"Pheww."
Sweet smoke seeped out from between my lips.
Before my eyes, a beautiful girl sat with flushed cheeks, red as a freshly ripened apple, drunk on wine. In her right hand, fine wine. In her left, a cigarette crafted by a subordinate solely for me. This is what life is. This is what it means to be a man.
It's a beautiful life.
To express the emotions I'm feeling right now, I had no choice but to borrow the words of foreigners.
I gazed, slightly moved, at the cigarette smoke as it faded wistfully into the air. Ivar Lodbrok seemed to have misunderstood something, smiling smugly.
"Your Highness? If you've had enough, shall I take the wine away?"
"Heh. Someone whose tongue is already so loose doesn't scare me one bit."
"My tongue is perfectly fi-ine—?"
"Yeah, real perfect."
Your mouth has practically melted off your face. You can't control your expression at all.
I grabbed the bottle and chugged away. The girl's face, which had been brimming with confidence at first, grew darker and darker as the wine in the bottle dwindled. Before long the bottle was completely empty, and Ivar Lodbrok's expression turned sullen.
Maybe it was time to poke at her a little.
"Phew…"
As if I could hold on no longer, I let my head droop. At that, the girl's voice brightened slightly.
"Are you perhaps feeling unwell, Your Highness?"
"Mmm. No. Any more…phew, it's getting tough."
To sell the act, I dropped the bottle from my hand. Thanks to the carpet, the glass bottle landed softly. Ivar Lodbrok, apparently thinking that even if I was drunk, she was drunker, shot up from across from me and sat down in the seat beside me.
The girl stroked my back and spoke.
"Your Majesty? Shall we stop now? Then... would it be all right if I claim victory?"
At first glance it sounded like a worried remark, but joy was practically bursting from her voice.
Seeing her in such a disheveled state, she was actually quite cute. I even found myself thinking about whether I should knock her over and have my way with her. Ivar Lodbrok was a shrewd woman. She'd probably be delighted at the thought that entering into a physical relationship with me, a Demon Lord, would give her political leverage to exploit.
But it was still too soon. I wasn't particularly intoxicated by Ivar Lodbrok's beauty. I simply wanted to try conquering an official heroine as a devoted Dungeon Attack enthusiast.
I hung my head and waved my hand dismissively.
"That's it, that's it... I surrender! I just can't keep going. I give up. If there's anything you want to ask, go right ahead. I'll answer whatever you like."
"Then... Your Majesty. Forgive my presumption, but may I ask?"
Ivar Lodbrok stroked my back.
"How did you know my personal history... that I had been hiding my true form, that I had lost a former lover — such things? Were you already aware?"
"Ohh? You mean that? Simple. I have an ability to see the past."
I gave her the pre-prepared answer.
"An ability to see the past?"
"When I look at a person... what they went through in the old days, that sort of thing just naturally comes to mind. Well, it's not that impressive a skill. It doesn't always work. For instance, I can't see the pasts of other Demon Lords at all. It only comes up very rarely."
The girl muttered, "So it wasn't a prophetic ability, then..."
"If I may... the attack on the Habsburg imperial woman in Bruno — was that also—?"
"Ah, yes. That was just lucky. For some reason, it came to me the moment I laid eyes on her. Yes, I suppose what surfaces is whatever past the other person finds most painful... something along those lines, I'd imagine."
"I see."
Ivar Lodbrok appeared to accept the explanation.
"Your Majesty said that the very purpose of a Demon Lord's existence is questionable. What did you mean by that?"
"Hmm? Did I not explain? Whether it's Demonkin or human — drawing that distinction in the first place is one of the Demon Lords' little tricks."
I spoke while occasionally mixing in groans as if my head ached. I didn't forget to ramble on at length like a drunkard slurring through a monologue. Everything was designed to look like I was speaking my honest truth, while ensuring she'd dismiss it all as the sober thoughts hidden within intoxication.
"In the sense that they possess reason… yes. In the sense that they are rational beings, there is absolutely no difference between the human race and the demonkin. And what is a rational being? It is a free being. One who can control oneself. Yet because of the Demon Lords. Solely because of the Demon Lords, the demonkin have been stripped of their freedom…"
"……"
"For a demon to be reborn as a true demonkin, the Demon Lords must first be wiped out entirely. Yes. My objective is… my objective is to make every last Demon Lord disappear."
She drew in a sharp breath.
"Every single Demon Lord…?"
"That will be the beginning of everything. Ah, yes, exactly. Only then can the demonkin finally… truly live as rational beings."
"Bu—But. Your Excellency Dantalion, did you not lead the Crescent Alliance Army to success?"
"The important thing is balance."
I raised my head and looked her clearly in the eye.
