Welcome to the Impregnable Demon King Castle

25 – The Hero’s Sleeping Friend 1

「A normal person would’ve left such a rude woman alone…」

Despite the utter lack of respect I was showing him, Lem didn’t get upset and made a wry smile.

「Hmm, well, I suppose I would be hurt if someone spoke badly of me because they dislike me. There’s no helping that. You can’t just not hate someone that you hate. But I know you’re different. I’m used to people talking crap to me, you see. I can tell if someone legitimately hates me or if they’re just annoyed.」

He was right on the mark.

It wasn’t that I disliked Lem.

I envied Lem’s position and ended up saying awful things to him.

I decided to scorn him for such a ridiculous reason. I was the worst.

「When someone suffers or has something unfavorable happen to them, they end up releasing that stress onto their surroundings. To family, to friends, to lovers, to the people that are important to them. But there are also people that aren’t able to do that. It doesn’t have to do with being alone or not, some people just have a strong sense of independence and refuse to show weakness. Those kinds of people eventually have all kinds of dark emotions stuffed into their hearts. But they’ll have to release those emotions sooner or later, otherwise, they’ll break. If they don’t have anyone around them to release them on, then sometimes they’ll release them on someone who just happens to be around.」

……

His words flew straight into my chest.

He described my complicated feelings perfectly.

「Of course, that’s not a good thing to do, but I wouldn’t abandon someone that’s about to get attacked just because of something like that. I’m in a Hero’s party, after all.」

He spoke while putting his hand to his chest and smiling. The proud face he was making left quite the impression on me.

I immediately felt incredibly ashamed of myself and spilled out all the feelings that were bubbling up from my chest in words on the spot.

「I-I’m sorry…! I’m sorry that I said those awful things to you! You didn’t deserve that… Please forgive me…!」

「I forgive you.」

The boy kindly nodded. He forgave me just like that.

「Um… why is it that you let people boss you around even though you have such powerful abilities? Don’t you think you should let people know about your true strength? It doesn’t matter if you’re a Black Sorcerer, or if you’re a woman, or if you’re young, or whatever dumb reason. They need to see you for who you truly are!」

I ended up talking about him as if I was talking about myself, but Lem didn’t poke into my business.

If he did, I’d end up opening up the wounds that I didn’t want to talk to others about.

That’s why he didn’t ask anything and simply responded.

「Well, I was the one who chose to join this kind of messed up system, after all.」

「…」

“It’s easy to give up, but you didn’t give up, and that’s why you’re suffering. Why didn’t you give up, then? In my case, it’s because I had a dream. I was able to keep going because I had a goal in front of me. The voices around me hurt, and to be honest, they frustrated me. But when I think about how my dream will be achieved, it’s hardly a big deal at all.”

Why didn’t I give up? Why indeed…

I thought I didn’t give up because I couldn’t change my Job, because that was the only choice I had if I wanted to live on.

I thought I’d be able to succeed at that too, so I tried the hardest I could.

Now that I think about it, it might have been my pride at work.

「I personally find people who don’t give up in the face of a challenge to be cool. But if you feel like you’re reaching your limits by doing that, then maybe it’d better if you changed the way you do things.」

「The way I do things…?」

He was speaking as clearly as possible for my sake even though I was drunk.

「For example, you could look for an employer that doesn’t care about age or gender. You can escape from the things you don’t like. It wouldn’t be running away, it would be retreating. I’m sure you’ll be able to find the next place to challenge. But… I’m not sure if I should be saying that though, since I don’t actually know who you are.」

He must have felt he was trying to cheer me up in an irresponsible way as he made an apologetic face.

I had convinced myself somewhere along the way that my roads were closed off to me.

But I can retreat. Even if it meant I had to find work at some faraway town.

Maybe I could find a female Dungeon Master that would hear me out.

「Anyway, let’s go somewhere else. But we probably shouldn’t just leave these guys here…」

Lem seemed to be uncomfortable knowing that there might be more casualties like myself if those men were to be left alone like this.

At the same time, he couldn’t leave both the men and myself in the same place, nor could he let my still drunken self head back home alone.

I could tell that that’s what the kind boy was worried about.

The fear and shock I was experiencing from before had settled down and I had regained some of my composure at this point, so I activated my ability.

My bats, who had the blood inside their bodies mixed with my own for a while now, responded to my call.

「Bats…?」

「Yes. Vampires suck both blood and Magical Energy. Now then, what exactly is Magical Energy?」

「It’s said to be the base of everything in this world, right? That’s why by making things like water or fire via the molding of Magical Energy, you can either improve or worsen the state of a person.」

「Right. Have you ever heard of this? Those that use too much magic will apparently dry up and turn into something like a mummy.」

My head still hurts, but I was still able to talk.

The fact that there was someone by my side that would never hurt me probably helped me maintain my mental state.

「Well, yes. There was a time where I feared for my life when my own arm dried up… wait, no, I mean, I heard something like that before. Basically, if you end up using your own life energy in place of magical energy, you’ll die.」

「Yes. It’s the same reason why when a beautiful girl is rescued from a vampire sucking on their blood, they might end up looking like an old lady.」

「Because they had their life energy sucked out…?」

「Correct. It’s something that I should never do, but… I’m about to do that right now so that these men will never do evil again.」

「What they did was unforgivable, but…」

「It’ll be fine. I won’t steal their youth… but sins require punishment. I will give them the punishment they deserve. That’s what is necessary here.」

Lem then seemed to realize something.

He made an uncomfortable face but eventually turned his head down.

「…I’ve drunk quite a bit of alcohol myself, so I might forget everything that happened here by tomorrow.」

He was essentially going to act like this never happened.

I directed my bats to the organs that drove the men to commit to such evil criminal behavior.

They stole the life energy from them.

These men would never again assault women.

Afterward, Lem accompanied me back to my house.

I still have that robe. I never gave it back to him.

I knew.

Lem didn’t really talk about it, but he was an incredible Black Sorcerer. But he must have had some kind of reason for hiding that fact.