episode_0007
by fnovelpia***
In the comedy world, it was natural for a big dog or person to rush in and fall down spitting blood when hit in the body. That’s why I wasn’t so surprised. Wiping my mouth, I casually said,
“You’re… strong… Is it because you put meat in the soup? Haha…”
“Are you joking right now?!”
“Tongue, don’t… touch it… Ugh!”
Suddenly, Noah approached and wiped my mouth with his sleeve. Nero, hanging onto my waist, showed tears. I lightly raised my hand and said,
“No, this isn’t a big deal at all -”
“How is this not a big deal?!”
Noah shouted firmly. Trembling, I said,
“It’ll… get better soon. It’s really okay.”
“You…”
Noah bit his lip and glared at me. What? What’s wrong? Did I do something really bad?
“Sob, waaah…”
“Huh? Nero isn’t dead. It’s really okay!”
Comforting the crying child, I climbed the stairs and took out a cookie wrapped in paper from my pocket.
“Here, have something sweet and calm down -”
Swoosh, snap.
The moment I felt a breeze, the cookie I was holding disappeared.
“Huh…?”
When I turned my head, a red-haired girl was eating the cookie and looking at me.
“Tasty.”
“Uh… that’s mine…?”
“It’s very tasty.”
“Um… thanks?”
The girl suddenly rushed towards me and hugged me tightly. No… she clung to me.
“Hey! Wait a minute!”
“The person who gives tasty things! My sir!”
“What, what? What’s going on?”
“My sir!”
Every time the girl spoke, cookie crumbs fell on her head. I tried to pull her away by grabbing her waist, but she didn’t let go. Nero and Noah, who were nearby, also tried to separate the girl, but she growled and they couldn’t help.
“If it doesn’t fall, it’s hard to prepare lunch later -..”
Swoosh!
Before the words were even finished, it fell in an instant.
“Stay quiet here. Then I’ll bring you meat soup later.”
The girl nodded vigorously. Suddenly, animal ears popped up above her head. A red tail stuck out from under her long skirt, swishing against the floor.
“She liked the soup last time… but today is more dramatic.”
With a strange sense of satisfaction, she laughed and escaped from the prison.
Clang.
Locking the door, I spoke to the children inside the prison.
“Don’t come out no matter what happens. Hide in the corner if there’s a loud noise, got it? I’ll try to block as much as I can…”
I remembered Rania reaching out at the end. She had fallen after hitting the celestial object hanging from the ceiling, but by now, she should have woken up.
As he pondered over Rania, his expression clouded, freezing the children’s faces, but Lian didn’t notice.
“If I bake more cookies, will they behave? No, they might be attacked before that.”
With that thought, he climbed the stairs.
Creak.
Carefully opening the door leading to the underground prison, he looked outside. Fortunately, Rania was nowhere to be seen.
“Did she go back?”
“What went back?”
“Gah!”
Startled by the voice right next to his ear, he kicked the door and rolled forward.
“She managed to escape?”
“T-That’s…”
“Hmm, you ran away from me and ended up here? Why? Did you hide something good here?”
Looking into the stairway leading underground, Rania spoke. The underground stairs weren’t very long, so if you tilted your head, you could see the underground prison. Desperately, I stood up, pushing Rania away and said,
“There’s nothing, absolutely nothing!”
“Earlier, you were running away in fear. Is there something you want to protect that badly?”
Without responding to Rania, I slammed the door shut.
“The ones underground are just Odil’s test subjects. Since Odil is currently absent, it wouldn’t be strange for a riot to occur anytime, so I’m being cautious!”
I made plausible excuses to keep her from showing interest in the children.
“What about me?”
“You’ll be here the whole time, won’t you?”
“No.”
Rania shrugged. I responded as if to say “See?”
“We don’t know when Odil will return, but it’s best not to provoke the test subjects until he does.”
“Are the test subjects so interesting that we need to be this careful?”
“No, it’s not that…”
I said, scratching my neck.
“Even with just ordinary test subjects… there aren’t many I can handle.”
“Hmm, I see.”
She looked me up and down, nodding. Though only children were kept in the prison, generally, test subjects ranged from adults to children. Hence, it was easy for her to believe that I, who looked barely 13, couldn’t stop the test subjects.
“But… I don’t think Odil will come back…”
“Why? How do you know?”
“Because we’re both dark sorcerers. Usually, a dark sorcerer’s lab has nothing left in it.”
“That means…”
“You’ve all been abandoned here! Haha! Soon, you’ll all be taken by slave traders!”
She laughed as if it were an amusing spectacle, tears even visible. I grabbed my head and knelt, banging it on the ground.
“T-That can’t be!”
As I lay sprawled in despair, a shadow fell before me. As I raised my tear-streaked face, Rania sat in front of me, twirling her hair around her finger, and spoke.
“If you’re scared, do you want to come with me? I’ll take care of you.”
“Eek!”
If she didn’t know who she was, she might not have known, but if there was a name that suited Rania even among the Four Kings, it was ‘crazy woman.’ Right now, she seemed interested in me, but if I had upset her even a little, my body would have been shattered to pieces.
“How difficult is it to assemble that thing!”
If I had assembled the shattered pieces into a complete form and appeared unharmed, I would have felt even more interested, as I would have used her as a punching bag. Just imagining it made my stomach ache.
“It’s, it’s okay. I am your faithful servant…”
“Speaking like that makes it even more interesting.”
A shadow fell over her face.
Thud! She grabbed my shoulder and brought her face close.
“Where, am I, inferior, to Odil?”
“Gasp?!”
At that moment, when I stiffened my shoulders.
Thud, thud.
The sound of a heavy door being knocked on was heard. I laughed hopefully, tears streaming down my face as if a waterfall, as if I had been given a new lease on life.
Creak.
Because of Odil’s magic, the door that should have been firmly closed opened lightly. At that sight, I thought as tears streamed down my face,
‘Odil really escaped…even though I fed him such delicious food…’
While thinking that, feeling betrayed, the door opened, and a woman with short blue hair came in. The first thing that caught my eye was the corset that tightened below her chest.
It looked more like a dress that accentuated her waistline rather than a corset that tightly cinched her waist like the noble ladies in the movies. My gaze wasn’t exactly directed at the corset. It was directed at the magnificent chest accentuated by the corset.
“Wow..”
“Wow..”
I was mesmerized by the beautiful and shocking scene. My gaze then shifted to her lower body. The corset and connected pants made her long legs even longer and slimmer. While I was in awe, Rania wore a rough expression as if facing something bothersome.
“Ugh.”
As Rania got up, I collapsed to the ground. She walked past me and said, “Mia, what’s going on here?”
“Well… isn’t that something I should be saying? Master.”
Mia pushed up her large, round glasses with her index finger, furrowing her brow enough to cover half of her face. The thin silver glasses sparkled in the light.
“You are the Four Kings, Master. If you leave your seat so carelessly -”
“Oh, whatever! I only listen to the Demon King!”
“Ugh…”
She sighed and tapped the ground with the wooden staff she held in one hand. The staff Mia held was easily my height, with a fierce, rounded branch wrapped around a spherical bead. The bead hummed a deep crimson. It looked menacing.
“When are you going back?”
“Well, actually, the guy I was supposed to meet today ran away, so -”
“Then you should go back now.”
“That’s not so easy, is it?”
Rania pointed at me with her thumb.
“This guy has nowhere to go.”
“…?”
The thought ‘What on earth is the problem?’ floated into Mia’s mind. She briefly sighed, then raised her staff.
“It means we have to deal with it, right?”
A menacing crimson flame rose from the end of her staff.
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