"Ha ha ha. Why, falling in love with a little human missy, you’re even more of an odd duck than I!”
I was a demon, and s.h.i.+ek was a pixie. The explanation had been fine up to that point, but when he asked me why I was pretending to be human, this was how he responded when I answered.
"Captain, It can"t be helped~ When you first told me, I laughed myself silly~"
I knew it was unthinkable for a normal demon, but was it really that hilarious?
I couldn’t help that I fell in love.
"...Come on. It"s not that funny. You even went and got yourself lost."
Mortified by their continuous laughter, I tried fighting back. It seemed to have worked better than I imagined.
"Lost...?"
There was an audible crack, like stone skin fracturing. My words had apparently done quite a bit of damage. Contrary to his appearance, he was surprisingly thin-skinned.
"Ye~ah. Lost, lost~"
I tried to ignore s.h.i.+ek’s laughing. It was just a snappy comeback, but the gargoyle had taken quite the hit.
"No...To be lost is humiliating. Alas, I am unable to refute the truth of that statement..."
Now I had a depressed gargoyle on my hands. His response was much heavier than just a normal retort. Thinking about it, I only really knew weird people. Cecilia was the only one amongst them that seemed to have a shred of common sense, and she s.h.i.+ned all the brighter in my mind for it.
"Putting all that lost stuff aside, you"re not planning on causing any mischief, right?"
"Naturally. I merely live in this shrine. I neither intend to trouble the village, nor save it."
In others words, he meant neither harm, nor good.
Even so, he had still rushed to save Tiel-chan when she was in trouble. I"m sure it would be fine if I overlooked that small detail, but I still planned to discuss it more with Cecilia when we got back.
"So long as you mean no harm to the villagers, we"re golden. s.h.i.+ek, let"s go back."
"O~kay."
We said our goodbyes to the gargoyle, then returned to Tiel-chan"s home.
Just as we were leaving, the gargoyle asked us to keep our lips sealed. "Do not tell anyone of my existence," he demanded.
Don"t worry, I wouldn"t tell anyone other than Cecilia. It"d be a huge ha.s.sle if I told any of the villagers anyway.
When we got back to Tiel-chan"s house, she was sleeping in her bed, while Cecilia was sitting in a chair reading.
"Thank you for your hard work. ...Did anything happen?"
She had some questions after seeing the dirty state of our clothes. After making sure Tiel-chan was fully asleep, I told Cecilia everything that happened.
"The Guardian Deity was really a gargoyle? He hasn"t caused any trouble for the villagers, and there hasn"t been a request to exterminate him. However, that doesn"t rule out the possibility of something happening in the future..."
Cecilia wasn"t sure where she stood on the issue. I didn"t really mind overlooking his real ident.i.ty but Cecilia couldn"t afford make her decision so lightly.
"He"s behaved himself for several hundred years already. I"m sure it"ll be fine."
"Well, when you put it that way... And there is the fact that he saved Tiel-chan; he does not seem to have any ill-intentions."
"I"m bo~red~"
Right in the middle of a serious conversation, that little twerp...
"Go check on things in the village then. If you"re hungry, get something to eat with this."
I gave s.h.i.+ek some spending money, and kicked him out of the house. Now the nuisance was out of the way. It may have been mean, but he left for the village in high spirits, so everything should be fine.
"Is that really all right?"
"Even if he had stuck around, he wouldn"t really have an opinion on the matter. He just wants to play around right now."
"That is true..."
She was easily convinced. It just went to prove how childish s.h.i.+ek really was, didn"t it?
"...So, we were talking about what to do about the gargoyle, but why don"t we hold off on that for now? We still need to heal the last of the villagers, and I think we should plan for what to do if the bandits attack again."
Plus, if we did anything to the gargoyle, who knows what Tiel-chan would do? Tiel-chan was the biggest advocate around for the Guardian Deity.
"That"s true. Let"s focus our efforts on healing the villagers . Youki-san and s.h.i.+ek-kun have been such a big help; The healing is nearly finished. Then we may be able to do something about the bandits..."
We then further discussed what to do about the bandits.
We came to the decision that tomorrow, once the villagers were healed, we would get some information from the gargoyle.This would also allow Cecilia to have a proper conversation with him. When we"d finished our discussion, we realized night had already fallen.
