episode_0010

“No way!”

Hira quickly flapped his wings and jumped to pick up Leah, who had been abandoned by Mino after he finished sucking her blood.

“Ugh…”

A pale complexion and lack of strength were typical appearances of a vampire victim.

“You… You… What the hell have you done… Do you know, Mino…?!”

When Hira scolded Mino with an expression full of anger, Mino looked like he couldn’t understand.

“Calm down, of course I know that your thirst for friends is more than our vampire instincts, but I’m not that clueless. You’re still alive, so if you just rest for a few days…”

“You! …In this… situation… That’s what I… say…?! Leah… is… so… weak…!”

Hira raised his fist and grumbled. Of course, if Hira had heard that she was weak, Leah would have been the first to collapse from high blood pressure, but fortunately or unfortunately, Leah had already collapsed from excessive bleeding, so she did not hear those words.

“Calm down, okay? Put your fists down first…”

Mino, who had not yet realized his own faults, quickly began to treat Leah, perhaps because the fist in front of him was more effective than a distant moral sense. Hira’s fist was something that even the vampire lord himself could not guarantee life or death.

“More…More, cure it quickly…”

‘I… just got back from the battlefield…’

Perhaps his achievements were forgotten because he had not been seen on the front lines since the first time, and had only been transformed into a bat and made surprise attacks? Hira’s treatment was so cold that he thought that way. In reality, it was just Mino who had done something that made him angry first, but for him, who treated humans like rice bowls, to understand that, it would have to be through more overwhelming violence.

And was it the heavens that had chosen this day to make Mino understand that? As Mino was glancing at Hira’s fist, a black shadow appeared behind him, and a cold murderous aura dripped down from him.

“…Vampire Lord.”

‘D-Demon King…?!’

Mino, who could be arrogant because he didn’t even know what he had touched, felt something was wrong as he saw Abel, who had a distorted expression on his face, hugging Leah and glaring at him.

“Get out.”

“ㄴ, yes…?”

“I told you to get out. Succubus Queen.”

“ㄴ,ㄴ,ㄴ,yes…!!”

Hira had no veto power. He only had the choice to obey.

As Hira glanced back, worried about Leah’s well-being, he eventually left the room, and saw Galvein, who had been dragged out by Abel to execute the death list. He had probably returned with them.

“Tsk tsk, if I had to drink blood… If I had just opened the drawer right next to it, it would have been full of troll blood.”

Galvein made a tsk tsk sound.

It seemed that none of the Four Heavenly Kings had a high chance of survival for Galvein or Hirado Mino.

*****

“Mino.”

“Oh, Demon King…”

“I thought you were the one who caused the least accidents among the three. Galvein said that he was quicker to forgive than to grant permission, so he used the military funds for his research and then filled it up with gambling, and Hira would often destroy a part of the Demon King’s castle with that damn charm punch, so the repair costs were crazy. ”

“…”

“But, I guess I should have remembered the saying that the quiet cat goes up to the roof first. Seeing you blatantly provoking the person I love the most in the Demon King’s castle. Were you really hungry? That excuse doesn’t work. When I saw you earlier, you were moving and talking well, but did you not have the presence of mind to look for the catalyst blood in Galvein’s drawer? You must have provoked Leah because you were just annoyed, or because you wanted to eat fresh blood. …How dare you. ”

“Your Majesty… I truly did not know that the young girl was important to you. If I had known-”

“Shut up. I’m contemplating whether or not to kill you right now.”

The temperature, which was thought to have no further fall, began to plummet further.

The overwhelming power of the tyrant was no different from that of a low-level imp, even the vampire lord could not reach. As the sincerity was directed at him without restraint, Mino could do nothing but bury his head even flatter on the floor.

“…”

The silence continued for a long time, and as time passed, Mino’s complexion became more and more pale.

“I won’t kill you because of the affection we’ve shown you so far.”

Instead of explaining further, Abel picked up a stake and a hammer.

“Exactly 10 times. I’ll let you go if you shed 10 times the amount of blood you’ve consumed. I need to know who you’ve touched. But you won’t die, because you’re a vampire lord.”

That was the end of it.

And Mino’s screams had to echo throughout the Demon King’s castle for hours on end. The eardrums of those who heard them were a bonus.

*****

“That’s an exaggeration.”

