episode_0026

“It’s horrible. I can feel the malice in every trace of the wound.”

Mino said as he entered the barracks and examined the wounds of a badly injured male sergeant.

“Woof? Aren’t all wounds the same, woof!”

“Dalla, King. That’s… I mean, I held my breath on purpose. To tie your ankles. ”

A painful groan escaped the patient.

I wanted to use the power of healing. When I was a warrior, I could use it with amplified power without any burden. However, after healing the World Tree, I reached my limit even if I used it just a little bit-

I didn’t want to die in his place. It may have been selfish of me to be a warrior, but I wanted to live out the remaining 11 months or so.

I didn’t want to sacrifice myself like that for someone else. Anyway, no one would know and I would be harmed again. I rationalized it.

So, instead of talking about my healing powers, I quietly brought gauze and hand-stained disinfectant and such.

“Your noble one, I earnestly request that you leave this place to me and investigate the strange man. I also ask that the King of the Kings intervene in the investigation.”

“Then… I beg you.”

I quietly placed the burgers and disinfectant I had brought next to Mino, and pulled the King of Dogs’s hand as if urging him. Maybe he wanted to get out of here quickly because of his guilt.

“Kang… Shit, I get it.”

It was obvious that Ken-wang and I wouldn’t be of much help, so in the end, Mino ended up kicking Ken-wang and me out. Of course, it was out of consideration for us.

“Where is the crime scene? I want to see it from there.”

So, I decided to start by doing the best I could.

“Follow me. It’s a little far from here. Woof!”

I took a step and followed the King.

As I followed the King of Dogs, more and more blood was sticking to the soles of my feet. Was this meaning that what I saw was just the tip of the iceberg?

*****

“This is…”

It’s bright red. It’s as sticky as if a child had put a bright white drawing board into a paint container and taken it out, and it turned red.

Except for the King and me, there was nothing that wasn’t colored. It was a sight that could only be described as such.

“Looking at your scars…you’re a swordsman. And your long black hair is falling out. Most of the Ken clan have short hair, so this magic is definitely…of the Demon clan.”

And surprisingly, the investigation was easy enough for me to do alone. The criminal may not have had any intention of covering it up in the first place.

“How’s the progress? Do you think we can find out who the culprit is?”

“Yeah. It’s almost identical to your testimony, King Gyeon, and above all, if you look at the sword marks left on the rock wall and the corpse…”

It’s almost identical to Abel’s. How could that be? Abel told me it wasn’t.

“If you look at the sword marks…”

Oh, I can’t open my mouth. I have to say that it was Abel who did it, but I keep weighing it.

“Looking at your reaction, it seems like you already figured it out, you who fights the Demon King more than anyone else, there’s no way you could be wrong in thinking that way, woof…”

As expected, the King of the Dogs, with his expression like that, seemed to have already been convinced. Of course, it wasn’t the first time he had seen the tragedy that Abel had caused, but this was different. He was not even a hostile human, but a member of the alliance…

“Let’s chat for a moment, Four Heavenly Kings. Sit here.”

The King of Dogs, sitting on a red wooden pillar in the corner, fell down – cut down by a sword strike – and tapped his side.

Is it really okay to sit down, I’m sure I won’t get hacked?

“I don’t do petty things! Come, it’s okay.”

“Then excuse me.”

Blood stained my shirt and it turned red. Actually, it was already red so it might not have made much of a difference. I just got the blood of a stranger, but the King of Dogs…

When I glanced sideways, I saw that the King of Gyeon was holding back tears. However, he couldn’t hide the fact that his bloody hands were trembling.

“Do you think you know why? Aren’t you the person the Demon King loves the most, woof…”

“But you don’t say she’s a woman. …Honestly… I don’t know. The Abel I know wouldn’t do something like this…”

“What, that guy? Are you kidding me?”

The King of Gyeon forced a smile, but when he heard what I said, his smile changed into a genuine smile and he started giggling.

“No, really?”

“Are you kidding?”

Boo- and puffing out his cheeks, the King of Dogs sighed.

“No matter how much you try to cover it up, to this extent? You need to hear an explanation, woof.”

“…”

I hesitated for a moment. Should I really listen to this? But I opened my ears with a strange confidence that since nothing happened even if I saw something worse, it would be okay.

“I, the leader of the Kyeon clan, have a very strong affection for their own kind. But, that guy is not like that. No matter what anyone says next to me, I can’t respect that guy, woof!”

The thoughts are different. Leah thought she understood as she listened.

“What leader in the world would openly collude with the enemy? Today, in front of me, openly with an angel… You’ll know soon enough when you see me anyway. Even if I were just the Four Heavenly Kings…”

It was awkward to listen any longer. Most of what the King of Dogs said while cursing Abel was true, but I wanted to ignore it because I didn’t hate Abel.

I turned my eyes away from the King of Dogs, since there was nothing else to look for. All I could see was red, but I needed something to turn my eyes to…

It’s like when I got into a fight with my neighborhood friend Charles as a child and got scolded by my mother, I would look at the wood grain on the floor and let it go in one ear and out the other.

“…Huh?”

“If things continue like this, the moment the Kyeonjok stand on the battlefield, they’re all destined to be slaughtered – Is there something there, huh?”

So there was a very subtle difference that could be discovered. There was something that only Leah, who had fought, fought, and filled her head with information, theory, and practice to the point of vomiting, could recognize.

“King. Look closely at the traces.”

“What?”

“Don’t you think the height is a little short?”

“What?”

…You can only do that… I was a little taken aback, but I continued my explanation.