"Already that time, huh? We"d best get back to the mayor"s house."
We didn"t want to worry anyone by getting back too late.
"I must agree. Let"s be on our way then."
We left quietly so as not to wake Tiel-chan.
Walking through the woods on a moonlit night, just the two of us, it doesn"t get much more romantic than that.
I hadn"t experienced the joy of walking with a woman on the street late at night in my last life.
I was incredibly nervous, but I tried not to let it show on my face.
I took a fleeting glance at Cecilia, but she didn"t seem particularly nervous at all, just walking along normally.
"...Is something the matter?"
"Ah, no, nothing."
As I guessed, Cecilia didn"t think anything about it. Seeing me all fidgety, Cecilia tilted her head.
In the end, even though there was such a good mood to work with, nothing happened on our trip back to the mayor"s house.
I"m such a loser... I should have at least tried to hold her hand!
"Ooh! Cecilia-sama, you and your friend had us worried, coming back so late. Your other friend came back a while ago. He already ate dinner and retired to his room to sleep."
Upon reaching the house, a very lively mayor came out to greet us. He was very happy with the progress we"d made healing the villagers.
s.h.i.+ek must have tired himself out from playing around. He ate his dinner and went to bed without even waiting for me or Cecilia? I suppose it was fine since he was just a kid.
"I"m sorry to have caused you any worry. After we treated Tiel-chan, we lost track of time while we were talking."
"Is that what happened? Tiel lost her parents early on, then just 3 years ago, she also lost her last blood relative, her grandmother. I"m sure Tiel had fun talking together with you. Thank you very much."
He bobbed his head in thanks. We spent more time with a pretty interesting Guardian Deity, but what the mayor didn"t know wouldn"t hurt him.
After that, we were treated to dinner. On the menu was vegetable stew and bread.
"I hope you"ll excuse this meager meal, it"s all we could prepare..."
"No, no. Considering the circ.u.mstances with the bandit attack and all, it"s normal not to have much in the way of food. I"m simply thankful you were able to give us any food at all. Time to dig in!"
I said my piece, then started chowing down on the grub. The mayor"s wife, our chef for the night, was a bit taken aback watching me eat so heartily.
"Youki-san is just that way. I shall also partake in the meal."
Cecilia was my opposite, eating quietly and ladylike. Seeing us, the wife looked pleased.
After finis.h.i.+ng our meal, we went over tomorrow"s plans with the mayor before heading off to bed in the late of night.
"Cecilia-sama, please use the room you were in earlier, and have your friend stay in the room next door."
Following the mayor"s instructions, we headed up to the second floor.
I told Cecilia goodnight, entered my room, and saw s.h.i.+ek already fast asleep on the bed with that dumb-looking face of his. Apparently, we were sharing a room. It didn"t really bother me since it wasn"t any different than usual.
I needed to heal more villagers tomorrow, and had to get more information from the gargoyle. Being so tired, I immediately fell asleep.
"Today we"re gonna continue healing the villagers, then get some more information from the gargoyle!"
"We are indeed."
"Boo~"
It was morning, and we were gathered in Cecilia"s room to go over the plan for the day. s.h.i.+ek was still half-asleep, but I dragged him along anyway.
"I"m sure the gargoyle has some solid intel, but I also want to hear what the villagers think. s.h.i.+ek, you better get your rear in gear."
“......Fi~ine.”
He didn"t sound motivated at all, would he really do his job? I knew it would have been impossible, but should I have tried to bring Duke or Hapyneth along?
"When we take a break from healing the villagers, shall we go visit Tiel-chan once more? I"m still a bit worried about her health."
"I think it"s a good idea, since she knows the most about the ‘Guardian Deity’."
We"d be able to meet with the gargoyle and have our talk with him after meeting Tiel-chan. After eating the breakfast the mayor"s wife gave us, we gathered all the injured people back at the same place, and resumed treatment.
"Thank you, Cecilia-sama."
Many of the villagers, especially the guys, wanted to be treated by Cecilia, creating a long line. I was tempted to get rid of the ones that had obvious ulterior motives with my magic.
"Take care~"
"Thanks, s.h.i.+ek-kun."
