118 A New And Unexpected Familiar
—–
I suddenly realized something as I saw Furoh’s memories. The Demon King had used money to lure the demons into battle.
One of the “royal demons” as they called them, who were from families of high society and strength compared to the “lesser demons” like Furoh and the other demons from the slums, had come to offer money in exchange for anyone that became a soldier for the Demon King.
This was something new I didn’t even know about. Furoh, who was barely living on scraps and hunting little monsters to sell their magic cores, suddenly found a golden opportunity to show off his strength. Plus, he was even being paid ten coins upfront.
He immediately went to take the job but… it ended up going badly.
The other soldiers always ridiculed him and laughed at him. Many bullied him and even sometimes stepped on his long worm-like tail. Whenever he tried to fight back against them, they would gang up on him and leave him within an inch of death.
If it wasn’t because of his amazing regenerative ability, which he developed over the years of living through near-death experiences and recovering afterwards, he would have died and left crippled.
It was obvious why he would run away when he found the opportunity. Even when he was already in the human continent of Gallatea and no longer in the Demon Continent.
He went to this wilderness, holed himself in a dungeon, and decided to wait until everything was over by hibernating, a method he had also evolved through his years of starvation as a child…
…..
Poor thing.
Damn, now I really pity him.
However… there’s something else, the Demon King.
They paid people from the slums, which were not even experienced at being fighters or soldiers, to go fight a war in another continent… isn’t that… kind of wrong?
They forced these people… well, they paid them well but still…
They ended up just throwing away their lives for the money before they could even spend it.
Damn, Demon King. I’ve begun to feel pretty glad mom and dad killed you now.
You could have used that money to instead save your people from hunger and all the poverty they were living, right? You clearly had the money if you were able to pay 10 gold upfront to thousands of people, right?
Instead of thinking about conquering another continent, why not try making yours better? You were already trying to go to another continent when yours was still a shithole…
Seriously?
Sigh…
Now I wonder how the Demon Continent is like nowadays, probably worse than before.
I slowly opened my eyes as I looked at Furoh in front of me. His eyes were a bit nervous, looking down.
“I-Is it done? I… I saw a bit of your memories… it felt weird…” he said.
“Ah… h-how far did you see?” I asked.
“I saw you… dying…” he replied.
“Oh… let’s not talk about that for now,” I said in response.
“Only if you don’t talk about my past either… it’s embarrassing.” He sighed.
“Sure… you had it hard,” I told him.
“Hmm… more or less…” he replied, lightly sighing.
I petted him after that. He was rather amorphous in shape, but I really wanted to make him feel comfortable.
“Don’t worry pal, you got me from now on. You’ll never be alone now,” I told him.
“Sylph…” he muttered. He was getting emotional out of nowhere.
Furoh had never really felt any companionship in his entire life. When he gained consciousness of himself, he was already alone. His parents were nowhere to be seen, as he was born inside trash.
Well, it has only been the first day since I’ve met him, and we already feel so close. It feels a bit rushed, but I’ll take it easy from now on.
Soon after, I felt like my Soul Scape was changing. There was a land of flames where Ignatius resided, and then there was a place filled with beautiful nature where Naturia was. Now, there was a new place, something that resembled an empty wasteland, where dark smoke exuded from within. This was the place that represented Furoh… quite sad. I wish it could be prettier, but perhaps he saw himself as something comparable to a wasteland, trash…
“Now! It’s done, right? Alright… demon… Furoh, right? You better not do anything to this beautiful little girl or I’m going to come and kill you next time… make sure to prove to me that not all demons are monsters, alright?” Ninhursag saod with a rather strong voice and authority.
“Y-Yes…!” replied Furoh rather shyly.
“Now it’s getting late… all of you should head back to your village, your parents must be worried,” said Ninhursag soon after.
“W-Will we meet you again?” Aquarina asked.
“Aw… you want to be my friends?” Ninhursag asked back.
“Yeah, I wouldn’t mind… you’re cool,” replied Zack.
“I would love to!” I said with great enthusiasm.
“Ugh… I’m so weak to cute little children like you… fine… come meet me every weekend around here. I’ll train you guys, and we could even eat together! How’s that?” Ninhursag suggested soon after.
“Nice!” replied Aquarina.
“T-Thanks…” said Zack with a nod.
“I would appreciate that,” I said, also nodding.
“Good! But there’s a condition… I don’t want the Amazon to make a fuss over me. They kind of tried once to get me to join their village, and it was a pain to evade them until they gave up. So, don’t go telling anyone about me, okay?” she told us, letting out a sigh at the end.
“Oh… sure,” I replied.
“Good girl,” said Ninhursag as she petted my head. Then, she suddenly gave me a little kiss on my forehead, making me blush a bit.
She quickly kissed the forehead of Aquarina and Zack too. The two grew just as red as I was getting.
“With that, I’ve marked all three of you. It will be easier for me to find you,” she told us.
“Oh, so that’s why you kissed us?” I asked.
“Indeed, though you’re so cute I couldn’t resist~” she replied while winking.
“I-I see… Haha…”
After that, she quickly converted into a wolf and ran away.
“That was quite something…” said Zack.
“Y-Yeah…” Aquarina agreed.
“Let’s go back to town for now…” I told them.
—–