episode_0044

“Ugh… Ugh……”

It felt like my whole body had been beaten.

What on earth happened to me?

The demon Bloodstain appeared… the ground collapsed… and I fell into a bottomless pit……

After that, I had no memory, as if I had lost consciousness.

Judging by the pain in my body, it seemed like I wasn’t dead.

To survive a fall from such a height while losing consciousness.

I forced my eyes open, straining to focus, as I heard the sound of water flowing right beside me.

And my body was completely soaked in water.

What happened in the battle.

No, more importantly, where am I?

My mind was in disarray, unable to make sense of anything.

It seemed like I had fallen through a hole, lost consciousness, and drifted down in the water.

“So cold……”

I hugged myself tightly, shivering.

I checked my body for any serious injuries and looked around.

The ceiling and floor were filled with stalactites and stalagmites.

It seemed like a underground cave.

The walls and floor were covered with glowing moss and mushrooms, thankfully not too dark.

“My sword is gone……”

It seemed like I had lost my sword.

No matter where I looked, I couldn’t see my sword.

It seemed to have drifted down the stream of water I came down.

Oh, that was the sword I had grown attached to.

But is there a way out.

In my last memory, it felt like I fell for a long time.

At that depth, there wouldn’t be a normal way out.

Then suddenly, a translucent and familiar figure appeared from the wall covered with mushrooms.

It was the little demon ghost, Shari.

“Oh, right. You were here.”

Shari appeared from the wall with a gloomy expression, then smiled widely and clung to my body.

Through the consciousness transmitted to my mind, I could feel that Shari was very worried about me.

“Yeah, yeah. It’s okay.”

I comforted Shari by patting his head, even though he couldn’t be touched.

Come to think of it, if Shari had been with me the whole time, he might know what happened to me after I fell into the hole.

“Shari, can you show me what happened to me after I fell?”

I asked Shari.

Then, a few scenes shown by Shari flashed through my mind.

Reaching out to the sky with an unreachable hand, falling endlessly into the hole.

Losing consciousness in the puddle of water, then quickly drifting down along the connected stream.

After that, only scenes of continuous drifting were shown.

I must have drifted a considerable distance.

“Yunoa was looking for a way back, but there was no immediate way to return.

He couldn’t rely on a rescue team.

He was trapped in this abyss-like underground.”

The narration in my mind reminded me of my desperate situation.

If there was no way back, I had no choice but to move forward.

I was anxious about losing my sword, but staying still wouldn’t help.

“Yunoa gathered his courage and decided to move forward through this labyrinth-like underground.

But there was a fact he didn’t know.

The Horn Canyon was close to a place known as the Demon Realm.

Then where is this place that has been flowing into the underground for a long time.”

As I tried to move my body, the narration uttered ominous words.

If they were reminding me that the Horn Canyon was close to the Demon Realm, then could it be…?

“Yes. This place was the underground of the Demon Realm.”

* * *

The battle in the Horn Canyon ended with the victory of the extermination team.

The demon lord’s direct subordinate, the Lord of Bloodstain, retreated when the number of monsters decreased during the confrontation with Mileia.

The canyon was in chaos, filled with the corpses of many monsters and broken rocks.

Adventurers, knights of the kingdom, and soldiers united to form an organized punitive force suffered significant losses.

More than half of them sustained various injuries, and there were casualties as well.

It was a clear mistake on the part of the kingdom for not properly assessing the scale of the monsters.

Nevertheless, the members of the punitive force were pleased that they were able to successfully end the battle and repel the monsters.

Just surviving a dangerous battle where death was a real possibility was reason enough for them to be happy.

However, Milaia could not find it in herself to be happy.

She had missed her enemy, Bloodstain, who had destroyed her homeland right before her eyes.

She had spent her life pursuing strength for the sake of revenge, but even then, the direct subordinate of the Demon King was not to be underestimated.

Furthermore, there was another reason for Milaia’s sadness.

“Yunoa…?”

A massive hole appeared as the ground of the Horn Canyon collapsed.

The inside of the hole was so deep that nothing could be seen.

