Chapter 191 : Chapter 191
Chapter 191: The Princess Cannot Sleep (2)
At Lily's question like that, everyone seated showed a shocked appearance.
Especially Ibi, who would be sad to be called second in being direct, was so surprised that she froze with her mouth wide open.
On the other hand, a firm will was felt from Lily's expression.
That she would never back down until she heard an answer somehow.
At this.
“.......”
Lilith slightly lowered her head as if what was to come had finally come, and let out a small sigh.
Then.
“...First, please relieve the fatigue of your journey.”
She proposed finishing the meal first.
And after that.
“At that time... I will tell you everything you are curious about.”
She said she would give an answer to Lily's question.
At those words, Lily looked at Lilith quietly for a while, then soon showed an appearance of stepping back.
After offering a short prayer to Sistina before the meal, she started the meal as proposed.
Seeing that, the other companions also quietly resumed their meal one by one.
Of course, everyone was at the level of picking at their food while constantly glancing around as if sitting on thorns.
Occasionally, simple conversations went back and forth, but that was all.
Lilith also watched us like that and didn't say anything in particular.
To be precise, I should say she couldn't.
Eventually, we came to have a very quiet meal, completely different from the usual boisterous atmosphere.
Even Ibi, a glutton who likes eating to the point where it's amazing where all that food goes into that thin body, couldn't eat like usual, perhaps because the atmosphere was absolutely not suitable for it right now.
...Well, of course, that was her posture, but even in the midst of that, as if she couldn't give up eating, unlike the upper part glancing around, her hand below kept moving and injecting fuel into her mouth.
As a result, the table that was luxurious enough to remind one of a ‘feast with the devil’ remained almost in its initial state except for the portion in front of one person.
“...I apologize.”
After the meal submerged in silence ended like that, Lily suddenly bowed to us and apologized.
Saying that it became an uncomfortable meal even for us because of her.
“N, no, Lily Sister! Please raise your head...!”
As soon as he saw this, Miki waved his hands hurriedly in panic.
“There is no reason for you to apologize.”
Because we knew Lily's circumstances, and therefore dared not fathom how she felt, we could sufficiently endure the ‘discomfort’ during that short meal.
We had to.
“But because of me...”
Nevertheless, Lily couldn't lift her bowed head and apologized repeatedly saying her thoughts were short.
“...No, that's something you obviously have to ask.”
Then Ibi, as if she couldn't watch any longer, forcibly straightened Lily's bowed waist.
“If there's anyone at fault, isn't it obviously that woman who made you ask such a question, not you?”
“Ibi is right, Lily.”
I chimed in immediately too.
“And, don't worry too much.”
Then, to relax the atmosphere, I continued lightly in a joking tone with a sly laugh.
“It was quite a satisfying meal thanks to someone who ate well enough to make me full just by watching.”
“Hey, you bastard, I also...”
Then Ibi, who seemed to have felt guilty even before glancing at herself, tried to refute immediately, but whether she thought there was no room for it looking back or grasped my intention, she eventually stopped talking.
Well, probably both.
Of course, although she just didn't speak, she secretly(?) kicked my leg lightly below, but I had to accept that level of protest.
It was then.
“Everyone. Lady Lilith is looking for you.”
Not long after we returned to the rest area after finishing the meal, a guard came to find us.
And in the room we were guided to by her, naturally, Lilith was waiting.
“You have come.”
With six ‘beds’.
Probably she prepared them while we returned to the rest area.
Lilith looked at Lily for a moment, then.
“...Here, I intend to show you the ‘answer’ to the question you asked earlier.”
She opened her mouth cautiously again.
“Would it be okay for your companions to hear it together?”
Asking for Lily's intention.
Then Lily, who looked back at us once.
“...These people are my family. I have no intention of hiding anything from these people.”
Answered immediately without any hesitation.
Rather, it was to the extent that her will for us to watch together was felt.
“If so, would it be okay for you all as well?”
Hearing those words, Lilith asked for our intention this time.
Of course, everyone nodded without hesitation.
If Lily wished, that was enough.
“Understood. Then, please sit comfortably here.”
At that, Lilith pointed to the prepared beds, and although everyone wondered slightly why it was beds not chairs or something, they followed her words without complaint for now.
While doing so, there were some who showed an appearance of still considering the possibility of it being a trap, but.
“──Then, first.”
Suddenly, after Lilith's two eyes began to be dyed, they lowered their guard.
“Would you please fall asleep?”
With their eyes also being dyed in light red── obvious light of 「Charm」.
Eventually, everyone started to collapse one by one and fall asleep lying on the beds they were sitting on.
Except for Rine who has ‘Sleep Immunity’, and me who possesses high [Charisma] resistance.
“...!”
Seeing the appearance of companions who fell asleep in an instant, Rine immediately jumped up from her seat and aimed the staff in her hand toward Lilith.
“──Rine.”
I stopped such Rine immediately.
“It's okay.”
Reassuring Rine first like that, I looked back at Lilith again.
She likewise looked quite flustered.
