Ch.156Pursuit (1)

# Pursuit (1)

Returning to his sage state, Lug was able to reach one conclusion with his foggy yet intelligent mind.

‘This puts us one step further from the dissolution of the hero’s party.’

Eirene would no longer act as impulsively as before.

While the resulting decrease in skinship was regrettable, it was good that the discord causing tension in the hero’s party would disappear.

This meant that the precarious tightrope walk they’d been performing had finally been resolved. This couldn’t be anything but good news for both Lug, who was loved by dangerous women, and Esmeralda, who managed the hero’s party.

As a result, Lug thought:

‘Perhaps I could resolve relationships with others using the same method.’

It would be good to reestablish relationships this way at least once.

So Lug set out to solve problems in his sage state.

“I will match Lady Millia’s pace. So there’s no need to be so hasty… Eeek?!”

However, there was a side effect of being in the sage state:

Not everyone had transcended desires and emotions as he had.

In some ways, Millia was even more honest about her desires than Lug.

In such a situation, would she even hear the nonsense spouted by Lug who suddenly visited in the middle of the night?

And the decisive difference was that Eirene and Millia had different tendencies.

While Eirene was embarrassed but made efforts to seduce Lug, for Millia, it was just everyday life.

“I don’t know what you’re suddenly talking about, but I’ll go at my own pace then.”

Millia became honest with her desires.

And at that moment, Lug realized that Millia had been holding back until now.

Tentacles blooming like flowers behind her back began to restrain Lug’s limbs as they writhed uneasily.

“Wait a moment.”

Lug, who was relatively close to the sage state, was horrified.

What on earth was she planning to do with those tentacles?

Then, the events from just half a day ago flashed through Lug’s mind. Tentacles that swallowed monsters whole and dissolved them.

“Lady Millia?”

His proposal turned into a plea, and the plea gradually began to approach a scream.

It was time for the foolish human who had opened Pandora’s box to pay the price.

But even so, there was hope.

“What on earth are you two doing in the middle of the night?!”

Lug’s hope. The hero, Esmeralda, had heard the commotion and come looking.

What she saw was an unspeakably hideous sight.

Lug suspended in mid-air with his clothes half-torn, and a half-naked Millia staring at him intently.

Esmeralda wanted to gouge her eyes out right then and there.

But being a hero who doesn’t turn away from the weak, she cut off Millia’s tentacles and rescued Lug who was suspended in mid-air.

“Gack!”

Correction.

She just cut off the tentacles and didn’t care whether Lug fell to the ground or not.

But it’s true that she was angry at Millia.

“I just asked you to be careful not to cause problems!”

“Lug seduced me first…”

“Do you think that makes any sense…!”

Esmeralda was about to shout but suddenly found herself at a loss for words.

The incident occurred in Millia’s room. Moreover, reading her surface thoughts, Millia genuinely felt wronged.

“Lug?”

“…”

Conversely, Lug was avoiding Esmeralda’s gaze.

But even if he avoided her gaze, he couldn’t escape her eyes.

[Note: Strictly speaking, I don’t think I’m wrong.]

What an insane bastard.

Esmeralda couldn’t hold back the words that were about to burst from her mouth.

“What exactly is this?”

To make matters worse,

Esmeralda wasn’t the only one who heard the commotion. People who had been resting in their rooms gathered in groups and gaped in shock at the disaster unfolding before them.

Having just woken up, Garnet frowned and rubbed her eyes, while Eirene shed tears as if she had witnessed something unbelievable.

“What’s this? I feel like I’m the only one being excluded, am I right?”

And Tina&Tanha could tell from Eirene and Millia’s reactions that Lug hadn’t sought only her out. Of course, strictly speaking, he hadn’t sought out Esmeralda either, but wasn’t Esmeralda in the middle of interrogating Lacrima?

And Lacrima, the homeowner who had been forced to receive guests, glared at the chaotic room with the coldest possible gaze.

“…Can I reconsider the proposal from earlier?”

“What’s done is done, Lacrima.”

Lacrima, who had been considering a temporary alliance with the hero’s party to recover her Second, regretted it intensely.

Her image of the hero’s party was being shattered in real time.

Lacrima, who used illusion magic to deceive people as her main weapon, had to doubt her own eyes.

“Hmm.”

Esmeralda needed to somehow resolve this desperate situation.

Not only had that bastard Lug caused trouble by being unable to control himself, but Eirene’s state seemed more shocked than usual, suggesting that Millia wasn’t the only victim.

“Should I cut it off?”

