“Brother, are you all right?!”
“…Didn’t I tell you to stay put. Ia.”
“B-But. I was so worried…. I couldn’t just stay still. Ah, no, more importantly. We need to run away quickly. Please hurry, Brother!”
Ia has a kind heart—I know that.
Since it seemed I wasn’t returning,
the desire to help me must have taken precedence over the fear she felt before the enemy, driving her to shake off her terror of her own accord and come to give me aid somehow.
However.
Rather than being moved by that heart, I was a little angry.
No, I was far angrier than I thought.
This was no different from saying she had failed to exercise the common sense I had naturally expected of her.
‘…Impudent little brat! She can’t even look after herself, yet she tries to look after others. Without any real means to resist, she’s practically hastening her own death.’
Such kindness only works when the surroundings are peaceful.
Needless to say, it is only because I have Jade subdued that she is safe.
Had his strength surpassed mine and I had been defeated miserably, would she not have been caught as well, exposing the girl I had taken such pains to hide, and killed?
Again.
She is doing this again.
And of all people, it is my “little sister” who is acting with such recklessness again.
If she were to die doing this.
If she were captured somewhere and subjected to vile acts without dying.
What am I to do then?
Adding ‘that bastard’s’ share and Ia’s share together,
do I merely need to annihilate the demon race twice?
Useless thoughts trailed on and on, one after another, but—
there was only one thing for me to say here.
“Ia. To get straight to the point, I have this one well in hand. There was no need for you to step in. If you had died doing so, I would have been furious.”
Calm though it was—
—a tone brimming with seething rage from within.
Spoken with such a tone, a girl like Ia should realize at once that my condition is somewhat poor.
“A-Aah….”
And so, after depriving her of my gaze for a moment, I looked down at Jade, pinned beneath me.
Having been struck by a stone, he looked bewildered, scratching the back of his head with an expression debating whether to kill Ia or not, but even so—
‘Ringleader.’
‘Yes, Lord Valter…!’
When I mouthed a few words,
through an impressively swift judgment of the situation, he completed a perfect act of groveling.
Seeing this, Ia scurried over to me,
holding the hem of my clothes as if she might burst into tears at any moment, begging for my forgiveness.
“I did something needless, Brother…. I’m sorry….”
“Please don’t do this again. The force wielded by one who cannot protect themselves is feeble and laughable. Before those with malicious intent, that kindness may shatter at any moment and in any way—nothing would be strange about it.”
At that, her face soon crumpled into a tearful expression.
Seeing that transparent visage without a single blemish, a slight crack formed in the heart of mine that had lived on bitter and twisted.
“Ia, I am not doing this because I hate you.”
“That’s a relief…. That it’s not that.”
At this, perhaps I revealed a fraction of my true feelings.
Pure emotions untainted by a single thing.
“Rather, this is because I like you. I only wish that you would know that much, at least.”
“………B-Brother.”
“Let’s return. If I show Mother this one, she will surely be proud.”
“Yes, Brother…. I understand.”
In the end, that day’s affair concluded with dragging the captured Jade back as a prisoner to the count’s castle.
Whisper, whisper—
“Speak so that Ia cannot hear. Shackled Jade. First, I want to keep you bound in plain sight, so I intend to take you to my main estate.”
“How could I refuse? However, my essence is an evil spirit. If such an evil spirit enters a human castle, my identity will be exposed at once. What do you intend to do?”
“I have a collaborator.”
In truth, that collaborator was my mother.
I decided not to speak of her in detail.
Though Jade had displayed a strong will to submit the moment he learned of my existence, acting as though he would give me his liver and gall—his very all—
to be honest, even knowing all of his background, was the trust between us not still too weak for me to fully believe such a display?
Even if following me was a matter of course from his lips—
put bluntly, there is nothing one cannot do with words,
and he might well be harboring different thoughts within.
Therefore, until that is confirmed—
compared to Valeria, who is bound to me by blood and displays strong trust, the intensity of faith could only be weaker.
That was my judgment.
“I shall consider it done that I have caught you. You, meekly hole up in the underground prison. I will have you out soon using my collaborator.”
For now, I left him at that.
I decided to use him as a pawn I could play at any time.
“Compared to the three hundred years I have waited for you, being imprisoned is but an instant. I, Jade, shall endure it with a heart of utter self-sacrifice and devotion.”
Jade accepted this readily, fitting for one who had asked if there was any objection.
As I dragged him all the way to the estate like that….
“The young lord of Count Tark’s household, Valter, returns. Open the gates at once.”
“Y-Young Masteeeeer?!”
“I’m tired. Raising a clamor as if noise alone….”
“That evil spirit being dragged behind your horse, what in the world…?!”
