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A girl came to a certain farm in the Hitia Duchy to take care of the livestock.
"Sorry for being late~! I'll give you your food right away, so wait just a little, okay!"
The girl spoke to the livestock as she gave them the feed she had brought.
"I'm sorry I haven't been able to come as often lately. There are magic beasts appearing outside now, and Mom told me to stop coming here~"
The girl narrowed her eyes and continued talking to the livestock as they ate.
"Ah… it's already this late…"
After talking one-sidedly to the livestock for about ten minutes, a shadow fell over the girl's face.
"…I'm sorry. I came here without telling Mom, so I have to get back before she notices. …Right now, the explorers are working really hard to drive away the magic beasts around here! Once the magic beasts are gone, I'll come take care of you properly again. So… just be patient a little longer, okay!"
With a heavy heart, the girl left the livestock, looked around to make sure no magic beasts were nearby, and hurried back home.
She had been running for a while when she suddenly felt an extremely unpleasant gaze on her back.
When the girl fearfully turned around—
"—Hii!?"
A gigantic wolf with fur dyed blood-red was looking down at her, even though no one had been there just moments before.
The girl was so terrified that she fell on her backside.
The gigantic wolf seemed to be a magic-using species and mercilessly fired a magical bullet at the cowering girl.
The girl squeezed her eyes shut.
"—Magic Sword Unity, Alteration. Fifth Form: Mont Fünf."
Orun stepped between the girl and the gigantic wolf and blocked the magical bullet with a magic shield.
"…Am I… still alive…?"
The girl, who had heard a thunderous roar right in front of her, let out a surprised voice upon realizing she felt no pain at all.
"Are you okay? Are you hurt?"
Orun turned around and asked the girl in a gentle voice.
"Ah, um… Yes… I'm okay."
The girl, who still hadn't fully grasped the situation, blinked repeatedly as she answered Orun's question.
"I see, that's good. It must be scary, but just bear with it a little longer, okay?"
Orun smiled at the girl to reassure her.
"Yes… Ah! Look out!"
In the girl's field of vision, the gigantic wolf was raising its front paw to crush Orun.
Under normal circumstances it would have been an attack from a blind spot, but the current Orun was supplementing his blind spots with Aerial Perspective.
Before the wolf's front paw could reach Orun, a jet-black trail ran across it.
The magic shield Orun had been holding had changed into a magic blade at some point.
That magic blade had sliced off the wolf's front paw.
Normally a large amount of blood should have sprayed from the wound, but the cut surface had frozen solid, so not a single drop of blood flowed.
"—Ice Demon Blade."
Orun turned his gaze toward the wolf and swung the magic blade.
Countless slashes extending from the blade assaulted the wolf.
The fatally wounded wolf turned into black mist and scattered.
"Amazing…"
The girl's eyes sparkled as she watched Orun defeat the gigantic wolf in the blink of an eye.
Orun crouched down to match the girl's eye level and spoke.
"I'm glad I could help you. But you shouldn't come outside alone anymore. When you go out, make sure you're with someone who can fight magic beasts. Okay?"
"Y-yes… I understand. Um… thank you for saving me!"
"You're welcome. …Is that your mother over there?"
When Orun looked into the distance, he saw a woman who had probably come from the town and several armed explorers running toward them.
"Ah, yes! That's her!"
"I see. She must be worried, so hurry and go to your mother. And don't make her worry like this again, all right?"
The girl nodded strongly at Orun's words and ran toward her mother.
"Ia!"
The girl—Ia's—mother hugged her tightly.
Orun watched the two of them with a gentle smile for a moment before leaving the area.
As he did, he wiped his nose with his hand, and blood was on it.
"You went outside alone again! Are you okay!? Are you hurt!?"
"Yeah! I'm fine! Because—————huh…?"
Ia was about to happily tell her mother something, but she suddenly tilted her head in confusion.
"How did I… get saved…?"
Orun had used Recognition Alteration to erase Ia's memories related to him.
Orun knew that he would soon be officially designated as an enemy of the world and that it would be widely reported.
Although the Hitia Duchy was on Orun's side, on the surface it was taking the same stance as the other countries that were condemning him.
For that reason, even within the Hitia Duchy, it could not be called a safe haven for Orun.
If Ia remembered Orun, there was a chance she could get caught up in trouble for some reason.
That was why Orun had erased only the parts concerning himself from her memory—.
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"…So I'm the 'Demon King,' huh."
After saving the girl from a giant beast species—a massive magic beast created and modified by the church—and returning to Celest, Orun spent the little free time he had reading the newspaper that had been published that morning.