Esmeralda alternated her gaze between her holy sword and Lug’s lower half before proposing such a drastic measure.

Lug’s complexion turned as blue as his Blue Blood characteristic.

“Please give me a chance to explain!”

“Fine, go ahead.”

Esmeralda nodded as if willing to listen to a criminal’s final confession. Seeing this, Lug became even more desperate.

“I know how it might look, but I actually came to suggest that we take our relationships slowly until we reach the end of this journey!”

“Then why did you touch my chest and kiss my collarbone?”

Millia’s scathing retort.

At that testimony, Eirene fell to her knees as if in despair, and Esmeralda shook her head and pointed the blade of her holy sword toward Lug’s lower half.

“C-can’t you let me say one more thing?”

“I don’t think I could accept anything you say at this point.”

Esmeralda was resolute. The root cause of all this trouble was indeed Lug.

How could she believe that he was trying to create distance when he had already gone that far? It’s more correct to assume he was lying because he got scared after seeing Millia’s tentacles while trying to go all the way.

If Esmeralda read Lug’s surface thoughts now, she might have discovered his innocence, but unfortunately, she had no desire to read his lewd inner thoughts in this situation.

“When everything is over… Eirene will reattach it, right?”

“I’m half demon, so holy power would actually have the opposite effect on me?”

“That’s… unfortunate.”

Esmeralda bowed her head.

She felt sad thinking that she had to neutralize Lug like this.

But she knew she needed to cut it off in one go to make it as painless as possible for him.

‘…Should I coat it with sword energy so it doesn’t get dirty on the holy sword?’

Just as she hesitated for a moment before swinging her sword, Lug finally uttered the one condition that could overturn this situation.

“Hero, you’ve seen it yourself! If I had really intended to do it, it wouldn’t have been just this much!”

“Wha… W-what are you saying?!”

Esmeralda’s gaze momentarily shifted to that place at Lug’s desperate cry.

And the other hero party members wouldn’t miss that moment.

After all, it was the moment of truth. As they were about to witness the result of Esmeralda’s decision, they couldn’t help but notice her gaze fixing on a specific area for a moment and her slight nod.

Yes, she had unconsciously compared the size of the demon sword she had seen in the past with the one she saw now.

“You didn’t just look at it! You even touched it…!”

“W-when did I ever?!”

Esmeralda belatedly realized she had been too flustered and immediately tried to silence Lug.

Not in a romantic sense, but by changing the direction of her sword swing.

Yes, the holy sword flew not toward his lower half, but toward Lug’s neck.

But…

“I think we need to hear more about this story in detail, Hero.”

“I knew it, Esmeralda.”

“…This is a big disappointment.”

The other three hero party members rushed in simultaneously to stop Esmeralda.

It was a moment when their unity was higher than ever before.

“Great. You’re all doing so well.”

“Um, could you all please leave my house? I’ll pay you.”

Garnet clicked her tongue, finding her situation laughable, while Lacrima looked tearful.

And it was also the moment when the subject of the trial shifted from Lug to Esmeralda.

***

“Based on everything we’ve heard so far, we can say that we’re already too late.”

“Hero, your hand is lowering? Don’t lower it sneakily, hold it up properly.”

“…Anyway, the Demon King’s army has already begun its march, and even if we arrive at the Demon King’s castle belatedly, it will already be too late.”

“Esmeralda, your arms aren’t level? Spread them properly.”

“We need to pursue the Demon King’s army, and half of the remaining generals… I’ll brief you about them.”

“Esmeralda, if you’re twisted like that, there’s no meaning to the punishment, is there? You should kneel properly with your arms together.”

“…Excuse me, aren’t you being particularly strict with me?”

Esmeralda was kneeling while holding up her holy sword.

It was because she had been presumptuous. She had secretly closed the distance with Lug while pretending otherwise in front of others.

Moreover, circumstances revealed from Lug’s mouth showed that Esmeralda had told him to keep it a secret.

What an outrageous thing.

For the hero’s party, who had been listening to Esmeralda’s nagging while causing all sorts of trouble, it was exasperating.

Esmeralda was paying the price dearly.

“Keep your back straight, Hero. Did you think we wouldn’t notice if you shifted your center of gravity like that? Are you going to deceive people’s eyes again while being punished? Like how you deceived us earlier and drastically closed the distance with Lug?”

“…”

Esmeralda straightened her back. Undisguisable tears welled up in her eyes.

“Good. Do it like that. Now, tell us. What were you saying?”

In the end, she had to explain the future plans while kneeling.