“…Did Yunoa fall here?”

Milaia asked the other members of the punitive force expressionlessly.

“Y-Yes. The ground suddenly became unstable, and everyone managed to avoid it, but because of him standing here…”

Milaia picked up a fist-sized rock from the ground and threw it towards the hole in the canyon.

The rock was sucked into the dark hole in an instant, disappearing from sight, and no sound of it hitting the ground could be heard.

“Yunoa…”

Milaia softly called out Yunoa’s name.

There was no response.

At this height, even a human who had trained their body with magic could not be guaranteed to be alive.

“Milaia, there are many wounded. It will take some time for them to recover. What should we do?”

“…”

The member of the punitive force asked Milaia, but she did not respond.

Was she wrong again this time?

As soon as she found Bloodstain, she had abandoned everything to confront him in pursuit of revenge.

But because of that, Yunoa had fallen into this hole without being able to avoid the collapsing ground from behind.

Milaia thought that if she had been by Yunoa’s side, this would not have happened.

She regretted her judgment once again.

Because of her wrong judgment, she lost Yunoa.

“Milaia?”

Milaia was confused.

Casualties in a fierce battle were to be expected.

It was not the first time someone had died in the punitive force she led.

Yunoa was the only man who did not fear her and could honestly point out her mistakes and tell her when she was wrong.

That was all. Yunoa and Milaia did not have any special relationship.

“Yunoa…”

But what is this feeling?

Milaia could not understand her own emotions.

The more she tried to recall the reason, the more confused she became, unable to know anything.

Milaia stood silently like a statue in front of the hole where Yunoa had fallen for a long time.

Not responding to anyone who tried to talk to her.

* * *

Capital Pifnel, inside the warrior’s room in the central church.

The warrior Cain, who had been struggling with the aftermath of the attack by the deceitful Lord Javiel, woke up from his bed.

“This damn…!”

And Cain was furious.

Not only did he endure the pain of his body being torn apart if he refused to fight the Demon King, but now he was also under threat of assassination by the demons.

“Oh, warrior. Have you woken up? How is your body feeling?”

At that moment, the bishop of the Castia diocese entered the warrior’s room and inquired about his well-being.

“Get out! You bastard! Are you also a demon? I don’t trust anyone anymore!”

Cain jumped out of bed and grabbed a flower vase next to him, throwing it at the bishop.

Crash!

The vase hit the bishop’s head, shattering and spilling water everywhere.

“Ugh… Ugh….”

The bishop groaned in pain, blood dripping from his head.

“Get out! I will consider anyone who enters without my permission as an assassin and kill them. Go and deliver the message!”

“Y-Young hero…”

“I said leave!”

Cain picked up his sword that was standing next to the bed.

Sensing that the bishop was truly intent on harming him, he hastily left the room.

Since that day, no one was allowed to knock on the hero’s door without Cain’s permission.

The fact that a demon named Mercy disguised as a human had attempted to assassinate Cain was a huge shock to him.

Cain could no longer trust those around him.

If he remained a hero, the demons would surely target his life.

His plan to do whatever he wanted using his hero status was impossible.

“If I just kill that bastard demon king, all this nonsense will end…”

But how could he kill the demon king?

Even the guy who was Mercy, the demon king’s subordinate, almost killed him.

If he hadn’t desperately resisted and bought time, he would have undoubtedly been killed.

The assassination attempts would not end with just this one.

As long as Cain, the hero, was alive, the demon king would constantly try to kill him.

Cain wanted to put an end to this miserable hero’s life, which had no good points at all.

He felt more suited to living like a vagabond in the back alleys as he did in the past.

But just thinking about that brought excruciating pain that tore through his body.

Cain pondered.

How could he defeat the demon king as quickly as possible?

In reality, the fastest way for a hero to defeat the demon king was to go on an adventure, gather allies, and obtain the holy sword.

All the past heroes who successfully defeated the demon king had done so.

But Cain did not have the patience to wait for such a process.

He just wanted a way to enter the demon king’s castle right now and defeat him.

Unaware that such a shortcut would only delay the demon king’s defeat.