“The truth is coming, my noble one…”

“There’s no reason for the Demon King to do that just because of me. If you’re going to do something, do it properly…”

At Leah’s mutterings, Mino’s balls twisted tightly in a 720° jerking rhythm.

Then how can I prove that I was stuck on a stake? That this is the truth! This frustration twisted my insides like a whipping machine.

No matter how much I told her, Leah wouldn’t believe me in the end. If Hirara had been there, she would have explained it to me instead, but Hirara was one of the Four Heavenly Kings, and had just gone out to work after hearing what his subordinate had to say.

“Then why would the Demon King protect me, who was his enemy until just a few days ago, is a woman on the outside but a dark man on the inside, and has no relationship with me other than as the Demon King and the Hero, while making me the Four Heavenly Kings’ oath meat?”

“You still insist on being that guy…”

“Shut up.”

I am a man! With that mindset, I punched Mino’s pot. Of course, it didn’t have much effect. There was no way that my weak fist, weaker than that of a normal woman, would be effective against the Four Heavenly Kings.

“Damn… If only I had the power of a warrior… That bastard Smith. With the power of a warrior, I would have made a harem of my comrades…”

“…Your Excellency?”

“Thinking about it, it’s pathetic. Me… My childhood friends Bell, Anna, Sudo, Gabriel, Nia…!! Rather than the memories we had together, or the time we spent together, money, status, and desires were more important to me… I really had no eye for people. That’s why I ended up like this… Heh… Haha…”

“…Huh? Hmm??”

“I don’t need anything… What good does it matter what the Demon King thinks of me now? I’ve lost everything – my power, my family, my honor – so how can I get revenge? If I just die like this -”

And then, not long after Hira left, another bomb exploded. It was also because Leah’s mental state was still not intact.

And being next to Leah was the worst possible choice in this regard. If Hira had been there, this wouldn’t have happened because of her fascination, and if Galvein had been there, he would have kept the situation under control with rational words that only faced reality until Hira came, and if it was Abel, he would have raised the mood with endless nade-nade.

However, the Vampire Lord had lived for so long that he had a mind that lacked the ability to empathize, so he couldn’t even empathize and had nothing to say.

“Sigh, sniff… sob. Hehe…”

However, if Abel, who had just left, came back and saw this sight, it was only natural that this time, a stake of anger would strike his heart. In the end, Mino used his brain to full capacity and came up with the best solution he could think of, which was to solve the cause of the problem.

“…Directly! Go see those enemies yourself. To the imperial capital…! Some of my subordinates have infiltrated there! So please hold on tight…!!”

“…Really, hmm… Really?”

“That is right. Why would I, a small person, lie to such a noble person?”

“…Then, sniffle… Then let’s go… Always… being in the Demon King’s Castle… I kind of wanted to… go for a walk… and see it for myself… Right now, with my own strength… I can’t take revenge, but how those traitors live…”

Thank goodness! That was Mino’s first thought.

Naturally, Leah, whose anger and negative emotions had already subsided over the past few days, was not the type of machine that would just blurt out negative words like before, so she raised her head in response to Mino’s words.

“What are you going to ride…?”

A word I blurted out without thinking. Naturally, I thought I would go through a portal or something like that.

“Okay, let’s get in.”

“/”

So, there’s no way in the world I could possibly think of a vampire lord turning into a giant bat and trying to become my mount.

“Oh, this. You… right? Ride? You? ”

“Yes, that’s right…”

“Your back won’t break…? No, I don’t think I’ll use it anyway. I’ll ride it well.”

“?”

Mino was hit with a questionable extreme. Leah meant that there was no hard labor that could use his waist, but of course, it sounded different to Mino.

“…I’m leaving.”

Mino flew up into the sky above the Demon World, wiping away a tear.

‘Yes, once you go on a patrol in the empire, you will feel better. If you think of it as a walk, your mood will improve, and your nobleness will also feel much better.’

“Ah.”

“?”

“Take a blood pack. If you’re going to use me as a lunch box, then I don’t mind. But if I don’t die, then I don’t mind either…”

Mino quietly returned to the Demon King’s Castle and stole the blood pack from his close friend Galvein’s room, along with a note saying he would return it later.

Even by mistake, Mino did not want to touch Leah with even 0.1mm of his teeth. For some reason, the illusion of Abel holding a stake and hammer and smiling evilly behind Leah may have further fueled that desire.