WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

Editor: Hydrogen B

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Chapter 424: Is It Always Beauty That Topples a Nation?

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Rulers were busy. Anyone responsible for managing those beneath them had to shoulder work proportional to their numbers. Even if Tyr was a god and a figurehead, she still had plenty to do. Considering she had been absent for more than a century, it was impressive that Valdamir had whittled it down this much.

"Opening the Castle of the Full Moon? This place is open to visitors?"

"The Castle of the Full Moon was originally a fortress built so vampires could live together. As our numbers grew and the lands we had to govern expanded, everyone scattered, and it became my territory. But what use is such a large castle when I live here alone? Whenever vampires gather like this, I offer them guest rooms."

Even if they gathered every Yeiling-class vampire, there would only be around fifteen hundred. It would be more practical to cram them into the castle than arrange separate lodgings for all of them.

"None but Elders would dare come upstairs. You will have no reason to encounter them, so do not worry."

"I'm not particularly worried. It'll be nice to meet new people again. After all, I have someone backing me."

"You have me. Hehe. Yes. As long as I remain in this country, there is nothing for you to worry about."

"There is one thing. You changing your mind. They say a concubine gets treated like a spy once they fall out of favor. Isn't that exactly the position I'm in?"

Tyr put on an offended expression.

"Do you think I, who have lived for over a thousand years, would abandon you over some trivial matter?"

"Who knows? You never know what the heart will do."

"I am a vampire. I carried deep, dark hatred for a thousand years. Do you think my affection for you would not last even a century?"

"For the thousand years before this, your heart didn't beat and you had no senses. In the hundred years to come, you'll have both. I should know better than anyone, since I was the one who gave them to you."

"Even so, I will remember the kindness of the one who gave me a heart and senses. Just as I carved my grudges into my heart, I will surely repay that kindness. That does not mean my heart will change."

Drawing on my memories of working at a host club, I strengthened Tyr's feelings a little further. If I gave the impression that I was slightly afraid of being abandoned by an older woman, they tended to become more attached. I wasn't sure whether that applied to someone a thousand years older than me... Fortunately, it seemed only the fact that she was older mattered, not the size of the age gap.

"That's true. To see my gift through, I'd have to restore all your senses. How is it, Tyr? Is your shoulder better now?"

"Yes. It feels cool and itchy at the same time. It is very strange. I keep wanting to hunch my shoulders without realizing it. Is that normal?"

"That's normal. When people are young, they find it itchy, perhaps because their bodies are soft. As they get older, being touched feels refreshing instead, perhaps because their muscles grow firmer."

"Ahem. I thought it felt itchier somehow."

"It follows the age of your body. Your shoulders are done now. We've finished all the exposed areas."

Since her head was at the top, restoring her senses had to proceed from top to bottom. Her face, neck, shoulders, and part of her back. Tyr examined her sensations. Unlike smell or taste, the body only had touch, but Tyr, who had freely shattered and cut apart her own body because she had lacked even that, felt somewhat uneasy about the unfamiliar sensation.

‘So that is why Hyu kept asking whether I was all right. Sensation will make me a completely different being from before. I will seek more comfortable textures and crave sweeter flavors. As sensation changes me, I too will become bound by sensation....’

Tyr's worries ended there, though. Change she could not control was what Tyr had truly wanted.

Nothing lasted forever, not even for a thousand or ten thousand years. Even great principles that had existed since the beginning would change as time passed. Those of us living within them were swept along as well.

Tyr had watched the world change and grown sick of remaining the same... Without realizing it, she had begun to crave change, which led to her wish for her heart to beat again.

She didn't know how she would change, but she believed it would be for the better.

‘There is nothing to worry about. The Duchy remains as it was, and Hyu is by my side. More importantly than that....’

"...More importantly than that, Hyu."

"Yes?"

Tyr started to say something, then mumbled and sharply turned her head away.

"...No. It is nothing. Forget it."

"What is it? You stopped halfway through."

"Did I not say it was nothing?"

"Tyr. There are two ways to make someone angry. The first is stopping halfway through what you're saying."

Tyr, who had been quietly listening, urged me on.

"Why did you only say the first? What is the second?"

"I'll tell you once you finish. What was this nothing you were about to say?"

"Did you make that up just to hear it? Did I not say it was nothing!"

Tyr raised her voice resolutely. I'd used that line to make her understand how it felt, but she was too stubborn for me to get the answer through conversation. I had no choice but to rely on mind-reading.

Sorry, Tyr. I don't have any privacy.

‘To restore sensation to the body, it must be touched. The threads of lightning Hyu emits need to be planted into it, so thin cloth covering the body greatly weakens the effect. The fuzz on the fabric swallows the tiny bolts of lightning.’

After being treated so many times, Tyr had grasped the principle to some extent. Demon God or not, even magic became common sense once you grew accustomed to it.

