Valentine’s Day (3)

—The “me” of this life did not possess the emotion of anger.

This was only a guess, but I believed it was because I had unconsciously placed a kind of limiter on myself, using the intense emotion of 『anger』 as a trigger so that I would not wield the power and magical energy of my former self—the “I” who had once been the Demon Lord—before recovering those memories.

What would happen if, by some chance, an ordinary little girl with no memories of her previous life and no knowledge of how to use that power suddenly gained an utterly abnormal amount of magical energy and strength?

The answer was obvious.

She would almost certainly arrive at the extreme conclusion that, “I can just solve everything with force.”

Power she could not control would cause enormous destruction, she would continue annihilating whatever came after her, and by now I might even have turned the entire world against me.

That was why, until the day I recovered the memories of the “I” who had been the Demon Lord, the “me” of this life had probably lived while deliberately keeping my emotions muted.

—But now, things were different.

This was power I had painstakingly built up and honed piece by piece in my previous life.

I understood the different levels of strength involved and could say with confidence that I fully understood what would happen depending on what I did and how I did it.

That was why I could avoid killing them.

The man with the filthy dyed-gold hair lay motionless at my feet, his face pressed against the floor.

He would not be moving for a while.

If I put even the slightest pressure into stepping on him, crushing him like an overripe tomato would be easy.

The only reasons I refrained were so that I would not cause trouble for Mom and Yuzu-neesan, my precious family.

And so that if Tomo ever somehow learned I had killed someone, she would not be burdened with the guilt of thinking, “She killed them to save me.”

—That consideration was absolutely not for trash like you.

When I fixed the remaining two men with murderous intent in my eyes, they collapsed onto the floor, their teeth chattering as their bodies trembled and their eyes opened wide.

All I was doing was enhancing my senses by channeling magical power into my eyes, something called 【Combat Eyes】, yet that alone made them cower, shake, burst into tears, and completely lose heart…

“…Brats who have never even grown accustomed to killing intent seem to have taken their little mischief far too far. Did you believe yourselves safe? Did you imagine yourselves strong? How foolish. The looks people give you are neither fear nor reverence. They merely understand that dealing with you would be troublesome and choose to avoid you, you idiots.”

I grabbed one of the trembling men by the collar and raised him bodily with one hand, making him let out a pathetic, quavering noise.

“Now then. Where is Tomo?”

“Ah, aaah… o-our… h-hangout…”

“Hangout? How would I know where your miserable little hangout is, fool? Where is it? Answer.”

“Eh, ah, um, th-that’s…!”

“What is it? Until moments ago, you were acting so smug and composed. Are you stalling for time? Hmm? I will break you.”

“Eek…!?”

“—I-I know!”

“Hi… guh!”

Hearing a voice behind me, I tossed the man I had been holding onto the other one and turned around. The girl who had brought me here—Konomin—was looking at me, only to flinch when our eyes met and let out a frightened, “Eek!?”

How unreasonable.

I had no intention of doing anything to you.

“I-I think it’s about twenty minutes from here by car. Um, is it okay if I show you on a map app? I don’t really know the roads.”

“Yeah, that’s fine.”

“O-Okay, then wait a second. Um…”

She still would not make eye contact with me.

Hmm. I had already deactivated 【Combat Eyes】, and I was no longer directing any killing intent at her.

Ignoring my puzzlement, Konomin opened a map and showed me the location.

“Um, I’ve heard that this abandoned factory here is their hangout because the warehouse is huge and there aren’t many people nearby. I think… it’s probably here.”

“I see, I see… Got it. Thank you, Konomin.”

“Wha—!? You suddenly switched to a nickname!? Your sense of personal distance is completely broken!”

“Huh, really? Well, we can save the rest for another time. I’m going to go pick up Tomo.”

“Huh…? W-Wait! Why are you going!? You should call the police or something…!”

When I started walking away, she grabbed my arm. I turned back to find Konomin looking anxious, almost as though she were about to cry.