The lady receiving medicine was charmed by s.h.i.+ek"s adorable smile. There were a lot of young women going to see s.h.i.+ek.
Me, on the other hand...
"Sorry to trouble you, Youki-san."
"Thanks, sonny."
"Them"s good healin"s."
I had a majority of the older folks. I didn"t hate it or anything, but...I felt like I lost to Cecilia and s.h.i.+ek.
"Hahaha...Don"t push yourself too hard with the healing, m"kay?"
When I used my healing magic on them, the older folks relaxed and conversed with me. It was the kind of talk you"d hear at a hot spring resort. As I thought about that, I suddenly remembered about getting information on the gargoyle.
There was a high chance the elders still knew of stories from the past. This was my big chance, right?
"Excuse me, but do you happen to know anything about the village"s Guardian Deity?"
"The village"s Guardian Deity? ...Aah, I do know a little something. It’s that demonic statue deep in the woods. Tiel-chan is a devout wors.h.i.+pper of that statue after all. Everyone in the village knows about it."
So apparently Tiel-chan was famous in the village. Everyone else in the village, other than her, knew it was a demonic looking statue. So that"s why the overly zealous Tiel-chan was infamous.
"Then is there a reason you call it the Guardian Deity of the village?"
"Hmmm....I"m not sure. It"s just been pa.s.sed down as a legend that the demonic statue saved the village. But no one knows who made that stone sculpture, and there"s no record of it either."
Of course there wasn"t. That statue itself was the one that saved the village after all. I wondered if there wasn"t any more pertinent information.
"But if that"s all there is to it, why is Tiel-chan so attached to it?"
"Ah, that girl wasn"t always like that in the past. She"d clean or take offerings from time to time, and that was all. But you see, one day that girl was attacked by a Red Fang."
The Red Fang was a wolf-like monster. It got its name from the blood that would drip from its mouth when it caught prey. The name’s origin made it sound scary, but it was still only a piddly little rank E monster.
"Tiel-chan was 7 at the time, and she has that weak little body, ya know? But when all hope seemed lost, the Guardian Deity saved her...or so she said."
That lying piece of...he had already been saving Tiel-chan for a while!
"Ehheh~. Then, no one else ever claimed being saved by the Guardian Deity?"
"Does a bear take a s.h.i.+t in the woods? It"s just an old wives’ tale. No one really believes in that thing. And everyone thinks the statue looks creepy, so we never go near it."
"I see."
After that, I asked many of the other elders, but it was all more of the same. The healing was done much faster compared to yesterday, and afterwards the three of us met up once again to go over the information we gathered.
"I"m sorry. I tried to ask most everyone about the Guardian Deity, however they ended up asking me a lot questions instead."
"Me too~..."
They both felt guilty, but it couldn"t be helped. Their lines were full of the younger generation villagers. Even if they"d managed to ask, most of them wouldn"t have known anything about it. Rather, I wanted to beat the s.h.i.+t out of the guys. .h.i.tting on Cecilia.
"...Youki-san? What strange thoughts are rattling around in that head of yours?"
"That I want to beat the h.e.l.l out of all those guys fawning all over you."
"Please don"t, it"ll take that much longer to heal everyone...so did Youki-san manage to gather any information?"
Cecilia firmly warned me. I"d just have to do it in a way so she wouldn"t find out...er, now wasn"t the time for that! I imparted to them all the intel I"d gathered from the older villagers.
"I see."
"Heeh~"
Cecilia was listening intently, taking stock of all my info, but s.h.i.+ek"s interest was waning. I had no more faith in this kid except where medicine was concerned.
"There are some major discrepancies compared to the info we got from the gargoyle yesterday. It also seemed like no one remembered that it had been the result of a previous bandit attack. He doesn"t sound very reliable."
"Be that as it may, I would still like to speak with Gargoyle-san for myself."
Maybe I was doubting him a little too much, but I felt justified considering the circ.u.mstances. We also still had our planned visit with him yet to come.
"Weren"t we going to visit Tiel-chan before that~?"
"Ah."
"Ah!"
Totally forgot about that part. And I couldn"t believe it was s.h.i.+ek of all people who reminded us.
"Then s.h.i.+ek, why don"t you go visit Tiel-chan? It"d be bad if she b.u.mped into the gargoyle while we were talking."