“Abel is about this tall, profit, anyway, he’s much taller than me. Maybe over 20cm? But no matter how I look at it, it looks like someone who’s only about 7~8cm taller than me swung it. ”

When I showed an example by swinging my sword near the sword mark on the tree, only then did the King of Dogs seem to notice something was strange.

“And, if you look closely, it’s strange. Abel usually uses claymores that are longer than average, over 150cm. No matter how you look at it, this sword is not even 110cm long. And-”

“That’s it. No more headaches like details. Woof! So, that guy isn’t the Demon King? Woof? No, rather, he was trying to incite internal strife by making you think that way…”

There was a high possibility that the King of Dogs’ words were correct.

If it weren’t for the difference in height, it would have been so eerily ‘Abel-like’ that it would have been impossible to get caught. However, once suspicion arose, questions began to arise one after another.

In the first place – if it was the real Abel, wouldn’t it have been possible to simply ask Galvein to use disguise magic without having to reveal his true form?

The more he thought about it, the stronger the image grew in the King’s mind that ‘that thing’ was not the Demon King.

“Ahem, the truth is always one! How is it, how is it?”

Seeing Leah shrugging her shoulders, the Dog King somehow thought that if Leah were a Dog, her tail would be wagging a lot by now.

More than that, that line somehow feels like a necromancy?! It feels like murders are going to happen around here…

“Kang, you’re not planning on sticking a sleeping pill or something down my throat, are you?”

“…?”

Gyaut, Leah tilted her head, wondering what that meant. In fact, even the King of Dogs had no way of knowing, but it was just a feeling that it would be like that in the realm of instinctive intuition.

“If not, then that’s fine. Woof! This is a huge incident, Woof woof! Someone is intentionally trying to cause internal division in the alliance between the Demon Tribe and the Ken Tribe, Woof!”

“Yeah…yes.”

But I felt a sense of uneasiness.

Is this really the end? If he was that strong, he wouldn’t have needed to use that kind of disguise in the first place, right?

Something is strange.

The sense of foreboding was so vivid, but Leah couldn’t figure out why. The ‘hypothesis’ had already been established so clearly.

“So what should I do now?”

“What do you usually do in situations like this, idiot?”

Hmm, usually in times like this… Leah didn’t really feel like it, but she recalled her memories from when she was a warrior. After all, it was easier for her to refer to it.

It was better to report to your superiors, right?

When I told the King of Dogs exactly as I had thought of it, the King of Dogs smiled and said that I should tell Mino. In the end, it would be Abel who would make the decision, and there was no one better than Mino to tell such a story.

“It ended sooner than I thought. It’s not that bad…”

“No, Woof! You did something amazing, Woof! No matter who you put there, it would be hard to tell that it was a disguise with just a few centimeters difference! Only you can do it, Woof! ”

“Galvein would have known with one spell.”

“Kang… Try to be more confident. If you do this, I’ll feel bad about calling you a parachute, woof!”

It was a parachute, but it was something I received for free because we were lovers in a previous life.

“Why are you praising me like this?”

“Keong…”

“…”

I thought I knew.

Abu, abu, you are a pain in the ear. Why are you doing this?

Belle, who covered my eyes while chattering that she loved me; Gabriel, who worked me to the point of my body being torn apart but justified it with words like it was the path of noble sacrifice and that a single drop of my sweat could cost a person’s life; Ena, who cheaply forced me into battle under the guise of a knight’s honor; Su, who talked as if she was influenced by me but in the end only thought of money, didn’t even look at my face, and treated me like less than a person she knew. She probably thought it was annoying. The dead Noah didn’t even wear a mask and was talking nonsense openly, so I took it off. And the nobles who whispered to me that I had a hard time, that it was the empire’s blessing, that all the people would praise me, while taking credit for my achievements.

Anyway, the fact that I automatically feel irritated and tired whenever I see people wearing masks doesn’t change.

At first glance, he seemed to have considerable loyalty to the Ken clan, but Abel had been fighting me too much, so he had already lost his position as the Four Heavenly Kings, and for some reason he needed that position, so I wonder if he was thinking of getting my protection instead. Things like political fighting were so boring when he was a warrior that his brain automatically spit out the repertoire.

“Okay, let’s go quickly. We have to report to Mino.”

“Okay, woof!”

The King of Dogs followed me closely.

It was a secret that I had a fleeting feeling that he really looked like a puppy. Even if I said it out loud, I would have controlled my expression.

…At least Abel, Hira, Mino… Galvein is a bit ambiguous. He didn’t wear a mask like this.

Actually, it wasn’t the King’s fault. From her perspective, she had good reasons for it. And if you were going to be that picky, shouldn’t I, the parachute drop-in, be the first to be blamed?

But, after being hit by someone who was already wearing a mask… no, maybe someone who had never worn one, but who I had mistakenly thought was wearing one, I instinctively felt a sense of rejection when I saw someone wearing a mask.

I need to get back to Mino quickly. And then I need to go back to the Demon King’s Castle and play with Abel.

*****

Well, I made a big mistake, woof!

I thought he was just a parachute, but I really like his determination not to give up easily, woof!

I don’t know why someone like that has such low self-esteem, but… Woof!

Anyway, I want to be friends with you, woof!

“Okay, let’s go quickly. We have to report to Mino.”

Now, look. Woof! Can’t you see Jim’s friendliness? He’s already become incredibly friendly, Woof!

Ah, before that, I should apologize for being rude and talking about the parachute while I was going back, woof! That was definitely my fault, woof!

By the way, at that time, Leah was frowning so that the Dog King could not see her.

The King of Dogs just wanted to be friends.

(King of Dogs)