落とし穴外伝：勇者と魔王を国として見た場合 (Part2)
"If you put it that way, then Deryu from my side and Liliana from the Last Kingdom are women, too."
"Ah, now that you mention it, you're right. I wonder if women have a higher aptitude for being Demon Lords?"
"Who knows?"
As we were having this conversation, the Demon Lord—a former goddess—seemed to notice our presence and turned her gaze toward us.
"……What happened……?"
It appeared she hadn't even grasped the current situation. Well, that made sense. It wasn't just that information was in disarray; the army that had been closing in on the Ioa Kingdom had been wiped out in a single day, and not even three days had passed since then. By the standards of this world, it was entirely possible that the messengers hadn't even arrived yet.
For now, I decided to get on with the job.
"Let's start with introductions. I'm Yuki, sent by Luna—though I doubt you'd know her—that shitty high-ranking goddess."
When I said that, the Demon Lord’s eyes widened in shock.
"Why would a high-ranking god show themselves now of all times!"
"Fair point. But before I answer that, how about an introduction from you? If we keep going like this, I’ll have no choice but to keep calling you 'Demon Lord'."
"……Call me Holy."
Everyone froze. They were desperately trying to suppress their reactions. Holy. It was English. In Japanese, it meant "sacred."
……Isn't that the exact opposite? Is this a joke? Is she serious?
Regardless, she had given me a name, so I had to keep the conversation moving.
"I see. So, Holy-san, the reason we came is that the monster berserkification you’ve been causing is going to affect other continents if you keep it up. It’s causing trouble for the other gods, you see."
I kept my tone extremely calm, but…
"So what! I have forsaken humanity; monsters are far more natural! What is wrong with destroying the wicked who trample even the happiness of individuals!"
Ah, I see. So Holy had completely despaired of humanity. She was a worse version of Firia or Senaru. She had gone through with most of her plans and had reached the very edge of success.
Well, these kinds of verbal sparring matches were pointless, so…
"I see. I understand your side of things. But from our perspective, you're a nuisance, so we came to stop you. That’s all. Anything else?"
"You…"
My detached attitude seemed to catch Holy off guard, and she stared at me, dumbfounded. For the record, Holy’s appearance was half-human, half-monster; her long white hair turned deep crimson at the tips, a horn sprouted from the right side of her forehead, her left hand resembled a dragon’s claw, and she had a tail. Since she was wearing pants and shoes, I assumed her legs were still human.
"Are you going to kill me? But you have no killing intent. The goblins around you, too… And behind you… Ah, are you gods?"
It seemed she finally had the composure to look around and noticed Lilishe and the others.
"Haha… So you’ve gathered this much force? I suppose I became that much of a threat, but in the end, I couldn't destroy humanity after all……"
She hung her head in despair, perhaps linking the disparity in strength to our lack of killing intent. To an outsider, it might look like we were surrounding and bullying a woman, but the reality was that we were simply taking down the mastermind behind a mass slaughter.
Still, whether or not to take her head here wasn't really my job.
"Like I said before, my job is to stop the berserkification using that volcano. I won't do anything beyond that. Well, if the Hero wants to finish you off, I won't stop them."
"Eh? Are you passing this to me? I don't have any personal grudge since neither I nor my country suffered any damage, and it leaves a bad aftertaste, doesn't it?"
"Exactly."
None of us wanted to cut down a woman who was essentially offering no resistance. But then again…
"……Are you not going to hand me over to the Ioa Kingdom?"
"That would leave a bad aftertaste if they executed you. So, we'll make it look like we sealed you away. If you decide you want to die later, you can tell Luna. That’s too heavy a burden for us. Besides, the New Year has already passed, and I don't want to take on any more work."
I stated my honest feelings. Even if we billed the Ioa Kingdom for our deployment and ammunition costs, they couldn't possibly pay it, and considering their future reconstruction, we’d likely end up supporting them instead. I had only helped as a side task to Luna’s job, but I wasn't kind enough to do it for free. Luna’s reward and the Ioa Kingdom’s reward were two different things. If that was the case, killing this Demon Lord here and becoming a pariah was just a hassle.
"Work?"
"Yeah, work. If you were in such a wretched state that we couldn't even talk, I’d just lop your head off and be done with it. But you have no subordinates and no military strength left. I’m not going to do something like finishing you off. I’ll just hand you over to my superiors and wait for their judgment."
I told her that and, without waiting for Holy’s reply, ordered her transport.
"W-wait."
"I won't. I want to finish this cleaning up quickly."
"C-cleaning?"
"Yeah, the year-end cleaning I didn't finish."
"Huh?"
Perhaps unable to keep up with what I was saying, the Demon Lord forgot to struggle and was hauled away by the goblins. Ah, the world is truly heartless.
"You, really. Couldn't you have phrased that better?"
"Saying it seriously would only make it more painful, wouldn't it? This way is better."
You’ve got to learn to take things easy in this world. Seriously. Full-power brawls are exhausting, you know.
In conclusion, both are a pain. If you think of it as individuals possessing nuclear weapons, it’s easier to understand in modern terms, right? That’s exactly why people fight over them, and why I wish they’d just belong to someone.