""Ka~y."
We left Tiel-chan to s.h.i.+ek, then Cecilia and I went to see the gargoyle.
"You scoundrel, you have broken our agreement. I told you not to reveal my existence to anyone!"
After we got to the shrine, the minute I told Cecilia about him, the gargoyle stopped his statue-act and raised h.e.l.l.
"So you are Gargoyle-san? My name is Cecilia. After the bandits attacked the village, leaving a great number of wounded behind, the Mayor requested my aid. So I came to this village to treat the injured villagers."
"Hooh...So you were the little missy this demon brat was speaking of yesterday. Well then, did you have business with me?"
Brat? Well, I suppose in the eyes of a several hundred year old guy I"m still just a kid.
"I came to speak with you about the village. You really have no intention to attack it?"
"That"s what I told that brat yesterday. I have no interest in attacking the village, nor do I wish to help it. I merely live here."
The same answer as yesterday. As I thought, it"d be fine to just leave this guy be.
Perhaps because it was just like I told her yesterday, she seemed to be satisfied. Ah, but there was one more thing we needed to ask about.
"Hey, I wanted to ask, when Tiel-chan was about 7-years old, did you save her from a Red Fang?"
"Perhaps...and if I did?"
"Are you...a ‘Lolicon’?"
"L-lolli-kon?"
"Ah, you don"t know the term ‘Lolicon’ ?"
Not surprising that word doesn"t exist in this world.
"I don"t."
"I am also unfamiliar with the term."
They asked casually, but they"d probably be surprised by the true meaning. Well, the gargoyle was probably just returning a favor, so there wasn"t really any profound meaning behind it.
"Nah, nevermind, it"s fine."
"Come now. You have piqued my curiosity. Out with it, boy!"
"You leave me with no choice. So this is a word that comes from the world of my previous life..."
As I was telling them the meaning behind the word Lolicon, the gargoyle grew irate, just as I predicted, and started a fight with me. As we brawled he screamed things like "I have no such hobbies!".
Cecilia let out a deep sigh as she sat in the shrine watching over our brawl. She didn"t even say not to overdo it...
"Remember this well, brat! I would absolutely never harbor feelings for young girls!"
The result went without saying. The underdog did not come out on top; the losing gargoyle was left howling in defeat. Having lost to s.h.i.+ek before, there was no way he could have beat me.
When Cecilia figured the fight was over, she stood up from the shrine, and dusted off her robe. I surmised from her expression that she was less than thrilled at the outcome.
"It appears to be over. ...Youki-san, please don"t provoke meaningless conflict. Truthfully, if there was any meaning to this fight, it was beyond my understanding."
"It was just a slip of the tongue."
"Even so, normally one would come to the conclusion that he was simply returning the favor for Tiel-chan cleaning every day. I do not believe he falls under your definition of ‘Lolicon’, does he Youki-san?"
I winced under Cecilia"s sound reasoning. At this rate, I would look like the bad guy. That was the last thing I wanted her to think about me. All righty, sorry gargoyle, but I"m gonna make you into a real Lolicon.
"But, according to the information we got from the villagers, there was no corpse where Tiel-chan got attacked by the Red Fang, all that was left were black burn marks. This guy probably used the senior level Dark magic 《Dark Blaze》 to defeat the Red Fang."
Dark blaze produced a flame that destroyed all it touched, leaving nothing behind; Truly a senior level magic spell. It was not a spell that a rank E monster like the Red Fang could handle . It was clearly overkill.
"Just to save Tiel-chan, this guy used a ridiculously powerful spell. Therefore, I could only think that he couldn"t forgive the Red Fang"s attack on his beloved Tiel-chan."
Yep. A wonderful distortion of the truth, if I do say so myself. Upon grasping the meaning of my words, Cecilia"s eyes changed when she looked back at the gargoyle.
"Brat, quit with your hogwash. Hey, human girly, don"t give me that look!"
No matter what the gargoyle said, the look in Cecilia"s eyes did not change. Heh heh, Operation "Gargoyle is a Lolicon" was a success. Sorry "bout that gargoyle. I give thanks for your n.o.ble sacrifice in keeping Cecilia from hating me.