The content was about the summit meeting that had taken place the other day.
It also reported that Orun had been designated as an enemy of the world and placed on the international wanted list.
It seemed Princess Lucilla had acted exactly as Orun had requested.
Infiltrating the enemy as a spy carried considerable danger.
He could only feel gratitude toward her for accepting the role despite knowing that.
Princess Lucilla would probably be able to handle most situations, but he should prepare to provide support immediately if anything happened.
…Speaking of Princess Lucilla, her special ability, Magic Stone Perception, and its expanded interpretation as Magic Beast Perception had been incredibly useful.
The church had released giant beast species only in the Hitia Duchy amid the labyrinth overflows occurring across the world.
They were probably trying to force Orun and Amuntsāsu to deal with the giant beasts.
Because of Orun's selfish desire to "minimize damage as much as possible," the majority of Amuntsāsu's combatants were fighting magic beasts in other countries, even reducing the defense of the Hitia Duchy.
Orun was filling in those gaps.
Since Magic Beast Perception could distinguish between normal magic beasts and giant beast species, he had left the normal magic beasts to the explorers of this country and had spent the past two months continuously hunting the giant beast species.
Without Magic Beast Perception, it would have been far more difficult.
In that regard too, he was grateful to Princess Lucilla.
"At any rate, it's good that the world situation seems to have calmed down to some extent."
Through the newspaper, he learned that each country had implemented measures to protect their own nations from magic beasts, and that damage from the magic beasts had decreased considerably compared to the beginning. For now, he felt relieved.
(…Still, placing labyrinth cores in various locations, huh. If taken at face value, it's to lure magic beasts away from places with many people, but would they really use precious magic stones—the labyrinth cores—so freely just for that…? I want to look into this. In that case, the right person for the job would be Zriel? Also, if I ask Guild Master Leon to register a few fictional explorers—)
"—I finally found you!"
While Orun was organizing his thoughts by speaking them aloud, he heard Shion's voice.
"Huh? Shion? You should be in another country right now…"
"The situation is starting to calm down, so each country is becoming able to handle the magic beasts on their own to some extent. That's why we're taking turns with time off, and today is my day off."
"Ah… Chris mentioned something like that the other day."
"It's not 'mentioned'! Orun, you have the day off today too. Everyone is worried about you. Leave the rest to the others and rest your body properly, okay?"
"No, I'm fine. There are still giant beast species left. I can't afford to rest."
"That's no good! You've been fighting almost without sleep for two whole months, right? If you keep that up, you'll collapse! Please, just rest today!"
From Shion's behavior, Orun could tell she was genuinely worried about him.
But he could not yield on this.
"I'll be fine. I can recover fatigue with Self-Healing, and if my body breaks down, I still have Time Regression. See? I'm okay, right?"
He tried to reassure her, but at that exact moment blood began flowing from his nose, so he hurriedly wiped it away.
He had been aware that his body had been screaming in protest since last week.
Even so, he could not stop here.
Even at this very moment, people were living in fear of the magic beasts.
To give them peace of mind, he had to keep fighting.
He believed that was his duty as someone with power.
"That's not what 'okay' means at all…!"
Seeing Orun with a nosebleed, Shion shook her head sadly.
"I think your way of thinking is admirable. I think it's amazing that you're working so hard, even risking your life, to save as many people as possible. But I don't think continuing forward is always the right thing."
"Shion…"
"Orun, I don't think you're being calm right now. Think about it carefully. Saving the people in front of you is certainly the right thing to do. But today, someone else can handle what you're trying to do. If you collapse here, that would actually bring us closer to total annihilation. You're someone who can't afford to collapse until the very end. Right now you might be able to do anything alone, but you only have one body. There is a limit. So please. Rely on me, rely on your comrades. Don't fight anymore with a body like that. Just for today… rest…!"
Shion desperately tried to stop him.
Seeing her like that, Orun felt pain in his heart.
In the end, he might have been trying to handle everything by himself.
There was only so much one person could do.
Without realizing it, he might have mistakenly believed he could do anything alone.
"…Sorry, Shion. I probably wasn't being calm. I'm sorry for making you worry."
"It's not just me—everyone's been worried about you. You have to apologize to them too next time!"
"Yeah, I understand. As you said, I won't fight today."
"I'm relieved to hear that. But as punishment for making me worry, I'm taking some of Orun's time!"
"…Huh?"
As soon as Shion said that, she took Orun's hand and activated Shift Teleportation.