"There is one thing the Demon Lords claim that is actually correct… namely, that Hell is far too barren a place for the demonkin to live in. Look at the orc tribes. The orcs who went out to the continent have thrived and multiplied across every corner of the land… and what about Hell? At most, there are a few thousand. The difference in environment between the continent and Hell is that stark…"
I picked up the wine bottle from the table and took a swig.
"Hrrgh. Now, if every Demon Lord were to die in this state, what would happen? Unprecedented chaos would erupt. And the human race would seize the opportunity to drive the demonkin off the continent entirely. Before eliminating the Demon Lords, we need to weaken the power of the human race first."
"Balance…"
Ivar Lodbrok murmured in a daze.
"Balance. Through prolonged war, we must properly whittle down the strength of both the human race and the Demon Lords' army. The Eighth Crescent Alliance Army was the first step toward that. We just happened to win a little too decisively. It was a miscalculation."
I stared straight into her pupils.
"And that's why I started a civil war."
"What do you mean…?"
Ivar Lodbrok's voice trembled.
"That war was Lord Agares and Lord Gamigin acting on their own initiative..."
"Mureu. Gamigin plotted the war yet received no punishment whatsoever. Barbatos, on the other hand, gave away a piece of the Plains Faction's territory. Do you think that was a coincidence?"
"You can't be suggesting that Lord Dantalion planned the war from the very beginning!"
I smiled.
"Agares is foolish, but not completely stupid. If he hadn't had an ally like Gamigin backing him, he never would have started the war. I did have to hand over the entire Moravia region to convince Gamigin, but so what? It wasn't a bad trade."
"...!"
The girl's violet pupils trembled.
"Thanks to that, I managed to weaken the Demon Lord Army's forces more or less. They no longer have the energy to continue the war against the Crescent Alliance Army. No — even if they did have the energy, they won't move. Do you know why?"
"...This one cannot fathom it."
"Heh heh, you must be drunk. You would've answered easily if this were any other time. It's simple. Suspicion has taken root within the Demon Lord Army. Agares has already started a war once. How could anyone guarantee that another Demon Lord won't stab their allies in the back?"
In truth, the Neutral Faction had halted their campaign against the Crescent Alliance after the civil war.
At any moment, their allies could betray them. Such incidents had occurred throughout history, and the most recent was Agares's betrayal. The 8th Crescent Alliance Army could now be considered essentially concluded.
"As a result, the human race has been given a chance to catch its breath. A fortunate outcome, wouldn't you say?"
"If the human race recovers its strength... will Your Lordship start another war?"
"I will."
I declared without hesitation.
"In the next war, I will push both the human race and the Demon Lord Army to the brink of annihilation. Even if every last Demon Lord dies, I will ensure the human race never dares to wage war again. Yes — leaving something like the Kingdom of Vernicia and the Kingdom of Castilla should do nicely... that way, the balance will be just about right."
"That is heresy! Utter and irredeemable heresy!"
The girl cried out, her voice rising with agitation.
"How many lives do you think will perish! Tens of thousands — perhaps even a million, regardless of race. You speak of returning freedom to the Demonkin, yet you would drive them to such deaths... it is an outrage beyond words!"
"Oh. Is that so? Then you're suggesting we simply let it be?"
A sneer hung at the corner of his lips. Ivar Lodbrok had never felt much affection for his own kind. It would have been simple enough to settle.
"In the past several thousand years, hundreds of thousands of humans and Demonkin have already perished because of the Crescent Alliance Army. How many more lives will be lost in the thousands of years to come? Even if those millennia repeat meaninglessly over and over, the Demon Lords will still be alive, and the Demonkin will still have no freedom."
"......"
"If hundreds of thousands of lives are going to be lost regardless, then the Demon Lords deserve to die too! Heretic or not, I couldn't care less. This is the right way!"
I seized the girl's hand. It was frail and delicate.
"Ivar Lodbrok... don't you feel any resentment? Tell me. What happened to you in the past. How unjustly you were treated. Tell me the grudge you hold against the Demon Lords!"
"I... I..."
The girl's lips trembled.
"...I was a member of a minor tribe. Lord Vassago... made a promise to my clan. He said that if we helped him, he would grant us prosperity and abundance in the future."
At last, the 'story' I had been wanting to hear began to emerge from Ivar Lodbrok's lips. Vassago. The third-ranked Demon Lord. Long, long ago, Ivar Lodbrok had once served him loyally.
"But then, while we were fighting the Dragonkin and found ourselves in a desperate situation... Vassago..."
"What about Vassago?"
I pressed firmly.
"What did Vassago do?"
"He abandoned my clan... as sacrificial pawns..."
Ivar Lodbrok's tears began to fall.