“Ho, how...”
Since neither 「Charm」 nor 「Sleep」 cast by herself, the Succubus Queen, worked (even both of them), it was understandable.
“Because Lilith wants to talk with us through a ‘dream’.”
When I asked back “Isn't that right?”, Lilith nodded slowly.
“...Yes, that's correct.”
Lilith said.
She intends to ‘show’ the answer.
Not ‘tell’.
Because sometimes showing is much more effective than speaking.
And she had enough ability to do so too.
Just that she hadn't expected us to ‘resist’.
Previously, that is, when Lilith first called me into the ‘dream’, the subject falling asleep was eventually me.
It means I fell asleep myself, not through 「Sleep」.
At that time, it was definitely an exhausted situation, so just as I was dozing off, I received an ‘invitation’ to the dream world and could fall asleep helplessly as it was.
But since now wasn't such a situation.
“Please give me 「Sleeping Pills」.”
Eventually, another method was needed.
In my case, unless it was a skill based on the ‘Charisma’ stat, I couldn't be resisted easily.
And in the case of Rine who has innate immunity altogether, if she intended to sleep herself on purpose, she could sleep sufficiently.
“Trust me, Rine.”
So Rine, who nodded hearing my words, soon drank the 「Sleeping Pills」 she received and obediently lay on the bed to sleep herself.
After confirming even Rine falling asleep like that, I also drank the handed pill without hesitation.
“Then, see you in the dream.”
Then toward me lying on the bed slowly.
“...Thank you.”
Lilith bowed her head deeply to express gratitude.
“For trusting me.”
I caught my gradually fading consciousness and answered with a light nod.
And, fell into the ‘dream’ again.
***
When I opened my eyes again, the first thing I saw was the companions who had fallen asleep first.
“This is...”
Everyone was looking around, showing reactions finding it hard to believe.
“You are dreaming a ‘dream’ right now.”
Then we looked back in surprise at Lilith who appeared suddenly and spoke.
“Rather than telling you about my past one by one... I thought showing it directly like this would be much better.”
Such words of hers were words that immediately convinced them of the scenery they were seeing right now.
They had to be convinced.
Because if it weren't something like a ‘dream’,
“Then, what is over there...”
There wouldn't be another Lilith visible in front of our eyes like now.
Moreover.
“Yes. It is the past.”
Lilith with a fully swollen belly── unmistakably pregnant with a child.
“...A very happy, past.”
And beside such ‘Lilith in the dream’, a man was sitting together.
Gently stroking Lilith's swollen belly.
Lily couldn't take her eyes off those two people.
The fact that Lilith is her biological mother was a fact she had already guessed since a while ago, regardless of whether she could accept it or not.
But in the midst of that, the appearance of her biological father whom she hadn't guessed at all,
“That person, is your father.”
She saw for the first time now.
Although it is a dream, with her own two eyes directly.
He did not look as similar to Lily as Lilith did.
Because like Lilith, there were actually virtually no ‘genetic features’ that anyone could tell the two were connected by blood.
Whether hair color, eye color, or facial features, all such ‘features’ of Lily were inherited from Lilith.
However, nevertheless, one could recognize at a glance that the two were connected by blood.
Even if there were no words from Lilith, or even if there were no ‘circumstances’.
“The only human... no, person I loved in this world.”
Because that benevolent smile shown while stroking Lilith's belly resembled her really too much.
Enough to know at once from whom that smile came.
“That person... is my...”
Also, around his neck, he was wearing a necklace symbolizing the Sistina Church just like Lily now.
No.
Actually, it wasn't at a similar level.
Just, it was the same necklace.
Lily, realizing this, flinched and grasped her necklace.
“He and I... at first, naturally were enemies. As most demons and humans are.”
‘Reality's Lilith’ said.
“Occasionally beyond the wall── that is, in the ‘world of humans’ where you came from, there were children causing trouble. ...Mostly, they were very hungry children.”
Saying that succubi who were kicked out of the demon world which is ‘survival of the fittest’ for this and that reason, or who couldn't handle their power properly because they were born beyond the wall from the beginning and persecuted, were like that.
Of course, naturally there were cases not like that, but Lilith's words were that it was mostly like that.
“For me, as the Succubus Queen, I had an obligation to take responsibility for those children.”
Conversely, he too had an obligation to take responsibility for his ‘people’.
“He was a cleric. Among them, he was an ‘Inquisitor’. ──An existence often called by the alias ‘Demon Hunter’ in your world.”
‘Inquisitor’.
Just as Lily, a cleric, advanced to ‘Saint’, this is also another subclass a cleric can choose.
Like Lilith's words, mainly specialized in combat── especially combat with demons.
Well, although it's just said so, actually it's a job class that fights more often with fellow humans for this and that reason rather than devils.
Anyway, that is the background of how the job class ‘Inquisitor’ first came into being.
“So, we had no choice but to clash.”
This meant that with the Succubus Queen, an existence representing ‘devils’, they were naturally in an antagonistic relationship.