

I was the demon king, for crying out loud. Making things go my way, possible or not, whether by misleading words or by brute force, was supposed to be my forte.

I would have no more of this.

My heart filled with conviction, I allowed ‘myself’ to spread out.

The overflowing darkness at the core of my soul, amplified by several layers of divinity, spread around the room, eating away at all it touched. The chains on the wall, the corpses in the corners, the candlelight, up high—it all melted away, dropping to the ground as black sludge. Miasma.

I cared not. The only thing I was looking at was that thing. Perhaps, if I melted it away instead of simply destroying it, the memories it stole, the personality it stole, they would leak back, returning to their former owner.

A completely baseless theory, but my intuition told me there was a chance it would work.

Thus, I had no path but to try.

I felt a presence approach me from behind.

A warm, soft body embraced me. Entropy, too, imitated me—she may have lacked my conviction, and my bond with the girl, but she more than made up for it with power.

Letting out a scream of anguish, the Azalyth melted away, the black miasma seeping into Remiel’s body.

Several gasps leaked from her mouth, and then she surrendered herself to my embrace, sobbing her heart out.

***

It took longer than I had expected for her to calm down, but she managed.

“Do you remember now, Remiel?”

Given she was no longer crying, I had dropped the embrace and returned to a standing position.

“Yes… Yes, I remember, Arthur.”

About me. About herself. About our allies, lost along the way.

“Tell me, Arthur… The other Saints, are they…”

“Theliel, Guriel and Sarandiel are dead. Saniel has joined my side as a monster.”

“Th-then… What about Maliel, and what about sis?”

“Maliel and Rachiel are alive and well, as far as I know. I have not yet run into them.”

“I… Mmh, gotcha…”

She cast her gaze down. Really, it was understandable.

“So… you’ve become the scary bad guy, huh?” she asked, a hint of desperation in her voice.

“Well, I suppose so.”

Though her eyes were still red from all the crying, she managed a laugh.

I hesitated a moment, but managed to voice my question nonetheless.

“Remiel, would you join me?”

She seemed genuinely shocked by my question. It took several seconds, but she managed a response.

“You’d… Let me?”

“What makes you think otherwise?”

“You were always… So against me fighting…”

Despite her words, she did not seem to actually have disliked that part about me.

“I always was, and I always will be, Remiel. I would not have you join me in combat. No, I will repeat the question I have already asked you once before.”

I cleared my throat. I could practically feel Tempest’s gaze, from behind, boring into my back.

“Remiel… Would you become my little sister?”

Indeed, I had already asked her this, once in the past. Before I became the demon king. Before I met Entropy, before my allies were annihilated… Indeed, even before Remiel had become a Saint. Back when we were just two Heroes—a young man and a little girl.

Yet back then, she had vehemently refused, insisting she did not need to be protected. I had respected her decision, though I had always stayed reluctant to rely on a child as a comrade.

But now, her answer could not have been more different—

“Yes!” she said, smiling through her tears.

***

“Uhm… Asty, I’m really happy for ya—seriously, seriously! I wasn’t expecting you to pull it off!”

After a few more sobs from Remiel, Cy entered the room, in what must have been the most subtle way she could manage.

Despite that, Remiel still felt the need to hide behind me—reasonable enough, she did appear a bit… roughed up, and Cy was the only possible culprit.

“That sentence structure sounds like you are going to append a ‘but’ on the end, Cy.”

“Well, I am. Uh… This is a little hard to ask, but… What’re ya gonna do about the Aspect?”

I froze up. Behind me, I could feel Remiel do the same.

“Well, ya could just do the same thing ya did to Saniel, but… I feel like ya’d be, y’know, reluctant to do that?”

“That judgment is correct, Cy. If possible, I would prefer not to behead my newly obtained little sister.”

“I thought so… If ya don’t mind a somewhat weak connection between soul and body, I could help?”

“Ah, your dominion over souls, is it…”

“Um!”

In spite of the situation, Remiel still managed to speak up, loud enough to draw our attention.

“What is it, Remiel? Ah, you do not need to worry about the moron with the cat ears. She will not hurt you any further.”

“Uh, could you just, uh, tell me what you’re talking about? Beheading, and souls, and stuff… It sounds scary…”

“Ah… Well, that is not unreasonable. To put it simply, Remiel… I wish to become a god.”

“A god?”

“Aye. So I can be with my beloved forever… Nay, so I can be with all my beloved forever. My goddess, and my sworn friend, and my Demon Generals… and you, of course. Thus, I am gathering divinity… Part of which is hidden inside the Aspects you saints have.”