"He used force to... keep us from fleeing, and while we were being slaughtered one by one, only Vassago escaped... my father, my mother, my beloved, all of them... only I survived. Hiding beneath the corpses, alone, barely clinging to life..."
"......"
"Demon Lords are all that kind of creature... I swore an oath! That one day I would have my revenge! That I would return the exact same weight of betrayal to those who mocked us, humiliated us, and treacherously abandoned us...!"
And so the girl, who had lost her entire clan, threw herself headlong into the merchant world all on her own.
Even Demon Lords need money. The girl resolved to build the greatest trading company in the Demon Realm and seize control of the Demon Lords' purse strings. As a Vampire, she employed every means at her disposal, sometimes even sacrificing her own body, doing whatever it took to press forward.
When Ivar Lodbrok betrayed them during Dungeon Attack, the fallout was truly staggering.
The greatest trading company in the Demon Realm crumbled overnight. Countless smaller trading houses that had depended on the Kunkuska Trading Company went bankrupt, the entire economy of Niflheim collapsed, and naturally, the Demon Lords' armies were thrown into utter chaos.
Ivar Lodbrok had, in the end, succeeded in her revenge.
"Hh... hnn..."
The girl was crying.
Her small shoulders trembled as she recalled the family and lover who had died long ago. Thousands of years were more than enough time for both the desire for revenge and the love for one's family to rust away. And yet Ivar Lodbrok had chewed over that vow she made that day and walked all the way here.
"I know."
I pulled her into a tight embrace.
"What you've been through, how monstrous the Demon Lords truly are—I know it all. That's why I've wanted to be at your side from the very beginning. I believed only you could understand my hatred of the Demon Lords."
"...Your Majesty."
"Ivar Lodbrok. We are comrades. I am a Demon Lord and you are Demonkin, but regardless of that, we share the same heart."
I stroked the girl's golden hair and whispered.
"Let us destroy every Demon Lord. Let us create a world where no Demonkin ever has to shed tears because of a Demon Lord again. Let us believe that is the reason the two of us were born into this world—even if it means the blood of millions must be spilled..."
I felt the girl nod her head against my chest.
Of course.
All of it was a lie.
'Heh.'
The girl probably doesn't realize I'm smiling right now. Destroy every Demon Lord? Wouldn't that mean destroying me too? What a laughable joke.
Suicide isn't my hobby. I simply played along with Ivar Lodbrok's mood and told her the story she was desperate to hear.
'Done, done! I've cleared all the conditions!'
The conditions for breaking through Ivar Lodbrok's Affinity cap were as follows.
Condition 1. The player character and Ivar Lodbrok drink alcohol 'alone, just the two of them.'
Condition 2. At least 'three hours' in game time have passed since the player character and Ivar Lodbrok started drinking together.
Condition 3. At least 'one year' in game time has passed since the player character and Ivar Lodbrok first met.
Condition 4. The player character listens to Ivar Lodbrok's 'story about her past.'
Satisfying all four conditions at once could raise Ivar Lodbrok's Affinity by 50 or more. After that, you could smoothly raise Affinity all the way to 99. To reach Affinity 100, you had to complete one more condition.
And the long-awaited condition for breaking through the Affinity 99 cap was—
'Seeing Ivar Lodbrok's 'true form'!'
That's right. Even when Ivar Lodbrok joined the Hero, she never used her true form from the start. She used the body she'd shown me earlier — the one with the different eye color. Truly a calculating personality.
What am I supposed to do about this?
I've already seen Ivar Lodbrok's true form.
'That means… two Affinity locks have been broken simultaneously!'
This was exactly why I'd been singing that song all along — please show me your true form, please show me your true form. From the moment Ivar Lodbrok brought out her true form and met with me, the outcome was already decided. Didn't I say it? In a game, the result is already set the moment you start.
Sure enough.
"Deep Friendship! The other party regards you as a trusted comrade. Due to this friendship, a new title has been created for the other party."
"Impeccable Trust! The other party regards you as their life partner. Due to this remarkable friendship and trust, a new title has been created for the other party."
The system messages that appear when an Affinity cap is broken flashed before my eyes. Even though Ivar Lodbrok's Affinity hadn't even reached 20 yet, the effects activated simply because the Affinity cap had been broken.
Truly the trick of all tricks.
From now on, all that remained was watching the Affinity climb higher and higher without any caps to hold it back. Thanks to the title's effect, Affinity would soar with every interaction. Conquering her would be a piece of cake.
"Mmph……h ngh, hah……."
I pulled the weeping girl into my embrace and wore a satisfied smile. I'd stretched the truth a little, but I didn't have a single shred of guilt about it now. The sense of accomplishment from successfully conquering a genuine heroine swelled in my chest.
It was the moment the fastest conquest in the world was accomplished.