244

Chapter 244 — Even in a Life Like This (7)

After parting ways with Meister, Deathbringer turned those parting words over in his mind again and again.

Yet every time, he arrived at only one conclusion.

Could it be?

Surely not.

There was no way, but—

“His memory… is gone……?”

Could it be that the Demon Knight had no memories of himself?

Even if they were not completely gone, could there be parts he simply could not remember?

Surely……?

“There’s no way…….”

The Demon Knight very rarely displayed his intellectual abilities outright, so Deathbringer could not be certain.

But from everything he had seen so far, the man did not seem like the forgetful type.

Even taking into account the possibility that he simply never showed it, Deathbringer’s judgment remained the same.

He had never once seen the Demon Knight cover something up because he had forgotten it, nor flounder because something had slipped his mind.

In other words, at the very least, he was not someone who simply forgot little, trivial things.

But at the same time, Meister’s words bothered him far too much to just dismiss them.

And then there was the very first piece of evidence that had given rise to all these suspicions: the fact that the Demon Knight had bought information about himself.

Considering that people generally purchased things because they needed them, the fact that he had purchased information about himself led to only one conclusion.

No matter how deeply Deathbringer thought about it, that remained true.

“No. There’s no way. Surely not…….”

But.

But still.

Was it possible for someone to live solely for revenge while possessing incomplete memories, clinging clearly to only the single moment when their family died?

…Could a person like that really exist?

“It can’t be…….”

Maybe he had simply been curious about how much information concerning him had spread.

After all, he had only just begun living as a fugitive.

If someone intended to conceal their identity and live in hiding, checking how much information was already circulating about them was essential.

Only by knowing that and preparing accordingly could one make concealment easier.

So there was nothing strange about him buying information about himself.

Nothing strange…

Nothing…

Strange……

…Even if it was information the Guild already possessed, compiling all of it must have taken months.

Which meant the Demon Knight would have had to be considering escape several months ago…

Wasn’t that even stranger?

“It has to be something else…….”

Then had he really commissioned the Guild because there were blank spaces in his own memories and he wanted to know what belonged there?

“It… had to be something else…….”

The hypothesis that was less miserable did not fit the facts.

And the hypothesis that fit the facts was miserable.

Caught between the two, Deathbringer’s lips trembled.

He did not know how large the blank space in the Demon Knight’s memories was, but realizing that it could not possibly be small made the grief all the worse.

“Damn it…….”

Because if the Demon Knight’s past, delivered this time, was what had caused him to escape—

if memories he had lost and then regained were what had finally moved him—

then could that blank space truly have been small……?

Especially when, until recently, he had even forgotten that he had lost his memories at all?

And even if he had known about the memory loss, it was just as bleak.

Normally, someone aware that they had forgotten something would have tried long ago to recover those memories.

Yet the Demon Knight had only recently made the request.

Did that not mean he had placed no value on his own loss until now?

In other words, he had been living with the attitude that losing something as insignificant as his own memories was acceptable so long as he could devote himself entirely to revenge.

“Fuck… Is he even human? Is that human……?”

Was that truly a person?

Would it not be more accurate to call him a beast?

That.

Something like that.

A life like that.

…Ah.

Is death truly the only thing capable of saving you?

* * *

The questioning did not take long.

Daniel had not been involved with that man for very long, after all.

But the intensity of the betrayal he felt bore no relation whatsoever to the amount of time they had known each other.

I knew it.

I knew this would happen.

The resentment swelling inside him scraped viciously at his skin and constricted his lungs.

The pain felt as though fingernails were raking across his organs, so severe that it made him sick of everything.

His head was spinning.

But what if he collapsed here?

That would be exactly what the demon that had deceived him wanted, would it not?

Daniel clenched his teeth and fought to steady his blurring vision.

He could not tell whether it actually steadied.

His chest felt tight, and his breathing quickened several times.

He wanted to die.

No.

He wanted to kill.

He wanted to tear apart his enemy—that wicked thing that had deceived him yet again.

That damned demon that had killed his parents and then stood before him pretending to know nothing.

He truly wanted to—

『I don’t know what misunderstanding you’ve had, but let it go now. Maybe I’m saying this because I don’t know everything… but he didn’t seem like a dangerous person.』

『Yeah. I didn’t spend that much time with him since I was tending the shop, but… I got pretty much the same impression. He seemed more like someone something bad would happen to, not someone who would do something bad.』

『Mm, that Ahjussi? He was awesome! He showed me his sword, even let me touch it, and, um, he shared some mulled wine with me too! He’s a nice Ahjussi. I want to see him again. Do you think he’ll come back sometime?』

…And yet, at the same time, Daniel wanted to ask.

Why had he done it?

Demons might be born from evil and act only through evil, but even so, how could he do something like that?

Had it really been so enjoyable to show kindness to Daniel’s remaining family and win their affection with the very hands that had murdered his parents?

