Episode 228
"......."
"Frey, why are you silent? Tell me something interesting."
"Shut up."
As Ruby walked down the corridor with a wicked smile and spoke thus, Frey glared at her and shouted.
"How cute. Even that glare. It feels like a wounded cat glaring at me."
"I said shut up."
Ruby, who had been watching Frey with a smiling gaze, spoke thus and stroked his head, but Frey immediately struck her hand away violently.
"Instead of that, Frey, how about we get along a little better?"
However, thanks to the system's barrier that appeared at that moment, Frey's hand bounced back weakly.
"Anyway, in a few months, you'll have to see me enough to get sick of me at the Academy."
Thanks to that, Ruby, who continued stroking Frey's head as he ground his teeth and stepped aside, spoke casually.
"Come here, Frey."
As Frey tried to ignore Ruby and step aside, Ruby wrapped his arm with her tail that had suddenly appeared.
"No matter how much you struggle, you can never escape from me."
Before long, she used the tail wrapped around his arm to pull Frey toward her, and she was already in her original form.
"How is it? This form. You seemed to dislike the childlike form... How about this voluptuous form?"
"......."
"Surely you're not regretting it? That you didn't become my subordinate back then? But it's already too late. You've already missed your chance..."
"You look hideous."
Ruby, who had been wearing a confident expression, frowned when Frey looked at her with eyes full of disgust.
"What exactly is your taste? Surely..."
"It's because it's you. No matter what form you take, you always look hateful."
"...Is that so?"
Upon hearing those words, Ruby smiled.
"Even like this?"
Then, Cania suddenly appeared before Frey.
"Young master, I have prepared your meal."
She, wearing a wicked smile different from Cania's usual self, spoke while pretending to pour coffee into a cup.
"How is it, young master?"
- Bang!!
Unable to bear it, Frey threw a punch at her.
"...Hah."
The Demon Lord, who had been staring blankly at his fist blocked right in front of her face, soon returned to the form of Hero Ruby.
"If you became my subordinate, I could have performed multiple roles for you."
Ignoring Ruby, Frey walked down the corridor, rubbing his fist.
"Walk slowly. There's no need to rush..."
Ruby, who had been walking with her hands behind her back, looking at Frey with eyes saying he was cute.
".....Hmm?"
Soon, she frowned deeply and turned around.
"........."
After staring at one place for a while, Ruby looked at Frey and asked in a cold voice.
"You seemed completely indifferent... But as expected, you're concerned about me too?"
"...What?"
"Recently, I keep feeling gazes. What have you done? Even I can detect it."
"I don't know what you mean."
When Frey answered indifferently and walked down the corridor, Ruby smiled.
"...Of course, that would be the case."
Saying so, she also quickened her pace.
"Hero! How are you!"
When she arrived in front of the waiting room after walking down the corridor for a while, a knight hastily saluted her.
"Yes~ Thank you for your hard work!"
Ruby greeted the knight warmly.
"Frey, watch closely."
With a smile spread across her face, she whispered in Frey's ear who was beside her.
"Those you love, those you like, those you wanted to protect..."
"......"
"Smiling at me, praising me, swearing loyalty to me."
Ruby, who said that, looked up at Frey who was deliberately avoiding her gaze.
"Watch that sight, and show me your crumbling expression."
She was wearing an ecstatic smile.
"Um, Lady Ruby. Please wait for a moment..."
"...Hmm?"
However, Ruby's escort knight, whom she had sent to the waiting room first, blocked her path with cold sweat and whispered urgently.
"Um, that's..."
"Mr. Vener? What's going on..."
Ruby, who wanted to enter the waiting room quickly, pushed her aside slightly and moved her steps forward.
"........"
After examining the inside of the waiting room, she soon wore a cold expression.
"...What is going on here?"
The waiting room was completely empty.
"Ah, well... The Saintess and Mr. Rosewin were here just until a moment ago... They said they were going to the restroom..."
"...Only two came? Despite the summons order?"
"I apologize."
Ruby, who had been looking at the escort knight who couldn't stay still and was bowing his head with a flustered expression.
"What are you doing...?"
When Frey, who had been standing quietly beside her, whispered in her ear with a sneering smile, her eyebrows twitched.
"You should show me something at least?"
.
"Hah..."
Ruby, who had been sitting at the desk in the empty waiting room, was looking at Frey with bored eyes.
"...Annoying."
Frey, sitting in front of her with his arms crossed, glaring at her.
His eyes, today too, had not lost their light and were shining.
'Like this... the plan is going awry...'
Ruby's original plan was to bring Frey to the waiting room and have the hero party members who came under her summons order denounce him.
There would have been nothing more capable of shaking Frey's heart than that, it would have been nothing short of perfect.
"So, why did you call me?"
"........."
However, for some reason, the hero party members did not come.
Thanks to that, the imperial family and the religious order seemed to be in emergency mode over the plan to introduce the hero party to the public later, but such things didn't matter to Ruby.
She just wanted to see Frey. A beautiful and noble existence. Breaking, suffering, and struggling before falling right before her eyes.
"...Tch."
Originally, the target of Ruby's destructive impulses was 'this world.'