‘...Then, if I am to restore sensation to my entire body, Hyu's hands will have to run across all of me. Without so much as a thread on me.’

She hadn't been embarrassed at all by showing me her heart, but perhaps because of a conventional sense of resistance, the twelve-century-old girl felt reluctant to expose her bare skin.

I was the same, actually. When the Healer Sage cut open my abdomen, what I'd felt was fear, not embarrassment. Vampires and humans weren't so different after all.

‘That is too embarrassing for me to say aloud. But it would be strange if Hyu brought it up as well. What should I do....’

Ah, that. Hmm. Right. It was difficult.

As a mind-reader, how much importance the other person placed on something mattered a great deal to me. You could say its value depended on the other person. If she had reservations, I wouldn't force her.

If she didn't? I'd be happy to.

‘I-If you asked whether I disliked it, I would say no. But is this not too fast? I want to go more slowly and calmly, to share enough words and feelings as we progress. I do not wish to handle something so precious, my first time, carelessly just because it is for work.’

Tyr's feelings were more complicated than that. Her resistance was strong, but so was her desire for someone to tear down that wall.

Tch. At this point, it didn't look like I needed to do anything more.

"Tyr. I think this is enough."

"Hm?"

"You are human enough now. You are my equal, or even beyond me."

I cheerfully removed my hand.

"Honestly, there's no need to restore the senses below your neck. This is enough. If you have taste, smell, and touch, then you've restored everything that matters."

"U-Um?"

"Some people who aren't vampires have no sensation in their bodies. Since you can move your body freely, you're better off than they are. You can taste and smell everything, and you even got to experience stiff shoulders, so you've got it all."

"Is... is that so?"

"Yes. What if we restore all sensation to your body and you start feeling pain too? You still have some fights ahead of you, so it's better to keep pain to a minimum."

"That... is true."

It was like pouring cold water over Tyr's heart, which had been unsettled and excited only moments earlier. Feeling oddly annoyed, she stood up.

"Then why did you have me sit on your lap? If it was going to end so quickly, there was no reason to remain that way even in front of Cabilah."

"I wanted to restore all your senses quickly."

"Hmph. You rushed through it in a flash. I couldn't even tell whether sensation had returned to my shoulders."

"And because you're the perfect size to sit on my lap. It felt nice."

"As if...."

Tyr scoffed, then hesitated for a moment. She was considering whether saying she was small and soft enough to hold was a compliment or not. Either way, the work was finished now.

"I'll stop here. If there's anything you want to test, call for me again. I only used this to restore senses, but I think its applications are limitless."

I kneaded my sore hands and headed outside.

Hup. That was satisfying. It had been a little difficult, but easier than restoring her heart before.

It had looked easy then, but it was dangerous. I had focused my mind-reading on Tyr, becoming, as the King of Humanity, a representative of only one person, Tyr, and inscribing a mental image of myself as I was then into Tyr's heart. It was as though I had taken on Tyr's childhood memories wholesale.

It had only been possible because the Abyss was nearly empty, and Tyr had remained frozen in her old body. Even then, the side effects had been severe enough that I almost lost myself. The memory had been so intense that I nearly lost my ego and became a girl.

...No, perhaps it had only been possible because I'd lost the power of the King of Humanity. Representing only one person wasn't something the Beast King could do.

Either way, now that I had the Demon God, it was easier than before. I still had my cards, so I didn't need to empathize with Tyr as I had then.

What should I do now? I'd finished one task, so should I take care of the rest? Every grave had its story. We'd found Luscinia's killer, but I was still curious about what lay behind it all.

Lir Nightingale, who had inherited true blood, was a Yeiling. Naturally, there was a thrall who had turned her into a vampire, and that thrall was one of Luscinia's Ain. That person was Lily, Lir's mother.

Yet Lily had been executed. For the crime of fleeing.

Wasn't that strange? How could an Ain flee while the Elder was perfectly fine?

Jazra, one of Luscinia's Ain, had said that Lir had broken the blood shackle. Their request for Lir to be killed had contained something beyond simple rage over their liege's death. It was a shame Jazra had died so quickly that I hadn't been able to read all their thoughts.

The dead didn't merely lack words. They couldn't think either. If there was a part of human affairs that I didn't understand despite having mind-reading, the clue would lie with the dead.

After descending one floor from Tyr's level, I turned toward the presence following me.

"Count Erte."

"Did you call for me?"

"Is there anyone among the late Luscinia's Ain whom I might be able to meet?"

The Duke of Crimson Blood's watcher looked slightly troubled by the unexpected request. But for Count Erte, an Ain, the Duke of Crimson Blood's orders were absolute, and he had ordered Count Erte to obey me. Count Erte couldn't object, no matter what I asked.

Even if it was dangerous.

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