The Hero Who Returned From Death Quits

EP9. ■■

Sein began to wander through various scenes inside his mind along with Ainzel’s desires.

Memories of countless fights. Memories of brief moments of happiness. And, I looked around at all those memories of being in pain, being sad, dying, dying, dying.

“…Ainzel.”

Se-in called his name softly. He looked through countless memories, but he still could not find his true body.

Moreover, as she crossed the scene, black creatures appeared and she gradually began to grow tired.

“Ugh… Where on earth do these black creatures come from?”

At first, she was able to deal with it, but as the battle continued, she couldn’t help but feel that her stamina was decreasing. She could feel her breathing getting faster in real time. Since it was an inner world, it meant that it was affected by her own mental power, which meant that just as her mental power had its limits, so did her physical strength within it.

Desire said, scratching the ball.

“Uh… That’s coming from me. To be exact, it’s coming from the Demon King’s magic that has contaminated me.”

“what!?”

Se-in opened his eyes fiercely and looked at Desire. Desire made a move to calm Se-in down and then spoke.

“Whoa, whoa. Wait. This isn’t what I wanted. This is just because the main body has completely lost its mind. It’s going to keep going like this until the main body’s mind comes back. If this was something that could be controlled, I wouldn’t have had to go through all this trouble!”

After hearing that, Se-in looked at Desire for a moment and then said.

“…I see. I understand. I’m sorry for doubting you for no reason.”

“If you’re really tired, do you want to take a break?”

Se-in glanced at the face of desire that spoke like that and shook his head.

“No, if you knew the look in your eyes right now, you wouldn’t be able to say you’re going to rest.”

There was a sinister look in the eyes of desire. Are you saying that you can rest and trust what you will see after resting? Sein hoped to find Ainzel’s body even sooner.

“Ah… Sorry. Do my eyes look a little strange? That’s because I’m a being born from nothing but desires. My body takes care of everything like reason, so I don’t have any reason at all and can’t control my impulses. Should I say that my emotions aren’t filtered?”

Sein frowned and said.

“Does that mean… that when your emotions hadn’t yet been neutralized, your body also looked at me with those eyes to some extent?”

Se-in looked a little flustered. That was understandable. How could he possibly react to the fact that someone precious to him had been looking at him with s*xual eyes for a long time? Desire looked at him as if he was asking a funny question and said.

“Isn’t that obvious?”

“what?”

“Of course. As a living being, it is natural to instinctively react when you see an attractive person of the opposite s*x. No matter what the situation is. Furthermore, since the main body only had good feelings toward you, wouldn’t it be stranger to say that you didn’t look at it with s*xual eyes?”

“No, that’s it.”

Sein’s eyes seemed to be wide open. What should she say? So, did Ainzel really want to do something like that with her? As a virgin, she couldn’t help but be flustered because such a story came out so naturally.

“If you completely set aside your reason and only look at your animalistic side, you probably don’t have such desires at all, right? What’s important is not a completely raw desire. It’s a desire that exists in a state of reason. Do you think that just because the raw material is red, the resulting product will necessarily be red? Well, I’m not sure. I’m just a situation where only desire gathers, so I can’t control it well. My body was originally strong enough that reason would overwhelmingly defeat me, so it wouldn’t have mattered. However… maybe it’s because of the Demon King’s magic, but my reason is weakened, so I can act like this.”

Se-in nodded and said.

“Hmm… I see. So that’s what it was. I see.”

Other than that, I didn’t know what else to say, so I couldn’t help it. Then, Desire came closer to Sein and said.

“So… what I’m trying to say is, uh, um… just rest. The way I look right now is natural, so don’t worry about it. Honestly, do you think I could beat you if I attacked you right now? Besides, if you’re going to touch me, you should do it outside. What’s the point of touching me here?”

Se-in glanced at him for a moment, wanting to make a natural, flirtatious remark. Then, he discovered something and gradually backed away from him.

“Huh? Why are you like that! I told you to rest. No matter how ugly I am, in this situation, you should at least have some sense of the situation-”

“Look below me and tell me.”

After hearing that, Desire lowered his head and said with a cold sweat.

“Uh… well, I can’t help it since I’m not wearing any clothes, and it’s not like it can be adjusted in the first place…”

“So, you want me to just take it easy and trust the words of the man who made my lower body look like that right now? Do you think that’s possible?”

“No… That’s… Uh, sorry.”

Inevitably, desire had to accept that she had to be separated from herself.

Se-in said, glancing at Desire from a distance.

“…Are all men like that?”

“huh?”

“Yes, the one below. It looks a bit… unrealistic. I asked if that was normal.”

“aha.”

Desire smiled faintly. Se-in seemed to be annoyed by her attitude as if she understood everything.

“This? I don’t know about other humans, but… Usually it’s less than half of this? And this is probably the same as the main body. Since my current form itself is copying the main body’s appearance, I’m sure it’s certain? Why, are you interested?”

“…Who would be interested? Okay, get out of here.”

They were able to get some rest.

…

They searched through Ainzel’s inner self. As a result, only one scene remained.

“Childhood memories… that’s it.”

In the end, his body, which was in crisis, chose his childhood, where he could have been happy without knowing anything, as his sanctuary. And Sein was in a situation where he had to drag Ainzel out of that sanctuary.

“Well, it can’t be helped, so don’t worry too much about it. We can’t just leave Ainzel… in a monster-like state, right? All we can do is quickly bring him back to his senses and turn him back to how he was. And then…”

Desire cut off the words. Se-in looked at Desire and said.

“Why are you suddenly cutting me off?”

“…No, it’s nothing.”

After saying that, Desire looked at the scenery of the village and said.

“Wow, what a beautiful view. I feel like I could just keep looking at it.”

“Were you able to feel that kind of emotion?”

“The desire to be lazy is also one of the foundations of who I am. The main character must have thought that desire was a sin, so he made the thought of wanting to be lazy a part of himself and separated it from me. No… maybe he had no choice but to separate it.”

Se-in bit her lips as she looked at the desire that spoke like that. There were also many things she learned as she looked into his inner self. And, the more she did so, the more she felt pain.

And then the desire that had been looking at her suddenly opened its mouth.

“Oh, over there.”

I wanted to see Ainzel’s childhood reflected in front of my eyes.

Ainzel’s childhood was running away with a happy smile. Seeing that, Sein felt like his guilt was growing even deeper.

“…Now, what should I do?”

Se-in tried hard to shake off that feeling. Desire answered.

“I need to bring the body that is buried in the memory of the current scene back to reality. In short… it would be good if there was something that could bring back the memory.”

“Something that will bring back memories?”

While they were talking like that, they felt something enter the scene. Se-in and Desire looked back.

Other colleagues were visible. Feria let out a sigh and approached.

“The timeline was so messed up that I barely managed to figure out the pattern and come here. … But who’s next to him? He looks exactly like Ainzel, but… something’s different. It feels incredibly dangerous.”

Sein answered Peria.

“It’s said that Ainzel’s desires met the Demon King’s magic power and became a concrete entity. It seems that Ainzel had chosen to abandon all of his desires in the past, so they were separated from Ainzel’s true self. So, if we do it well, we might be able to revive Ainzel’s emotions.”

Upon hearing that, Peria became happy and said:

“What? Really?”

Desire looked at Peria and said with a slight smile.

“Yes, of course.”

And Feria didn’t know that there was darkness hidden somewhere in that smile.