"...That's impossible. There's no way that could work."
"You know, it's funny — everyone I've defeated pulls the exact same routine. I'm starting to suspect you all rehearse your lines in advance."
I walked toward the corner of the art studio.
There sat the bag I'd brought from the cabin in the snowy mountains.
I rummaged through the bag and pulled out a chain. It was the kind that disrupted the flow of mana itself. I picked it up and headed back toward the woman. The chain dragged across the floor behind me, letting out a sharp, ominous scrape.
"You despicable son of a bitch. You think you'll get away with something like this...?"
"Well now. Most things in life are a gamble, when it comes down to it. And judging by how things have been playing out, I don't think I'm the one who's lost. If anything, I'd say the odds leaned a bit more in my favor."
"My subordinates are monitoring everything... You get down on your knees and apologize this instant!"
"Oh my. How terrifying."
I hummed a tune.
It was the song Daisy used to sing to me whenever I drifted off to sleep. Compared to Daisy, my singing was laughably terrible. Ignoring pitch and rhythm alike, I belted out the melody however I pleased.
"I'm warning you ahead of time — stay still."
I approached the woman with the chain in hand. Both my hands were already occupied with daggers, so I planned to start by shackling her ankles. But the moment I moved to lock her ankles with the cuffs attached to the chain, the woman kicked out toward me.
"Oh, come on."
If I hadn't been careful, that kick would've caught me right in the face.
The woman glared at me through tear-filled eyes. Was it from the pain? From the humiliation? She clenched her teeth. Her voice seeped through in a ragged, shredded rasp.
"Don't touch my body."
"......"
I let out a sigh.
In situations like this, I truly felt the absence of charisma. Bael, Agares, Barbatos, even Paimon — their voices carried something akin to a verbal spell. The kind that made your heart pound as though it might burst raw from your chest. Intimidation. The power to compel the other party to acquiesce to your commands of their own accord — not to acquiesce would simply be unthinkable.
I, unfortunately, always seemed to lack that quality. For better, you could call me a gentle man; for worse, a pushover. Why couldn't the people of this world understand my earnest desire to always resolve problems through kind conversation?
Was it a matter of sincerity? Did I need to show more sincerity, then?
I pulled a spear from its place on the wall, where it had been hanging as decoration.
"Huh?"
It was an exceedingly thin spear. So light that even someone of my naturally gentle constitution could lift it with ease. It was less a weapon for fighting people and more the sort used to hunt wild boar.
"Wait — wait a moment."
And so, with the sensation of driving a spear point downward into an animal, I thrust the spear into the woman's thigh. With a sickening thud, the feeling of muscle being torn apart traveled up the shaft and into my palm. Whether it was blocked by tough muscle or caught on bone, the spear tip came to a stop midway.
"Aaaaaaah—!"
I pulled the spear out. Blood gushed from the dark red hole like a backed-up sewer. Since the withdrawal had scraped the muscle to shreds all over again, the woman's scream intensified even further.
I tossed the spear onto the floor. The shaft bounced twice before rolling away with a clatter. I grabbed the woman's chin with my right hand and twisted her face toward me. Drool was spilling from her mouth, her facial muscles spasming uncontrollably from the extreme pain.
"Didn't I warn you beforehand?"
"Ugh, aagh… kkh…"
"I have no intention of killing you. I told you that this world ends only when I die. I believe you find yourself in the same position. Even if I kill you in this world, you'll revive just fine over there. That's a bit too far removed from the structure I'm aiming for."
With my left hand, I pressed down hard on her thigh — right next to the hole.
The woman convulsed. Her facial muscles, beyond her control, twisted into random spasms, and her eyes rolled back slightly as though she might lose consciousness at any moment. Groans — broken, choked — poured out ceaselessly.
"My plan is not to kill you outright, but to inflict pain. However, how much pain you endure can certainly be lessened depending on how cooperative you are. For example, to the extent that I'm merely kneading the area around the wound, like now."
I plunged my index finger deep into the wound.
Another scream.
An unpleasant warmth enveloped my fingertip.
"Something like tearing open a wound with your own finger, yes. There are various levels of pain on offer. It's a matter of attitude and reaction. No matter how miserable life may be, surely it's our duty to at least scramble about trying to ease that misery."
"……, ……."
The woman's cheeks trembled violently.
Not nodding her head was probably the last shred of pride she had left.
I pulled my right hand—now thoroughly drenched in tears—away from the woman's face. I retrieved the chain I had left to the side and fastened it around her ankle. This time, the woman didn't kick. She seemed more docile than before, and that was satisfying.
I tied both legs and both arms to the chair. For the record, I did remove the dagger from the back of her hand first. However, I immediately pinned her hand back down against the chair's armrest with the dagger. All I had done was change the location. The woman now lacked even the strength to scream, managing only to froth at the mouth while letting out the occasional groan.
"If only you had been willing to talk from the start, things would have gone so much smoother."
"……you bastard……you were the one……"
"My apologies. I have a habit of only listening to things I enjoy hearing."
The woman fell silent. Her gaze still burned with killing intent. I had only cracked a joke to lighten the mood, but the response was lukewarm, to say the least. This was exactly why people with no sense of humor were so difficult to deal with. She was a little lacking in social skills.
To make sure she didn't bleed to death even by accident, I dripped a potion onto her wounds. I wondered what it would feel like to have a blade still pressed into the back of your hand while the skin regenerated. Would it feel like growing an extra bone? I had never experienced it, so I couldn't say.
"Mm."
I retrieved a particularly fine bottle of whiskey from the cabinet. Here, whiskey was a so-called trendy item that had only recently started to spread. For someone like me who only dealt in wine and beer, it was a new challenge. I poured some into a glass, took a sip, and a sweet aroma rose up.
