Chapter 193 : Chapter 193
Chapter 193: The Princess Cannot Sleep (4)
The two people hid their identities and built a new nest in a quiet countryside village inside the wall, which was beyond the wall from Lilith's perspective.
It was a remote place where it was hard to find people at all, let alone anyone who would recognize them.
The problem was, there were those searching for them.
The ‘enemies’.
The two had uncovered the truth, which meant they had made many enemies.
Especially the powerful figures who had conveniently hidden the truth disguised as ‘devil's deeds’ until then were like that.
They were the so-called ‘ones who shouldn't be touched’.
They tracked the Inquisitor who suddenly disappeared to the end, and eventually found him.
Along with finding out that the partner who disappeared with him was actually a ‘devil’.
Because of that, when Inquisitors stormed into the couple's house, Lilith was full term pregnant.
She wasn't in a state to fight properly.
No matter if she was the Succubus Queen, dealing with elite Inquisitors in a weakened state wasn't easy.
Moreover, because he knew well the strength of those who were once his colleagues, he couldn't let Lilith risk the danger of confronting them.
So, to buy time for Lilith to escape somehow, he sacrificed himself.
He let Lilith escape, and he confronted the Inquisitors alone.
And as a result, he ended up being dragged to the trial.
The powerful figures turned all the things they had done until then into the deeds of the ‘devil’── Lilith.
“Even things we weren't involved in, things we hadn't even heard of until then, were all supposedly my doing.”
They created another scapegoat to hide their evil deeds.
And the ‘truths’ he had uncovered as an Inquisitor all became ‘lies’ created to hide the acts of that devil he colluded with.
A cleric possessed by a lust demon.
A traitor to humanity who sold his soul to the devil.
An upright person who just tried to do the right thing was burned at the stake like that.
Lilith conveyed this fact to us in a calm tone, but perhaps because she couldn't bear to recall that memory, she didn't show it directly this time either.
Like that, Lilith was left alone.
The one person she wanted to be with for a lifetime even if she turned her back on the whole world was taken away from her.
“I, couldn't forgive.”
Therefore, she wanted revenge.
On all those who took him away from her.
So, she wanted to tear down the wall.
Because that was indeed what they, what all humans feared so much.
And to do that, she had to be the ‘Succubus Queen’.
She had to return to the position of Queen and regain all the ‘power’ she abandoned and left.
However, getting involved with humans was considered a great disgrace even for demons.
And even otherwise, succubi were often ignored among demons as naturally lowly beings because they frequently copulated with humans, even if it was a kind of ‘hunting’.
But if it becomes known that Lilith, the very person who barely raised such standing, the Succubus Queen representing all succubi, had a child with a human?
Absolutely, it was something that shouldn't happen.
It wasn't just her own honor being tarnished.
It was a matter involving the honor of all succubi.
“It was obvious I would be despised, saying I was nothing but an unprincipled whore from birth. ...Actually, such perception was prevalent until I came to be called the ‘Queen of the Night’.”
She couldn't let it go back.
With such standing, she couldn't achieve her will to tear down the wall and take revenge on humans.
Besides, she had already betrayed her kin once by leaving them without a word.
She couldn't betray them again.
Simply disappearing without a word, and reappearing with a child born with a human after disappearing like that were problems of completely different dimensions.
In the former case, she might somehow take all the blame herself, but the latter was impossible.
So, there were many reasons.
But, actually the biggest reason above all.
“...I, wanted to protect you.”
Yes.
It was the safety of the child held in her arms.
If her and all succubi's standing were shaken, it didn't just mean the ‘power’ to achieve the purpose of tearing down the wall would disappear.
It meant even the power to protect her would disappear.
Especially from the same succubi.
Would they leave the ‘evidence of shame’ that lowered their standing alone?
She would receive the hatred of all demons, of all kin in one body.
She couldn't make it happen like that.
For that.
“......I had no choice but to deny your existence itself.”
She had to ‘abandon’ another person she loved most in this world herself.
“Sista Village was his hometown.”
Lily's father, just like Lily, grew up as a devout Sistina believer in that village.
And, as an admirable person.
He loved his hometown like that.
He repeatedly said he definitely wanted to return someday.
So much so that at first, they actually considered settling in that village with Lilith.
Just that they eventually couldn't because there would be many people recognizing him as expected.
Of course, after having him taken away by humans like him, Lilith virtually lost faith in humans, but,
“Perhaps... if it's that village he cherished so much, I thought... they might take good care of you.”
Even if she didn't believe them anymore, because he believed.
Holding that small belief, hope, she wanted to entrust the child to Sista Village.
So in front of the church where he grew up, she put 「Sleep」 on the child who didn't want to fall from her as if intuitively sensing the separation, put her to sleep soundly, and carefully put her down.