“Can you not see? I met it on the way out for a stroll with Ia and captured it by chance. It is our prisoner now.”
“I-I see!! Then I shall sound the victory bells at once. Please, please enter!!”
“What, why are you so happy.”
A festival was held.
As it turned out,
it was the first news in nearly a century of a high-ranking monster being subjugated in the Tark domain.
After Seradion’s 1:60 Incantation, humanity had walked a path of decline and grown far too weak.
Among the territories held by mankind, the Tark domain, which was rather remote, was a place so structured that it was difficult to bring even modest news of subjugation, but….
That the young heir born after four generations had accomplished this with a mere ordinary steel sword was truly an occasion for the entire domain to celebrate.
“Valter, Valter…. Aah, as expected of my son. You are magnificent. You have accomplished a most excellent deed.”
“It was nothing, Mother. This was a matter of life or death, so I simply did my best.”
“This is an occasion worth opening the count’s granaries to celebrate. All must know of your great deed. Therefore, do not worry, Valter. Leave all matters of raising your renown to this mother….”
However.
Despite hearing such honeyed words,
a corner of my heart remained constantly ill at ease.
‘Ia’s expression had looked constantly confused. Did I go too far after all?’
It was because, once my heart had calmed, I keenly felt how much I had acted under the sway of emotion then.
To have learned of Jade’s existence this time,
and to have picked him up was indeed a certain gain.
I had not known that the underground organization called the Blood Apostles, which surrounded me, had been formed over the past three hundred years.
Moreover, I had not known whether that evil ghost was alive or dead.
That I had unintentionally found a being connected to her and been able to unravel the threads of the matter was entirely thanks to the favor Ia had shown me, was it not?
“…Shall I borrow the occasion of the festival to apologize? After all, she is my only little sister; I ought to cherish her.”
Of course.
I did not know then.
That Ia was by no means a person to sulk over such matters.
Rather,
she would blame herself for being lacking,
and was someone who would desperately wag her tail to win my favor.
That day, Ia knocked on the door of the spire, which protruded especially sharply from the count’s castle.
For her,
the person there was the one she disliked most in the world.
Nevertheless, she had to do this.
For the brother who had told her he ‘liked’ her.
***
Knock, knock—
“Big Sister, Big Sister….”
“……….”
“You can pretend you are not here. I am picking the lock and coming in.”
Clack—
“Ugyaaaaak—?!”
“I knew you were here.”
What she faced upon opening the door
was a woman with the same red hair and pale face as herself, yet so small that one would doubt she was an adult,
so emaciated and gaunt that she seemed lighter than a feather, perhaps from rarely eating,
and what was more, a bizarre figure wearing a magician’s robe and hat that reeked of being unwashed.
She was already a famous person in Count Tark’s household,
so that anyone hearing such traits could immediately identify her.
She was none other than the first daughter of Valeria,
and Valter’s elder sister.
Lujena von Tark.
“Kyaaaa—!! You vulgar pervert. I’ve been telling you for months not to let anyone in. Why are you picking the lock and entering?! Thanks to you, my superlative magical session was interrupted.”
“Brother took the master key from the steward while surveying the manor’s structure, and I merely retrieved it from him again.”
“So you stole what was stolen?!”
“Yes.”
“D-D-Damn it. What kind of household is this. I must tell Mother to dismiss the steward—”
Floating down from above in a childish manner,
kicking the ground in a tantrum, displaying an immature appearance.
No dignity befitting the eldest daughter could be found in her.
She seemed utterly unable to tolerate Ia’s presence here and vented her spite freely.
Communication was impossible.
Always, as it ever was.
“…Please do not be so spiteful. I came today because there is something I truly wish to request of you politely.”
“After showing such rudeness, what request would I grant?! Have you ever once seen me play the caring big sister? Oho, suddenly this is interesting…. What kind of judgment led you here…. Could you have been poisoned by some strange gas….”
However.
Ia knew better than anyone how to win her over.
“Well, I have come only to receive the help of the sole ‘once-in-a-millennium prodigy of magic’ in this timeline.”
“Wh-What?”
“…Just as you heard. Everything depends solely upon you, Big Sister.”
“Ufufu, ufufu—. You speak quite pleasing words. How cute.”
At that,
Lujena seemed to be in better spirits,
laughing without hiding her foolish, snickering grin.
“If you ask me to change your sex, I will kill you! Aside from that, speak your request.”
“It is nothing like that, Big Sister. I simply wish to learn magic.”
“You?! Ia?! The Ia who locked herself in the library and tried to do nothing?!”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
To such a sister,
Ia’s answer was simple.
“Because I felt how weak I am today. I wished to become strong enough that he would want to take me with him.”
“Who?”
“Brother.”
Ia’s resolve was firm.