The continents that had beautifully prospered since the Great War 1000 years ago.
The Sunrise Empire called the brilliant sun, the Western Continent where various races coexist, and the Eastern Continent called the mysterious place.
How fun would it be to burn and destroy the relationships, loves, beautiful structures, and histories tied to those places?
That was why Ruby wanted to burn the world. Because she wanted to see beautiful and noble things crumble by her own hand.
"Why did I call you, you ask?"
However, recently even that seemed to be becoming a secondary goal.
Because she found a being more beautiful and noble than anything else in the world, perhaps the only one in history.
No matter what hardships and adversities come, never breaking or falling, always moving forward.
Because a 'hero' who focused her destructive impulses in one direction had appeared.
"That is..."
If she burns 'this world' that such a man loves so much. How sweet would the expression he shows at the end be?
How ecstatic would his suffering appearance be, how crumbling figure be?
That was why Ruby was preparing to destroy the world even more diligently...
"...I'll tell you now."
Recently, something hasn't been satisfying.
Ultimately, all of this is about wanting to see the man in front of her break.
But recently he's living too comfortable a life. He doesn't waver either. In short, there's no 'crisis.'
And Ruby didn't want such a flat situation.
- Click.
After watching Frey for a while, Ruby flicked her hand, and the waiting room door was firmly locked.
"What are you trying to do now?"
Frey looking at such Ruby with eyes full of wariness.
- Swish...
Taking in Frey's upright gaze, Ruby slowly rose from her seat.
'If there's no crisis... I can just create one.'
Then, slowly approaching him, she muttered to herself.
'I'll isolate you, Frey. Today, in this place, I'll make the whole world hate you... I'll completely isolate you.'
"What...!"
Frey, who noticed Ruby's change, hastily rose from his seat.
- Grab...!
"Eek!"
Ruby, who grabbed both his arms at an unbelievable speed, slammed him to the floor.
"What, what is this...!"
"Stay still."
Thanks to that, Frey, who was quite flustered, twisted his body, but Ruby pinned Frey down with overwhelming force.
- Crush...!
Frey's slender arms were pulled by Ruby, then slammed to the floor together with her hand.
"Ah..."
Because of this, Frey, with tears welling in his eyes, looked up at Ruby who was lying on top of him, holding his two arms.
- Press...
Ruby, who pressed Frey's arms firmly to the floor, unconsciously imprinting her dominance over him, licked her lips and began to speak.
"I want to see you break, Frey."
- Press...
"If only I could attack you... I would have half-killed you, and enjoyed watching people denounce you as you died, only to regret it belatedly when the truth was revealed."
Ruby, who was speaking thus, said with a regretful expression.
"However... unfortunately, our system interferes with attacks."
"W-why..."
Frey, who heard Ruby's words, opened his eyes wide and asked.
"Why are you fine even though you're attacking me now?"
"That is, I recently found out while continuously receiving damage from a foolish woman."
Then, Ruby smiled with her lips raised.
"The standard of the attack prohibition applied to you and me... seems to vary depending on the intention of the one performing the act."
"What does that..."
"This is not an attack, Frey."
And at the words that came out of Ruby's mouth the next moment, Frey's eyes opened wide.
"...In the system, this act is considered as an act of affection."
".......!"
At those words, Frey began to break out in cold sweat, and Ruby, looking down at such Frey, quietly licked her lips with her tongue and whispered.
"Right now, in this place, I will corrupt you, Frey."
.
Meanwhile at that time.
"As I thought... there is something..."
Glare was pacing around the waiting room with her arms crossed.
"There's definitely something... definitely..."
The person named 'Frey' she had just met kept weighing on her mind for some reason.
Why was that?
Whenever he received criticism from everyone, cold gazes, or denunciation, she felt pain in her heart as if it were her own matter.
Of course, even when living on the streets, she had always felt sad when someone was starving to death.
But this time was a bit different.
"Hmm..."
Frey, the fallen noble she had only heard rumors about.
Despite being the duke family's young son, whether he was used to being ignored and criticized by people, he had endured and listened to people's denunciations earlier.
And that appearance looked very different from what was being talked about in the world.
"........"
That wasn't all.
The strange expression he made when looking at 'Ruby,' the enemy of the hero. The way Ruby treated him when he hid himself knowing she was coming.
No, fundamentally, it was strange that Ruby was taking such a person with her.
What was happening in the waiting room right now?
"...Should I take a slight peek?"
For some reason, Frey being dragged by Ruby looked pitiful and dangerous.
- Snap!
Glare, who had been pacing outside the room for a while, quietly flicked her finger.
- Crash!
Then, a corner of the opaque window in the waiting room broke slightly.
Glare's destructive ability had become strong enough for even such delicate control.
".....Gulp."
Like that, approaching the corner where light was leaking from the waiting room and quietly swallowing her saliva as she looked inside.
"......!!!"
Soon, she covered her mouth.
"S-stop... stop..."
"Stay... still...!"
"Stop...!"
Ruby was on top of Frey, holding his two arms, and Frey was struggling with all his might.
"...What?"
No matter how she looked at it, that was a situation right before Frey was about to be violated by Ruby.