Schutz still wanted to see him again.

“…I got permission from the captain. Go rest early.”

“No. I’d rather work. Work……”

Daniel bit hard at his lip at his senior’s consideration.

He wanted to do something, if only so that he would not vent his unexpressed rage on someone undeserving.

But objectively speaking, he did not seem capable of it.

The mere fact that his senior’s kindness was making him angry proved that much.

No matter what Daniel attempted right now, he would eventually lose control of his anger.

Even if what he attempted was something meant to calm that anger.

“…I’m sorry.”

In the end, he clenched his teeth and apologized.

There was no helping it.

He despised himself for being unable to control one personal emotion and having to withdraw when everyone’s circumstances were already so bad…

but stubbornly refusing to admit it and broadening the range of people he inconvenienced would be even more detestable.

Right now, removing himself was the better choice.

“Don’t worry about it too much. You can just work more next time.”

At his senior’s consideration, Daniel reluctantly nodded.

He headed toward the lodging they had prepared earlier.

“Are you truly certain you require no escort?”

“I have managed perfectly well without one until now. They already have plenty to do. Let them rest.”

But then someone he could not ignore entered his field of vision.

The rage he had barely suppressed flared all at once and took over his mind.

Had it not been for the patience and faith cultivated through his years as an Inquisitor, he would have rushed forward without warning.

Drawing on the very last of his restraint, Daniel marched toward the figure and reached out through clenched teeth.

“Archmage.”

His hand closed around the Archmage’s wrist somewhat roughly, though not roughly enough to be interpreted as hostile.

“You are……”

“I do not know whether you remember me.”

Apparently the surprise of recognizing his face outweighed the displeasure of having her wrist suddenly seized.

The Archmage’s eyes widened.

She did not even seem to consider pulling her hand free.

“Of course I remember. How could I possibly forget you?”

Thanks to that, Daniel’s anger lessened slightly.

The other party—an elderly woman, no less—was looking at him with nothing but straightforward puzzlement and not a shred of hostility.

That cooled him down, if only a little.

The fact that she herself was not the target of his grudge helped as well.

At last, he managed to release her wrist.

“Then please, would you speak with me?”

But a slight reduction in his anger did not mean the fury had vanished.

Daniel spoke with his molars still clenched.

The resonance rising from his vein-strained throat sounded closer to something inanimate than to a human voice.

It was that rigid.

The Archmage, who had no idea what was happening, grew serious as well.

“…Very well.”

Fortunately, she was perceptive enough to deserve the title of Great Sage.

“However, if we are going to speak, moving elsewhere would be better for both you and me.”

Daniel did not reject the suggestion.

After all, arguing with the Great Sage in full view of everyone was not something he wanted either.

Regardless of who was right or wrong, it was hardly appropriate behavior for a priest.

“Come to the lodging.”

“Yes.”

And so he followed the Archmage toward her lodging.

Even during the nearly ten-minute walk, the volcanic anger boiling within him did not cool easily.

Still, it was better than before.

He had gained a little more room to think.

Only a little.

“This is merely somewhere to sleep, so there is nothing much here. I hope you will excuse it.”

“That is fine.”

As though he would expect hospitality in a situation like this.

He was not in any state of mind to accept it anyway.

Daniel acknowledged her warning.

Swish.

At that exact moment, the tent flap opened.

Read only on MUGEX

“Goddammit…….”

Someone who had been curled up, crying while trying even to suppress the sound of breathing, was gently exposed to their sight.

“You?”

“……?!”

Naturally, both the Archmage who saw him and the person who had just been caught crying jolted in surprise.

Even Daniel did.

“…Would it be better if I came back a little later?”

Given that his profession regarded service to others as a virtue, it was difficult to remain openly furious in front of someone else’s tears.

That remained true even when the crying person was someone Daniel found extremely difficult to deal with and when his rage had risen all the way to the top of his head.

The sheer intensity of that anger only made his insides boil even more fiercely…

but enduring it was still the proper thing to do.

Daniel finally forced the words out.

“I would appreciate that.”

The Archmage agreed.

“Why?”

Someone else did not.

“Didn’t you come because you had business with me too? If you’ve got something to say, say it now. Don’t make me look at your damn face twice.”

Deathbringer scrubbed forcefully at his cheek with one hand and rose.

His eyes, sunken hollow beneath crushing fatigue, looked even deeper with the shadows around them, almost like caves.

“You only have one thing to ask anyway, don’t you?”

And from within those hollow eyes, the only things retaining any light gleamed.

Though green symbolized nature, those eyes brought decline to mind before prosperity, and death before life.

Was it because they did not possess a pure green, but instead held a strange murkiness?

Because that murkiness resembled the thickness and revulsion of swallowing poison?

No.

Perhaps the problem was not the color of his eyes at all.

“Say it!”