“Ah… We were told not to die, no matter what. Was that…”

“Aye. A saint who dies will pass on her aspect to the killer.”

“I see… Then when you said Saniel’d become a monster, did you mean—?”

“Indeed. She has died once, and has been reborn as an undead.”

“An undead…”

“Ah, but do not get the wrong idea. She is not some mindless zombie. She is in possession of all her memories and mental faculties.”

“Right…”

She looked like she was having trouble parsing the concept. Considering what I was telling her, I could not blame her for such.

“Ah, yes, let me introduce you to a few people, Remiel. Come, come, this way. Let us leave this dreary place.”

“R-right.”

***

“... And finally, this is Cy—Cyci. I am sure you already figured out her identity earlier.”

The only sound that left Remiel’s throat was a dry laugh. Indeed, I had introduced her to my five Demon Generals, as well as Entropy, and them to her.

I thought I saw a look of envy float up on Charlotte’s face when I introduced Remiel as my little sister, but I decided to make no mention of it.

“So then, Cy. This idea you had?”

“Ah, yeah, it’s simple enough. I pull her soul out of her body, then you kill her body and bring it back to life, and then I stuff the soul back in. It won’t be perfect, but it won’t turn her into an undead, either. Though, it’ll leave a period during which she’ll be extra influenced by blessings… You could take advantage of that ‘n give her an extra strong one, if ya wanted.”

“Blessings… Ah, yes, speaking of, Cy.”

I cleared my throat and asked the question that had popped into my head earlier.

“What would happen if I were to bless my Demon Generals?”

“What’d happen? Hmm… That’s a surprisingly difficult question, y’know? They’re all strong-willed in their own way, so there’s no danger of painting them over… No? They might be able to take that power and make it their own? Yeah, I’m not sure. If you’re lucky, they might be able to evolve, though. Ah, to maximise the effect, you should bestow the blessing in a way that emphasises your bond. In your case, a pat on the head, or words of praise, or something…”

“Our bond? Hm, hm… I see. Aye, I understand. You lot. Line up.”

At my instruction, my Demon Generals formed an orderly line, next to each other, though there seemed to be no real logic to their sequence.

I stepped up to the first in line. Davna. The little dragon.

The girl who had no parents or family, not even a single member of her own race to call a relative. The girl who looked to me as her parental figure, and the girl I—

I pressed my lips to her forehead.

Next. Tempest. The mad witch.

The woman who was unlike any other witch. With a deep passion, for which she would throw away her very life. In a way, she was not unlike me. I—

I pressed my lips to her forehead.

The third in line. Navillus. The adorable slime.

The creature which tottered between sentience and non-sentience. At times, she showed an animalistic attachment to me, and yet at times, she showed a surprising intellect, and a desire to be useful. I—

I pressed my lips to her forehead.

Fourth. Lilith. The lazy devil.

The girl who had once had her family taken from her, and thus now placed a value on bonds above all else. She did not like to put effort into things, but when she did, it was always for the sake of others. I—

I pressed my lips to her forehead.

And lastly, Charlotte. The loyal vampire, trembling in anticipation as she watched me approach.

The girl who had had no family, no friends, no equals for thousands of years, and who had resigned herself to live that fate forever. The girl who stood alone at the peak, until she met me. Her, too, I—

I pressed my lips to her forehead.

Indeed, I loved them all. Aye, how I loved them. Certainly, it was by no means the same emotion I felt towards Entropy—but it was love, all the same. They were my precious family. I would not let anything happen to them.

Tempest and Lilith froze up in shock. Davna excitedly threw her arms around my waist, Navillus did the same from behind, whereas Charlotte trembled with joy.

And Cy—

“I see, I see… They’re your precious daughters, aren’t they? Y’sure know how to make a girl envious, Asty.”

“What, do you want a kiss, too? All you have to do is approach, Cy.”

“I don’t like that look on your face, so I’ll refuse.”

What look? I was only going to curse her a little. How rude.

And yet that little bit of teasing was interrupted—

By the sound of a sob, followed by the sensation of someone clinging to my chest. Someone substantially heavier than Davna or Navillus. Indeed, someone with an adult body…

“Lilith, are you… crying?” I asked, barely able to keep the shock from entering my voice.

“Sh-shaddup. I’m not cryin’. No way. No… No way. I’m… I’m not…”

I decided not to mention the stains she was putting on my suit, or the fact that she most certainly was crying. I just wrapped an arm around her shoulder and pulled her close.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“Nuh-uh. Later. For now, just… Lemme stay like this. Please?”

“Of course.”