Uh, I mean, after seeing what happened here and looking at Dirty Blondie-kun, I would have thought she understood I was not exactly in danger…

Aha. She must be worried about dealing with the aftermath of these men all by herself as a frail young girl.

There was also the possibility that they would wake up and try to take revenge.

“…Yeah, you’re right. If we’re going to deal with them properly, I suppose I should kill—”

“—Did you just say something terrifying!? Why did the conversation suddenly go there!?”

“Huh? That’s not what you meant?”

“Wait, you were serious…?”

How strange.

We stared at each other, both frozen, with the distinct sense that something had gone catastrophically wrong in our understanding of one another. Konomin finally rubbed her temple with an exhausted expression and released a very deep sigh.

“…God. I was just worried about you. Sure, maybe you’re strong enough to take down a man like that, but you only managed it because you caught him off guard, right? If you actually go somewhere Tojo and all his buddies are waiting, things aren’t going to end this easily.”

…Hmm?

Oh, could it be that Konomin thought I had some martial arts experience and had simply gotten lucky enough to land an attack, and that was why those men were terrified?

There were massive cracks all over the floor, though.

Just as I thought that, she looked around Dirty Blondie-kun and muttered, “So this must be what they were renovating. I guess the floor’s fragile.”

HMMMMMM?

…Could this girl… genuinely not have noticed my strength at all…?

“Konomin.”

“I told you about that nickname— Ahh, forget it! Fine! What is it!?”

“You’re unstable because you’re pure, aren’t you?”

“Wha…!?”

I believed that the emotional fluctuations and childish uncertainty I had sensed in her could, from another perspective, be called purity.

She did not calculate everything through compromise, self-interest, or ulterior motives before deciding how to act. She faced people with her emotions laid bare. That was precisely why she was so easily influenced and so easily shaken.

So that was the kind of girl she was.

Rather than immature, perhaps she was simply an ordinary child who had been raised with love by the people around her and by her family.

Tomo and Yuika had already chosen their own paths and were steadily walking toward them, which gave them firm cores of their own, but this girl still had not decided hers. She was a child in the truest sense, still sheltered within a cradle.

This really was a peaceful country in a peaceful age.

Children were allowed to remain children.

They could survive without having to pretend to be adults.

“Konomin. I’ll wake these guys up and send them home, so you can leave first.”

“Huh!? That’s not what I—!”

“It would be better if you didn’t get involved any further. This was a problem between Tojo and me from the beginning. That hasn’t changed, and I’m the one who will settle it.”

“But…! Why…? You could just rely on the police.”

“It’ll be fine. So—go home and get some rest.”

“Ah… …Okay.”

The emotion disappeared from Konomin’s eyes, and she walked away from the scene as though nothing had happened.

It was only a minor suggestion spell, but because Konomin was so pure inside, she fell under it almost immediately.

Depending on the situation, I had even considered using a mind-control spell powerful enough to brainwash her, but in her case, once she left this place and the suggestion wore off, what happened here would probably grow hazy in her memory and be forgotten before long, so that was a relief.

Brainwashing magic could easily damage the mind, so I had not wanted to use it on Konomin.

“—Of course, I have absolutely no intention of showing such consideration to the likes of you.”

I turned around and said that to the men, and the two who were still conscious began trembling and crying again as though their fear had suddenly returned.

…Creatures without resolve.

There were children who got hurt because they surrendered themselves to foolish bravado, but these men were far too accustomed to wrongdoing.

Even when one of them tried to put his hands on me earlier, the way he spoke had made it obvious he was relying on experience from having done things like that before.

Then they should learn the feelings of those victims.

They should learn their pain.

Thinking that, I raised one hand and activated my magic before speaking without emotion.

“I shall grant you neither pleasant dreams nor brainwashing that lets you forget everything. What I shall grant you is only the pain of the sins you will carry for the rest of your lives. I will not permit repentance. I will not allow atonement. Suffer for your entire lives—for eternity—until your very souls wither away.”

I needed to finish dealing with these fools and get to Tomo as soon as possible.