"This has a charm of its own, doesn't it?"
"……."
The woman glared at me as I sat across from her. The potion seemed to have helped her regain a bit of composure.
"What are you trying to get out of me?"
"Hm?"
I tilted my head.
The woman bit her lip.
"Stop playing dumb. You grabbed me because you wanted to negotiate. Shit, you're making a fool of yourself right now. If you'd just shut your eyes and killed yourself, I was already planning to grant everything you wanted……."
"You seem to be under some sort of misconception."
I moistened my tongue with the whiskey. It was definitely stronger than wine or beer. I'd have to make this my go-to drink from now on.
"I have absolutely nothing I want from you."
"……What?"
"I simply made preparations in case you came looking for me while I sat here doing nothing."
The alcohol was delicious.
But yes — the snacks were lacking. If there had been some chicken skewers here, they would have paired perfectly. Add some green onions and it would have been the ideal accompaniment.
"Fortunately, my expectations turned out to be correct. I'm relieved that all the things I prepared didn't go to waste. You can be happy about it. You're a guest worth treating."
"What are you talking about……I have no idea what kind of nonsense you've been spouting since a while ago!"
The woman's face twisted.
Could she be upset that I was sipping fine liquor by myself? Sorry, but this was something I couldn't concede. I'd only given up my drink to Lapis two or three times at most.
"Do you have any idea what kind of feat you accomplished? You're ranked first. Out of tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of agents handpicked from every world, you set an overwhelming record at number one! You can grant any wish, virtually without limit."
"Thanks for boosting my ego. It's already inflated about as far as it can go, so it doesn't really help, though."
"Any wish can come true!"
The woman screamed nervously.
It was something I'd noticed from our very first meeting, but this woman was clearly suffering from a severe case of hysterical personality disorder. I felt slightly sorry for her. How had such a young woman ended up so broken?
"You can bring every person you've ever loved into reality."
"Interesting."
"Not just a resemblance in appearance and personality — all the memories you shared with your children preserved intact……living forever in a mansion like a palace, enjoying happiness and pleasures that ordinary lesser beings could never dream of."
"Quite the tempting offer, isn't it."
The problem was the chicken skewers.
Without the chicken skewers, what was the point of anything, you fool. The whiskey was dwindling fast. At this rate, there was a real chance I'd empty the entire bottle without so much as a snack to go with it. Wait. Hold on. Was there still a way? If I brought one more bottle, the problem would be solved neatly and completely.
The woman's expression grew agitated.
"Wh-what, if you don't like that, you can manipulate this world however you want. Want to go back to the past? Want to change the actions you took? It's all possible. All you have to do is report it to the higher-ups, and having it fall under your management is really just a matter of time."
"A truly generous proposal."
I rose from my seat and retrieved two bottles of whiskey. Indeed. It was remarkable, but humans possessed two whole hands, which meant the feat of carrying two bottles of liquor at once was entirely possible. What a wondrous thing.
"Oh, right. But summoning chicken skewers or anything like that—is that beyond your abilities?"
"......"
For some reason, the woman's face had turned deathly pale.
So it was a difficult request after all.
The woman had told me that not interfering with me was in her best interest. In other words, it meant that if she did intervene, the fact would be automatically recorded. I had no way of knowing the finer details, but the woman did not have the authority to deceive this world's system. In short, she couldn't act like some sort of transcendent being.
She was probably only permitted to observe me. Or perhaps she could only manipulate things from the outside rather than the inside. Now that she was inside, the woman could no longer wield godlike power.
From the very beginning.
There was a 'need' for her to come find me—specifically to exploit the vulnerability of me being weakened by alcohol.
The woman had essentially already revealed half the cards in her hand to me.
Of course, I had no obligation to tell her any of this. The world was a curious thing. Something that one person could grasp at a mere glance, another might know nothing about, simply going along with whatever situation they found themselves in. The woman was putting on quite the impressive show of superiority, but she was no different. Just how far did she underestimate me?
"So then, why did you bring me here?"
"Didn't I already say? I needed someone to talk to."
I poured the newly opened whiskey into my glass, dribbling it in a thin stream. The amber liquid with its golden hue was dazzlingly beautiful. I was not an alcoholic. Just an ordinary connoisseur of fine drink.
"I intend to quietly hole myself up in this world until it ends. Whether that will be thousands of years, tens of thousands of years, or—even if it's somewhat hard to imagine—a billion or trillion years, no one knows."
It was essentially the same work as when I had been Dantalion.
The Demon Lord sustains the Demon Lord's Castle by existing. You could say the scale has simply grown a bit grander. I sustain this world—this place where every trace of me remains—by existing.
Sometime in the past, Ibar once dramatically dubbed me the reincarnation of Angolmois. Perhaps prophecies truly do exist. In a form I never could have anticipated, Ibar's metaphor-that-wasn't-a-metaphor had come to pass.
If one who guards a castle is called the Demon Lord of Ten Thousand Demons...
...then one who guards a world is surely worthy of being called the Demon God of Ten Thousand Demons.
All the more apt was the Angolmois metaphor, given that I was nothing more than the lingering soul left behind after the man called Dantalion had died.
"No matter how ironclad my reason may be, eons upon eons are still a bit unfamiliar, wouldn't you say? To keep one's sanity, one needs at least a minimum amount of conversation. That has always been the way of things."
He smiled gently.
"Be my conversation partner until the world ends."
"......"
"Oh, I'll need the occasional bout of feverish delirium, so there will be torture involved. I have every confidence you can endure that much. Think of it as a valuable life experience."
Silence fell.
After a long while, the woman spoke through trembling lips.
"You're... insane."
I emptied the second glass of whiskey.
A smile curved the corners of my lips.
"Everyone who's ever dealt with me says the same thing. How curious."