"Grr...If this conversation is over, I"m going back to sleep. ...I"ll say it once more, don"t reveal my existence to anyone else. Especially that little girl!"
He went back into the shrine and reverted to his statue form . He had run away with his tail between his legs. I tapped on the stone skin, but he didn"t react at all.
"Well, at the very least we can be sure this guy means no harm now, right Cecilia?"
"...Yes, more or less."
I got the feeling she meant that in a more dangerous way than it seemed. I wondered if I really should clear up this grievous misunderstanding. Then again, there was a good chance he really was a Lolicon...yeah, I had no idea what to do.
"Youki-san isn"t...that Lolicon thing right?"
"No worries, my only type is Cecilia."
"Wha-?! You can’t just say something like that without any warning..."
Nothing happened between us yesterday, so I tried to work up a little more courage today. It had been a normal conversation up to that point, yet she suddenly turned her head away. My response seemed to have had the desired effect. I’m glad she didn"t think it was creepy.
Then, during our little chat, I felt a sudden murderous intent.
The murderous intent was coming from the shrine. The demonic statue"s face looked harsh. He was probably giving us a warning, "quit with your flirting in my presence". Well, guess that meant it was time for us to move on.
"Okay, let"s go meet up with s.h.i.+ek at Tiel-chan"s place."
He was just dropping off more medicine, so he should have been done by now. Or rather, he could have gotten tired of waiting for us to get back and took off to play with the village kids. I took the still-bashful Cecilia"s hand, and headed to Tiel-chan"s home.
"...is why the Guardian Deity is so great. s.h.i.+ek-kun, are you listening?"
"Ah ye~ah, I am~"
When we got into the house, Tiel-chan was speaking pa.s.sionately about the gargoyle, and s.h.i.+ek looked like he was about to go out of his mind. They were both relaxing on top of the bed.
"Captain~"
"Please wait, s.h.i.+ek-kun! I have so much more to tell you about Guardian Deity-sama!"
"Save me~"
s.h.i.+ek came running for me, but Tiel-chan had a tight hold on him. s.h.i.+ek was on the verge of tears. I bet Tiel-chan talked to him about the gargoyle the entire time he was here. For s.h.i.+ek, who loved nothing more than to frolic and play outside, this was h.e.l.l.
"Youki-san, Cecilia-san, what perfect timing. I can also regale you with the fabulous tales of Guardian Deity-sama..."
s.h.i.+t, if we stuck around to listen, who knew what time we"d be able to leave.
"Oh, sorry. We"re very busy today so we need to be going. Let"s go, Cecilia."
"Wai-, Youki-san?! Tiel-chan just wanted to talk to..."
"s.h.i.+ek, I"m counting on you to gather some good information. Make sure to come back by dinnertime."
I felt bad for s.h.i.+ek, but it was a necessary sacrifice. It would have been difficult to get out of that situation otherwise. Plus, he was always talking about being bored, so this was a perfect way for him to pa.s.s the time...was the excuse I made up just now.
"Captain!~"
"That"s a pity, but it cannot be helped. Now then s.h.i.+ek-kun, to continue where I left off..."
I ignored s.h.i.+ek pleading for help, and slammed the door shut. Once again, taking Cecilia by the hand, we returned to the mayor"s house. For some reason, this time I was able to take hold her hand naturally.
"...I really can"t help but feel sorry for s.h.i.+ek-kun."
"He got to play around a lot yesterday, so this much is fine."
"I wonder if he"ll be all right, s.h.i.+ek-kun..."
"Judging by his reaction, it wasn"t a very interesting conversation. ...Still, we got a lot of information from the gargoyle, so we shouldn"t have any problems."
“......”
Cecilia didn"t say anything after that; Tiel-chan"s zealotry was just that intense. I wondered if s.h.i.+ek would actually make it back before dinner?
In the end, he did not..
Apparently Tiel-chan had slept so much the previous day that she wasn"t tired at all today, and s.h.i.+ek kept her company through all her rambling.
When s.h.i.+ek finally did make it back, he ate the dinner that was left for him and quickly went to bed.
I spent the night reflecting on my actions after doing some pretty mean things to the gargoyle and s.h.i.+ek today.
Like this, we continued healing the villagers and bothering the Gargoyle for the next few days.