With a short note saying this child's name is Lily.
“I had to deny everything about you, but at least the name he left... I just couldn't, do that.”
With tears that wet that note.
And not long after, Lilith hid and watched until the end as the priests of the church discovered Lily in the basket and took her.
To be precise, while watching like that, after accidentally making eye contact with a priest── who would later be called Bishop── who picked up the note smudged with tears and looked at it, she hurriedly pulled down her hood and left the place, it should be said.
After that, Lilith returned beyond the wall, to her castle again.
Although she was Lilith who disappeared without a word and returned after a few months, no one showed hostility towards her.
Rather, she was praised.
Because before returning to the castle, the story that Lilith counter-hunted the notorious ‘Demon Hunters’ had already spread widely.
Not long after giving birth to Lily, Lilith, who recovered her condition, carried out revenge immediately.
Like that, she virtually completely annihilated the Inquisitor forces who took him away from her.
If it were a simple clash, it would have been difficult even for Lilith, but she had a battlefield called ‘dream’.
Over several weeks, she found all Inquisitors involved in the execution and made them sleep forever in their bedrooms.
Also, she made the powerful figures who framed her and him meet the same fate.
The only existence capable of such a thing in this world was the ‘Queen of the Night’.
No one doubted Lilith's whereabouts for several months, who returned proudly after achieving revenge.
The blank few months she left turning her back on the whole world were naturally understood as the time needed to achieve that immense ‘hunt’.
Rather, another legendary achievement of the Succubus Queen was added.
And to humans, she became an object of fear even more.
Like that, Lilith could hide her only weakness── Lily's existence from the world.
However, even after that, Lilith continued to watch over Lily.
“I had to keep staying away from you... but I just, couldn't do that.”
And, she protected.
As her partner hoped, the more Lily grew, the more she resembled Lilith.
Not only the appearance that looked exactly alike, but also the innate ability inherited from the Succubus Queen was so.
The ‘sex appeal’ Lily was born with as a succubus was strong enough to arouse desire even in those uninterested in women.
Therefore, no matter how much the people of Sista Village were ‘good people’, no matter how devout believers of Sistina Church they were, harboring lust looking at Lily was absolutely something they couldn't ‘resist’.
At least, the villagers who watched Lily from a very young age showed an appearance of trying to restrain themselves mostly even if they harbored such desires.
However, the ‘outsiders’ they welcomed were different.
Lily was regarded like a daughter of the church, of all villagers, but to outsiders, she was just an attractive woman.
Nevertheless, among them, there was no one who lost reason and tried to attack Lily.
Because before that, Lilith took action first.
Previously in Sista Village, Lily answered my question ‘haven't you received many temptations until now’ like this.
─ As you said, there were cases where people from outside sometimes courted me, but......
Like that.
Actually, considering Lily's birth, it was a story that didn't make sense.
That it was ‘sometimes’.
And that it stopped at simply ‘courting’.
Everything was possible because Lilith intervened.
Because she detected the desires of those approaching Lily and eliminated them in advance.
Thanks to that, Lily could be safe from the desires she unconsciously aroused.
Well... Lilith probably never expected that she would grow up knowing nothing about sex at all even so, but.
“I hoped that someday you would... share affection with a partner you truly want, and come to control the instinct born as a succubus.”
Not in a coercive way that ignores Lily's strong will of ‘wanting to keep chastity’.
But for this and that reason she couldn't, and as everyone here knows, the incident in Sista Village happened.
That too, unluckily coinciding with the time when the Demon King started gathering the Demon King's Army in earnest to cross the wall.
Lilith, a Corps Commander, couldn't risk the danger of Lily's existence being known during that period, so she stopped protecting her for a while.
If she had known Lily started going berserk, she could have helped her in some way though.
Fortunately, Lily could avoid the worst case due to ‘our’ intervention, but Lilith felt immense guilt for not being able to protect her at a really crucial time, she said.
So after Lily joined our party, she couldn't approach her fearing her ‘meddling’ might have the opposite effect again.
But, she couldn't do that anymore.
Since Lily crossed the wall, and moreover, since she became chased by the entire Demon King's Army after defeating a Corps Commander (actually two).
“......Everything must sound like excuses. Yes, that's right. They are nothing more than excuses. Even if there was a reason, I abandoned you.”
Therefore.
“I denied you, the child I gave birth to. ......I am, a person not qualified to be called a mother.”
Even though she knows well herself that she has no such qualification.
“But...... Still, I want to protect you.”
Now that 23 years have passed, she called her to her castle.
“That heart... has remained unchanged all along, from the moment I held you in my own hands directly.”
To protect her, once more.