At Nobuhiko’s plea, ‘she’ returned to the department store.
She sneaked inside without anyone noticing and ran through the first floor.
As for why Shinichi was in the first floor and not the third floor, ‘she’ couldn’t have possibly known since she was outside.
Which is why when she reached her destination and saw the mountain of rubble that fell from the upper floors, she froze.
A lone boy was lying face down.
She tilted her head and asked.
“…Why are you sulking there, Master?”
To untrained eyes, it looked as if the boy had fallen along with the rubble and was unconscious, but to Youko’s eyes, she knew that he was conscious and depressed.
“…Why did you come?”
But Shinichi didn’t answer and instead said that as if in reproach.
Although he hadn’t directly given her the order, he had still asked her to watch over his family.
So why was she here? That was the reason why he reproached her.
Although curious why her master was laying face down, she honestly answered.
“Why? There’s no way I could have just stayed outside when the divine ki was leaking. Your dad asked me to check up on you too.”
“…What, did you say? The divine ki leaked outside?”
“Yes. It even reached the refugee shelter they built across the road. Did something happen? Something that could make you release divine ki that could get that far— Master?”
Midway through her words, a parched laughter resounded while Shinichi was still lying face down. Clearly, he was not acting normal.
What in the world happened? She climbed up the mountain of rubble and approached him when he mumbled tearfully.
“…That’s it. I’m done. I’m going back to Falandia.”
“…”
Youko blinked at that abrupt statement, but from that, she could more or less infer what had occurred.
After all, he had a tendency to become like this whenever he dealt with a situation.
A state of reckless self-abandon where he would say nonsensical things.
Regardless, what things he might say, though. They would always just be whines with no actual intent behind them.
It was a state somewhat akin to an emergency measure to help him recover his mind after it’s been tilted toward a strange direction.
“Sigh, in the end, you just happened to make a mess ‘as usual’ didn’t you? Perhaps you humiliated your opponent too much despite having their own circumstances? Or maybe you became too emotional and started preaching? Maybe you tried to hide your strength, but in the end, things didn’t go well and you ended up showing more than you’d intended? And now that the building has been broken to this extent, you have no idea how you’re suppose to play cover up? Something like that, Master?”
That’s why she knew that the best way to deal with him when in this state was to point out everything bluntly.
Shinichi himself knew that but his face remained sullen.
“…You’re talking like you saw everything.”
She had pointed out everything so accurately that Shinichi felt down again for a different reason.
“You’re always beating yourself up over the same things, so I just brought up the previous list.”
Shinichi acted different during emergencies.
In such moments, he would have no mercy to his opponents. He would insult them, provoke them, do anything he could to make them waver.
To someone like him with less potential than others, humiliation was a weapon.
But as someone who was raised up correctly, it still made him feel guilty and ashamed.
Because of that he would always be full of regrets afterwards.
Though it would only last while he’s reflecting over his actions and is putting his mind back in order.
Afterwards, he would usually start settling his affairs.
“Just how long do you think we’ve been together, Master?”
“Don’t be stupid. It hasn’t even been half a year. And this time wasn’t like that. I was really too harsh this time around.”
Because of that although they were bantering with each other, Shinichi’s words were still heavy.
Shinichi mumbled about wanting to cry as he raised up his head, then he saw the gaping hole in the ceiling.
When Youko saw his expression reach its ‘limit’, she gulped and muttered to herself, “this illness is serious”.
“The divine words leaked while I was talking…”
“…Hah!?”
She was already used to Shinichi’s depressed antics, so when those words came out next, she was really shocked.
She had been given a rough summary of the events that occurred around her master.
Much emphasis was put over explanations concerning abilities, but she was still able to infer what happened and what kind of wounds he incurred.
Divine Words were literally the words of a god. And humans were beings that at the fundamental level could not disobey the words of a god.
There simply existed an absolute gap between humans and gods.
But of course, there were still exceptions. One such exception would be Shinichi, who by coincidence have become an existence beyond the logic of gods.
Another would be someone possessing a strong will or someone with an object with a powerful blessing.
Or someone that had nothing to do with the contents of the divine words uttered.
That’s why the effects of the divine words couldn’t be seen on the main culprits..
Perhaps they never had a dream or an ideal that they chased after in the first place.
Or maybe they were satisfied pretending to be mercenaries.
Regardless, Shinichi was the vessel of the Evil God and has even been assimilated by him.
Although he has already returned to being a human, and although it was only to the same extent as dipping one’s toe in a pool, in the end, he still encroached into the domain of a god.
A normal human would obey him just from hearing his words.
Normally, he would mutter words in his mouth that would cancel out the effects of the divine words, so usually there weren’t any problems.
But for some reason, in just that moment alone, he couldn’t do that.
“That was a first. This has never happened before!”
Of the abilities he gained from the evil god, the ability he hated the most was the Divine Words.
Because it was a power ignored others’ wills, and allowed him to twist those will however he pleased.
Used incorrectly, it could alter even the destiny of a person.
That’s why he avoided using it as much as possible.
At most, he would use it for experiments or for when he fought the other bodies of the evil god.
Because of that the number he has used the divine words in his two years of travels could be counted on one hand.
Not once had he lost control of it.
Tl Note: These series of chapters are all 02-21.
Leave a Reply