Because despair, frustration, resignation, emptiness…

those kinds of emotions were perhaps the greatest poisons a human being could possess.

“Insult Sir Demon Knight in front of me!”

But Daniel was in no position to notice that and show consideration.

That was the problem.

Sir.

The word Deathbringer used for that wicked thing that had deceived them all shattered the dam Daniel had barely kept intact.

Or perhaps it was the faint trace of faith audible in the way Deathbringer spoke the title that pulled the trigger.

“You think I can’t?! You think I can’t say it?!!”

All the resentment Daniel had suppressed forced its way through his vocal cords.

“I should never have trusted him! I shouldn’t have! Even though I knew how cunning and abominable demons are, I still—still did it again!!”

“Sir Demon Knight isn’t abominable!”

“Fool! After being deceived to this extent, do you still wish to believe in him!? He betrayed your defense of him, and even the testimony of the people precious to me!!”

“Sir Demon Knight didn’t betray anyone!”

“If this is not betrayal, then what is?! I trusted him! Just as all of you did, I chose to trust him! And look at the situation now! In the end—he was a demon, was he not!!”

“Shut up! Don’t call him a demon!! Someone like you, who hasn’t seen a damn thing, has no right to call that man anything!!”

“If I have no right to judge him, then who does?!”

“Me.”

At that moment, an unusually calm voice cut through the shouting.

Wham!

A vicious impact immediately followed.

Then someone fell.

“……?!”

“Wh-What……”

“…You.”

Daniel blinked after being punched across the face and sent sprawling.

Directly before him, hair of mingled brown and pink swayed.

“What the hell do you think you’re—!”

Wham!

Naturally, Daniel was about to focus less on questioning the situation and more on the fact that someone had just hit him.

A follow-up kick stopped that.

The foot struck him squarely under the jaw.

When a single kick failed to knock him unconscious, Meister kicked him several more times.

The Inquisitor’s consciousness snapped off.

Unable to keep up with how quickly everything had happened, the Archmage and the furious Deathbringer both froze with their mouths hanging open.

“Is he dead?!”

“Did you kill him?!”

“He’s not dead.”

“He’s not dead, okay?”

Nobody noticed that Berserk was standing behind Meister, or that she had spoken.

* * *

The Archmage closed her eyes for a moment as dizziness washed over her.

Inside the darkness, the events of the last few minutes arranged themselves neatly once again.

First had been her encounter with Inquisitor Daniel.

He had asked to speak, so they had moved somewhere private.

Then they had discovered Deathbringer already inside, and not only that, but he had been crying.

Yes.

That had been the beginning.

Then where had matters escalated?

Probably when Deathbringer had picked a fight with Inquisitor Daniel first.

Of course, Daniel choosing to rise to the provocation instead of avoiding it had played no small part, but regardless.

Now, lastly, how had the situation ended?

She had been anxiously wavering between trying to stop the two arguing men and being unable to simply stand by—

and then Meister had arrived.

Meister had……

…Meister had knocked Inquisitor Daniel unconscious before she even had time to recognize the newcomer and say hello!

Yes!

Meister had punched him and kicked him until he passed out!

Having reorganized her memories in an attempt to understand the situation, the Archmage fell into shock all over again.

She had done it to recover her composure, but because the sequence of events was so absurd, it only made her dizzy again.

But who wouldn’t react that way?

Who would ever expect a newcomer to suddenly settle an entire dispute with their fists?

Especially when the person throwing those fists was, by profession, supposed to belong to the sort who pursued knowledge.

“Y-You. That is… what exactly……?”

“You called for me, didn’t you?”

Meanwhile, Meister apparently felt no regret whatsoever over what had just happened.

Completely ignoring the unconscious person lying nearby, Meister went straight to the reason for coming here.

The Archmage was rendered speechless again.

She had tried to call for Meister.

It was true that she had wanted to speak with Meister.

But…

was this really the moment for a conversation……?

“Were you not looking for me?”

“I was, but……”

“Then let’s talk.”

“No, I—”

The problem is the unconscious Inquisitor lying at your feet.

Unable to bring herself to say it aloud, the Archmage merely lowered her gaze.

Meister’s gaze followed hers.

“Ah, that’s fine.”

“What about that is fine?!!”

At last, Deathbringer exploded.

Whereas his previous outburst had been born of grief and anger, this one consisted entirely of bewildered outrage.

“But the more I think about it, everyone’ll probably believe me if I say I punched that bastard because thinking about it again pissed me off.”

“How the hell would that work?!”

“I’m telling you, it will.”

“Not only do I not believe you, but if that genuinely works as an excuse, doesn’t that mean there’s something seriously wrong with your life?!”

The opponent was not an easy one.

“I’ve always lived like this.”

Blue Coral.

How in the world did you raise your grandchild?

The Archmage suddenly wanted very badly to see her friend.