SWNOVELXO Chapter 423
“…A child?”
A demon and a girl.
The sight of the culprit, a combination of two completely mismatched concepts, left Arisa and her companions so bewildered that they forgot their anger.
“Uh, what do we do? Daria, is this child really the culprit?”
“D-don’t be fooled. There are countless races in this world where appearance and actual age don’t match. Besides, calling her a ‘girl’ is just based on human standards!”
“By saying that, you’re admitting that you don’t know if the demon’s appearance is just youthful or if she’s actually a child.”
“Don’t let your guard down! That frightened appearance might just be the demon’s evil trick to make us lower our guard!”
Despite their hesitation at the demon’s childlike appearance, Arisa and her group soon hardened their resolve to neutralize the demon girl, driven by the widely known evil reputation of demons and their desire for revenge for Liche.
“Anyway, it’s still suspicious that she’s living alone in such an ancient ruin. We won’t be fooled by appearances.”
“…But let’s try to subdue her without causing too much harm.”
“After all, it’s something we have to do to heal Liche.”
Rationalizing as if trying to convince themselves, Arisa and her group prepared for combat.
They ignored the unease in their hearts and gradually approached the demon girl, who, seeing them, shrank back in fear and began to sob.
“D-don’t come closer…! Stay away!”
“Y-you can’t fool us with that pitiful act!”
Just as Arisa and her group were about to pounce on the demon girl.
Clang!
A green shadow swiftly descended between Arisa’s group and the demon girl, separating them.
“Kurt!”
The green shadow was Kurt.
Why was Kurt, who should be protecting Liche, now standing in their way as if to shield the demon girl?
There was only one conclusion.
“Good grief! Demon soul manipulation! They’ve turned Kurt into a slave!”
“No wonder they were stalling with rats and bugs earlier! They were planning this from the start!”
“If we had known, we wouldn’t have hesitated because of her childlike appearance and attacked right away!”
“Ugh! Kurt turning against us…! This is the worst situation.”
Arisa and her companions, facing what they believed to be their worst enemy yet, tightened their grips on their weapons and aimed at Kurt, who tilted his head with a half-disbelieving look.
“What are you doing?”
…
…
…
With Kurt’s sudden intervention, the tension in the room temporarily eased.
Kurt stood protectively in front of the trembling demon girl, blocking Arisa’s group. Daria, unable to understand, questioned him.
“Why are you protecting that demon? Don’t you care what happens to Liche?”
“Actually, I want to ask you. What does this demon girl have to do with Liche’s fever?”
“Of course, this demon must be the reason Liche suddenly fell ill!”
As Daria raised her voice, the demon girl, who had been watching from the corner, startled and hid further behind Kurt.
Kurt glanced at the demon girl, gesturing for her to calm down, and then turned back to Daria.
“If this girl is the culprit, how did she make Liche sick without us noticing?”
“W-well… Demons have their own unique methods that other races can’t mimic… We were planning to capture her and investigate…”
Her reasoning was purely speculative, with no concrete evidence to back it up.
Daria, knowing this, could only stammer out a weak excuse.
“So you’re just assuming she’s the culprit from the start? Liche’s fever is just because she didn’t want to worry us and kept her pain hidden until it became a problem. Right now, you’re just trying to pin all your misfortune on this child.”
“But we were led here to this demon.”
“That’s because Charles has the ability to detect ancient empire ruins. Without him, we wouldn’t even know this place existed. Are you saying this child somehow knew about Charles’ ability and lured us here?”
“That’s… But still…! Why are you siding with the demon? Even if what you say is true, demons are an evil race that should be eradicated. Even if it has nothing to do with Liche, that’s no reason to spare a demon. Or have you really been brainwashed by the demon?”
Daria, growing suspicious again, narrowed her eyes at Kurt.
“That’s impossible. I just know this girl is an innocent victim.”
“That’s even more suspicious. We should investigate… Wait, what do you mean, an innocent victim?”
Stubbornly holding onto her opinion, Daria caught the unbelievable word from Kurt’s mouth and questioned him.
“Are you saying you’re siding with a demon, a creature more evil than us!?”
At this, Arisa and her group’s eyes filled with shock and betrayal.
To them, and to most people in this world, demons were inherently evil creatures that could never be associated with the word “victim.”
This belief was especially strong in Daria, who hailed from the Holy Kingdom, which is why she had pointed to the demon girl as the cause of all their troubles.
Thus, Daria had blamed the demon for everything, and the others had agreed with her baseless reasoning.
Even though the demon they had tracked down looked like a fragile young girl, their deeply ingrained beliefs didn’t waver, and they twisted the current situation to fit their preconceptions.
The common sense they had been taught since childhood had become shackles, limiting their thinking and blinding their vision.
But this was only true for those born and raised in this world, who had been indoctrinated with its common sense.
Kurt, who had been born with the mind of an adult human male, had no such preconceptions. Thus, when Daria first pointed to the demon as the cause of everything, he had felt an unconscious dissonance. However, just as Daria’s reasoning lacked evidence, his dissonance also lacked proof, so he hadn’t argued.
But after Daria left to track the demon, Kurt found evidence in the ruins to support his unease.
“Here.”
Kurt didn’t answer with words but instead pulled out an old notebook from his pocket and handed it over.
“Is this notebook… a treatment log?”
The old notebook, which looked like it would fall apart at the slightest touch, had the same format as the treatment log they had found near Liche’s bed earlier.
But Arisa, who had been quietly listening, soon realized that this old notebook was different from the one they had read.
“Could this be… the next volume of that treatment log?”
“Yes. I found it while searching for any information that might help with our current situation.”
Daria, receiving the notebook, kept a wary eye on the demon girl hiding behind Kurt and opened the old notebook.
“By reading this, I was able to get a rough idea of what happened here. What the people who lived in these ruins did, and what their relationship with this demon girl was.”
“…”
Daria, who until now hadn’t taken her eyes off the demon girl hiding behind Kurt, finally turned her gaze to the notebook Kurt had handed over, unable to resist her curiosity.
“What exactly is written in this notebook?”
“More than you can imagine. You’d better prepare yourself before reading. Mari and the others are still in shock from what they read.”
At that moment, Kurt’s voice wasn’t siding with the demon girl but rather expressing concern for Daria.
What could be written in the notebook that warranted such a warning?
“…”
Daria, unknowingly tense, began to read the pages of the notebook.
And soon, the shocking truth contained within made her forget about Liche’s condition and even the demon girl before her.
The notebook detailed events that had taken place here long ago.
The reason the demon had visited these ruins.
The story of a new race born from the meeting of demons and wizards.
And finally, the secret of the great war, which had been known in the Holy Kingdom only as a one-sided demon invasion, the reason for which had remained unknown for so long.
The first paragraph of the notebook began like this:
—
“Finally, we’re beginning to see a clue to treating the ‘people’ in the shelter.”
“All of this is thanks to starting experiments using the creatures from another world called ‘demons.'”
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